Herbert van Thal: The Seventh Pan Book of Horror Stories

'What is it? Is Dora worse?' she demanded as soon as Peter had stepped into the hall.

Peter shook his head and explained his mission: Dora wanted something from her desk.

'Why didn't she ask me to bring it?' her mother protested.

'She only thought of it just now.'

'It must be very urgent if it couldn't wait till tomorrow.'

'It is urgent,' Peter assured her. 'It's a matter of life and death.'

She followed him reluctantly to Dora's bedroom, where the desk was kept unlocked. It was a walnut Queen-Anne-style model with small drawers that pulled out sideways, but there was no fir-cone in any of them. Peter began to poke about among the papers stuffed into pigeonholes above the writing flap.

Mrs Matthews watched him in silence, like a professional burglar assessing an amateur's attempts. I I knew what you were looking for..she suggested.

'I'm looking for a fir-cone,' Peter said.

'A fir-cone!' Mrs Matthews's voice was remarkably like her daughter's. 'You're not going to tell me that Dora sent you here to pick up that?'

It has sentimental associations,' Peter said lamely.

'A fir-cone, indeed! I can tell you, you won't find that.'

'You mean you know where it is?' Peter asked hopefully.

'I put it in the dustbin last week.'

'What!' Peter spun round, leaving the desk-drawers gaping. 'What in heaven's name possessed you to do that?'

'I take it I may act as I wish in my own home,' Mrs Matthews reproved him. 'Dora is my daughter, after all.'

'That doesn't give you the right to dispose of her belongings. Couldn't you have waited till she was dead?'

'Peter!'

'I'm sorry. I didn't mean it. Forgive me.'

'My poor boy, you're thoroughly overwrought.' Such demented distress was so flattering to Dora that Mrs Matthews was prepared to be generous in return.

But Peter ignored her generosity. 'Which day does your dustman call?'

'Tuesday morning,' Mrs Matthews answered.

'Then there's just a chance that the fir-cone is still there.'

He was already on his way to the kitchen when Dora's mother succeeded in catching his arm. 'Peter, listen. I know you hate to disappoint her, but there's no point in turning my dustbin upside down. The fir-cone won't be any use if you find it. It was mouldy. Rotten to the core.'

With a cry, Peter broke away from her. 'Are you certain?'

'Of course I am. That's why I threw it away. You don't really think I'd dispose of Dora's things for no reason?'

'But she told me the fir-cone was all right.'

'I expect she hadn't looked at it lately.'

The sweat was standing out on Peter's brow. 'I've got to have it,' he cried. 'Oh God, I've got to have it.'

He made a dive toward the kitchen-door. There was a clatter as the dustbin was up-ended. The refuse rolled in all directions over the yard. Mrs Matthews watched with mingled alarm and horror as Peter, unheeding, flung himself on his knees among the cinders, tin cans, withered flowers, empty bottles and rotting cabbage-leaves.

Even so, he almost missed the fir-cone, which had rolled as if trying to escape. Then he spied it and rose, stained but triumphant.

Dora's mother looked at him pityingly. 'You see? It's exactly as I told you — not worth keeping. Dora won't want to have it now. In fact, I doubt if the hospital would allow it. It's not a very hygienic souvenir.'

Something about the fir-cone's soft, rotting substance made Peter's gorge rise until he wanted to retch. He fought down the nausea with an effort. It was as though his fingers had touched decaying flesh.

He put it in his pocket and turned to Dora's mother. 'I'll take it back,' he said in a hollow-sounding voice.

'I should leave it till the morning,' she said gently. 'They won't let you see Dora now.'

'No, no. I don't mean to Dora. I mean I'm taking it to the lie des Regrets.'

To Peter, that evening was the beginning of a nightmare. It proved impossible to book a seat on a plane. The Easter holiday rush had already started and there was nothing for it but to travel by boat and train. But he had already missed the night boat from Southampton and he could not afford another twenty-four hours' delay. The fir-cone in his pocket seemed to be mouldering faster. Eventually he settled for the crossing Newhaven-Dieppe. From Dieppe he could travel crosscountry to Quimper, and from Quimper by bus to K6roual-hac. He did not know how he would cross from there to the island, but trusted that he would find some means of accomplishing this last lap. He would beg, buy, borrow, even steal a boat if need be. Desperation would show him the way. The fircone had to be returned if Dora's death were not to be on his conscience, for had he not wished that their marriage might never take place? Admittedly he had not wished that any disaster should befall Dora and nothing had been further from his thoughts; but it was the way of the lie des Regrets to grant a wish and cause one to regret its granting — as Dora regretted being ill.

At the thought of that mysterious malady, Peter's scalp prickled. Dora, like the fir-cone, was rapidly wasting away. Unless he could return it in time, he knew too well what would happen. And now, when he most needed speed, he encountered only adversity and delay.

The Channel was rough and the boat was an hour late on the crossing, which meant he had missed his connection with the fast train. At St Malo a porter gave him wrong information and allowed his train to pull out under his nose. The excited Englishman in a stained suit, unshaven, untidy, speaking unintelligible French, was an object of mirth rather than of pity to this Breton, who, when he understood the purport of his questions, amused himself with over-literal replies. No, there were no more trains until tomorrow. The last bus? That had left an hour ago. There would not be another till Saturday. A daily service? Bien sur there was a daily service, but it did not run on the Friday before Easter, of course. Yes, monsieur could hire a car if he preferred it, and no, the garage was not open this afternoon. And who had said anything about there being no means of getting to Quimper? Monsieur had been asking about getting there direct . But if he took a bus to La Rocaille and there changed to another bus, he could be in Quimper by half past four tonight. Only the bus for La Rocaille was on the point of departure; one would telephone and ask it to wait..

It was when he was on the bus and had got his breath back that Peter first saw the Face. Small and malignant, it leered at him from a peasant-woman's market-basket and seemed to require some leer or gesture in return. Its expression was one of malicious satisfaction, as though it were pleased that the journey was late and slow. Yet when Peter moved his head in an effort to escape its triumph and looked again at the basket, it was no longer there.

Thereafter it played hide-and-seek with him among the passengers; it peered at him from over the shoulder of the man in front; it grimaced at him from the crook of a woman's arm hung with parcels; where two children put their heads together and whispered, it made an evil and, to all but Peter, invisible third.

It vanished each time he moved abruptly on the narrow seat, to the discomfort of his neighbour who glared at him with such intense ferocity that Peter felt impelled to explain.

'II y a quelquechose dans le panier de cette dame-la/ he murmured.

'Et vous, vous avez quelquechose dans le cuV

Between dread of seeing the Face and mortification, Peter did not know which way to look. No one else seemed to have perceived this grotesque, non-fare-paying passenger. Peter began to wonder if he was imagining things; he had slept very little on the crossing. And then the Face put out its tongue at him.

Quick as lightning, Peter returned the compliment, only to meet the horrified then angry gaze of the woman opposite. She gave a small, involuntary scream. Peter's neighbour cautioned him to mind his manners. Any trouble and they would put him off the bus, him and his remarks about 'something in her market-basket'. Just let him try anything with Madame Blanche, that was all.