Black Rock Read online

  S’n’J dro­ve slowly and ca­re­ful­ly back on to the nar­row track down which she had co­me, cons­ci­o­us that her jud­ge­ment wasn’t up to scratch. Sin­ce she’d fal­len off the path - and al­most to an early gra­ve - everyt­hing se­emed off-kil­ter, as if the world had al­te­red its stan­dard set­tings con­cer­ning gra­vity and spa­ce.

  When she re­ac­hed the po­int whe­re she’d first se­en the dog, she re­ali­zed that she wasn’t go­ing to ha­ve to dri­ve all the way back to Tin­ta­gel to sum­mon help af­ter all. She had be­en spe­aking to Janie on the mo­bi­le at this po­int on her way down the track. It had only cut off comp­le­tely when she’d pas­sed the le­vel of the whi­te farm bu­il­ding whe­re the tra­iler and the dog we­re.

  If the pho­ne (God bless it!) still wor­ked, she wo­uld be ab­le to ma­ke the call from he­re. She bro­ught the car to a halt, snatc­hed the pho­ne from her poc­ket and was abo­ut to di­al when it be­gan to trill.

  S’n’J sta­red at it in dis­be­li­ef, sud­denly kno­wing who it wo­uld be. She hit the but­ton and put the pho­ne to her ear.

  ‘Lo­ok Es­se­nj­ay, I don’t know what’s wrong…’ Mar­tin star­ted.

  And be­fo­re he co­uld comp­le­te his ope­ning gam­bit, S’n’J cut him off short. ‘You may not know what’s wrong, but I do,’ she his­sed, ‘and I ne­ed an am­bu­lan­ce so get off the li­ne whi­le I call one!’

  She punc­hed the but­ton and shut off the pho­ne. When she tur­ned it on aga­in, Mar­tin was still the­re. ‘What’s wrong?’ he ble­ated.

  ‘ring off mar­tin!’ she de­man­ded, ‘ring off and do it NOW. THIS IS UR­GENT!’

  For on­ce in his li­fe, Mar­tin did as he was told rat­her than as he wo­uld ha­ve li­ked.

  S’n’J tur­ned the pho­ne off, then on aga­in, and punc­hed three ni­nes.

  ‘Emer­gency, which ser­vi­ce do you re­qu­ire?’ a calm vo­ice as­ked.

  ‘Ambu­lan­ce,’ S’n’J sa­id, trying to match that se­re­ne to­ne and fa­iling mi­se­rably.

  ‘Hold ple­ase cal­ler, I’m put­ting you thro­ugh,’ the ope­ra­tor sa­id.

  ‘You re­qu­ire an am­bu­lan­ce?’ an ef­fi­ci­ent ma­le vo­ice sa­id.

  I know that al­re­ady, S’n’J tho­ught, ‘A man’s fal­len off the ro­of of his ho­use and he’s ble­eding and un­cons­ci­o­us,’ she blur­ted.

  ‘Co­uld you gi­ve me the ad­dress ple­ase?’ the man as­ked.

  They’re not go­ing to get he­re, S’n’J tho­ught as she told him the ad­dress. They won’t be ab­le to find it.

  ‘And the man’s un­cons­ci­o­us af­ter a fall and you think he’s suf­fe­ring inj­uri­es?’ the ope­ra­tor en­qu­ired.

  ‘Yes,’ S’n’J sa­id thro­ugh clenc­hed te­eth.

  ‘And you’re the­re now are you?’

  Hurry up, why don’t you? ‘Yes,’ she sa­id. ‘A lit­tle way away. I’m in my car. I had to dri­ve out of a te­lep­ho­ne de­ad spot to ma­ke the call.’

  ‘Co­uld I ha­ve yo­ur na­me, lo­ve?’

  ‘Why?’

  ‘For the re­cord.’

  He thinks it’s a prank call. They’re not go­ing to send an­yo­ne, she tho­ught, then rep­li­ed, but they ha­ve to. Even if they think it’s a fal­se alarm they ha­ve to send so­me­one, just in ca­se. They’ve got to send so­me­one.

  S’n’J’s vi­si­on swam for a se­cond. ‘My na­me,’ she he­ard her­self say with the ut­most cla­rity, ‘is Snowd­rop Dres­den. I li­ve at Black Rock, Bar­ras No­se, Tin­ta­gel.’

  ‘Be the­re right away,’ the am­bu­lan­ce co­or­di­na­tor told her and rang off.

  Engul­fed by an aw­ful fe­eling of dis­lo­ca­ti­on, S’n’J hardly he­ard him. She felt as if she’d just wo­ken up on the pla­net Xarg whe­re all words had a slightly dif­fe­rent me­aning. The only use­ful tho­ught in her he­ad at that mo­ment was that she’d ha­ve to mo­ve her car be­ca­use pretty so­on the­re wo­uld be a si­ze­ab­le am­bu­lan­ce co­ming down he­re and she was bloc­king its path.

  But you don’t ha­ve to go back down the­re at all. You can just put the car in ge­ar and ke­ep on go­ing the way you’re fa­cing. That’d be the bet­ter idea.

  And S’n’J ag­re­ed. Un­til she’d fi­nis­hed her pasty and dri­ven out of the car park in Fal­mo­uth, everyt­hing had be­en go­ing swim­mingly for her. Or at le­ast pre­dic­tably and nor­mal­ly. In a co­up­le of very short ho­urs she had co­me clo­se to cras­hing her car, she’d suf­fe­red hal­lu­ci­na­ti­ons, dis­co­ve­red an inj­ured man it was al­most im­pos­sib­le to help, and ne­arly lost her li­fe.

  But she put the car in re­ver­se ge­ar any­way.

  Be­ca­use you didn’t aban­don an inj­ured man.

  Don’t do this! her Girl Gu­ide ple­aded. Le­ave now, whi­le you still can.

  Bac­king to­wards the fo­re­co­urt of Black Rock, S’n’J tho­ught abo­ut this. Per­haps she sho­uld qu­it whi­le she was ahe­ad. Per­haps.

  But you won’t. You won’t be­ca­use the ho­use is exactly as you ima­gi­ned it and so is the inj­ured man. You won’t be­ca­use that wi­de-eyed lit­tle girl in­si­de you be­li­eves in happy sappy en­dings. And she won’t let you go ho­me whi­le the­re’s a chan­ce, ho­we­ver slim, that she might be right. She’s a kid trying to stay awa­ke on Christ­mas Eve to see San­ta be­ca­use even tho­ugh she knows it’s her dad in a red co­at, the­re’s a mil­li­on to one chan­ce that the re­al San­ta will co­me this ye­ar.

  S’n’J bac­ked in­to the dri­ve and pul­led up. The ho­use was not ha­un­ted be­ca­use the­re was no chan­ge when she lo­oked at it in the car’s mir­rors. And Mr Win­ter was not a ghost be­ca­use he had not va­nis­hed. He still lay in exactly the sa­me po­si­ti­on he’d be­en in when she left.

  If the­re we­re any ghosts pre­sent, she de­ci­ded as she got out of the car, they we­re of the ca­ni­ne va­ri­ety. The mo­ment be­fo­re she bac­ked ac­ross the pe­ri­me­ter of Black Rock, her fri­end the po­in­ting dog had be­en up the­re on his tra­iler. Now, less than twenty se­conds la­ter, he sto­od at the cor­ner of the ho­use. It wo­uld ha­ve be­en im­pos­sib­le for the world’s fas­test grey­ho­und to ha­ve tra­vel­led that dis­tan­ce in the few se­conds that had pas­sed.

  When the ha­irs at the na­pe of S’n’J’s neck fi­nal­ly stop­ped prick­ling and a lo­gi­cal exp­la­na­ti­on ca­me to her, she be­gan to smi­le. It was ob­vi­o­us now. So ob­vi­o­us she co­uld ba­rely be­li­eve she hadn’t tho­ught of it be­fo­re.

  The­re we­re two dogs. Not one ghost dog, but two or­di­nary ones. One of them sta­yed ne­ar the whi­te farm bu­il­ding ac­ross the val­ley and le­apt on to the tra­iler to see what was go­ing on each ti­me it he­ard her car’s en­gi­ne and the ot­her was simply skul­king aro­und down he­re. The fact that both dogs we­re ne­ver in vi­ew at the sa­me ti­me held no sig­ni­fi­can­ce what­so­ever. If she wa­ited long eno­ugh, they wo­uld be.

  ‘OK ho­und, I’ve got you sus­sed,’ she cal­led, still a lit­tle un­set­tled at its im­mo­bi­lity.

  The dog did not mo­ve.

  S’n’J be­gan to hob­ble to­wards Mr Win­ter.

  And stop­ped de­ad in her tracks when the no­ise star­ted.

  After­wards, when she tri­ed to pi­ece to­get­her the se­qu­en­ce of events that fol­lo­wed, S’n’J fo­und she had a prob­lem, not only with fit­ting everyt­hing in­to the few se­conds of ti­me that pas­sed, but with fit­ting tho­se events in­to her vi­ew of re­ality.

  S’n’J had he­ard dogs howl and she knew what the lo­nely vo­ice of a wolf so­un­ded li­ke, but she had ne­ver he­ard an ani­mal howl with such po­wer, or in a to­ne which sug­ges­ted such de­so­la­ti­on. The bans­hee wa­il fro­ze her to what se­emed li­ke ab­so­lu­te ze­ro. It was a so­und that hurt yo­ur so­ul to he­a
r, that ma­de you wish for a qu­ick, cle­an de­ath ins­te­ad of the ae­ons of tor­ment it sug­ges­ted. S’n’J sud­denly un­ders­to­od the true me­aning of the word ‘fe­ar’.

  She tri­ed to turn her he­ad to­wards the dog but her neck was ri­gid, the musc­les bunc­hed and loc­ked so­lid. Her eyes we­re the only part of her that she was ab­le to mo­ve and they swung slowly to­wards the cor­ner of the ho­use, mo­ving li­ke ice-bre­aking ships in the Arc­tic.

  The dog was sit­ting up in a kind of beg­ging pos­tu­re, he­ad thrown back, jaws wi­de, its paws not dang­ling pret­tily, but stretc­hed to­wards the sky li­ke the arms of an evan­ge­list re­ac­hing for God. To the left of it, out over the co­ast bet­we­en he­re and Tin­ta­gel Cast­le, the clo­uds which ra­ced in from the sea we­re no lon­ger tra­vel­ling at a cons­tant al­ti­tu­de, but swe­eping up in a gra­ce­ful cur­ve, to per­haps two hund­red fe­et, then swe­eping back down aga­in, hit­ting the co­ast­li­ne at gro­und le­vel and swam­ping it with a fast-mo­ving fog. Out in the sea, at the sa­me po­int that the clo­uds be­gan to ri­se, a lar­ge fo­aming wa­ve was for­ming. The wa­ve ap­pe­ared to ha­ve no for­ward mo­men­tum. It was not rus­hing to­wards the land gat­he­ring vo­lu­me, but stan­ding still in a fa­irly well de­fi­ned pe­ak and simply gro­wing tal­ler and mo­re cur­ved. Wa­ter cur­led from the top of it ma­king it lo­ok a lit­tle li­ke that sur­fer’s fa­vo­uri­te, a tu­be, but the lost mass wasn’t stop­ping it gro­wing.

  Li­ke the mas­sing wa­ve out at sea, a tho­ught was for­ming in S’n’J’s he­ad. It was the sing­le ter­ri­fi­ed word of a wo­man who­se grasp on sa­nity is gro­wing we­ak: Im­pos­sib­le.

  And the dog how­led. On and on, way past the po­int at which any na­tu­ral dog’s lungs sho­uld ha­ve run out of air.

  S’n’J sen­sed mo­ve­ment to her right and to­re her eyes away from the dog just in ti­me to catch sight of so­met­hing flut­te­ring. She saw it only on the pe­rip­hery of her vi­si­on; it was go­ne in a mo­ment and she wasn’t su­re what it was. Ex­cept that she was su­re; she just co­uld not al­low her­self to be­li­eve it.

  It was Mr Win­ter.

  He had fol­ded up. Not fol­ded up li­ke a man hit in the sto­mach, but li­te­ral­ly. She had just wit­nes­sed Mr Win­ter cre­ase li­ke a lar­ge pi­ece of black and whi­te pa­per. As if un­se­en hands had re­ac­hed down, pres­sed him flat and pac­ked him away. He had be­en cre­ased ac­ross the cent­re of his body, bent do­ub­le, then cre­ased down the mid­dle of his spi­ne and bent do­ub­le that way. And fol­ded and cre­ased, aga­in and aga­in, fas­ter and fas­ter, his si­ze di­mi­nis­hing un­til he was on the po­int of va­nis­hing.

  When the dog fi­nal­ly ran out of air to howl with, the si­len­ce that fol­lo­wed al­most ma­de S’n’J col­lap­se. She wan­ted to cry, and per­haps fa­int too, but ins­te­ad she gas­ped and scre­wed her eyes shut, ten­sing her­self for a re­pe­at per­for­man­ce - which didn’t co­me. She ope­ned them aga­in in ti­me to see the hu­ge wa­ve col­lap­se on it­self and form two smal­ler ones on eit­her si­de of whe­re it had be­en. And in ti­me to see that the clo­uds we­re now ra­cing furt­her in­land.

  Du­ring the mo­ment her eyes had be­en clo­sed, the dog had va­nis­hed.

  And when she fo­ught off her pa­raly­sis and tur­ned back to­wards Mr Win­ter, he had go­ne too.

  It oc­cur­red to her - but only very dis­tantly - that she sho­uld go and se­arch for him in ca­se he’d wo­ken up and stag­ge­red ro­und the si­de of the bu­il­ding. S’n’J ins­tantly re­j­ec­ted this co­ur­se of ac­ti­on, re­ali­zing she was no lon­ger run­ning un­der the he­ading of Miss Lo­gi­cal. In fact, Miss Lo­gi­cal had ta­ken a long hi­ke from which she might ne­ver re­turn. She was now Miss Han­ging-on-to-her-Sa­nity and li­ke her Girl Gu­ide al­ways sa­id, it was bet­ter to qu­it whi­le you we­re still ahe­ad.

  She glan­ced at the spot whe­re Mr Win­ter had be­en (all that re­ma­ined was the blo­od on the shing­le), hob­bled the few yards back to the Si­er­ra, star­ted it up, gun­ned the en­gi­ne and left.

  If the­re was only one thing she was su­re of at this mo­ment in her li­fe, it was that if all the wild hor­ses in the known uni­ver­se we­re ro­ped to­get­her and ti­ed to her, they wo­uld ne­ver drag her back he­re aga­in.

  7 - Martin Makes a Call

  Pin­ned to the cork bo­ard be­hind his desk in Ace’s of­fi­ces, was Mar­tin Din­sey’s mot­to. It sa­id:

  WE TURN THE IMPOSSIBLE INTO REALITY

  If you had told Mar­tin that it was sto­len from a com­pu­ter ad, he wo­uld ha­ve shrug­ged and nod­ded. He didn’t know whe­re the words had co­me from, and he didn’t ca­re. What he did know was that they fit­ted, qu­ite per­fectly, the li­te­rary task he and his aut­hors re­gu­larly un­der­to­ok. Tur­ning the im­pos­sib­le in­to re­ality.

  The mot­to was the key to his suc­cess. Over the past fif­te­en ye­ars as an edi­tor, Mar­tin had be­co­me an icon of the fan­tasy gen­re. The sub-gen­res inc­lu­ded sword and sor­cery and hor­ror and Mar­tin hand­led them all. And ex­cel­led.

  He had a blo­od­ho­und li­ke no­se for a go­od re­ad, and knew how to ma­ke a go­od re­ad in­to an ex­cel­lent one. And that of­ten me­ant cut­ting, which was whe­re he’d ga­ined his nick­na­me, ‘Snips’. But mo­re of­ten, it me­ant re­const­ruc­ti­on. Mar­tin li­ked to think of him­self as the Isam­bard King­dom Bru­nei of li­te­ra­tu­re. But ins­te­ad of de­sig­ning sus­pen­si­on brid­ges, he de­sig­ned the sus­pen­si­on of dis­be­li­ef. He hel­ped turn the im­pos­sib­le in­to re­ality.

  Now, he was fa­ced with the dis­con­cer­ting fe­eling that he’d wor­ked his ma­gic mot­to on him­self. So­me­how, he had tur­ned the im­pos­sib­le in­to re­ality. And not li­te­ra­rily this ti­me, but li­te­ral­ly.

  He co­uldn’t qu­ite put his fin­ger on the mo­ment it had hap­pe­ned, but his mind had jum­ped the po­ints and chan­ged tracks. Which only went to show that if you li­ved most of yo­ur li­fe in the re­alms of fan­tasy, so­oner or la­ter you wo­uldn’t be ab­le to tell the dif­fe­ren­ce bet­we­en that and re­ality.

  And that had su­rely hap­pe­ned, be­ca­use Mar­tin now be­li­eved that du­ring the walk back from the Gay Hus­sar res­ta­urant to Ace’s of­fi­ces, a crystal had for­med in his bra­in. A sing­le tiny speck of ice. And whi­le he had wal­ked, it had grown. Not slowly, li­ke the su­gar or alum crystals in sci­en­ce at scho­ol, but ama­zingly ra­pidly. And then it had stop­ped be­ing a crystal, and sha­ped it­self in­to a rec­tan­gu­lar block, which lo­oked so­met­hing li­ke an empty pa­per­we­ight. In his mind’s eye, whe­re the block still hung, he co­uld see it cle­arly. He co­uld even fe­el the cold ra­di­ating from it. And when he pe­ered in­to that block, he co­uld see… not­hing at all. Just emp­ti­ness.

  Ear­li­er, an ima­ge of Black Rock had hung the­re. Then the ima­ge had chan­ged, li­ke a mo­vie cut­ting from one sce­ne to anot­her, and he’d watc­hed Es­se­nj­ay fall down the si­de of a ste­ep hill to­wards the sea. Then, be­fo­re he’d se­en what had hap­pe­ned to her, the ima­ge had cut back to the sta­tic fron­ta­ge of the ho­use aga­in. And af­ter he’d spo­ken to her on the pho­ne when she’d told him to get off the li­ne be­ca­use she ne­eded an am­bu­lan­ce, the ima­ge had cle­ared, le­aving the block blank.

  It had sta­yed blank sin­ce.

  The dis­con­cer­ting thing was not that the block had sta­yed blank, but that it had sta­yed at all.

  Mar­tin, who spent his who­le li­fe in one aut­hor’s pre­tend world af­ter anot­her, did not be­li­eve in the su­per­na­tu­ral. Or in al­ter­na­te uni­ver­ses, pa­ral­lel ti­me stre­ams, de­mons, we­re­wol­ves, dra­gons, or any of that ot­her shit that Ace’s re­aders so­aked up li­ke spon­ges.

  What
he did be­li­eve in, was the sci­en­ti­fic exp­la­na­ti­on of li­fe which left no ro­om for af­ter­li­fe, be­fo­re-li­fe, re­in­car­na­ti­on or the su­per­na­tu­ral. The­se ir­ra­ti­onal be­li­efs we­re me­rely the pro­ducts of bra­ins which had ge­ne­ti­cal­ly mu­ta­ted in­to so­met­hing mo­re than simp­le sur­vi­val com­pu­ters which dro­ve pe­op­le to eat and rep­ro­du­ce. The hu­man bra­in had ex­pan­ded it­self to the po­int whe­re it al­ways had to be tel­ling it­self sto­ri­es, and ext­ra­po­la­ting from them. And li­ke even the best com­pu­ter soft­wa­re, the bra­in had a few bugs lur­king. Con­se­qu­ently yo­ur bra­in co­uld turn tra­itor and ma­ke you be­li­eve things for which the­re was no em­pi­ri­cal evi­den­ce.

  And this was su­rely what had hap­pe­ned to him - the pres­su­re of his fa­iled re­la­ti­ons­hip had ca­used his bra­in to strip a few cogs, er­go the psychic ice block that now sto­od in his mind’s eye, wa­iting, li­ke a blank com­pu­ter scre­en.

  But Mar­tin li­ked to think of him­self as re­so­ur­ce­ful and co­nj­ured up a vi­si­on of an in­dust­ri­al hot-air blo­wer. In his mind’s eye, he tur­ned the blast to­wards the ice block.

  Which not only didn’t melt away, it didn’t so much as drop a be­ad of wa­ter.

  He then tri­ed pne­uma­tic drills, he­avy mac­hi­nery and fi­nal­ly a nuc­le­ar exp­lo­si­on, but not­hing wor­ked. And if he was truth­ful with him­self, he had to ad­mit that the re­sult he’d ob­ta­ined was en­ti­rely the re­sult he’d ex­pec­ted. No­ne of the men­tal ima­ges he pro­vi­ded se­emed even a tenth as subs­tan­ti­al as that of the ice block.

  Which left him with a big prob­lem.

  Mar­tin ‘Snips’ Din­sey, was sit­ting in the hall of his ex-wi­fe’s ho­use in Ladb­ro­ke Gro­ve with the te­lep­ho­ne in his hands, cer­ta­in he’d go­ne mad.

  ‘Did you get thro­ugh?’ An­ge­la cal­led from the kitc­hen.

  For a mo­ment, Mar­tin wasn’t cer­ta­in he’d even di­al­led Es­se­nj­ay’s num­ber. He had be­en trying to re­call the twenty odd pa­ges of Black Rock he’d re­ad, but they we­re va­po­ri­zing in his me­mory.