Silent Footfall Part 3

Silent Footfall Part 3

Silent footfall Part 3 (20.08.14)

An icy finger stroked Gina’s spine. Even after twenty years that voice still had the power to turn her blood to ice. She turned slowly to face him. Grey haired and stooped now he fixed his mismatched eyes on her.

“Every year I waited but you never came.” The voice was soft but she heard the reprimand behind the quietly spoken words. Fear squeezed her heart making it difficult to breathe. “I only came…for water…for Chalkie…my dog…”

“Ah yes – your dog. A very unworthy offering to our glorious…”

“Offering? No! You don’t understand. I didn’t kill him. It was an accident. The choker…”The words died in her throat. Memories flooded in. Her childish hands squeezing, squeezing until the squirming newborn pups gave up their fight for life. She shivered. She could still hear the dull sound of the plop as their dead bodies hit the water; floated on top of for a few seconds before sinking below the dark surface. That was how I knew this house had a well, she realised. She felt sick. But she had needed to kill the newborn pups to teach the mother dog a lesson. She was always the one who sniffed out my hiding places in the forest, she reasoned.

“You’re early – still getting your days mixed up? You can help me get the house ready. Be like old times,” he smiled moving towards her.

Gina put her hand behind her and fumbled for the corner of the old house and began working her way backwards. She stumbled over the stacks of rotting grass. Its smell seemed more pungent now. He followed her. Stupefied with terror she turned around and around amongst the weed choked flowers in the small square of front garden.

Chalkie wasn’t there.

Her mind began to splinter. She could feel her sense of reason slipping from her grasp. “Chalkie ran away and left me.” She could hear the petulant childish note of hysteria in her voice. “Max, Max, help me,” she whimpered. She ran towards the gate. She had to get away. Get back to the holiday park. Phone Max…

She could hear a slow shuffle on the gravel as he rounded the corner of the house. Felt his hot breath on the back of her neck; felt his surprisingly strong hands grip her shoulders. “Don’t run away. I’m glad you came. Glad I didn’t have to go looking for you – like some of the others,” he wheezed.

Desperation gave her strength. She struck out backwards. She knew her elbow had found its target when he loosened his grip. It was all she needed. She rushed for the open gate and stopped. A creature – half man and half goat stood between the pillars blocking her escape. The sun, a ball of orange sinking behind the trees cast its face in shadows .Something metallic glinted at its throat. She knew then that it had been that she had seen in reflecting in the sunlight in the dimness of the forest. She shut her eyes against the glare of the setting sun and then snapped them open again. “The sun can’t set in the middle of the day,” she whispered.

Behind her he gave a derisory chuckle. “C’mon, come inside. You need your medication….” She turned then and looked into the mismatched eyes; one a pale faded blue, the other bright amber. As if he was made of two different people, she thought distractedly.

“How do you know about …my med….”

His eyes narrowed slightly. “?Max told me of course.”

Hope leaped in her chest “Max is here?”

He nodded.

“But…he doesn’t know where I am,” she said weakly. She could sense he was growing impatient now. She looked back towards the gate. Chalkie lay at the creature’s feet, his footfall silenced.

“Max is here. He’s always been here. Don’t you remember? He was clearly impatient now.”You two are the only children left of the original group from the holiday park.”

Gina felt the ground shift under her feet. Her mind grappled with the information. Max? The holiday park! No! It couldn’t be true, she’d remember. But even as she thought it she knew that her mind could only cope with remembering some of the things about the going-on in the house. That is why you got on so well, her internal voiced mocked her. He’s an old friend.

“Remember setting the snares and skinning the rabbits?”

She nodded reluctant to remember.

They had set the snares for the rabbits and hares in the surrounding woods and fields; but that hadn’t been Max, had it? He had shown her there to squeeze so that the rabbits died slowly, painfully. It had always exited him. An image of the boy’s long squared tipped fingers dripping the blood… Max had squared tipped fingers..

He saw realization dawn in her terrified eyes. “Come inside, child and embrace your future,” he commanded.

Gemma Hill 2014  ©

Part 4 -23.08.14

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