The Grin of the Dark (17 page)

'Yes, come out of it,' my father orders.

Perhaps my mother doesn't care for his tone. She limps sideways
to the aisle less rapidly than I would prefer. At every other step her
body tilts as if she's delivering a bow to the spectacle onstage. I take
her arm as she leaves the row at last. 'Get a move on,' my father
says and stumps towards the exit. I help my mother after him and
try to ignore the sound behind us – a whispering too faint to be
identifiable. Then it grows louder, though surely not closer, and
there's a soft flat thud.

I have to look, because my mother has twisted around to see. The
sixth figure has sloughed its face, a pale lump that is lying inches
away from the edge of the stage. I've barely distinguished this when
the front of the next head slides off. As it plops onto the stage the
clouds shut off the moon.

There's further movement on the stage. It sounds as if the entire
line of figures is collapsing – shifting in some way, at any rate. My
mother halts as though the darkness has frozen her, and when I take
a firmer hold on her arm I realise she's trying the flashlight. 'Don't
bother with that,' I say too much like my father, except not as
steadily. 'We can still see.'

We barely can. As I steer her towards the exit a section of the
lobby is just visible beyond my father's bulky silhouette. 'Move
yourself if you want us to,' my mother tells him.

He doesn't budge. Has he chosen this moment to demonstrate that
he's too old to be ordered about, or can he hear the noises I'm
hearing? I do my utmost not to take them as any kind of a response
to my mother's words. It sounds as if the shapes against the walls are
collapsing as well, slowly and at length, unless they're stirring in some
other fashion. I'm preparing to urge my father aside when he finishes
peering at my mother, who is giving the flashlight a last try. In a few
paces hindered by her limp I'm able to make out the exit to the street
beyond the lobby. I know she can't safely walk any faster, but I feel
as if we're shackled by the dark.

My father blocks the way into the lobby in order to check that
we're following, and my mother repeats her command. As we follow
his grudging retreat I keep my eyes on the exit. I won't be distracted
by the fancy that a pale lump is pressed against the window of the
box office. I'm ushering my mother across the frozen mass of
misshapen footprints to the car when she says 'That was an
adventure, wasn't it?'

My father glares at this and me as he crouches into the Mini. 'I'm
glad you liked it,' I feel bound to respond.

She climbs in beside my father and twists her head around as I
open the rear door. 'Better shut it up, do you think? We don't want
children getting into mischief.'

I can't see any children. I can see the car looking out of place on
the abandoned street and isolated by the nearest working streetlamps
several hundred yards away. I hurry across the treacherous pavement
to seize the edge of the board and tug hard. The door resists for a
grinding instant and then yields, which dislodges some kind of loose
fabric that brushes my fingertips. It doesn't really feel like a farewell
kiss from a moist puffy mouth. The door slams with a clank of the
bar, and I manage not to fall in my absurd haste to reach my parents.
My father has already started the car, and swings it away from the
kerb almost before I'm seated. 'What would you like to do now,
Simon?' my mother says.

She seems so unaffected by the recent panic that I wonder if her
memory has lapsed. 'I suppose I should be thinking of heading back
to London.'

'No sooner thought than done,' my father declares.

As the car puts on speed, the forsaken theatre surges after us, or at
least its reflection in the mirror flares up with renewed moonlight.
The building seems to brighten in proportion with the distance before
it vanishes like an image expunged from a screen. We've simply
turned where the road forks, but my mother says 'Where are you
taking us, Bob?'

'Where I was asked.'

Is he proposing to drive to London? 'I didn't mean you should take
me literally,' I say, attempting to laugh.

The narrow street is pulsing with the buds of trees in front rooms.
When I was little my father used to drive us on a tour of the Christmas
suburbs, but if I feel like a child again it's from helplessness. My
mother gazes at me in the mirror and says 'He's like this now.' At
least, I think that's what she mouths, and I'm about to voice another
protest when my father claps his hands like a magician or the solitary
enthusiastic member of an audience. 'There, I was right,' he tells
anyone who doubted it, and grabs the wheel again. 'Here we are.'

An unlit building brings the street to an end. Trees flicker on either
side of the car as if they're close to giving up their existence, and I'm
afraid we've returned to the Harlequin. Are we approaching it from
the back? No, we've arrived at a junction, the far side of which is
occupied by a railway station. 'The line to London comes through
here,' says my father.

'Aren't we driving Simon to the proper station?'

'He's in a rush and I want to get you home.'

His stare in the mirror is warning me not to interfere. At least I can
say 'I'm glad I dropped in.'

'We are,' my mother assures me. 'Hurry up Christmas with
everyone we're thinking of.'

I mumble amiably rather than commit Natalie and Mark. My father
delivers a handshake so terse it's little more than the memory of one,
but my mother clutches the back of my neck and pulls my head
between the front seats to receive a fierce kiss. I'm turning away from
the car when my father shoves his door open and rears up like a Jack-in-
the-box to crane over the roof. 'If you're thinking of coming again,'
he says so quietly that I barely hear him, 'next time don't get your
mother in a state.'

The brake lights give a Christmas wink as the Mini vanishes around
a bend, and I venture into the station. It's unstaffed. The ticket office
in the token hall is so thoroughly shut that I have to peer at it to
establish that it isn't just a patch on the dim wall. I can't see the name
of the station anywhere on the lightless platform. Wires shiver
alongside the glimmering railway lines in a wind that lends unnecessary
animation to a solitary poster in the booking hall. The text has
been scratched out, and the vandal has also erased more than the face
of the figure prancing in the foreground. The damage has lent the
performer a disproportionately swollen white head above the baggy
costume, and someone has inked a black grin as wide as the otherwise
featureless expanse. The ragged outline works as though the eyeless
substitute for a face is struggling to emerge from the poster. All this
gives me yet more reason to want to speak to Natalie. I dig out my
phone and bring up her home number.

However late in the day it feels to me, it may not be Mark's
bedtime yet. The bell rings twice and falls silent, but nobody speaks.
It's partly the desertion all around me, not to mention the restless
poster, that makes me blurt 'Mark?'

'He's on his computer. Why, do you want him?'

'You were so fast I thought it must be him. I'll have you instead
any time, Natty.'

Her wordless sound reminds me of Bebe even before she adds 'You
might want to be a bit careful with saying things like that.'

'Even to you?' When she doesn't respond I say 'Sorry, have I done
something I should know about?'

'Nothing we need to discuss over the phone,' she says, and I tell
myself that it's only the wind that chills my neck.

When I let myself into the apartment the only sound is my own
breath. Mark will be in bed by now, but I'm hoping Natalie
has stayed up. 'Hello?' I call not much above a whisper. 'Hello?'

I might as well be speaking to a dead mobile phone, since there's
as little response. The muffled childish giggle in the apartment
opposite can't be one, and I don't waste too much time staring across
the corridor in case anyone emerges. I bolt the door and tiptoe to
Natalie's room. 'Are you awake?' I murmur.

She isn't, unless she's pretending, which she has no reason to do.
She doesn't stir under the quilt in the dark. I want to believe this
proves whatever she withheld on the phone is unimportant, but I feel
worse than frustrated. I restrain myself from shaking her and trudge
out of the room. I ease the door shut and head for my computer. If I
have to wait until tomorrow to hear from her, I'll see whether I need
to deal with something else.

I close the door of the main room and mute the speakers. The icons
gather and regain their colours with a collective shiver. I hope the
chirpy dialling of the modem won't rouse Natalie or Mark. I listen to
the silence until I'm sure of it and then check my email. I've had
dozens of communications on nonsensical subjects from people with
meaningless names. I delete them all unread and open the page for
Tubby Thackeray's film.

Now Mr Questionabble's pretending that he's going to be
published. Everyboddy shout if they bellieve him when he can't
even spell it. Wow, it's quiet round here. And on top of
prettending he's got the gaul to tell us we've got to be
pubblished before he'll allow us to say annything on here. Well,
he can look and see how much I've pubblished now. I'll stake all
the monney in the bank he won't like it, though.

If Smilemime has signed his real name to anything, how am I
supposed to find it? Or perhaps I know what he means. I bring up the
page for
Tubby's Twentieth-Century Tincture
, and the one for
Tubby
the Troll
, and the rest of them. Long before the end I've run out of
gasps of disbelief. Smilemime has posted a synopsis for every film,
including
Tubby Tells the Truth
, which he summarises as 'Tubby
dresses up as a proffessor and shows us how he turned into a commic'.

He must be especially well informed to be able to describe a film
that was never released. I'm about to begin my response with that
comment when I wonder where else he may be posting. He seems the
kind of person who would frequent newsgroups, and what might they
tell me about him? I open the page for the Google groups and enter
Smilemime in the search box. There are hundreds of postings, and
I've read no more than the title of the most recent when I have to grip
my face to keep in the noise I would otherwise make. Whatever it
would be, it's no laugh.

I barely sleep. Whenever I manage to doze, my mind lights on
Smilemime – on how his messages may be multiplying like a virus
designed just to harm me – and I jerk awake. I wouldn't be in bed if
Natalie hadn't gone to the bathroom and then wandered somnolently
to find me. As soon as she began to fumble with the doorknob I
logged off and shut down the computer, and was in time to meet her
at the door. I was ashamed of what I'd been looking at, which added
to my rage. She was nearly asleep, and wholly so before I joined her
in bed, where she nevertheless slipped an arm around my waist. Its
comfort is oppressively unhelpful in its lack of awareness. I try to sink
into the peace of her breathing, but Smilemime is there, and Tubby's
face shining like ice. I feel like an armature composed of nerves that
unite in the dark lump of my brain. Perhaps my nerves are making my
wrist tingle reminiscently, which is why I give up lying still.

I inch my arm from under the quilt. I thought I'd scrubbed off the
last of the clown's face, and there is indeed no sign of it in the almost
imperceptible glow from the sky through the curtains beyond
Natalie's side of the bed. Dawn must be on the way, and there's no
point in my courting sleep when I'll need to take Mark to school in a
couple of hours. If I deal with my tormentor now I'll be able to sleep
after delivering Mark.

As I steal out of bed Natalie emits a faint sigh that could be interpreted
as resigned. I pad to the main room, closing doors without a
sound, and switch on my computer. Even the burbling of the modem
seems muffled, presumably because my senses are. When the
Frugonet icons swim up I could imagine that they're floating in my
eyes. I blink hard to focus and in an attempt to render my eyes less
parched while I type Smilemime in the newsgroup search box. His
message is the same, but in more places now. He has been at work
while I wasted time in bed.

Watch out for Simon Jester aka Lester aka Leslie Stone

Claims he's been pubblished. Says he's seen films noboddy
else has. Wants people to think he's an authorrity on films and
commedians. You can find him putting on his act at

www.imdb.com/title/tt1119079/board/nest/30615787

May show up on this newsgroup. He'll be after information he
can claim he found himself and make out he's an expert. Don't
anyboddy let him. Noboddy had ever heard of him till he started
claiming he knew more than me.

The message has been posted to newsgroups about the cinema,
about silent films, about theatre, comedy, music-hall... At least I
drafted a response in my head while I was failing to sleep.

I'm going to confine myself to facts. My name is Simon Lester. I
wrote at least one featured article in every issue of
Cineassed
. I
never write under a pseudonym, even on the Internet. Anyone
who helps me with my research will be named in the
acknowledgments if they want to be. As for this person,
whatever his real name is, I've said all I intend to say about him.

I copy this before I post it, and once I've loosed it I set about
sending it to the other newsgroups, almost forty of them. By the time
I've finished, my tendons are twitchy with repetition. I shut my eyes
while I recompose the next message I outlined at the edge of sleep.

Dear Rufus:

Just wanted to update you. I'm on the Tubby Thackeray trail.
He caused a riot at one theatre he played at, and someone died
laughing at him somewhere else. I'll be visiting the grandson of
the director who made all his films. I may find out more than I
can write up by the deadline. Can we solve this, do you think?
Oh, and I seem to have attracted some kind of Internet
antagonist by putting him right about a Tubby film on the
IMDb. Part of the fun of being a writer, I expect.

Yours until the final frame –

Simon

I've shut my eyes in an attempt to recall another task when I hear
Natalie emerge from her room. The door swings inwards, and she
blinks at me. 'What are you doing in the dark?'

'Trying not to waken anyone who shouldn't be awake.'

'No need to go blind doing it,' she says, surely not because she's
suspicious of my activity, and switches on the room light. Beyond my
eyelids she asks 'Haven't you been to bed?'

'Hours ago. I thought you knew I was there.'

'Well, I didn't. I'll be back in a minute.' She's at least four times
that in the bathroom, but when she returns I still haven't identified
the thought she interrupted. 'Do you want coffee?' she says. 'I
should put something on before Mark joins us.'

Since she's wearing a robe, she means me. I'd forgotten staying
naked so as not to disturb her sleep. I fetch my robe from the bedroom
as she fills the percolator. 'Close the door,' she says, and then 'You
might want to watch out round the school.'

'Is Mark having trouble? What do I need to sort out?'

'Not Mark. I think some of the parents were talking about you.
Were you making a fuss of one of his girlfriends?'

'Me? A fuss? I may have smiled at one. That wasn't illegal last time
I looked.'

'I'm only saying you might have taken a little more care when
nobody knew who you were.'

'Did you tell these parents you thought it was me?'

'I had to. One of the girls thought you were Mark's father.'

I'm not going to ask how Natalie responded, but I'm provoked to
ask 'So how was your day at work?'

'Good fun. Hard work but I enjoyed it.'

'You like it hard, then. Much contact with Nilochas?'

'Who did you say?'

'Sorry if I've mixed him up. Too long at the keyboard. Head full
of letters and no sense. Nicholas, that's the man.'

'He's behind the scenes. I don't expect to see much of him,' Natalie
says with a smile that's ready to be more of one. 'You aren't jealous,
are you, Simon?'

As I open my mouth it stiffens as if a mask has been clamped to
my face. I'm struggling to voice my thoughts when Natalie says
'Anyway, how were your parents?'

'Old.'

'You'd expect that, wouldn't you?'

'Older.' Rather than pursue this I say 'We've been asked up for
Christmas.'

'Then we'll go, or we could for your birthday. We'll need to spend
either Christmas or New Year with my parents.'

'Whichever you like,' I say, although the prospect of either with
them makes me nervous.

'Let's see what Mark says.' She pours two coffees and carries them
into the room. 'I may as well have my bath,' she says and is taking
her Supermum mug to the door when she pauses. 'Was your trip
successful otherwise as well?'

'Maybe next time.'

'I'm sure it was still worth the journey,' Natalie says and delivers
a swift kiss to convince me before she pads out of the room.

I take a sip and then another from my mug, which is decorated to
resemble a spool of unexposed film. I set it down almost hastily
enough to spill coffee across the desk. Natalie's last question or the
caffeine has booted up my brain, and I've remembered what I
couldn't bring to mind: I need to check which newspaper I bought at
the fair. The trouble is that the paper isn't on or in the desk. It isn't
in the room.