Especially this business about someone being able to control another person’s Astral Body. You’re going to have trouble making the readers believe that.’
‘Phil, I’m telling you, I know it can be done,’ said Blake.
‘Facts, Dave,’ the publisher reminded him. ‘Once I’ve seen the finished manuscript then maybe we can sort something out.’
There was a moment’s pause then the Scot continued.
‘David, I want this book in print as much as you do. We both stand to make a lot of money out of it but, in its present form, we’ll be laughed out of court if we publish. You realize that.’
Blake sighed.
‘Facts,’ he said. ‘All right, Phil, I’ll get back to you.’ He hung up. The writer stood there for a moment then he balled up the letter and threw it into a nearby waste-basket.
He headed back towards the cellar.
‘Hello, Phil. I’d like a word if you can spare me the time.’ ‘Sure. What’s on your mind?’
Oxford
The book fell from his hand and hit the bedroom carpet with a thud.
Dr Stephen Vernon sat up, disturbed from his light sleep. He yawned, retrieved the book and placed it on his bedside table. Then he reached across and flicked off the light. The hands of his watch glowed dully, showing him that it was almost 1.05 a.m. He pulled the sheet up to his neck and closed his eyes but the sleep which had come to him earlier now seemed to desert him. He rolled onto his side, then his back, then the other side but the more he moved the more he seemed to shed any desire to sleep.
He sat up again, reaching for the book.
He read three or four pages without remembering a single word and, with a sigh, replaced the thick tome. He decided that his best strategy was to get out of bed. He’d make himself a hot drink, that usually did the trick. Vernon clambered out of bed and pulled on his dressing gown. He left the bedside lamp burning and padded across the landing.
He was at the top of the stairs when he heard the faint knocking.
Almost instinctively he turned and looked at the door of the locked room but it took him but an instant to realize that the sound had originated downstairs.
He hesitated.
The knocking came again.
Vernon swallowed hard and moved cautiously down the first three or four steps.
Outside, in the darkness, he heard the sound of movement, the crunching of grave! beneath heavy feet.
Vernon peered over the bannister, down into the pit of blackness which was his hallway. The light switch was at the
bottom, beside the large window which looked out onto the gravel drive and the front garden.
He glanced down, his heart quickening slightly.
He had neglected to draw the curtain across that window.
The movement seemed to have stopped so Vernon scuttled down the stairs, gripping the bannister with one hand in case he overbalanced in the gloom.
He was level with the window when he saw a dark shape three or four feet from the glass.
It moved rapidly back into the gloom and seemed to disappear.
Vernon felt himself perspiring as he reached the light switch, not sure
whether to turn it on or not. If he did then he would be visible to anyone outside. His hand hovered over the switch but, eventually, he decided against it and moved cautiously into the sitting room, ears ever alert for the slightest sound.
From the brass bucket beside the fireplace he retrieved a poker then he turned and walked back into the hall, pausing at the front door, listening.
There was more movement outside.
Footsteps.
Should he call the police, he wondered? If it was burglars then there might be more than one of them. What if they should attack him?
What if he called the police but they didn’t arrive in time?
What if…
The sound was right outside the front door now.
Vernon, with excruciating care, slipped the bolt then the chain and fastened his hand around the door handle, raising the poker high above his head in readiness to strike. His heart was thudding madly against his ribs, his mouth as dry as parchment.
He pulled open the door.
Nothing.
Only the wind greeted him, a cool breeze which made him shiver. He exhaled almost gratefully and lowered the poker, squinting into the blackness in search of that elusive shape.
He saw nothing.
Vernon waited a moment longer then turned.
He almost screamed as the hand gripped his shoulder.
It appeared as if from nowhere and the older man tried to raise the poker once more but his co-ordination seemed to have deserted him. It fell from his grasp with a dull clang.
He turned to see the figure standing before him.
‘You?’ he gasped, one hand clutched to his chest. ‘What do you think you’re doing creeping about in the dark? I could have hit you with this.” He retrieved the poker. ‘I wasn’t expecting you so soon.’
Alain Joubert walked past Vernon into the house.
London
Toni Landers held the small bottle before her and read the label.
Mogadon.
She unscrewed the cap of the bottle and upended it, coaxing the contents into one hand. There were twelve of the white tablets, all that remained since she had begun taking them soon after Rick’s death.
Rick.
The thought of his name brought a tear to her eye and she sat down on the side of the bath, still clutching the tablets, remembering the monstrous image which had appeared before her the night before, called by Mathias. That abomination, that disfigured, mutilated monstrosity had been her son.
She opened her hand and looked at the tablets again.
Would twelve be enough?
She had contemplated suicide only once since he’d been killed but, after what had happened the previous night, the prospect of ending her own life now seemed positively inviting. She wiped a tear from her eye and spread the tablets out on the ledge beside the sink.
It was after three in the morning but the house was not silent.
Across the landing she could hear the muted, muffled sounds of cautious lovemaking. An occasional stifled moan of pleasure, a whispered word. It only served to remind her of her own loneliness.
She had been staying with friends ever since Rick’s death but she realized that she must go back to the States eventually. Back to her own home. The home she had shared with Rick.
She looked at the sleeping tablets once more and realized that there was no way she could return. Toni picked one up and held it between her fingers for a moment. It wouldn’t be difficult. She’d take the tablets then wander back to
bed and fall asleep. It was that simple. All she had to do was take the first tablet. Then the second. Then …
She filled a beaker with water and got to her feet.
As she did so, she realized that the sounds of lovemaking had stopped. The house was silent again.
Toni heard footsteps, soft and light crossing the landing. She scooped up the Mogadon and pushed them back into the bottle, slipping it into the pocket of her housecoat. But, the footsteps receded momentarily and she guessed that whoever it was had gone into the nursery.
