Vengeance Child (15 page)

It was dusk when he reached the red motor boat pulled on to the pebbles. The sun glinted on its Perspex windshield.

Solomon eyed the river. ‘Thank goodness there are no crocs or hippos. Especially hippos. I hate hippos.'

His heart still pounded. Telling the couple, and such a lovely couple, that they would have to act in an extreme way to preserve life was hard. He wondered if they would have the courage to do as he suggested. If anything, his heart clamoured even faster as he untied the rope from an old tree trunk lying in the mud. Nerves, he told himself. Is there any wonder? Sweat dribbled inside his shirt. His mouth tasted bad. The sooner I get away from this island the better, he thought. When the boat was afloat the current pulled it quickly downstream. Before he'd even started the motor it passed a headland. At the tip of that headland stood a young boy. One with elfin eyes. He stood, feet apart, completely motionless.

The man's heart lurched. He recognized the boy from the photographs his Internet searches had revealed. The boy watched him drift past. The ex-cop met his gaze. Inside his chest his heart went berserk.

‘Solomon . . . Solomon . . . Solomon.'

Even though Solomon didn't hear the name he knew that Jay mouthed it over and over. The moment he managed to start the engine his heart rammed against his ribs with enough force to make him grunt. Then that fist-sized block of muscle that had driven blood through his veins for more than five decades stopped dead. Solomon Constable collapsed backward across the boat's seats. Sightless eyes gazed heavenward. Still hopeful, always hopeful, of ascending there when his day was done.

With no one to guide it, the boat surged down the estuary toward the ocean where it dwindled to a speck and eventually disappeared from human sight.

Eighteen

‘Archer . . .'

‘Go away.'

‘Archer. I hurt people. I know that. I hurt the policeman today. He fell in the boat. The river took him out to sea.'

‘Go away.'

‘Archer, I'm frightened.'

‘Why should I want to know that, Jay? Go tell Laura.'

Jay stood in Archer's bedroom at the farm. Archer had been in bed ten minutes when Jay appeared in the door. Archer hated Jay. He talked in that weird way again, sort of dull sounding, his arms hanging down all limp. When he told Jay to go back to his own room he didn't seem to hear, he just kept talking. Archer didn't want to hear.
What if he starts saying my name? Or if he takes me for a walk?
Archer remembered the last time with a shudder. The car in the cave-place . . . the dead woman in the back seat . . . how she'd got hold of him . . . then stuck the gold bracelet into his hand so hard that it hurt. Tears welled in Archer's eyes.
Jay's a witch. He does bad things to people. He's done bad things to me!
Jay took a zombie step into the room. Archer moaned in fear. He pulled the blanket up so only his eyes peered over the material.

‘I don't want to hurt people, Archer. But there's this thing inside of me that makes me do it. It's like being hungry. You can't help it when you're hungry. Your stomach aches until you put food in it. This begins with me hurting inside. I know I start to look strange to people. I just keep staring and muttering and I don't move. You see, I've got the power to do bad things to people. But I try to make good things happen for them. If I concentrate really hard I can do nice things instead of bad things . . . or at least I try. Because sometimes it turns out wrong. I took Laura to see Tod Langdon, where he was locked up, but she became frightened. I thought Laura would be happy to see Tod again but it was nasty.'

‘You made me go into that room with the car. There was something horrible inside it. It scared me, Jay, 'cos I thought the dead woman would kill me. That wasn't to make me happy it was to frighten me to death, you bloody witch.' Archer knew he risked provoking Jay, but the memory of the body in the car still tortured him. ‘You did that to be evil to me, and I've done nothing bad to you, Jay.'

Jay continued in monotone. ‘That wasn't meant to hurt you. I wanted to do a nice thing for Victor. Victor's OK. I like him. He worries about Ghorlan. I knew I could bring something back for him. The bracelet. You're going to give it to Victor.'

‘No fear.' Archer buried his face in the blankets. Even looking at Jay made him feel sick with terror. He didn't want to be in the same house as him, only with everyone falling ill on the island he'd been forced to stay here with Jay. Laura was in the room down the hall. Victor had an apartment in a different building across the yard.
If Jay wants me to take the gold bracelet to Victor then he's dead wrong. Victor might have put the woman in the car. If he finds out I know about the body he'll put me in the car, too. For ever.
There was silence for a moment. Archer began to hope that Jay had gone. When he peered over the blankets he saw Jay had come closer so he could look right down at Archer.
Or do something awful to me.

For a moment Jay did that zombie stare at Archer, then continued. ‘Archer, this island has done something to me. My power is different here. I can make it do more. Something inside me wants to hurt you.'

Archer whimpered.

‘It wants me to hurt you, Victor, Laura, Lou, Max, Trisha, Ben, Carol . . . and everyone on the island. It wants me to kill everyone I can. It's what I'm supposed to do. But this island is strong. It's made me stronger too. I'm changing. I feel different inside. If I try as hard as I can I'll be good.' His eyes shone in the gloom. ‘Tonight I'm going to do magic. I'll make nice things happen for everyone.'

Jay wants everyone to be happy.
That night he went across the island. He longed to help people, not hurt them. So he strived to make wishes come true. Of course, everyone whose wish came true the night the epidemic took hold blamed it on the fever. They insisted they dreamt it. But the scars they received, both inside and out, told a different story. Because sometimes what you wish for can so easily become your curse.

‘You're getting cold. Come back to bed.'

The church clock chimed midnight. Tonya Fletcher continued to stare out of the window, hardly daring to believe her eyes. Her naked body rashed with the faint puckering of gooseflesh.

‘See? You're cold,' said her husband. ‘Aren't we going to finish what we started downstairs?'

Tonya shivered. That wasn't the cool air. She shivered because she saw something that excited her.

Richard sat up in bed. ‘What's out there?'

‘Oh, it's nothing.' Don't come to the window, she thought. If you look you'll spoil it . . . like you've managed to spoil everything else.

He laughed. ‘It must be an interesting
nothing
. You can't take your eyes off it.' He swung his legs out of bed. ‘Are you going to let me see, too?'

Tonya hid the powerful emotion that must show on her face by keeping her face to the blind. ‘It's the Saban. They're back in the street again.'

Richard smiled. The foreplay had put him in a good mood. ‘You know what they say? When the deer come into the village then miracles happen.'

‘I don't see any miracles yet,' she lied. ‘Just a bunch of animals munching flower beds.'

‘Speaking of munching . . .' He patted the mattress.

Tonya Fletcher continued to look out of the window. In the moonlight she saw about twenty of the Saban Deer. A little bigger than Labrador dogs, they were moving slowly along Main Street; they resembled a dark stain seeping over the road. The peculiar sight that first caught her attention wasn't the rare appearance of the Saban in the village, but that a boy stood down in the garden. He gazed up at her as she'd gone to the window just moments ago. Aged about eleven, he had large almond-shaped eyes. The way they caught the moonlight in such an uncanny way had held her attention. Tonya saw him mouth a word as he locked his eyes on hers. At that instant she felt such a tug of vertigo she thought she'd tumble forward out of the window. Then she saw an impossible sight. Andrew sat astride his motorbike in the middle of the deer herd. There, her first love gazed up at her. It was just the same as when they'd dated each other. Andrew would arrive on the motorbike, then wait patiently until she looked out of her bedroom window back at her parents' home. Her heart would leap with excitement when she saw his face. Then she'd hold up three fingers.
I'll be down in three minutes.
One minute to change. One minute to apply lipstick, spray perfume. One minute to brush her hair. Then she'd dash downstairs with a hurried, ‘Mum, I'm going out. See you later.' Seconds later, she'd kiss Andrew – a heartfelt kiss. Then she'd swing her leg over the pillion, pull on the helmet that he held for her and . . . whoosh . . . they'd roar away through the suburbs.

But here there were no city suburbs. Her parents were long dead. She'd not seen Andrew in twenty years. Yet all those issues she should be considering rationally evaporated. The conundrum of the past suddenly gatecrashing the present was blocked by the sheer pulse-racing excitement of seeing twenty-year-old Andrew Derby waiting astride his BMW bike. Her heart filled with a warm tide of pure love for the man again. Other than the child there was no one else about. Only her first boyfriend sat astride the motorbike as deer ambled by them. Normally, they were so shy they'd flee at even a glimpse of a human. Tonight they were unperturbed. As the fable goes: if the Saban enter the village they bring miracles on their horns. Tonya smiled down at Andrew. He returned it with a heart-warming grin of his own. As always, still so completely patient. He'd wait hours for her without a word of complaint.

‘Tonya, I'm jealous. You've found something more fascinating than me.' Richard walked toward the window, clearly intrigued by what fascinated her.

‘The deer?' Her mind was racing. ‘Oh, they've gone now.'

‘But what are you looking at?' He closed in on the window.

She gave him a smouldering look. ‘I'm looking at you, handsome.'

God, did that sound false or what? But whatever you do, don't let Richard see Andrew.
Despite the impossible scene outside, and all the questions that threatened to burst her bubble of happiness like ‘how can Andrew be on the island?' and ‘why hasn't he aged in the last twenty years?' she fiercely suppressed any doubt. Come to that, she crushed rational thought entirely. Seeing Andrew out there on the bike, just like old times again, had gifted her the happiest moment in years.
If Richard sees Andrew everything will be spoilt.
As Andrew smiled she held up three fingers.
Give me three minutes.

‘If those animals become a pest they'll have to put cattle grids in the roads,' Richard said as he reached out to pull back the blind.

Before he could look out and ruin everything Tonya turned to him. With her mouth on his she desperately pushed him back to the bed. Breaking the kiss, she panted, ‘I thought we were going to finish what we started?' For a moment she feared Richard would insist on looking out. However, the rub of her hand soon aroused him enough not to give a damn if even the Welsh national choir was marching down the street, singing at the tops of their voices. With a grunt he settled back on to the bed. Tonya glanced at the clock. Three minutes past midnight. Richard stroked her nipples. They were still hard from the attack of goosebumps when she saw Andrew. Now she knew what she must do. Before her husband could roll his masculine weight on to her she sat astride him, her inner thighs clamping against his hips. Quickly, she positioned herself so she could slide on to him. She needed to control the pace of sex tonight. The sooner this miserable, life-deadening man climaxed, the sooner she could leave the house.

Tonya rocked against him hard. She made all the right noises. She moaned when he kneaded her breasts. When he came with that pretend roar of his that normally annoyed the hell out of her, she closed her eyes in bliss as she pictured Andrew waiting so patiently for her. In twenty seconds Richard had turned over. Soon he began to snore, his legs twitching every now and again. Tonya didn't want to hurt the miracle by thinking it through in a logical way. In a silent whirlwind of activity she slipped on her jeans, zipped shut a pink leather jacket over her naked top half, applied lipstick, added a spray of perfume, then brushed her hair. So, it had been more than three minutes. But then good things take a little longer.

Elsewhere on Siluria Jay visited more residents. A bright moon turned the River Severn to liquid silver. Trees on the island were hunched beast-like shapes that seemed to gather pools of moon shadow to them. Nearly all the houses lay in darkness. Jay, the boy with the elfin face, reached into these quiet homes like a child reaching into boxes full of delicate butterflies. He tried so hard to do the right thing and not cause damage, but like a child touching fragile wings his innocent intervention wreaked an ugly carnage.

When Gerald Moore closed the mirrored door of the bathroom cabinet he saw the boy in the reflection. At seventy-five, Gerald still had pinpoint sharp vision.
So what on earth's a child doing in my bathroom at midnight? Such an odd-looking boy, too. Surely, I've never seen anyone with eyes as large as that, have I?

As Gerald turned round he was struck by vertigo. Just for an instant he seemed to be in a hospital room and in his bathroom simultaneously.
And the symptoms of senile dementia are?
His attempt to make light of an increasingly disturbing vision. The boy had vanished. Instead, his wife stood there in the centre of an otherwise empty hospital room. She was connected to a machine by tubes that pumped vivid red fluids into her neck.

‘Lydia?' He stared. There was a youthful freshness about her. Since his wife died three years ago he always pictured her as a young woman. Not the exhausted figure that had lain as limp as an empty nightdress on the bed. ‘Lydia, you know this isn't right. You mustn't come back here.'