And then there was a blankness; and then I was reluctantly pushing myself from my new mother’s womb.
I staggered to my feet, all four of them. My head was dazed and spinning, not just with the physical blow it had received, but with the facts that had been revealed to me.
Reg was not the evil man of my dreams: he had been a friend in life and a friend in death. He’d succumbed to my wishes, kept the company small; the extension was a sign that the company was still profitable and growing in the way I had wanted, for it meant no drastic development had taken place, only improvement to existing production. Had he kept it this way out of respect for me, or had his business venture merely fallen through without my added strength? There was no question in my mind, I knew the former was the case. And Reg, the lifelong bachelor, the man I had teased so often about his unmarried status, the friend who had admitted quite openly there had only ever been one girl for him and I had married her, had finally taken that plunge. Not just for me, a noble act in taking care of my bereaved family, but because he had always loved Carol. He’d known her long before I had (it was he who had introduced us) and our rivalry for her had been fierce until I had won, and then he had become a close friend to both of us.
Our business partnership had often been stormy, but our friendship had rarely rocked. Not until our final conflict, that is. And that was a conflict I know he regretted bitterly. As I now did.
I looked back at the car, its engine dead but the lights still blazing. Disturbed dust swirled and eddied in their beams. Blinking my eyes against the brightness, I staggered forward, out of their glare and into the surrounding darkness. My eyes quickly became used to the sudden change in light and I saw Reg’s body slumped half out of the smashed windscreen across the car bonnet. He looked lifeless.
With a gasp of fear, I ran forward and jumped up at the bonnet. One of his arms dangled down the side of the car and his face, white in the moonlight, was turned towards me. I stretched forward and licked the blood from his gashed cheek and ear, begging forgiveness for what I had done, for what I had thought. Don’t be dead, I prayed. Don’t die uselessly as I had.
He stirred, groaned. His eyes opened and looked directly into mine. And for a moment I swear he recognized me.
His eyes widened and a softness came into them. It was as if he could read my thoughts, as if he understood what I was trying to tell him. Maybe it was only my imagination, maybe he was just in shock, but I’m sure he smiled at me and tried to stroke me with his dangling hand. His eyes suddenly lost their sharpness as consciousness slipped from him. There was little blood on him apart from the gash in his cheek and ear caused by my teeth in our struggle inside the car; my body had broken the glass of the windscreen, he had merely followed through. The steering wheel had prevented him going further and I checked to see it had done no serious damage to his body. It was of the collapsible kind and so he would have a massive bruise across his stomach the next day, but probably nothing more serious. His head must have struck the top of the windscreen frame as he’d gone through and this had caused his blackout. There was no smell of death on him.
Voices came from further down the lane as people left their houses to investigate the sound of the crash. I decided it was time for me to leave; there was nothing here for me any more.
I stretched forward and kissed Reg on his exposed cheek. He stirred but did not regain consciousness.
Then I dropped to all fours and padded away into the night.
21
So there you have it, old man. That’s it.
Do you believe me?
Or do you think your pain is driving you mad?
Dawn is creeping up on us now, and death – for you – is creeping with it. I knew when I found you here by the roadside last night it was too late to find help for you; the cancer in your stomach had already made its claim.
How long have you walked the roads, caring for no one and no one caring for you? What did life do to make you flee from it? Well, it’s over for you now; your years of wandering are done.
I wonder if you do understand all I’ve told you? I think your closeness to death has made our communication possible. You’re in that transitive state which makes the dying receptive to many things they’ve closed their minds to before. Do you still think there’s only one blackness waiting for you? Or hell? Heaven? If only it were that simple.
There’s not much more to tell you now. I waited, hidden in the darkness, until they had pulled Reg from the car and saw he had regained consciousness again. He actually walked himself to the ambulance which had arrived by then, and I could see him twisting his head, peering into the gloom, looking for me. The people helping him must have thought he was concussed when he kept asking about the dog he’d seen.
I left the area shortly after, paying one last visit to my own grave before going. I don’t quite know why I went there; perhaps in some strange way it was to pay my last respects to myself. It was the end of something for me. The end of a life, possibly.
Fresh flowers had been placed at the graveside, and I knew I had not been forgotten. The memory of the husband, the father, the friend, would dull with time, but I’d always be somewhere in a corner of their minds.
For me, it was to be different. The memories might still linger, to surface occasionally, but the emotions had changed. My emotions were fast becoming those of a dog, as though, now my search was over, a ghost had been vanquished. The ghost was my humanness. I felt free, free as any bird in the sky. Free to live as a dog. I ran for nearly a day and, when I finally dropped, the last remnants of my old self had been purged.
That all happened at least – in your terms – two years ago. Memories and old habits still visit me from time to time and I remember myself as a man. But now they only return to me in dreams. Finding you last night tucked away in this hedge by the roadside, dying and afraid of death stirred those hidden feelings again. Your dying, the aura that’s now around you, drew those feelings out, and with the feelings came the old memories, so clear, so sharp. Perhaps you’ve helped me too, old man; it would never do for me to relinquish my heritage completely. What was it the badger had said? ‘You’re special.’ Maybe he was right. Maybe everything he told me was right. Maybe I’m meant to remember. Maybe I’m here to help those like you. Maybe.
All I know is that I forget more and more what I was and become what I am.
And by and large, I enjoy what I am. I see life now from a different level: knee-level. It’s surprising the difference it makes. It’s like always approaching a place from the same direction, then suddenly coming from the opposite way: the familiar changes shape, looks different somehow. It’s still the same, but has taken on a new perspective. Know what I mean?
I’ve travelled the country, swum in the sea. Nobody’s ever owned me again, but many have fed me. I’ve talked with, eaten with, and played with so many different species my head aches trying to remember them all. I’ve been amazed at and chuckled over the neuroses in the animal world: I’ve met a pig who thought he was a horse; a cow who stuttered; a bull who was bullied by a shrew he shared a field with; a duckling who thought he was ugly (and he was); a goat who thought he was Jesus; a woodpigeon who was afraid of flying (he preferred to walk everywhere); a toad who could croak Shakespeare sonnets (and little else); an adder who kept trying to stand up; a fox who was vegetarian; and a grouse who never stopped.
I’ve fought a stoat (we both broke off and ran at the same time – otherwise we’d have both been slaughtered), killed an attacking owl, battled with a rat-pack, and been chased by a swarm of bees. I’ve teased sheep and irritated horses; I’ve philosophized with a donkey on existentialism’s possible influence on art, ethics and psychology. I’ve sung with birds and joked with hedgehogs.
And I’ve made love to seven different bitches.
Time’s running out for you now; death’s nearly here. I hope what I’ve told you has helped, I hope it’s made some sense to your feverish brain. Can you smell that hea
vy sweetness in the air; it means I’ve got to go. It’s a lady friend, you see. She lives on a farm three fields away and she’s ready for me now. It’s just a matter of getting her out of that shed, away from the jealous old farmer; but that shouldn’t be too difficult for a smart dog like me.
One other thing before I go: I met Rumbo again the other day. I’d been sleeping under a tree when an acorn hit me on the nose; when I looked around I heard a voice call out, ‘Hello, squirt,’ and there he was above me, grinning all over his little squirrel face. He showered me with a few more acorns, but when I called his name he looked blank, then scurried off. I knew it was him because the voice – thought pattern if you like – was the same; and who else would call me ‘squirt’?
It made me feel good, although I had no desire to follow him. It was just good to know someone like Rumbo was around again.
Excuse me now, my lady friend’s scent is really becoming too much to ignore. You don’t need me any more anyway, the next part you have to do on your own. At least, I hope I’ve helped. Maybe we’ll bump into each other again sometime.
Goodbye.
Hope you’re a dog!
The tramp tried to follow the dog with his tired old eyes as it scampered away, through the broken hedge, into the fields beyond. But the effort was too much.
His body twisted with the pain and seemed to shrivel within the rags he wore as clothes. He lay on his side, his grizzled cheek resting against the damp grass. A solitary ant, not three inches from his eye, gazed on him without expression.
The tramp’s lips tried to smile but the pain would not allow it. With his last remaining strength he brought a shaking hand up, and with all the concentration he could summon he placed a finger carefully over the creature’s tiny body, but the ant scurried away and hid in the forest of grass. With one last painful shudder, the old man’s breath left him and took his life with it.
He died. And waited.
Fluke
James Herbert is not just Britain’s number one bestselling writer of chiller fiction, a position he has held ever since publication of his first novel, but is also one of our greatest popular novelists, whose books are sold in thirty-three foreign languages, including Russian and Chinese. Widely imitated and hugely influential, his twenty-three novels have sold more than forty-eight million copies worldwide.
Also by James Herbert
The Rats
The Fog
The Survivor
Fluke
The Spear
The Dark
Lair
The Jonah
Shrine
Domain
Moon
The Magic Cottage
Sepulchre
Haunted
Creed
Portent
The Ghosts of Sleath
’48
Once
Nobody True
The Secret of Crickley Hall
Graphic Novels
The City
(Illustrated by Ian Miller)
Non-fiction
By Horror Haunted
(Edited by Stephen Jones)
James Herbert’s Dark Places
(Photographs by Paul Barkshire)
Devil in the Dark
(Biog. Craig Cabell)
First published 1977 by New English Library
This edition published 1999 by Pan Books
This electronic edition published 2011 by Pan Books
an imprint of Pan Macmillan, a division of Macmillan Publishers Limited
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www.panmacmillan.com
ISBN 978-1-447-20336-0 EPUB
Copyright © James Herbert 1977
The right of James Herbert to be identified as the author of this work has been asserted by him in accordance with the Copyright, Designs and Patents Act 1988.
You may not copy, store, distribute, transmit, reproduce or otherwise make available this publication (or any part of it) in any form, or by any means (electronic, digital, optical, mechanical, photocopying, recording or otherwise), without the prior written permission of the publisher. Any person who does any unauthorized act in relation to this publication may be liable to criminal prosecution and civil claims for damages.
A CIP catalogue record for this book is available from the British Library.
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James Herbert, Fluke
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