Once... by James Herbert
How cruel then, when it was all snatched away.
Thom’s expression darkened and he immediately pushed this last potentially lachrymose thought away: he’d endured enough self-imposed self-pity over the past few months to last a lifetime. Time to move on, live for today. Then why the return to Little Bracken? He straightened his shoulders. To convalesce, why else? And to get some of that happiness back into his life.
He smiled again, turning around on the quarry-tiled floor, muddied boots scuffing the stone, taking it all in one more time. It was beginning to work already. Joy was soaking through his very skin; a lightness was filling his whole being.
Thom stopped turning and closed his eyes. He allowed the relief to flood his senses.
Using his right hand, he lifted the iron latch to the interior door, this one as big as the front door itself, although unpainted, the grainy wood unpolished and interesting. The staircase beyond spiralled round the interior of the stunted tower that gave the cottage its unique appearance. It wound its way up to a landing outside the cottage’s single bedroom before continuing another flight to the door that led out on to the flat lead-covered roof.
The space at the foot of the stairs contained a broom closet which also housed an electric meter and small boiler. Next to this, a tiny combined bathroom and toilet, whose tub, were fitted in directly beneath the winding stairs, was only long enough to sit upright in; a small basin with mirror above took what little room was left. Thom peeked in, pulling down on the hanging switch as he did so. The little room was filled with light, the abrupt environmental change paralysing a huge black spider that had found itself trapped in the bathtub. Even though his earliest years had been spent in the countryside where insects and spiders were part of everyday life, Thom could not help but shudder. He hated the buggers. Hated their long spindly legs that ran so scaringly fast, hated their furry bodies and malevolent eyes. Hated them for the evil thoughts he always imagined they were thinking.
In disgust and, he had to admit to himself, in fear, he reached for both taps and turned them on, then quickly grabbed the new-looking plastic lavatory cleaner someone had thoughtfully provided for his visit. He used the bristled end to push the spider into the whirlpool around the bath’s plughole. The spider desperately tried to swim for it, but it was quickly sucked into the miniature maelstrom. To Thom’s dismay, however, it was too big to be flushed through the gaps in the outlet’s ring. The spider’s cotton-thin legs scrabbled at the edges as its body wedged into one of the openings and irrationally – God, he knew he was being stupid – the sight caused him to panic. He had only meant to wash the spider away and prevent its return by placing the chained rubber plug on the outlet, but now he had to beat at the wriggling creature and push it through and the very thought made him feel physically sick. ‘Wuss,’ he accused himself and jabbed at the struggling spider with the brush. He fancied the creature was screaming, calling up at him to stop, please, leave me alone, I’m only little, and cursed his own overcharged imagination.
He paused from the pounding to turn the taps full on, intent on drowning the bloody thing if it wasn’t already crushed to death, poking with the brush again and again until the soft, pulpy mess suddenly disappeared from view into the pipe, one of its black legs remaining stuck (or clinging?) like a pubic hair to the metal ring around the hole. To his relief, the stubborn limb soon followed the mashed body and Thom quickly hung the plug above the swirling water, then let it drop home lest the crushed spider minus one leg miraculously rise up again against the deluge.
‘Bloody hell . . .’ he whispered to himself as he leaned back against the bathroom wall, shaken by and ashamed of his panic. It was only a defenceless spider whose long skinny legs made it appear larger than it really was. What the hell was wrong with him? He was supposed to be a grown-up now, not some snivelling kid afraid of creepy-crawlies. No other such creatures, insects or beasts, had unduly disturbed him as a child – not even the occasional rat that might find its way into the house – but there had always been something about spiders that had turned his legs to jelly and sent his heart racing. His mother had often patiently explained that every creature had its part to play in nature, none of less value than the next, but the young Thom had never been truly convinced. Spiders had always remained abhorrent to him. He shuddered as he peeped over the edge of the bath, half-expecting to find the rubber plug wobbling in its metal setting as thin spider’s legs pushed through from underneath . . . Jesus, cut it out!
Over-tired and over-wrought, he told himself. Get a grip.
Replacing the makeshift plastic bully-stick, he backed out of the bathroom, still eyeing the puddle of brownish water at the bottom of the tub, heart skipping a beat when a single air bubble escaped the side of the plug. The plug remained firmly in place though.
At another time he might have smiled at his own nervousness, but today wasn’t the day: he was too vulnerable, his homecoming was too emotional. He closed the bathroom door and began to climb the creaky wooden stairs, his left hand brushing over the newel post, the thick trunk around which the staircase spiralled. More memories came with the touch and in his mind he was a child again, in a time when his knees rose high to mount the steps that were thin at one end, broad at the other, his small hand pressed against the circular newel for balance, his head tilted upwards to look into the shadows above: on the first floor landing, the door leading off to the bedroom he had shared with his mother, as big and sturdy as the two below, as if they all had come as a job lot; the leaded window set high in the curved wall, too high for him to look through unless he was on the stairs just past it, always a pot of bright seasonal flowers or a plant sitting on its oak sill . . .
There were no flowers and no plant there now, just an empty vase, one that was unfamiliar to him. He could see through the window as soon as he reached the first step beneath it.
The bedroom door was already open and he peered in without entering, noting that this, too, had hardly changed: the same oak four-poster bed, large enough to accommodate himself and his mother, the dark brown sideboard with separate mirror on top that served as a dressing-table for Bethan, the stone fireplace with its heavy duty wooden lintel, the six-panelled windows on three of the angled walls, these too, leaded, their number ensuring the room was always bright, even on the dullest of days. He didn’t linger too long, for it was the rooftop with its panoramic views over the surrounding woodland that he wished to revisit most of all.
There were even more cracks and holes in the stair-boards than he remembered, some of those holes as large as old penny pieces, and he recalled shining torchlight down them all those years ago. Somehow the beams had never been able to penetrate the seemingly endless darkness, even though the backing board could not have been more than a foot away. It was eerie then, the thought of it eerie now.
Yet that kind of thing had been part of Little Bracken’s fascination: its warmth in summer, when doors and windows could be left open all night, its winter coldness; its security and sometimes – only sometimes – its bleakness; its interesting nooks and crannies, built-in cupboards and bell-less belltower, places where a little boy could play hide-and-seek with an indulgent mother. Then there were the mysterious scrapes and bumps late at night, the distant yet somehow close-by sounds that would wake him from sleep, or interrupt one of Bethan’s night-time stories as he lay by her side in the broad four-poster bed they shared, noises that would cause his eyes to widen and his shoulders to stiffen. Always his mother would give a little laugh at his fear, or perhaps just smile as she cuddled him close and told him there was never, ever, anything to be afraid of, not in this place, and not with her beside him. And sometimes, when he pulled away to look at her face for extra reassurance, her soft features rendered even softer by the candlelight she always kept burning through the night on the mantelshelf opposite, he would catch a certain knowing look in her light-blue eyes, as if she was only too aware of the sound’s cause and it secretly amused her. She would explain it
Thom resumed the climb, boards creaking noisily beneath his feet. Normally, spiral staircases in castles and fortresses twisted to the right so that soldiers defending their ground had room to swing swords or thrust pikestaffs at advancing intruders whose own sword arms were disadvantaged, but Little Bracken’s original architect obviously had only peaceful purposes in mind when he designed the banquet and its copycat tower, hence these stairs turned to the left. However, that non-military consideration had not prevented the boy Thom from engaging imaginary foes in battle there, his own short reach and wooden weapon unencumbered by the vagaries of architecture, the invisible villains easily beaten back by his ferocious attack.
He was smiling yet again as he quickly reached the short landing where the newel post ended and two thick horizontal rails served as a balustrade. Directly above him was the empty – save for stout crossbeams – conical-shaped space beneath the lead apex which, in truth, was never meant to house a bell. To his right on the landing was another door, this one considerably smaller than those below, which opened out on to the cottage’s roof, and Thom lifted the latch, then pushed outwards.
The breeze hit him instantly, refreshing him and clearing the mustiness (compliments of the disused cottage) from his nose. Before he had even stepped through he was dazzled not just by sunlight, but by the view itself, and he gave a small gasp of pleasure.
It was still as beautiful as he remembered; time had neither enhanced nor diminished the reality. The thousand hues of green were the same, the pale blueness of the distant, low hills was unchanged, the sheer vastness of the clear, open sky was just as impressive.
He walked out on to the flat rooftop, pausing each time to lift his left foot over the lead ridges, and approached the thick open stone balustrade that ran round seven sides of the octagonal deck, the tower wall and door taking up the eighth angle. Thom leaned forward, resting both hands on the balustrade’s wide coping, and gazed out at the landscape.
Below, the woodland was like a deep, bumpy carpet stretching far into the distance, its shades ranging from an intense jade to an exuberant lime and beyond this fields and grassland rising to gentle hills. Easily visible on its own rise was Castle Bracken, its walls washed almost golden by afternoon sunlight that was beginning to mellow. Yet although from this viewpoint and in the scenic grandeur of its setting it truly did resemble a castle from a child’s storybook, Thom could not remember ever having been in awe of it. Perhaps even as a boy there had been a dark side to his imagination, an aspect of his nature that had picked up on the misery contained within those stone walls and high-ceilinged halls. A sadness seemed to pervade the very air, as if past tragedies tainted everything that was to follow. In those days he had pitied his friend Hugo, for the older boy seemed crushed by the austere, even grim, atmosphere, and afraid of his own father.
Sir Russell had lost two wives in this place, his first dying swiftly from throat cancer, the second – Hugo’s mother – even more quickly in a fall down the central hall’s main staircase. (Apparently she was a heavy drinker – or had become a heavy drinker since her marriage to the knight – who had many bitter arguments with her husband. She had tripped at the top of the long staircase during a particularly heavy binge and after an especially nasty quarrel.) Then, Hugo’s elder stepbrother, the son from Sir Russell’s first marriage, had been blown to pieces by a booby-trapped bomb planted by the IRA while he was serving with the British Army in Northern Ireland. It was little wonder that Castle Bracken seemed burdened by grief, shadowed with gloom, and not surprising that Sir Russell himself presented such a gruff, embittered figure. Only when he and Thom had played together outside in the grounds or down by the bridge had Hugo truly come to life, his humour and unbridled enthusiasm infectious, so that Thom, himself, would become boisterous and joyous, revelling in the companionship. The only minor hitch in their relationship was that Hugo would never enter the woods, no matter how much he was begged by Thom, who knew there were even greater adventures to be had and secrets to be discovered there. But Hugo had been forbidden by his father ever to wander into the forest, intimations that he would become hopelessly lost and that nasty animals roamed the wildwoods enough to discourage the boy if Sir Russell’s order alone was not sufficient.
Thom wondered how his old friend would cope with the latest in a long line of tragedies that haunted Castle Bracken: the impending death of his father. Would he succumb to the grief? Would he be lost without his father’s – overbearing? – guidance? Or would he feel liberated, would he at last become his own man? It remained to be seen.
Thom heard a car’s engine growing louder and looked below to see his Jeep emerging from the lane almost opposite, its wheels bumping over the rough unmade road, bodywork jolting as it passed over the deeper holes. He caught sight of Eric Pimlet through the windscreen and raised a hand to wave, but realized the gamekeeper was concentrating too much on handling the vehicle to notice.
The Jeep came to a halt close to the front door and the horn sounded twice, upsetting a bird settled in a nearby bush. It took to the air, complaining loudly, and, as Thom turned from the balustrade to make his way back across the leaded roof, he noticed another bird perched on the lip of the belltower.
The magpie studied him coolly – seemed to watch him coolly – apparently not at all intimidated by his closeness, and Thom felt sure it was the same one who had watched him approach the cottage earlier. There was something eerie about its unblinking gaze, as if the bird were thinking dark thoughts, all of them about Thom. He suddenly clapped his hands together, sharp and hard, hoping to make the bird take flight. It didn’t. The magpie did not even flinch. It continued to watch.
For a few moments longer, man and bird stared at each other, and it was Thom who broke first. Eric’s waiting below, he reasoned, somewhat ruefully, and here am I trying to face down a bloody bird!
He shook his head and passed beneath the magpie into the open doorway. The bird made a short hacking sound and Thom muttered, ‘Yeah, and fuck you too,’ as he began to descend the stairs.
Of course, it was in his own imagination, but the next cry he heard sounded like a challenge, as if the magpie were warning him off its territory.
Stupid, Thom, he admonished himself, very, very stupid.
HE HAD no idea what had roused him. A noise? He didn’t think so. His sleep had been deep and he was sure that only a sound as loud as thunder would have woken him. It had been a tiring day – the drive up from London, the walk through the woods and the re-exploration of the cottage, then later helping Eric unload his gear from the Jeep and chatting with the old gamekeeper over steaming mugs of coffee, reliving past times, chuckling at most of them, until the sun had turned golden and begun to slip away.
For some reason, it had been a relief to find the gamekeeper had scarcely changed – perhaps it was because he represented a kind of constant in Thom’s own changing life. In fact, whenever Thom looked back on passing years, he always saw Eric as ‘old’, so that now the most that could be said was that the gamekeeper had ‘grown’ into his proper age: his abundant head of hair was overall white rather than a patchy grey as Thom remembered, his pale blue eyes, a little watery these days, rheumy even, squinting so much more that they were almost slits, and the lines and wrinkles of his face, especially the ‘crow’s feet’ that ran from the corners of his eyes to large, stick-out ears, had deepened, become more established rather than increased; thread-veins splayed his ruddy cheeks and hooked nose, and his thin
After Eric had left, he had eaten one of those sad prepacked dinner-for-ones cooked in the mini-microwave he’d brought up with him, followed by a bath, knees and shoulders well above the waterline in the short tub and, finally, he’d taken the weary climb up the creaking stairs to bed.
If he had needed reminding he was still a convalescent, then the busy day had done the trick. When he’d pulled back the bedsheets he had been almost dead to the world. After taking his routine medication – aspirin to thin his blood, a mild and, by now, probably unnecessary dose of pravastatin to reduce his cholesterol level; he decided the diothiepin to help him sleep and ease any anxiety wasn’t needed (night-time was always bad for stroke victims, for death was always closest when others slept and shadows seemed to beckon the invalid), because he was too exhausted not to sleep – Thom had turned off the bedside lamp, laid his head on the pillow, and had been instantly out.
If he had dreamed, he could not remember, for the sudden awakening had wiped the dream-slate clean.
He regarded the underneath of the four-poster’s sagging canopy, the corner curtains and pelmets restricting his view of some of the room, then lifted his head to glance towards the stone fireplace opposite the end of the bed. There was enough moonlight to tell there was no intruder – unless he was hiding, of course. But although he was tense, he could not feel another’s presence, there was no shift in the atmosphere, no sneaking scuffles. There were, however, faint reflections on the part of the ceiling close to one of the stone-framed windows.