The Night Clock Page 17

  “Read it, have you?”

  Bix nosed at the cover. “Not yet, but I know all about that thing.”

  “What is it?”

  “It’s the devil-in-dreams,” Bix said. “It’s the darkness behind the Autoscopes. It’s what wants to kill you.”

  “This was supposed to comfort me,” Chloe said in a hushed voice. Her eyes pricked suddenly with tears. Was this a trick? Was Babur just another monster?

  “It’s knowledge, Chloe. Information. It was written so that you could know your enemy and learn how to fight it.A good man wrote this book for his own son for the same reasons.”

  Chloe nodded, still eyeing the cover with unease.

  “Open it,” Bix said. “And I’ll read it to you.”

  Full of wonder—for this dog, for the book, for her life—and full of apprehension, Chloe opened the book to the first darkly illustrated page, and Bix began to read.

  TOWARDS THE END of May, the surrounding fields become luminous. Beneath the wide, unsettled skies, the soil at the edge of the fens and beyond brings forth, for some dark spring days, brief, dazzling ingots of yellow, stinking rape. And then, almost overnight, the crop is harvested, the lights go out, and profusions of poppies emerge like beads of blood welling from the raw, grazed earth.

  The countryside is flat, littered with machine parts and the shells of outbuildings, windmills, pump houses and neglected railway lines. There are plenty of working farms, stables, boat-builders, but it is the dereliction that seems to give the landscape an age. It leaves its history lying around like discarded rind.

  Other abundant features are the water towers, great structures that bestride the fields and roadsides. The variety of their architecture is striking; some look like follies, with their turrets and fancy brickwork, others like alien war machines bristling with panels and aerials, others still look like colossal viruses, built from diagrammatic specifications in text books, their elevated reservoirs like stylised concrete capsids.

  So this land, inert, dreary, interminable to some; an inspiration to artists, horsemen, travellers, preservers of Tudor architecture, bucolic, antique and primal, keeps secrets and legends tight in the dark back rooms of drowsy pubs, the fire-lit tiled parlours of isolated farmhouses and the intricate quarters of the tithe cottages lining the drives of the ubiquitous studs.

  It is seldom fragrant. In fact it often stinks. The air carries the heavy odours of silage and ordure. Miles of churned manure; huge, slumbering pigs lethargic and deliberate outside their ranks of half-cylinder tin shelters; the scorched beetroot stench of the sugar factories and the miasma of hops fermenting in the breweries; that sudden, bright, dirty incandescence of rape.

  AND THERE ARE brutes at large in the fens, the fields, and the night-lone back streets of dark and secluded villages. Black Dogs and Big Cats, phantom beasts, elusive monsters. They have always been amongst us here, their burning eyes glimpsed across a yard, through dark windows, watching you from a remote horizon.

  This is Old England and these are its legends, its Hob-footed thugs.

  But now there is a new unease, a slow paranoia creeping through this old, measured shire. There is talk of a new beast.

  And its name is Junction Creature.

  A YOUNG BOY cycles to school on a cold spring morning. He has a new red sports bag slung over his shoulder. It’s filled with books, trainers to change into at playtime and his lunch - chicken sandwiches with pickle, a Penguin biscuit and an apple, a bottle of water and a Hartley’s lemon jelly (he tries to eat the jelly in secret because if the other boys see him with a jelly, he gets teased, but he loves them and he eats them in defiance of their opinions.)

  His name is Alex and he is ten years old. He lives on a farm with his uncle and aunt. It’s not a working farm anymore. His uncle sold off most of the land and converted the barn so that he could concentrate on being a sculptor. Alex is fascinated by his uncle’s work. He makes things from metal and glass, and they look alive as they arch, stretch and climb towards the timber roof of the barn. The light striking from his uncle’s arc welder illuminates the barn with electric flashes long into the night.

  Alex is just as fascinated by his uncle Sandy. Sandy is a large man, completely bald with an untamed black beard, and a moustache he teases out and waxes into two long, twitching stilettos of hair. His eyes are dark and his mood is often reflected likewise within them and beneath the intense crush of his brow. When he wears his welder’s mask the top of his hairless, shining head rises like a dome above it and his beard and the tips of his moustache protrude from underneath it and from its sides like wild weeds struggling from beneath a cloche.

  His aunt, however, is a different matter. She is beautiful. Like an actress, a starlet, his uncle Sandy calls her. She has long, curling silvery blonde hair and a face that expresses an abundance of exciting knowledge and experience. She doesn’t do much except lounge about the farmhouse drinking gin and looking gorgeous in her antique gowns and dresses, but she is kind, in a detached, mysterious way, full of her own enshrined passions which express themselves internally and are only occasionally evident in a rosy flush, or a deep, satisfied sigh. Sandy is devoted to her, is fiercely, overly protective and frustrates the life out of her with his constant fussing. For a big man, uncle Sandy is gentle as a lamb. He adores his Jean.

  Alex smiles, thinking of them both, and pushes down on his pedals and heads down the lane. He is looking forward to a brisk kick-about in the playground before the bell. They’re about 26 - 12 up from yesterday’s match. He can almost feel the tennis ball flying from the toe of his trainer with that satisfying and mildly painful hollow crack it makes when you catch it sweetly off your toes.

  TODAY, THOUGH, ALEX doesn’t make it to school.

  A couple of monsters see to that.

  AS HE CYCLED, from across the fields came a cry. He skidded the bike to a stop and stood with it tilted between his knees. He looked around. The sound continued, off to his left. He grimaced. It began as a low note and Alex felt it blanket his bones with a chill. It began to rise in pitch, gaining in volume and it was the most awful sound he had ever heard, a sound, he thought, that wanted to hurt you.

  At once, all the birds for miles rose up out of the distant woods and filled the sky with wheeling black static. They flocked in great pulsing blotches against the low white cloud Alex shielded his eyes with the palm of his hand and squinted through the low morning sunlight. He gasped.

  The birds were flocking as one, regardless of species. They wheeled towards where he stood. Crows and doves, woodpigeons, starlings and magpies, all turned and shoaled together in total formation. It was as if the sky was folding and unfolding itself. They swarmed overhead and Alex saw nightjars and wrens; herons, ducks, kingfishers and owls all in profusion above him. But the thing that shook him, which made the whole spectacle upsetting rather than just bizarre—owls, flocking?—was how they all looked. They all appeared terrified, as if this whole thing was out of their control. Their beaks gaped and their little eyes bulged. And throughout it all, that screaming drove them, welling up out of the woods.

  Alex turned his bike around and started to pedal home. He needed his uncle Sandy to see this, to hear that cry.

  As Alex reached the end of the lane and cut along a path worn into the earth at the outskirts of the farm, the weather changed. Snow began to fall. Great flakes swirled down from the darkening clouds. He rode through a dense and thickening blizzard, aware that the snow was settling quickly on the hard, churned earth and budding branches around him. Flakes drifted into his face and spattered against the back of his neck.

  There had been snow here before in early spring, but the end of May? And this sudden? This storm? Alex skidded the bike onto the driveway leading up to the farmhouse. The wheels slipped on a thickening mat of snow. He reached the farmhouse just as the front door opened.

  He climbed off his bike and kicked the stand down. He stopped for a moment and peered through the snow. The sky was white, t
he birds had gone. Whatever had terrified them could not keep them airborne in this blizzard. They had taken roost against it. The screaming had stopped, too. Alex breathed deeply, snowflakes landing on his head the size of moths.

  He turned to go inside, but as he was about to push the door open he glimpsed something move in the field behind him. He paused and looked back down the path and as he did so two beasts charged out from the cover of the hedgerow and flew towards the farmhouse.

  One of the beasts was low to the ground and scaly. It had a human face and outrageous curly blonde hair, as if someone had stuck a doll’s head on a Gila monster. It walked on all fours, although all four limbs were arms with long fingered hands. It had spines like knitting needles in a ring around its neck.

  The other creature had left the path and was circling; a cluster of eyes like a spider’s high on its forehead glittered with malice as it stalked. It walked upright but with a stiff caution as if it had recently recovered from a near fatal accident. It had a face as round and pale as a pudding bowl, featureless apart from that handful of eyes. It wore a dark pinstriped suit, which was smothered in mud and blotchy with mould. For an awful moment of stillness it stopped and stood there, swaying slightly in the snowfall, and marked Alex. It reached out an arm and pointed at him. It made a gesture with its thumb and index finger like a pistol and mimed a shot at him. Alex felt a rush of air along his cheek and a small hole appeared in the doorframe behind his head.

  Alex cried out and ducked. It only got off one shot.

  From out of the farmhouse charged uncle Sandy. He threw himself at the creature. It made to fire on him but didn’t get a chance because uncle Sandy had seized its wrist and was wrenching at it like it was the leg of a stubborn Christmas turkey. The creature shrieked and made a desperate imploring gesture to its companion. Sandy punched it in the gut, collapsing it like a clothes airer. The doll-faced thing blubbered, rolled its haunting blue eyes and scuttled across the grass to assist. The three fought in the snow, Pinstripe on his back with uncle Sandy savaging its gun hand, the lizard-thing circling and slapping and whining. And all the time the snow continued to fall.

  Then, from behind Alex: “Sandy!”

  Aunt Jean put a hand on Alex’s shoulder. She held a slender glass full of gin and tonic with ice and lemon in the other hand. The ice clinked as she leaned forward and yelled across the yard.

  Sandy was up, his broad, muscular back heaving from the exertion as he stood over the injured brutes. His fists were clenched and he was trembling with fury. He booted the lizard-thing in the face and turned and stalked back to the farmhouse, barrel chest heaving.

  The thing in the pinstripe suit lay on its back in the snow, arms and legs splayed out. It appeared dead. The other creature ran around it in circles, flakes of snow caught in its blond curls. Its hands were blue with the cold but it didn’t seem to notice. Then, suddenly, pinstripe sat up. It fixed Sandy with its tiny cluster of beady eyes and something unzipped beneath its chin. Fluid dribbled down its tatty shirtfront and then two huge fangs like shards of porcelain slid out. It lifted its gun hand.

  “Inside!” said aunt Jean, and she shut the door behind them.

  Alex was too shocked to say anything and went through to the sitting room. He went over to the window, which faced onto the yard and looked out.

  There were no more shots though, only a shriek of fury. The creature was on its feet again and was holding its shattered wrist in its good hand. It flapped it and tried to point it at the cottage, but it was useless. Sandy, standing beside Alex, murmured something contented, and patted Alex’s head. They watched as the two beasts turned and stalked away. They disappeared back into the hedgerow.

  Sandy gave Alex a hug. He patted Alex’s back and Alex could smell the good smell of paint and varnish on his clothes, from his work in the barn.

  “I’m okay,” he said. Sandy ruffled his hair and stepped over to the window. The snow was falling more thinly now and had yet to cover up the scuffed tracks in the grass where he had seen off the beasts.

  “Who are they, uncle Sandy?” Alex asked.

  Sandy was silent for a moment. Behind them the fire roared. Alex could hear the clink of ice being added to the makings of another gin and tonic.

  “Toyceivers,” he said.

  Alex didn’t know what to make of the word, but before he could say anything else there was a sudden explosion of noise from outside. It sounded like a circus load of animals blundering around tearing up trees and bushes.

  Sandy snarled. “Right,” he said. “This is it. Let’s get to the barn.”

  SANDY AND ALEX went through the cottage locking up and fixing shutters. Aunt Jean sprawled on the sofa in the living room with her drink. Sandy worried over her but she shooed him away and blew him a kiss saying she’d be fine.

  Upstairs, Alex spared a moment to look out of the window but all he could see was the snow-covered yard, which appeared as smooth and mysterious as the wide white screen of the picture house he loved to visit in town.

  And then, like grotesque images projected onto that screen, they began to come, edging onto the whiteness from the border of the farm.

  Alex banged the shutters closed and locked them then returned to the top of the stairs. His heart was hammering in his chest.

  He paused in the stairwell and looked down. Sandy was by the front door pulling on a pair of boots. He was speaking soothingly to Jean, who was telling him to stop it and get the boy to the barn.

  Alex ran down the rest of the stairs and stood with Sandy by the door. Sandy reached for the handle, but before his fingers closed around it, something hit the front door with enough force to splinter the frame.

  “Out the back,” he said. His voice was calm and steady but there was a different look in his eyes now. Anger and regret together, and with that all-consuming protectiveness. It made him look stronger than ever.

  Above, Alex could make out a sound. Something was on the roof, battering at the tiles.

  Something crashed against the front door again, popping it open off its latch. Cold air blew in and something was out there on the porch craning in at them. It had a thick grey neck and a tiny head, all teeth, like a cricket ball studded with fangs. It made a sound unlike anything Alex had ever heard before, like paper endlessly tearing.

  Outside came the sounds of growling and roaring, things slithering and purposeful. Something the size and shape of a marrow waddled across the yard carrying blades.

  Sandy shouted and kicked at the thing jammed in the doorway. It swung its small, lethal head but missed and clocked itself on the doorframe. It slumped away from the opening and Sandy had to dodge as the thing beyond it slung a blade at him. It flew past his face as he leaped aside, and embedded itself in the banister rail.

  Sandy shoved the door shut again and latched and double bolted it, top and bottom. Then he took off down the hall and through to the kitchen. Alex followed.

  Uncle Sandy threw open the back door and checked outside. So far nothing had ventured around the back. The barn stood high and wide across the back yard, its large, heavy wooden doors ajar.

  “Come on,” he said, and they ran full tilt across the yard and into the barn. Sandy pulled the doors shut and secured them with more heavy bolts. They stood, breathless and wired, and Sandy immediately started looking around.

  The barn was Sandy’s workshop. In the middle of the floor was a huge workbench made of ancient pine. It was littered with bits of wood and metal, cogs and clockworks, oilcans, drill bits, engine parts and electronic circuits. There were tiny motors, resistors, amplifiers, canisters and beakers. Against the wall he had installed a lathe, a sanding belt and an angle grinder. The walls were hidden behind cabinets and shelves full of tools and equipment and the whole room was sweet with the smell of varnishes, linseed oil and paint. His welding equipment stood beside the bench, a spot welder and an arc welder, both with red steel housings and side ventilators like gills. the floor around them was scattered with weldi
ng tips that looked like a spill of bullet cases.

  And everywhere else, arrayed around the barn and lurking back in the storage area, stood his sculptures.

  Alex could hear the racket outside. Things barging around and battering at the farmhouse and the walls and doors of the barn.

  “Uncle Sandy,” he said. “What about Aunt Jean?”

  Sandy was at the back of the barn amongst his sculptures. He was yanking leads and plugging them into sockets built into the floor.

  Still working, he said, “She’ll be fine, son. Nothing’s going to harm your auntie Jean.”

  Something battered against the barn door. It made a low drumming sound and then the tip of a tentacle pushed through the gap between the ground and the bottom of the door and probed about.

  “How do you know?” Alex said, a little desperation creeping into his voice. The tentacle flattened beneath the door, leechlike, and tried to push further inside. Alex considered stamping on it but it looked clammy and repellent.

  Sandy went over to the wall and pulled a switch. There was a flash and a crackle and Alex felt all the hairs on his head rise in an invisible caul of static. He looked around, his eyes wild.

  Sandy was standing with his hands on his hips, looking up at his array of sculptures. Electricity was crawling across the floor in a rippling blue tide. Sandy was wearing rubber boots but Alex was still wearing his school shoes.

  “Uncle Sandy!” he said, his expression stupefied, his arms out at his sides, hands spread wide.

  “Oh, jump up on that bench, son. It’s wood. It’ll insulate you.”

  Alex climbed up onto Sandy’s workbench, scattering tools and detritus.

  The electricity had reached the sculptures and was climbing up their struts and along their spars like tinsel. Alex could see bulbs illuminated in their heads and within rib cages made from the hollow chassis of reclaimed cars and trucks.