Ramsey Campbell - The Claw

Perhaps Granny Knight already had. Perhaps mummy was coming upstairs now, stealthy as a cat. Anna glimpsed her creeping upstairs on all fours, her claws ready. She spun round wildly on the chair, but that made her feel so dizzy and vulnerable that she grabbed the desk. The desk jerked, the phone jangled, and she sat shaking with the effort of trying to be still for minutes while she wondered if the phone had also rung downstairs.

She began to relax eventually, but also to sob. The phone had told her what to do, but she was afraid to. She'd tried to phone from the hotel room; how could she go through all that again? But if she didn't phone, the only alternative was to wait until mummy came upstairs to her. Perhaps the phones downstairs wouldn't ring when she picked up daddy's phone. Sometimes they all rang, but not always.

She stared out at the billowing fog until it made her so dizzy she had to close her tearful eyes. Then, while her eyes were closed and she couldn't see what she was doing, she reached out and grabbed the receiver. As she lifted it off the cradle the phone rang, so loudly that she couldn't hear if the others had. Could that sound be heard downstairs? She clutched the receiver, afraid to open her eyes.

But she had it now, and she must use it while she had the chance. All she had to do was to dial 999 if anything was seriously wrong – mummy had told her that once. But her hand was shaking so much that she couldn't lift the receiver to her face. She was afraid that if she did, she'd hear mummy saying, 7 heard you.' She dragged the receiver through the air and pressed it against her ear, pressed it until her ear burned, until she realized why she wasn't dialling, why it was no use: you had to wait until you heard the buzzing, the dialling tone – mummy had told her that, too. There wasn't any buzzing. The phone wasn't working.

She laid the receiver on the desk and began to cry in earnest, hopelessly, her head and jaw throbbing with every sob. The fog surged at the window and drifted away, surged and retreated. She wished she could climb onto the sill and jump – she couldn't see the drop – but she wasn't brave enough. She could only wait for mummy to come to her. Wouldn't mummy hear her crying if she picked up the phone downstairs? It didn't matter, she didn't care. That made her cry harder. But then, suddenly, she hushed, swallowing and gulping. She'd thought she'd heard voices downstairs.

She made herself let go of the desk and crept to the door, pressing her ear against it. She was terrified that the door would open without warning, that mummy would be there – so terrified that she didn't realize how she was trying to hang onto the wall until she felt wallpaper gathering under her nails. That made her squirm, but she had to be still, because there was a voice downstairs that wasn't mummy's. She had to press her ear against the door until her blood sounded like the sea before she was sure that it was Granny Knight's voice.

She hadn't gone yet. Anna realized she'd been behaving as if Granny Knight already had. She wanted to scream, but suppose mummy heard her before Granny Knight did? Suppose mummy got to her first? Having Granny Knight still here only made her feel worse; she was sobbing loudly now, she didn't care who heard, she just wished someone would so that everything would be over. She didn't want to try and speak to Granny Knight. She didn't want to use the phone.

But she could, if she was lucky. If she jiggled the cradle of daddy's phone until it rang, it might ring downstairs as well. If Granny Knight picked up the phone, Anna could tell her everything – she'd have to. Could she take the risk of mummy hearing instead? But already she was stumbling back to the desk, sobbing as she sat down in daddy's wobbly chair, sobbing painfully as she picked up the receiver and began to move the cradle, jiggling it more and more violently as it rang and still nobody answered. It was ringing downstairs, she could hear that now, and she could hardly breathe for sobbing. Someone must answer – her bruised arm was already aching, her head and her jaw and her whole body were.

When she heard the click of the phone being lifted downstairs, loud in her ear as the closing of a trap, she almost dropped the receiver. She had to clutch it with both hands. She didn't dare speak. Then she heard the hollow shell-like sound of a hand cupped around the mouthpiece. 'Yes?' a low voice said.

It didn't sound like mummy. Nevertheless it seemed to take Anna forever before she could swallow and draw a shuddering breath and, risking everything so completely that she had to close her eyes, whisper, 'It's Anna.'

'Yes?'

The voice sounded even gentler. It couldn't be mummy; she wouldn't speak like that, not any more. That thought broke the dam of Anna's fear, and she began to babble into the phone. 'Oh, please come and get me. Mummy's locked me in daddy's room. She's going to hurt me, she wants to hurt me, she isn't like mummy.' Now she was sobbing not so much with fear as with having to say such things about mummy; her face was blazing with shame. 'Please don't go away, please come and let me out. Please don't let mummy get me…'

The silence didn't last long, it only seemed so. 'I'll be coming for you,' the low voice said, 'don't you worry,' and Anna replaced the receiver as quickly and quietly as she could. She sat hugging herself on daddy's chair and watched the door. Thank you, thank you, she said over and over, not knowing if she was speaking out loud, or to whom. Nobody but she could have heard the low voice on the phone.

It was Isobel who draped Alan's arm round her shoulders and guided him into the long room, while Liz searched for money in her bag to pay for the taxi, which had come all the way from Norwich. Alan seemed scarcely to realize it had to be paid for; he seemed aware of very little except that he was home. 'I'm all right,' he kept murmuring hoarsely to Isobel, 'I can walk.' But even if he didn't need to be supported physically, he was obviously grateful for the contact, pitifully so. When they disappeared into the long room, Liz gave the taxi-driver more than she'd intended, then closed the front door on him and the fog rather than wait for change. She didn't want to leave Isobel alone with Alan. She mustn't give her a chance to talk.

Alan was sitting in his usual chair facing the television. Liz was reminded of the time he'd shown her the Nigerian cassette, which was still on the videorecorder. She remembered the bloody man stepping towards her out of the mosque. The memory made her tremble, and so did the sight of Alan. He looked pale, famished, shockingly aged. His eyes looked as if he were hiding in them, or trying to.

Both he and Isobel were gazing at her. His eyes were pleading with her, Isobel's growing more suspicious every moment as Liz didn't go to him. Liz could see as well as Isobel that he was pleading with her to hold him, talk to him, ask him nothing for the moment; but she was afraid to go to him. Suppose he read in her face what she'd done to Anna? She was sure he would if she went near.

Eventually she did, for Isobel was growing visibly readier to tell Alan all she knew, or thought she knew. Christ, couldn't she leave them alone? Liz's body felt like one long tearing scream at Isobel, but she could only squat next to Alan and stroke his hair, massage his shoulders. He felt dismayingly thin and stiff and unresponsive; he didn't feel like Alan at all. Just now, what with the shock of his return and everything else that had happened to her, she, too, seemed unable to react.

Isobel’s face was wavering, trying to be calm for his sake, but then her feelings won. 'Oh, Alan, what have they done to you?'

He stretched out his hands to her in a gesture that was meant to be reassuring, but, as he lurched forward in the chair, Liz saw how long his nails were. 'Don't upset yourself,' he said. 'It's over now.'