Sarah Rayne - What Lies Beneath

‘I am. I’m sorry. I should have been firmer about Sir Julius, and I should have warned you… The male instincts are still strongly with him, it seems. I should have warned you he might want to—’

‘You couldn’t have known,’ said Serena quickly, because it would be curdlingly embarrassing if he referred to the marriage act. Nor could she possibly let anyone know that Julius had forced her. Let Dr Martlet and anyone else believe this conception had happened during one of Julius’s normal spells – one of the times when he was living in the house as usual, talking to people, behaving ordinarily.

Martlet did not press the point. He merely said, ‘I shall take very good care of you.’

After Dora had shown him out, Serena sat by the window of her bedroom for a long time. Her mind was in turmoil. People said nowadays that the manner of a child’s conception could not influence its character.

But what of a child fathered by a man at the height of insanity? A child conceived from out of that violent darkness .

Entries From an Undated Journal

There were no darknesses in Crispian’s life. I always knew that. All that lay ahead of him were good and happy things. Inherited money and property, and let’s not forget Cadences itself. I could see him very clearly indeed sitting in the bank’s famous oak-panelled boardroom, presiding over directorial meetings, issuing orders, controlling the lives of so many people. And the thing that hurt most was that he would do it so well and all those people would like and trust him. They would like him right up until he died, and probably afterwards. Whereas it’s unlikely anyone will mourn me, or even remember me after I’m dead.

It’s a curious feeling to know so definitely when you’re going to die. There are four and a half days left to me now. One hundred and eight hours. Or have I miscounted? Dear God, have I? No, I’m right. Why I should panic so massively at the thought I might have miscalculated a few hours, I can’t think.

I believe if I could put an end to my life now and avoid what’s ahead I’d do so, but it’s impossible and, believe me, gentle reader, I’ve checked. I’ve bloody checked every fucking possibility and there’s absolutely no way I can commit suicide…

Rereading that last sentence, it amuses me to juxtapose flowery Victorian or Austen-esque phrasing with stinging obscenity. In any case, they weren’t so very prim, those Victorians, it was just that they had to appear to bow to the conventions of the day. I’ll bet Charles Dickens sometimes had to restrain himself from adding a saucy paragraph or two when he chronicled the exploits of his street women and his gangs of ruffians. And let’s not forget H. G. Wells and his numerous liaisons and freethinking outlook, or Oscar Wilde…

I’m straying from the point. I’m trying to explain, to anyone who might read this, that there’s nothing I can do to cheat the inevitable. But there’s also the fact that I haven’t entirely given up hope. I still have a tiny, absurd green shoot of belief that something will happen, that some long-odds, outside chance will rear up and come hurtling in like a deus ex machina. God in a machine, riding to my rescue? Some chance.

God was certainly nowhere to be seen during that sea voyage, and if anyone walked with me that day the ship docked at Messina, it was the Devil…

I sometimes think if any of the great actor-managers had witnessed my behaviour during that sea voyage, they would have whisked me off to their theatres there and then, and set me down on their lighted stages.

I was good . No, dammit, I wasn’t just good, I was inspired . Believe me, David Garrick and Henry Irving had nothing on me, and as sure as God is my judge I fooled everyone. It’s extraordinary how, once you adopt a role, it starts to become part of you. I think it’s safe to say I almost became the person I was trying to portray. I wanted to become that person as well, I honestly did. I wanted to be normal. But every time I thought I might be within grasping distance the darkness would stir.

It was with me on the day the ship put into Messina and it was one of the times when I let it have its way – one of the times when it was too strong for me.

Messina is a very old city, but it suffered an earthquake a few years before our visit – 1908, I think it had been – and a lot of it had been rebuilt. Even so, the traces of the ancient city were still visible. There were fragments of Greek and Byzantine influences, if anyone reading this likes that kind of historical detail. And, like most cities, you can walk along a modern street with smart new buildings, then turn a corner and find yourself in an ancient cobbled square, as if you’ve stepped back three or four centuries. I’ve done that many a time in London.

That day in Messina, there was one moment when I was in a broad street, with bustle and shops and people, and then the next moment I was in a dark narrow alleyway in the shadow of one of the ancient cathedrals. There was a service going on inside the cathedral. I could hear faint chanting voices and the sonerous notes of an organ. It sounded as if they were reciting the General Confession. It was in Latin, of course, and although I’m no scholar in the accepted sense, I remembered enough of my schooldays to translate most of it. Mea culpa , they were chanting. Mea culpa, mea culpa, mea maxima culpa… And even though the darkness had its teeth and claws into me, I stood there in that ancient corner of an old city, my mind splintering with pain, and found myself asking forgiveness for what I was going to do. It was very nearly medieval behaviour, like those sly, venal priests who traded in indulgences and sold pardons before the sin was committed. Like building up a credit balance with God. But I stood there and thought – God forgive me for what I can no longer help. Then I went, like that poor wretched creature Edward Hyde, deeper into Messina’s Old Quarter to slake the hunger and reach the peace that always came afterwards.

I found what I wanted quite quickly. Any city has its women of the streets, and ports probably have more than most. The alley I entered was narrow and sunless, with tall deserted buildings on both sides, warehouses of some kind, their windows boarded up. Arched bridges spanned the street overhead and it was a slightly sinister place. But oh God, it was so very exciting to stand in a shadowy doorway, waiting. It was, in fact, an excitement that tipped over into actual sexual arousal. I write that without comment and once again the reader may judge me as he or she wishes. But I’ll wager that a great many murderers – and murderers manqué – go to their macabre work in a semi-erectile state. The books don’t describe that, of course.

As I waited, my heart thudding with anticipation, one or two people walked past, but I pressed back against the wall and none of them seemed aware of me.

There’s a line from some Shakespearean play, I forget which one, but it goes, ‘By the pricking of my thumbs, something wicked this way comes…’ Those words resonated through my mind and, standing there, I understood what Shakespeare, wily old bard, had meant, because between one heartbeat and the next, I knew, absolutely and utterly, that my victim was approaching. That’s something else the books about murderers don’t relate. That in the last few moments, an instinct – almost primeval – tells you your prey is within your reach. By the pricking of my thumbs, something tempting this way comes…

Footsteps, quick and light, came towards me and I felt my fingers curl into predator’s claws. This was it… In another few moments… I watched her walk along the street – there was a faint drift of cheap perfume, and anyone with half an eye could have seen she was a prostitute. She glanced over her shoulder as she went past the doorway where I stood – the quarry scenting the hunter, you see. That pleased me because her fear would lend an edge to what I was about to do.