Nicola Barker - Darkmans

Huh?

Kane frowned at what he took to be Beede’s unnecessarily cutting tone.

‘Did you simply go along with it?’

‘Yes.’ Elen responded simply, unequivocally. Kane smiled. He touched the back of his hand against his cheek, then glanced up and saw himself in the hallway mirror — the dreamy eyes, the goofy look — and dropped his hand, appalled.

‘At first I honestly believed him,’ she continued. ‘It sounds stupid now, I know, but I was completely taken in. I thought he had lived in those places. The first couple of times at least…’

‘And he never set you straight? You never interrogated him afterwards?’

‘No. Not that I can clearly recollect. We spoke mainly in German back then. My vocabulary was somewhat limited. And the relationship was new. It was far less…well, vocal …’ her voice petered out.

‘But that still doesn’t make any sense, Elen,’ Beede all-but snapped. ‘It’s illogical. How could he possibly have lived in those places when he was born and raised abroad?’

‘But he wasn’t,’ Elen said calmly.

Pause

‘Pardon?’

‘He was born here, in England. His parents were Londoners. They emigrated to Germany when Isidore was a boy.’

‘Oh.’

(Beede sounded shocked.)

‘And in my own defence,’ she continued, ‘I suppose I was just a little more naive back then. Dory was always so plausible. And the whole thing was so bizarre, so out of character, so unlike him. You know yourself how straight he is, how repressed, how law -abiding…’

‘Yes.’

(Although Beede didn’t sound entirely convinced.)

‘And I guess,’ Elen persisted, ‘that I probably found it quite funny in a way. Exciting , even. We were young. Things weren’t nearly so…’ she cleared her throat ‘…so fraught between us back then.’

Her voice faded somewhat towards the second half of this speech. Kane leaned in closer to the door. It sounded like she was standing in the kitchen now.

‘The point is that wah fwah-wah fmwah-wah fmwah …’

Kane scowled, exasperated.

‘…I mean not in years , but then yesterday, out of the blue, he suddenly forced me to pull over the car, leapt out, and went to wah fwah wah-fmwah wah-wah-fwah. This tiny, little fwah-wah-wah …’ ‘An old house, you say?’

Beede’s voice sounded more distant again, too.

‘Oldish. But not that old.’

‘Who answered?’

‘This young girl — this very fmwah-fwah-wah wah fwah .’

Kane placed his ear directly against the crack in the door.

‘So what did you do?’

‘I didn’t really know what to do. I just grabbed wah-fmwah wah fwah fmwah fmwah-wah. I mean it’s not that I didn’t trust him…’

‘Did she show you around?’

‘Yes.’

‘And did he seem quite…’ Beede paused, judiciously ‘…quite himself ?’

Elen paused, too.

‘Yes. I mean… yes . A little manic, perhaps.’

‘So what happened?’

‘Well he suddenly came out with all this amazing detail about how the place had been when his old aunt had lived there. It was incredible. How he’d built this wah fmwah fmwah-fwah-wah …’ Kane rolled his eyes.

‘…Even all this crazy stuff about his aunt being a very strict Catholic, and how she’d had crucifixes hung up everywhere, at which point the girl — Gaynor — who certainly appeared to be taking the whole thing with quite a pinch of salt — although maybe that was just me , I mean my paranoia — suddenly told this story about how when they’d first bought the place there’d been all these marks on the wallpaper — shadows — from where crucifixes had obviously been hung before…’

‘Perhaps he’d noticed one of those shadows as you were walking around?’

(Sound of refrigerator opening.)

‘No. They’d redecorated. This was years ago…’

(Clanking sound.)

‘Does this fmwah smell all right to you?’ she enquired. ‘It’s the day after its sell-by date…’

(More clanking.)

‘There should be a new one. Hang on…’

(Still more clanking.)

Pause

(Sound of teaspoon rattling around inside a mug.)

‘What you need to bear in mind,’ Beede pontificated, ‘is that even twenty or so years ago a standard Catholic home would’ve had fmwah-wah fmwah-wah on fmwah-wah all over the house…’

‘Of course. But it was just…’

‘Is that pale enough?’

‘Yes.’

(More stirring. Sound of objects being placed on to a tin tray. Clanking sound. Noise of refrigerator closing.)

‘I don’t mean to put a damper on things,’ Beede’s voice grew much louder, ‘but you’d be astonished how easy it is for someone with a very basic knowledge of human psychology — or in possession of certain behavioural techniques — to infer things from an environment, and simply — by the power of suggestion, by picking up subtle hints …’ ‘I’m fully aware of that, Danny…’

Danny?!

Kane flinched at Elen’s casually abbreviated use of his father’s Christian name.

‘…But when we went into the tiny living-room Dory walked straight over to the fireplace. He said he’d carved his initials there, as a boy…’

‘ Inside the fireplace?’

‘No. In the stonework around the side of the chimney breast.’

‘Well perhaps he’d already noticed something scratched there?’

‘No. It wouldn’t have been possible. I mean not from the angle …’

‘Sorry. Is that…? I’ll just…Thanks.’

(Sound of small table being cleared off and moved over towards the sofa.)

‘Were his initials there, then?’

‘Yes. Well, no .’

‘Pardon?’

‘There was a letter, which the girl claimed never to have seen before…’

‘The letter D?’

‘No.’

‘An I?’

‘No…’ Elen cleared her throat, nervously, her voice almost dropping to a whisper. ‘A J. A tiny letter J. Dory claimed it was an I, but written in the Germanic style. Then after he’d said it he kind of…he kind of turned to me and gave me this…this awful look .’

‘A look ?’

‘Yes. A kind of a…a mocking look. A loaded look.’

‘Oh.’

Pause

‘Is that dripping driving you mad?’

‘Pardon?’

‘The tap — the dripping tap?’

‘The tap ? No. No . I hadn’t actually noticed it.’

Pause

‘So you think it was a J, then?’

‘Yes. I’m absolutely sure of it.’

Another pause

‘Well…’ Beede rattled what Kane presumed to be a teapot, ‘I don’t think we should allow ourselves to get too worked up over this. It was probably just a coincidence. He got lucky. He was flying by the seat of his pants…’

‘But you said the other day…’ Elen lowered her voice to a whisper again ‘…you said that you were worried about fwah fwah fwah-wah fmwah-wah-wah …’

Kane almost choked with frustration at his inability to hear her. ‘I was just being paranoid,’ Beede insisted.

‘But things have become so…so fluid lately. And the meditation’s definitely a part of it. He’s developed this strange routine with a bandage. He winds it around his head — over his eyes and his nose…’

Kane stiffened.

‘…I looked it up in his Pranayama book. There was a picture. It’s called the Six Openings Seal…’