The House of Doors - 01 by Brian Lumley Read Free Book Online Page B

was a bad one. Except it hadn’t been Rod but George.
    “Angela?” his tinny voice had croaked. “You’d better get— uh!— out of there, love, and run for it! Rod’s— uh! —here, and he’s just had a go at me!” George had been out of breath, sounded like he was in pain. Angela’s heart had almost frozen inside her.
    “George? Has he hurt you? Could you smell drink on him? Oh, God, he’s been drinking! Where are you?”
    “Finsbury Park,” his choking voice had come again. “God! He has fingers like a steel vise, that bloke! He accused us of having an affair, you and me, and said he could kill me! But he wouldn’t because it’s you he wants. If he killed me, they’d put him away, and you’d be free to go on running around and, well, fucking whoever you want!”
    “George!”
    “That’s what the bastard said!” George had rasped. “He accused you of being— uh! —a bloody vampire, said you’d suck any man you could dry as a stick. So he was going on a crusade for all men. He was going to get you and settle with you for good! He pitied me, he said, because I was just the latest in your long line of victims, and he wanted to know why my ‘poor cow of a wife’ wasn’t complaining about it. Or maybe I was having both of you away in the— uh !—same bed.”
    “George, but you know none of that’s true!”
    “’Course I do, love, but he thinks it is! Angela, this bloke is as barmy as they come. So you get out of there. There’ll be motors on the roads by now, but even so he’ll still be able to bus it up there in about twenty-five minutes. And if he has a car, it’ll be even quicker. Just tell Siobhan not to answer the door to anyone, and then make yourself scarce. Do you need money?”
    “No, that’s one thing I’m not short of.”
    “Off you go, then. Me, I’m calling the police.”
    “What? Did he hurt you?”
    “I’m not a hospital case, if that’s what you mean. But he scared the shit out of me, yes. And I’ll likely have bruises on my windpipe for a week! You should know what he’s like if anyone does.”
    Angela had fingered her own slender throat. “But the police, George!” she’d protested. “It’s all over for him if you call them.”
    “Better if it’s all over for him than for you or some other poor sod! Now you do what you want to, Angela, and I’ll do my own thing. But right now, love, get the hell out of there. You’re wasting time!” And with that he’d put the phone down.
    Then, no longer concerned whether Siobhan had hysterics or not, she’d rushed about the house bundling her few things into a travel bag, and as her friend had stumblingly followed her about trying to get orientated, told her what was happening.
    “Rod, coming here?” Siobhan had finally got the message.
    “Lock the door after I’ve gone,” Angela had breathlessly told her. And she’d left her with a kiss on the cheek. She hadn’t even had time to say thanks.
    At midday, from Waverly Station in Edinburgh, she’d phoned Siobhan and got the story. Rod had arrived a little after the police, and George had been a few minutes behind him. Except there’d no longer seemed to be any anger left in Rod, just tears, exhaustion, shame. Siobhan even sounded a little sorry for him. George hadn’t brought charges; the police had shrugged and called it “a domestic,” and they’d asked Rod if he wanted to report Angela as a missing person; George had finally gone off late to work and Rod … had fallen asleep in the spare room! In fact he was still sleeping there now.
    Well, he had been, but he’d heard Siobhan on the telephone. And suddenly, instead of talking to Siobhan, Angela had found herself talking to Rod. He must have had a good dose of whatever he’d been on, because she could still hear it in his voice. She recognized and knew that tone only too well, and also that any remorse he’d shown had been make-believe, conjured to pacify the police and perhaps to give himself a