Dancing Jax Read online

  Spencer’s gaze was elsewhere. He thought he’d heard something scuttling over the warped parquet floor.

  “Welcome to blazes,” Estelle said with a nervous laugh as she moved out of the torchlight. “This is where AF waited out the decades, after that terrible night of dedication. This wretched tomb absorbed him like a sponge and his essence occupied every room, every corner. I can’t begin to tell you what it was like for… we who are bound to this place, how he tormented and toyed with us. There were no havens here, nowhere safe to hide, no escaping. Just the dark and him, the dark and him – always.”

  She fell silent and a spasm of pain passed across Eun-mi’s face.

  “He’s gone from here now,” Gerald said. “He can’t torture you any more.”

  “Yes, he’s gone, but the walls, the floor, even the paint and the peeling varnish, they remember him. And then there’s us, the ones left behind; we can’t escape, we’re still lodged here, with the… newcomers.”

  Stepping into the middle of the large, panelled hall, she revolved slowly.

  “Where would you like the tour to begin?” she asked, shaking off the grim mood. “The scullery? AF’s bizarre boudoir? How about the cellars? That’s where he kept those nasty little books you know. All those years sealed up in crates, waiting patiently for eager eyes to drink in their words.”

  Gerald swept the beam around. He wasn’t sure where to begin. Martin had told him all about his one visit here, when he’d encountered the Ismus and his bodyguards in the conservatory. From that account, there didn’t seem to have been anything to discover on this floor.

  “Is the cellar where they held their rituals?” he asked.

  “I was only ever present at one, darling,” she replied. “But no, that wasn’t down there. It was upstairs, in the special room. I don’t want to go there.”

  “We’d best take a look at it.”

  The girl pretended not to hear and reached for Spencer’s hand.

  “You must see the ballroom!” she enthused, pulling him further down the hall towards one of the doorways. “We could do the Lindy Hop. But don’t scold me if I make a frightful hash of it – it’s been an age!”

  Spencer snatched his hand back.

  “I don’t dance!” he spluttered. “And there’s no way I’m going to start now.”

  Estelle threw Eun-mi’s arms round his neck and looked at him imploringly. “Don’t be beastly,” she pleaded. “I’m sure you’d be the most marvellous hoofer if you’d loosen up.”

  Before he could stop her, she whisked his spectacles away.

  “Why, Spencer!” she exclaimed, studying his face appreciatively. “You’re turning into quite the elephant’s eyebrows. In a few years you’ll be the gigolo who breaks all the girls’ hearts.”

  “Except for the acne, you mean.”

  “Poppet!” she cooed. “That will fade, and then just think how splendiferously rugged and tough you’ll look. They’ll be swooning at your feet.”

  “Leave him alone,” Gerald warned her.

  The boy grabbed his glasses back. “None of us will be here in a few years,” he said.

  “Oh, poor bunny!” Estelle cried, cradling his face. “And here you are, never so much as kissed a girl, have you? How perfectly dismal and bleak. Would you like to do it now? There’s a little room over there; we could creep in, just the two of us, and have a powwow, with the emphasis on the wow. I could show you a heap of things better than cowboy films. Shanghai Lil has never kissed anyone either; what a locked-up little icebox she is. Oh, come on, do – it would be too precious. I’d feel like a referee at the all-in wrestling. I’ll give you both a fantastic time! I was top of the class at the old fornication. I’m sure I haven’t got rusty at that and she’s hardly a Bonzo, is she?”

  “Stop this!” Gerald shouted angrily.

  “Yes,” Spencer cried, flushed in the face. “Get off!”

  Estelle untangled herself from him, amused. “Just teasing,” she said, before turning to Gerald. “I shan’t ask you to come into that little room. I know a daisy when I see one.”

  “Don’t even,” the old man growled. “I’ve been harassed and hated by experts; you don’t come close, love.”

  “Teasing, darling. That sort of thing never bothered me. The debauchery I’ve seen at orgies in Fitzrovia would wave Caligula’s hair. When did everyone become so dour and cranky?”

  “Since that book was brought up from the cellars,” Gerald told her.

  Spencer gazed at the stairs. “We going up then?” he asked.

  The old man nodded.

  “You really shouldn’t, you know,” Estelle said quickly. “It’s the most dangerous part of the house. There’s no protection. It will get you.”

  “There’s no protection anywhere, is there?” Gerald asked. “If it’s going to get us, I can’t see what difference it makes where that happens.”

  Placing a hand on the banister, he shone the torch upwards and started when he saw hundreds of pale eyes gleaming back at him. They scattered swiftly, vanishing into the shadows or rushing up the walls.

  “Er… looks a bit crowded,” Spencer said.

  “Those are large spider-type beasties,” Estelle told him with a grimace. “Horrid articles, as big as terriers with stalky legs. A horde of them came through a few months ago. Most of them dashed out into the woods, but lots stayed behind and now they infest one of the bedrooms at the end of the landing. You can hear them growling at each other.”

  “Doggy-Long-Legs,” Spencer put in. “I’ve seen them before.”

  “Is that what they’re called? Fancy! They crawl along the cornices and lie in wait, dropping on whatever passes underneath.”

  Spencer backed away. “They’re dead vicious,” he told Gerald. “I mean really… really bad.”

  “You’ll be wearing one as a titfer in no time if you go up there,” Estelle added. “And it’ll yomp through your head as if it were a toffee apple.”

  Gerald passed the torch to Spencer. “Keep it steady, Spence,” he said. “I’ll just see how far I can get.”

  “Stubborn old duck, isn’t he?” Estelle commented as Gerald began to climb.

  “He’s ruddy epic is what he is,” Spencer informed her.

  Keeping his eyes on the way ahead, Gerald crept up to the half-landing where the staircase turned left. The panelling was scored and broken and slime trails, wider than the span of his hand, glistened in the trembling circle of light. He could hear the furtive sounds of clawed legs scraping over wood and plaster, but, when he stared up at the main landing, there was no sign of those creatures.

  “Seems clear so far,” he said.

  “Not like those things to be shy,” Spencer answered. “Just be…”

  The sentence went unsaid. Beyond the torchlight, in the dim gloom above, he had seen shapes scurrying across the ceiling. Then a fleck of falling spittle passed through the beam. Angling the torch upwards, he saw that the ceiling over the staircase was now carpeted with furred bodies and round, gleaming eyes glared down. All at once, the Doggy-Long-Legs dropped, en masse.

  “Watch out!” Spencer yelled, while Estelle shrieked.

  Gerald’s rifle swung up and roared fiery blasts. Plaster exploded across the ceiling and every Doggy-Long-Legs that was about to fall directly on to his head splattered into lifeless tatters. The rest landed on the stairs around him. Snapping their jaws, they hopped about to leap up at his face. But they burst and jerked as the bullets tore through them. Dark blood, spent casings and splinters of wood, bone and plaster filled the air, and the din of the automatic rifle was matched by squeals and screeches as the attack became a frenzied effort to escape.

  Fleeing Doggy-Long-Legs hurtled down the stairs, racing over Spencer’s feet, but giving Estelle a wide berth, then through the hall to reach the front door. Parquet tiles shattered around them as the bullets followed. Gerald was determined to drive them out and kept his finger on the trigger, even after the last had sped into the night. When h
e stopped, his shoulders sagged and he lowered the rifle slowly.

  The staircase was a slope of carnage. Stick-like legs poked up from furry carcasses and fang-filled mouths gaped wide. Bulging black eyes stared out lifelessly, their fury spent, growing dim and dull as the floating plaster dust settled.

  “Ugh!” Gerald uttered with a shiver. “Never did like creepy-crawlies.”

  “You were brilliant!” Spencer said. “They won’t be back any time soon.”

  “Won’t they? I don’t know. Let’s hope not; but I’m an idiot – that was the last of my ammunition. I should have brought another clip with us from the cab.”

  “We’ve still got ours,” Spencer reassured him. “We’ll be OK.”

  Estelle gave a little cough. “Those spider beasties are the least of your problems,” she told them.

  “Give me your rifle, Spence,” Gerald said. “I’m going on alone. You stop down here.”

  The boy kept hold of the AK-47 and shook his head.

  “Let’s not do this again,” he said. “We’re already off that cliff. I’m coming with you.”

  “Then mind where you tread.”

  The boy began to pick his way through the dead Doggy-Long-Legs. The bare wood was sticky and wet and he reached for the banister in case he slipped.

  “You really are a pair of brutes!” Estelle exclaimed, arms folded at the bottom of the stairs. “Abandoning a poor defenceless girl alone down here. What despicable rats you are!”

  “Somehow, my dear,” Gerald said, without turning round, “I don’t think you’re as defenceless as you make out. You are dead after all.”

  “I wasn’t talking about me,” Estelle answered. “I can skedaddle any time I please. I was talking about Shanghai Lil. Anything could happen to her down here. She’s only human.”

  “That’s debatable,” Spencer mumbled.

  “Then bring her up here with us,” Gerald said.

  “I told you, I don’t want to go up there.”

  Gerald halted and looked down at her. “So why don’t you get out of Eun-mi’s body and let her follow us up without you?” he suggested.

  Estelle twisted the Korean girl’s mouth to one side, then gave a surly toss of her head.

  “I’ll come up,” she submitted grudgingly. “But you’re both unspeakable cads making me do this.”

  “Thought you would,” Gerald murmured under his breath.

  Crunching and squelching up the staircase, the three of them made their way to the first floor where they paused and shone the torch up and down the long landing. Every door was firmly shut and, at the far end of each wing, the two sets of stairs that climbed to the next floor were engulfed in shadows that the beam couldn’t reach.

  The dirty, tattered webs of Doggy-Long-Legs, hanging from the ceiling and draping the walls, stirred faintly. Blank expanses, where portraits of the Fellows family once hung, were covered in old slime trails and the floorboards were crusted with the same.

  “Big snails?” Spencer ventured in a low voice.

  Estelle shook her head. “Nothing so charming,” she told him.

  “Now give me your rifle, Spence,” Gerald said, and the boy swapped without argument.

  “That won’t be much use this time,” Estelle said dryly. “You should have brought a cannon.”

  “What made these trails?” Spencer asked.

  “Don’t expect me to know what it’s called. I never saw any of them in the zoo with Nanny. I only know it’s very big. You can hear it squirming about up here and dragging itself across the floors above. Since it arrived, it’s never ventured down to ground level though – I don’t know why.”

  “Er… where is it now?”

  “Not here,” she said thankfully. “Those spider beasties learned to avoid it, so it’s probably squelching about on the second floor or the attics. What luck for us! Of course, there are other things…”

  Spencer’s skin tingled and he could feel the hairs rising on his neck. Gerald felt it too. The atmosphere on this level was crackling with static and an unpleasant metallic taste formed in their mouths.

  Estelle regarded them keenly. Any sense of playfulness had gone from her.

  “AF’s machines were never switched off,” she explained. “They’ve been tuned to the same signal since 1936. It’s stronger up here.”

  “What machines?” Gerald asked.

  “He called them his superheterodyne henge,” she said solemnly. “He used them in his ceremonies. Listen, can’t you hear them?”

  Spencer and Gerald suddenly became aware of the low electronic hum that had surrounded them since they’d entered the house. It had been droning so softly in the background they hadn’t even noticed.

  “Machines, in ceremonies? How does that work?”

  “With the greatest efficiency,” Estelle said. “Sometimes there’s music too, brief snatches of dance bands that sound like they’re playing underwater. I think that’s the doing of AF’s sister.”

  “Augusta,” Gerald said. “And she wasn’t really his sister at all.”

  “You’re remarkably well informed about his family. I suppose he’s hugely famous out there in the world?”

  “My grandmother was in service here. I learned it from her.”

  “Did your granny tell you how deranged AF’s limp, not-at-all-sister was? Not quite the full shilling, as they say. Quelle surprise – growing up with him, I imagine. Apparently though she was a bit of a boffin – she could certainly bore for the Empire on all things Marconi. She told me she helped AF in his work. I rather think that meant more than just being a hostess at the gatherings of his Inner Circle and hogging the gramophone. She may actually have had a hand in the design of those oversized wirelesses, or whatever they are, in that hateful room. That would account for the garbled scraps of Al Bowlly that waft through this place like so many miasmas. She was fixated on him, an absolute monomania. I couldn’t bear the sound of his dirgey voice back when I was flesh and blood, but after being tortured by it all these years, well… it’s the proverbial red rag.”

  “Never heard of him,” Spencer said.

  “Don’t let Augusta hear you say that,” she hushed quickly. “She’ll want to educate you. Not that I’ve ever seen or even felt her wet-lettuce presence here. Do you know what happened to her that night? There’s not a whisper of her in the house – or out in the grounds. That’s always been a mystery to me. Maybe she was guzzled by the machinery; that would explain a lot.”

  “Augusta wouldn’t be here,” Gerald said. “She survived that dreadful night in thirty-six. But it broke her mind and she spent the rest of her life in an asylum. That’s where she died – a long way from here.”

  “Lucky bitch,” Estelle said with bitter envy. “Even that was better than what I had to endure.”

  Spencer held up his hand. “Shh,” he hissed, turning his head and listening intently. “There…”

  Mingled with the constant electric hum was a new sound – a wet sucking and squelching.

  “It’s on its way,” Estelle breathed, edging away. “It’ll be coming down to this landing soon. I’m not staying for that!”

  Before she could leave, Gerald caught her arm and pulled her back.

  “Show us this special room,” he urged quickly.

  “There isn’t time!” she insisted, trying to break free. “If that horror catches us…”

  “So make it quick!”

  Estelle glanced at the darkness at the end of the landing. The repulsive slithering sounds were louder now.

  “I can’t!” she cried.

  “You’re wasting time!”

  “I shan’t do it!”

  “Then you, Winnie the Wisp, can clear off, back into the ether, or wherever you’re from, and let go of Eun-mi because Miss Chung isn’t going anywhere without us and we are going to look in that room!”

  “All right – all right! I’ll show you. But hurry! This way.”

  Gerald pushed her in front and she ran to the far en
d of the west wing, where the main building joined the tower. Gerald and Spencer raced after her. The girl stopped at a large door that was unlike any of the others they had seen. It didn’t match the heavy Victorian panelling of the rest of the house. This was smooth and covered in sleek veneers, with a long chrome handle.

  Estelle hesitated before touching it. A bright blue filament of energy sparked across with a loud SNAP, which made Spencer jump.

  They could actually feel the hum now. It resonated against their eardrums, buzzed in their chests and set their teeth on edge.

  “Are you absolutely sure?” she asked one last time. “You won’t find any answers in here.”

  “Open it,” Gerald said resolutely.

  The girl clasped the handle and Spencer let out a startled, “Woah!”

  Eun-mi’s hand was shifting in and out of X-ray. He could see the bones inside her flesh. For an instant, there was only a skeleton standing there, wearing the uniform of the People’s Army of North Korea, a Kalashnikov slung over one shoulder and his Stetson perched on the skull. Then she was back again, but the ends of her hair were lifting.

  “Not my doing,” Estelle assured them. “It’s what’s in this room. You still think you want to go inside?”

  She saw by their faces that they were determined.

  “Just a moment,” Gerald said quickly and he set the bag of grenades on the floor. “Best to be safe than sorry. We don’t want whatever forces are fizzing in there to detonate these.”

  Estelle said nothing and pushed the door open. Spencer chewed his bottom lip and followed Gerald inside.

  At once the metallic tang in his mouth became unbearable and he had to spit out the saliva that had turned to a weak acid around his tongue. Then he saw that all three of them were jumping in and out of X-ray. Intense pulses of UV came after, which caused the old man’s snowy hair to fluoresce like a halo and Eun-mi’s white shirt to zing out.

  “Er… like, amazing,” Spencer gasped. Holding a hand up before his face, he waggled his fingers and saw the fine network of nerves and arteries branching across the muscles and tendons. His marvelling, flesh-framed smile grew even broader when his gums disappeared, exposing the grinning skull beneath.