Тим Леббон - New Fears 2 - Brand New Horror Stories by Masters of the Macabre

As deep as my obsession with the typewriter runs, it will not come between me and my family. When convenient, I shall tinker. Until then, I shall not.

Saturday 1st February 1964

Ordered: 1 x carriage release lever, 1 x backspace lever, 1 x replacement rubber for platen, 1 x space bar, 1 x shift key, 1 x type guide, 2 x paper guides, 4 x typebars (G, O, T, M), 6 x face keys (B, E, H, O, R, W), 1 x ribbon, 1 x bell.

I spent all day looking around specialist shops in London. Evelyn was in a foul mood when I returned home.

Sunday 22nd March 1964

It is done. After more than two months of fastidious cleaning, fiddling, adjusting, and waiting for parts, the typewriter is now in working order. Not quite as polished as I had hoped, but a vast improvement on the eyesore I brought home from Temple’s Bric-à-Brac. Even Evelyn stated that I did a splendid job and has allowed me to bring it into the house (although a whiff of dead puppy remains; try as I have, I simply cannot eradicate it). I set it on a table in the back room, where we keep all manner of items too cumbersome to transfer to the loft: the children’s old cot, a wardrobe with a cracked mirror in the door, Auntie Mabel’s mangle, which we inherited after a rather unfortunate mishap. I must admit to a wonderful feeling of achievement, to have breathed new life into something so fractured… so pitiable. I wonder if heart surgeons feel the same way after a successful operation. Needless to say, I was as happy as a sandboy this evening, singing along to the BBC Light Programme, dancing with Patricia, and play-wrestling with Christopher on the living room floor.

“You’re in good spirits, Arthur,” Evelyn remarked. “Perhaps we should get you to fix some things around the house.”

To which I laughed, twirled her in my arms, and planted a kiss on her lips.

Later, with the children in bed and Evelyn listening to her favourite show, I retired to the back room with a sheaf of foolscap, thinking I would compose a brief poem on my restored machine, one pertinent to my good mood. I pulled a chair to the table and sat for a moment, admiring my handiwork, and then fed a sheet of paper into the carriage. Before beginning, I thought I should test the quality of each letter, but no sooner had I set my fingers upon the keys than a dire sensation gripped me. It was like nothing I’d felt before, and I lost all sense of myself. My fingers rattled upon the keys with a will of their own. I heard the typebars strike the page and the carriage judder to the left. With a gasp I pulled—yes, pulled: an act of force—my hands from the keytop and stood up quickly. The chair toppled over but I barely noticed; my attention was on the page. Whereas I had intended to type, “The quick brown fox jumps over the lazy dog,” what I had actually typed was, “Kill the cunt. Cut her in half.”

I took a quick, sharp breath, then pulled the page from the carriage and crumpled it in my hands. I was shocked beyond measure, and my heart raced in my chest. I cast a distrustful eye upon the typewriter and stepped away from it, but not before catching my reflection in the cracked mirror on the wardrobe door. I’m sure it was a device of the mirror’s imperfection, but I was certain I saw two reflections: my own, and that of a distorted figure looming not behind, but within me, like a blurred photograph.

I hurried from the back room, disposed of the offensive sheet of paper (I pushed it to the bottom of the dustbin, where Evelyn would not find it), then washed my hands and joined my wife in the living room.

She was too absorbed in her show to notice my strained smile.

Monday 23rd March 1964

Couldn’t concentrate at work today. Thinking about the typewriter, more particularly about the odd sensation that overcame me, and the words—those shocking words—that had jumped unbidden across the page.

I returned home subdued and confused. Evelyn asked what was wrong and I told her only half the truth—that I’d had a long and stressful day. The lamb chops and mint sauce cheered me up a little, although the mashed potatoes were cold and lumpy.

Avoided the back room, but felt the typewriter calling to me.

This is all very disturbing.

Tuesday 24th March 1964

Called in sick today after a night of terrible dreams. In the most vivid of them I stood in the living room with a human kidney in my hands. The wireless played, not the BBC Light Programme, but a melody of clicks, clacks and bells. I turned to the fire, then laid the kidney gently amongst the flames. It hissed and sizzled. I gave it a couple of prods with the poker, then turned around, my chest swelling with pride.

I awoke in a dishevelled state, dripping with perspiration, my heart pounding in my chest.

I think I’m coming down with something.

Friday 27th March 1964

Feverish for… I don’t know how long. Days? Yes, days. In bed writing this. The room is spinning and the sheets smell of sickness. I can barely read my own writing. Think I’ll sleep for a while.

Monday 30th March 1964

The fever continues and every sound hurts. I need a shave. I’m a whiskery chap. Like a sailor. No, like a pirate. Arrrrggh! Did you hear that the quick brown fox jumped over the dead puppy? What a terrible smell. Arrrrrrrggggghhh!

Tuesday 14th April 1964

It is illogical to fear an inanimate object (unless the object happens to be a NaziV-1 Doodlebug, as my dear grandmother discovered—God rest her soul). After three weeks of avoiding the typewriter, I decided to confront it, having attributed the previous aberration to the fledgling stages of my illness.

And so, after tea, I entered the back room and found the typewriter as I had left it, sitting on the table, its U-shaped typebars resembling the wings of an insect about to take flight. I pulled up a seat and wiped sweat from my brow, then grabbed a sheet of foolscap and rolled it into position.

I placed my fingers on the keytop and typed, “Cut their juglars very quiet with a razer and use an ax to lop off their fucken limbs.”

So, nothing to worry about, then. And all the letters in fine working order.

Jolly good.

Wednesday 22nd April 1964

Writing diary entry on typewriter for first time. Why not, eh? Will cut out her kidne and snip off her fingurs and staple it into the diary proper.

Rather a long day at work. Drummond still giving me flack for taking two weeks off sick, but I had a doctor’s note so I don’t know what his problem is I’ll kil him too cut his fucken throat the toad.

The family was in fine form tonight. Jollity all around. Nothing I lik more than to watch someon bleed.

Sausage, egg and chips for tea.

Thursday 23rd April 1964

Wrote a poem tonight on my typewriter. A rather beautiful piece, reminiscent of Coleridge. I may try to get it published.

Friday 24th April 1964

My reflection in the cracked mirror is a peculiar thing. The defect runs directly down the middle of my face. On one side I appear quite normal. On the other I am distorted. My mouth is twisted, my eye dripping, and the air around me is dank with shadow. However, when I move away from the table upon which the typewriter sits, my reflection snaps back into something more familiar. It is simply me again, on both sides of the crack. A handsome devil, it has to be said.

Saturday 9th May 1964

Received a rather stern rejection from Ambit magazine, requesting I never sully their slush pile with my filth again. A perplexing response.