DARK COUNTY (8 page)

‘How did you manage it?’ I said. ‘I mean aren’t you supposed to tell people about things like what happened here?’

Lance beamed again.

‘I didn’t have to,’ he said. ‘He knew all about it.’

A mix of realisation and dread hit me hard. I didn’t have to ask him, I knew now who had bought the house, I just wanted to hear it from his lips.

‘Who bought it?’ I asked.

‘I’m not really supposed to give out that information,’ he said. ‘But he’ll tell you himself, I’m sure. It now belongs to Wayne Cooper.’

I went home and called Wayne. I asked him if he was back in town. He said that he was staying at his mum’s with the girls while his wife finalised the sale of her house in Yorkshire. I didn’t ask him about the house by the marsh, nor did he tell me his news about buying it. I asked him if he was free later for a drink. He said that he could fit me in for a few hours.

We met up at the same pub we had gone to when we had spoken last. As I approached the bar, I was shocked at his appearance. He was stood there waiting for me, his hair was longer than I’d seen it since we left school, and more unkempt than I’d ever seen it. His face was covered in a growth of hair that was beyond stubble, but too patchy to be considered an actual beard. He was dressed in sweat pants and a baggy jumper. He looked pale, and there were dark circles around his eyes.

We exchanged a few perfunctory pleasantries before taking our drink outside to the beer garden on the riverside. There was no one else out there, which was a good thing as I knew that this was going to end in an argument.

‘Why?’ I asked as we sat looking out at the brown water of the river.

‘You know then?’ he said, taking another sip of his drink. ‘I guessed you did when you called.’

‘Why on Earth would you want to buy that place?’ I said.

‘My family needs a new house, here, and it was a great price.’

I shook my head.

‘Because of all the fucking murders that have happened there, or did you forget about that?’ I said, feeling the muscles in my face contracting in anger.

‘No,’ he said. ‘I can’t forget that house. I dream about it almost every night, and I couldn’t take it anymore. I knew if I bought it, and lived there, I could prove to myself it’s just a house.’

I thumped the table.

‘That’s just what it wants you to think,’ I said. ‘It draws us in, and makes us do terrible things, Wayne. For God’s sake, think about your girls.’

He leant over and grabbed me by the collar.

‘I am thinking about my girls,’ he said, spitting in my face. ‘Look at the state of me. Do you think having a father who looks and acts like this all the time is good for them? I can’t sleep, I have no energy, I’m short-tempered all the time. Do you think that’s a pleasant life for my daughters?’

He let me go, and I took a sip of my drink.

‘It already has a hold on you,’ I said. ‘Can’t you see it? You know what comes next.’

‘It’s just a fucking house,’ he screamed at me. ‘Bricks and mortar, nothing else. No ghoulies, no ghosties, and no fucking curses.’

‘Then how do you explain everything that’s happened?’ I screamed back at him.

‘Coincidence,’ he said. ‘Nothing more than that.’

‘You really believe that?’ I said.

‘I have to,’ he said. ‘You know, you’re the one who’s obsessed with that place.’

He got up and left the table. He started to walk away, then stopped and looked back at me.

‘Stay away from my family,’ he said. ‘And my house.’

With that, he was gone.

I went home and sat there trying to think of a way I could stop him, convince him that he was wrong, and that his life and those of his family were in danger. He was right, I was obsessed with that house, we all were, and had been since that night fifteen years earlier. Why could no one else see what was so clear to me?

Something dark had got inside us all, it started that night, and it was still there now, curled up inside us like a sleeping beast waiting to attack. It drew us back there to the house time after time. It had turned two of my closest friends into killers, and had turned Wayne into a stranger I could not even recognise.

It had to end, there had to be a way. Rob had tried destroying the old house, but it had not helped. Whatever it was, it was in the soil, the air, the land around the house. It could not be destroyed just by removing the house; it infected the new one as soon as it was built. I racked my brains to think of an answer. I had spent my whole life watching horror movies, and reading about the supernatural, surely somewhere tucked in a corner of my mind there had to be an answer.

Then it came to me. It was so obvious.

I waited until nighttime and then gathered the things I would need. I set off in the car, driving down that road was now second nature, I could have done it in my sleep. As I approached the house, I saw that there was a car in the driveway. Wayne was carrying a box from his car into the now uncovered door. All of the boards had gone; a few of the windows were lighted. I carried on driving towards the marsh, passing the house. I parked up further down the road and walked back, carrying the implements I needed to carry out my plan. Wayne’s presence might delay me, but it was not going to stop me.

I stayed close to the hedgerows as I neared the house, hoping the night and my dark clothing would conceal me. Wayne came back out of the house and got another box from his car. When he returned to the house, I sneaked across the road and ran to the side of the house. This was closer than I had been to it since the old house was there. I felt that familiar queasiness that always seemed to come over me once I was in the garden. I cautiously moved along the wall. I looked through the window. I could see Wayne placing the boxes in the kitchen. None of the appliances were in place yet. I moved to the next window, this room was probably a dining room due to its proximity to the kitchen, though I could not tell for sure as the room was devoid of any furniture.

My spirits began to rise as I realised that Wayne and his family had not moved in yet. He was obviously just dropping a few things off in advance. All I had to do was wait for him to leave, and then I could go ahead with my plan. The queasiness was not going away, though, and I wanted to spend as little time in the garden as possible. I decided I would run back across the road and wait by the hedgerow a little way up, for Wayne to leave.

As I turned to run back to the road, I tripped over some sort of garden ornament and fell to the gravel floor with a thud. I was just about getting up when I heard a voice from behind me.

‘Oi!’ It was Wayne.

I tried to start running, but had twisted my ankle in the fall. I could hear Wayne’s footfalls on the gravel behind me. He grabbed hold of the back of my hooded sweatshirt.

‘What do you think you’re doing?’ he said as he spun me around. He saw it was me and looked confused. ‘Chris?’

I had no choice. I swung around and hit him hard. He took a step backwards more surprised than hurt by my blow, but it made him let go of me. I bent down and grabbed a rock from the ground, and as he came at me again. I struck him with it on the side of the head. He went down instantly. I looked at him lying on the ground, a trickle of blood running from just above his ear, and for a moment I panicked. My decision to go to the house had been based on my desire to save Wayne and his family from himself, now he was on the floor bleeding. In my attempt to save him, had I just killed him?

I knelt down at his side and listened to his chest, not only could I hear his heartbeat I could also feel the rise and fall of his breathing. Thank God, he was alive. I took him under the arms and lifted slightly, then I dragged him across the drive, out of the gate and to the safety of the other side of the road. He would be all right there until I was done, and then he would thank me, I knew it.

I walked down and gathered up my things, the three full Jerry cans of petrol and the bag of flares. I walked back towards the house. This had to work, I had read about it so many times. When a place was so evil, so infected with darkness, the only way to get rid of it was purification by fire.

I used the first jerry can to soak as much of the downstairs of the house as I could, not wanting to linger inside too long. Even the brief time I was in there, I could hear the house screaming at me inside my mind. The queasiness increased dramatically inside the house. At one point, I had to stop to be sick. I coughed up some disgusting black substance, I hoped it was the darkness leaving me, being expelled from my body, just as I was about to expel it from this place.

I used the second two Jerry cans to soak the garden, letting the petrol absorb into the soil. Like I had said earlier, just getting rid of the house was not enough, the land had to be purified as well.

When I was done, I walked back across the road. Wayne was still where I had left him, he was starting to murmur now, it would not be long before he regained consciousness. I had to move quickly. I opened the bag of flares. I took the first one and struck it, its red light illuminating the area. I walked as close to the door as I dared and threw it inside. Instantly it made contact with the petrol and the hallway erupted in flames that soon spread to the other rooms. I walked to the side of the house and struck another flare, this one I launched into the garden at the back of the house. The fire spread like napalm over the grass. Finally, I walked back to the gate and threw the last flare into the front garden. The night was lit up by the inferno raging before me, and all at once, I felt a peace I had not experienced in years.

‘No! God! No!’ I heard from behind me. I turned to see Wayne rushing towards me. I thought that he would have felt the relief, too, that he would have seen that it was finally over. Instead, he looked hysterical in fear.

He tried to run past me, into the flaming driveway. I grabbed him and smiled at him.

‘It’s over, Wayne,’ I said, ecstatic in my relief. ‘It’s finally over.’

‘What have you done?’ He screamed at me, his eyes full of fear and anger.

‘I’ve got rid of the darkness.’

Wayne pushed me away and looked at the house.

‘My girls are in there!’ he screamed at me before running full pelt into the flames.

I stood there open mouthed. I looked at the upstairs window above the door. I saw them, two little silhouettes, black against the orange and raging flames. I dropped to my knees in defeat. The house had won, I was the one who had been pulled back to commit a great evil this time. I would never be free of the curse. Never.

1

Most people turned to crime to fund their drug addiction. Paul Mayhew was not most people. He had turned to selling drugs to fund his gambling addiction. The drugs themselves he never touched, not even pot. No, for Paul, the drugs were just a means to an end. Once upon a time, he’d had a fairly good job. He’d been the assistant manager at the local Argos, until his gambling problem had become so bad that he was caught stealing from the tills to fund it.

It had started simply enough, when he was in college in Boston. In those days, he spent most of his time avoiding lectures in the student union bar, or ‘The Horn Bar’ as it was actually called. It was there that he had first started playing on the fruit machines. To begin with, it had just been a few quid here and there, but gradually it increased to everyday, and then all day everyday. The thrill of those little wins spurring him on, the promise of the big payout always just around the corner. The first time he’d won a jackpot, with a double repeater, had been the happiest day of his life up until that point hands down.

When he managed to get into university, he had found a small arcade around the corner from the campus. Not the garish kind he was used to back home in Skegness, with all the lights and computer games, no, this was one of those dark, dingy places with nothing but the gambling machines. He and his fellow addicts, of course at this point he hadn’t realised he had a problem, spent hours on end feeding coins into those infernal machines. Once he had spent four hundred pounds of his eight hundred pound loan cheque in two hours. When at the end of this he had not won a thing, he had merely gone to the bank and drawn out the remainder of his cash.

At the end of his second year, he had dropped out and returned home to Skegness, where he managed to get the job at Argos. Skegness was a strange place, a costal town and holiday resort in the true British seaside tradition. It was not big enough to match up to the likes of Blackpool, but was still a popular destination for people from Nottingham and Yorkshire. Its popularity was something that had always confused Paul; to him it was just his hometown, as boring a place as anyone else’s home.

In the summer it got to the point where you couldn’t walk down the street sometimes for the sheer amount of bodies, all moving in and out of one tat shop after another. The nightlife in season could be bad as well, people were on holiday and relaxing, trouble often started.

By contrast, in the winter the place had an eerie and isolated quality. Sometimes it felt as if the place only really existed in the summer, and that during the winter the town and its residents were merely ghosts.

The problem for Paul was that there were so many arcades, with so many fruit machines, that there was no way to abate his need to gamble. Over the years, he had advanced to betting on the horses, he was a regular with every bookie in town, and to playing poker, online and in the pubs and clubs. Sometimes he would win fairly substantial amounts of money. In one poker tournament he had won nearly seven grand in a night. The only problem was that no sooner had he won the money than he was betting on something else, and more often than not losing it all.

This was the situation that had led him to start dealing on the side. He had made the acquaintance of one of the most successful, and brutal, of local dealers, a man simply known as Big Baz. The name was not ironic, Big Baz could easily have been called Fucking Enormous Baz, and it wouldn’t be an understatement. He was a giant, at least six foot six and built like a brick shithouse. He was covered from head to foot in tattoos, not tasteful or arty ones, dirty homemade tattoos that you only seemed to find on the criminal classes. Baz had no front teeth and a nose that wouldn’t have looked out of place on a boxer. He was always wearing tracksuits and baseball caps, and had two large Staffie dogs that he kept on large brass chains.

Paul was not ashamed to admit that the first time he had met the man mountain that was Big Baz , he had been terrified. Paul had been in one of the clubs on the sea front, that had long since closed down, enjoying a drink when he was approached by Baz.

‘Oy you?’ Baz had said towering over him. ‘You work at Argos don’t ya?’

Unable to speak due to his fear Paul had simply nodded.

‘Yeah, thought so. Do you know that little scrote, Dennis?’

Again, Paul nodded.

‘Have you seen him?’ Baz asked.

Paul pointed over towards the bar area.

‘Cheers,’ Baz had said, wandering off to the bar with the kind of swagger that made him look even more ape like. Paul watched as he walked over to Dennis, who Paul agreed was a scrote. He worked at Argos during the summer, and was a pretentious twat of a sociology student who thought he could change the world.

Baz put one of his giant hands on Dennis’s shoulder and dragged him back from the bar. Though there was no way on Earth that he could hear the conversation, it was clearly unpleasant. Baz was bending down to yell in the weedy little guy’s face. He looked like a taut spring waiting to uncoil. Dennis, on the other hand, looked like a floundering fish, his hands gesticulating at speed as he tried to reason with the monster. Eventually, Baz tired of the conversation and smashed his beer bottle on the side of Dennis’s head. Paul felt bad for leading Baz to him. Even if he was a bit of a dick, Dennis didn’t deserve that.

One of the bouncers, one who’d been called in from out of town, had come over and tried to drag Baz out. Baz had head butted the guy in the face, flattening his nose. The other bouncers came dashing over and pulled their fallen comrade and Dennis away, undoubtedly to wait for ambulances. They left Baz well alone. They knew from personal experience that it was not worth confronting the dealer. He could do as he pleased, they even turned a blind eye to him dealing in the club, better that than ending up in hospital, or worse.

Baz grabbed another couple of beers from the bar, free of charge no doubt, and headed back towards Paul. He knew he was physically quaking with fear as the man approached. He knew he was next, guilty by association. What he had done to Dennis and the bouncer had not sated his blood lust.

Instead, he smiled and handed the second beer over to Paul.

‘Cheers for pointing him out,’ Baz said sitting down opposite him.

‘No problem.’

‘I’ve been looking for him for days. You would not believe how much money that little prick owes me.’

With that the two of them had got talking and, to some extent, become friends.

After he lost his job at Argos, Paul had approached Baz with a business proposition. Paul explained that through his university days he knew many of the middle class drug users around the area, those who would not want to associate with someone like Baz. If the drug dealer were to give him a commission, Paul would sell drugs on his behalf. Baz had loved the idea, and for the last few years that was how Paul had been paying his bills and feeding his habit. Now, though, he was in trouble, he had lost a poker tournament he had entered with Baz’s money, and now he owed the dealer five grand, and had no way to pay.

2

Paul had spent the last few days in hiding, he hadn’t dared to spend time in his little flat, instead he was staying at his mum’s house. He wasn’t sure if Baz knew where she lived, though knowing Baz’s contacts he wouldn’t have trouble finding that information out. Paul’s hope was that even a brute like Baz wouldn’t want to smash a guy’s skull in front of their mother.

His mother knew he was in trouble of some kind, she knew of his gambling problem, but didn’t know he was selling drugs for the local psychopath. She was getting tired of him hanging around the house.

‘Are you short of money again, love?’ she asked.

‘A little,’ Paul replied.

She reached for her purse and drew out a twenty pound note.

‘Will this help?’ she said, handing the cash over to him.

‘Yeah,’ he lied. ‘Thanks, Mum.’

‘Go on get out of the house for a bit,’ she said, it was more like a demand than a suggestion.

Paul slipped on his coat and headed out. He stuck to the side roads as he headed towards town. He didn’t want to see Baz cruising through town in his BMW the way he liked to. He had no idea how he was going to get out of the situation he was in. He supposed he could take the twenty quid his mum had given him to the bookies and try to increase it to an amount he could enter another poker tournament with. He shook the idea away, it was that kind of thinking that had got him in this situation in the first place. No, his best plan was to talk to Baz, they had been friends for a few years now, Baz had always been reasonable with him. There was one problem with this—Baz was not reasonable with anyone who owed him money, let alone someone who owed him five grand. He would probably kill him, certainly put him in hospital.

As he approached town, Paul headed for The Lumley. It was the one place in town that he had never met Baz for a drink, he hoped that this meant that Baz was unlikely to turn up.

He walked into the bar and got himself a pint. There were several tables free. Paul chose the one in the corner, the most hidden from sight of the door, hoping if Baz came in and scanned the room he would not see him.

He finished his first pint and got another. He returned to the same table, from there he could see the fruit machine, its multicoloured lights blinking and flashing at him. Most people will look at these lights, they are sort of hypnotic, but to Paul watching them filled him with longing, a hunger that had to be satisfied.

For a while he tried to ignore it, the pulling sensation down in the pit of his stomach. He looked around the pub as his sipped his pint, watching the other people to distract himself from the fruit machine and its siren spell over him. There was an old man sat on his own, reading a paper and drinking bitter from a pint mug. There were a few younger lads playing pool and competing for the alpha male of the group status. There were a group of middle-aged men stood at the bar. They looked like they had money, business suits and expensive watches. There were a group of people, male and female, of various ages, all laughing and joking. From the way they behaved, Paul assumed that they were either a family group or coworkers. Finally, there was a young couple, chatting with each other, oblivious to everyone else. Paul tried to remember how long it had been since he had felt that close to someone, it must have been years. It was when he was still at university and had been going out with an art student called Harriet. God, he’d loved that girl. It had ended when he flunked out. She was unprepared to leave the city and go with him to Skegness, and he couldn’t blame her.

The bitterness of the memory made him turn away from the young couple, and again he was staring at the fruit machine, its lights and noises calling to him like he was a sailor lost in the fog.

‘Fuck it,’ he said to himself as he stood up and pulled some change out of his pocket. He stood at the machine and dropped a few pound coins into the slot. He heard it drop straight to the bottom of the machine. To an experienced player like him, it was a beautiful sound, it meant that the prize fund was full and the money going in was bypassing it. It was ready to pay out.

He spun the wheels, feeling the surge of excitement that he always got when he thought he was on for a win. He was so engrossed in the game that he didn’t notice the door open and Big Baz step in. He still had a pound credit in the machine when Baz grabbed him by the shoulder and dragged him backwards out of the pub.

Baz let him go once they were in the abandoned smoking area outside.

‘You been avoiding me?’ Baz asked. He seemed calm. This scared Paul more than if he’d seemed pissed off. When Baz was about to commit an act of brutal violence a strange kind of peace came over him.

‘Course not, Baz,’ Paul said. ‘I’ve just been a bit sick lately.’

Baz nodded and lit a cigarette.

‘Anything serious?’ He asked.

‘Just a bit of a cold, been staying at my mum’s so she can look after me.’

‘Did you sell that stuff yet?’ Baz asked.

‘Not all of it,’ Paul lied. ‘What with feeling shit and everything.’

‘Well, I need whatever you’ve got left then,’ Baz said.

‘But I’ve promised it to one of my customers Baz, he’s expecting it.’

‘When?’

‘When I’m well enough to take it to him,’ Paul said.

‘Well, I can get you some more in a few days, but I got a deal on tomorrow afternoon that means I need the stuff or the money to buy more,’ Baz said. ‘Which is it?’

‘I can’t get you either tonight, Baz,’ Paul started to explain.

Baz grabbed him by the throat with one hand and swung him round so his back hit the wall of the pub.

‘Are you trying to fuck me over?’ Baz said, his eyes burning with sudden rage.

‘No, Baz,’ Paul choked.

‘You better not be,’ Baz said. ‘I swear to God if you have pissed my money away down the bookies I will make sure you never fucking walk again.’

Paul was starting to feel light-headed, the pressure that Baz was exerting on his throat was stopping just enough air getting in to make him woozy.

‘I want the money or the drugs tomorrow morning. Do you understand?’ Baz said.

Paul nodded in response. He was no longer able to speak, if Baz didn’t loosen his grip soon he was going to pass out.

‘Bring one of them round my gaff by half nine,’ Baz said. ‘Or I’ll tear this fucking shithole town apart to find you.’

Finally, Baz let go of his throat and Paul slid to the floor gasping for air. Baz leaned over him.

‘Half nine at the latest,’ he said.

Paul nodded and Baz walked away.

3

When he had dusted himself off a little and finally regained his breath, Paul headed back into the pub. As he approached the machine, he saw that one of those middle-aged businessmen was playing on the fruit machine. Not only that, but as the light flashed manically, Paul could tell that the man had just won the jackpot. Paul felt a flush of white-hot anger. He had left money in the machine; if Baz had not just dragged him out of the pub that jackpot would be his. He was not usually one for confrontation, but the incident outside had left him wound up. He stormed over to the businessman.