Ann Pilling - The Pit

Everyone at school knew that Oliver Wright was a bit of a weirdo, always borrowing other people’s horror comics and taking them home to read in secret, always taking the creepiest books out of the library; and he’d never denied that he liked grisly things. What he felt now though was of a different order from all that. As he stared into Ted’s face, he found himself remembering the worst moments of his life.

He remembered the day one of his mother’s old ladies had died in her bedsitter, and how he’d seen the shiny coffin being carried down the stairs. He’d been told to stay in the flat that morning but he’d peeped, through the banisters, and he’d thought he’d heard the body, rolling about inside. Then he saw the damp cellar under the house, mouldy and reeking, where he was sometimes sent to look for jam jars, and he remembered the terrible day when his father had switched the light off, not knowing he was there, and how he’d been left all alone in the pitch dark, crawling about and unable to find the steps.

The look on Ted’s face was about the darkness. As he stared at him, Oliver felt he’d been snatched away from the dull familiar street, with the rain falling and the knot of men still huddled in the road, plucked out of the dreary present and swept back, to the secret horrors and fears he struggled with at night, when the rest of the house slept. A deep silence enveloped him now, broken only by the curious, muffled tolling of that single bell. The very sound lapped him in darkness, and Oliver felt suffocated. Whatever had sent Ted Hoskins screaming down the street was here too, inside him . It was like a physical weight, dragging him down. “Did you hear me?” Rick was saying, and he shook him hard. “Do you want this boot in your backside?” But Oliver was already running, running away from the blackness, down the dingy street, not stopping till he was safe on his own doorstep, with the thin, cold rain dripping down his neck.

He woke next morning to the sound of water drumming on the roof. He got out of bed and lifted up a corner of one curtain; the sky was the colour of pea soup. There’d been thunder in the night, followed by rain, the kind that set in with a vengeance then fell steadily, hour after hour. The demolition site would certainly be deserted this morning but it would also be a sea of mud. His mother might ask awkward questions if she saw him sliding off down the street, so he decided to postpone his visit to the site for a bit. It had been a bad night, full of horrible dreams about cellars and coffins. He didn’t really feel up to tackling his mother.

On his way down to the kitchen, two floors below, he stopped on the narrow half-landing and looked through a front window. The sky looked several shades darker now, and it was still pouring down, but someone was out there, standing quite still on the opposite pavement, staring up at Number Nine.

Oliver pressed his nose to the glass and stared back. All the houses in Thames Terrace had tiny front gardens where nothing much grew, but theirs was special. Right in the middle was a massive oak tree, so wide that the front railings actually bulged out, over the pavement. It was supposed to be nearly four hundred years old, an “historic tree”, according to Oliver’s father, and there was a little bronze plaque on the trunk, telling you all about it.

Perhaps the person in the road was a tree expert. Oliver couldn’t think of anything else interesting about their house. He stayed at the window, his pale cheeks flattened against the cold glass, and watched the figure move a few steps along the pavement. He could see it properly now.

It was an old man, very tall and spindly, with a lot of white hair blowing out from under a large black hat. He wore a very long black coat, black trousers and black shoes, and he was carrying a stick.

A funny cold feeling began to creep down Oliver’s spine, and his dark dreams of the previous night started coming back again. This old man didn’t belong to Thames Terrace at all; perhaps he was a ghost.

He shut his eyes tight and counted slowly to ten. When he opened them the tall black figure would have disappeared, flitted back to the world of make-believe, where it belonged. But when Oliver looked again the man was still there, pacing up and down the pavement, still looking up at the house, then down towards the little graveyard where the old people sometimes sat out on green benches.

Oliver watched him. Looking carefully both ways, and leaning on his stick, the gangly black figure crossed the road cautiously and disappeared into a green fuzz of leaves and branches. Seconds later there was a loud banging at the front door.

He peered down the stairwell and saw his mother come out of their kitchen. A smell of bacon and tomatoes wafted out with her. Muttering to herself, and wiping her hands on a tea towel, she began to go down the stairs. Oliver followed silently, and stopped when he reached his usual vantage point, a little niche at the top of the first flight of steps where he could stay safely hidden behind a large plant stand.

The old man had a thin wavery voice but he spoke with a very refined accent. When he said “Good Morning” it sounded like a TV announcer, and he actually raised his hat. Oliver’s mother would approve. She was always nagging him about good manners and good speech.

“I’d like one of your rooms,” he was saying politely. “I understand you have a vacancy. I’ve filled in the necessary papers, and I have my cheque all made out. How soon could I move in? I don’t want to inconvenience you, of course …”

“Well, I don’t know about this at all,” Oliver’s mother was saying, and she sounded distinctly annoyed.

Raising his large black hat a second time, the old man had already walked past her, into the hall. He’d produced a sheaf of papers from inside his coat and he was fanning them out, under her nose. “The Society is quite happy for me to have the room,” he said, “if you’re in agreement, of course.”

“Well, I’m not sure that I am, Mr – what did you say your name was?”

“I didn’t. It’s Verney. Thomas Verney.”

“I have to explain, Mr Verney, that this is rather irregular, you see—”

“ Dr Verney. Not a medical doctor, you understand, a Doctor of Science. I used to teach at the University. That’s all behind me now, of course. I’m retired.”

“I see.”

Oliver peeped round the plant stand. His mother’s voice had changed slightly. She’d put her glasses on now and she was inspecting the papers more carefully. He knew just what she was thinking, that a well-spoken retired professor from London University could give Number Nine a touch of class.

“As I say,” Mrs Wright began again, handing back the papers, “the usual procedure is for a new resident to come along to the house first , with someone from the Society. The room may not be to your liking, you see, and in any case we may not get on with each other. It’s a very small community, Dr Verney, and if people don’t get on …”

“Oh, I’m sure I shall be very happy here,” the old man interrupted, looking pointedly at the stairs. “I’m familiar with this street, you see, and I’ve always wanted to live here. So I wonder if you’d be so kind as to let me see the room?”

“As a matter of fact, it isn’t quite ready,” Oliver’s mother said firmly, standing with her back to the staircase. “I’ve not quite finished dealing with the last resident’s belongings.”

The old man wasn’t in the least put off. On the contrary, he started to ask a lot of questions about the house, questions which made him sound just a bit peculiar. He seemed obsessed with hygiene for one thing. Were there any rats or mice in the house, he wanted to know, with it being so near the Thames.