The Shadow Man

by Mark Brownless

  We set off at a run, aiming for the turnstile gates, the heat increasing and stinging our faces. Smouldering debris rained down on us and dark ashes fell like snow. We hit the gates at a run and barely avoided getting ourselves trapped in the rotating metal arms, fighting our way through them and into the grounds of the burning building. Firemen looked across as we stood in open-mouthed astonishment at the building in front of us as it started to collapse.

  ‘You’d better get back, mister,’ said the nearest fireman. ‘This whole place is going to go.’

  ‘Is everyone out?’ Dad asked, pleading.

  ‘Can’t help you there, I’m afraid. Everyone is mustering in the front car park.’

  ‘Yes of course.’ Squeezing my hand tighter still, both of us terrified that the worst might have happened, we rushed around to the front and saw hundreds of people milling around. Some lay on stretchers receiving oxygen from ambulance-men, others were bent over coughing and spluttering, smoke rising from their jackets. One couple seemed completely unaffected and stood talking, while other uninjured folks were overcome with relief and were crying. Mum wasn’t at the front of the crowd, so we both scanned through the rows, trying to peer through people, craning our necks left and right to see if we could see her. Dad and I started to gently push through the survivors, needing to see her, needing reassurance. We were almost through to the other side of the crowd, with the growing and terrible realisation that she wasn’t there, when the last few people parted and Mum stood before us. We engulfed her in our arms and all cried together, relieved that she was okay. Mrs Pullman stood next to her, a sooty graze on her face being tended to by someone in an overall.

  ‘What happened?’ asked Dad.

  ‘I don’t know. We were in the meeting, and Geoff Thornton was going on – you know, like he does – when I started to smell something… off. Then it became obvious that it was smoke, and we could see it coming under the doors that lead off to the library and offices. So we got out.’

  ‘And that was it? How did Cynthia get injured?’ Dad asked.

  ‘There were flames everywhere in the foyer – the fire had really taken hold and the ceiling tiles were starting to fall in – God knows what they’re made of but they were like gooey marshmallows falling on us. One of them hit Cynthia in the face.’

  ‘Ouch,’ I said. Dad went to speak to a fireman – someone in dress uniform and not overalls, so maybe the guy in charge. ‘Did everyone get out okay?’ I asked when he came back.

  ‘They’re not sure. Not everyone is accounted for, but they’re still walking people out.’

  ‘Oh God, I hope everyone’s okay. How did it start?’

  ‘They don’t know anything yet, but the fire seems to have started in the library and records area.’

  ‘How can they tell that, Dad?’

  ‘I’m not sure myself, but I think it would probably be where the fire was at its fiercest, you know, did the most damage. He said it went up through the ceiling of the room and caught hold of the old wooden rafters, spreading it across the whole roof, burning the lath and plaster ceiling of the main hall and melting the tiles of the other rooms. That’s how Cynthia got hurt. The chap said it’ll take a day or two before they know for sure what caused it.’

  ‘Any ideas, Mum?’

  ‘No, we were in the back office for a while before the meeting started and there was nothing then – everything seemed fine, like it always does. Then we were in the meeting, started to smell smoke and the next minute we’re stood out here.’

  ‘Why did it take so long to get everyone out – why didn’t you all just leave when you smelled smoke?’ I asked.

  ‘Because the front doors were locked and nobody could find a key. Geoff had to go back to the office to look for his jacket and ended up crawling through the smoke to get it. Everyone was panicking and hammering on the doors, pushing against each other and wouldn’t let him through even when he had the keys. By the time he got back there the fire brigade were knocking down the door.’

  ‘Why the hell did he lock the doors?’ Dad said, incredulous.

  ‘He said he didn’t – he never does. And people were coming backwards and forwards through the evening before the meeting started so I believe him. I think we got locked in when we were all together in the hall.’

  ‘When the meeting had started?’ Dad asked.

  ‘Yes.’

  ‘Somebody deliberately locked you in?’

  ‘I think so, yes.’

  The local news and papers were full of the fire for the next few days, and there was some fire brigade spokesman on the telly all the time saying that there was no news yet. On the third day they released a statement. It said that the fire started in the records room, and it looked like it was started deliberately. There was no mention of the locked doors. They said they found the remains of a cigarette-butt in there and that may have been the cause. Then the whispers started, almost like the wind in the wheat.

  Janey’s mum smokes, and she smokes at work.

  Mrs Pullman had the press camped on her door that week, but Mum helped to diffuse things by telling everyone that while she’d had a smoke in the car on the way up, she hadn’t had another cigarette that night. Mum didn’t mention about the locked doors either. It was as if nobody wanted to make public that there was an arsonist in the village who had deliberately tried to kill fifty people, as if by not mentioning it, it wouldn’t have happened, and they would go away. The pressure eased on Mrs Pullman, but I knew that suspicions would still be there for a long time afterwards.

  It turned out that some of the historic records of the village and surrounding areas were lost, the seemingly less vital stuff that wasn’t births deaths and marriages. Only some aspects remained. Some had made it onto microfiche, and some copies had been retained more centrally, but a lot of the history of the village was gone. This didn’t raise any suspicion in anyone apart from us.

  ∞ ∞ ∞

  ‘It’s him,’ Janey said as she drank some mushroom tea. We were sitting at the lake the day after the fire, and two days after we’d been searching for Luke. It seemed odd to return, like going back to a relative’s house that you haven’t visited for a while – everything was there and as it should be but just something… I couldn’t put my finger on it. We’d all brought towels and costumes – as if swimming was an option, just not in the buff – but no one suggested going in, which was unheard of. We were mellowing with the tea, however, and I was starting to relax, realising that I’d been on edge since we’d first turned onto the lake road.

  ‘We can’t really say that can we?’ Katie replied, sipping her tea and still wincing at the taste.

  ‘Yeah we can, he locked the bloody doors for God’s sake. That Geoff said he didn’t lock them and they weren’t locked when their meeting started – it can only be him. He’s pointed the finger at Mum, and thank God for your mum, Flip, otherwise she might be in clink right now,’ said Janey.

  ‘If it’s not him, we’ve got two arsonist nutters running around,’ said Clara.

  ‘I don’t know why they didn’t say anything about the locked doors in the paper.’ Janey shrugged.

  ‘Maybe they don’t want to worry people,’ said Sal.

  ‘Half the fucking village was either at that meeting or knows someone who was, and I would imagine they were all quite worried.’

  ‘But why? What’s he playing at?’

  ‘He’s coming after us. Targeting our parents – who knows what he might do next.’

  ‘He’s targeted them but there’s nobody else is there?’

  ‘What do you mean?’ Sal frowned at Katie’s comment.

  ‘I mean all this stuff about other kids that’ve gone missing, apart from Luke. There isn’t anyone is there?’

  ‘Not that I know of,’ said Janey.

  ‘It’s just the rumour-mill isn’t it? People are shit-scared and so if their kid is even the slightest bit late home, they start phoning around and the news is they’re missing.
Doesn’t matter that they’ve already turned up at home by the time that gets out.’ Clara shrugged, as if we were helpless in all this.

  ‘So we haven’t got a lot of choice then, have we?’ I said.

  ‘What do you mean?’ Janey’s eyes were wide, probably from being a bit stoned, but also with a degree of excitement.

  ‘We’ve gotta fight back.’

  ‘And how do you propose we do that?’ Clara wasn’t drinking any tea, she was shivering slightly despite the warmth of the sun.

  ‘I know,’ said Janey. ‘It’s obvious.’

  ‘Go on.’ Clara had her arms wrapped around her knees to keep warm.

  ‘We give him what he wants.’

  ‘Which is?’

  ‘Us.’

  Chapter 19 – Then – In Search of the Shadow Man

  BOTH FIGURATIVELY AND literally the dust settled regarding the fire. The press drifted away and the report that was published later just read like a fudge. Life in Laurendon seemed to return to normal. As normal as it could be, I suppose, considering how crazy the summer had been, but nobody seemed to be trying to link anything together. The police had conducted house to house enquires the day after Luke’s disappearance when we were at the lakes, retracing my steps. They were appealing for information and had apparently talked to all his friends, but nobody knew anything about where he was.

  They finally caught up with me, with all of us, the day after the fire. While his parents were making appeals about the disappearance of their son – I read an interview with them in the paper where they talked about what a lovely boy he was and how he had so many friends who were ‘heartbroken’ that he was missing – I told the police about the Luke I knew. The bully, the leader of a gang that had chased us down Brewery Hill that had resulted in an accident that had cut his face open. The boy who’s hatred for us had grown even more and had brought him out to the lake to try and find us and fuck me up. I decided against telling them about Luke attacking me and what happened then – I sensed they believed me, that they appreciated a balanced view of the boy rather than the rose-tinted one they were getting from his parents. They asked me if I thought he could be hiding out somewhere or if he’d run away from home and I told them I didn’t know him well enough to say. By all of us saying the same thing to the police, I heard they went to talk to his friends again, and maybe they had to change their story about him.

  We kept getting lectures from various parents about being careful when we were out and about, but because we were the only people who really knew what was happening in the village, we probably felt safer than anyone.

  The next day – the third after Luke disappeared – we decided to go up to the lake to watch the sun go down. The holidays were nearly over with the end of August in sight. It had been overcast with some light drizzle in the morning – the first rain we’d had in what seemed like ages, the last time being when I’d seen the Shadow Man dance on my front lawn in the downpour. Today, when the drizzle finally stopped, the air smelled of ozone and summer storms. By mid-afternoon, however, the sky had cleared and the sun was poking through, the heat rising once again. We cycled around collecting one another, formulating our plan. We told our parents we were all going round to Katie’s to watch videos. She lived in a big house on one of the new estates, round the corner from us. Her folks owned the small supermarket in the village, so we could always rent anything we liked. Katie told her parents that she’d been invited over to mine for food and we were going to listen to music together afterwards. And despite what had been going on, our parents were happy with our arrangements and didn’t check – they knew we’d be safe because we’d told them. These were not the days of setting up a parents Facebook group to track our activity. It was 1985, and it was fine.

  By seven we were heading out on Lake Road, and had made camp by half past, the sun hanging low on the horizon. We’d all brought supplies in small bags but Janey had a huge mysterious looking rucksack on her back. We rode out along the road, not really concerned about having lights to guide us home later.

  By the time we’d had a quick dip it was after eight and the sun was starting to fade. Janey produced sticks, tinder and matches from her bag. She quickly built a wigwam of kindling over her tinder and lit it with a match, the small fire taking immediately, sparks roaring upwards into the darkening sky. We piled on some logs we’d found at the edge of the treeline before it had got properly dark, and saved some more for when those died down, the flames roaring as the fire grew hotter. We sat around and felt cosy even as the night air came down with a chill. Janey also produced Ray’s stove from our storage behind the treeline and started to heat some bottled water in one of his camping pans. Good old Ray.

  As the water boiled on the stove, we passed the snacks around but Janey went tramping off round the camp site, torch in hand, looking for something. Ten minutes later she arrived back, on cue as the water in the pan boiled. She sat and busied herself with her Swiss Army knife in the torchlight, adding things to the pan, before boiling it again.

  ‘Come over here you lot,’ she called a few minutes later. We’d been staring at the sunset, lost in our own thoughts of the metaphysical, having long since stopped wondering what Janey was up to. We sat around her in a circle, and she passed us some plastic cups full of mushroom tea.

  ‘I’m still not sure I’m getting a lot out of this stuff, you know,’ said Clara with each suspicious sip.

  ‘Apart from an increasing dislike of mushrooms,’ added Katie.

  ‘Yes. That.’

  It took a while for us all to drain our cups and flop back on the grass to stare at the sky, the edges of which were fading to black as night started to envelope our hemisphere. The sun slowly dropped to the horizon in a shimmering heat haze, beyond the lake, beyond the farm buildings and fields. It finally became a ball of red fire and disappeared, the sky above us turning from yellow, to orange and then red, and I could see stars poking through the fire. I’ve no idea how long I lay there – probably only a couple of minutes – before the fungi started to work on me. Everything above me slowly started to rotate, the sky spinning on my axis, the pinpricks of starlight moving around me. The yellow, orange and reds began to move and flow, like flames in a fire – merging and twisting, rolling and fighting together, like colourful lovers entwining across the cosmos. The sky was turning faster now and I began to feel a little sick with the motion of the stars blurring as they raced around the periphery of my vision. The flames chased each other round and the centre of rotation collapsed on itself becoming a vortex, sucking in the surrounding stars, pulling the last beams of light from them before they disappeared. Then I was being drawn in, the entire galaxy above lifting me toward the gravity vortex, drawing me to the same fate as the stars.

  ‘Let’s go swimming!’ Janey cried, and her shadowy figure sprinted from somewhere behind me to create a loud splash in the lagoon. I sat up, the spell broken, or at least in part, as everything was still spinning around, despite my shaking my head to clear my senses. We all followed Janey, and, ignoring any common sense or warnings that our brains might otherwise flag up, we too jumped into the cool water. We swam silently, enjoying the almost complete stillness of our surroundings. Janey led, and we rounded the point, our senses shocked by the chill of the deeper water into regaining at least a little clarity. My lazy breaststroke was keeping pace with Janey in front as I dreamily enjoyed my surroundings becoming mild hallucinations, when suddenly she screamed. Not a cry of being in trouble or for help, but a blood-curdling scream, that must’ve echoed all the way back to the village. She screamed again and pointed to the shore, incapable of speaking. Finally she found her voice.

  ‘Look at the fucking shore, it’s him, it’s him. It’s the fucking Shadow Man!’ I followed the direction of her finger and saw a dark shape on the shore, receding as I stared. Janey was off, kicking out hard to reach the bank, gliding round the point and leaping out of the water as soon as she felt the lagoon shelf beneath her.

&n
bsp; ‘Janey, no!’ I called after her, struggling to keep pace with her and emerging a few seconds behind her, the others not far behind. Janey had found her torch and was crashing through the undergrowth ahead of us, already beyond the treeline when I caught up with her. ‘Janey, stop.’ I could be quite insistent when I wanted to – nothing’s changed since. I led her back out of the trees onto the bank where the others were shivering in the now chilly air, the warmth of the day having disappeared with the sun.

  ‘I saw him, he was on the bank.’

  ‘You were off your tits on ’shrooms, love, that’s what you were,’ Katie had picked up her towel, now damp from the evening dew.

  ‘I’m not, I saw him, I’m telling you.’

  ‘Janey –’

  ‘I fucking saw him, alright?’ Janey shrugged my arm off and marched off to where she’d seen the Shadow Man. ‘See? Look. Footprints.’ She shone her torch down onto the grass and mud on the other side of the peninsula.

  ‘We’ve all been over here during the day, Janey, walking around.’ I tried to be gentle and measured.

  ‘And which one of us has got size twelve fucking feet then?’ She pointed the beam of light at the large bootprints in the wet grass.

  It wasn’t the chill of the night making us shiver. We huddled around Ray’s camping stove as Janey boiled the kettle for more mushroom tea, throwing the last branches onto the dying fire. Katie passed the vodka around. I took a long glug, the alcohol burning the back of my throat, almost making me choke, but I swallowed both the spirit and the cough reflex. The booze went right to my head, like the first hit of a cigarette or your first line of cocaine – or so I’m told. I’d drunk my fair share over the summer but this was particularly affecting me and I swayed backwards and blinked a few times, trying to collect my thoughts.