House of Malice

TEN

Mandy fought the urge to dive under the bedclothes. Her frozen gaze locked on to the bedroom door: a moment earlier its shape had been lost in the pitch blackness of the room; now it stood faintly outlined by a glimmer of light.

Then, the unmistakable sound of a muffled footstep beyond the thick oak door. Followed by a second click as another of the corridor lights was switched on.

Closer now. The thin strip of light around the bedroom door a little brighter.

Horror welled up like bile in Mandy’s throat. Galvanised by her panic, she leaped out of bed and ran to the door, slapping on the main bedroom light switch on the wall next to it. The sudden intense brightness of the room made her blink. She grasped the ring of the iron door key and twisted it, locking herself in.

She backed away from the door, breathless and shaking. ‘Who’s there?’ she demanded in a quavering voice. ‘I said, who’s there?’

The only reply was another shuffling footstep from outside in the corridor. There came another click as the closest of the three wall lights was switched on.

In her mind she involuntarily pictured the hand turning on the light. Skeletal fingers caressing the switch. Taking their time. The scrape of cold bone. The mental image made her want to scream.

Whoever or whatever was out there, it was now standing right outside her door. All that separated them were three inches of oak. How easily could the door be broken down? How strong was the old lock?

‘Whoever you are, you’d better leave now,’ she shouted. Her voice was shaking so badly, the words came out half garbled. ‘I have a phone in here and I’m calling for help!’

Still no reply. Mandy ventured a step closer to the door. Then another. Trembling, she pressed an ear to the smooth wood.

And thought she could hear raspy breathing on the other side as the intruder hovered there. Waiting. Waiting for what?

The doorknob turned. Gently at first. Then with more force.

Mandy recoiled from the door in fright. She clutched her side of the knob, gripping it tightly with both hands and trying to prevent it from turning, but she lacked the strength and it twisted violently back and forth in her fingers. ‘Leave me alone!’ she screamed.

An impact against the door made the oak shudder in its frame. Then another blow, harder, resonating through the floorboards so that they quivered under her bare feet. Mandy let go of the knob and backed away, thinking desperately of escape. The door began to rattle with increasing violence, building into a frenzy so intense that she was certain it would rip from its hinges with an explosion of splintering oak.

And if that happened, what would follow?

Everything in the bedroom seemed to be shaking. She could hear Buster downstairs, barking and howling like a crazed wild animal.

The door went on shaking. For a few instants, Mandy seriously considered jumping from the window. But what if she only succeeded in injuring herself? How could she escape from her intruder with a broken ankle or leg?

She ran to the phone extension at her bedside and snatched up the receiver. Her hands were trembling so badly she could barely dial in Todd’s number. When he answered, she screamed into the phone, ‘Todd! Todd! Someone’s in the cottage! They’re outside my bedroom door! Help me! Please!’

‘Hold on, Mandy, I’m coming!’ Todd’s voice said on the line.

‘Hurry!’

The line went dead. At that precise instant, the insane rattling at the door fell into complete silence.

Slowly, hardly daring to, Mandy looked back at the door. The strip of light underneath it seemed to have disappeared, but with the bedroom lit up it was hard to tell.

She crept nervously to the doorway and turned off the main bedroom light.

In darkness, too terrified to breathe, she crouched down in front of the keyhole, felt for the cold iron ring and drew out the key as quietly as she could. Peering through the keyhole, she saw only the solid blackness of the empty corridor.

Whatever had been out there was now gone.

A few minutes seemed like hours before the reflection of car headlights swept the bedroom window and she faintly heard the sound of Todd’s Volvo rasping to a halt on the lane outside the gate. A door opening, closing; then a few moments later, running footsteps coming round to the back of the house. Mandy rushed to the window and ripped open the curtain to see a shining light and the dark figure of Todd standing there, torch in one hand, something that looked like a cricket bat in the other. She unlocked the window and threw it open. ‘Todd! Thank Christ!’

‘No windows smashed,’ he called up to her. ‘Your front door’s locked, so’s the back. Nobody seems to be about. Let me in.’

‘Are you sure?’ she called back down to him, terrified to open her door in case the intruder might still be lurking there. She had to summon all her courage to turn the key and slowly, slowly, creak open the door. The darkness of the corridor seemed to waft into the bedroom like a smell.

The nearest corridor light was just a foot away. She clicked it on, then ventured as far as the next, chasing away the darkness. The corridor was empty.

She crept anxiously down the stairs. Buster was still barking inside the kitchen. Mandy turned on the lights, ran to the front door, unlocked it.

‘Are you all right?’ Todd asked grimly, stepping into the entrance hall. He laid down the long metal torch he was carrying, shut the door behind him and gripped her hand. There was mud on his shoes where he’d run from the car in the pouring rain. He wiped them clean on the mat.

She was almost crying with relief. ‘Todd, I didn’t dream it. Someone was here!’

‘Are you hurt? Did he touch you?’

‘I locked myself in the bedroom. He tried to get inside. Then just as I phoned you, he was gone!’

‘Let’s take a look,’ he said firmly, clutching her hand tightly in his, cricket bat ready. She was glad of his strength. ‘Ground floor first,’ he said.

They opened the kitchen door and Buster burst out, yapping frenziedly with his tail tight between his legs. ‘Look at him,’ Mandy said as she tried to calm the dog. ‘I’ve never seen him so nervous.’

As they checked each room in turn, she described in a shaky voice exactly what had happened, from the beginning. ‘You have to believe me. Someone was here.’

Todd said nothing until they’d checked every room in the cottage. Finally, he turned to her. ‘Mandy, there’s no sign of any intruder having been here. Are you really certain you didn’t just imagine it?’

‘Yes! I—’

‘Please, listen. Let’s be logical about this. It’s pissing with rain outside. The front path and garden are all muddy. If someone had got in here, they’d have left a trail of footsteps across the hallway, up the stairs, along the passage to your bedroom. But there’s nothing. How did they get in? And who would break into a place where there’s a dog barking its head off?’

‘But—’

‘I know it’s hard to accept, but isn’t it possible you just had a nightmare?’

‘It was real! It happened!’

‘Maybe it only seemed real,’ Todd said. ‘Especially for an overimaginative writer living all alone in an old house, with a head full of horror stories. A writer who’s written a whole novel in a week, driving herself half nuts with overwork, and probably hasn’t been eating properly.’

Mandy stared at him. Her lip began to tremble.

‘Don’t be angry with me, Mandy,’ he implored her. ‘Please. I care deeply about you.’

She burst into tears and fell into his arms. ‘Oh, Todd, please don’t go away tonight. Please, stay with me.’

‘Of course I will,’ he replied, holding her. ‘Get me a blanket and I’ll kip on the sofa.’

She looked at him with wide, wet eyes. ‘No,’ she said. ‘I mean stay with me. I want you with me tonight.’