Books of Blood (10 page)

     
‘Walk?’ Gina said, disbelievingly. ‘Yes… walk… I need some fresh air.’ ‘You can’t leave us here.’

      ‘I’ll find somebody to help us clear up.’ ‘But Mandy.’

      ‘She’ll get over it. Leave her be.’

      That was hard. That was almost unforgivable. But it was said now.

      He walked unsteadily towards the front door, feeling nauseous after so much spinning. At his back Gina was raging.

      ‘You can’t just leave! Are you out of your mind?’

      ‘I need the air,’ he said, as casually as his thumping heart and his parched throat would permit. ‘So I’ll just go out for a moment.’

      No, the Yattering said. No, no, no.

      It was behind him, Polo could feel it. So angry now, so ready to twist off his head. Except that it wasn’t allowed, ever to touch him. But he could feel its resentment like a physical presence.

      He took another step towards the front door.

      It was with him still, dogging his every step. His shadow, his fetch; unshakeable. Gina shrieked at him, ‘You son-of-a-bitch, look at Mandy! She’s lost her mind!’

      No, he mustn’t look at Mandy. If he looked at Mandy he might weep, he might break down as the thing wanted him to, then everything would be lost.

      ‘She’ll be all right,’ he said, barely above a whisper. He reached for the front door handle. The demon bolted the door, quickly, loudly. No temper left for pretence now.

      Jack, keeping his movements as even as possible, unbolted the door, top and bottom. It bolted again.

      It was thrilling, this game; it was also terrifying. If he pushed too far surely the demon’s frustration would override its lessons?

     
Gently, smoothly, he unbolted the door again. Just as gently, just as smoothly, the Yattering bolted it.

      Jack wondered how long he could keep this up for. Somehow he had to get outside: he had to coax it over the threshold. One step was all that the law required, according to his researches.

      One simple step.

      Unbolted. Bolted. Unbolted. Bolted.

      Gina was standing two or three yards behind her father. She didn’t understand what she was seeing, but it was obvious her father was doing battle with someone, or something.

      ‘Daddy —‘ she began.

      ‘Shut up,’ he said benignly, grinning as he unbolted the door for the seventh time. There was a shiver of lunacy in the grin, it was too wide and too easy.

      Inexplicably, she returned the smile. It was grim, but genuine. Whatever was at issue here, she loved him.

      Polo made a break for the back door. The demon was three paces ahead of him, scooting through the house like a sprinter, and bolting the door before Jack could even reach the handle. The key was turned in the lock by invisible hands, then crushed to dust in the air.

      Jack feigned a move towards the window beside the back door but the blinds were pulled down and the shutters slammed. The Yattering, too concerned with the window to watch Jack closely, missed his doubling back through the house.

      When it saw the trick that was being played it let out a little screech, and gave chase, almost sliding into Jack on the smoothly-polished floor. It avoided the collision only by the most balletic of manoeuvres. That would be fatal indeed: to touch the man in the heat of the moment.

      Polo was again at the front door and Gina, wise to her father’s strategy, had unbolted it while the Yattering and Jack fought at the back door. Jack had prayed she’d take

the opportunity to open it. She had. It stood slightly ajar:

      The icy air of the crisp afternoon curled its way into the hallway.

      Jack covered the last yards to the door in a flash, feeling without hearing the howl of complaint the Yattering loosed as it saw its victim escaping into the outside world.

      It was not an ambitious creature. All it wanted at that moment, beyond any other dream, was to take this human’s skull between its palms and make a nonsense of it. Crush it to smithereens, and pour the hot thought out on to the snow. To be done with Jack J. Polo, forever and forever.

      Was that so much to ask?

      Polo had stepped into the squeaky-fresh snow, his slippers and trouser-bottoms buried in chill. By the time the fury reached the step Jack was already three or four yards away, marching up the path towards the gate. Escaping. Escaping.

      The Yattering howled again, forgetting its years of training. Every lesson it had learned, every rule of battle engraved on its skull was submerged by the simple desire to have Polo’s life.

      It stepped over the threshold and gave chase. It was an unpardonable transgression. Somewhere in Hell, the powers (long may they hold court; long may they shit light on the heads of the damned) felt the sin, and knew the war for Jack Polo’s soul was lost.

      Jack felt it too. He heard the sound of boiling water, as the demon’s footsteps melted to steam the snow on the path. It was coming after him! The thing had broken the first rule of its existence. It was forfeit. He felt the victory in his spine, and his stomach.

      The demon overtook him at the gate. Its breath could clearly be seen in the air, though the body it emanated from had not yet become visible.

     
Jack tried to open the gate, but the Yanering slammed it shut.

      ‘Che sera, sera,’ said Jack.

      The Yattering could bear it no longer. He took Jack’s head in his hands, intending to crush the fragile bone to dust.

      The touch was its second sin; and it agonized the Yattering beyond endurance. It bayed like a banshee and reeled away from the contact, sliding in the snow and falling on its back.

      It knew its mistake. The lessons it had had beaten into it came hurtling back. It knew the punishment too, for leaving the house, for touching the man. It was bound to a new lord, enslaved to this idiot-creature standing over it.

      Polo had won.

      He was laughing, watching the way the outline of the demon formed in the snow on the path. Like a photograph developing on a sheet of paper, the image of the fury came clear. The law was taking its toll. The Yattering could never hide from its master again. There it was, plain to Polo’s eyes, in all its charmless glory. Maroon flesh and bright lidless eye, arms flailing, tail thrashing the snow to slush.

      ‘You bastard,’ it said. Its accent had an Australian lilt.

      ‘You will not speak unless spoken to,’ said Polo, with quiet, but absolute, authority. ‘Understood?’

      The lidless eye clouded with humility.

      ‘Yes,’ the Yattering said.

      ‘Yes, Mister Polo.’

      ‘Yes, Mister Polo.’

      Its tail slipped between its legs like that of a whipped dog.

      ‘You may stand.’

      ‘Thank you, Mr Polo.’

     
It stood. Not a pleasant sight, but one Jack rejoiced in nevertheless.

      ‘They’ll have you yet,’ said the Yattering.

      ‘Who will?’

      ‘You know,’ it said, hesitantly.

      ‘Name them.’

      ‘Beelzebub,’ it answered, proud to name its old master. ‘The powers. Hell itself.’

      ‘I don’t think so,’ Polo mused. ‘Not with you bound to me as proof of my skills. Aren’t I the better of them?’

      The eye looked sullen.

      ‘Aren’t I?’

      ‘Yes,’ it conceded bitterly. ‘Yes. You are the better of them.’

      It had begun to shiver.

      ‘Are you cold?’ asked Polo.

      It nodded, affecting the look of a lost child.

      ‘Then you need some exercise,’ he said. ‘You’d better go back into the house and start tidying up.’

      The fury looked bewildered, even disappointed, by this instruction.

‘Nothing more?’ it asked incredulously. ‘No miracles? No Helen of Troy? No flying?’

      The thought of flying on a snow-spattered afternoon like this left Polo cold. He was essentially a man of simple tastes: all he asked for in life was the love of his children, a pleasant home, and a good trading price for gherkins.

      ‘No flying,’ he said.

      As the Yattering slouched down the path towards the door it seemed to alight upon a new piece of mischief. It turned back to Polo, obsequious, but unmistakably smug.

      ‘Could I just say something?’ it said.

      ‘Speak.’

     
‘It’s only fair that I inform you that it’s considered ungodly to have any contact with the likes of me. Heretical even.’

      ‘Is that so?’

      ‘Oh yes,’ said the Yattering, warming to its prophecy. ‘People have been burned for less.’

      ‘Not in this day and age,’ Polo replied.

      ‘But the Seraphim will see,’ it said. ‘And that means you’ll never go to that place.’

      ‘What place?’

      The Yattering fumbled for the special word it had heard Beelzebub use.

‘Heaven,’ it said, triumphant. An ugly grin had come on to its face; this was the cleverest manoeuvre it had ever attempted; it was juggling theology here.

      Jack nodded slowly, nibbling at his bottom lip.

      The creature was probably telling the truth: association with it or its like would not be looked upon benignly by the Host of Saints and Angels. He probably was forbidden access to the plains of paradise.

      ‘Well,’ he said, ‘you know what I have to say about that, don’t you?’

      The Yattering stared at him, frowning. No, it didn’t know. Then the grin of satisfaction it had been wearing died, as it saw just what Polo was driving at.

      ‘What do I say?’ Polo asked it.

      Defeated, the Yattering murmured the phrase.

      ‘Che sera, sera.’

      Polo smiled. ‘There’s a chance for you yet,’ he said, and led the way over the threshold, closing the door with something very like serenity on his face.

PIG BLOOD BLUES

YOU COULD SMELL the kids before you could see them, their young sweat turned stale in corridors with barred windows, their bolted breath sour, their heads musty. Then their voices, subdued by the rules of confinement.

      Don’t run. Don’t shout. Don’t whistle. Don’t fight.

      They called it a Remand Centre for Adolescent Offenders, but it was near as damn it a prison. There were locks and keys and warders. The gestures of liberalism were few and far between and they didn’t disguise the truth too well; Tetherdowne was a prison by sweeter name, and the inmates knew it.

      Not that Redman had any illusions about his pupils-to-be. They were hard, and they were locked away for a reason. Most of them would rob you blind as soon as look at you; cripple you if it suited them, no sweat. He had too many years in the force to believe the sociological lie. He knew the victims, and he knew the kids. They weren’t misunderstood morons, they were quick and sharp and amoral, like the razors they hid under their tongues. They

had no use for sentiment, they just wanted out.

      ‘Welcome to Tetherdowne.’

      Was the woman’s name Leverton, or Leverfall, or —‘I’m Doctor Leverthal’

      Leverthal. Yes. Hard-bitten bitch he’d met at —‘We met at the interview.’

      ‘Yes.’

      ‘We’re glad to see you, Mr Redman.’

      ‘Neil; please call me Neil.’

      ‘We try not to go on a first name basis in front of the boys, we find they think they’ve got a finger into your private life. So I’d prefer you to keep Christian names purely for off-duty hours.’

      She didn’t offer hers. Probably something flinty.

      Yvonne. Lydia. He’d invent something appropriate.

      She looked fifty, and was probably ten years younger.

      No make-up, hair tied back so severely he wondered her

eyes didn’t pop.

      ‘You’ll be beginning classes the day after tomorrow. The Governor asked me to welcome you to the Centre on his behalf, and apologise to you that he can’t be here himself. There are funding problems.’

      ‘Aren’t there always?’

      ‘Regrettably yes. I’m afraid we’re swimming against the tide here; the general mood of the country is very Law and Order orientated.’

      What was that a nice way of saying? Beat the shit out of any kid caught so much as jay-walking? Yes, he’d been that way himself in his time, and it was a nasty little cul-de-sac, every bit as bad as being sentimental.

      ‘The fact is, we may lose Tetherdowne altogether,’ she said, ‘which would be a shame. I know it doesn’t look like much . . .‘

‘— but it’s home,’ he laughed. The joke fell among thieves. She didn’t even seem to hear it.

     
‘You,’ her tone hardened, ‘you have a solid (did she say sullied?) background in the Police Force. Our hope is that your appointment here will be welcomed by the funding authorities.’

      So that was it. Token ex-policeman brought in to appease the powers that be, to show willing in the discipline department. They didn’t really want him here. They wanted some sociologist who’d write up reports on the effect of the class-system on brutality amongst teenagers. She was quietly telling him that he was the odd man out.

      ‘I told you why I left the force.’

      ‘You mentioned it. Invalided out.’

      ‘I wouldn’t take a desk job, it was as simple as that; and they wouldn’t let me do what I did best. Danger to myself according to some of them.’

      She seemed a little embarrassed by his explanation. Her a psychologist too; she should have been devouring this stuff, it was his private hurt he was making public here. He was coming clean, for Christ’s sake.

      ‘So I was out on my backside, after twenty-four years.’ He hesitated, then said his piece. ‘I’m not a token policeman; I’m not any kind of policeman. The force and I parted company. Understand what I’m saying?’

      ‘Good, good.’ She didn’t understand a bloody word. He tried another approach.

      ‘I’d like to know what the boys have been told.’

      ‘Been told?’

      ‘About me.’

      ‘Well, something of your background.’

      ‘I see.’ They’d been warned. Here come the pigs.

      ‘It seemed important.’

      He grunted.

      ‘You see, so many of these boys have real aggression problems. That’s a source of difficulty for so very many