Darkest Part of the Woods (29 page)

He'd cleared the steps under the mound. He and his aunt had ventured down past things he thought should never have lived, and he'd/ glimpsed one that was somehow still alive. He'd done his best to restore the mound to its state prior to their intrusion, but now that suggested an attempt to bury his memories of their descent and of finding Selcouth's journal. The memories felt poised to let another reach him, and not just of having encountered the insects before. As if they had scented his thought and were drawn by it, all the insects rose from the mound and flew at him.

They were across the clearing before he could retreat a pace. He was stumbling backwards when they streamed between the trees at the height of his head. As they passed through the network of shadows they continued to shine with colours he couldn't begin to name, colours he might have been dreaming rather than seeing. He'd backed! less than a yard when his spine collided with a tree-trunk. The impact pinned him there as the swarm reached him.

He flailed at the oncoming mass with both hands. For a moment he thought he'd managed to ward it off as it swerved and danced back creating pattern after intricate rapid pattern, towards the mound. He was on the point of grasping the impossible geometry the patterns implied when a single insect darted into his face. Though its wings which were flickering almost too fast to be visible, were insect-like enough, the claws it stretched out to him might have been microscopic bunches of twigs, while its body and limbs appeared all too nearly human, despite their scaly covering that resembled iridescent moss. How could he distinguish all this when it was scarcely as long as his thumbnail? Yet he did, unless his mind was frantically inventing details to blind him to some reality. He was feeling pitifully grateful that he'd had no time to recognise its face, despite an impression of shimmering eyes and a mouth that opened to help them greet him, when the creature swelled up in his vision and vanished.

His hands jerked up to claw it out of his hair, though his fingertips tingled with unwillingness, but it was beyond their reach. For the briefest instant-as long as he would have been able to bear the sensation-he felt it crawling within him, and then it seemed to expand, filling his skull with a darkness as cold and as immeasurable as space. Perhaps that was a memory of its origin; without question it unlocked memories-Sam's own. Now his hands were desperate to stop him seeing, but covering his eyes or even destroying them couldn't achieve that.

He could only clutch at the air as if it contained forgetfulness.

He remembered straying into the glade months ago. He remembered the figure that had come to meet him-remembered her taking his hand to lead him to the mound.

They'd undressed so slowly and wordlessly they might have been enacting some ritual.

It had felt like a dream he was having while awake, but now it seemed more like a nightmare that wasn't about to finish. He hadn't recognised her then, and surely she couldn't have recognised him. As her long bare legs had closed around his waist, hauling him deeper into her, she had uttered just one word. At least, a voice had sounded in his ears or in his head, but perhaps it hadn't been Sylvia's. "Selcouth," the muffled voice had kept repeating. "Selcouth."

26

Parental Problems

AS Heather turned along Woodland Close she saw a man lurching to close her gate from within. He was swaying so much that she took him for a drunk. Another second's driving brought her close enough to recognise Sam. Of course only his limp was required to unbalance him when he was moving at such speed. She sounded her horn, and he glanced towards the sound. He had to be preoccupied, because he shut the gate hastily and blundered towards the house.

Perhaps he thought she was already home. Perhaps he was as anxious to tell her why he'd phoned her at work as she was eager to know. She left the car in the middle of the roadway and the door ajar as she ran to the gate. When her footsteps didn't make him turn from unlocking the front door, her voice outdid them for sharpness. "Sam."

She saw his shadow on the wooden panels shrink into itself, then bloom larger and paler as he floundered around to face her. "What?" he just about said.

"I don't know. You wanted me."

Was that gentle to the point of inaudibility? He looked as if he either hadn't heard or didn't understand. As she unlatched the gate and swung it wide she said "It was such a good day I went out for f. lunchtime walk. I'm sorry I missed you."

"Doesn't

matter."

"You sorted it out, then, whatever it was."

She would have thought he could take that as a question, but he was turning towards the house. "You aren't cold, are you?" Heather wondered, and went on as he shook his head "You can't be. Wait while I bring in the car."

She hoped he might at least close the gate behind her without being asked, and he did.

She was out of the car before he could retreat into the house. "What was the matter, then?" she said, and when his face tightened "Is it still?"

"Just something dad wanted me to do."

"What kind of something?"

"Get a job."

"I think we'd all like that for you. Are we talking about a specific job?"

"Interview."

"Where?"

"Publishing."

"Well, don't overwork the suspense. How did it go?"

"Didn't."

"Oh dear, Sam, never mind. Did they tell you that or could you be underrating yourself as usual, do you think?"

"I mean I didn't."

"I'm sorry, Sam, you're saying you didn't..."

"Go."

A passing pair of neighbours she knew barely well enough to recognise as such glanced sharply at her when she raised her voice. "Why not?"

Sam jerked his left hand at her. She thought he was trying to ward off the question until she realised that the darkness on his wrist wasn't a shadow cast by nothing she could see, it was the remnant of a message. "I lost the address," he mumbled.

"Where did you get it from?"

"I told you, dad."

He hadn't quite, and his response suggested how confused he was "Couldn't you get it from him again?" Heather more than wanted to know.

"That's why I called you." Sam's voice was growing raw with resentment of her questions or of the admissions he was being forced to make. "I forgot where he works."

"Hartley,

Tracy

and-"

"Harvey. The three adverbs, like you used to say. I know now. I forgot before."

The strolling neighbours glanced back as though in search of evidence that the surviving Prices were no more stable than Lennox had ended up. Nothing like that was wrong with Sam, Heather assured herself, but she'd had enough and a second helping of their scrutiny. "Let's continue inside," she murmured. "Why were you so worried about an interview?"

She assumed it was her interrogation that made him suddenly reluctant to move towards the house. "Who says I was?" he muttered.

"Mustn't that be why you couldn't remember where you were supposed to go?" When he frowned so unhappily his entire face seemed in danger of pinching inward she said "Of course it must. You'd be amazed what I've forgotten when I've too much on my mind. Go ahead, open the door while I unload the car."

She wondered if his limp was troubling him; certainly he took his time over reaching the house. When she followed with her handbag and a carrier of groceries he was edging the door open. He stepped into the hall and switched on the light, only to falter. Wasn't he used to the faint ancient smell that had taken up residence? She didn't want to grow used to it either, but she was about to urge him to move when she saw what he'd seen. Propped against the phone on the hall table was a note in Sylvia's handwriting.

All it said was Gone to mum's, though to begin with Sylvia had written mom's, so that the altered letter resembled an egg almost filling an upturned tube. If Sam's reaction didn't mean he'd wanted his aunt's presence to bring an end to Heather's questions, presumably he was glad she wouldn't hear them, if indeed he was sure which. "

"had you better ring your father?" Heather said. "He may still be at work."

"Why?"

"Why should you ring him? To get the number of the publisher so you can let them know what went wrong."

"I

remember."

"You remember..."

"Everything," Sam said, but closed his eyes and jerked his hands up less in surrender than as though he was about to scratch at the container of his brain.

She took him to be wishing her elsewhere, since he muttered "The publisher."

"Then I'll leave you to talk to them while I put away the shopping The kitchen light had finished flickering to life before she heard him lift the receiver. As she began to unpack the carrier he asked Directory Enquiries for the number of Midas Books. Heather set about rustling plastic and generally making a noise as if she didn't want to overhear what came of his dialling the number. She heard him ask for someone called Fay Sheridan and say "Oh, isn't she?" with some relief and "If you like" with none. Heather spent the long pause guessing that he'd been offered a word with Fay Sheridan's secretary to whom he had to admit "It's Sam Harvey. I was supposed to see her today."

Heather busied herself with putting groceries away, but couldn't pretend she was making as much noise as she might have. When Sam said "I got lost" she willed him not to ruin his chances by owning up to all his forgetfulness. Pauses that her busyness was unable to rob c threat were followed by his saying "It got rubbed out" and "I couldn't remember any of it" and

"It's all right, I should call her." With rather more animation than any of this had involved he said "Goodbye."

By now Heather had run out of items to unpack and was stark through the window. The reflection of the kitchen didn't quite disguise the appearance above the fence of the tangled scalp of a vast unseen head-of the treetops. She waited for Sam's footsteps to succeed the clatter of the receiver; she was hoping they would make for her rather than limp upstairs. When they stayed put and mum she called "How long did she have to wait for you?"

"I didn't say I'd be there. It wasn't definite."

"Let's hope she gives you another chance, then." Having waited for a reply, Heather pulled the door wide. Sam had picked up Sylvia's note and was staring at it. "Is something else wrong?" Heather said.

He must have begun to crumple the note, which unfolded like a misshapen blossom as he opened his hand. "What's his name," he said.

Despite its flatness, she assumed this was a question. "Natty, you mean?"

"Why would I mean that?" he said with a fierceness that took her aback. "We don't even know what it is."

"A boy or a girl, you mean." Her confusion made her ask "So is it the other parent you're wondering about?"

"Other, right. Mr. Other." Presumably amusement was the reason Sam bared his teeth.

"Are you expecting to meet him?" he demanded more than said.

"Somehow I don't think we will."

"What would you do if you did?"

"Welcome him if Sylvie does."

"You think you would," Sam said with undisguised disbelief. "You'd do that."

She couldn't have predicted his reaction; he sounded more like a father than a nephew.

"Why, how would you deal with him?" she said.

"Christ knows how I'll have to."

"You won't, Sam. I'm sure he isn't going to turn up. Between ourselves, and we won't let it out of the family, will we, I don't even think he knows he's a father."

"Won't let it out of the family." When Sam had finished lingering over the repetition he said

"Suppose he's realised?"

"I don't see how he can. He and Sylvie aren't in any kind of touch."

Sam's lips twitched and continued to grimace as he said "Don't you want to know his name at least?"

"Not if she doesn't want us to. It's my impression she'd rather forget him." As she spoke, Heather had an idea that explained altogether too much: could the father have been a patient at the hospital where Sylvia had shared a room with Merilee? Surely that couldn't affect Sylvia's child. It was partly to drive away the fear that Heather declared "The baby's all that matters. We don't need to know an more to look after it and its, let's say his for now, his mother."

She hoped Sam wouldn't disagree with that. She was less than reassured when the question that slowly opened his mouth proved to be "What have you forgotten?"

"I wouldn't remember, would I?" When the sally fell short of him and did little for her, she said "What are you trying to remind me of?

"You said outside you'd forgotten stuff too. How do you know you don't remember what it was?"

"I meant while I was a student, round about your age, come to think. Maybe it's something that runs in the family, we go a little strange when we're that age."

None of this appeared to hearten him. She was wondering whether she should try to take any of it back when she heard footsteps behind him. She saw him move his arm, which looked not much less stiff than a branch, to let Sylvia's note drift like a dead leaf onto the hall table.

Though he didn't turn until the key had finished scraping in the lock and the front door had swung inward, she couldn't read his mask of a face. As his aunt leaned her swollen body against the door to shut it, he twisted swiftly around. "We were just talking about you," he said.

Sylvia raised her eyebrows slightly and the corners of her mouth. The expression made her look as her childhood self had looked- dreamily assured that all was well and ready to anticipate better-but her words were older, even second-hand.

"Nothing bad, I hope."

"Maybe I don't know what is," said Sam.

"Nothing to do with any of us, can we say?"

He shrugged or writhed his shoulders, and Heather tried to put a stop to his embarrassment. "We were talking about our happy event," she told Sylvia. "What we really want to know is how you feel."

"Like I expect I'm supposed to."

"Well, good. Is it?"

"Like we could be seeing the one we're all waiting for any day now."

"He'll be a few months yet, Sylvie, or she will."