John Harding - The Girl Who Couldn’t Read

I felt about with my hands stretched out in front of me like a blind man, trying to remember exactly where I had set down the candleholder, but in my panic could remember nothing of the room. I told myself I must think clearly and sucked in a couple of deep breaths, got myself calm again and eventually laid my hand on the candleholder. I found the box of matches Morgan had placed on it and fumbled one out and struck it, the noise like an explosion in the dead silence of the night. I had great difficulty in applying the flame to the wick, my hand was shaking so. The match went out and I struggled to light another, the light flickering wildly as my fingers trembled. I steadied myself and at last the thing was lit. As visibility returned and the edges of the room fell into place, so my terror abated. I felt as if I had seen a ghost, and indeed it was not too fanciful to believe that I had. That fleeting suggestion of white dress, the patter of feet – it was all the stuff of tales of hauntings.

It was with some trepidation that I eased open the door, in dread of its rusty creaking. All this achieved was to protract the noise of its unoiled hinges, which took on the sound of a small animal, or some ghostly child perhaps, being tortured. As soon as there was enough of an opening, I insinuated myself around the edge of the door and shuffled my way along the passage outside, fearing that at any moment the spectre would come rushing at me and – and – and what? That’s the thing about terror: it’s the not knowing that gets to you and what your mind makes up instead. I stood still a moment, took another deep breath and rationalised what had happened. I had seen a hint of female garment. It was a woman and I was a strong fit man; what did I have to be afraid of? But then I began to think what woman it might be. The most likely was one of the attendants, of course, because by now the inmates were all safely locked in their dormitories (safely as long as there wasn’t a fire!). But what if one should have escaped somehow? What then? What if she were violent? I shuddered at the thought of some madwoman launching herself out of the shadows at me and found myself twitching with every flicker of the candle flame, at every dancing shadow on the walls.

It seemed an age before I achieved the end of the passage. The gas lamps in the main corridor had now been extinguished and there was no light showing under Morgan’s door, so I guessed he must have retired for the night. The silence overwhelmed me because every instant I expected it to be broken by that other presence I had glimpsed. I made my way up the main staircase, treading as softly as I could, for it was old and as creaky as the library door and apt to groan a protest at every step. On the second floor everything was unfamiliar in the weak candlelight and I made several false turns before I found the right passageway and at long last made my way toward the safety of my room.

With a sigh of relief I closed the door behind me and leaned my back against it, sucking in deep gulps of air because I had, without realising it until now, been holding my breath for so long. I put a hand to my face and found my forehead was clammy. The bruise there seemed to be thumping away in time with my overworked heart. Several minutes passed before I was composed enough to put the candle down upon the writing desk, although my hands were still shaking. It took another few minutes before I felt confident enough of not injuring myself to take the cheese knife I had stolen from my pocket and set about the valise locks. The knife was very thin and the curl at the top of it made it ideal for the task, and the case and its locks were cheap. After no more than a couple of minutes I had triggered the springs of both locks and snapped them open. I took another deep breath to steel myself to lift the lid. What if the contents weren’t sufficient for my basic needs? What if there were no spare shirts or linen? It was perfectly possible. They might have been in some steamer trunk in the baggage car for all I knew. I flung open the lid, and saw to my relief a pile of neatly folded shirts, underwear, socks, a spare pair of pants, a washbag containing toothbrush and powder, a hairbrush, a bottle of hair oil, a razor and so on. I lifted them out and found underneath a book, the boards well worn from use, the spine slightly torn. As I picked it up I realised I had put down the Shakespeare in the darkness in the library to look for my candle and in my terror never thought to take it up again, and so felt a little surge of pleasure that at least I had here a book to divert me from my gloomy imaginings. I took it up from the valise and read the title from the spine. Moral Treatment by Reverend Andrew Abrahams.

I tossed it onto the writing desk in disgust. Obviously some uplifting Christian work. Just my luck! I’d rather have had the Bible itself; at least the language is memorable and there’s a rip-roaring story or two, not to mention a fair bit of adultery. But God save me from the sanctimonious religious writings of the present time, when men ought to know better. Still, at least it told me something about the sort of pious fool I had become.

Having nothing to entertain me, I got on with the necessary business of hanging up my clothes in the closet and laying out my toiletries on the chest of drawers. I put the valise under the bed, undressed and put on my nightshirt, which was just the kind of scratchy garment you’d expect from some Holy Roller, like sleeping in sackcloth, although after a short time it ceased to matter, for soon after my head hit the pillow, I was lost to the world.

I did not pass a peaceful night but was troubled by a succession of dark dreams. In most of them I was wandering along dimly lit corridors, haunted by shadowy corners from which, with no warning, and screams that froze the blood solid in my veins, women would fling themselves upon me, their faces hideously deformed, eyes black with madness, lips red as arterial blood, teeth bared like wolf fangs and dripping with hunger, their fingertips ending in long talons which raked my face, tearing at my eyes. I finally awoke from one of these nightmares to the sound of birds singing and light pouring in around the edges of the blind at the window, and although I normally have no time for Him, thanked God that at last day had dawned.

My nightshirt and the sheets were soaked with sweat. I wondered that I should have been so frightened to cause this and then worried that it might not be anything to do with my dreams but rather because I had suffered some serious injury in the accident, that perhaps the blow to my head had caused a fever of the brain.

I could hear footsteps in the corridor outside, doors opening and closing, the hollow echo of distant shouts, all the noises of a large institution rousing itself for another day, dreadfully familiar to me from the past few months but somehow different too. I threw back the blankets and got out of bed. There was no heating and it was cold, though not so cold as where I had just come from. I took off the nightshirt, found a cloth and a bar of soap in the washbag, poured myself a bowl of water and, after recovering from the shock of its bracing temperature, gave myself a thorough scrubbing. I examined the bruise on my forehead in the mirror and was glad to see it appeared less livid. This minor improvement was enough to give me a little surge of optimism and kindle the belief I might survive here for a while, that everything would be OK. I dressed in clean linen, shirt and necktie and pulled on the spare pare of pants. I sniffed the armpits of the jacket I’d had on, the only one I possessed, and recoiled at the stench of stale sweat. I opened the bottle of hair oil, which proved to be scented. There was no way I was letting the stuff anywhere near my head, but I shook a little into the armpit linings of the jacket and rubbed it in. The effect might make me stink like a French pimp but on the other hand it was to be preferred to yesterday’s sweat.