Hiding From the Light by Barbara Erskine Read Free Book Online

me. I am a clot. I never look where I’m going. Colin, do something!’
    Emma had not even realised there was someone else in the room. The man who now stood forward was shortish and solidly built with pepper-and-salt hair, perhaps in his mid-forties. He grinned at her peaceably.
    ‘My colleague is always flattening people and I constantly find myself picking them up!’ His voice had the unmistakable singsong of the Welsh hills. ‘Would you like a doctor, an ambulance, a bandage, a lawyer or a cup of coffee?’
    Emma burst out laughing. ‘I’ll settle for a coffee. That is where I was heading when we bumped into each other.’
    ‘God, that’s tactful!’ The younger man straightened up. ‘Bumped into each other! I completely bulldozed you.’
    ‘You’re forgiven!’ Emma was rubbing her foot. ‘Much as I’m enjoying the sympathy this is not a bruise, you know. It’s actually dirt.’
    ‘Off my great clumping shoes.’ The younger man looked down at his feet ruefully. ‘This place is filthy.’
    ‘I’ll fetch us some coffee while Mark looks after you.’ The Welshman fished in his pocket for some change. ‘We have made an arrangement with the café next door. They will let us bring real cups across here and they have nice home-made cakes and buns.’ He winked.
    ‘Are you buying this shop?’ Emma looked round for the first time as he disappeared out into the street. The man she now knew as Mark shook his head. ‘God, no. In fact I gather the shop is almost unsaleable.’ There was another folding chair in the room beside the one in which Emma was seated, and two large metal cases of what looked like cameras and photographic equipment, a heavy coil of cable, two large canvas bags and a spotlight on a tripod. Uneven oak floorboards covered in dusty footmarks and heavily beamed walls and ceiling proclaimed the age of the building. In the far corner a broad flight of stairs led up out of sight. There was an ugly modern counter to one side of them, bare but for a couple of notebooks, two empty coffee cups – presumably from the obliging café next door – pen, light meter and clipboard.
    ‘You’re photographers?’ Emma waggled her foot experimentally.
    ‘Film. TV.’ Mark turned to his briefcase and pulled out a pack of Kleenex. He proffered it hopefully. ‘Will this help clean you up? Or there’s a loo upstairs.’
    ‘Actually I might go up and wash my hands.’ She pulled herself to her feet with a wince.
    ‘Straight up. You can’t miss it.’ He grinned. It was his lucky day. A beautiful woman, literally, falling at his feet!
    Glancing into the upper room from the landing at the top of the stairs she saw that it was large and empty, the windows leaded and dusty. A bluebottle was beating against one of the panes and on the floor below the sill she could see the bodies of several others. She shivered. In spite of the frenzied buzzing of the fly there was a strange stillness in the room which was unnerving.
    She found the cloakroom, cleaned off most of the dust, washed her hands and was making her way back towards the empty room when she heard someone walking across the floor towards the staircase. She paused in the doorway, looking round. ‘Mark?’
    There was no answer. ‘Mark, are you there?’ The room was empty. The bluebottle was lying on its back on the window sill, spinning feebly in circles. She stepped cautiously into the room. ‘Hello? Is there anyone here?’
    The silence was intense, as though someone was holding their breath, listening.
    ‘Mark? Colin?’ She stared round nervously. ‘Who is it? Who’s there?’
    There was no answer.
    Retreating to the top of the stairs she glanced back towards the window and caught her breath in surprise. There was someone there, surely. A stooped figure, staring at her across the pile of boxes in the middle of the floor.
    Welcome back .
    The words seemed to hang in the air.
    For a moment she couldn’t move, her eyes locked onto the pale,