Read Online Ritual by Graham Masterton - Free Book Online Page B

– are
you there?’
    Charlie cursed
everything he could think of, and in particular he cursed himself for having
thought that it would be a good idea to bring Martin along with him on his tour
of New England. Goddamnit, the boy was nothing but confusion and trouble.
Charlie called, ‘Martin?’ again, not too loudly in case he disturbed Mrs Kemp,
but a whole minute passed and there was still no answer, and so he ventured out
on to the landing and peered down into the stairwell.
    He made his way
downstairs, treading as softly as he could. The house all around him seemed to
hold its breath. He could feel the string backing of the worn-out stair carpet
under his bare feet.
    When he reached
the hallway, he paused, and listened, but there was nothing to be heard. He was
tempted to go back to bed again. After all – where could Martin have possibly
gone? Out for a walk, that was all, because he’d eaten
too much, and couldn’t sleep. Out for a walk, because he wanted to think about
his parents, and his fractured upbringing, and how much he distrusted his
father. Charlie could hardly blame him.
    But then he
heard a door softly juddering, as if it hadn’t been closed properly and the
wind was shaking the latch. He paused, and listened, and the juddering
continued. For the first time in a very long time, for no earthly reason that
he could think of, he was alarmed – so alarmed that he groped around the
shadows of the hallway searching for something that he could use as a weapon. An umbrella, maybe; or a doorstop. All he could find,
however, was a very lightweight walking stick. He swung it in his hand so that
it whistled through the air. Then he made his way along the hallway to the
kitchen door.
    ‘Martin? Are
you there?’ His voice sounded unfamiliar, and he turned quickly around to make
sure that there was nobody standing close behind him. For one second he felt
the thrill of real fright. A shadow was standing close to the front door, its
huddled shape limned by the blood-red light that gleamed through the
stained-glass panes. But it was only an overcoat that Mrs Kemp had left hanging
on the hallstand. Coats and blankets and dressing gowns, thought Charlie. Innocent garments by day, threatening hunchbacks by night. He couldn’t count the number of times he had woken up in some strange hotel
bedroom to stare fascinated and frightened at his own coat, crouched over the
back of a chair.
    He turned the
handle of the kitchen door. It grated open, grit dragging against floor tiles.
The kitchen smelled of burned fat and sour vegetables. There was an
old-fashioned cooking range, and a white-topped table. In the corner stood a
coffee grinder and an old rotary knife-sharpening machine, like Puritan
instruments of torture. Blue-patterned plates were stacked on the hatch.
Charlie stayed in the half-open doorway for a moment, holding his breath, but
when he heard nothing he turned away, lowering his walking stick. Martin is
fifteen years old right? He isn’t a child any more. And just because you
happened to miss his childhood, that doesn’t give you any kind of right to treat him like a kid. If he wants to take a hike
in the middle of the night, that’s up to him.
    Charlie wasn’t
convinced by any of his reasoning, but he retreated slowly along the hallway,
tapping the tip of his walking stick gently against the walls, like a man who
had recently lost his sight. He was just about to return it to the cast-iron
umbrella stand, however, when he thought he heard somebody whispering. He
froze, his head lifted, trying to catch the faint sibilant sounds of
conversation.
    Maybe it’s the
wind, thought Charlie. But he knew that it wasn’t. No wind ever argued, the way
that this voice was arguing. No wind ever begged. Somebody was right outside
the kitchen door, in Mrs Kemp’s back yard; and that somebody was talking,
quickly and urgently, pleading, the way that a lover pleads, or a man asks for
money – one well-rehearsed argument