'Good question,' I said. 'And I don't think we're going to like the answer, when we find it. I'd like to think everyone just ran away, but... I'm beginning to suspect they weren't that lucky. I don't think anyone here got out alive. Something bad happened here. And it's still happening.'
Joanna looked around her, and shuddered. 'What in sweet Jesus' name could have summoned Cathy to a place like this?'
'Let's find out,' I said, and calling up my gift I opened my private eye again. My gift was getting weaker, and so was I, but I was so close now it was just strong enough to show me Cathy's ghost prancing down the street, lit up from within by her own blazing emotions. I'd never seen anyone look so happy. She came to one particular house, that looked no different from any of the others, and stopped before it, studying it with solemn, child-wide eyes. The door opened slowly before her, and she ran up the stone steps and disappeared into the darkness beyond the door, smiling widely all the time, as though she was going to the best party in all the world. The door closed behind her, and that was that. I'd come to the end of the trail. For whatever reason, she'd never left that house again. I took Joanna by the hand and replayed the ghost so she could see it too.
'We've found her!' said Joanna, her hand clamping down on mine so hard it hurt. 'She's here!'
'She was here,' I said, pulling my hand free. 'Let me check the house out before we go any further, see what my gift can tell us about the house's past and present occupants.'
We walked right up to the house, and stopped at the foot of the dirty stone steps that led up to the paint- peeling door. Old bricks and mortar, smeared windows, and no signs of life anywhere. The door looked flimsy enough. I didn't think it could keep me out if I decided I wanted in, but this was the Night-
side, so you never knew ... I raised my gift and concentrated on the house, and despite myself I made a sudden, startled sound. There was no house before me. No history, no emotions, no memories, not even a simple sense of presence. As far as my gift was concerned, I was standing before a vacant lot. There was no house here, and never had been.
I grabbed Joanna's hand again, so she could see what I wasn't seeing, and she jumped too.
'I don't understand. Where did the house go?'
'It didn't go anywhere,' I said. 'As far as I can tell, there's never been any kind of house here.'
I let go her hand and dropped my gift, and there was the house again, right in front of me. Large as life and twice as ugly.
'Is it another ghost?' said Joanna. 'Like the cafe?'
'No. I'd recognise that. This is solid. It has a physical presence. We saw Cathy go into it. Something here ... is playing games with us. Disguising its true nature.'
'Something inside the house?'
'Presumably. Which means the only way we're going to get any answers is to force our way in, and see for ourselves. A house ... that isn't just a house. I wonder what it is?'
'I don't give a damn what it is,' Joanna said hotly. 'All that matters is finding my Cathy, and getting her the hell out of here.'
I grabbed her by the arm to stop her from charging up the steps. Her face was flushed with emotion at coming so close to the end of the chase, and her arm trembled under my hand. She looked at me angrily as I stopped her, and I made myself speak calmly and soothingly.
'We can't help Cathy by plunging headlong into traps. I don't believe in charging blindly into strange situations.'
'Just as well I'm here then, isn't it?' said Suzie Shooter.
I looked round sharply, and there she was in the street behind me; Shotgun Suzie, smiling just a little smugly, the stock of her holstered pump-action shotgun peering at me over her leather-clad shoulder. I gave her my best glare.
'First Walker, and now you. I can remember when people weren't able to sneak up on me all the time.'
'Getting old, Taylor,' said Suzie. 'Getting soft. Found anything for me to shoot yet?'
'Maybe,' I said. I gestured at the house before us. 'Our runaway is in there. Only my gift says there's something decidedly unnatural about this place.'
Suzie sniffed. 'Doesn't look like much. Let's do it. I'll lead the way, if you're worried.'
'Not this time, Suzie,' I said. 'I have a really bad feeling about this house.'
'You're always having bad feelings.'
'And I'm usually right.'
'True.'
I made my way slowly up the stone steps. There still wasn't anyone around, but I could feel the pressure of watching eyes. Suzie moved in beside me like I'd never been away, like she belonged there, her shotgun already in her hands. Joanna brought up the rear, looking a little upset at being pushed into the background by Suzie's presence. The sound of our feet on the stone steps seemed unusually loud and carrying, but it didn't matter. Whatever was waiting for us inside the house that wasn't just a house, it knew we were there. I stopped before the door. There was no bell. No knocker or letter-box, either. I rapped on the door with my fist, and the wood seemed to give slightly under each blow, as though it was rotten. The sound of my knocking was eerily soft, muffled. There was no response from within.
'Want me to blow the lock out?' said Suzie.
I tried the door-handle, and it turned easily in my grasp. The discoloured metal of the door-knob was unpleasantly warm and moist to the touch. I rubbed my hand roughly on the side of my coat, and pushed the door open with the tip of my shoe. It fell back easily. Inside, there was only an impenetrable darkness, and not a sound anywhere. Joanna pushed in beside me, staring eagerly into the dark. She opened her mouth as though to call out to Cathy, but I stopped her. She glared at me again. There was an urgency in her now. I could feel it. Suzie produced a
flashlight from some hidden pocket, turned it on and handed it to me. I nodded my thanks, and played the bright beam back and forth across the hallway before me. Hardly anything showed outside the beam, but the hall seemed long and wide and empty. I moved slowly forward, and Joanna and Suzie came with me. Once we were safely inside, the door closed behind us if its own volition, and none of us were a bit surprised.
TEN -
The house was dark and empty, utterly quiet and almost unnaturally still. It was like walking into a hole in the world. It felt like something was holding its breath, while it waited to see what we would do next. My back and stomach muscles tensed as I walked slowly down the wide hallway, anticipating an attack that somehow never came. There was danger all around me, but I couldn't put a name to it, couldn't even tell what direction it might come from. I hadn't felt this nervous in the future Timeslip. But some traps you just have to walk into to get to where you're going.
Shadows danced jerkily around me as I played the
beam of my flashlight back and forth. For all its brightness, the beam didn't make much of an impression on the dark. I could make out the hall before me, two doors leading off to the right, and a stairway to my left that led up to the next floor. Ordinary, everyday sights made somehow sinister by the atmosphere they were generating. This was not a healthy place. Not for three small humans, wandering blindly in the dark. The air was thick and oppressive, hot and moist, like the artificial heat of a greenhouse, where great fleshy things are forced into life that could not normally survive. Suzie moved silently along beside me, glaring about her. She hefted her shotgun and sniffed heavily.
'Damp in here. Like the tropics. And the smell... I think it's decay ...'
'It's an old place,' I said. 'No-one's looked after it in years.'
'Not that kind of decay. Smells more like ... rotting meat.'
We exchanged a look, and then carried on down the hallway. Our slow footsteps echoed hollowly back from the bare plaster walls. No furniture, no fittings; no carpets or comforts of any kind. No decorations, no posters or paintings or even calendars on the walls. Nothing to show that anyone had ever lived here. That thought seemed
