The Devil’s Paintbox Page 13

  It was too dark to see the liquid crystal display so she used the torch app on her phone and held it near, waving the counter towards the town.

  ‘Just over point one seven,’ she said, in bewildered disappointment. ‘That’s barely average. Can’t be . . . was sure it was radiation. Maybe Cloggy was right and it was a chemical spill, or a new bioweapon that escaped the lab. Yeah, must be that.’

  Her torchlight swept across Cassandra’s face and Orkid saw her properly for the first time.

  ‘Wait,’ she said. ‘I know you. You’re the crank with the witchcraft shop who was on the news today. Ha – chances of you being the first person I run into! I’ve got to get a selfie with you to send to Jasmin and Mank; they’ll think it’s hilarious.’

  She pressed herself closer to Cassandra, pulling a spooked expression as she took a photograph.

  ‘Hang on – might want another for Instagram . . . Hold up, who’s that over there?’

  She had seen a figure standing in the background and peered across the car park as it walked towards her. Jack Potts removed the hood from his head.

  ‘What. Is. That?’ Orkid demanded. ‘This is some secret military operation, isn’t it. Is that some new type of weapon, yeah? Like a Terminator?’

  ‘A teamaker, if you please,’ Jack Potts corrected her.

  Orkid began backing away and pointed to the camera mounted on her helmet. ‘Right, I’ve got enough evidence on my GoPro – night vision! The cat’s well out of the bag now and all hell will break loose.’

  ‘To be more precise,’ the resonant voice of Queller declared by the door of visitor centre, which unlocked and swung open by itself, ‘the cat is out of the gift shop – and he’s brought along a couple of friends. You’re more or less correct about the latter part of your statement however.’

  Orkid shone the light around and saw a large catlike shape with wings fly out of the building. Then four eyes reflected the light back at her as two great Rottweilers followed.

  The dogs bared their teeth. Orkid let out a terrified yell. Dropping her phone and Geiger counter, she fled down the lane.

  Catesby rushed between the Rottweilers and they bounded after obediently.

  ‘Come, my dear,’ Queller called to Cassandra. ‘Let us admire the nocturnal serenity of this desolate ruin, undisturbed.’

  He took her hand in his wraith fingers and led her through the darkened visitor centre to the abbey beyond. Mrs Wilson barely heard the moment when the dogs caught the young activist. The screams beyond the high encircling wall were nothing compared to the charming presence of Queller.

  He danced her round the truncated remains of stout carved pillars, ranged along the neatly mown lawn, and into the three enclosing walls of the north transept, his devastating smile captivating her utterly.

  ‘Did I not promise you your husband would be spared the worst ravages of the sickness?’ he asked. ‘And did I not keep the Carmine Swarm from your threshold?’

  ‘My husband? Oh yes . . . he . . . he was much better today. Not like the rest.’

  ‘Tomorrow you shall be seen to heal others and that will win you followers. Bring them here. Together we shall call on powers to bring an end to the terrors afflicting this town.’

  Round and around he waltzed her. In a fog of dazed pleasure she felt her feet leave the ground and the abbey walls drifted by as the pair of them rose into the air. The floating sensation was exhilarating, but Queller’s smiling face was even more wonderful. Presently Cassandra found herself standing upon the stone apex of the abbey, directly above the rose window, a staggering height. An intoxicated grin lit her face and she tore the choker from her neck.

  Queller made her wait for his kiss. From that high vantage point, he could look down on to Abbey Lane where Orkid lay in the road. He watched Catesby land on the activist’s back and claw at the camouflage jacket.

  ‘Now feed well, my pet,’ he murmured. ‘Cross the blood bridge and be living flesh once more. Be as you were, a breathing, blood-filled horror.’

  Catesby fed and soon let out a mewling cry of triumph as he stretched his new muscles and flexed his leathery wings – no more a ghost. Taking to the air, he soared over the cliff, wheeling in exuberant circles.

  Watching with pride, Queller returned his attention to Cassandra and pressed his deathly lips to her neck.

  ‘OK,’ Cherry said, with a nervous laugh, ‘so the next colour is called Despairing Black – how bad can it be, right?’

  It was seven o’clock the next morning and she and the two children were in the courtyard outside her cottage. The paintbox was on a stool in the middle of them and Lil had just read out the name on today’s colour. The image on the front was a crescent moon surrounded by clouds.

  ‘An eclipse?’ Verne suggested.

  ‘Anything is possible,’ Cherry answered. ‘Don’t think it’ll be that literal though.’

  ‘Whitby jet, that’s black – and local. And it was a mourning, funeral thing, so that’s the despair part.’

  ‘Somehow I can’t see it rainin’ Victorian jewellery on us,’ Cherry said.

  ‘Ready?’ Lil asked, reaching for the paintbrush.

  ‘The answer’s never gonna be yes, hun, but you gotta do it.’

  Lil dipped the brush into a jar of water and steeled herself. Carefully, she washed it across the watercolour. Holding their breath, they waited.

  The paintbox juddered.

  There was a bone-rattling blast and a gigantic spike of black lightning ripped into the sky where it forked and crackled throughout the town, jagging from aerial to letter box to car. Every street lamp shattered as the bulbs exploded and sparks spat from electrical sockets.

  ‘Oww!’ yelled Verne, scrambling to wrench a smoking watch from his wrist while Lil pulled her fizzing mobile from her jeans.

  All across the beleaguered town it was the same – everything that used electricity sparked and fused. In the hopelessly overrun hospital the medical machines failed and the electrics in every car were fried.

  A circle of black mist flowed out from the box. Moving slowly, like treacle, it rolled to the ground, pushing out to form a sea of inky vapour in the yard. It swirled about Cherry and round the children’s legs, and their skin crawled at the touch. Then it spread through the alleyway and out into the streets, with sluggish, deliberate purpose.

  Cherry clutched her chest and lumbered to her front door. Tripping on the step, she fell into the dense mist.

  ‘Daddy?’ she bawled in her mind as she sank deep into painful memories. ‘Daddy, I’m sorry. Don’t go, don’t leave us. I didn’t mean to turn the malt pink. I didn’t know I could do that! I won’t do it again! I promise. Please, Daddy. Please!’

  The six-year-old girl had screamed herself hoarse the day her father left home. The pain and guilt of it unfurled afresh like a dark flower in Cherry’s psyche. She had driven her father away, destroyed the family, brought shame. Years of isolation and self-loathing followed. And then one day, at her lowest, when she was propping up a bar in a cheap club in the Old Town part of Chicago, she saw him again. He was older, thinner, more beaten down by life, but he still wore pomade in his steel-grey hair and took care of his out-of-date suit.

  Her first instinct was to shout out to him, run over and throw her arms round his neck. A glance in the mirror behind the bar slapped that down. She had changed so much and looked bad. He’d never recognise her.

  ‘Hey, Pete,’ she called to the bartender. ‘The guy at the end there, what’s he want?’

  ‘Cheap liquor, same as everyone else. He’s just some dude. Salesman, I guess. Why?’

  ‘Didn’t say his name?’

  ‘Who does in this joint?’

  ‘Get me black coffee, will ya? A gallon – with added backbone.’

  ‘Aw come on, Cherry, you drunk already? You’re on in a half-hour.’

  ‘Java, mucho strongo, now-o.’

  Cherry scalded her mouth on the coffee that Pete set in front of her. Forcing i
t down, she motioned for him to fetch another. Then, sliding it along the bar, she sidled up to her father, with a friendly smile.

  ‘Hey,’ she said. ‘Haven’t seen you round before. I’m not hustlin’ ya. I work here and I like to get to know the Joes who come in; makes it more bearable for me. I’m a people person.’

  ‘Lady, I’m sure you’re real nice, but I just want to be left alone. I only come in to get out the rain.’

  It had been a long time since anyone had called her a lady. Cherry almost buckled right there, but she took another slug of coffee instead.

  ‘The Windy City can be mighty lonely if ’n you don’t know nobody. Oops, that came out sounding a bit like Doris Day in Calamity Jane, but you know what I mean. I know what it’s like being a stranger in town – I’m a Canuck.’

  He looked up slowly. ‘You’re from Canada? Whereabouts?’

  ‘Ontario.’

  A flicker of life kindled in his eyes.

  ‘Ever been to a place called Whitby there?’

  Cherry drained the coffee and called for a third to give herself time to think.

  ‘No,’ she lied. ‘We was Ottawa. Don’t recall we ever went to Whitby. That where you’re from? What’s it like? Is it pretty?’

  The man returned his gaze to the glass.

  ‘Parts were very pretty.’

  A sorrowful smile appeared on his lined face. ‘You know,’ he continued, ‘it’s named after a place in Yorkshire, England. Always wanted to go see that one day, sounds beautiful. Was gonna take someone with me too; she’d have gotten a real kick out of it.’

  ‘Never too late, mister. Say, what’s your name? Can’t keep callin’ you “mister”.’

  She had pushed too far too soon and he clammed up again.

  ‘What you wanna know for? You some kind of undercover cop or something? What’s with the third degree?’

  ‘Cherry a cop?’ the bartender laughed as he poured the coffee. ‘That’s a real laugh riot! You think the CPD are that desperate?’

  ‘Pour the coffee and go, Pete,’ Cherry told him.

  ‘Hey, buddy,’ Cherry’s father said sternly. ‘Watch your lip. You don’t get to bad-mouth no lady in front of me, you got that?’

  Pete sauntered round the bar, still snickering.

  ‘Never thought a gallant white knight would come into this joint,’ she said, greatly moved.

  ‘I’m no white knight.’

  ‘You are to me, mister. Hey, see that wall over there? The one with all the photos? That’s our rogues’ gallery where we put all our best and favourite customers. Would you mind if I took your picture and pinned it on there?’

  There was an unusual desperation at the back of her request. The man couldn’t understand why.

  ‘Just one lousy picture, mister, please?’

  ‘I won’t be coming back here.’

  ‘Even more reason. How else am I gonna remember what my white knight looked like?’

  He could see tears brimming in her eyes and her voice was unsteady, but he thought it was just the booze.

  ‘Sure,’ he said.

  Cherry leaned across the bar and took the management’s instant camera from a shelf above the clean glasses.

  ‘Say cheese.’

  ‘Wait, what’d he say your name was?’

  ‘Cherry, Cherry Cerise.’

  ‘OK, I’ll say “Cherry” instead of cheese. Never did like cheese.’

  Cherry smiled in sudden remembrance. That was a detail she had forgotten about her father.

  ‘Ready?’ she asked, holding the bulky camera to her eye.

  ‘Cherrrryyyy,’ he said.

  The cube flash went off and he blinked, temporarily blinded.

  ‘So,’ he said, rubbing his eyes, ‘who gives their daughter such a cockamamie name?’

  ‘Nobody,’ she answered, pulling the undeveloped photograph out of the camera and placing it under her arm. ‘It’s a stage name. I’m a dancer here.’

  The man looked at the small platform by the band, hung with silver streamers and he regarded her with disgust.

  ‘I had me a daughter,’ he said. ‘By the looks of you, I reckon she’s about ten years younger. If I ever found out she worked in a place like this, I’d die of shame. Now there’s the laugh riot, cos I’m dying anyway. Got me just days left. Well, I’m getting out of here, don’t want to spend my last gasps in the company of lowlifes. Be spending all the time in the world with roaches and worms soon enough.’

  Reaching into his pocket he put a few crumpled dollars on the bar and left.

  Cherry stared after him, quivering as though he had struck her. She dug her nails into the bar and they splintered and broke.

  ‘Daddy,’ she whispered.

  Ripping up the photograph into tiny fragments, she grabbed the ice bucket and snatched up the ice pick.

  ‘Cherry!’

  ‘CHERRY!’

  Lil and Verne’s frightened shrieks cut through the agony.

  Jolted out of the bitter memory, Cherry jerked her head back. The bar was gone and she was in her small kitchen again. She had pulled open a drawer and was holding a knife to her own stomach.

  ‘Put it down!’ Lil shouted. ‘Drop it!’

  Cherry stared at the blade for a moment then gave a cry of horror. She threw the knife back in the drawer and slammed it shut.

  ‘Oh, kids!’ she wept, pulling the children towards her and hugging them tightly. ‘Thank you. Bless you!’

  ‘What happened?’ Verne asked when the colour witch had calmed down.

  ‘Hold on a minute,’ Cherry said, running to the parlour where she delved into her Mary Quant bag and took out her purse. She fumbled with the clasp, then produced a flat leather wallet. It was well worn and most of the stitching had come away, but inside it contained a treasure. With jittery hands, Cherry opened it.

  There was the faded Polaroid of her father with her name on his lips.

  ‘It’s not ripped. It didn’t happen that way. No, course it didn’t.’

  ‘You OK?’ Lil asked.

  ‘Gimme a moment, babes. I need to relive what really went on then. Let me just remember . . .’

  She closed her eyes and concentrated, fighting through the false memory that the black mist had tormented her with, cutting through it to the truth, to what had actually happened that night so long ago.

  The idle dirge of the out-of-tune band swelled around her again. She was back in that crummy Chicago club.

  ‘A dancer?’ her father repeated. ‘As long as it makes you happy, Cherry.’

  ‘It doesn’t.’

  ‘Then find something that does. Look at me, learn from my huge mistake. I spent a lifetime running away from what really made me happy.’

  ‘Why’d you do that?’

  ‘Because I was scared – or dumb. Or both. Didn’t think I could hack having a daughter who was different; didn’t realise till it was too late that she weren’t different. What she was was special – an honest-to-God miracle.’

  ‘Why didn’t you go back and tell her that?’

  ‘Cos I was ashamed, and by the time I stopped feeling sorry for myself I’d left it too long. My little girl had run away and there was no way of tracing her. She never writes her mom, so she’s lost to me now. I tried three detective agencies, but they turned up squat.’

  ‘Don’t give up, she might be real close.’

  ‘Nah, she’s better off without knowing me now. You see, I got me this ulcer, real nasty. Nothing they can do about it, only a matter of time, and some days it hurts like I swallowed a grenade. But when I think about my beautiful daughter, living her happy life, it’s like a lion tamer gets that ulcer to jump on a chair and sit up and beg. Reckon I’d have caved in to it weeks ago if I didn’t have that to focus on. Even though I know it’s just the fantasy of a stupid old man, it keeps me strong. I need to hold on to that perfect image I got.’

  Cherry peeled the film backing off the Polaroid and propped the picture against his glass.
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  ‘Well, any gal would be proud to have that smiling guy as their daddy,’ she said warmly. ‘Hey, this might sound a lil strange, but would you dance with me? We’re two Canucks in a strange city. Let’s pretend for five minutes we’re family. Say I’m five years old, and it’s Christmas morning and the radio is playing something by, oh, I dunno . . . Nat King Cole, and we’re dancing in the wrapping paper we just ripped off our gifts.’

  ‘Hey, Nat was always my favourite.’

  She held out her hand and he let himself be led to a small cleared space between the tables.

  ‘Shut your eyes,’ she said. ‘Imagine I’m your little girl.’

  Feeling foolish, he complied and she threw a look at the amused band to quiet down.

  Then a small, shy voice began to sing an old song, ‘Take Me Back to Toyland’. It was her father.

  Cherry rested her head against his lapel and they danced with the reserved awkwardness of strangers.

  She clutched the precious moment to her heart, but it was over all too soon.

  Her father squeezed her hand and returned to his bar stool.

  ‘Well, I’ll be getting along,’ he said, putting on his overcoat. ‘Think the rain’s eased off some. Thank you, Miss Cerise. Felt a mite silly, but you know something, my ulcer’s quiet as a lamb right now.’

  ‘You be careful out there,’ she managed to say.

  He headed for the door then turned. ‘Hey,’ he said, ‘you know what I’d tell my daughter if I did meet her one last time?’

  ‘What?’

  ‘I’d say, princess, you have been blessed with astounding gifts. Don’t waste a single one. Learn how to use them, for the good of this world. Make your daddy even more proud than he already is. Yeah, that’s what I’d say.’

  With a smile that wiped away the care of years, he left the club.

  Cherry sobbed beside the bar and reached for the Polaroid.

  ‘C’mon, Cherry,’ Pete said. ‘You’re on in five; it’s funky time.’

  ‘Pete,’ she answered, staring lovingly at the photograph, ‘you go funk. I quit. I got me a whole bunch of catch-up learning to do.’