Faces of Fear by Graham Masterton Read Free Book Online Page B

I couldn’t move a muscle.
    â€œThis terrible creature seized that poor dog and ripped it out of the man-trap without even opening it. It had long clawlike fingers. The dog screamed, but the creature took hold of its ribcage and pulled it apart, as easily as you might pull a chicken’s ribcage apart. The dog’s innards dropped to the ground and the creature fell on them and started to cram them into its mouthindiscriminately, strings of fat and liver and shredded intestine.
    â€œAfter a while, the creature left its feast and slowly made its way back through the undergrowth, toward the house. I was shivering and sick to my stomach, as you can imagine, and I turned immediately for home. I had only gone a few yards, however, when I heard another scream up ahead of me – and this time, it wasn’t a dog. I ran as fast as I could. I nearly tore out my eye on one bramble – here, you can still see the scar.
    â€œI didn’t have to go far before I found Miles, with his hand caught at the wrist in another man-trap. His face was grey with shock. He must have tripped, and put out his hand to save himself. The steel teeth had gone right through skin and flesh, and his hand was dangling by not much more than few shreds of skin.
    â€œI tried to open the trap, but it was just as strong as the first one. While I was trying, Miles kept begging me to set him free, but I simply couldn’t. And it was then that I heard that
rushing
sound again, those fearful crashing footsteps, and I realized that the creature in black was coming for Miles.
    Duncan Greenleaf took out his handkerchief and wiped his eyes. “There was nothing else I could do. I couldn’t have left him there for the creature to tear apart.”
    â€œSo what did you do?” asked Marcus, although he could easily guess.
    â€œI took out my penknife, and I cut off my brother’s hand.”
    â€œOh, God,” said Marcus.
    â€œOh, God, indeed,” said Duncan Greenleaf.
    â€œSo that’s him … with just one hand, being eaten up by the hungry moon.”
    Duncan Greenleaf said, “Somehow I dragged him outof the woods. I took off my belt and used it as a tourniquet to try to stop the bleeding, but he just went on pumping out more and more. By the time my father could call for the ambulance, he was unconscious; and by the time they got him to hospital, he was dead.”
    â€œBut your father didn’t believe what had happened? And neither did the police?”
    â€œGrown-ups don’t believe in black monsters with mouths like sharks, Marcus. Especially when they searched the woods and found nothing at all – no man-traps, no dog. And the Vanes, of course, denied all knowledge of such things, as you would expect them to.
    â€œI don’t expect
you
to believe me, either. Why should you? But let me tell you this: I looked into the history of the Vane family when I was older. In fact it became something of an obsession of mine, and I expect you can understand why. The Vanes made all of their fortune in shipping, in the Mediterranean, and especially Greece. But in 1856 they were financially ruined: they lost several valuable cargoes and made some bad investments in America. However, only two years went by before the Vane’s main competitors suffered some catastrophic shipwrecks, while the Vanes themselves suddenly appeared to have more money than they knew what to do with.”
    â€œI don’t understand what you’re getting at,” said Marcus.
    â€œSimply this: that John Vane, who was the head of the family at the time, went to Thessaly on the borders of Macedonia, and was publicly said to have ‘consulted with business experts’, who assisted him to rebuild the family fortunes. But what ‘business experts’ could he have possibly found in a Godforsaken place like that?”
    â€œI’m sorry. I have no idea.”
    â€œAh! Thessaly, as you probably don’t