Doctor Who_ The Sleep of Reason - Martin Day [78]
Laska pushed open the door, ushered Smith inside. She was going to clear some of the detritus off her bed but Smith almost immediately sat on it, un-embarrassed and unconcerned.
She hauled the suitcase over. ‘It’s not everything of Dad’s,’ she said. ‘It’s just what I grabbed before I came here.’
Smith glanced down at the array of notes and documents, clearly resisting the urge to dive in, as if in respect for Laska’s memory of her father. As if not wanting to intrude any more than he had to.
‘And the diaries?’ he queried gently.
‘They’re here.’ Laska brought them over, the large, dark one that belonged to the doctor, the smaller, red one that was the vicar’s. ‘I was reading them at lunch time,’ she said. ‘It took me a while to get used to the calligraphy, but now. . . I seem to keep coming back to them.’
138
‘I’m glad that you did,’ said Smith.
‘When Liz mentioned taking Mr Butler’s body to the chapel,’ said Laska by way of explanation, ‘well, it reminded me of what I’d just read.’
‘And you don’t believe in that sort of coincidence?’ asked Smith.
‘I suppose not,’ said Laska.
‘Good,’ said Smith. ‘You’ve been honest with me. Soon I will be completely honest with you.’
He smiled brightly, then turned back to the diaries.
‘Let’s see what we have here,’ he said as he started to read.
139
Fifteen
A Hideous Strength
(Dominion)
Extract from the Diary of the Reverend Mr William Macksey Friday 25th December 1903 (continued)
I stared at the governor, scarce believing what I saw. ‘What madness is this?’ I exclaimed.
‘Not madness, sir,’ Christie said, inching away from us as if suspecting that we might try to overpower him. ‘It is what has to be done. It is what will bring all this to an end.’ He paused, the awful confidence of his face now replaced with a look of utter, abject uncertainty. At least. . . I think. . . Made mighty by madness, birthed in terrible destruction. . . ’
He repeated this last phrase over and over again, like some grotesque religious refrain.
‘Whatever is going on within Mausolus,’ I said, ‘you cannot hope to defeat it in this way!’
‘But I must try.’ His face contorted as if he were suddenly in great pain. ‘Or perhaps. . . Perhaps this is some part of the plan. Perhaps my mind is not my own.’
Torby chose this moment to lunge at Christie. He had noticed that the good doctor had a Lucifer match in his hand and was preparing to strike it. Moments later Craig and I were also on the man; we quickly had him overpowered.
Our victory was but a glimpse of the sun on the morning of Armageddon.
We were just beginning to wonder aloud what we would do next, and how this fuel-sodden room could be made safe, when the dark outline of a man stepped into the light of the doorway. He dragged an unresisting body behind him.
The man pushed the door closed, turned the key in the lock. We were all trapped in the chapel with Christie.
At the man’s side was a hound – or what had once been a hound. It now seemed bloated, swollen like a corpse dragged from the sea. The skin, almost 141
entirely bare of fur, writhed continually, as if infested with parasites. The eyes glowed like nautical beacons, and spittle fell from the creature’s jaws in a constant stream.
Although this domestic animal had been transformed into a veritable hound of hell, Christie recognised the creature. ‘Grant?’ he whispered. He would have walked towards the dog but Torby still had his arms in a vicelike grip.
Christie did not seem to notice. ‘Is it you?’ he continued.
The creature moved forward a few feet as if obediently shadowing its new master.
It was only then that I recognised the dark figure by the door. It was Fern –
or what was left of him.
His eyes seemed to have shrunk back into the sockets, though, like the hound’s, they now took on a ghastly inner light of their own. His skin was almost translucent, and on his cheeks glinted what I can only describe as tears.
At his feet lay the body of the late Mr Haward, the dark handle still jutting from his back. The limbs were lying at angles that