The Mammoth Book of Nightmare Stories

by Stephen Jones

  Two weeks later the builders moved into the now vacant house at number 35 Rathbone Terrace. A month after that, Linnea and Simon Shipley arrived and began to decorate.

  They concentrated on finishing one room at a time, starting with the bedroom, and then the kitchen. Surprisingly, Linnea had trouble adjusting to the new house. Her sleep was disturbed by bad dreams, but she was never able to remember them when morning came.

  One windswept autumn afternoon she stood in front of the fireplace and scraped at the curving mantelpiece with a pocketknife.

  “God, Simon, it’s gold underneath the pea, then purple, can you believe that?” She scraped a little more and checked the blade. “Then it’s black, and underneath that it’s finally marble. White marble or alabaster, I think. But the figures are made out of inlaid bronze. Do you suppose we can take the paint off without scratching the metal?”

  “There are all kinds of solvents. It shouldn’t be too difficult.” Simon knelt down and examined the floor. “These boards are in good enough condition to varnish.”

  “Then let’s do it. I hate carpets, especially the one that was down in here. It smelled like someone had died on it.” Linnea stepped back from the fireplace and admired it, her head on one side. The lounge had been painted white but still seemed cold and gloomy. The only way to make the place brighter would be to cut down the overgrown laburnum in the front garden.

  “Perhaps we shouldn’t sell the house once it’s finished,” said Simon, rising from the floorboards and dusting down his jeans. “It’s in such a great area.”

  “I know,” agreed Linnea, “but we could make fifty grand on it, at least. I’ll find us another one around here.” She gathered her long red hair at the back of her neck and tied it up. “Of course, we’ll never find another fireplace like this so we’ll have to take it with us.”

  “Do you think that’s fair?”

  “Of course it’s fair. Anyway, who cares? You’ve no business sense, Simon. It’s not part of the original house, anyway. Someone imported it and installed it in the wall. Pity it’s bricked up, though.” Linnea ran her hand over the blocks which had been amateurishly cemented into place between the supporting pillars. “I wonder why he did that?”

  “Who knows?” replied Simon. “It sounds like he was a loony. It shouldn’t be too hard to open up. Hang on a minute.”

  He disappeared upstairs and returned with a hammer and chisel. After tapping at the mortar which surrounded the bricks for a few minutes, he rocked back on his heels and wiped his forehead with the cuff of his shirt.

  “There wasn’t much sand in this cement, I can tell you. I’ve barely left a mark, look.”

  Linnea examined the wall of bricks and stepped back, worrying a nail with her teeth. “Perhaps the whole cavity is filled in.”

  “I don’t think so. Listen.” He banged the wall with the head of the hammer. The sound reverberated up the chimney. “I’ll get to it at the weekend, but right now I’m going to take a shower.”

  As Simon left the lounge, shucking his shirt as he went, his wife crouched down against the fireplace wall and listened. It seemed to her there was a scratching from within, as if a bird had blundered down the chimney and was now flapping about in the darkness of the cavity, bloodying itself in a desperate frenzy to find the narrow passageway back to the light … She rose quickly, shivering, and ran from the room.

  That night she remembered her dreams for the first time since they had moved into the house. She saw a man, tall and thin, dragging a woman’s body across the floor of the lounge. The man pulled the corpse away to the side of the room, then darkness closed around them as he stepped through the wall, heaving his human burden in with him.

  “Well, it’s obvious, isn’t it?” said Simon when she described her dream to him the next morning. He pointed to the small portable television, which stood on a pile of books at the end of the bed. “You were watching that ridiculous horror film when you fell asleep. You know how susceptible you are. How many times does Doctor Hammond have to warn you about being influenced by such rubbish before you take notice of him? The last thing we want is for you to have a relapse.”

  He slammed the hall door on his way out of the house, angry with her for revealing this glimpse of her former self.

  Although her husband asked her not to, Linnea worked late the rest of the week. There was a big auction coming up, and the new office was due to open in a fortnight’s time. That meant a lot of extra paperwork, and as Linnea had recently been made a partner she was now expected to shoulder more of the responsibility. Besides, she made more money than Simon ever did in his teaching post, so who was he to tell her when she should and shouldn’t work?

  Most nights when she returned home he could be found asleep on the couch cradling an empty wine bottle. He had always been a heavy sleeper after a few drinks, so she got into the habit of going to bed alone rather than trying to wake him. She turned off the portable lounge heater as she went, so that he would inevitably join her upstairs at some point before dawn, when the chill of the night finally penetrated his bones and forced him to wakefulness.

  One night, letting herself in and finding Simon in his usual unconscious state, she did not go straight to bed but sat sipping the last of the Chablis bottle as she stared at the art nouveau fireplace, wondering if he would ever manage to finish the job he had started. Much of the paint had now been removed from the surround, revealing tantalizing portions of the lustrous bronze figures beneath. The grate was still blocked up. There were heavy scratch-marks over the brickwork, as if Simon had half-heartedly attempted to break through the wall to the cavity beyond. He would need a power drill, she thought, making a mental note to buy one tomorrow. God, how he hated her being in control of the purse strings. But, she thought bitterly as she drained the glass, he had no choice in the matter. She was the one with the buying power.

  Half-asleep, she rose and walked over to the electric radiator to unplug it from the wall. As she bent down she heard the scraping sound again, as if something was trapped behind the fireplace bricks. Tucking her unruly hair behind her ear and pressing her head against the cool stone, she listened intently. There it was again. Faint and repetitive, a tapping and scratching, like the claws of a squirrel, or the dragging fingertips of a slowly reviving corpse …

  That night she firmly locked the bedroom door.

  “It’s always the same thing,” she said, pulling the dressing gown tightly around her as she entered the kitchen. “He’s dragging a body through the lounge. It’s in this house, and the room is decorated the way it was before we moved in, when Myson lived here.”

  “That’s how you first saw it,” said Simon, following her. “The scene left a strong impression on you, so you dream about it.”

  “He drags the body over to the fireplace with great difficulty.”

  “Why’s that?”

  “I’m not sure. I can’t see too clearly. I think his victim is just stunned, or maybe drugged. Anyway, she’s resisting. Then he pulls her into the fireplace and steps over her body, out of the hole.”

  “Then what?”

  She looked at him as if the answer was obvious. “He bricks it up, of course,” she replied.

  She had to work through most of the weekend, but managed to find time to buy Simon the drill. When she presented it to him, however, he was reluctant to use it. “Unsealing the hearth can wait until I’ve cleared away all the paintwork,” he said. “I’m not going to rush things just because you’re convinced you’re going to find a body behind there. You’ve been warned God knows how many times about your overactive imagination.” He sighed, exasperated with her. “Try to remember the way you felt before your breakdown. All the things you imagined were happening to us. Just keep that in mind, okay?” And with that he resumed rubbing a small patch of the mantelpiece, carefully removing layer after layer of the paint.

  Upset, Linnea left the house and went for a walk to clear her head. At times she found the house stuffy a
nd claustrophobic. And she was starting to feel uncomfortable when left alone in the lounge. Alone in the room with the fireplace, and its odd little scratching sounds that nobody else seemed to hear …

  The next evening she came home from work at nine o’clock and found that he had finished removing the paint from one side of the fireplace. The effect was startling. The women were carved in glistening bronze, with sashes of inlaid copper strip tied around their waists. The stems of the twining lilies and roses were fashioned in green metal, the color of the deepest part of the sea. The piece was an extraordinary work of art, most likely unique. Linnea thought of what it was worth and her excitement overcame her growing fear of the object.

  “I think we’re going to find that it’s signed somewhere,” said Simon, wiping his brush clean on a rag. “Nobody could fashion this and not put their signature to it. Now do you see how silly your imaginings were?”

  “What do you mean?” asked Linnea coldly.

  “Well …” He sat down on the floor and crossed his legs. “Ask yourself, how could something as beautiful as this be hiding a corpse?”

  “There are a great many beautiful tombs,” she said, turning on her heel and leaving the room.

  Simon sighed and threw down the brush. He would not go after her. Showing sympathy had no effect. He still remembered the time before. Linnea had been working until all hours, growing increasingly neurotic, and becoming so convinced that he was having an affair while she worked late that she managed to smash up the flat before the doctor finally arrived. One way or another he would have to see to it that the events of the past did not repeat themselves.

  At Brockton & Shipley the auction was due to take place in three days’ time, the new office was about to open and several members of staff were off sick with the flu. Linnea was the only member of staff who had a clue about the company’s ongoing sales, and was consequently working harder than ever.

  Halfway through the week she returned home late to find the house closed and dark. There was no sign of Simon. Angry, she let herself in, went straight to the lounge and poured out a whiskey. Then she flopped down on to the couch to gather her thoughts. It took another few moments for her to notice the sheet that had been draped over the fireplace.

  Standing her drink down, she rose and moved closer. Why had Simon covered the damned thing up? Two cans of paint pinned the sheet to the ends of the mantelpiece. Gingerly she reached out and touched the cloth, but could not bring herself to remove it. A cold draught seemed to move through the room, as if someone had opened the door to the garden. And there was a strange sour-sweet smell, reminiscent of rotting vegetables. Strengthening her resolve, she raised one of the paint pots and let the sheet pull out from beneath it.

  Simon had succeeded in removing a large area of paint from the remaining covered column of the fireplace. Now the other woman stood revealed in magnificent detail, from the delicate tracery of her burnished hair to the tiny scrolled stitchwork of her bodice. And he had managed to remove one of the center bricks from the blocked cavity between the columns.

  Linnea felt the draught brush her legs again and realized that it was coming from the neatly chiseled hole. She badly wanted to look into the wall beyond, but lacked the courage to do so. Obviously, there was nothing inside the fireplace. Simon had presumably removed the brick in daylight, and would never have left it open for her to stumble upon if there was anything unpleasant to be found beyond. Slowly, she bent her legs and brought her eyes close to the opening. Cool air fanned her face. So, she thought, the chimney is open.

  There was a muted sound from within, the light tapping she had heard before. It’s the wind, she thought, lifting and dropping a desiccated, ancient piece of paper, or perhaps dry leaves, fallen from the blackened tunnel above. Moving closer, she peered into the dark oblong hole. For a few moments her eyes failed to adjust to the gloom. Then, in the faint light which filtered from the distant chimney opening, she found that she could just discern the soot-caked far wall of the fireplace. All was quiet as she stared in, save for her own hesitant breath and the continuous faint scratching behind the brickwork.

  Then suddenly she was looking into another pair of eyes, staring back at her from within the cavity, eyes in an ancient corpse-black face, rolling eyes, glittering and mad. She screamed and fell backward, knocking over the paint pot of turpentine, scattering the brushes and scrapers as she fought to her feet and fled the room, terror still shrilling in her throat.

  Simon did not return at all that night. Linnea ran to her room and stayed there, breast heaving, locked in with the lights on and the radio playing, until exhaustion robbed her of consciousness in the cold hour of dawn-light.

  She heard him come in. He went straight to the kitchen and boiled water for tea, barely acknowledging the rumpled figure in the dressing gown who stood in the doorway and stared at him in silent accusation.

  “I know what you’re thinking,” he said casually, filling the teapot, “but you’re wrong. I got drunk last night and stayed at the school. The staff party—I warned you about it, remember?”

  “I remember nothing of the kind,” said Linnea icily. “I know you. I could see this coming, as soon as I began working late again. I’ve always been able to tell what you’re about to do.”

  “Well, you were wrong last time, and you’re wrong again,” he replied with a sigh. “Call the school if you don’t believe me. My energies are all taken up here, with you. I haven’t the strength to see anyone else, believe me.” He held out a cup of milky tea to her.

  “Believe you!” she repeated, knocking the cup from his hand and storming out.

  In the office later she considered the rashness of her behavior. She had accused him of starting an affair. The pattern was repeating itself. She had been wrong before. As the telephones rang around her, she buried her head in her hands and thought carefully. She would find a way of letting him know that there would be no repetition of last time. This was just an isolated incident. She was still a sane, rational person. She would apologize for flying off the handle. She would even leave the office a little early tonight and take Simon to dinner somewhere smart, just to show him that she was still in control.

  Then she remembered the fireplace. How could she describe what she had seen without him thinking her mad? Of course there had been nothing within the wall. Her mind had provided an apparition because it knew she would be perversely disappointed if there was nothing to be found. She decided to treat the incident as if it had never happened.

  She called Simon, then booked the restaurant. The rest of the day followed smoothly, until she opened the evening newspaper.

  “It’s not the same man,” said Simon finally. “This one’s name is Parsons, not Myson.”

  “And I’m telling you that it is,” said Linnea, her voice rising. “He may have changed his name, but that is definitely the man I bought the house from. I’d know his face anywhere.” She tapped the photograph with a bitten nail. “He’s lying to the police about his identity.”

  “Come on, they don’t even know if they’ve got the right person.” Simon pushed the folded newspaper back across the table. “All it says here is that he’s helping the police with their inquiries. Besides, that photograph’s so blurred that it could be anyone.”

  “For God’s sake, don’t you see?” Several other diners at nearby tables looked up from their meals at her. Noticing their alarm, she lowered her voice. “It all fits. He’s wanted in connection with the murder of a woman.”

  “The body was found in a railway siding, not a house,” said Simon patiently.

  “Who knows how many others he’s murdered? He could be like that man who killed all those teenagers and buried them beneath his floorboards. He was scared when I met him, anxious to sell up and get out.” She tried to recall the occasion of her meeting with Mr. Myson. She had been so intent on reducing the value of the house that she’d missed parts of his mumbled conversation.

  “He said he’d been havi
ng bad dreams. He kept looking at the fireplace. I’ve been having the same dreams, only it’s him I see!”

  Simon pushed his glasses back up his nose and thought for a moment. “You can’t possibly know that you’ve been having the same dream as him. You’re building a case out of nothing. A few nightmares, a blurry photograph, it makes no sense.” He reached across the table and took her hand. “Please, darling, listen to yourself.”

  “There’s a body behind the fireplace,” she said quietly. “I looked in, I could see it. I know it’s there, I could smell it. He killed someone in our house, then he killed again and the police caught him. You took the brick out. Didn’t you see anything?”

  “No, I didn’t,” he admitted. “But I was in a hurry. I wanted to get through the cavity wall, just to make a start on the removal of the bricks. Then I remembered I had the staff function to get ready for, so I left everything where it was.”

  “I want to go to the police, Simon.” She drained the Chablis from her glass and refilled it, finishing the bottle. “I’ll take the morning off and we’ll go first thing.”

  “That’s stupid. We’ll open the fireplace first, completely. We’ll see that there’s nothing inside and we’ll be able to forget the whole ridiculous incident.” He shook his head. “I’m beginning to sound as …” He changed the sentence. “Like you.”

  In the car on the way home she could feel him watching her as she drove. He had been about to say “as crazy as,” but had caught himself. Could she be crazy, concocting conspiracies where there were none to be found?

  That night he tried to hold her in bed, but she rejected his attentions, pushing him away to the far side of the mattress. She slept fitfully, winding stickily in the sheets until she became trapped by them. The fireplace and its grisly secret burdened her dreams until the nightmare once more replayed itself in full, as if the corpse in the wall below was forcing the images of its death upon her.