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<h2>22</h2>
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<p>Jack Park came trundling up the road in his Range Rover, feeling
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the car bounce and sway as he took the corner, avoiding the ice
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patch picked out by the beams, where the ditch had spilled over
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from the field drain. He’d had a long drive up from Leyburn
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in Yorkshire, pushing the limits, desperate to get home for
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Christmas Eve. He’d checked out a couple of yearlings that
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might make an addition to his stable. Already he was planning for
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an end to recession and brighter times ahead when people had more
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money to spend. He was ready to open his paddocks as a riding
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school and get rid of the cattle altogether. At the height Middle
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Loan farm stood, high on the hill overlooking the estuary, with a
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commanding view up and downriver and with the orange lights of the
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sweeping bridge a magnificent string of jewels in the winter mist,
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the farming was a marginal business. Weekend riders and summer
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trekkers, would be money spinners when the time was right. It had
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been Kate’s idea, one he’d initially looked at with
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some reluctance, farming being well grained into his tough hide.
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His family had farmed Middle Loan since the middle of the last
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century.</p>
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<p>He eased the car round the last bend and onto the narrow
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straight that led up to the farm, noting with no surprise, the
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mounds of horse droppings, pleased at the evidence that Kate had
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got back in the saddle again so soon after her legs were in the
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stirrups. He smiled at his own joke and looked forward to a good
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malt whisky, and after that, a great grilled steak festooned with
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mushrooms and tomatoes. More than that, he was glad to have made it
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home despite the delays on the motorways. He wanted to help wrap
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little Kirsty’s Christmas presents for the morrow. He’d
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phoned from the pit stop down the motorway and Kate had held the
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baby close, letting her snuffle into the receiver and instantly
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Jack had felt that warm, urgent twist in his belly.</p>
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<p>That was something completely new. He was in love. For the first
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time in his life, he was completely, irrevocably, absolutely in
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love. It was different from the love for Kate, vast orders of
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magnitude stronger, though what he felt for his wife was a powerful
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emotion in itself. He loved Kate truly and deeply. They were
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friends and lovers and partners. He had hungered for her since the
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first time they’d met at a young farmer’s barn dance.
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Her auburn hair had been longer then, glinting chestnut under the
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lights and she’d been a pound or two lighter, no
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featherweight, but her sturdy curves had been well within his own
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ideal, and her thick red hair which faded to a fair matt beside her
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ears had hinted at a hirsute secrecy which he had discovered and
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revelled in. He had lusted after her and he had liked her,</p>
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<p>and had great appetites for everything in life and for life
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itself. She could milk a cow and cook a steak and wrestle a ram to
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the ground and at night, when he cuddled up against her firmness,
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she would go the distance with joyful and noisy passion and then go
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some more. He loved her, he imagined, as much as any man loved a
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woman.</p>
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<p>But when he saw Lucy the hammerblow had hit him so hard, he was
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still, more than a month later, reeling from it. It hit him in his
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heart and in his soul. He had seen her head push out from between
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Kate’s quivering, straining thighs and seen the ugly little
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twisted face and then they’d handed the slippery bundle to
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him and to her and he had almost died of it.</p>
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<p>Parental love kicked him down, lifted him up, made him fly. It
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had been the greatest, most momentous occasion of his entire life.
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Up in the high field, bringing the highland cattle down to the low
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pasture, he would savour the moment over and over again. Coming up
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the motorway, he would relive it time and again so that the
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distance passed without him being able to recall any of the road.
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Lucy, she had transformed from a lump, to a squirming thing and
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then to a complete human person as soon as he held her in his big,
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strong hands, and she had transformed him. He’d been a man
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who was comfortable, but distantly vague, with the idea of
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impending parenthood. Then Lucy had arrived and he was a father and
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what he had considered before as sunshine paled to twilight beside
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the radiance she put in his heart.</p>
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<p>He thought of a malt whisky, he looked forward to a good sirloin
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steak dripping in its own fat. He felt a buzz of pleasure and
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pressure at his groin in anticipation of getting his wife under the
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sheets and running his hand down the taught curves of her breasts
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and her hips into that hirsute secret.</p>
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<p>But more than anything he wanted to hold his baby again.</p>
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<p>He gunned the engine, feeling the back fishtail on the black ice
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now forming on the road and got to the gate. The light was on at
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the corner of the byre, the warm and welcoming glow reflecting off
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the whitewashed corner, illuminating the side of the barn and the
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smooth cobbles of the entrance to the courtyard. He got out of the
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car, arching his back to take the stiffness of the road out of his
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muscles, glad he was driving a high-topped four by four and not
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some low slung saloon which would leave him creaking for weeks. He
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walked to the gate imagining he could feel the heat of the halogen
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lights on the back of his neck and as he pulled back the bolt,
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something flickered above him.</p>
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<p>Startled, he turned. The flock of pigeons, racers and fantails,
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the doves white as snow in the beams, went fluttering with a
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whistle of wings, wheeling all together across the road, circling
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the dovecote.</p>
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<p>Jack pulled the bolt against the spring and swung the gate
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forward, once again reminding himself that one day he’d get a
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remote control to open the gate and save him the start-stop every
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time he arrived home. The pigeons wheeled round again, flying in
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tight formation, turning all at once. They looked panicked and he
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wondered if a stoat had got into the dovecote. A stoat or a ferret,
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or one of those wild mink from the old farm on Langside, any of
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them could do a lot of damage in a henhouse or a pigeon loft. The
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birds hardly ever flew at night and when they did, they sought a
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place to roost as quickly as possible. Something must have spooked
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them to keep them on the wing. He thought he’d get the gun
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out and check out the roost after he’d something to eat.</p>
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<p>He drove the car through, got back out again, closed the gate.
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For a third time the birds circled, trying to keep within the
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circle of light the lamp afforded, certainly unwilling to settle.
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Ahead, one of the horses was whinnying. It kicked the door and he
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thought maybe it was a fox, though the horses rarely bothered about
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vermin. The car door closed again and the heat inside, after the
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cold of the night, was suddenly quite oppressive. A bead of sweat
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trickled down the back of his neck, making the skin pucker. He was
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half way along the track, along the home straight as he and Kate
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called it when he realised it was not a hot sweat at all.</p>
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<p>The hairs on his forearms rippled.</p>
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<p><em>Something wrong?</em></p>
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<p>He shook his head. He was just tired. On the way up, apart from
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thoughts of his beautiful daughter, he’d decided the price
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was right for two fillies. He’d phone later and make the
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deal. All work and no play made Jack a tired boy. That’s what
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he told himself as he slowed down at the end of the drive where the
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close cropped hawthorn hedge glistened with frost. The lights
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bounced off the whitewash of the wall, illuminating the night and
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making the mist sparkle. With the ease of long practice he swung
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the wheel, feeling another little slip as the tyres spun on hoar
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ice on the cobbles, then he was past the gaping door of the
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barn.</p>
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<p>He eased the car into the yard, hauled hard to the left and
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drove straight into the garage.</p>
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<p><em>Something wrong?</em></p>
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<p>A twist of odd sensation gripped the muscles of his belly and
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gave a squeeze. He was out of the car, still in the dark of the
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garage. For some reason, his senses seemed abnormally acute. He
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stopped for a moment, put his hands on the roof, leaning. His
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breath made pale clouds in the dark and he tried to slow it
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down.</p>
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<p>Why was he breathing fast?</p>
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<p>“Must be coming down with something,” Jack muttered.
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He hoped not. Not now when they were getting ready to celebrate
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their first Christmas as a threesome. He’d told his parents
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and Kate’s family too, that they would see them all the day
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after Christmas at the earliest. The big day, he swore, was going
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to be at home, all of it. The tree, the presents, the dinner, it
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was to be their special time and he wasn’t going to drag his
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baby daughter round from one side of the country to another on a
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cold winter day to visit grandparents.</p>
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<p>“Maybe it’s the flu,” he wondered aloud. He
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really hoped not. He didn’t want the baby catching something.
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If she got sick he’d shit himself, he knew that. He’d
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be unable to move for the fear of it. The hairs on his forearms
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were all marching together, standing proud like proper little
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soldiers. The skin puckered and tensed and he thought that was very
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odd indeed.</p>
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<p>“Maybe it’s just the cold.” The cold. A cold.
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Maybe even just the tiring journey. He pushed himself away from the
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car.</p>
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<p><em>Something wrong?</em></p>
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<p>He walked out of the dark, into the yard and stopped. The moon
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was high and dented, a slumped face in the velvet sky. Over beyond
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the byre, the birds were still flying. What was different? He knew
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what was different, his instinct knew and his years on the farm
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told him. Something was wrong. Something was out of place.</p>
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<p>There was noise where there should be silence. There was silence
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where there should be noise. It was inside out or back to
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front.</p>
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<p>Out behind the cowshed, where the sturdy stables gave on to the
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paddock where the old dovecote stood in the centre of the field,
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the horses were whining and snorting. One of them kicked out every
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now and again, rattling the door, sending a hammershot into the
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night air.</p>
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<p>Inside the byre, the cows were all howling. They were not
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lowing, the way they would in the spring as they headed along to
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the pasture, or the way they would when it was time for the
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afternoon milking. They were howling the way cattle did when their
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calf is straining to get out, head turned back the wrong way, stuck
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in the passage. The hoarse, high grunts made the building
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shiver.</p>
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<p>“What the hell...?” he began to say. Where was Kate?
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Had she gone for the vet? Were they sick?</p>
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<p><em>Something wrong.</em></p>
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<p>The chickens were silent. There was always, even in the dark, a
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squawk as the pecking order was maintained. He turned and walked
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past the coop. A black shape came scooting from the side of the
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shed, startling him of balance, just a dark blur. The cat, the best
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ratter they’d had in years, went screeching past him, ran
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towards the door of the tack room, missed and hit the wall with
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such a thud that it somersaulted backwards, landed on its back, got
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to its feet still screeching and then shot right out of the
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yard.</p>
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<p>Where were the dogs? They always yapped him a frenzied welcome.
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Always.</p>
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<p>“What the fuck is going on here?” he demanded to
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know, speaking aloud.</p>
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<p>He almost went straight to the house, but something held him
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back. He could not explain it, but suddenly he felt a shudder of
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real apprehension. Instead, he crossed to the byre, got his weight
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against the door and slid it open on its rollers.</p>
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<p>The cows were crying. They howled and screeched, each one in its
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stall, crying in the darkness. He reached a hand and hit the light.
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The fluorescent bars flicked on one after another, drenching the
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place in their pale glare. He walked into the centre into the warm,
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steaming air, breathing in that familiar scent of hot milk and warm
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cattle. He turned round by the stalls and his jaw dropped so wide
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his chin hit his chest.</p>
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<p>He was standing in a pool of milk. Six of the seven cattle were
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standing, legs spread, sides convulsing while all of their milk
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poured steadily in pulsing spurts from their grotesquely swollen
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udders. One of them managed to turn round, a gentle jersey the
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colour of old honey. Its great black eye rolled, showing white all
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round, pinning him with the desperation of its pain.</p>
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<p>“Jesus God,” Jack said finally.</p>
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<p>The six cattle were standing leg-spread and each of them was
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covered in blood. Behind them all, in the drainage gully, their
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part-formed calves, calves that would have been born in the late
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spring, lay in greasy heaps of placenta and blood. They had all
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aborted, every one of them.</p>
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<p>A chill stole right inside Jack Park. Were they sick? Had they
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caught a disease?</p>
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<p>He saw his milk profits and his calf profits gone for the year.
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A sick feeling of apprehension lurched inside him and he staggered
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backwards with the force of it, feeling his own gorge rise at the
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grotesque sight of all those slimy packages that would have been
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calves. The seventh jersey, his best milker and mother of three
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others standing in the stalls, was lying on the ground, her head at
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a strange angle. She must have slipped and the collar had choked
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her, retaining all the blood in her head so that her face was
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swollen and black and her tongue protruded grotesquely. Her legs
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were splayed and from just under her tail, her calf’s hind
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legs protruded like a growth.</p>
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<p>Jack moved back. His good-to-be-home feeling had evaporated
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instantly.</p>
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<p>“What the fuck? What the bloody fuck?” he demanded
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to know, almost incoherent. He bulled his way out of the barn,
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leaving the cattle to bellow their pain. He crossed the yard at a
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trot and almost stumbled over the terriers, still locked in a dead
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embrace.</p>
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<p>Dread clamped on Jack Park’s heart.</p>
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<p>Poison, he thought. Had there been a leak of something? Had
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there been a chemical emission from the big incinerator over the
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hill towards Drumadder? His heart was beating so hard it made him
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dizzy. Nausea and vertigo came on in waves. The front porch loomed
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and the fear gripped him in a cold and merciless hand.</p>
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<p>“No,” he said aloud, a panicked blurt of sound.</p>
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<p>This was all madness. His dogs were dead. His cattle were dying.
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What was happening? The pigeons flew round again in their sweep and
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he wanted to shoot them down, make them stop. He wanted the cattle
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to stop their wailing, the horse to quit kicking. He wanted the
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pressure inside his head to slacken because suddenly he was very
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afraid to open his own front door.</p>
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<p>Had somebody done this? Had somebody killed his dogs and
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poisoned his cattle? The irrational thought did not seem irrational
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to him, not at that moment. His wife and child, his wife and his
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baby girl, they were inside the house</p>
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<p><em>Were they?</em></p>
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<p>waiting for him to come home to them.</p>
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<p>“Oh please,” he whimpered, his voice breaking,
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gaining two octaves in height, making him feel like a helpless boy
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again. He moved towards the door then stopped. Maybe there was
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somebody here. Maybe strangers had come and were inside there
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now.</p>
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<p>Anger suddenly flared up under the fear, twisting him this way
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and that. He stopped once more, trying to think. They would expect
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him to come in the front. They could be waiting for him.
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<em>They</em>. He turned and moving as quickly as his quivering
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muscles would let him, went to the path at the side of the house up
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beside the vegetable garden, unwittingly following the trail of
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something else.</p>
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<hr />
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<p>The mother’s breath came harsh and shallow, panting for
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air. She was fighting him, even in her shallow slumber the way the
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other one had fought him, but he had been prepared and he had
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battened her down, using the last of his resources to subdue her.
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Now she lay slumped in the darkness, dazed and numb, her body
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shaking all over, vibrating with a delicious frequency that set up
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a sympathetic resonance within himself.</p>
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<p>His glands had squeezed him almost dry, filling her with his
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essence and she had succumbed. Her massive teats were filling now.
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He could feel the swell of them and smell the nourishment surge
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inside. He had clamped his sucker mouth on one of them, letting his
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tiny teeth dig just enough into the surface of the skin so that the
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trickle of blood and new milk mingled. Strength began to flow back
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into him in a hot stream.</p>
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<p>After a while he was aware of the rumble of the engine as the
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car trundled along the road he’d been carried along when the
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day was fading.</p>
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<p>Immediately, all of his gathering senses went on the alert.</p>
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<hr />
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<p>Ginny Marsden coughed the last of her blood onto the hay and she
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died at the same time as little Lucy Park.</p>
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<p>The baby’s mother had been powerless, bound in mental
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webs, chemical manacles that prevented her from moving. She
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remained slumped against the wall with the image of the
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thing’s eyes burned into her brain, hovering in front of her.
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The whole world had taken on a red tinge, turning the light of the
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room into a strange purple. She was gasping for breath trying to
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clear her lungs of the thick and acrid miasma that had sprayed out
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from it. Behind her the baby whimpered and the thing, the other
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baby turned its head, quite unnaturally, almost completely around
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on its narrow shoulders, like an owl responding hungrily to a
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squeak in the dark. She needed to mother it, was compelled to feed
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it, yet at the same time she wanted to kill it. She had tried to
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reach and clasp it by the throat, but her hands were only capable
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of stroking its smooth, unblemished skin and pull it even closer to
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her own body. She could not make them grasp and strangle.</p>
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<p>Behind her Lucy cried again, and the baby moved quickly.</p>
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<p>“You can’t walk,” she tried to reason,
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mouthing the words while dribbling saliva onto her bare chest.
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“Just a baby.”</p>
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<p>It clambered off her, crawling quickly and moved to the little
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wicker Moses basket Jack had brought back from a trip down south.
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She heard the scrabble as it climbed up and she tried to scream a
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warming. The baby was climbing up to her child.</p>
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<p><em>Not a baby</em> she tried to think, but the thought
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couldn’t break through the membrane that encapsulated her own
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mind.</p>
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<p>Out of sight, she heard a sucking, wet sound and her heart
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slumped, giving a slow double beat that was shock and loss and
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dreadful despair. She tried to move once more, but her limbs were
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incapable of anything more than a slow-motion, directionlesss flop.
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The baby cried out, thin and fearful and then the sound faded out.
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Kate’s mouth stretched wide in a silent scream and all that
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came out from between her quivering lips was a thick and ropy
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saliva.</p>
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<p>The baby, her own baby, gurgled again, a sound that was liquid
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and high. The cot rattled violently and she could not turn to stop
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it, could not turn to protect her own. After a while, the sound
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stopped and her baby was silent and the other one came crawling
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back to her, climbing up between her breasts again. She felt the
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terrible touch inside her head and the need to mother this thing
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came rushing back into her. Down in the depths of her belly, blood
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trickled and the baby on her breast lifted its head. His eyes bored
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into hers and forced once again and she drew her arms around it,
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compelled to protect this one, driven to feed it. She drew it back
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down to let it suckle and after a while the appalling pain in her
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heart was crushed away by the scraping touch in her mind and she
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fell into a numbed daze.</p>
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<p>It was some time later when she awoke, fuzzy and drugged, rising
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up from a black pool of sleep where terrible things happened in
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nightmare visions of death and destruction. She slowly got to her
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knees, clasping her baby tight, pressing its tiny frame against
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her. There was somebody outside and he was coming for the baby. She
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knew that without doubt, not aware of any true reality.</p>
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<p>She quickly moved to the front room, robe flapping, protecting
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the child. Someone was outside. She heard the engine, over and
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above the howling of the cattle. Someone was coming and the baby
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was in danger. She could feel its urgency, feel its demands for
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protection</p>
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<p><em>Mother me mother me mother me.... A</em> mantra of wordless
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demand. She could do nothing except obey.</p>
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<p>It was dark in the room where she sat in the corner, prepared
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now.</p>
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<p>And all the time, her very soul was riven and rent by the
|
|
unspeakable knowledge that her own baby, her Lucy, was gone.</p>
|
|
<hr />
|
|
<p>His guns were in the cabinet in the front of the house. There
|
|
was a spare key in the roll-top desk in the same room, but it was
|
|
still at the front of the house. He was sure nobody could break
|
|
into the gun case where the two twelve bores stood side by side,
|
|
but whoever was in the farmhouse, they could still be armed. He had
|
|
convinced himself that the threat was human.</p>
|
|
<p>His heart was beating somewhere in his throat, making it
|
|
difficult to breathe quietly. Fear and anger were battling it out,
|
|
each a powerful force, but utter desperation overshadowed them
|
|
both. His hands were shaking as he grabbed the spade from the side
|
|
of the greenhouse and hefted it in two hands. It had been well used
|
|
in the summer and autumn and the moonlight reflected off the
|
|
abraded blade.</p>
|
|
<p>“Let them be all right,” he whispered under his
|
|
breath in a hoarse prayer. “Let them be all right.
|
|
Please.” He appealed to any god, any force. What he was
|
|
saying was <em>let them be alive.</em> Cold dread twisted inside
|
|
him, and he could feel the loop of sudden nausea force upwards. He
|
|
swallowed it back, telling himself he had to be clear, he had to be
|
|
strong.</p>
|
|
<p>There was light inside the house, but no sound at all. He made
|
|
his feet move silently on the flagstones, avoiding the small
|
|
decorative chips that would crunch underfoot, and got to the back
|
|
door. Very carefully, he turned the handle. The door opened a
|
|
crack.</p>
|
|
<p><em>Something here.</em></p>
|
|
<p>The perturbing smell reached him and for an instant he thought
|
|
again about poison, some sort of pollution. His heart leapt at the
|
|
notion. Maybe they were safe. Maybe....</p>
|
|
<p>He opened the door further, pushing it quickly to prevent a
|
|
squeal. He got inside. Slunk along the narrow little corridor to
|
|
the corner where it turned beside the baby’s bedroom. Here
|
|
the smell was thick and clogging and he felt his heart speed up
|
|
with sudden vigour. Without warning, the desperation evaporated and
|
|
the anger suddenly soared to ascendancy. The fear disappeared. An
|
|
instant, burning rage bubbled inside his veins, making his temples
|
|
pound. His vision wavered as the adrenaline punched into his
|
|
bloodstream. He moved quickly, carried on the surge of anger,
|
|
holding the spade right out in front of him, ready to decapitate
|
|
the first bastard he saw. In his mind, pumped up in the flare of
|
|
rage, he saw an ugly head topple from shoulders to land with a thud
|
|
and the image gave him a savage sensation of gleeful
|
|
anticipation.</p>
|
|
<p>“Fuckin bastards,” he growled, unaware that he spoke
|
|
aloud. He barged, not quietly, into Lucy’s room. It was
|
|
empty. The little Moses basket was askew on its stand, and he knew
|
|
instantly that Kate had grabbed the baby to protect it. She must
|
|
have. He turned, about to storm out, then halted, garrotted by some
|
|
new information. He spun back, leaned over the cradle. A dark stain
|
|
smudged the tight basket weave of the little cradle. A smudge of
|
|
deep red.</p>
|
|
<p>His thudding heart hammered against his ribs with such violence
|
|
it was like a small explosion. He leaned forward, face contorting
|
|
in awful apprehension, fingers digging into the shaft of the
|
|
spade.</p>
|
|
<p>A waxen doll lay on a red-stained pillow, a small and inhuman
|
|
thing with plastic, stiff fingers, and half-closed dark eyes which
|
|
glinted in the overhead light. A darker smudge indented under its
|
|
chin, like a bruise. Twin trickles showed where tears had trailed
|
|
from its glassy eyes.</p>
|
|
<p>The bolt of nausea made it into his throat, hard and bitter
|
|
lumps hitting his palate only to be swallowed down in a little
|
|
acrid stream. He turned away, stumbling, his brain in a state of
|
|
complete rejection. He saw a doll, he told himself. It was just a
|
|
doll that Kate must have bought for the baby.</p>
|
|
<p>The stiff little fingers reached up into the air. He could see
|
|
them in his mind’s eye and he knew they had to be plastic
|
|
because they were still and rigid, not like his baby girl’s
|
|
soft and gentle, perfectly formed hands. He made himself walk out
|
|
of the door, trying to call his wife’s name, but unable to
|
|
get his mouth to form the words. The muscles in his belly were
|
|
heaving and twitching and all across his back they were moving in
|
|
conflict with each other as if all the nerves had been disconnected
|
|
and rewired wrongly. A singing noise filled his ears in a juicy,
|
|
high pitched monotone.</p>
|
|
<p>He staggered into the kitchen. On the stove a kettle was
|
|
billowing steam. A pile of washing lay on the table. On the work
|
|
surface by the sink, two substantial steaks were lying on a flat
|
|
plate, each in a dark pool of blood.</p>
|
|
<p>“Must have been the steak,” he said. “Must
|
|
have been. Sure.” He giggled and the sound had a taste of
|
|
madness in it. “Should have washed her bloody hands
|
|
first.” He laughed again, high and manic. “Bloody good
|
|
pun.”</p>
|
|
<p>Inside him, his inner voice was trying to make him go back into
|
|
the baby’s room, telling him to look again. His subconscious
|
|
had taken in the shape in the cot and it had recognised it for what
|
|
it was. Jack Park’s conscious mind would not let him accept
|
|
it.</p>
|
|
<p>He whirled round, shouted his wife’s name now.
|
|
“Kate, I’m home.”</p>
|
|
<p>He still held the spade up like an axe as he walked into the
|
|
front room.</p>
|
|
<p>His hand reached for the light, but even before he touched it,
|
|
he saw her in the corner, slumped or crouched against the wall. Her
|
|
robe was wide open and she held a small monkey in her arms. He
|
|
blinked once, twice. The smell here was dreadful, nauseating. It
|
|
stung his eyes and he felt the surge of emotions shudder through
|
|
him again. He hit the switch and the thing on Kate’s chest -
|
|
both of the breasts were bared, rounded and full - the wizened form
|
|
blurred and wavered. For a second it was grey and emaciated, ridged
|
|
and flat faced and then its outlines ran and expanded. It was Lucy.
|
|
He shook his head, trying clear his vision. The baby screamed and
|
|
changed again, wavering into some ridged and blotched little
|
|
gargoyle. The scream sounded like grinding glass. It scraped inside
|
|
his head like fingernails down a blackboard. Sudden pain twisted in
|
|
both ears.</p>
|
|
<p>“What the fu...” The red eyes flicked open and
|
|
glared at him.</p>
|
|
<p><em>A fucking alien Jesus it’s a</em></p>
|
|
<p>He didn’t even think. He reacted, taking two steps
|
|
forward, raising the spade at the same time. He would smash it off
|
|
her. The thing wavered again, twisted. It was Lucy again, small and
|
|
fragile, bleating in fear. He was about to smash his
|
|
daughter’s head with the garden spade.</p>
|
|
<p>The picture of the doll in the cot, the doll with his
|
|
child’s face suddenly leapt into the forefront of his mind.
|
|
Utter horror swamped him. His brain almost stopped functioning from
|
|
overload under the overwhelming visual and mental and chemical
|
|
assault. He managed one more step forward.</p>
|
|
<p>Thunder erupted from the corner and smashed him backwards into
|
|
the wall. He spun, hit his knuckles against the cupboard door and
|
|
saw a crimson slash appear on the paint.</p>
|
|
<p>“Wha...”</p>
|
|
<p>Thunder roared again and slammed him again, taking him in the
|
|
side. His hip hit the wall and a strangely numb but somehow
|
|
fizzling pain, expanded in his arms and in his side. The spade spun
|
|
away and landed next to the desk, clanging like a cracked bell.</p>
|
|
<p>“Kate its...” he started to say when he saw his
|
|
hands, torn and ragged where the shot had blasted them, trying to
|
|
comprehend the enormity of the damage, the immensity of this. He
|
|
twisted, tried to make his legs move, failed and toppled to the
|
|
floor. His feet did a jittery little dance and then were still.
|
|
Huge pain bloomed in his side and in his back and he knew the heavy
|
|
goose shot had done more than ruin his hands.</p>
|
|
<p>A cool realisation soared above the pain. “She must be
|
|
mad,” he thought. “She’s bloody well killed
|
|
me.”</p>
|
|
<p>He lay on the carpet, feeling his very essence ooze away so
|
|
quickly that the room darkened almost instantly. Over in the
|
|
corner, he heard Kate moan and for some reason the sound was the
|
|
distillation of all fear, even though she had used his own gun and
|
|
had killed him.</p>
|
|
<p>A picture of the doll in the cot came back to him and he saw his
|
|
daughter’s face lying face up, his brain now able to
|
|
comprehend a greater enormity than the fact of his own death.</p>
|
|
<p>“Lucy darlin’...” he managed to blurt before
|
|
his lungs emptied in a frothy gush. He fell forward and died.</p>
|
|
<p>The last thing he saw as his vision faded to black, was the grey
|
|
and ragged thing that squatted over his wife’s trembling
|
|
body, one great red eye fixed on him while it sucked at her flesh.
|
|
In the last moment of his life, Jack Park thought he saw the face
|
|
of the devil.</p>
|
|
<p>Much later, long after the bottom of the kettle had melted on
|
|
the stove, while her baby’s body was stiffening with rigor
|
|
mortis, while Ginny Marsden’s disintegrating corpse was
|
|
turning rigid with the bitter cold out in the barn and while her
|
|
husband’s mutilated, slumped shape had dripped his last
|
|
through the devastating wound in his side, Kate park got to her
|
|
feet and went through the chest in the baby’s room, cradling
|
|
the thing close to herself. Almost instinctively, she turned to
|
|
look in the cot, but another force made her turn away and pay
|
|
attention to what she was doing.</p>
|
|
<p>Over there in the little moses basket, there was something she
|
|
should know, something she had to see, but she had no volition, no
|
|
wherewithal to make herself cross the short distance. Her mind was
|
|
not her own. She bent and wrapped her new baby up in the wonderful
|
|
Christening shawl her mother had passed down, a link from a
|
|
generation gone, her grandmother’s to a new one just begun.
|
|
She wrapped it tight against the cold while its huge blue-lagoon
|
|
eyes held her attention and her mind.</p>
|
|
<p>She wrapped the new baby while in the core of her being she was
|
|
screaming madly, as Ginny Marsden had done. Her breasts were full
|
|
and swollen by now and there was a tingling in her veins as her
|
|
temperature rose, her body fighting a futile war with the new
|
|
chemicals, the long and complex molecules now riving through her
|
|
bloodstream. The twist in her belly proclaimed the start of her
|
|
period after ten months of freedom from cramp. Without pause, she
|
|
stripped off her robe, not noticing the new bruises on the
|
|
ballooning skin, or the scratch marks where small and thin fingers
|
|
had clenched her tight. She dressed herself like an automaton,
|
|
knowing she would have to move soon, while ignorant of where, or
|
|
when, or why.</p>
|
|
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