Read Online Eleven New Ghost Stories by David Paul Nixon - Free Book Online Page B

have you?”
    I think he assumed I had more
knowledge and feelings about women at that age than I really had.
“We went fishing,” I told him, scared out of my wits.
    “Oh yeah,” he said. “That’s all
is it? Just fishing?”
    “Yes please, let me go.” I was
almost in tears; I was so frightened.
    “Now you listen to me, your
lordship. I don’t want any of your type near my family. You make me
sick, you hear? No rich toffs near my sister. I hate bloody rich
ponces; you stay away from her or I’m gonna ‘ave you. You getting
me?”
    I nodded furiously, and he let
me go. I landed hard on my behind as he lumbered back to his house.
“Don’t let me catch you anywhere near this house again!”
    Upset, I went very quickly back
to my uncle’s. What he was supposed to do about it, I don’t know.
He probably didn’t even know what a punch was. But I went back to
his shop for comfort, or support, or merely for someone to talk
too. Iris was my friend and the thought of not seeing her again… I
was unhappy about it. And I wasn’t too keen on getting my ears
boxed in by brother Billy either.
    Guillam’s shop door was open,
even though it was past his closing time. I shouted for him when I
got in, but he didn’t answer. I walked up to the counter and
shouted for him again; still there was no answer. I went through
the door to the left of the counter, into his museum. Amongst all
the noise it was as likely as not he wouldn’t be able to hear me if
he was in there.
    It was as intensely loud with
tickings and clickings as always, but there was no sign of him. I
shouted again, as if he could hear anything coming from amongst
such a din. As I walked slowly through the aisles, feeling sorry
for myself, the clocks started to ring for half-past the hour:
half-past four. I sighed, because Iris had always said she’d wanted
to see the museum, but I had never taken her. For Uncle Guillam
there was never a good time for it.
    As the bells and chimes rang, I
became aware of one ring above all the others. A sharp, shriller
ring that somehow I was able to make out over all the other chimes
– like the ringing in one’s ear you get when exposed to a loud
noise, or when your ears pop. I identified its origin almost
instantly; I don’t know how or why, but I looked right up at the
high shelf, to the black clock – it was ringing.
    I had no idea that Guillam had
got around to fixing it. It was an odd sound, very clear, very
high. And it seemed to be echoing, even in that small space. The
high-pitched sound seemed to be bouncing off the walls.
    I thought it was peculiar that I
had been able to single out that sound amongst all the other sounds
in the room. And that’s when I discovered, much to my total
astoundment, that it was the only clock ringing… or ticking for
that matter
    The room of clocks, the ever
incessantly ticking clocks – was silent! There was no sound at all.
I looked around me – all the clocks had stopped; the hands weren’t
moving, the pendulums were caught mid-air. Nothing moved, stirred,
ticked or clicked a sound.
    I couldn’t believe it. It was as
if the whole world had come to a stop. And I was caught in the
middle, in a little pocket of… dead time. Literally stuck in a
moment. It was an extraordinary, unsettling feeling.
    Then I looked again to the black
clock. The bells rang again; I could see them shake – their sharp
hum was the only sound in the air, everything else was still. And
then when they stopped, it was deadly silent.
    There was no sound, no noise at
all.
    And then there was a
footstep…
    My skin fell cold. I was
breathing heavily – I was not alone, there was someone behind me.
Their shadow fell over me, the floor creaked underneath them; I
could hear their breath above mine.
    I spun around in terror. The
figure I saw there, the face – I’ve never forgotten that face. It was scorched, all down one side, from the right eyelid all
the way down past the mouth. Half-blind – the burn