The Second Wish and Other Exhalations Read online

  Even with the windows rolled up, I could smell some­thing of the smoke, and something that wasn’t smoke …

  In Makelos town, Julie began to stir. I asked for her to be sedated, kept down for the night. Then, when she was sleeping soundly and safely in a room at the mayor’s house, I began asking questions. I was furious at the beginning, growing more furious as I started to get the answers.

  I couldn’t be sorry for the people of Makelos, though I did feel something for Elli, Dimitrios’s wife. She’d run to Nichos, told him what was happening. And he’d alerted the townspeople. Elli had been a sort of prisoner at the taverna for the past ten days or so, after her husband had ‘gone funny’. Then, when she’d started to notice things, he’d told her to keep quiet and carry on as normal, or she’d be the loser. And he meant she’d lose all the way. She reckoned he’d got the parasites off the goats, accidentally, and she was probably right, for the goats had been the first to die. Her explanation was likely because the goats used to go up there sometimes, to the cave under the mountain. And that was where the things bred, in that cave and in the well it contained, which now and then overflowed, and found its way to the sea.

  But Elli, poor peasant that she was: on her way to alert Nichos, she’d seen her husband kill George’s wife and push her over the cliffs into the sea. Then she’d hid herself off the road until he’d turned his three-wheeler round and started back toward the taverna.

  As for the corpse under the tarpaulin: that was Dimitrios’s grandfather, who along with his grandson had been a survivor of the first outbreak. He’d been lucky that time, not so lucky this time.

  And the tick things? They were … a disease, but they could never be a plague. The men from Athens had taken some of them away with them that first time. But away from their well, away from the little shaded valley and from Makelos, they’d quickly died. This was their place, and they could exist nowhere else. Thank God!

  Last time the chemicals hadn’t killed them off, obviously, or maybe a handful of eggs had survived to hatch out when the poisons had dissolved away. For they were survivors, these creatures, the last of their species, and when they went, their secret would go with them. But a disease? I believe so, yes.

  Like the common cold, or rabies, or any other disease, but far worse because they’re visible, apparent. The common cold makes you sneeze, so that the disease is propagated, and hydrophobia makes its victims claw and bite, gets passed on in their saliva. The secret of the tick-things was much the same sort of thing: they made their hosts pass them on. It was the way their intelligent human hosts did it that made them so much more terrible.

  In the last outbreak, only Greeks — Makelosians — had been involved; this time it was different. This time, too, the people would take care of the problem themselves: they’d pour hundreds of gallons of gasoline and fuel oil into the well, set the place on fire. And then they’d dynamite the cliff, bring it down to choke the well forever, and they’d never, ever, let people go into that little valley again. That was their promise, but I’d made myself a couple of promises, too. I was angry and frightened, and I knew I was going to stay that way for a long time to come.

  We were out of there first thing in the morning, on the first boat to the mainland. There were smart-looking men to meet us at the airport in Athens, Greek officials from some ministry or other. They had interpreters with them, and nothing was too much trouble. They, too, made prom­ises, offers of compensation, anything our hearts desired.

  We nodded and smiled wearily, said yes to this, that, and the other, anything so that we could just get aboard that plane. It had been our shortest holiday ever: we’d been in Greece just forty-eight hours, and all we wanted now was to be out of it as quickly as possible. But when we were back home again — that was when we told our story!

  It was played down, of course: the Common Market, international tensions, a thousand other economic and diplomatic reasons. Which is why I’m now telling it all over again. I don’t want anybody to suffer what we went through, what we’re still going through. And so if you happen to be mad on the Mediterranean islands … well, I’m sorry, but that’s the way it was.

  As for Julie and me: we’ve moved away from the sea, and come summer, we won’t be going out in the sun too much or for too long. That helps a little. But every now and then, I’ll wake up in the night, in a cold sweat, and find Julie do­ing her horrible thing: nightmaring about Dimitrios, hiding from him, holding her breath so that he won’t hear her…

  —And sometimes screaming her silent screams …

  De Marigny’s Clock

  Not too many years before I was born, H.P. Lovecraft had written a story called “The Terrible Old Man”. The basic similarity of themes between that tale and this present one didn’t strike me until quite recently, but since I’ve always loved Lovecraft, I suppose it’s possible I was subconsciously influenced sufficiently to write it ‘after’ HPL. Certainly the fate of the villains is … ah, but that would be telling.

  Something else in this story that you’ll find in Lovecraft is the extraordinary timepiece of the title …

  Any intrusions, other than those condoned or invited, upon the privacy of Titus Crow at his bungalow retreat, Blowne House, on the outskirts of London, were almost always automatically classified by that gentleman as open acts of warfare. In the first place for anyone to make it merely to the doors of Crow’s abode without an invitation — often even with one — was a sure sign of the appearance on the scene of a forceful and dogmatic character; qualities which were almost guaranteed to clash with Crow’s own odd nature. For Blowne House seemed to exude an atmosphere all its own, an exhalation of impending something which usually kept the place and its grounds free even from birds and mice; and it was quite unusual for Crow himself to invite visitors. He kept strange hours and busied himself with stranger matters and, frankly, was almost antisocial even in his most ‘engaging’ moments. Over the years the reasons for this apparent inhospitality had grown, or so it seemed to Crow, increasingly clear-cut. For one thing, his library contained quite a large number of rare and highly costly books, many of them long out of print and some of them never officially in print, and London apparently abounded with unscrupulous ‘collectors’ of such items. For another his studies, usually in occult matters and obscure archaeological, antiquarian or anthropological research, were such as required the most concentrated attention and personal involvement, completely precluding any disturbances from outside sources.

  Not that the present infringement came while Crow was engaged with any of his many and varied activities — it did not; it came in the middle of the night, rousing him from deep and dreamless slumbers engendered by a long day of frustrated and unrewarding work on de Marigny’s clock. And Titus Crow was not amused.

  “What the hell’s going on here? Who are you and what are you doing in my house?” He had sat bolt upright in bed almost as soon as the light went on. His forehead had come straight into contact with a wicked-looking automatic held in the fist of a most unbeautiful thug. The man was about five feet eight inches in height, thick-set, steady on legs which were short in comparison with the rest of his frame. He had a small scar over his left eye and a mouth that slanted downward — cynically, Crow supposed — from left to right. Most unbeautiful.

  “Just take it easy, guv’, and there’ll be no bother,” the thug said, his voice soft but ugly. Crow’s eyes flicked across the room to where a second hoodlum stood, just within the bedroom door, a nervous grin twisting his pal­lid features. “Find anything, Pasty?” the man with the pistol questioned, his eyes never leaving Crow’s face for a second.

  “Nothing, Joe,” came the answer, “a few old books and bit of silver, nothing worth our while — yet. He’ll tell us where it is, though, won’t you, chum?”

  “Pasty!” Crow exclaimed, “Powers of observation, in­deed! I was just thinking, before hearing your name, what a thin, pasty creature you look — Pasty.” Crow grinned, got out of bed and
put on his flame-red dressing-gown. Joe looked him up and down appraisingly. Crow was tall and broad-shouldered and it was plain to see that in his younger days he had been a handsome man. Even now there was a certain tawniness about him, and his eyes were still very bright and more than intelligent. Overall his aspect conveyed an impression of hidden power, which Joe did not particularly care much for. He decided it would be best to show his authority at the earliest op­portunity. And Crow obligingly supplied him with that opportunity in the next few seconds.

  The jibe the occultist had aimed at Pasty had mean­while found its way home. Pasty’s retaliation was a threat: “Lovely colour, that dressing-gown,” he said, “it’ll match up nicely if you bleed when I rap you on your head.” He laughed harshly, slapping a metal cosh into his open palm. “But before that, you will tell us where it is, won’t you?”

  “Surely,” Crow answered immediately, “it’s third on the left, down the passage … ugh!” Joe’s pistol smacked into Crow’s cheek, knocking him sprawling. He carefully got up, gingerly feeling the red welt on his face.

  “Now that’s just to show you that we don’t want any more funnies, see?” Joe said.

  “Yes, I see,” Crow’s voice trembled with suppressed rage, “just what do you want?”

  “Now is that so difficult to figure out?” Pasty asked, crossing the room. “Money … we want your money! A fine fellow like you, with a place like this—” the lean man glanced appraisingly about the room, noting the silk curtains, the boukhara rugs, the original erotic illustrations by Aubrey Beardsley in their rosewood frames — “ought to have a good bit of ready cash lying about … we want it!”

  “Then I’m sorry to have to disappoint you,” Crow told him happily, seating himself on his bed, “I keep my money in a bank — what little I’ve got.”

  “Up!” ordered Joe briefly. “Off the bed.” He pulled Crow to one side, nodding to Pasty, indicating some sort of action involving the bed. Crow stepped forward as Pasty yanked back the covers from the mattress and took out a sharp knife.

  “Now wait…” he began, thoroughly alarmed.

  “Hold it, guv’, or I might just let Pasty use his blade on you!” Joe waved his gun in Crow’s face, ordering him back. “You see, you’d be far better off to tell us where the money is without all this trouble. This way you’re just going to see your little nest wrecked around you.” He waited, giving Crow the opportunity to speak up, then indicated to Pasty that he should go ahead.

  Pasty went ahead!

  He ripped open the mattress along both sides and one end, tearing back the soft outer covering to expose the stuffing and springs beneath, then pulling out the interior in great handfuls, flinging them down on the floor in total disregard of Crow’s utter astonishment and concern.

  “See, guv’, you’re a recluse — in our books, anyway — and retiring sorts like you hide their pennies in the funniest places. Like in mattresses … or behind wall- pictures!” Joe gave Pasty a nod, waving his pistol at the Beardsleys.

  “Well for God’s sake, just look behind them,” Crow snarled, again starting forward, “there’s no need to rip them off the walls.”

  “Here!” Pasty exclaimed, turning an enquiring eye on the outraged householder, “these pictures worth anything then?”

  “Only to a collector — you’d never find a fence for stuff like that,” Crow replied.

  “Hah! Not so stupid, our recluse!” Joe grinned, “But being clever won’t get you anywhere, guv’, except hospital maybe … OK, Pasty, leave the man’s dirty pictures alone. You—” He turned to Crow, “— your study; we’ve been in there, but only passing through. Let’s go, guv’; you can give us a hand to, er, shift things about.” He pushed Crow in the direction of the door.

  Pasty was last to enter the study. He did so shivering, an odd look crossing his face. Pasty did not know it but he was a singularly rare person, one of the world’s few truly ‘psychic’ men. Crow was another — one who had the talent to a high degree — and he sensed Pasty’s sudden feeling of apprehension.

  “Snug little room, isn’t it?” he asked, grinning cheerfully at the uneasy thug.

  “Never mind how pretty the place is — try the panelling, Pasty,” Joe directed.

  “Eh?” Pasty’s mind obviously was not on the job. “The panelling?” His eyes shifted nervously round the room.

  “Yes, the panelling!” Joe studied his partner curiously. “What’s wrong with you, then?” His look of puzzlement turned to one of anger, “Now come on, Pasty boy, get a grip! At this rate we’ll be here all bleeding night!”

  Now it happened that Titus Crow’s study was the pride of his life, and the thought of the utter havoc his un­welcome visitors could wreak in there was a terrifying thing to him. He determined to help them in their abor­tive search as much as he could; they would not find anything — there was nothing to find! — but this way he could at least ensure as little damage as possible be­fore they realized there was no money in the house and left. They were certainly unwilling to believe anything he said about the absence of substantive funds! But then again, to anyone not knowing him reasonably well — and few did — Crow’s home and certain of its appointments might certainly point to a man of considerable means. Yet he was merely comfortable, not wealthy, and, as he had said, what money he did have was safe in a bank. The more he helped them get through with their search the quicker they would leave! He had just made up his mind to this effect when Pasty found the hidden recess by the fireside.

  “Here!” The nervous look left Pasty’s face as he turned to Joe. “Listen to this.” He rapped on a square panel. The sound was dull, hollow. Pasty swung his cosh back purposefully.

  “No, wait — I’ll open it for you.” Crow held up his hands in protest.

  “Go on then, get it open,” Joe ordered. Crow moved over to the wall and expertly slid back the panel to reveal a dim shelf behind. On the shelf was a single book. Pasty pushed Crow aside, lifted out the book and read off its title:

  “The … what? … Cthaat Aquadingen! Huh!” Then his expression quickly turned to one of pure disgust and loath­ing. “Ughhh/’ He flung the book away from him across the room, hastily wiping his hands down his jacket. Titus Crow received a momentary but quite vivid mental message from the mind of the startled thug. It was a picture of things rotting in vaults of crawling darkness, and he could well understand why Pasty was suddenly trembling.

  “That … damn book’s wet!” the shaken crook ex­claimed nervously.

  “No, just sweating!” Crow informed. “The binding is, er, human skin, you see. Somehow it still retains the ability to sweat — a sure sign that it’s going to rain.”

  “Claptrap!” Joe snapped. “And you get a grip of your­self,” he snarled at Pasty. “There’s something about this place I don’t like either, but I’m not letting it get me down.” He turned to Crow, his mouth strained and twisting in anger: “And from now on you speak when you’re spoken to.” Then carefully, practicedly, he turned his head and slowly scanned the room, taking in the tall bookshelves with their many volumes, some ancient, others relatively modern, and he glanced at Pasty and grinned knowingly. “Pasty,” Joe ordered, “get them books off the shelves — I want to see what’s behind them. How about it, recluse, you got anything behind there?”

  “Nothing, nothing at all,” Crow quickly answered, “for goodness sake don’t go pulling them down; some of them are coming to pieces as it is. No!”

  His last cry was one of pure protestation; horror at the defilement of his collection. The two thugs ignored him. Pasty, seemingly over his nervousness, happily went to work, scattering the books left, right and centre. Down came the collected works of Edgar Allan Poe, the first rare editions of Machen’s and Lovecraft’s fiction; then the more ancient works, of Josephus, Magnus, Levi, Borellus, Erdschluss and Wittingby; closely followed by a connected set on oceanic evil: Gaston Le Fe’s Dwellers in the Depths, Oswald’s Legends of Liqualia, Gantley’s Hydrophinnae, the
German Unter-Zee Kulten and Hartrack’s In Pressured Places …

  Crow could merely stand and watch it all, a black rage growing in his heart, and Joe, not entirely insensitive to the occultist’s mood, gripped his pistol a little tighter and unsmilingly cautioned him: “Just take it easy, hermit. There’s still time to speak up — just tell us where you hide your money and it’s all over. No? OK, what’s next?” His eyes swept the now littered room again, coming to rest in a dimly lighted corner where stood a great clock.

  In front of the clock — an instrument apparently of the ‘grandfather’ class; at least, from a distance of that appearance — stood a small occasional table bearing an adjustable reading-lamp, one or two books and a few scattered sheets of notepaper. Seeing the direction in which Joe’s actions were leading him, Crow smiled inwardly and wished his criminal visitor all the best. If Joe could make anything of that timepiece, then he was a cleverer man than Titus Crow; and if he could actually open it, as is possible and perfectly normal with more orthodox clocks, then Crow would be eternally grateful to him. For the sarcophagus-like thing in the dim corner was that same instrument with which Crow had busied himself all the previous day and on many, many other days since first he purchased it more than ten years earlier. And none of his studies had done him a bit of good! He was still as unenlightened with regard to the clock’s purpose as he had been a decade ago.

  Allegedly the thing had belonged to one Etienne-Laurent de Marigny, once a distinguished student of occult and oriental mysteries and antiquities, but where de Marigny had come by the coffin-shaped clock was yet another mystery. Crow had purchased it on the assurance of its auctioneer that it was, indeed, that same timepiece mentioned in certain of de Marigny’s papers as being ‘a door on all space and time; one which only certain adepts — not all of this world — could use to its intended purpose!’ There were, too, rumours that a certain Eastern mystic, the Swami Chandraputra, had vanished forever from the face of the Earth after squeezing himself into a cavity hidden beneath the panel of the lower part of the clock’s coffin shape. Also, de Marigny had supposedly had the ability to open at will that door into which the Swami vanished — but that was a secret he had taken with him to the grave. Titus Crow had never been able to find even a keyhole; and while the clock weighed what it should for its size, yet when one rapped on the lower panel the sounds such rappings produced were not hollow as might be expected. A curious fact — a curious history altogether — but the clock itself was even more curious to gaze upon or listen to.