‘Oh, come on.The fucking house is new. It had been standing empty for two years before I bought it. It’s not built on some fucking Indian burial ground or a cemetery or any of that kind of Hollywood bullshit. Its a new house. I was the first tenant. Nothing happened here before I moved in, Martin. The house is not haunted.’
There was another long silence finally broken by Connelly.‘And these …
apparitions?’ he said.‘You think they’ll come again tonight?’
‘I don’t know.’
‘Could they be linked with what’s happening though?’
‘I don’t know,’ Ward said a little more loudly.
The two men locked stares.
‘This is like something you used to write,’ said Connelly.
Ward didn’t answer. He merely got to his feet and dropped the dirty plates into the sink. ‘Want a drink while we wait?’ he said. ‘Wait for what?’
Connelly asked. ‘For the night to come,’ Ward said.
TIME TO SPARE
4.29 p.m.
‘What do you think this means?’ Connelly held up the sheets of handwritten paper.
‘I told you, I don’t know,’ Ward rasped, sipping his drink.
‘Perhaps the answer is in here somewhere. The answer to all of this. It can’t hurt to go through it.’
Ward shrugged. He watched as Connelly spread the sheets of paper out on the coffee table, gazing at each one in turn.
‘“Reality and fantasy become inseparable”,’ Connelly read.
‘It’s a pity they don’t. I’d write a novel about an author who wins the fucking lottery,’ sneered Ward.
‘Is that what you think this means? That what is written eventually becomes fact?’
‘Who knows? The point is not what it means but how it got in my office in the first place. We need to know who wrote it, not what they’re trying to say:
Connelly read more. ‘It talks about confrontation,’ he said thoughtfully. ‘How conflict is good. How power is good and weakness is bad.’
‘Perhaps my office is haunted by Nietzsche,’ chuckled Ward.
‘I’m glad you find it funny, Chris. I wonder if the police will be laughing when they see that video.’
‘Are you threatening me, Martin?’
‘Why? What if I was? Are you going to do to me the same as you did to her?’
‘Fuck you.’
‘I’m trying to help. You asked me to help. That’s what I’m trying to do.’
Ward regarded him balefully for a second then refilled his glass. ‘All right, go on,’ he murmured.
‘It’s this last bit. “There are others.” I wonder if it means others like you.’
‘Murderers, you mean?’
‘What do you think it means?’
‘I told you. I don’t know and I don’t fucking care. All that bothers me is how it got into my office.’
‘Are you sure you didn’t write it?’ Connelly was growing agitated.
‘How many more times? I told you—’
‘Are you sure?’ shouted Connelly.
‘It’s not my writing. It’s not the way I write. I’m sure!
Connelly got to his feet and wandered over to the French windows that looked out on to Ward’s back garden. In the sky, clouds were building steadily like gathering formations of troops preparing for a final onslaught.
‘It looks like there’s another storm coming,’ murmured Connelly.
Ward didn’t answer.
THE COMING STORM
6.42 p.m. Rain hammered down unrelentingly, falling from the seething banks of black clouds in torrents.
Ward gazed out of the French windows and watched the droplets pounding against the concrete outside. Part of the garden near one of the oak trees was already under half an inch of water. Elsewhere on the grass, other puddles were growing larger as the downpour showed no sign of abating.
The first distant rumble of thunder rolled across the sky like artillery fire.
When Ward turned his head, he saw that Connelly was also looking out of the window. The agent looked a little apprehensive.
‘If this keeps up it’ll be dark in an hour,’ said Ward.
‘And then?’
Ward shrugged. He sat still a moment longer then got to his feet.
‘I’m going out to the office,’ he said. ‘Just to shut the computer down. Turn off the monitor. I’ll lock it up for the night.’
‘Do you want some company?’ Connelly asked, also rising.
‘No. I’ll only be a couple of minutes. Pour us some more drinks.’
The agent nodded.
Ward stepped out of the room.
Outside, a brilliant white shaft of lightning tore through the clouds and illuminated the sky.
Think hard and consider the situation in which you now find yourself.
Contemplate the possibilities and mull them over in your mind for there is but one outcome. When first our union was sublimated there was no questioning.
There were no doubts or remonstrations. The terms were accepted. The price was set. A valuation put upon that which is ordinarily thought to be above remuneration. Consider this and also contemplate what has been given and accepted without question. For all deeds and acts there is a manifest set of circumstances. An outcome. Irrevocable and irretrievable in its finality.
Terms were set. Accepted. Acted upon. Now is the time for payment.
Many others have walked the same path. Many more will do so. There are others.
Others who seek what you have sought. Who will attain what you have attained and who will pay as you must pay. With the passing of the years has come no remembrance. No recollection of what was desired and what was offered in
return. Something offered more priceless than the treasures of the ages.
Consider the following and prepare to settle that which must be accounted tor: 12 12 84 the choice was made. Now must come the reckoning.
COMMUNICATION
Martin Connelly heard a sound from inside the study. He approached the door slowly.
‘Chris,’ he called.
No answer. Just that insistent noise he’d heard a moment earlier. Like …
Like what?
Like the mechanical and electronic sound made by a printer as it transfers the images from a computer screen on to paper.
He pushed the door wider and stepped inside the room.
The computer was indeed on. The monitor was active. Connelly could see words spreading across it. He crossed to the machine and stood staring at the screen.
Names. Hundreds of them.
And the printer dutifully transferring them on to paper.
Connelly read them:
Dante Alighieri Ludwig van Beethoven Adolf Hitler Napoleon Bonaparte Bram Stoker Hieronymus Bosch Christopher Marlowe And still they continued.
He was still gazing at the screen when Ward walked in, his hair and clothes dripping. A single sheet of paper gripped in his fist.
‘What the fuck is going on?’ Ward said, looking at the names dancing across the screen.
Connelly could only shake his head.‘It just started,’ he said, indicating the computer.
