Read Online The Man in the Moss by Phil Rickman - Free Book Online

I s'pose,
Bridelow's one of those places where most of us are happy to be. Home. And
there's no defining that. Not everybody's found it. We're lucky. We've been lucky.'
                'Luck?' Something was kindling behind Ma's eyes.
Eighty-five if she was a day and still didn't need glasses. ' Luck ? You don't see owt, do you?'
Ernie'd had glasses full-time since he was thirty-five. 'What's it got to do
wi' luck?'
            'Just a figure of speech, Ma.'
                'Balls,' said Ma. 'Luck! What this is, it's a balancing
act. Very complicated for t'likes of
us. Comes natural to nature.'
                Ernie smiled. 'As it would.'
                'Don't you mock me, Ernest Dawber.
                'I'm sorry, Ma.' She was just a shade herself now, even
her blue beret faded to grey.
                'Beware of bright, glaring colours,' she said. 'But most
of all, beware of black. And beware of white.'
                'I don't know what you mean...'
                'You will,' said the little old woman. 'You're a
teacher.' She put a hand on his arm. 'Ernest, I'm giving you a task.
            'Oh 'eck '
                'You've to think of it as the most important task you've
ever had in your life. You're a man of learning, Ernest. Man wi' authority.'
                'Used to be, Ma. I'm just a pensioner now ...' Like you,
he was going to say, then he noticed how sad and serious she was looking.
                'Get that man back.'
                'Who?' But he knew. 'How?' he said, aghast.
            'Like I said, Ernest. Tha's
got authority.'
            'Not that kind of authority,
for God's sake.'
     
    Nobody there. He swallowed.
Nobody. Not in or near the bus shelter.
                It was on his nearside, which was no good, he might get
hurt, so he drove further along the road, reversing into someone's drive,
heading back slowly until he could see the glass-sided shelter, an
advertisement for Martini on the end panel, lit up like a cinema screen in the
headlights: a handsome man with wavy hair leaning over a girl on a sofa,
topping up her glass.
                He was mentally measuring the distance.
                What am I doing! What am I bloody
doing?
                I could park it just here. Leave it. Walk away. Too far,
anyway, for her to hear the impact.
                In his mind he saw Therese standing by the telephone
kiosk, about to phone for a taxi. In his mind she stopped. She was frowning.
She'd be thinking what a miserable, frightened little sod he was.
                He could say
there had been somebody in the bus
shelter, two people. Get angry. Was he supposed to kill them? Was he supposed
to do that?
            But she would know.
                He stopped the car, the engine idling. The bus shelter
had five glass panels in a concrete frame. The glass would be fortified. He
would have to take a run at it, from about sixty yards.
                If he didn't she would know.
                He remembered the occasions she'd lost her temper with
him. He shivered, stabbed at the accelerator with the car in neutral, making it
roar, clutching the handbrake, a slippery grip.         Too much to lose. Gritting his teeth until his gums hurt.
            Too
much to lose.
                And you'll feel better afterwards.
                Took his foot off. Closed his eyes, breathed rapidly, in
and out. The road was quiet now, the hedges high on either side, high as a
railway embankment.
                Shaw backed up twenty or thirty yards, pulled into the
middle of the road. Felt his jaw trembling and, to stiffen it, retracted his
lips into a vicious snarl.
                He threw the Saab into first gear. Realised, as the
stolen car