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winter. If it was him he'd have a knife, and use it without hesitation. Or the
white-cloaked figure, still dripping blood from its shotgun wound, come in
search of revenge. / killed your cat and your rabbit, now I'm going to kill
you \
Peter was on his feet. His legs felt weak and were trying to pull him back
down into the chair. He moved forward a couple of steps and called out, 'Who's
there?'
Silence for a few moments, then the scratching started again, lower down,
almost at ground level. The blows were weaker than before as though the
nocturnal visitor's strength was ebbing.
'I said who's there?' Peter scarcely recognised his own voice, a high-pitched
shout that was almost a scream.
No answer. Just that same laboured breathing.
He reached out a hand and tugged at the bolt. He had to jerk it clear of its
socket. The latch rattled, then steadied as something on the other side pushed
at the door.
Peter backed away a step, and held the gun in one hand whilst with the other
he leaned forward and flicked the latch with the end of the torch. The door
creaked slowly inwards; he backed away another pace, his mouth so dry it was
painful to swallow.
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Then he saw it, clearly circled in the white beam of the torch: a figure that
crawled on all fours and seemed to be caught up in the torn bedsheet, which
had been fashioned into a cowled garment. The face was twisted with agony,
hideously caked with dried blood.
A bloody hand was raised, pointing at him. Accusing. Words hammered into his
brain: You killed me and now I've come for youl
He wanted to flee, to scream. But there was nowhere to run to and his vocal
chords were paralysed. It wasn't possible, but it was happening before his
eyes: the tattered, bloody corpse he'd left up in the big snowdrift was here,
crawling in through his own doorway.
Don Peters, the Woodside poacher, had returned from the dead to exact a
terrible revenge!
15
Peter had the shotgun loaded and cocked, yet for some reason he did not
squeeze its double triggers. He just stared in disbelief, the barrels lowering
until they were pointing down at the floor.
"Help me!
With that cracked, pathetic cry, the white-robed figure before him slumped
down, breathing heavily, with a gurgling sound as though there was some
obstructing fluid in the lungs. His head was raised, looking up, an expression
of sheer terror on the blood-caked features. 'Help me, lock the door . . .
They are out there!'
And in that instant reasoning came like a cooling wind across a parched
desert, and Peter expelled his pent-up breath in one loud gasp of relief. The
man who lay on the floor before him was not Don Peters; it was the dead man's
poaching partner, Mick Bostock!
'Bostock!' he grunted. 'What's happening? What the hell are you doing here?
And -'
'Close the door.' It was a croak of terror. "They are out there, I tell you.'
'They?' Peter reached the door, slammed it shut and shot the bolt. 'And who
the hell are they?'
'My God, I wish I knew.' The poacher was close to breaking down. 'But they'll
kill us both if they get us!'
Somehow Peter got Bostock into the kitchen chair, and by the light of his
torch began to remove that snow-saturated, partly frozen bloodstained outer
garment. It was a head wound of some kind, a gash above the left ear which had
bled profusely before it congealed, and matted hair clung to the dried blood.
Nasty but not dangerous.
'We'll have to wash this,' he murmured as he moved the kettle on to the wide
Rayburn hotplate. 'Now, suppose you tell me what happened to you and your
mate, eh.'
'Don - have you seen him?' Bostock gripped the sides of the chair and tried to
sit upright, but immediately fell back again. 'For God's sake, where is he?'
Peter was trying to sort out some bandages from the meagre first-aid tin on
the Welsh dresser. 'I've seen him but I'm afraid he's dead, a wound like a
horse had kicked his head.'
'I knew it.' Bostock's voice trembled. 'I knew he'd never get out of that
bloody wood alive.'
'Now suppose you stop talking in riddles and try and tell me what the hell is
going on around here.' Peter found some rolled bandage and wondered how long
it would take the kettle to boil. 'You and your mate were doing your best to
try and frighten the life out of us in the Cat that night. Now it seems that
all your bogeys have materialised.'
'We was poaching, Don and me.' Bostock's eyes widened as he began to relive
the terrifying events which had led up to this meeting. 'Rabbits, mind you,
nothin' else, no game or pheasants or the like. We was on Ruskin's land when
we saw 'em. Christ, if only we'd seen 'em sooner we might've stood a chance,
but the buggers were dressed like us, all in white. First we thought they was
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somebody else out after the rabbits but the way they started after us we knew
then they was no warreners. We split up and took to the woods to try and shake
'em off. You could hear 'em all around looking for us, and then from afar off
I heard Don's scream. Just one scream that was sorta cut off so sudden I knew
he was dead. Then they was after me. I gave 'em a chase I can tell you, right
out of the big wood on to Hodre ground. I reckon I might've made it down here
but something hit me.' Bostock fingered his wound gingerly. 'Don't know what
it was but it came with terrific force, and if it'd hit me fair and square I
guess I'd've dropped there and then. It was a glancing blow and I staggered on
somehow, bleeding like a stuck pig. How they never caught up with me I'll
never know but eventually I found myself all alone with not a sound of anybody
around.
That was when I passed out, and I guess I must've lain a whole night and a day
out there in the snow. When I came round I knew there was no way back to
Woodside; all the old tracks were drifted up since Don and I had set out. So I
had to come here. You understand that don't you, Mr Fogg?'
'Yes.' The kettle had boiled and now Peter was trying to bathe the ugly wound,
grimacing. 'But how do you know that - that they are out there now?'
'I saw 'em,' He winced. 'God strike me, I saw 'em, Mr Fogg, up on the slope
above the Hodre Circle, four or five of 'em all dressed in white and heading
here, sorta glidin' over the drifts!'
'I see.' Peter began winding the bandage round the poacher's head; the sooner
the man saw a doctor, the better. 'But who are they?'
'I told you, I don't know. They ain't after the rabbits, that's for certain,
even if they are dressed similar to how Don and me always dressed for snow
poaching. If you ask me, there's something funny going on up at that old
circle.'
Which was what Peter had thought in the first place: nutters who were out to
offer up a human sacrifice to whatever entity they were trying to raise up.
'I think we'd better go upstairs if you can make it,' Peter said. 'I've got a
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