Pax Britannia: Human Nature (17 page)

"What sort of signs were you hoping to find?" Ulysses asked, as much as by way of finding something to distract them all - but mostly himself - from the sudden enforced intimacy the three of them suddenly found themselves sharing.

"Spoor, claw-marks, a paw-print if I was lucky."

"Like this one you mean, ma'am?" Nimrod said in his usual underwhelmed monotone, raising an eyebrow at something on the ground - or rather, an impression in the ground.

And there, in front of them, partially hidden by tufts of grass and moss, was the nonetheless still clear indentation of four claw marks and the pads to match.

"That's it!" Jennifer shrieked in delight. "You've found it!"

"By Jove, old chap! Score one to you, eh? But bloody hell!" Ulysses exclaimed as he studied the mark for himself. "Look at the size of it!"

The single, threatening paw-print was more the size of a horse's hoof than the impression left by a dog, even something as large as a Great Dane. The terrier's feet were dwarfed by it, in comparison.

"It looks like you were right, Jennifer!" he added excitedly.

"Yes, it does rather, doesn't it?" she replied just as excitedly, for the moment the pain in her ankle forgotten. "We should take an impression. I have a mould and some plaster of Paris in my bag. It shouldn't take us more than about -"

"Sir," Nimrod suddenly butted in, eyes turned to the subtly darkening blanket of clouds that covered these desolate moors, "I hate to put a damper on things, but dusk is drawing on and we have just found the very evidence Miss Haniver was looking for to prove that there
is
a ravening beast at large on Ghestdale."

Suddenly realising what he was saying, he looked at the sky again and noted how much greyer and gloomier the moors appeared than when they had first arrived at this spot. Dusk came early this late in the year, frighteningly early.

"Nimrod's right," Ulysses said. "We have to press on. We can come back here again in force, after someone's seen to that ankle of yours. But have no fear, Jennifer, I do believe you've made the discovery of the deca -"

"Ulysses?" the young woman asked, looking anxiously at her knight in shining armour, who was now suddenly doubled up beside her.

"Sir? Are you all right?" Nimrod sounded genuinely concerned, his voice laden with unaccustomed emotion.

A hand pressed to his temple, Ulysses straightened again as the shock of the migraine-flash of awareness began to pass.

"Oh, Nimrod, I do so hate it when you're right."

And then they all heard the deep-throated, guttural growl behind them.

Chapter Twelve

The Barghest

All three of them snapped their heads round at the same time, terror-widened eyes staring through the encroaching gloom at the entrance to the narrow defile by which Ulysses and Nimrod had come to find Jennifer Haniver.

There, standing stock still on four thick legs was a black shape, a blot of darkness against the dimming horizon, a threatening shadow charged with menace and power. It seemed to exude an aura of malevolence that hit the three of them with a wave of nausea-inducing fear.

And Ulysses knew that the beast was watching them just as intently. He almost fancied he could see its eyes glowing red in the darkness, and then he chided himself for allowing such fanciful imaginings to subsume all rational thought. He needed to keep his wits about him: now was the time for action, not for macabre, doom-laden fantasies.

The creature stood rigid, apparently simply watching them. Ulysses knew that they had to run, that if they were to survive the surely inevitable attack that was sure to come, they had to give themselves as much of a head-start as possible.

And there was no doubt that it
was
the Barghest beast. Everything about it exuded malign threat, even at this distance. It looked like it was as big as a pony, although there was something about the shape of its silhouette, and the way the creature held itself, that suggested its essence could not be contained by something as ordinary as a dog's hide.

As Ulysses watched, transfixed by the appalling majesty of the animal standing there, the dog-beast threw back its head and howled.

The sound - one long ululating howl of savage animal delight and hunger - echoed from the walls of the enclosing defile, screwing Ulysses' stomach into a knot, an icy chill rippling through every part of him. He felt his skin contract, the hairs of his arms standing on end, and heard the rapid
dub-dub dub-dub
tattoo of his quickening pulse pounding in his ears, as the old adrenalin-fuelled flight or fight response kicked in.

And then - still unable to take his eyes off the ominous black shadow-shape - Ulysses saw the creature drop its head and look straight at the compromised trio. He saw its stance visibly tighten, thick cords of muscle knotting beneath its velvet-black hide. The Barghest was tensing, ready to spring. And then something in Ulysses snapped.

"Come on!" he hissed at his manservant and the girl, muscles moving again now that he was freed of the paralysis of unbridled fear. "We have to get out of here."

"Yes, sir!" Nimrod acknowledged his master emphatically.

Jennifer, however, now that she was faced with the truth of what had so far only been her academic pursuit of the Barghest beast, could only whimper and mutter to herself, her own anxiety overwhelming her.

Ulysses' gut instinct told him that it was now a case of when, not if, the creature would launch an attack. With the deadliest of intent.

"Come on, Jenny, you can do it, I know you can," Ulysses encouraged her, trying to make his words as calm and reassuring as possible, worried as he himself was that the young woman's own fear might prove more crippling than her injured ankle. "We have to keep moving."

"Nimrod," he said, turning to his manservant, his voice hushed but as hard as iron, "arm yourself, just in case."

He heard the click of Nimrod's pistol chamber being closed again, his ever-reliable manservant close to being a mind-reader himself, having already unholstered his gun and checked its load.

"Already done, sir. Just in case."

"Yes, just in case," Ulysses repeated, as if the animal's attack was anything but inevitable, clinging onto the desperate hope that they could all still get out of this alive.

"We're doomed!" Jennifer hissed. Ulysses could feel her body shaking, pressed against his as it was. "Those who hear the Barghest's howl are doomed to die."

"You know what always made me laugh about folk tales like that?" Ulysses said between puffs and sharp intakes of breath as the three of them attempted to quicken their pace, like competitors in some bizarre four-legged race.

"What?" Jennifer found herself replying.

"If all those who hear its howl always die, then who was it who passed on that little titbit of information?"

And then, the adrenalin-high emotion of the moment catching her completely off-guard, a burst of laughter escaped Jennifer's lips, startling herself so much that she suddenly fell silent again.

"That's more like it," Ulysses gasped, as they continued their stumbling run.

But Ulysses' forced good humour was short lived as he looked back over his shoulder and was unable to stifle his own moan of shock and horror.

"What is it?" Jennifer gasped. "It's gaining on us, isn't it?"

"You could say that," Ulysses had to agree.

Jennifer turned her head.

"Hey," Ulysses snapped, "I think we should concentrate our energies on keeping going, don't you?"

Jennifer gave up on her attempted observation and instead re-doubled her own efforts, pushing hard with her good leg, her hops helping the others carry her over the uneven ground.

Ulysses had only had a split-second's look at the beast, but it had been more than enough. In that split-second the monstrous appearance of the creature had indelibly seared itself onto his retinas. Although it roughly resembled a dog in shape and form - hunched shoulders and slavering muscular jaws screaming its canine ancestry - at the same time it was like no dog he had ever seen.

First of all, the thing's head appeared too large for its body, the thick hump of its broadly-muscled shoulders seeming to have to compensate for the extra weight. Its skin appeared to be pulled too tight against its skull, and this aspect of its appearance wasn't down to the creature being malnourished either. It might have a ravenous hunger - Ulysses could well believe it, seeing the thick strings of saliva dripping from its tusk-like teeth - but if so, it was by design rather than due to the fact that the creature hadn't fed well.

The flesh of the dog's head was drawn back from jaws that seemed too large for even its over-sized skull. It was as if a lion's skull had been forced inside the tight sack of the dog's skin. Jutting fangs, far larger than those of any naturally evolved canine, thrust from glistening gums and partially denuded bone, while the skin at the side of the creature's head was pulled back in creased rolls that seemed close to tearing. Its muzzle was practically debrided bone, giving its snout a bat-like appearance. In fact, the stretched nostrils, jutting, over-sized fangs, red eyes and midnight-black pelt gave the beast a sinister, vampiric quality on top of everything else.

The rest of the beast's body, its heaving ribcage, its lithe, muscular flanks - even its thick, heavy, tail that in the half-light appeared to glisten as might a snake's - spoke of strength, savagery and ferocity. A nightmarish terror-dog; the perfectly designed killing machine.

"Nimrod, leave me to it," Ulysses said, indicating Jennifer with a nod of his head. "I want you to concentrate on emptying your gun into that thing as soon as it's close enough, preferably right between its eyes."

"Very good, sir."

Leaving the young woman solely to his master's attentions, Nimrod turned to face the approaching monster, continuing his half-run backwards, parallel to the other two, pistol out straight in front of him, aimed at the beast.

Just for a moment, Ulysses looked Nimrod's way, just to check that his manservant was all right, and then wished he hadn't. He could not remember the last time he had seen such a look of shock and unadulterated terror on his aide's face. And that unsettled him even more than the appearance of the beast closing on their position.

It unsettled him to the point where, his usual indefatigable positivity suddenly crushed, for the first time he dared to allow the possibility to enter his mind that perhaps the three of them weren't going to get out of this one alive; that he had met his nemesis at last, in the form of unbridled, savage nature, blood red in tooth and claw.

And then they were out of the defile, with nothing but open moorland between them and the twinkling lights of a house, visible on the horizon, a postage stamp of shadow against the rapidly darkening, overcast sky.

The fading twilight played tricks on the eyes, as Ulysses was well aware, but the house still appeared to be a long way away; further than they could ever hope to reach before the terror-dog surely caught up with them.

And then the shooting started.

The first shot was loud and close. The pistol-crack caused Ulysses' body to tense automatically, almost as if he had been shot himself. Jennifer gave a gasp of surprise and hugged herself to him even more tightly as he re-doubled his efforts once again.

"If you'll excuse me, Miss Haniver," Ulysses said as he hastily swept Jennifer up in his arms. She in response, put both arms around his neck and clung on tightly. Momentarily her eyes locked onto his, limpid pools of fear meeting his steely gaze.

Biting his lip against the pain, Ulysses ran on, adrenalin spurring him forward. It felt like the fingers of his right hand were being broken all over again, while his irksome old shoulder injury was flaring up under the added duress. But he focused his mind on the house on the horizon, compartmentalising the pain, so that it might be dealt with later - if there was to be a later - the cocktail of chemicals being released into the bloodstream by his own body helping to numb the searing agony in his hand.

More shots followed, seeming to mark his own fleeing footsteps.

Then several things happened in close succession that sent Ulysses' world into a whirl.

The first thing he was aware of was the savage snarling of the dog, so close behind them that, his overwrought imagination working overtime, he felt as if the unnatural animal's hot, fetid breath was gusting on the back of his neck.

He heard two more shots.
Five, six
.

He suddenly realised he had been subconsciously counting how many bullets had been fired. And now Nimrod's pistol was empty and Ulysses doubted that he would have any hope of reloading in time.

And then he heard a cry, followed by a sharp, splintering crack, and Nimrod was suddenly no longer gallivanting backwards beside them. His manservant was down, but all Ulysses could do was keep running. He had no choice.

Ulysses did not need his uncanny sixth sense to warn him when the beast was about to strike, as it finally caught up with them. He could hear its slavering, panting snarls, smell its rank breath and the stinking filth of its blood-matted fur.