Read Online The Face That Must Die by Ramsey Campbell - Free Book Online

began with a wedding, everyone breaking into song and dance. Then an engaged couple’s car broke down: thunder, lightning, lashing rain, glimpses of an old dark house. Perhaps, after all — They were ushered to meet the mad scientist. Horridge gasped, appalled. The scientist’s limp hands waved like snakes, his face moved blatantly. He was a homosexual.
    This was a horror film, all right — far too horrible, and in the wrong way. Horridge tutted loudly, but the voice continued shrilling, the hands unfurled like unnatural flowers of flesh. The homosexual had surrounded himself with friends. Horridge could hardly tell them apart, nor did he want to: they were all the same species of filth.
    The scientist created a muscle-man. Wouldn’t it tear him apart if he touched it? The film refused to let that happen. Horridge complained, and was told to be quiet. How could anyone be interested in this unless they were homosexuals themselves?
    They must have known what the film was. Shoulders pressed against him, soft but muscular. He grew clammily warm all at once; the cinema was stuffed with flesh, the air was clogged with smoke, not all of which smelled like tobacco. Someone was thickly perfumed. Perhaps if he kept quiet they wouldn’t bother him. His wet hands gripped his trembling knees.
    What would they dare to show next? The homosexual was seducing the girl. How could she let such uncleanliness near her? Horridge closed his eyes, sickened — but at once he opened them, sure that he’d felt hot flesh edging closer in the dark. The homosexual was in the boy’s room now. His silhouette moved on the curtain of the bed. Good God, they couldn’t be about to —
    He sprang to his feet before he knew he meant to. A sound filled his mouth like vomit. Nothing could make him sit through more of this. He forced his way out, struggling past legs, ignoring protests. He was trapped in a cage of flesh. Just let one of them touch him — they wouldn’t touch anything else for a while. When he reached the doors his hands were shaking. He stumbled into the passage, among burly dark red pillars.
    His nervousness hurried him to the Gents’. Someone was emerging. As he stood aside fretfully, he glimpsed the figure’s long hair. He retreated, but he hadn’t mistaken the sign: GENTLEMEN. He glared at the other, whose hair cascaded down his back and was spangled with rain.
    He limped to the urinal stalls, a row of hollow oval heads, their lower lips protruding. As he stood at one, feeling at the mercy of his bladder, someone padded softly in. Did he hesitate behind Horridge before moving on?
    Horridge ought to have used one of the cubicles. He didn’t like the threat of being watched. He tried to hurry himself, but there seemed no end to the nervous flow. Unease gripped him by the back of the neck and forced his head to turn.
    Had the man just turned away from watching? Horridge stared at the back of the head. In the clinical light the clipped tufts of black hair looked too vivid, unreal. The large square head was perched on the folds of the hood of the grey duffle coat.
    He remembered the coat that had lain over the seat, head gaping. Had the man followed him because he’d protested at the film? He forced himself to finish, and struggled with the zip, which felt as though it meant to gnash its teeth.
    He shoved at the door to the corridor while he leaned against the inner door. It cost him a few moments to realise that the outer door opened inwards, and to grab the handle. Behind him the inner door halted half-open. It was being held.
    He wrenched at the handle. Between the doors, the vestibule was claustrophobic as an airlock. His nervousness hindered the door. As he dragged it open, a large hand reached over his shoulder and laid itself flat on the wood.
    He saw its hairs, black as an ape’s. He saw the penumbra of moisture which outlined it on the door. It was inches from his face. He limped into the dim passage, clenching his eyes to