What's her game? She takes a breath, is about to say something, looks quickly at me, changes her mind, says nothing. I laugh. softly, leaning back in my chair with my hand clasped around my coffee cup.
'There are wolves and there are sheep,' I say, as I have often said.' Which do you think you are?'
'Neither,' says she.
'Then you are sheep,' say I. ' The wolves know what they are - what their function is, I am wolf,'
'Really, - ' she says and it is obvious that she is bored by my philosophy, not understanding it. ' You had better go to bed now-you are tired.'
'If you insist,' I say lightly.' Very well.'
She shows me up to the room overlooking the unlit street and bids me good night. Closing the door, I listen carefully for the sound of a key turning, but the sound doesn't come. The room contains a high, old-fashioned bed, a standard lamp with a parchment shade with flowers pressed between two thicknesses, an empty bookcase and a wooden chair, beautifully carved. I feel the chair with my fingertips and shiver with delight at the sensation I receive. I pull back the quilt covering the bed and inspect the sheets which are clean and smell fresh. There are two white pillows, both very soft. I extract myself from my suit, taking off my shoes and socks and leaving my underpants on. I switch off the light and, trembling a little, get into the sheets, I am soon asleep, but it is still very early. I am convinced that I shall wake up at dawn.
I open my eyes in the morning and pale sunshine forces its way between gaps in the curtains. I lie in bed trying to go back to sleep, but cannot. I push away the covers, which have slipped partly off the bed, and get up. I go to the window and look down into the street.
Incredibly, a huge hare is loping along the pavement, its nose twitching. A lorry roars past, its gears grating, but the hare continues its imperturbable course. I am tensed, excited. I open my door and run along the passage to the woman's room, entering with a rush. She is asleep, one arm sprawled outwards, the hand dangling over the edge of her bed, her shoulders pale and alive. I take hold of one shoulder in a strong grip designed to hurt her into wakefulness. She cries out, sits up quivering.
'Quick,' I say - ' Come and see. There is a hare in the street!'
'Go away and let me sleep,' she tells me, ' let me sleep.'
'No! You must come and look at the big hare in the street.
How did it get there?'
She rises and follows me back to my room. I leap towards the window and see with relief that the hare is still there.
'Look!' I point towards it and she joins me at the window.
She, too, is amazed.' Poor thing,' she gasps.' We must save it.'
'Save it?' I am astounded.' Save it? No, I will kill it and we can eat it.'
She shudders. ' How could you be so cruel?' The hare disappears around a corner of the street. I am furious and all the nerves of my body are taut.' It has gone!'
'It will probably be all right,' she says in a self-conciliatory tone and this makes me more angry. I begin to sob with frustration. She puts a hand on my arm.' What is the matter?' I shrug off the hand, then think better of it, I begin to cry against her breast. She pats me on the back and I feel better. 'Let me come to bed with you,' I plead.
'No,' she says quietly.' You must rest.'
'Let me sleep with you,' I insist, but she breaks from my grasp and backs towards the door.' No! Rest.'
I follow her, my eyes hot in my skull, my body full. ' You owe me something,' I tell her viciously.' You all do.'
'Go away,' she says threateningly, desperate and afraid of me. I continue to move towards her, beyond the door, along the passage. She starts to run for her room but I run also, and catch her. I catch her before she reaches the room. She screams. I clutch at her fingers. I bend them back slowly, putting my other hand over her mouth to stop her horrible noises. The bones snap in the slim, pale flesh. Not all at once.
'You made me wolf.' I snarl. 'And sheep must die.' My teeth seek her pounding jugular, my nose scents the perfume of her throat. I slide my sharp teeth through skin and sinew. Blood oozes into my mouth. As I kill her, I sob.
Why did she suck the soul of me from the wounds she made? Why am I wolf because of her? Or did it always lurk there, needing only the pain she made to release the ferocity? But she is dead.
I had forgotten.
I had sought her in this pleasant town.
Ah, now the other is dead, too.
Let murder drown me until I am nothing but a snarling speck, harmless and protected by my infinitesimal size.
Ok, God, my bloody darling…
CONSUMING PASSION
I TRAVEL swiftly and cautiously over the soft, dry woodshavings. All around me loom the canvas-covered piles of timber. It is on nights as dark as this that I enjoy my work; the fruits of my labours are that much more apparent.
I feel my mouth go dry, as dry as the wood I tread on; my breath comes quickly, in and out of my lungs; my heart pounds heavily against my ribs. Here is a place, a dark, quiet place with light dowelling stacked high. Fine kindling.
From my special little pocket, I extract my shiny petrol lighter. Press of a thumb, scrape of a wheel, a random spark shoots from flint to wick - and lights the invisible fumes. How perfect it is, this little pointed, flickering flame.
In my jacket pockets is paper, screwed up tight. I stuff it into gaps between the heaped dowels. Now I apply the flame.
Beautifully, the fire begins to lick explorative tongues delicately upwards, darting along the wood, further and further. The delicious smell of woodsmoke fills my lungs.
I stand back and I want to laugh at the flaming glory I have created. It will soon engulf the stacks of timber, but now I must run away. Far away. To be found here would mean that my days of creation would be over. It is warm, near the fire, and the night air chills me as I run.
Another Big Blaze ARSON STRONGLY SUSPECTED Is maniac at large? Jordan Mennell reads the headline with a slightly thumping heart. A faint smile plays around his well-shaped mouth. His eyes, too bright for grey eyes, scan the columns avidly.
Once more a masterpiece accomplished.
This makes ten. Ten great works of heart. Ten triumphs; ten little note-books with ten collections of clippings pasted neatly in them. And they have a name for him now.
Pyro Jack!
His pseudonym.
Tomorrow I try for eleven. No more petty ignitions of garden bonfires; no more the occasional surreptitiously dropped match in a waste-paper bin. Big ones from now on. Vast timber yards, rubber dumps, petrol reservoirs. Like God I create the flame which destroys. Yes, I am a creator and a destroyer. The power is in my hands. The glory of leaping, yelling, roaring, soaring flames - the red, yellow and blue, the gold and the silver. The tall columns of smoke and the red glow on the skyline. And frantic, terrified little men hopping about, impotent and frightened.
Tomorrow, the eleventh and greatest ever creation. Tomorrow - Dennissen's the furniture store. No watchman; quite safe.
Eight storeys of combustibles. A fitting monument to my power.
Today, dull wood and fabric; lifeless. Tomorrow-a glorious, sentient mountain.
He pulls on the black trousers, the dark shirt, the soft-soled shoes; feels for the lighter, checks for paper. Paper safe and crinkly against his thigh; lighter hard and smooth.
He goes out of the brown and grubby back door from which the paint is peeling. He turns the rusty key in the stiff lock; picks a silent path through the rubble of the yard, past the dilapidated shed with the door which hangs on one hinge. Over the leaning fence and into the narrow, cindered alley.
Softly, he crunches along, keeping to the maze of alleyways which run between the identical banks of houses. Bright lights of the High Street before him. A sudden dash across it into the gloom of another narrow alley. But this one is of firm concrete, a wall on one side, a tall corrugated-iron fence on the other. The fence is pointed at the top, like triangular fingers clutching for the sky.