The Collector of Remarkable Stories (27 page)

"Well it looks like someone got out of bed on the wrong side this morning."

Black Adam grabbed the periscope and, after taking a long deep breath, peered through the view finder. What he saw was in stark contrast to what he had seen just moments earlier.

Grandma Doyle's voice interrupted his thoughts. "Isn't it just the most beautiful thing you've ever seen?"

She was right.

Legend had it that the Sea of Sorrow was made from every tear ever shed by man and that every one of those tears contained an echo of the pain and sadness that had caused it. A sea inhabited not only by ghosts but also the sorrow that had engulfed them in life.

As a result, Black Adam and Grandma Doyle had anticipated a great swamp of doom; a dark gurgling cesspit of sadness. Instead it was more like a silent lake over which hung a floating island shrouded in mist. From the mist rose a great white cathedral of ice it's tall twisting spires reaching up into the sky like great crystal stalagmites. The sea on which it hung looked clear and as still as night.

How could something so beautiful harbour something so brutal, so treacherous? And more to the point, how had they managed to reach the Sea of Sorrow in just a matter of minutes when it should have taken them days? Was someone, or something, trying to tell him something? He'd been in Limbuss long enough to know that nothing happened without reason.

He stared at Grandma Doyle for the longest time, a single throbbing vein on the side of his head the only clue to the angry thoughts that were screaming round his head.

"I have a bad feeling," he said. "What we're doing isn't for the good of Limbuss like the poster said. I think it's blood money."

"What on Earth has gotten into you?" she scoffed. "Have you been on the moonshine?"

"Of course not, you daft old bat," he spat back.

Grandma Doyle's face pinched in tightly. "You want to back out don't you. You've changed your mind again!"

"And what makes you think we'd be of any help if we did go with her?" asked Black Adam. "If she
is
the collector then she has the protection of the divine order, why does she need us? Look at us; we're just a couple of old has beens."

Grandma Doyle lowered her voice to an almost inaudible whisper, "and what if she
isn't
the Collector. What then?"

Black Adam shook his head. "How can she
not
be? You've seen for yourself what she carries with her. You've heard the whispers too; she carries The Big Invisible."

"And that's all they are: whispers. If she
is
divine then why does she carry The Big Invisible? The fact is we just don't know."

A gravelly voice interrupted their conversation. "Is there a problem?" yawned Margie, sitting up shakily.

"Aha, the Sleeping Beauty has awoken," exclaimed Grandma Doyle with an exaggerated smile.

Margie rubbed her eyes. "I hope you're not fighting because of me."

Grandma Doyle and Black Adam remained locked together in a silent standoff.

"Nothing for you to worry your pretty little head about," said Black Adam eventually. He glowered at Grandma Doyle before resuming his position begrudgingly at the periscope.

"Ignore him," mouthed Grandma Doyle. "We've almost reached the Sea of Sorrow. We're almost there."

"Really?" squealed Margie, jumping up and joining Black Adam at the periscope.

"You're limping," said Grandma Doyle.

"It's okay," replied Margie, eager to forget her close encounter with Alpha. "I must have slept funny."

She was, of course, lying. Grandma Doyle knew it too. Her face for a start was more pale and drawn than it had been. If she wasn't already dead, Grandma Doyle would have said she was on death's door. The invisible demon that Margie had been carrying on her back was eating away at her slowly but surely.

As she drew close to the periscope, Black Adam shifted to one side, his eyes firmly on her back.

"Is the Darkest of All Places on that island?" asked Margie.

"So they say," said Black Adam impassively.

Margie suddenly looked brighter than she had done for days. "I thought it would take forever to find. Yet here we are. And look how beautiful it is."

"Don't get too excited child," said Grandma Doyle gently. "Fire is also a beautiful thing, but it sure as hell burns." She stroked Margie's face. "Sit down, you need some food in your system."

As Margie sipped on the broth which Grandma Doyle had prepared, Margie shivered uncontrollably. "What do you know about the Collector," she asked as Grandma Doyle placed a heavy blanket across her shoulders.

"Ah well," said Grandma Doyle with a smile that lit up her entire face. "The Collector is the first person you see when you die. She's beautiful, just beautiful. The first thing she does is hold your hands and then she asks you - without even speaking - if your story is complete. My child, have you never wondered why your life flashes before your eyes at the very moment of death? Well, that's the Collector drawing near; getting ready to take your story away. I was so happy to see her, I really was ... but I carried too much guilt. It weighed me down. And that 's why I ended up here."

Grandma Doyle thought for a while. "No one knows what happened to her. She just disappeared one day. And that's when things went horribly wrong. With no one to collect the stories - which are the very essence of who they are - and no one to turn them into light, people just started arriving in Limbuss. At first there were millions. It was a real crisis. Then all of a sudden it was under control. A system was created, I'm guessing, to cope with the problem until the Collector returned. But she never did. Some people think she got taken. Others think she just got fed up with it all. Really! Can you imagine that."

Grandma Doyle tutted then looked at Margie. Her face was pale and drawn and the lower part of her chin shimmering with a fine layer of frost. Grandma Doyle placed another rug over Margie's shoulders and shuffled up closer to her.

"Several decades later a young woman rocks up in Limbuss, unable to remember anything about her past and all of a sudden lots of people are getting very excited. Some people think she is The Collector ..."

"Do you?"

Grandma Doyle thrust a sideways glance at Black Adam that warned him to keep his mouth shut.

"I
know
you are."

"
How
do you know?"

"I don't know for sure. I just feel it in my heart."

"What's The Big Invisible Grandma Doyle? I heard you talking."

For the first time ever, Grandma Doyle was stuck for words.

"If I
am
the Collector, then why has The Big Invisible attached itself to me?"

"Poppycock," she replied. "The Big Invisible is just a legend. A story that old men like to tell when they're three sheets to the wind."

"I'm frightened," whispered Margie, her teeth now chattering.

"Come, come," said Grandma Doyle gently wrapping a third heavy blanket around Margie's shoulder. She squeezed Margie tightly. "Just remember one thing. It's very important: the darkest of all places is where the tiniest ray of light shines the brightest. Do you understand what I'm saying to you?"

Margie nodded then lay her head down in Grandma Doyle's lap, her eyes rolling into the back of her head. Grandma Doyle looked at her with growing horror. It was clear that Margie was running out of time.

A loud screech signalled that the scorpion had come to a halt. They had finally arrived at the shore of the Sea of Sorrow. And as they prepared to embark on the next stage of their journey, others too were preparing. In the Darkest of All Places, the darkest of all shadows gathered and lay in wait for the arrival of their unsuspecting prey ...

The Sea of Sorrow

Black Adam studied the ship through his periscope.

It was a tall, narrow clipper called
Swiftly
, a beautiful ship with three fifteen-storey masts and three square sails on each. From a distance, she looked like a great billowing cloud (even though she was moored in a windless harbour) as though desperately trying to relive her heyday as the world's most fêted tall-ship. She was, however, nothing more than a spectre among the dead for all around her lay the wooden skeletons and the putrefying corpses of boats and ships that had been abandoned, lost and forgotten.

Black Adam shivered. There was something about this ship that made him feel uneasy.

Thankfully, his part of the story was almost over. He would drop her off at the gateway, collect the bounty, then beat a hasty retreat. What happened to the girl after that was completely out of his control.

"Wake the girl," he shouted, eager to crack on. "We've arrived."

Black Adam led Margie through the narrow, dirty streets and alleys which led down to the harbour, while Grandma Doyle followed behind, keeping herself close to the shadows. Something didn't feel right. Everywhere she turned there were signs of life; a half eaten meal, abandoned card games, open doors swinging restlessly. Yet there were no people. The only sound they could hear was the mast of a tall ship creaking in the wind and the faint soft sound of waves.

It had seemed quite small at first, but as they drew closer it became clear that the boat was in fact enormous ... and in a dismal state of disrepair. A legend in her time, the ship had been built for a ship master called Bob (Rat Run) Roberts who was known for his sharp wit and impetuous spirit. His ambition: to be the fastest ship in the annual tea race. But it was this ambition combined with his fiery temperament that ultimately cost him his life when in June of 1865 he left Shanghai with 1500 tons of tea and never arrived home. Rumours were rife that, driven to drink and madness he sunk the ship in a storm, doggedly refusing to bring down the sails. Others claimed it had been overrun by pirates and subsequently used for smuggling. No one would ever know as no trace of the ship or her crew were ever found.

Of course, Black Adam knew nothing of this. All he knew was that the ship was right there in the harbour (albeit barely in one piece) and he was one step closer to claiming his reward.

"Who's that on the boat?" shouted Black Adam as they came within several yards of the vessel.

"It's not a BOAT, it's not ... a ...
BOAT!
" screamed the figure angrily, "it's a bloody ship!"

The man (clearly not a sailor) wore a double breasted frock coat and top hat. His eyes were hidden behind a pair of dark, round glasses. A crudely made leather face mask had been pulled down under his chin, two pipes leading out around his face and into some kind of breathing apparatus on his back. He leaned over from the foremost tip of the hull:

"What do you want?" he called out. "You have no business here!"

"We want to get to the island," shouted Black Adam.

The man stared at Margie for the longest time, his eyes boring into her. Eventually he nodded for them to board.

"If you think you're ready to sail in her," he hissed as they walked nervously past him, "you'd better be willing to sink with her. And don't you dare touch anything," he added. "Not
a damn thing
!"

Black Adam and Grandma Doyle exchanged nervous glances and boarded the decrepit, weather-worn vessel. Feeling much better, Margie tentatively explored the slime-covered deck whilst Black Adam (under the glare of the Top Hat) made his way straight for the Captain's Cabin.

As expected, the inside of the cabin was a mini palace lined with mahogany panels and equipped with nothing but the finest furniture, carpets, and drapery. However, this state-of-the-art room, which would once have been coveted and admired now lay rotten and decayed like an old disused asylum. Drained of colour and sheathed in mould and rot, the air was heavy with centuries of grief.

The three of them sat awkwardly at the Captain's table, politely ignoring their surroundings and waited silently for the ship to set sail. They didn't have to wait long. With a long creak and a screeching sound (that would have set their pulses racing if they'd had one) the ship lurched forward.

Sitting in the windowless room, the sea didn't feel as calm as it looked when they'd boarded. The thwuck thwuck of the sails suggested the wind was picking up as the ship slowly headed out - unbeknown to the passengers - into a heavy, rolling sea.

The boat made its way through the water, up and down for hour upon hour, the sea growing ever more angry. Black Adam, Grandma Doyle and Margie barely clung on as the ship lurched helplessly from side to side. The contents of an old shelf - a barnacle encrusted ceramic jar and a small blue ware bowl - crashed to the floor as the ship battled against the elements; her billowing sails nothing but a red flag to the bull.

Co-conspirators, the wind and the sea continued their heartless attack on the vessel. Like killer whales toying with seal cubs, they battered the ship from every angle until finally, bored of their game, they picked her up and threw her down in a final show of strength.

The ship listed heavily to one side and the trio found themselves tumbling about in an upturned room with an avalanche of freezing water rushing in.

"To the door," screamed Black Adam, but the door was nowhere to be found.

"It's under the water," yelled Grandma Doyle, "we're trapped!"

It took only a matter of seconds for the cabin to submerge and then, with a terrifying suddenness, the ship plunged beneath the waves. There was no time to think; no time to take a gulp of air as it plummeted into the murky depths. Once the cabin had filled with water, an eerie silence took over.

Margie could see Grandma Doyle and Black Adam banging, clawing and scratching at the walls; their eyes wide with fear and panic as they searched for a way out. There was something about the way their hair and clothes danced in slow motion that both captivated her and frightened her.

By now, her lungs were beginning to burn. Oh, for one tiny breath of air, she thought as she turned her back on the macabre ballet and swam towards something that resembled a small window. She almost wept when she realised that it was indeed a window; moreover it was open. But Margie's joy was short lived. As she reached out and grabbed it she heard a high pitched wailing sound, like an African ululation.

She snatched her hand away and turned her head quickly to see if the noise was coming from Grandma Doyle or Black Adam. But they were still desperately grappling to find a way out, seemingly unaware of the strange sound.

Again Margie pressed her fingers against the window and again she heard the wailing, only this time she was also gripped by a sense of helplessness and despair. In her mind's eye she was soaring through the sky, like an eagle drifting on a breeze. And then, just as suddenly she was being dragged to the bottom of the ocean. For a fraction of a second Margie wondered what she was picking up. Was this someone who had died on the boat? A sailor or a passenger? Whoever it was, they wanted her to know how they'd felt. They wanted her to feel their anguish as the boat plunged into the ocean's icy depths.

Margie didn't have time to think about it any longer. Her lungs were screaming out for air and her mind was focussed on one thing only and that was finding her way out of the boat and swimming up to the light; towards that precious air. She wanted to breathe. Needed to breathe.

Pushing any fear to one side, Margie pulled herself through the window. But instead of finding herself in the open sea she found herself in another room. A smaller, darker room. There was no time to be disappointed. Margie turned but there, guarding the exit, was the man with the top hat. His waxen, bloated face twitched uncontrollably with a venomous fury that bubbled and bulged and although his mouth appeared to be moving his voice came from all around her, as if the water was made of words.

"You want to leave my ship without paying?" he bellowed. "You're all the same! Take, take, take! Well for your information, when you sail in
my
ship you abide by
my
rules. You stay on
this
ship until I tell you otherwise."

The urge to breathe was almost unbearable now. As was the urge to scream.

"You're just like all the rest," continued the man, his eyes almost bulging out of his head. "You're nothing but a mutinous snivelling coward."

He was, by now, almost uncontrollable in his wrath. Barely inches from Margie's face his mouth seemed to be moving at a hundred miles an hour: "Don't listen to anything they tell you. It's all lies. Lies! None of them tell the truth. They're nothing but a bunch of filthy bilge rats. A dirty bunch of animals! I hate them! Hate them."

Margie wanted to scream at him to stop; to leave her alone. But there was no time. She had to get out. Get up. Reach air. Breathe.

Margie scrambled to get past him but he grabbed her by the throat and held her at arm's length. "Don't touch anything!" he screamed. "I told you not to touch
anything
."

The man's attack took Margie completely by surprise. As she fought and struggled to free herself she accidentally took a sharp intake of breath. The water filled her lungs, which caused a searing pain to shoot through her head. At the same time, she saw a large dark shadow moving towards her from one corner of the room. It was the same shadow that had taken The Giant. Then everything went black.

The ship shuddered as it hit the sea bed.

Margie's eyes flicked open. She was in the same room as before only this time she was alone and, more importantly, her lungs no longer hurt. "You can breathe," whispered a iridescent voice that ebbed and flowed like the sea. "You always could."

Margie couldn't see who the voice belonged to but she knew instinctively that it was the boat. The voice was deep and calm, dark and warm. It wrapped around Margie like a warm motherly arm.

"The only reason it hurt before was because you thought it would. You must not allow those thoughts to hurt you."

Margie shook her head. She simply couldn't bring herself to inhale the water; her brain simply wouldn't allow it.

"I know what you're thinking," said the voice. " But it's not a trick. I promise. You should know by now that nothing is as it seems in Limbuss."

Overwhelmed by fury and frustration, Margie shook the window frame violently until bits of wood started to fall off and float away. She
couldn't
breathe. She
couldn't.
By now, she was gripping the window frame so hard that long clouds of red smoke billowed out of her fingers.

"I'm not trying to hurt you. I told you not to go into that room. But you ignored me."

And that's when it dawned on Margie that the voice she'd heard; the anguish she'd felt was the boat's. She loosened her grip.

"Do what you're afraid to do," said the voice with reassuring earnestness. "Breathe."

Margie's mind and body were so exhausted that the promise of passing out again was enough of an incentive. Margie braced herself and took a breath. Only this time nothing happened. Nothing at all. No coughing, no choking, no burning lungs. In fact, as far as she could make out there wasn't even any water in her mouth or lungs.

An overwhelming feeling of relief surged through her body quickly followed by a feeling of regret for the damage she had inflicted on the ship.

"You mustn't feel sorry for me," said the voice. "I am but an old wreck. And what are a few extra scratches between friends."

Margie thought it strange that she didn't need to speak in order to be heard.

"I can sense what you are thinking," confided the ship. "The water that touches me, touches you too. We are bound as one through the physics of the universe. I can feel what you are thinking and likewise. You are sensitive to that. Not many people are."

There was a moment of silence before the voice spoke again. "I know you've been tortured by the voices of others, like I have. You've been tortured by millions whilst I've been tortured by one."

Margie knew instantly that the ship was referring to the man in the top hat.

"His name is Captain Roberts," continued the voice. "He has blood on his hands. Killed everyone on board. Poisoned them with strychnine then scuttled and sunk us all. Ever since, I've been forced to relive that day over and over again. Dragging unsuspecting victims to the bottom of the ocean to satisfy his ungodly desires. There's an evil about him that's impossible to escape. I've tried for decades. Half this ocean is made of my tears alone."

Margie would have cried if crying under water was possible.

"You are the first person who's ever heard me. You could have broken me into the tiniest fragments of firewood and I would still be grateful to you. You showed me that I do have a voice. I do."

"I
can
hear you," mouthed Margie, though no sound was made. "And if you really are grateful then tell me how to get out of here. Help me find my friends."

"People don't usually survive his rage. There must be something special about you."