15

Turning on the ignition, David could hardly see anything through the film of slime on his windscreen as he drove round the bend in the drive, out of sight of the house. It was going to take a few minutes for the glass to clear, so while he waited he fished out his phone to check his emails. However furiously he worked his wipers, the mess continued to smear back and forth across the glass without seeming to clear. An automatic car wash was unlikely to remove all the traces of slime and fragments of shell left by the eggs that had been thrown, but he had no other choice until the next day as the hand valeting service at the garage would be closed by the time he reached the garage. The car wash machine was better than nothing, although he might be better off to wait until the morning when it could have a more thorough hand wash, but if he left the car as it was overnight, the viscous muck might dry and be more difficult to remove. He was still undecided what to do, and couldn’t help feeling the situation had become more challenging than it ought to be for an intelligent man accustomed to dealing with problems.

It was tempting to go home and forget about the mess on the car until the morning. He was feeling nauseous and a little giddy with every breath he took, which was understandable after the fright he had suffered. At the same time, he was impatient to get the muck cleaned off his windscreen. In addition, if he went to the car wash he could stop off at the police station on his way home to register his dissatisfaction with the treatment his complaint had received. He would do himself a favour if he lodged a complaint without delay. Fiddling with the windscreen wash, he changed his mind again, mainly because he had just felt another wave of nausea and his stomach hurt. Thinking he might actually be sick, he opened his window, hoping that a blast of fresh air would revive him. Looking out, he blinked furiously. His windscreen still had a film of sludge on it, making the street look hazy, but outside a fog had descended quickly and what he could see through the open window was equally blurry.

He kept his wipers going at full speed, but the fog in front of the car did not clear. By now he was more concerned about his drowsiness, which he was struggling to overcome. Delayed shock at the attack on his car had finally caught up with him. At the time he had been too incensed to fully register the danger he had survived. As he reached across to remove his seat belt, he felt his heart racing and he almost blacked out. Wiping away a trickle of saliva that was dripping down his chin, he noticed he was breathing very rapidly now, and realised he was experiencing a panic attack. Desperately fighting to control his hands, he fumbled to open the door. He needed to get out of the car and breathe in some fresh air before he choked to death, but somehow his limbs no longer moved freely.

By the time he managed to clamber out of the car he was breathing in shallow painful gasps. Reeling, he almost lost his balance when he pushed the car door closed. He nearly lost his footing again as he staggered up the drive. It was dark, and he swore as he made his way towards the house. Any movement on the path was supposed to trigger the security lights, but they did not come on. That was one more problem he would have to sort out. Unless he took matters into his own hands, nothing ever got done. His wife was a useless lazy cow who left everything to him. She had never been any different. If she even noticed the lights weren’t working it would never occur to her to have them fixed. She would just tell him about it, if she remembered, and wait for him to sort it out, as she did with everything else.

The house looked a long way off, and for an alarming instant he was confused about where he was and where he needed to go. At the same time, the ground seemed to rock gently with each dizzying step, as though he was on a boat at sea. Beside the front door, one of the downstairs windows was shimmering brightly in the darkness. Stumbling, he made a conscious effort to place one foot in front of the other, but he didn’t seem to be making any progress in his long walk to the house. Everything around him seemed to be spinning and he couldn’t control his limbs. With a jolt of fear, he understood that this was more than a panic attack. He was ill. He had been working too hard. As soon as he got inside, he was going straight to bed, and he would take a couple of days off to rest until he recovered. Not only that, he was going to insist Anne summoned the doctor. He was no good to anyone like this. The front door hovered ahead of him, tantalisingly out of reach.

He wasn’t sure what happened, but one minute he was staggering towards the house, fumbling in his pocket for his key, and the next he was staring at a patch of moss on the path. His nose stung where he had hit it on a paving stone, and one of his hands smarted from breaking his fall, jarring his elbow painfully. Pain stabbed his shoulder as he turned his head slightly and saw the moon quivering crazily above him. He was vaguely aware of an irregular whine which seemed to be coming from his chest. Every time he inhaled, a sharp pain in his throat and chest worsened. He suspected he was having a heart attack. Understanding that he had tripped and fallen, he was afraid to move in case he had seriously injured his head which was pounding horribly. He felt sick. He tried to shout, but heard only a faint whimper. Perhaps he had suffered a stroke. Terror threatened to overwhelm him as it occurred to him that, if he didn’t get medical assistance soon, he might die.

‘Help,’ he murmured, ‘I’m not well. I’ve fallen over. I can’t move. Someone, help! Anne! Someone! Help me, please! Help!’

But his voice was barely audible, and the words he uttered were no more than an incoherent mumble. He could not lie there waiting to pass out. Before he lost the power to move or speak at all, he had to summon help. He could hardly believe that he hadn’t thought to use his phone straight away. His hand shook as he felt for it in his pocket. It wasn’t there. Dismayed, he recalled taking it out of his pocket to check his emails while he was in the car. He must have left it lying on the passenger seat. He was alone and helpless, barely a foot away from his own front door, and no one was going to come to his aid. As though to complete his misery, it began to rain.

Painstakingly, he began to drag himself along the ground in what he thought must be the right direction, although he could no longer remember where he was going. In the darkness, and the rain, he squirmed his way along the path. Faint light from a street lamp was suddenly blotted out and in the dim light of the moon he vaguely made out a figure standing above him.

‘Help,’ he whispered. ‘Help me.’

With a groan, he watched the other person lean over him, closer and closer, before vanishing into the darkness that was consuming everything. After that he felt nothing at all, only a coldness creeping over his limbs and body, dragging him down, down, into terrifying blackness.

‘No, no,’ he cried out, ‘I’m not ready to die,’ but his voice made no sound in the silence closing in around him.