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Back Cardinal Black Save as PDF
Chapters (44)
  1. Title Page
  2. One: Into the Storm
  3. One
  4. Two
  5. Three
  6. Four
  7. Five
  8. Six
  9. Seven
  10. Two: London Calling
  11. Eight
  12. Nine
  13. Ten
  14. Eleven
  15. Twelve
  16. Thirteen
  17. Fourteen
  18. Fifteen
  19. Three: The Malignant Seven
  20. Sixteen
  21. Seventeen
  22. Eighteen
  23. Nineteen
  24. Twenty
  25. Twenty-One
  26. Twenty-Two
  27. Twenty-Three
  28. Four: Squirrels and Cats
  29. Twenty-Four
  30. Twenty-Five
  31. Twenty-Six
  32. Twenty-Seven
  33. Twenty-Eight
  34. Twenty-Nine
  35. Thirty
  36. Thirty-One
  37. Thirty-Two
  38. Five: Revelation
  39. Thirty-Three
  40. Thirty-Four
  41. Thirty-Five
  42. Thirty-Six
  43. Thirty-Seven
  44. About the Author

Rain was beating at the window next to me. I heard voices. My Mum’s and … a voice I did not recognize. A low, harsh voice … I could not hear the words, but it was almost as if I could feel the entire house tremble.

Then … let me take a breath, if you please.

Then I heard a sound that could only have been a body falling to the floor. There was no scream, no cry for help. She was not given time. It came upon her so fast, she had no moment to defend herself. And who can defend against a razor, Matthew, when it comes at you without warning, and you are standing close enough to feel the other person’s breath on your face?

After the body fell, I heard the noise of … I can only describe it as pounding … a pounding … pounding. His boots upon her, as she lay in the hall. Pounding. It went on until it stopped.

‘Mum!’ I cried out. ‘Mum!’ And I crossed the room and reached for the door’s latch, and then I heard him coming down the stairs. My hand froze on the latch. He came down no longer as a guest, but as master of the house. He came down slowly, whistling a tune. An eerie sound, dissonant, discordant, disordered. A tune from the mind of the monster.

At last came the hand upon the door’s knob, turning it and turning it. And then followed the knock at the door.

‘Elizabeth?’ he whispered. And it was not fully the voice of Mister Robson. It was partly his, and partly some other voice that I can only say sounded harsh and bestial and … yes, I would say demonic. ‘Little candle,’ he said, ‘open the door and shine for me.’

You don’t have to go on, Matthew said.

Oh yes. Yes. Only partway out will not do … it has to be told all the way, as it happened. But thank you for your consideration.

I was not going to open that door. I was going to get out the window and run for help, because I knew my Mum … if she was not dead … she was not able to save me. And as I backed toward the window he kicked the door open and he came in with Mum’s lantern lifted high and blood on the razor and all over his shirt and his teeth bared. And his eyes … the cat eyes, the predator eyes … they glinted with pleasure in the light, for they had found a mouse to play with.

He put the lantern down very softly upon a table. Very softly. It hardly made a noise.

He put his hand in my hair. It was long then. Down over my shoulders. He put his hand in my hair, and I felt it tighten.