The Face That Must Die (16 page)

That night, and every night until she’d returned to her parents, he had lain cramped and sleepless on the couch. She’d achieved a quick move to another Inland Revenue district. Almost her last words to him had been “I think I could have borne it if it had been another woman.”

The water was cooling. He rose wallowing from the murk, and hoped those memories were gurgling down the drain, which sounded like an injured throat. Had Daphne married again? He wouldn’t like to have spoiled her life.

He swaddled himself in his towelling robe. He shaved, and stung his cheeks with Brut after shave. Oh you brute, he mocked his reflection. Who could care for that old bag of a face? It looked pouchy as a hamster’s. Going to the club tonight would be not only a regression but a waste of time.

Still, he began dressing. Usually the main room seemed comfortably spacious; the heavy curtains helped it seem so, as well as protecting his sleep from any hint of light. Now the room looked emptily large. His only companions were the photographs.

One was of Daphne. Just before she had found the magazines she’d had her hair cropped very short. Had she been prompted by her subconscious? At the time, she had never looked so attractive to him. Now, gazing with a faint calm smile out of the frame, she looked like Joan of Arc in the films.

Her expression would never change, nor would it reach him. He slipped a record from its sleeve: Beethoven’s last quartet, Opus 135. The stylus settled delicately on the rim. Even the first bars, which sounded more complex every time he heard them, failed to distract him from the photograph of Paul.

Left alone, Craig had known neither what he wanted to be nor how he appeared to others. Sometimes he’d behaved exaggeratedly male, sometimes a camp gesture had caught him unawares. When he’d set out to act camp, to put an end to speculations, his gestures had grown stiff, parodic. His colleagues had been bewildered by him.

He’d returned to the club, though he no longer felt at home. Then one night, just as the dim coagulated light and the camp squeals that slashed the roar of conversation were becoming unbearable, he’d seen Paul.

The young man had been leaning on the bar, looking like a model who’d been forgotten by an art class. H is expression was bored: posing wasn’t his style, he’d agreed to model only because he’d been asked — but was that expression defensive? A sweet ache, wholly unfamiliar, had grown between Craig’s stomach and his genitals: panic and yearning. He’d had to force himself to shoulder his way along the bar.

When at last he’d glanced at Craig the young man’s boredom had been visibly deliberate. “You look as though you feel out of place,” Craig had said.

The young man stared: was Craig about to jeer? At last he’d said “Maybe I do.”

“
So do I,” Craig had said, smiling with profound relief.

The peace which they’d experienced together then had been the seed of their relationship. Not long afterwards, Paul had moved into Craig’s flat. For months Craig had felt stable, calm, invulnerable — at least, as much so as he ever had.

Paul had been a plasterer. Once, when he’d worked on Craig’s bathroom wall, Craig had watched him: his complete involvement in his skill, his graceful deftness, the economy of his craftsmanship. Craig had thought he’d never seen greater artistry.

But Paul’s work had separated them. He had never wanted his workmates to come to the flat. When he went drinking with them, which was often, he had never invited Craig. It hadn’t mattered to Craig — but it had troubled Paul, who had stayed out drinking more frequently, sometimes not returning to Craig the same night.

One midnight he’d tramped in, punching the wall to steady himself. “I can’t stand this.” His voice had been drunkenly menacing. “I’m going back home.” He’d dragged his suitcases about, shoving Craig away, and had thumped downstairs with the suitcases full, to yell for a taxi.

Craig had moved to Aigburth Drive, to forget. He didn’t need sex, it involved too much pain and loss, it made him too vulnerable. He was content to stay within himself. He had a few close friends who shared his tastes in music. He liked his colleagues well enough, though their only notion of art seemed to be films, which he thought vulgar and sensational: he hadn’t been to a cinema for ten years. His work was demanding and sometimes unpleasant, but bearable. He was able to sleep at night.

Then the police had visited his flat.

At first, despite the initial shock, their visit hadn’t disturbed him. He could tell that they knew he was gay, but they seemed to accept that without censuring him. When they had satisfied themselves that he wasn’t the man they were hunting, they’d told him of the anonymous call.

No, he’d told them when he could speak: he had no enemies that he knew of. His mind was calling him a liar. It must be someone in the house: who else could have a motive?

He hadn’t needed the menacing calls to confirm his fears. Those calls had depressed him so much he hadn’t reported them to the police. It didn’t matter who had been calling: weighed down by distress, he couldn’t yearn for revenge. Even his thick curtains couldn’t help him sleep. It wouldn’t take many more calls to make him leave this flat.

The phone rang.

He started. One buttonhole of his jacket gaped while his fingers wrenched convulsively at the button. His heart scurried, his breath began to wheeze. The second movement of the Beethoven ended with an abrupt
forte
chord, isolating the shrill bell. Was it his tormentor calling? He lifted the pickup arm gently from between movements, slowly enough that before he could reach the phone, it fell silent.

But this was dreadful. He was afraid to answer his own phone. He couldn’t feel safe even in his flat. At work stray remarks made him feel insecure. “The queers are better off now they can be treated medically.”

“
They’d be all right if they left children alone” (as if all heteros did!). Even his colleagues who liked to think themselves tolerant made a joke of gay ads in the newspapers, as though nobody listening could possibly be gay. They were like Peter Gardner upstairs — his generation was supposed to be tolerant, yet he always stood away from Craig as though he might catch something. Fanny across the landing was one of the few with whom Craig could be open without fearing they would think he was making a pass.

Not that he cared for all homosexuals. He disliked the flamboyant gays; they lacked taste and discretion. He disliked the empty cleverness of others, their nervous brittle wit and ostentatious culture. Men who wept in public, even over the deaths of friends, embarrassed him. It was all so simple: he belonged nowhere.

He played the slow movement of the Beethoven as he finished dressing. No other music moved him so profoundly: its calm, its plaintive sweetness that achieved resignation. Often he felt that it contained all that Beethoven had wanted to say when he had known he was dying.

The music calmed him, to an extent. Perhaps after all he might meet someone tonight. He didn’t insist on a real man, whatever that was, as some did; he simply wanted someone who would make him feel peaceful.

He glimpsed himself in the mirror. Who would bother with that wheezing middle-aged bag, who didn’t know himself what he wanted to be? No doubt he’d spend the evening vying with the others in hollow wit. He had nowhere else to go; there were no concerts tonight. He sleeved the Beethoven, and checked automatically that the records were in order in their cabinet.

The landing was chill. He was glad of his thick overcoat; it promised to be a cold night. He poked the time-switch, then ducked back into his flat to confirm that the lights were out before he closed the door. His breath rasped as he hurried resoundingly downstairs.

The light clicked off just as he reached the hall, which allowed him to see someone’s silhouette on the glass of the front door. He heard a key scrabbling; it sounded clumsy as a dog’s claws. He strode to open the door for whoever it was.

Even when he opened it, the man in the porch remained little more than a silhouette. Craig stepped back a pace to let him enter, but the man stood, neither advancing nor moving aside. Though he was within arm’s reach, Craig could make out nothing of his face. All he could distinguish was that the man’s right hand had plunged into his coat pocket.

Craig paced forward. The cold that seeped into the porch seized him. Surely this man didn’t live here. Why should he have a key? The calls had made Craig nervous. “What do you want?” he demanded more sharply than he’d intended.

He heard a faint click, and the man’s right hand made a violent lunge towards his face.

For a moment the gesture seemed to have offered more violence than it had achieved. Something had flashed beneath Craig’s eyes, but hadn’t touched him. His throat was very cold. As he recoiled, his hand moved instinctively to draw his collar shut.

Then he realised that he couldn’t swallow. His neck felt unfamiliar, no longer merely cold. Good God, the man had attacked him — he’d whipped him across the windpipe with a piece of metal; that must be the source of this rapidly growing ache.

Only when his fingers touched his neck did he realise that the man had cut his throat.

* * *

Chapter XII

Horridge felt so confident that he made the first call from Cantril Farm. Craig was either not at home or lurking. Horridge made his way to the bus stop. Even the unlit walks, overlooked by blinded neon lamps, hardly bothered him now that he could defend himself.

The bus was crowded with young couples, dressed with what passed for smartness these days: they looked cheap to him. No doubt they were all off to get drunk. Let them waste their time if that was all they cared about. Some people had more important things to do.

The notice made him uncomfortable. He’d slipped it down the front of his trousers, having nowhere else to hide it. But the discomfort was worthwhile. This time he would get through to Craig. He had some bits of clay to attach to the notice; that would convince Craig it was the painter’s work. Either he would betray himself by accusing her, or this new distrust would be unbearable.

If only Horridge were able to confront him directly! He found these underhand methods slightly disturbing. Anything was justified under the circumstances. He hurried along Lodge Lane, past gateposts that led to mud which sprouted litter, towards Aigburth Drive.

He called again from the box near the house, waiting only a few seconds before he replaced the phone. After all, Craig’s window was dark. Even Craig would hardly be hiding in the dark. Or might he? Horridge had to remind himself that he was dealing with a madman. Never before had he noticed how meagre and how widely spaced the lamps were along Aigburth Drive.

No need to worry. Craig was out, he must be. Horridge needn’t be bothered about anyone else. If he encountered the painter, he had only to tell her that he was visiting Craig. Nobody else would recognise him.

He popped a sweet into his mouth to encourage himself. Then he made his way slowly up the drive. In the pale light the house looked like a bony ghost of itself. Within the curve of the drive, the ground was ragged with shadows of grass and hedge. He shivered; the night was very cold.

There was a light in the house.

The glass of the front door was bright. He faltered, clutching the razor in his pocket. The glass turned black. What did that mean? Was someone waiting for him in the dark? Perhaps he ought to come back later — but he knew perfectly well that once he retreated he wouldn’t be able to return. No need to be afraid. Nobody could harm him. He was armed.

His shadow rushed at the porch door. He managed to disentangle the keys from the razor. He closed the porch door behind him; he wasn’t about to be startled by its slam. He groped at the lock with the key. It felt wrong. Was the key upside-down? It must be the wrong key. Yes, because the other slipped easily into the slot. Before he could turn the key, the door tugged it from his hand. Darkness gaped before him, and Craig stood there.

The man’s dark bulk loomed over him. The dim white light from the street made Craig’s face look plastic, even more unhealthy. Horridge’s lips dragged his mouth open in a silent scream. His hand fumbled in his pocket.

Craig fell back a pace. Why, he was afraid! And he had every right to be. Could Horridge force a showdown? But the small grey face on the swollen head was peering at him, bearing down on him. “What do you want?” the voice said, high and menacing.

The porch felt shrunken, suffocating. He was trapped. He knew exactly how Craig’s victims must have felt. As the large head advanced towards him, it occurred to him that it must be bloated by disease; that explained the disproportion of the face. From the huge black overcoat that was about to engulf him seeped a faint sly scent.

He twitched open the razor, and slashed. At the last moment he had to close his eyes. At first the cut felt surprisingly easy, then he encountered an obstruction like an unexpected bone in a piece of meat, which made him shudder. But the blade soon cut free.

He opened his eyes. Craig stood clutching his throat. His eyes and mouth looked slack, no doubt with astonishment. He was at Horridge’s mercy now. But he was by no means dead, and he must be: Horridge mustn’t leave him like this. As he backed into the hall Horridge followed him and cut at his fingers, in an attempt to expose his throat.

Craig was growling faintly, like the animal he was. Then Horridge realised he wasn’t quite growling; it was more like a muffled gargling. There was no need to worry about it — it was clearly the loudest noise he could make.