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Jenny remained crouched on the floor. Despite his words, Bob did not move either. "Wait -- what was that?" Something was shuffling around outside. Jenny recognized the sound. A muttering, growling noise interspersed with barking laughter. "One of the animals strayed off the heath. There's probably some farmer looking for it." Bob began putting on his shoes. Jenny panicked. Her eyes were wide she held on to his arms. "What kind of animal makes that noise?" "What else could it be?" He shook off her grasp. The muttering changed abruptly to a snarling roar. It filled Jenny's head. Then it was at the window -- the terrified face of a woman, yanked impossibly backwards and covered by a hideous shape. Straggling hair in matted locks, teeth broken and rotting in a mouth that leered and twisted, eyes relishing the fear they provoked. Panting, Jenny tried to cover her face, to stop looking and turn the memory off. Bob reached for his jacket. "Don't go out there, please." Jenny scrambled between him and the door. Something flailed around outside, its movements becoming increasingly frenzied. Bob hesitated. The moaning and snarling intensified, rising to a shriek of pain and terror. "It must be caught on something. You wouldn't want me to leave it there in misery, would you?" He took her shoulders and moved her firmly to one side as if she had become a child or a doll with no will of its own. "You stay here, it won't take long." Jenny stared at the door after he had gone. The sound had ceased as soon as he stepped outside. Now, the silence was as eerie as the chaos of noise had been. The house ticked and cracked around her, settling down. Why didn't Bob come back? A chill brushed past her neck, as if the fire had never been lit. She could not leave that spot or look through the window. Why didn't he come back? It must have attacked him. But it was just a memory or a dream, something conjured from her dark side. There was silence, as if no one was there, not even her. The light dimmed, she could no longer trust the shapes around her not to move. With a sob, Jenny lurched forward and tore open the door. "Bob! Bob!" Silence except for a knowing sigh from the breeze. Jenny stumbled around the walls keeping to the pools of light from the windows, as if they were the only firm land amidst a roiling sea. Vague shapes hunched on the edges of the light -- an outbuilding, the chair she had seen earlier. Another sob escaped past the fingers Jenny held to her mouth. Where was he? She called again. Something shuffled, moving away, teasing her. Not Bob -- no, not Bob. Where was he? "Why don't you answer?" Another sound. Jenny turned quickly to trace the movement. Nothing, just a feeling of held breath, waiting. The solid wall was behind her; nothing could creep up. "Oh, dear God!" The door; had she shut it? Maybe Bob had gone back inside, maybe something else had too. Jenny felt her way along the wall to the next window. She waited, trying to feel the right moment, then peeped around the frame. She gasped. There was a figure with terror on its face and fingers clenched in the curtains. Jenny caught a glimpse of movement behind it as she drew back. Movement from the hearth and a face that could have been a reflection but was not. Jenny remembered how her fingers had cramped when the fleeting face with scared eyes had appeared in the window earlier -- her eyes. How it had happened or why did not matter, because later, after she and Bob had eaten and she was doing the washing up, Jenny knew she would feel the urge to look though the kitchen window. But this time she was on the outside, and then it would not be long before the screaming would begin. * * * THE END * * *
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