Free!
What a lovely word.
To celebrate the release of my YA horror A Graveyard Visible (get it
HERE), here's a second chance at this short story for you all to enjoy, or hate, or laugh along with, or laugh at, or to do with as you damn well please. All donations welcome.
It's a story I submitted to a few places, but never quite found a home, which is code for 'they hated it'. In all honesty it's about a million miles from perfect, but the energy is great, and I'm pleased with the opening image. It seems a shame to leave it languishing as a file in the cloud forever.
Quick ad for the new book first:
PRAISE
FOR A GRAVEYARD VISIBLE
‘A
GRAVEYARD VISIBLE is a literate horror story, a surreal portrait of
coming of age, pariah status, and intellect. It is also the story of
a tiny depressing town, and of a strange--even bizarre--cemetery,
where the impossible occurs.’ - Mallory A. Haws: The Haunted
Reading Room Reviews
‘This
book goes from “good” to “great” to “I can’t put this
book down until I have finished it”. If you want creepy,
edge-of-your-seat page turner, this is for you!’
- Laurie’s Library Place
‘This
book will make you want to close your eyes, but you can't... It's
scary and chilling, and horror buffs won't want to miss this one.’
- Amy’s Bookshelf Reviews
‘For
me personally, this is a story of profound loss. Each character is
battling with their own loss and dealing with it in varied ways. It
is through this loss that I really connected with Caleb...’ -
Jayne, Goodreads review
‘Caleb
is clearly a timid child and is all alone in the world. His mother is
a terrible loss but in addition he has lost a father too. I loved how
the author was able to portray this through his writing... (Caleb’s)
development throughout the story was important. At first he was a
scared, lonesome boy but after realising that there is a terrible
evil to overcome, he turns into a courageous young man.’ -
https://www.rorotbd.wordpress.com/
Enough of that: to the story!
Fair warning - there's an occasional bit of strong language from the dear old ladies, and the odd splattery part. Oh, and the German translations are probably way, way off, but I only took French at A level and Ancient Latin in university (what a ridiculous life I've led), so like a lazy git I just relied on Google Translate for those bits. Technically, therefore, it's not really my fault if it's wrong.
If you do happen to read it, be a love and take a sec to leave a quick note about what you think.
Oldies
Maude wiped the blood from her cheek with a lace handkerchief and took a sip of freshly-brewed tea. ‘She was a right bugger to deal with,’ she said, placing down the cup and taking a pre-made rollie out of a battered silver case.
Enid produced a lighter from her handbag, lit Maude’s cigarette and took one for herself. ‘She got a bit excitable towards the end.’ She opened the back door to keep the kitchen aired. ‘Do you fancy one of these scones with butter or cheese sandwiches?’
‘Oh, a couple of scones would be lovely. Cheese has been playing havoc with my doings lately.’ Maude moved herself to the back step. Dear old Enid didn’t like anyone to get in the way when she was faffing in a kitchen, even when the kitchen wasn't hers, and she could get a smidgen grumpy after a killing. ‘Her petunias are coming on a treat.’ The whole garden was a finely-tuned delight. A neatly-mown lawn with a dainty fountain in the middle. Perfectly straight rows of radiant flowers. Hedges trimmed and precisely level.
‘You’re having one of your wobbles, aren’t you?’
Maude kept her back to the annoyingly sharp-witted old woman. Enid would regularly forget where she’d left her glasses and have the most amazing difficulties naming family members, but when it came to spotting one of Maude’s moods she was always on the button. ‘Don’t be ridiculous. Why on earth would I be having a wobble? Look, steady as a rock.’ She held out a liver-spotted hand which jaked and jittered. She hadn’t had a steady hand in almost ten years.
‘Stupid old bat,’ said Enid. ‘That wasn’t funny the last fifty times you did it either.’
‘That’s because you’re dead inside, dear.’ Given the circumstances, the joke fell flat. ‘We’re old women, dear, we’ve been around every block. Think about the people in this village, what would they make of it all? It would take God knows how long to explain to them that we’re not a pair of crazy old mares ready for the knacker’s yard.’
‘God doesn’t have much to do with any of this.’ Enid searched for a couple of nice plates for the neatly halved and buttered scones. 'It's perfectly normal to have second thoughts about things when you've just finished off one of your neighbours.'
'And now we're tucking into one of her scones,' said Maude as her heart fluttered.
'Yes we are, because I need a rest and a smoke and a cuppa and a bite to eat before we start shifting her and tidying up. I feel awful about Agnes, of course I do, but she was dead before we got here, dead for days. That thing up there would have bitten your arse off without a single thought, and you know that, so stop being a silly old fool.'
‘Oh, go on, have another go at me. I’m only bloody human. I've got my worries just like everyone else.’
‘Give over. Being precious doesn’t suit you. She was a horrible busy-body in life. It's not like you've lost your bosom buddy, is it?'
'She didn't deserve that, though.' Maude inhaled deeply on her cigarette, the smoke rasping across her lungs. 'She might have been a shite-hawk, but no-one deserves that.'
'Yes. Well.' Enid couldn't find anything to add. She joined her old friend in the garden to smoke. A low wail wound up on the other side of the village, like some monstrous giant had lost its great love. 'You think it's the real thing this time?'
Maude shook her head. 'It'll be Old John getting carried away again, seeing Germans in the waves when there's nothing but water. He needs to lay off the rum.'
'And you say I'm a cynic.' A coughing attack overtook Enid, a thick, liquid sound. Maude slapped her a little too hard between the shoulder-blades and was waved off. 'Give over, I'm not choking, I'm just dying by degrees.' The siren reached full blare, a blanket warning of horror to come.
'That's you and me both on our last legs,' said Maude as she examined the fatly black sky. 'We're getting slow. This isn't an old woman's game.'
'Blah blah blah.' Enid flicked her cigarette at the petunias. 'Same old blather. If it's not the killing, then it's the people we're killing, or you're too old or too slow or this is no work for a woman I told you last time, if you're worried about dying and leaving the job undone, then you need to find someone to train up, someone who can be trusted not to drop us in it. And if you mention that grand-daughter of yours again you’ll be told to shove it. That girl has no idea that a mouth can be shut as well as open. Plus she’s an idiot. She can't decide which side of the bed to get out of in the morning, never made making hard decisions on the spot. I know she’s your grand-daughter, but I have to be honest.’
'Honesty's lovely, just stop enjoying it so much.' With one last glance to the sky, Maude led the way back indoors. Bolts were jolted into place. ‘I know she’s dumb as a post. I might love the lass, but I’m not blind. Not yet, anyway.’ She took a bite of a scone and scattered enough crumbs to make Enid tut. 'But there's no-one else. All the lads are taken up with the LDV.'
‘It hasn’t been called that for two years, you daft old bat.’
Maude scoffed as she pulled the shutters across the kitchen window. ‘Call it what you like, it comes down to the same thing, all boys together playing at armies. What do you propose we do? Stroll into one of their little meetings, stop one of their drills to tell them that we’ve got a plague of monsters and we’ve been going round chopping them up?’
‘We’re hardly chopping anyone...’
‘Did you forget about Glenda? She was in pieces by the end of Monday night. As was I. You going to stand there or help me lock up?’
Enid’s expression held the exasperation of years of friendship. ‘There’s no winning with you. You want to find a replacement but no-one’s good enough. Anyone would think you’re moaning for the sake of it. All those lads are doing is strolling along the cliff tops, swinging sticks at each other, and imagining what it would be like to fire the guns they’ll never get. They’d love to get involved in this, I’m telling you.’
Bang, bang, bang on the door. The old ladies shared a look. ‘Is the lamp still on in the front room?’
Maude peeked. ‘Yes.’
‘And the curtains?’
‘Open.’
Bang, bang, bang. A muffled voice above the siren: ‘Agnes? You need to get your shutters up, we reckon we’ve got incoming. Can you hear me, Agnes?’
‘Shite,’ said Maude.
‘Language,’ said Enid. ‘Is that the Robinson’s laddie?’ A nod. ‘He might move on.’
‘You haven’t had a fall have you, Agnes? Can you hear me, love? Are you alright?’ The door handle rattled.
‘Hold on,’ shouted Maude. To her partner: ‘The bugger’s going to end up kicking his way in. He’s been a pain in the arse since he learned to walk, this one.’ She wove through the clutter of armchairs and footstools and small chests in Agnes’ front room to reach the front door, shuddering in its frame as the visitor banged again. ‘I said hold on! I’m not a bloody Olympian.’
‘Who’s that?’
Maude struggled with the keys before getting the door open. ‘It’s me, that’s who,’ she told Sid Robinson, a lanky streak of boy in a cobbled-together man’s uniform. His tin helmet resembled a bucket attacked by hammers. ‘What do you want?’
‘Er, I’m, er, doing the rounds, er, making sure everybody locks up and boards their windows.’
‘It’s hard to lock up when I’m opening the door to you.’
‘It’s just that Betty down the road said she’d heard a bit of a commotion is all.’
Maude’s jaw clenched as she prayed that the boy didn’t overhear Enid behind her hissing about busy-bodies. ‘She had a bit of a fall, she’s not so steady on her feet these days, so she’s having a bit of a lie down. Nothing to worry about.’ She started to shut him out, but Sid put out a gently firm arm.
‘I’ll be deciding if there’s any worrying to do or not.’ His tone was a poor copy of the Sarge’s. It was a tone that gave Maude an urge to cuff his ear. ‘Falling down isn’t a kerfuffle, is it? Betty told me there was a right old racket.’
Dear old Betty was meant to be mostly deaf. ‘Our apologies. Agnes over-reacted a little, thought she’d broken something when really it’s only a little bit of bruising. She can be a drama, you know.’
‘Right. Well, can you make sure everything’s boarded up for her? And don’t try to make your way home, you’ll be best off staying here until...’
‘Until?’
‘Dunno. Until whatever this is blows over.’ Sid lowered his arm and Maude’s relief at getting rid of this boy was immense and she saw his eyes widen with horror and his foot shot forward to jam the door open and here was trouble. ‘I think now’s the time for you to tell me a few truths, don’t you?’
She turned to look at whatever had caught his eye. Propped against the wall at the foot of the stairs was a blood-covered pike. ‘That? I... don’t know anything about that...’
Enid elbowed her out of the way flung the door wide and thrust a knife at Sid’s throat. ‘Get in here, boy. Quick, before I decide to cut you anyway.’ He moved to grab the knife; she pressed the blade against his flesh. ‘Ever killed anyone, Army boy? Seen blood pumping out of a neck? It’s part of everyday life for me. Get your arse in now.’ With her free hand she got him by the scruff of the neck and pulled him inside. ‘Get the bloody door shut, Maude, and draw those curtains.’ She gave Sid a shove towards the stairs. ‘Up you go, laddie. Any messing around and this knife will go right up you.’ She gave him a prod when he failed to move.
‘You wait till the Sarge hears about this,’ he said, petulant. ‘He’ll have you, I’m telling you, he’ll bloody well have you.’
‘This is not a good idea,’ said Maude, locking up. ‘This is not how to do things.’
‘What’s the choice?’ Enid’s anger came through louder than her fear. ‘Let him go running off to tell the village that we’re murderers?’
‘You’ll end up in jail.’ A tremble shot through Sid’s shouts. ‘They won’t just throw away the key, they’ll bloody bury it.’
Maude followed them up the stairs. ‘He’s just a daft lad.’ She hefted the pike in case the daft lad tried anything.
‘He’s the fresh blood you’ve been asking for. Now if he doesn’t get a move on, prod him with your big stick.’
‘The pair of you will burn in Hell if you’ve hurt poor Agnes!’
‘Prod him.’
Maude obliged, without gusto. Sid leaped up three stairs with a yelp. ‘Why couldn’t you have pissed off, Sid?’ She suddenly felt like jabbing him a good deal harder. ‘You had to be the big man, didn’t you?’ At the top of the stairs he stopped and cringed, and she tried to push past Enid to get at him. ‘You stupid little shit! I ought to break your skull!’
‘That’s enough of that,’ said Enid, waving her friend down. ‘I said prod him, not kill him. Not until he’s seen what he’s here to see.’
Bravado gone, Sid shook his head, a lamb before the old wolf. ‘I didn’t mean it. I didn’t mean I’d tell the Sarge. Let me go.’
‘You wanted to see Agnes? Get in that room, or I’ll let this one loose with her stick. Move!’ Her phlegmy bark drove him to the bedroom door. His flappy hands got in an awful struggle with the handle. He jittered about, expecting the insertion of the pike at any second, then he was in and gagging on a miasma of sulfurous flesh and bubbling rot. Enid, pinching her nose, leaned into her friend and murmured: ‘Didn’t think you had it in you, great job acting like a bad bugger, we’ll have an heir to our throne in no time.’
‘Old age has finally sent you loopy if you think this is a good idea.’
‘But Maude, it’s not my idea, it’s yours.’ Enid followed Sid before Maude could vent any further.
The young man had both hands cupped at his mouth. He was vomiting into them, and doing a poor job of holding onto the slippery stuff. It splattered his scuffed boots. He heaved again, spurred on by the mess on the bed.
‘Think I’ll crack a window,’ said Enid, giving Sid a consoling pat on the shoulder as she passed. Fright jumped him against the bed, rocking the corpse on top. The final contents of his stomach threw themselves up his throat and out. ‘Alright, laddie, pull yourself together. We’ve got enough cleaning up to do.’
‘What the fuck have you done?’ he asked thickly, holding his dripping hands out before him.
Maude gave him a warning tap with the pike. ‘Language. And I’ll tell you what the fuck we’ve done, we’ve saved the likes of you from getting your arse bitten off while you stand on the cliffs looking out for Germans who’ll never come.’
Taking out another cigarette, Enid parked herself on the end of the bed, inches from a taloned foot. ‘This thing here used to be Agnes, but Agnes didn’t die here. The thing that took her over, that’s what we killed. No, no, shut your mouth and look at it. Look. We’re not murderers because murder involves killing a human. Look at her teeth. Look at the size of the eye sockets. Do you remember Agnes having a ridge across her brow like that? Or a set of fingers like those?’ Sid made a series of noises that could have been attempts to start a sentence. ‘And I know her chest is a mess, but do you remember her shoulders being that broad? And look at...’
‘I can see!’ His shout was ragged, on the verge of a scream. ‘Christ, I can see, alright? God help me, I can.’ He reached towards the triple-jointed fingers, then thought better of it. ‘What is this?’
‘We call them boggarts,’ said Maude, putting her weapon to one side, ‘but you can call them what you like, it doesn’t change how horrible they are. They’ve been popping up in the village. We find them, we get rid of them. They get into people somehow, take them over.’
‘How?’
Enid was already halfway through her smoke. ‘We don’t know. We’re a pair of biddies, not scientists. I can tell you that they horde knives and screwdrivers and the like, gather tools for when they’re ready to start killing. This thing that once was Agnes, it’s collected drawers full of blades. Drawers. All sharpened. While you and your mates were wearing your little armbands, the enemy was here and arming itself.’
‘Cup of tea, love?’ asked Maude of Sid.
‘No, ta.’ A fingernail-sized piece of flesh tumbled into the gaping wound in the boggart’s chest. Sid retched a little despite being empty. ‘How many... Urrgh, how many of these have you, er, have you...’
‘That’s the fourth. We thought after the first trio we’d nipped it in the bud, but...’ Enid shrugged and smoked.
Maude took over. ‘I can see what you’re thinking. You could persuade one of your mates to come over, but what do you think they’re going to see? The monster, or what remains of a corpse? It wouldn’t end very well for us. What I’m saying is, you need to choose. Are you going to run to the Sarge with your monster story, or are you going to help us?’
‘It’s, er, it’s...’
‘A lot to take in, yes. Compared to how me and Enid found out, you’ve been eased into this.’
Sid was a ghost of himself. ‘You want me to be stabbing people.’ A statement, not a question. ‘You want me to do actual killing.’
Enid flashed him a big smile. ‘We want you to fight the good fight. How about it?’
‘Oh boy,’ said Sid, running a greasy hand through his hair. ‘I just started seeing Sadie Buttersworth an’ all.’
That made Enid laugh until a rasping cough took over. ‘You’re alright, laddie,’ she spluttered, ‘you’re alright.’
‘No,’ said Sid. ‘No I’m not alright. I can’t have anything to do with this. I can’t! Look at me, look at what I’m wearing! I’ve got my Dad’s knackered old boots, this stupid armband, and that helmet, it looks like a fucking bucket attacked by hammers. I’m not even a real soldier, and you want me to do this? You’re not right in the head.’ His voice was rising. Enid flicked the fag butt and shut the window. ‘Look at the teeth on it! And the fingers! And you’re telling me there’s more of these things? And you think I want to meet them?’
‘I knew it,’ said Maude, reaching for the pike. ‘Bloody toy soldier, good for nothing. Don’t worry, she said, it’ll all work out fine, she said, load of old crap.’
Enid looked put out. ‘I said it was all your idea, and that’s all I said.’
Sid stepped towards Maude. ‘Out the way.’ He was stopped by a metallic point an inch from his nose.
‘What we going to do with him?’ asked Maude of Enid.
‘Let him go I suppose.’
‘Let him go? Stupid old bat.’ She didn’t take her eyes off the boy, didn’t even blink. ‘This is why I didn’t want to find someone to take over because I knew nobody could handle it. He knows what we do, and he can’t cope, so what now?’
The urge was strong in Enid to strike up another smoke. ‘Christ on a bike. You want it plain and simple? Here it is. We either let him go and hope he doesn’t drop us in it, or kill him and dump him with whatever’s eventually left of Agnes. Alright?’
Sid turned away from the pike, turned to the corpse. 'Kill me, then. Get it over with. You dragged me in here. I didn’t want to see this. I’m fifteen! There’s Nazis out there and there’s this in here and what chance have we got? All I want is a life for me and Sadie and I can’t have it. So kill me and have done with it.’
Maude groaned. ‘For Christ’s sake. I can’t go killing this silly little bugger, Enid, you know that. Let him go. Let him say what he wants. Fuck it. I don’t care any longer.’
‘Language. If you’re sure you’re sure, then...’ Tap. Tap, tap, tap. ‘That the front door again?’ A nod. ‘Bloody hell. Busy night considering the bloody air raid siren’s going off.’
‘Help!’ shouted Sid and he lunged forward and shouldered Maude out of the way and stumbled down the stairs shouting ‘Help!’ all the way.
‘What’s going on in there?’ called a voice outside as Enid clambered over her felled friend.
‘Betty! What on earth is she doing here?’
Sid’s feet tangled at the bottom of the stairs, and he hit the door face-first, smashing a tooth out of his head. Enid’s knees wouldn’t allow her to descend at any speed other than slowly. ‘You wait there one minute, Sidney Robinson. You obey me, I’m your elder!’ He tried to shake off the grogginess, fumbled with the keys. ‘Sidney! Don’t!’
‘Help me out!’ A returned urge to live pushed his voice to feminine heights.
A tremendous thud against the door from the outside. Sid took a backward step into the living room. A second later and there was no more front door and the air was strewn with chunks of wood. Splinters embedded in Enid’s forearms as she shielded her face.
In stepped a mockery of Betty. Bone bulged around the eye sockets. Those teeth didn’t fit her mouth right. Triple-jointed fingers clacked restlessly. Hunched and hulking, this Betty turned Sid’s bowels to water. It reached with too long arms, dragged Enid down the remainder of the flight, threw her at the boy. She and he hit the floor, a sore bundle.
Rasping like a dying airplane engine, Betty spoke. ‘We need a chat. Where’s the other.’
‘What other?’ snarled Enid.
‘Play games and I will tear off your arms.
‘I’m coming, I’m coming,’ huffed Maude. She appeared at the foot of the stairs, clutching the top of her arm. ‘Would have been quick if Master Robinson hadn’t decided to dislocate my shoulder.’
Fat, slimy words hacked through the mass of teeth in once-Betty’s strained and splitting mouth. ‘Get over there, bitch.’ One of her disgusting hands shoved Maude, a shove in the injured shoulder, and Maude heard herself cry out from far away as cold grey sheets rushed in from all corners, and a barked shin against a coffee table sharp woke her back up. Sid caught her before she pitched headlong into the fireplace.
‘You alright?’ asked Enid while not feeling particularly alright herself.
‘Excuse the language, but I’ve just picked up a bruise the size of a fucking tin helmet and it’s put me in a bit of a mood.’
In a wild temper Betty slashed out with an engorged hand, hit an armchair, snapped its back in two. ‘Shut mouths! Old bitches!’ Betty tensed, and tensed some more, bunching up and if she launched at them now they’d be smashed against the wall and splashed across the ceiling. ‘Stupid chit-chat, like this is one of your tea parties!’ Maude nudged Enid before any wisecracks could emerge. ‘Murderers!’ Betty snatched up the broken chair. ‘Murderers!’ She hurled it across the room where it crashed into the dining table, and Betty roared, throat bulging to let the raging noise loose, and Sid sank to his knees before this tirade and wept.
The once-Betty saw his crumpled form, his streaking tears, and her tension dissipated, dripping away from bulging head to fat toes bursting out of slippers. Her voice softened, but that deep-pit rumble remained like radio crackle. ‘Sidney. Poor, poor Sidney. A boy dressed up for the wrong gathering. Such fresh flesh.’ Gurgling laughter. ‘Do you like your new friends, Sidney? Do you like what they dragged you into? A bet I know what you didn’t like, the things they did to Agnes. Dear old Agnes. Did they make a mess of her? I smell the vomit on you. They must have left her in pieces.’
It was with a snarl that Enid spoke. ‘My God, you moan on exactly the way she did. Why don’t you give it a rest already?’
One of those long, long arms lifted, a thrice-knuckled digit uncurled to point. ‘Don’t be rude or I’ll poke out your eyes.’ With that corrupted limb outstretched, it was easy to believe that a quick flick could pluck an eyeball from a skull. ‘Sidney, I let you go, do you remember? You came a-knocking on my door, and I’m hungry you know, always so hungry and I could eat and eat and your flesh looks so sweet and yet I kindly turned you away. I wanted to rip open the door and drag you in and chop you up in the pantry and chew on your sweet flesh until there was only bones left to suck, and what I did was politely turn you away. And what did these murderers do? They dragged you into it. They pulled you in. They showed you blood and death.’ An attempt to smile split lips. ‘Who’s the real monster here? They’ve killed four times and stolen your innocence, and all I want to do is survive.’
An ornamental wooden owl bounced off Betty’s head. Oily blood seeped from the thin tear that opened the dry skin. Her left eye inflated angrily as she barked outrage. ‘There,’ said Enid. ‘There’s your monster. It’s that thing there, wearing a miserable old biddy like a ripped suit.’
The sight of that black, bleak liquid trickling from that mis-shapen temple stopped Sid’s tears. Real bleeding from an unreal thing. Cracks in his throat. ‘You sent me here, Betty. You knew what you were sending me into. Maybe you are hungry, but you like your games too, don’t you? You like watching me wriggle on the line, you disgusting thing.’ He brought his foot down on the coffee table that had tripped Maude, a heavy-booted foot, and smashed the table to bits. The sound, the action, the unexpected, caused Enid to jump. Her heart flapped like a mad bat. He picked out a short splintered leg, wielded it, a bludgeon. ‘Yes, you had your reasons, you’ve got your game. Well, I’m ready to play now.’
It occurred to Maude that the air-raid siren was still howling its mournful warning. Had it been three minutes since it started? Ten minutes? Two hours? Why was she thinking about this when once-Betty was bracing its long arms and ripped-slippered feet against the wall, preparing to thrust itself at them? She looked around. No more wooden owls. And her shoulder couldn’t cope with smashing up chairs and tables the way Sid could. Of all the people/monsters to take her and Enid down, it had to be this old windbag, the worst gossip in a gossipy village.
The boggart was grinding its teeth so hard that Maude heard two of them snap. Sid had his fists up, ready to box. She laughed. The stranger in the doorway didn’t. He pointed his gun and looked alarmed.
‘Who the hell is that?’ asked Enid.
Bulging, bleeding face rage-twisted, Betty craned her neck round for a look.
‘Was zum Teufel ist das?’ barked the soldier.
Enid had time to say ‘Language,’ before the rifle made a thin high crack, a noise that whip-lashed her ears, and a chunk of the boggart’s head blew off in a red-black mist and Maude screamed with painful volume, but no, it wasn’t Maude: her voice was a ruin from decades of smoking. Sid was the screamer. He was hitting incredible pitch.
Betty scrabbled at the air for something to stop her fall. Her ruined head dashed against a foot stool, and a small piece of blackened brain popped out onto the floor. The boggart’s legs kicked like it was sprinting in a race, heels drumming hard and fast. It clawed about wildly, tearing gouges in the plaster on the walls. The soldier switched the aim of his rifle between the creature and the group of people by the fireplace. ‘Was ist das?’ he shouted. ‘Was ist das für ein Ding?’
‘He sounds upset,’ said Enid.
‘Him being upset doesn’t bother me,’ said Maude. ‘That rifle of his bothers me.’
‘Sag mir, was los ist!’ barked the soldier, jabbing the weapon’s barrel in their direction before snapping it back to the jittering boggart. He took a step back as it kicked its slippers off.
Sid wasn’t screaming anymore. Maude saw his shoulders tense. He’d put himself in gear, but was it for fight or flight? She raised her hands; to catch Sid, or calm the soldier, she wasn’t sure which.
The boggart stopped thrashing. One overlong arm remained stiffly aloft. The soldier’s attention focused on that arm. And then Sid was pinwheeling towards him, flailing like a flung ragdoll. The rifle fired a second time. Sid jumped like he’d just had the world’s biggest surprise, then fell to the floor. A blood-thinning cry of delight, and the boggart lashed out with bare and taloned feet, tearing chunks of flesh out of the soldier’s shins, baring bone. He only had a few seconds to shriek in agony before his throat was crushed and his head smashed against floorboards.
Maude dropped to protesting knees beside Sid, rolled him over with a struggle. Blood seeped from his mouth. He couldn’t see her with his marble eyes. ‘Bloody hell, Sidney.’ And because she couldn’t think of anything else to say: ‘Bloody hell.’
Stepping over the dead boy, Enid scooped up the rifle, pointed the bangy end at the boggart. She’d never handled one before. She hoped it didn’t show. ‘Listen here, Betty,’ she said to the monster that was busy carving into the German’s face with its claws. ‘I’ve had enough for one day.’ The boggart growled at her with its half-mouth, spilling thick, greasy blood down its front, but it kept on carving. ‘If you want to continue existing, you need to do what I say.’
With a final tug and a wet tear, the monster pulled a section of the soldier’s head loose and screwed it into place within its own head. It held Enid with a sickeningly uneven gaze, one boggarty eye, one dead soldier eye looking out from a ragged patchwork face. It tapped the body it had just mutilated, fingers dripping. ‘Wha dis sack o shi?’
‘That sack of shit is a German. That German shot you in the face. There’s more of them out there. More, ready to shoot you as well. You think us two old biddies are bad news? When that lot gets wind of how dangerous you and your lot are, they’ll stop at nothing to wipe you out. Not for a cup of tea, not for a smoke, nothing. All they’ll want to do is shoot you in the face. You understand?’ The boggart traced its grey fingers around the bloody edges of its new chunk of head. ‘So it’s up to you. Waste time on us, or...’
‘Kill Germans! Kill Germans!’ It beat upon the corpse, pounded, pummeled. ‘Kill Germans!’
Icy, Maude said, ‘Fucking get on with it, then.’
Enid brought the rifle butt up against her shoulder in a manner intended to convey threat. A decision for the boggart. A choice between being a short distance away from the weapon that had already partially scrambled its brain, or the playground of the night outdoors and the many vengeances it could take.
Patchwork Betty fled.
Enid offered Maude a hand. It was accepted, and both women made various moanings and groanings as they battled Maude’s knees to get her upright. ‘Hopefully that’ll buy us five minutes or so of peace.’
Maude looked out of the front door. There were shots in the night, and thin, hot fireflies slicing the village. ‘How do you think all this will turn out?’
‘Badly, most likely.’ She looked terrible in her oldness, ill, like she’d never been young, like a soul born withered. They both did. A pair of oldies. ‘Let them sort it out. Then, whoever’s left, we’ll deal with them. We’ll have to.’ She made her way to the kitchen. ‘Fancy a cuppa?’
‘Stupid question,’ said Maude, following. ‘Not sure what we’re going to tell poor Sidney’s mother.’
‘I wouldn’t worry about that yet. She might not survive a night like this.’
‘Listen, Enid, I’ve got to ask. You didn’t push him, did you? You didn’t?’
Enid did the best she could with a smile as she filled the kettle. ‘You know what your problem is, don’t you? You worry too much.’
