Collected Stories (30 page)

He allowed weeks to pass while the resolution grew into awful maturity, and during that time living with constant fear became a natural state of existence. It was then he realized that hell could not be such a dreadful place, because in time, the damned soul would get used to it. Cold dread entered his bed and became a sleeping partner; nagging anxiety robbed him of appetite; black terror came out of the past and pointed a skeleton finger towards the future. But at the same time his brain, well trained in the art of manufacturing plots, creating problems that must be solved, devised a plan that was based on cool reason.

The thing—whatever its original state—was solid: There must be a form of flesh which coated a framework of some matter that was akin to bone. Therefore, it followed the creature—now a title, an easily recognizable name, began to frequently cross his crowded brain: Fly-by-Night—could be destroyed. Perhaps it would quickly recover from wounds; it might well be beyond his strength to inflict any kind of damage, but there was an element that no solid creature could resist. Fire. The resolution mated with the plan and became an operation.

So that his precious stock of courage should not be reduced by sights and sounds, he deliberately did not look out of the window once the sun had set, and he plugged his ears with cotton wool after retiring to bed. Then, when the moon had begun to wane, he went into purposeful action.

Eight sleeping pills powdered and mixed with cocoa made a near lethal drink, but the situation demanded drastic measures. He watched Celia sip from the earthenware mug, then trembled when she put it down with freely expressed disgust.

“Horrible!” She wiped her mouth, then glared at him with sudden suspicion. “What the hell did you put in it?”

He got up and moved towards her, grimly determined that nothing should delay or impede his great plan.

“Drink it,” he growled, and she shrank back, for he was now like any animal that has been driven into a corner. “Drink it.”

“No.” She shook her head wildly. “No, I’ll not let you do…”

“Damn you, drink it.”

He grabbed her and, made brutal by his great rage, flung the slender form on to the sofa, where it lay with staring eyes and gaping mouth. Then Newton took up the mug. He gripped her lower jaw with one hand while he poured the liquid down her throat with the other. Then he stepped back and waited.

“You fool.” She was ugly now; her face twisted up into a mask of hate, her brown-smirched mouth spitting out words. He knew if he had not killed her body, he had at least slain any regard she might still have retained for him. But it was not important—not now. “You can’t fight him. Whatever you do, he can’t lose. Get that into your sanctimonious head. You cannot possibly win.”

“I can try,” he said softly. “My soul would be damned if I did not try.”

“Your soul!” She laughed. A loud, harsh sound that crashed across the room and went echoing round the house. “What makes you think you’ve got a soul? A speck of awareness: an atom of intelligence, which will never withstand the shock of death. Immortality is only for the brave.”

Still he waited, and presently he saw her eyelids droop, while her tongue released words that had drifted from a mist-shrouded brain.

“My love flies in on the night wind… his breath is fear… he speaks with the voice of desire…”

The voice trailed off; the words died; Celia slept and Newton was now free to prepare for the coming battle.

From the kitchen dresser he produced a gimlet, screwdriver and a bag of three-inch screws. He then went upstairs and entered Celia’s bedroom, where he sought for fresh signs of the creature’s tenancy. They were not hard to find. On the floor, by the right-hand side of the bed, was a thick eiderdown and a pillow. On the dressing table stood a bowl of greyish water and, of all things, a razor and a tube of shaving cream. Somehow, this commonplace evidence of personal hygiene seemed both horrifying and obscene. The thought of that creature (and oh, my God, how it must have grown) scraping the bristles from its face made Newton feel sick. And hard on the trail of that discovery came another—it was imitating the habits of man. Blindly perhaps, for no other reason than this was one of the customs of the air-breathers.

The casement window was wide open, and beyond, the moon looked down on sleeping countryside. Newton closed it; then setting to work with his gimlet, he drilled holes in window and frame before inserting his screws. When he had finished, the room was sealed up and only by breaking the glass would the creature enter. As an afterthought, inspired more by hope than judgment, he drew a large red cross with Celia’s lipstick on each windowpane. It took him three hours to screw up every window in the cottage, and during all that time he kept looking up at the steel blue sky.

Locking both the back and front doors, he went over to the small garden shed and there prepared the firetrap. It was simple and, he hoped, effective. A mixture of paraffin, creosote and petrol was sprinkled over walls, a pile of dead wood, and placed in cans, bucket and a small barrel. After making a torch from a length of thick wood and padding one end with paraffin soaked rags, he sat down on the garden seat and waited.

The night was so beautiful: The sky was at peace and was a perfect setting for the crystal moon and the cold star-diamonds that spread out into infinity. He had a ridiculous feeling that he was the focal point for a billion eyes—a miserable biological specimen that was under a mighty multi-galaxy microscope and was now being watched to see how he would react in the coming battle.

Tobias came ambling across the garden and rubbed his body against Newton’s legs. He picked the cat up and deposited it on his lap, where it purred loudly, then settled down for a short sleep. Newton grinned ruefully when he remembered that Tobias was the innocent reason for him sitting here in the small hours, with his daughter drugged in a locked house and the garden shed full of inflammable material waiting for a match.

The first pale fingers of dawn were clawing the eastern sky when Newton stiffened and then gently lowered Tobias to the ground. A large black shape was slowly flying out from the shadows cast by the trees. It circled the house, and as the monstrous shape passed overhead, Newton gasped when he realized the extent to which it had grown. Even allowing for the bent hind legs, it must be all of five feet tall, and what was even more alarming, the wingspan was almost as wide. Gripping the unlighted torch in his right hand, Newton edged his way round the house, being careful to keep well within the shadow, and watched the creature’s flight with fearful anxiety. What would be

its reaction when it realized that the house was sealed up? There was always the possibility that it might break the glass and, once inside, his plan would be frustrated.

After circling the house three times, the winged shape sank down and glided towards Celia’s window, where it hovered while the wings flapped with intense rapidity. The ensuing shriek made Newton cringe against the wall, for it was a cry of baffled rage: an almost frantic scream of disbelief. Two long, thin arms emerged from behind the pounding wings, and a pair of taloned hands pawed the moon-bright windowpanes where the red crosses gleamed like blood streaks.

The shriek was terminated by a hoarse cry, and the creature, as though it had been electrocuted, fell heavily to the ground. There it crouched while, the wings half-folded, it examined its hands while twittering with pain or rage. Then it hopped up and down and blew on the extended claws like a schoolboy who has been caned. Newton dared to move a few paces nearer, still hugging the wall, but when he came to the corner of the house, the protecting shadow abruptly terminated and one more step would have brought him out into the full moonlight.

He stepped back and the heel of his shoe clicked against the wall. Instantly the creature became still—changed from a hopping monstrosity to a black frozen statue. Suddenly the head jerked round and Newton was staring at the sinister, pretty face, the exquisite blue eyes and the outstretched claws. He knew it could see him, but there was a completely silly thought that if he kept perfectly still, it would forget all about him. The clawlike feet moved apart and it was bounding towards him like a giant winged-bullfrog. The hind legs acted as springs, the half-folded wings as stabilizers, and doubtless behind the blue eyes lurked something that did service for a brain. Newton for a while forgot his plan, ignored the dictates of reason that stated now was the time to make a stand; instead, he surrendered to a blast of pure terror, turned on his heel and ran.

From little horrors, mighty monsters grow. Such was the impromptu thought that went with him as he ran. If only he had crushed the little thing that Tobias had brought home, now he would not have been running from something that leaped like a frog and twittered like an overgrown sparrow. A flapping sound told him the Fly-by-Night had taken to the air and the attack would come from above. His foot became entangled with a root and he went sprawling on the ground, where he lay waiting for the end. A minute, perhaps more, passed; then he ventured to look up. The creature was flying in rapidly decreasing circles, and it was in obvious distress. It made a strangled cry, then dropped a few feet, rather like an aeroplane that has hit an air pocket, and it took Newton some while before he realized the reason. The first golden spears from the rising sun were gliding across the clear sky. At once fear receded before a wave of new hope: The Fly-by-Night was a thing of darkness; it did not like light. It would be ridiculous to suppose that, like the legendary vampire, this monster would disintegrate with the rising sun, but it was uncomfortable and had a problem that could only be solved by finding shelter in a very short time. The house was sealed up; on the other hand, the garden shed was waiting—its door wide open. Newton fumbled in his pocket, found his cigarette lighter, then lit the torch.

The Fly-by-Night came down for a bumpy landing. It dropped the last two feet and rolled over while emitting a series of hoarse shrieks that made the newly awakened birds in the nearest trees rise up on fluttering wings. It regained an upright position and began to leap towards the house, presumably still instinctively regarding this as a natural place of protection. Newton ran forward and, with courage he did not suspect until that moment he possessed, stood in its path waving his flaming torch while moving slowly forward.

The Fly-by-Night, confronted in mid-leap by what it most feared, fell over, and Newton took advantage of the situation by thrusting his torch directly into the grimacing face. An ear-splitting shriek and it was flapping, creeping, lurching across the ground, oblivious of the growing light of day, fired only by the need to escape from the searing flames. Newton guided his quarry into the desired path by waving the torch to left and right, until the open shed door was in the creature’s line of vision. It managed to fly the last few yards, a kind of flapping run; then it disappeared through the opening, and Newton, his courage by now dangerously low, flung the torch onto the pile of oil-soaked wood and closed the door. He hastily fastened the padlock, then ran towards the house.

There was first a roar, than an explosion, and when he looked back, the shed was one gigantic flame. Such a fire would have gladdened the heart of an arsonist; it crackled, sizzled, spat out little gobbets of spluttering flame and reached upwards, as though to lick the stars, with yellow-and blue-edged tongues of flame. The roof fell in; the walls collapsed, and presently flame gave way to grey-black smoke and it was all over. When Newton at length walked slowly over to the smouldering ruins, there was nothing to see but grey ash, charred wood and a few pieces of twisted iron.

Then he broke down and cried.

It was late afternoon before Celia awoke. She did not speak until her father had prepared a cup of sweetened tea and a few slices of hot buttered toast; then she asked: “What have you done with—with him?”

“Don’t talk about it now,” he pleaded. “Wait until you are more yourself.”

She smiled. “I will never be more myself than I am now. What have you done with him?”

“I—” He paused, then for better or worse, announced boldly: “I burnt it. I burnt it in the garden shed.”

Celia daintily sipped her tea, then put the cup down. She nibbled the toast and, after waiting until her mouth was empty, said simply, “I see.”

He was at first puzzled, then encouraged by her calm acceptance of the news. Hope came to him.

“It’s all over now,” he said. “That creature is utterly destroyed and can never influence you again. Now we will begin to forget.”

She took another bite of toast and shook her head.

“No, we won’t.”

He knelt down by her chair and took her disengaged hand in his.

“Darling, you must try to understand. The creature has gone—burnt to a cinder—nothing remains.”

She finished her slice of toast, wiped a butter-smeared mouth on the back of her hand. Then she smiled again.

“Yes it does.”

“Celia, dear, please listen…”

She giggled and tilted her chin with the tips of her cool fingers.

“You listen, daddikins. They will grow very fast and very big.”

He brushed her hand to one side, then stood up.

“What will?”

Laughter clogged her throat, made her eyes water, but somehow the words came bubbling out.

“His… his children. The ones I’m going to have any minute now.”

(1976)