Clive Barker - Cabal

CLIVE BARKER

TO ANNIE

‘We are all imaginary animals …’

DOMINGO D’YBARRONDO

A Bestiary of the Soul

Cover

Title Page

Dedication

PART ONE: LOCO

I The Truth

II Academy

III The Rhapsodist

IV Necropolis

V A Different Ape

VI Feet of Clay

PART TWO: DEATH’S A BITCH

VII Rough Roads

VIII Where He Fell

IX Touched

X Sun and Shade

PART THREE: DARK AGES

XI The Stalking Ground

XII Above and Below

XIII The Prophetic Child

XIV Tabernacle

PART FOUR: SAINTS AND SINNERS

XV The Toll

XVI Now or Never

XVII Delirium

XVIII The Wrath of the Righteous

PART FIVE: THE GOOD NIGHT

XIX A Friendless Face

XX Driven

XXI That Desire

XXII Triumph of the Mask

XXIII The Harrowing

XXIV Cabal

XXV Abide with Me

About the Author

Praise

Other Works

Weaveworld

Copyright

About the Publisher

‘I was born alive. Isn’t that punishment enough?’

Mary Hendrickson, at her trial for patricide

Of all the rash and midnight promises made in the name of love none, Boone now knew, was more certain to be broken than: ‘I’ll never leave you’ .

What time didn’t steal from under your nose, circumstance did. It was useless to hope otherwise; useless to dream that the world somehow meant you good. Everything of value, everything you clung to for your sanity would rot or be snatched in the long run, and the abyss would gape beneath you, as it gaped for Boone now, and suddenly, without so much as a breath of explanation, you were gone. Gone to hell or worse, professions of love and all.

His outlook hadn’t always been so pessimistic. There’d been a time – not all that long ago – when he’d felt the burden of his mental anguish lifting. There’d been fewer psychotic episodes, fewer days when he felt like slitting his wrists rather than enduring the hours till his next medication. There’d seemed to be a chance for happiness.

It was that prospect that had won the declaration of love from him; that: ‘I’ll never leave you,’ whispered in Lori’s ear as they lay in the narrow bed he’d never dared hope would hold two. The words had not come in the throes of high passion. Their love life, like so much else between them, was fraught with problems. But where other women had given up on him, unforgiving of his failure, she’d persevered: told him there was plenty of time to get it right, all the time in the world.

I’m with you for as long as you want me to be, her patience had seemed to say.

Nobody had ever offered such a commitment; and he wanted to offer one in return. Those words: ‘I’ll never leave you’. Were it.

The memory of them, and of her skin almost luminous in the murk of his room, and of the sound of her breathing when she finally fell asleep beside him – all of it still had the power to catch his heart, and squeeze it till it hurt.

He longed to be free of both the memory and the words, now that circumstance had taken any hope of their fulfilment out of his hands. But they wouldn’t be forgotten. They lingered on to torment him with his frailty. His meagre comfort was that she – knowing what she must now know about him, – would be working to erase her memory; and that with time she’d succeed. He only hoped she’d understand his ignorance of himself when he’d voiced that promise. He’d never have risked this pain if he’d doubted health was finally within his grasp.

Dream on!

Decker had brought an abrupt end to those delusions, the day he’d locked the office door, drawn the blinds on the Alberta spring sunshine, and said, in a voice barely louder than a whisper:

‘Boone. I think we’re in terrible trouble, you and I.’

He was trembling, Boone saw, a fact not easily concealed in a body so big. Decker had the physique of a man who sweated out the day’s angst in a gym. Even his tailored suits, always charcoal, couldn’t tame his bulk. It had made Boone edgy at the start of their work together; he’d felt intimidated by the doctor’s physical and mental authority. Now it was the fallibility of that strength he feared. Decker was a Rock; he was Reason; he was Calm. This anxiety ran counter to all he knew about the man.

‘What’s wrong?’ Boone asked.

‘Sit, will you? Sit and I’ll tell you.’

Boone did as he was told. In this office, Decker was lord. The doctor leaned back in the leather chair and inhaled through his nose, his mouth sealed in a downward curve.

‘Tell me …’ Boone said.

‘Where to start.’

‘Anywhere.’

‘I thought you were getting better,’ Decker said. ‘I really did. We both did.’

‘I still am,’ Boone said.

Decker made a small shake of his head. He was a man of considerable intellect, but little of it showed on his tightly packed features, except perhaps in his eyes, which at the moment were not watching the patient, but the table between them.

‘You’ve started to talk in your sessions,’ Decker said, ‘about crimes you think you’ve committed. Do you remember any of that?’

‘You know I don’t.’ The trances Decker put him in were too profound: ‘I only remember when you play the tape back.’

‘I won’t be playing any of these,’ Decker said. ‘I wiped them.’

‘Why?’

‘Because … I’m afraid, Boone. For you.’ He paused. ‘Maybe for both of us.’

The crack in the Rock was opening and there was nothing Decker could do to conceal it.

‘What are these crimes?’ Boone asked, his words tentative.

‘Murders. You talk about them obsessively. At first I thought they were dream crimes. You always had a violent streak in you.’

‘And now?’

‘Now I’m afraid you may have actually committed them.’

There was a long silence, while Boone studied Decker, more in puzzlement than anger. The blinds had not been pulled all the way down. A slice of sunlight fell across him, and on to the table between them. On the glass surface was a bottle of still water, two tumblers, and a large envelope. Decker leaned forward and picked it up.

‘What I’m doing now is probably a crime in itself,’ he told Boone. ‘Patient confidentiality is one thing; protecting a killer is another. But part of me is still hoping to God it isn’t true. I want to believe I’ve succeeded. We’ve succeeded. Together. I want to believe you’re well.’

‘I am well.’

In lieu of reply Decker tore open the envelope.

‘I’d like you to look at these for me,’ he said, sliding his hand inside and bringing a sheaf of photographs out to meet the light.

‘I warn you, they’re not pleasant.’

He laid them on his reflection, turned for Boone’s perusal. His warning had been well advised. The picture on the top of the pile was like a physical assault. Faced with it a fear rose in him he’d not felt since being in Decker’s care: that the image might possess him. He’d built walls against that superstition, brick by brick, but they shook now, and threatened to fall.