His voice was a rough croak, but the most delicious sound I"d ever heard. He struggled to his feet, and insisted on giving me his hand to help me up. Living or dead, he was always a gentleman. When I was on my feet his arms came around me. He was weak enough that I ended up holding him up as we embraced.
"We could dance like this forever," he said.
I sighed romantically. "We could." I looked around. "We could if the sun wasn"t coming up soon. We need to get out of here."
He cupped my cheek and looked at me with his new night vision. "You"re as beautiful as I dreamed you were, my Stella. Thank you-for saving me, thank you for being with me now and forever."
There"s no way a girl can"t respond to that. I kissed him, and he kissed back and it was real and deep and better than any dream.
After a while he lifted his head and gave a dry, hacking cough. "S-sorry. Thirsty."
I put my arm around his waist and helped him toward the garden door. "I know just the place where we can get a beer. Now that you"ve changed you can find it on your own."
"I"d rather go with you."
You have no idea how much this meant to me.
Tiana met us outside the cafeteria and guided us along her secret route out of the hospital and away from the crowd. He noticed all the fuss as we drove away, he and I squeezed into the trunk of Tiana"s car.
"You have no idea how happy I am to leave the celebrity era of my life behind," he told me.
"You"ll miss acting."
"I"ll think of a way to get back to it. Do vampires work? Do I need a job?"
"I"m a real estate mogul. You can live off me. Wait-" I"d remembered Anton. "The place we"re heading, the Alhambra Club, needs a bartender. I know the owner." That would be me. "If you"re interested."
We were squeezed in pretty tightly, but he managed to pull me closer. "Does this place have a dance floor?"
I laughed, happier than I"d ever imagine I could be. "It will when we"re done with it if that"s what you want," I promised.
"I think dancing-being-with you is all I ever wanted."
"Me too." I couldn"t stop the girlish giggle from escaping. "I guess this is a real-"
"Hollywood ending," he finished, not having to be psychic to know what I was thinking.
A TRICK OF THE DARK.
Tina Rath.
This haunting tale takes us back to the period between two World Wars when chrome was shockingly modern, a young man might be thought to be an anarchist if he went about with long curly hair and wore no hat, and the best a young woman in poor health could hope for was to stay home in bed and await her demise . . . or perhaps not.
Tina Rath gained her doctorate from London University with a thesis on The Vampire in Popular Fiction and her MA with a dissertation on The Vampire in the Theatre. She has made radio and television appearances and lectured on vampires and other aspects of Gothic literature for various groups and societies. Her fiction has been published in periodicals such as All Hallows, Ghosts and Scholars, The Magazine of Fantasy & Science Fiction, Supernatural Tales 16, Visionary Tongue, and Weird Tales. Anthology appearances include Strange Tales, Exotic Gothic 3, and The Mammoth Book of Vampires. She edited the anthology Conventional Vampires for the Dracula Society in 2003.
"What job finishes just at sunset?"
Margaret jumped slightly. "What a weird question, darling. Park keeper, I suppose." Something made her turn to look at her daughter. She was propped up against her pillows, looking, Margaret thought guiltily, about ten years old. She must keep remembering, she told herself fiercely, that Maddie was nineteen. This silly heart-thing, as she called it, was keeping her in bed for much longer than they ever thought it would, but it couldn"t stop her growing up . . . she must listen to her, and talk to her like a grown-up.
Intending to do just that she went to sit on the edge of the bed. It was covered with a glossy pink eiderdown, embroidered with fat pink and mauve peonies. The lamp on Maddie"s bed-side table had a rosy shade, Maddie was wearing a pink bed jacket, lovingly crocheted by her grandmother, and Maddie"s pale blond hair was tied back with a pink ribbon . . . but in the midst of this plethora of pink Maddie"s face looked pale and peaky. The words of a story she had read to Maddie once-how many years ago?-came back to her: "Peak and pine, peak and pine." It was about a changeling child who never thrived, but lay in the cradle, crying and fretting, peaking and pining . . . in the end the creature had gone back to its own people, and, she supposed that the healthy child had somehow got back to his mother, but she couldn"t remember. Margaret shivered, wondering why people thought such horrid stories were suitable for children.
"What made you wonder who finishes work at sunset?" she asked.
"Oh-nothing," Maddie looked oddly shy, as she might have done if her mother had asked her about a boy who had partnered her at tennis, or asked her to a dance. If such a thing could ever have happened. She played with the pink ribbons at her neck and a little, a very little colour crept into that pale face. "It"s just-well-I can"t read all day, or-" She hesitated and Margaret mentally filled in the gap. She had her embroidery, her knitting, those huge complicated jigsaws that her friends were so good about finding for her, a notebook for jotting down those funny little verses that someone was going to ask someone"s uncle about publishing . . . but all that couldn"t keep her occupied all day.
"Sometimes I just look out of the window," she said.
"Oh, darling . . . " She couldn"t bear to think of her daughter just lying there-just looking out of the window. "Why don"t you call me when you get bored? We could have some lovely talks. Or I could telephone Bunty or Cissie or-" it"s getting quite autumnal after all, she thought, and Maddie"s friends won"t be out so much, playing tennis, or swimming or . . . You couldn"t expect them to sit for hours in a sick-room. They dashed in, tanned and breathless from their games and bicycle rides, or windblown and glowing from a winter walk, and dropped off a jigsaw or a new novel . . . and went away.
"I don"t mind, Mummy," Maddie was saying. "It"s amazing what you can see, even in a quiet street like this. I mean, that"s why I like this room. Because you can see out."
Margaret looked out of the window. Yes. You could see a stretch of pavement, a bit of Mrs. Creswell"s hedge, a lamppost, the post box and Mrs. Monkton"s gate. It was not precisely an enticing view, and she exclaimed, "Oh, darling!" again.
"You"d be amazed who visits Mrs. Monkton in the afternoons," Maddie said demurely.
"Good heavens, who-" Margaret exclaimed, but Maddie gave a rea.s.suringly naughty giggle.
"That would be telling! You"ll have to sit up here one afternoon and watch for yourself."
"I might," Margaret said. But how could she? There was always so much to do downstairs, letters to write, shopping to do, and cook to deal with. (Life to get on with?) She too, she realized, dropped in on Maddie, left her with things to sustain or amuse her. And went away.
"Perhaps we could move you downstairs, darling," she said. But that would be so difficult. The doctor had absolutely forbidden Maddie to use the stairs, so how on earth could they manage what Margaret could only, even in the privacy of her thoughts, call the bathroom problem? Too shame-making for Maddie to have to ask to be carried up the stairs every time she needed-and who was there to do it during the day? Maddie was very light-much too light-but her mother knew that she could not lift her let alone carry her by herself.
"But you can"t see anything from the sitting room," Maddie said.
"Oh darling-" Margaret realized she was going to have to leave Maddie alone again. Her husband would be home soon and she was beginning to have serious doubts about the advisability of re-heating the fish-pie . . . She must have a quick word with Cook about cheese omelettes. If only Cook wasn"t so bad with eggs . . . "What"s this about sunset anyway?" she said briskly.
"Sunset comes a bit earlier every day," Maddie said. "And just at sunset a man walks down the street."
"The same man, every night?" Margaret asked.
"The same man, always just after sunset," Maddie confirmed.
"Perhaps he"s a postman?" Margaret suggested.
"Then he"d wear a uniform," Maddie said patiently. "And the same if he was a park-keeper I suppose-they wear uniform too, don"t they. Besides he doesn"t look like a postman."
"So-what does he look like?"
"It"s hard to explain," Maddie struggled for the right words, "but-can you imagine a beautiful skull?"
"What! What a horrible idea!" Margaret stood up, clutching the gray foulard at her bosom. "Maddie, if you began talking like this I shall call Dr. Whiston. I don"t care if he doesn"t like coming out after dinner. Skull-headed men walking past the house every night indeed!"
Maddie pouted. "I didn"t say that. It"s just that his face is very-sculptured. You can see the bones under the skin, especially the cheekbones. It just made me think-he must even have a beautiful skull."
"And how is he dressed?" Margaret asked faintly.
"A white shirt and a sort of loose black coat," Maddie said. "And he has quite long curly black hair. I think he might be a student."
"No hat?" her mother asked, scandalized. "He sounds more like an anarchist! Really, Maddie, I wonder if I should go and have a word with the policeman on the corner and tell him a suspicious character has been hanging about outside the house."
"No, Mother!" Maddie sounded so anguished that her mother hastily laid a calming hand on her forehead.
"Now, darling, don"t upset yourself. You must remember what the doctor said. Of course I won"t call him if you don"t want me to, or the policeman. That was a joke, darling! But you mustn"t get yourself upset like this . . . Oh dear, your forehead feels quite clammy. Here, take one of your tablets. I"ll get you a gla.s.s of water."
And in her very real anxiety for her daughter, worries about the fish pie and well-founded doubts about the subst.i.tute omelettes, Margaret almost forgot about the stranger. Almost but not quite. A meeting with Mrs. Monkton one evening when they had both hurried out to catch the last post and met in front of the post-box, reminded her and she found herself asking if Mrs. Monkton had noticed anyone "hanging about."
"A young man," that lady exclaimed with a flash of what Margaret decided was rather indecent excitement, "but darling, there are no young men left." Margaret raised a hand in mute protest only to have brushed aside by Mrs. Monkton. "Well, not nearly enough to go round anyway. I expect this one was waiting for Elsie."
Elsie worked for both Mrs. Monkton and Margaret, coming in several times a week to do "the rough," the cleaning that was beneath Margaret"s cook and Mrs. Monkton"s extremely superior maid. She was a handsome girl, with, it was rumored, an obliging disposition, who would never have been allowed across the threshold of a respectable household when Margaret was young. But nowadays . . . Mrs. Monkton"s suggestion did set Margaret"s mind at rest. A hatless young man-yes, he must be waiting for Elsie. She might "have a word" with the girl about the propriety of encouraging young men to hang about the street for her, but, on the other hand, she might not . . . She hurried back home.
Bunty"s mother came to tea, full of news. Bunty"s elder sister was getting engaged to someone her mother described as "a bit nquos, but what can you do . . . " Nquos was a rather transparent code for "not quite our sort." The young man"s father was, it appeared, very, very rich, though no one was quite sure where he had made his money. He was going to give-to give-outright, Bunty"s mother had gasped, a big house in Surrey to the young couple. And he was going to furnish it too, unfortunately, according to his own somewhat . . . individual taste . . .
"Chrome, my dear, chrome from floor to ceiling. The dining room looks like a milk bar. And as for the bedroom-Jack says-" she lowered her voice, "he says it looks like an avant garde brothel in Berlin. Although how he knows anything about them I"m sure I"m not going to ask. But he"s having nothing to do with the wedding," she added, sipping her tea as if it were hemlock. "I wonder my dear-would dear little Maddie be well enough to be a bridesmaid? It won"t be until next June. I want to keep Pammy to myself for as long as I can . . . " she dabbed at her eyes.
"Of course," Margaret murmured doubtfully. And then, with more determination, "I"ll ask the doctor."
And, rather surprising herself, she did. On his next visit to Maddie she lured him into the sitting room with the offer of a gla.s.s of sherry and let him boom on for a while on how well Maddie was responding to his treatment. Then she asked the Question, the one she had, until that moment, had not dared to ask.
"But when will Maddie be-quite well? Could she be a bridesmaid, say, in June next year?"
The doctor paused, sherry halfway to his lips. He was not used to being questioned. Margaret realized that he thought she had been intolerably frivolous. "Bridesmaid?" the doctor boomed. And then thawed, visibly. Women, he knew, cared about such things. "Bridesmaid! Well, why not? Provided she goes on as well as she has been. And you don"t let her get too excited. Not too many dress fittings, you know, and see you get her home early after the wedding. No dancing and only a tiny gla.s.s of champagne . . . "
"And will she ever we well enough . . . to . . . to . . . marry herself and to . . . " But Margaret could not bring herself to finish that sentence to a man, not even a medical man.
"Marry-well, I wouldn"t advise it. And babies? No. No. Still, that"s the modern girl, isn"t it? No use for husbands and children these days-" and he boomed himself out of the house.
Margaret remembered that the doctor had married a much younger woman. Presumably the marriage was not a success . . . then she let herself think of Maddie. She wondered if Bunty"s mother would like to exchange places with her. Margaret would never have to lose her daughter to the son of a nouveau riche war profiteer. Never . . . and she sat down in her pretty chintz covered armchair and cried as quietly as she could, in case Maddie heard her. For some reason she never asked herself how far the doctor"s confident boom might carry. Later she went up to her daughter, smiling gallantly.
"The doctor"s so pleased with you, Maddie," she said. "He thinks you"ll be well enough to be Pammy"s bridesmaid! You"ll have to be sure you finish her present in nice time."
Margaret had bought a tray cloth and six place mats stamped with the design of a figure in a poke bonnet and a crinoline, surrounded by flowers. Maddie was supposed to be embroidering them in tasteful naturalistic shades of pink, mauve, and green, as a wedding gift for Pammy, but she seemed to have little enthusiasm for the task. Her mother stared at her, lying back in her next of pillows. "Peak and pine! Peak and pine!" said the voice in her head.
"Do you ever see your young man any more?" she asked, more to distract herself than because she was really concerned.
"Oh, no," Maddie said, raising her shadowed eyes to her mother. "I don"t think he was ever there at all. It was a trick of the dark."
"Trick of the light, surely," Margaret said. And then, almost against her will, "Do you remember that story I used to read you? About the changeling child?"
"What, the one that lay in the cradle saying "I"m old, I"m old, I"m ever so old?" " Maddie said. "Whatever made you think of that?"
"I don"t know," Margaret gasped. "But you know how you sometimes get silly words going round and round your head. It"s as if I can"t stop repeating those words from the story-"Peak and pine!"-to myself over and over again." There, she had said it aloud. That must exorcise them, surely.
"But that"s not from the changeling story," Maddie said. "It"s from "Christabel," you know, Coleridge"s poem about the weird Lady Geraldine. She says it to the mother"s ghost "Off wandering mother! Peak and pine!" We read it at school, but Miss Brownrigg made us miss out all that bit about Geraldine"s b.r.e.a.s.t.s."
"I should think so, too," Margaret said weakly.
Autumn became winter, although few people noticed by what tiny degrees the days grew shorter and shorter until sunset came at around four o"clock. Except perhaps Maddie, sitting propped up on her pillows, and watching every day for the young man who still walked down the street every evening, in spite of what she had told her mother. And even she could not have said just when he stopped walking directly pa.s.sed the window, and took to standing in that dark spot just between the lamp post and the post box, look up at her . . .
"Where"s your little silver cross, darling?" Margaret said, suddenly, wondering vaguely when she had last seen Maddie wearing it.
"Oh, I don"t know," Maddie said, too casually. "I think the clasp must have broken and it slipped off."
"Oh, but-" Margaret looked helplessly at her daughter. "I do hope Elsie hasn"t picked it up. I sometimes think . . . "
"I expect it"ll turn up," Maddie said. Her eyes slid away from her mother"s face and returned to the window.
"How"s Pammy"s present coming along?" Margaret asked, speaking to that white reflection in the dark gla.s.s, trying to make her daughter turn back to her. She picked up Maddie"s work bag. And stared. One of the place mats had been completed. But the figure of the lady had been embroidered in shades of black and it was standing in the midst of scarlet roses and tall purple lilies. It was cleverly done: every fold and flounce was picked out . . . but Margaret found it rather disturbing. She was glad that the poke bonnet hit the figure"s face . . . She looked up to realize that Maddie was looking at her almost slyly.
"Don"t you like it?" she said.
"It"s-it"s quite modern, isn"t it?"
"What, lazy daisies and crinoline ladies, modern?" How long had Maddie"s voice had that lazy mocking tone? She sounded like a world-weary adult talking to a very young and silly child.
Margaret put the work down.
"You will be all right, darling, won"t you?" Margaret said, rushing into her daughter"s room one cold December afternoon. "Only I must do some Christmas shopping, I really must . . . "
"Of course you must, Mummy," Maddie said. "You"ve got my list, haven"t you? Do try to find something really nice for Bunty, she"s been so kind . . . "
And what I would really like to give her, Maddie thought is a whole parcel of jigsaws . . . and all the time in the world to see how she likes them . . . She leaned against her pillows, watching her mother scurry down the street. She would catch a bus at the corner by the church, and then an underground train, and then face the crowded streets and shops of a near-Christmas West End London. Maddie would have plenty of time to herself. She knew (although her mother did not) that Cook would be going out to have tea with her friend at Mrs. Cresswell"s at half-past three, and for at least one blessed hour she would be entirely alone in the house.
She pulled herself further up in the bed, and fumbled in the drawer of her bedside table to find the contraband she had managed to persuade Elsie to bring in for her. Elsie had proved much more useful than Bunty, or Cissie or any of her kind friends. She sorted through the scarlet lipstick, the eye-black, the face-powder, and began to draw the kind of face she knew she had always wanted on the blank canvas of her pale skin. After twenty minutes of careful work she felt she had succeeded rather well.
"I"m old, I"m old, I"m ever so old," she crooned to herself. She freed her hair from its inevitable pink ribbon, and brushed it sleekly over her shoulders, then she took off her lacy bed-jacket and the white winceyette nightie beneath it. Finally she slid into the garment the invaluable Elsie had found for her (Heaven knows where-although Maddie had a shrewd suspicion it might have been stolen from another of Elsie"s clients-perhaps the naughty Mrs. Monkton). It was a nightdress made of layers of black and red chiffon, just a little too large for Maddie, but the way it tended to slide from her shoulders could have, she felt, its own attraction.
All these preparations had taken quite a long time, especially as Maddie had had to stop every so often to catch her breath and once to take one of her tablets . . . but she was ready just before sunset. She slipped out of bed, crossed the room, and sat in a chair beside the window. So. The trap was almost set (but was she the trap or only the bait . . . ?) Only one thing remained to be done.
Maddie took out her embroidery scissors, and, clenching her teeth, ran the tiny sharp points into her wrist . . .
The bus was late and crowded. Margaret struggled off, trying to balance her load of packages and parcels and hurried down the road, past the churchyard wall, past Mrs. Monkton"s red-brick villa, past the post box-and hesitated. For a moment she thought she had seen something-Maddie"s strange man with the beautiful skull-like face? But no, there were two white faces there in the shadows-no . . . there was nothing. A trick of the dark . . . She dropped her parcels in the hall and hurried up the stairs.
"Here I am, darling, I"m so sorry I"m late . . . Oh, Maddie-Maddie darling . . . whatever are you doing in the dark?"
She switched on the light.
"Maddie. Maddie, where are you?" she whispered. "What have you done?"
When Gretchen Was Human.