Ghost Stories - Lorna Bradbury [5]
The sharp trill of the telephone brought her mind back to the kitchen. a chill made her shiver. She glimpsed the glass of water she had given Mandy – the water heaved, as if rattled by an unseen spoon, tossing an invisible boat on its surface. She couldn’t stop staring at it. She tried to pull her eyes away from it. The telephone persisted. Something was badly wrong. although a storm was brewing outside, Mandy had neither a coat nor an umbrella, nor dripped a single drop of rainwater inside the house. how stupid. why hadn’t she noticed before? where was she now?
A screaming blast of cold air blew through the cottage. She was frozen to the spot. Every sinew of her body tensed. She felt as though the slightest touch would shatter her into a million icy shards. She heard Jenny’s shaky voice as the answerphone clicked in. ‘Lisa … you must come … you must come. Dan … Dan … needs you. Please Lisa … please … his fishing boat …’ abruptly, the message cut out.
She howled like a wounded she-wolf, but knew no one in the empty cottages nearby could hear her. She heard the front door slam. Mandy had gone. her mind raced back to the baby. Suddenly released from their frozen state, she willed her legs to move and dashed up the stairs to the bedroom. Before she got there, she knew that he had been taken. Blood pulsed in her ears. She sat, her chest heaving with sobs, on the bed.
Then, through the white sheets wound around his little body, she saw him – lying on the floor. She grabbed him to her, held him so tightly she nearly squeezed all the life out of him. Thank the Lord. he had not been taken after all. She cradled her helpless little baby as she looked up through the lashing rain, across the wind-whipped bay, still breathing heavily. Tears slowly rolled down her cheeks. Dan would be home soon. She longed to see his tired face, hear his heavy footsteps on the stairs. She would hang up his wet clothes, hug him to her and never let go.
She looked back to her tiny infant. awake now, his eyes glittered like icy water. She felt herself slowly falling into them, a heaviness pulling her down, down. Slowly, with horror, she realised. The bedside table had been ransacked. The box where her mother had kept Daniel’s caul, the perfect impression of his beautiful face, lay empty on the floor. The bedding and furniture in the room looked as if a storm had blown through it. ‘oh no.’ Mandy didn’t want to take her beautiful boy but, as amanda, she needed his caul. it was too late to be of use to her, but she wanted it for someone they both loved, to save him from drowning. Lisa looked out of the window. an icy, tingling feeling crept along her spine. ‘Dan, Dan … no!’ she wailed.
The baby’s eyes, no longer periwinkle blue, had turned the same colour as the dark grey, stormy, merciless sea.
A Hollow Cause
Craig Drew
These are the words of a dying man, so listen well. I know I do not have much time. in truth I never imagined i’d live this long. I presumed some lag on the make would shank me in the showers, or i’d get a good kicking while the screws’ backs were turned. it happens all the time. The press would turn them into heroes.
The staff are not what you would call attentive, but they appear at regular intervals to flood my veins with morphine. I am not allowed to administer my own analgesic; it is feared I will hasten my own death with an overdose, or attempt to at least, and with good cause. I never thought i’d be prevented from topping myself, but then the authorities have never known what to do with me.
Reading is difficult when the spasms are coming thick and fast. Someone dumped an old jigsaw puzzle on the table beside me as I slept one day; some