The Green Drift Page 4

  ‘Jesus!’ Richard said suddenly and felt sick.

  The vision was gone, the smell of death faded in the sweet summer air. Porch was brown and round again, his grey eyes clear and keen with curiosity.

  Before Porch could say anything Richard went on quickly to the gate, sweat freezing on his face with the wind of his motion. He heard Porch running softly behind him, and he slowed down.

  ‘Spiders.’ Richard said. ‘All those dead spiders. I ought to know.’

  “Horrible things, spiders,’ Porch said. ‘Too many legs.’

  Richard felt suddenly angry at him for saying it and half-turned to challenge him before he realised the stupidity of rage.

  ‘I never kill a spider,’ he said. ‘It’s bad luck.’

  ‘You don’t like them?’ said Porch.

  No, I don’t like them. I suppose I’m just frightened to ill one. It’s bad luck. We never kill them.’

  “My wife has things about the new moon,’ said Porch. You mustn’t see it through glass. You have to bow three times and turn your money over. I don’t go for that kind of thing.’

  He followed Richard back into the house to get his helmet. He picked it up, but still he did not go.

  ‘There’s all kinds of superstitions,’ said Porch, and rent on about it.

  As the voice rolled sonorously on, Richard was suddenly reminded of a scene; the scene in the Tell Tale Hearty where the police stay talking and talking until the murderer cries out, “Villains! Dissemble no more! I admit the deed ! ’

  He had a sudden urge to shout out and stop the aimless patter of the policeman. He had the feeling that if he did all would be lost, and that feeling grew so that the need to shout out became almost unbearable.

  ‘She isn’t here! ’ he said suddenly.

  Porch stared. Jennifer stopped on the landing and looked down, her heart beating fast. The tone of the voice was so taut and strange that it spiked her into stillness. She had dressed in shirt, slacks and sandals.

  ‘I know she isn’t, sir,’ Porch said.

  ‘Well, what do you want now?’ Richard said.

  Porch’s look became blank. Richard feared he would begin to see him fade into a skull again.

  ‘I’m damned if I know.’ said Porch. ‘I feel like sort ol stuck up in the air.’ His blankness changed to a frown. ‘There’s something funny about this place.’ He looked round the hall, as if the funny something might be flying about.

  Jennifer came down beside Richard.

  ‘Well?’ she said.

  ‘They ran away,’ Richard said. Porch nodded.

  ‘Ran away?’ Jennifer said, startled.

  ‘Ran away from me as if I’d got The Disease, whatever it is.’

  ‘But why?’

  ‘Don’t ask me. They dropped everything and bunked.’

  Jennifer put a hand to her brow, then shook her head.

  ‘This gets madder,’ she said.

  ‘I ll get back, sir,’ Porch said, suddenly making up his mind. ‘If they’ve decided anything—the Inspector—I’ll let you know.’ He went out, stumbled on the last step and almost fell. He went away down the path reluctantly putting his helmet on.

  As he went, Jennifer flung her arms round Richard’s neck and buried her face in his shoulder. He hugged her. She relaxed a little.

  ‘I’m frightened,’ she said, looking up at him. ‘There’s never been a day like this before. Everything’s so strange. Nobody knows what’s happening. Why did the people run away?’

  ‘I don’t know,’ he said. ‘But if it’s anything in the papers, it can only be in the News. That’s the only paper I haven’t seen now.’

  ‘Why should it be in the News and not in any of the others?’

  ‘I don’t know there’s even anything in that. But it’s a rag. It will shove in anything and apologise down amongst the small ads ten days later. You know them.’

  ‘But what could they say about us? What is there to say?’ She broke away suddenly. ‘What about that woman?’

  ‘I don’t know anything about her, honestly,’ he said. ‘If I did walk with her last night, I can’t think why. I can’t think why she’d have left the pub, anyhow. The men said I wasn’t there when she closed. Where was I, then? Where did she find me? It must have been a long time after she closed if she cleared up. What the hell was I doing?’

  ‘Waiting around for her, I suppose,’ said Jennifer sharply.

  ‘Then why did I leave the pub? Why did I go before she finished?’

  ‘Did you see her when I was away?’ Her eyes were cold and brilliant.

  ‘Only to have drinks there,’ he said. The puzzle was such that he did not notice her hardness. ‘I went down there in the evening. You had the car. I couldn’t go any further. It’s such a drag over to Cliffend.’

  ‘Did you go there much—to Barbara’s?’

  ‘Not much. Every evening. Just for the walk. We must get another dog. It makes you go out more.’

  He went back into the study and stopped by the window. looking out. She came to his side.

  ‘Have you tried to remember?’ she said.

  ‘Of course. Haven’t you?’

  ‘I just fell asleep. Nothing happened to me.’

  He stroked his jaw then turned round to the mantelpiece where he thought he had left his shaver. He looked on the table and on the bookcase shelves.

  ‘Where’s the buzzer?’ he asked. ‘I’m sure I put it on the mantelshelf.’ He went round the room, looking on the chair seats, shifting papers and magazines to look under.

  ‘Can’t you remember anything at all?’ she said. ‘Just anything?’

  ‘You don’t believe me, do you?’ he said. ‘You don’t believe I was in darkest Amnesia. All right, then. Where’s my razor?’

  ‘I don’t know where your razor is.’

  ‘Lift your slacks up.’

  Why?’

  ‘I want to feel your legs.’

  She reached down, an odd surprise running in her.

  ‘But I haven’t—’ She bent and touched the skin of her leg. ‘But I must have done.’

  He went to the door.

  ‘Ellen ! Will you see if my razor is in our bedroom?’

  ‘Yes, it is, X just put it in the drawer,’ Ellen squealed back. ‘I’ll bring it down.’

  He turned back to Jennifer.

  “Not only have you been using my buzzer again, but you try to pretend you didn’t! ’ he said briefly.

  ‘But I don’t think—I don’t—’ She looked at him and the reason for her strange surprise came out. ‘I don’t remember.’

  ‘Then you couldn’t have fallen asleep when you thought, could you?’

  Ellen came in with the razor and stumbled on the cord.

  ‘Lucky you didn’t do that coming down the stairs,’ Richard said.

  Jennifer turned away and took a cigarette from the table box.

  “I thought they was starting to go just now,’ said Ellen. ‘But there’s just as many. There’s a police car up there, sending them on, like. Why do they have that blue light flashing all the time? It’s like an ambulance. They give me the shivers. Ever since they took Mrs Dimmock away like that.… Supposing they’re still there at dinner-time? Alfie’s all right, of course: he has his dinner at school, and my husband takes his. So it wouldn’t matter, except I always go home dinner-time—’

  It was clearly the break in routine that was going to be the forecast of doom for Ellen. Richard realised it was just the same for them. It was because somebody was in the lane when there usually wasn’t anybody there at all,’ and Barbara not at home when she should have been.

  And, he was startled to realise, that was all.

  Except that they couldn’t remember last night.

  ’Ellen,’ Richard said suddenly. ‘Do you remember what you did last night?’

  ‘Well, it was Wensdy,-and always on Wensdy—’ She changed her mind. ‘He has an afternoon off on Wensdys, and we go to the flix and Alfie stays with Gra
ndma that night always.’

  ‘So you went to the pictures yesterday,’ said Richard. ‘Yes. We went into town, and it was over by nine and we came back in the car, and I remember him saying there was a rattle he would have to see to, and while I got the supper he tinkered with it. And then we had supper with the telly like and then—’ She shook her head. ‘Don’t remember next, but it’s this morning. I can’t remember anything properly, with them out there.’

  ‘Do you remember at all what happened after that?’ Richard said.

  ‘I’m all confused,’ Ellen said. ‘It’s the heat—and them out there. I couldn’t rightly say.’

  ‘Well, it was Wednesday,’ Jennifer said.

  Ellen looked at her sharply, then put her finger to her nose as if to still some kind of shock reaction. She dropped her hand.

  ‘I don’t remember, then,’ she said. ‘No, I don’t.’

  ‘I remember when it was ten o’clock,’ she went on suddenly. ‘It was that funny programme, where his wife always falls into things and gets into trouble.’

  ‘And what did she fall into last night?’

  ‘I don’t think I took much notice,’ Ellen said warily. ‘I must have been tired. Shall I do some potatoes?’

  ‘Not yet,’ Jennifer said. ‘But you might put the tea towels in the washer.’

  ‘Some of ’em are going through.’

  ‘I know. We must get some more.’

  Ellen went out. Richard plugged in the shaver.

  ‘She doesn’t remember, either,’ he said. ‘But the two men at the pub did, according to Porch. The two farmer’s men.’

  ‘You don’t think the whole village is affected with something, do you?’ Jennifer said, wide-eyed.

  ‘I wish Porch hadn’t gone,’ said Richard. ‘Because I’ve got the idea it’s something here in this house that makes us forget.’

  ‘How could it?’

  ‘I don’t know. How does anything make you forget?’ He began to shave.

  Ellen came in.

  ‘There’s a lot of dead spiders under where the washer is,’ she said. ‘I cleaned out there yesterday. I always do.’

  ‘We must have a plague of them,’ Richard said.

  ‘But they’re only in one place like,’ Ellen said. ‘You have a look.’

  Richard switched off the shaver and followed Jennifer out into the kitchen. There were small trails of dead spiders, very small ones. They were behind the washing machine under the draining board, behind the cooker and by the fridge.

  ‘I swep some up from the middle of the floor, too, when I first came,’ said Ellen. ‘There was some in the cleaner.’

  ‘It’s like a plague of flies, don’t worry,’ Richard said. ‘They’re all dead.’

  They left Ellen in the kitchen.

  ‘She’s got strangeness on her nerves,’ Richard said, as he went back into the study. ‘She’s inclined to see nasty- looking miracles in everything this morning.’ He started shaving again. ‘I feel odd myself. Pour me a beer, sweetie. I feel the need for strength.’

  She bent and picked up one of the Bass bottles from the floor by the cupboard door. She went to the table where the glasses and pots were.

  ‘Where’s the opener?’

  Isn’t it there:’ Never mind. There’s a spare hanging on the shelf in the cupboard. You know, that giant one.’

  The razor buzzed as she opened the cupboard door.

  Then it seemed there was a strange silence of great length, but was in fact less than a second of time.

  ‘Great God! ’ Jennifer cried out.

  He switched off.

  ‘What on earth’s the matter?’

  She could hardly speak.

  ‘Look” she said, after swallowing. ‘And you said—’ Al this point her voice failed her.

  Richard strode to her side and stared into the big cupboard. Lying flat out and naked upon the floor was a woman. She was lying on a pair of rumpled car rugs and her clothes were hanging from the hooks screwed into the shelves.

  ‘Good heavens! ’ Richard shouted. ‘Barbara! ’

  Both Richard and Jennifer turned from the cupboard searching each other with eyes like scanners.

  THREE

  ‘Would I have told you to look in the cupboard if I’d known?’ he hissed as he slammed the study door shut.

  ‘How do you know it’s her? Her hair’s all over her face! ’

  ‘I don’t know how I know, but who else can it be?’ he said, desperately.

  At that moment, Barbara Baynes gave a small moan and sat up. For the moment her big brown eyes registered nothing.

  ‘At least she’s alive! ’ said Richard hoarsely.

  The brown eyes suddenly gripped what they were seeing and grew brilliant with dawning horror.

  ‘Good Lord! What on earth—? Where?’

  She crossed her arms over her bosom and stared around in alarm.

  ‘Your clothes are on the hooks!’ said Jennifer furiously, and crashed the door shut.

  There was the muffled sound of her voice and moving about and falling against the door.

  ‘I can’t believe it,’ Jennifer said, glaring.

  ‘Neither can I,’ said Richard, bewildered. ‘What’s she doing in there? How did she get in there? It looks as if she went to bed there! ’

  ‘Yes, it does, doesn’t it?’ Jennifer bit her lips and turned away to hide a sudden start of tears. But instead of hiding, she found herself looking at the window and the silent, staring crowd outside.

  She had a feeling of being surrounded by horrors. They were closing in on her, eating up the familiar edges of her life as they came nearer.

  ‘I knew it was her,’ he said, incredulously. ‘I knew! ’

  She gripped her teeth together, and turned her hurt into anger.

  Ani I surprised? Or do you have all sorts of women sleeping in there? My God, my God! ‘

  ‘Don’t cry, for goodness’ sake! ’ he pleaded.

  ‘I wouldn’t let her see! Don’t worry! ’ she hissed close to him.

  But the clipboard door came open and Jennifer turned her back quickly. Barbara Baynes came out wearing a linen dress, sandals, and was trying to zip up the thigh. She saw herself in the over-mantel mirror.

  ‘Lord, I’m a mess!’ she said. ‘What’s happened? What on earth was I doing in there? Where is this, anyway? Mrs Chance—Richard— Is it your house? What happened to me? What day is it? How did I get in a cupboard—like that—?’

  There came a knock at the door, which opened slightly. Jennifer ran at it.

  ‘I’m just coming out Ellen!’ she said desperately, and pushed the door shut. Ellen called something through the panels. Nobody heard what it was.

  ‘This is fantastic! ’ Richard said in a voice so firmly in control that it quivered. ‘Utterly fantastic! ’

  Jennifer shook her head to sort her brains out.

  ‘You must have walked up here together last night,’ she said, her fists clenched as if holding tightly to the reins of lier emotion. ‘That’s what Porch said.’

  ‘Here? Me? What for?’ said Barbara. ‘But I had nothing on in there! Good Lord! Supposing I’ve been raped and never knew! I’d never forgive myself! … Last light? When is this now. then? Tomorrow?’

  ‘It’s Thursday, Thursday,’ said Richard, r “Where’s Wednesday, then? It was Wednesday last thing I knew! ’ Barbara Baynes was on the edge of blaming somebody, but could not decide which or for what. ‘Is his your house?’ She looked around. ‘Then it’s time it ras tidied up. I never saw such a hideous mess. Oh my lead! Did I get drunk? Oil no! I don’t feel ill.’ She stared at the window. ‘What time is it, if it’s Thursday?

  What happened to Wednesday night? I’ve gone mad. I’m in the bin. This is a looney bin. It’s visiting day. I was scared it would happen. I kept getting so screwed up I knew something would have to happen. That sod running off like that and leaving me with everything. 1 wouldn’t have minded, but that cow! I ask you! A bloody insult, she wa
s. Three children there, had to go to their grandmother. The miserable bitch—’

  She sat down in Richard’s working chair, put her elbows on the table and burst into tears.

  ‘Oh fish! ’ Richard groaned.

  Jennifer went to the sobbing woman and put a hand on her shoulder.

  Richard remarked that women seemed to sprout tears and the other women always seemed to go to their side, no matter which side they had been on before. Consolidating against brutal men, perhaps. He couldn’t understand it, but he couldn’t understand anything that morning. Or perhaps suddenly it was easier to understand the women. Or was it just another false impression?

  He went to the table.

  ‘Listen!’ lie said sharply. ‘Do you remember walking up here last night?’

  Barbara was shaken to lift her head and show a tear- stained face, shocked now.

  ‘Of course I don’t. Why should I walk up here?’

  ‘What’s the last thing you do remember?’

  ‘Well nothing. I mean—last night, if it was last night, and you in the bar—no, you weren’t in the bar, were you? No, you were in the garden. That’s right … It was very quiet. I worry when it’s quiet. I think that perhaps it’s because Ralph went like that and they think I’m to blame. It’s all very well. People do! Though you didn’t do anything at all, they still blame you for it. Sometimes I get tired of people. I Get tired of their stupid, staring faces. I get screaming the way they keep saying the same stupid, bloody things day after day and not a kind thing anywhere. I try to be kind and understand they have a hard life, but if they have why don’t they say so and be bitchy all the time? Why do they always try to get at people slyly, underhand, back of you all the time—?’

  ‘What do you remember?’ Richard shouted.

  She closed her eyes and shuddered slightly. Jennifer turned right away, as if to go out of the door, but stayed short of it.