The House of Canted Steps Read online

  THE HOUSE OF CANTED STEPS

  Gary Fry

  First eBook Edition

  The House of Canted Steps © 2014 by Gary Fry

  All Rights Reserved.

  A DarkFuse Release

  www.darkfuse.com

  This book is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places and incidents are either a product of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously. Any resemblance to actual events, locales or persons, living or dead, is entirely coincidental.

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  OTHER BOOKS BY AUTHOR

  Conjure House

  Emergence

  Lurker

  Menace

  Severed

  Check out the author’s official page at DarkFuse for a complete list:

  http://www.darkfuseshop.com/Gary-Fry/

  This book is dedicated to the guvnor,

  Mr. Ramsey Campbell

  Special thanks to Dave Thomas for this one.

  PROLOGUE

  1922

  The girl liked visiting her grandparents. Their house was so much nicer than hers in fashionable London. Her mother and father hadn’t been getting along very well lately, and it had also been a relief to travel up to Yorkshire and stay here.

  There were lots of bedrooms to choose from, but the girl had selected one overlooking the pretty back garden. Moving away from its window, she decided to go and play outside now.

  Last night she’d suffered a bad dream involving someone looming over her in bed. This person’s face had borne a sinister expression, but maybe that was just her way of dealing with memories of the man her mother sometimes invited to their home whenever her father was away on business.

  But the girl had left all those difficulties behind for a while. She should try and enjoy her break in the small northern town. Perhaps later this afternoon, she and her grandparents might go into Hantley and buy something nice from the shops in the market square.

  Meanwhile, she could help herself to a boiled sweet from the kitchen. She skipped down the staircase, trying to keep her balance because each step was tilted at an odd angle. The house was quite new, and so its builder must have included these deliberately. The girl couldn’t think why anyone would wish to do that, but it wasn’t important and didn’t concern her for long. After taking one of the confections from a bowl on the dining table, she hurried outside to stroll in bright morning sunshine.

  Her grandparents were talking in one of the upstairs rooms, and earlier, while standing in the hallway outside, the girl had heard her own name being mentioned. They’d both sounded troubled, but she imagined this was related to grown-up problems, with family issues she couldn’t understand. She was, after all, only six years old.

  After reaching the back garden, she glanced up at the property and admired its sprawling design. It was very big and almost blotted out daylight falling on to a piebald lawn and neat flowerbeds. The brickwork was covered in a thick white substance, like heavy makeup on a woman, and a network of pot guttering ensnared the tiled roof like a tight noose. All the windows resembled eyes watching her, but the girl didn’t feel threatened; in fact, she believed the building was looking out for her in a way her parents rarely bothered with these days. Even shadows under the deep eaves didn’t scare her. Indeed, her nightmare last night had been nothing to do with the house. The place appeared too friendly and supportive to have caused such horrid imaginings.

  The girl unwrapped the boiled sweet she’d taken from the kitchen and put it in her mouth. She knew it was silly to take seriously what she’d just been thinking. Buildings couldn’t think and didn’t feel anything, neither like nor dislike of people living in them. The girl started sucking the sweet, heading towards a wall dividing the property’s grounds from a narrow lane and many fields beyond it. She loved the countryside; there wasn’t much of this in stinky old London. There was also lots of wildlife to see in Yorkshire: cows, pigs, horses, and…and . . .

  Just then, the girl sensed something moving in the hedge near a fence separating this garden from the neighbor’s. Still rolling the confection in her mouth, she stepped towards the spot where she’d noticed brief movement. She’d heard a sound from there, too. A few plants had been whipped savagely, and this had surely been accompanied by a quick, low hissing noise. After reaching this area, she stooped to take a closer look.

  And that was when a thin snake lurched up to snap its swollen jaws at her.

  The girl jerked backwards, and despite believing there were no snakes in England, she was unable to prevent terror from filling her body. But after glancing again into the flowerbed, she saw no snake. She must have simply imagined it.

  But it was too late. The boiled sweet was caught in her throat and she’d begun to choke.

  The girl attempted to cry out, but all she produced was a weak, strangled whine. Then she turned to the house and began waving her arms frantically.

  The property merely gazed back, belying everything she’d believed about it only minutes ago. Now she knew that it wasn’t eager to save her, and that it actually bore the opposite intention. Falling to her knees, the girl thought that even if she could make enough noise to attract her grandparents’ attention, the property would stop it from reaching them in that bedroom.

  The place wanted her dead.

  Indeed, it continued watching with either indifference or glee as the girl slumped to the floor and breathed her last.

  PART ONE: ON THE MARKET

  “You can never go home again, but the truth is you can

  never leave home, so it’s all right.”

  —Maya Angelou

  “It is not flesh and blood but the heart

  which makes us fathers and sons.”

  —Johann Schiller

  1

  The gable end of the house reared above a front garden full of untended shrubs and trees, like a furtive person crouched in a hidey-hole. The place looks wary, thought Mark, drawing his car into the curbside. It looks as if it’s got something to hide…

  Moments later, however, he suppressed such nonsense. The divorce and everything else he’d gone through lately had obviously left him feeling suspicious, maybe even a little paranoid. What he needed was to lose himself in the mundane, matter-of-fact world of his job.

  After killing the engine, he reached across to the passenger seat, shunted aside the wrapped birthday present he’d bought that morning for his son, and lifted his clipboard bearing the property’s details. Jenny, his receptionist back at the office, had taken the booking yesterday. The vendors wanted a quick sale, apparently. Didn’t everybody in this game? Mark reflected, and stepped outside.

  It was a nice, secluded street in a prosperous area of town. There’d been no chance of Mark’s Sat-Nav system not recognizing the address; the housing round here had probably been built over a hundred years earlier and was part of the original layout of Hantley. Mark suspected the first owners would have been well-to-do professionals—solicitors, doctors, senior civil servants—or self-made capitalists who’d run factories and the like.

  He strolled across the pavement towards the building’s driveway, raking a glance along the length of the cul-de-sac he’d just driven up. About fifteen detached properties stood to the left and right, an
d three more around its bulbous head. The one he’d come to value was directly at the top, facing the junction giving onto the high street. Given its commanding position, this would certainly be the priciest.

  Nevertheless, the garden could do with a little attention. If the vendors intended to shift the house quickly, they’d have to either spruce the place up or market it at a cut price. Advancing to the front door, Mark thought the second option was the most realistic. It would surely take a few weeks to sort out the overgrown lawn and weed-clogged flowerbeds. The building’s façade wasn’t much better; it was supposed to be white stucco but had run a sickly yellow with age and pollution from the town’s nearby industrial sector. The ancient guttering had become green with moss, and sizeable chunks of mould hung under the eaves, like tumors on the turn from benign to malignant.

  These were all cosmetic problems, of course, but even so, they’d be the first things potential buyers would see. And people were extremely fickle these days…as Mark knew well from all his experiences with his ex-wife.

  But he wouldn’t dwell on that again. He glanced away from the house’s neglected frontage and knocked at the door, wondering who owned the property. The only name on the clip-boarded sheet was “Mr. Johnson.” But why would a single man live in such a big place? Mark had already figured out that it would have three or four bedrooms, and plenty of room elsewhere. It was more like a family pad, really. But perhaps any children had long ago fled the nest and maybe even the owner’s wife had recently died. Loneliness or grief could certainly account for the lack of care in evidence here. Hearing footsteps approach from inside, Mark prepared himself to greet an older man.

  And was surprised when the door opened to reveal someone about his own age, late twenties, and whose sudden smile seemed incongruous with the general shabbiness of his abode.

  “Hello there,” this man said brightly. But his voice belied the joviality he was trying to sustain: it was thin and strained. A certain redness of the eye also betrayed him. Mark knew this look well.

  However, he was an estate agent and not a social worker, and the last thing he should do was get involved in someone else’s problems.

  “Good morning,” he said, with the same false geniality as his host. He held out his free hand for the shake. “Mr. Johnson?”

  “Yes, that’s me. Are you from Addisons?”

  “I am indeed.” He shook hands with the man. “Mark Cookson. Good to meet you.”

  “Likewise. And please call me Eric. Won’t you come inside?”

  “Thanks,” Mark replied, and then paced into a large hallway whose main feature was a grand set of steps that boasted an ornate banister made of real oak. Impressed by the sight, Mark was roused to say, “Hey, it’s nice in here.”

  “Yeah, sorry the garden’s in a bit of a state,” said Eric, halting at the mouth of a similarly well-decorated kitchen, “but my wife and I work full-time, and what with a kid to deal with, too…”

  Mark had certainly been struck by the contrast between the grounds outside and the building’s interior. The walls were stylishly papered, with deep skirting boards. There were thick, expensive-looking carpets on the floor. And as for that staircase…Was it a trick of shadow now that he’d closed the door that made each step appear askew? All the risers looked tipsy, canted to the right. But if the flight was part of the original design, there was bound to be a little wear and tear.

  He looked again at Eric Johnson and grinned awkwardly. “Tell me about it,” he said, referring to the man’s occupational and familial woes, hoping this wouldn’t lead to further enquiry on such matters.

  But it did. As the vendor led Mark into his kitchen, where he switched on a kettle on a pristine work surface, he asked, “Do you have children of your own?”

  “Just the one. A boy.” Mark put his clipboard on a large dining table, but then didn’t know what to do with his hands. “In fact it’s his birthday today. I’m…I’m going to see him this afternoon.”

  Eric looked confused. “I’m sorry? You’re going to see h—”

  “My wife and I are divorced. My son lives with her.”

  “Ah. I see. It happens, doesn’t it?” The man plucked two cups from a wooden mug-tree. In light from a large window looking on to a rear garden no tidier than the front, his eyes appeared all the redder. “Fancy a cup of tea?”

  After my own revelation, I’d rather know what you’re hiding from me, Mark thought, but then reminded himself that this was none of his business. “That would be good. Tea, please—milk, no sugar.”

  “Sweet enough, eh?”

  “My new partner seems to think so. Life goes on and all that.” How the hell had he got himself into this discussion? It was surely time to talk shop. Firming up his previously hesitant tone, he said, “Anyway, I understand you’re looking for a quick sale?”

  While making the drinks, Eric delivered what Mark began to suspect was a well-rehearsed explanation.

  “Yeah, I work for a chemical company that’s expanding rapidly. I’ve been asked to relocate to our Manchester office and that obviously involves moving house. We bought this place about seven years ago, and what with house prices holding steady since then, I think we can afford to accept the first decent offer we get. It’s all been a bit sudden really, but it’s a great opportunity for…for us all. Wage hike, better pension plan—you know the deal.”

  I do indeed, thought Mark. But why hesitate before mentioning your family? Why not make reference to, say, better schools for your child in the new area? And how come you didn’t just mention your wife’s feelings about all this?

  But after accepting the hot drink Eric handed him, Mark only said, “Okay, I understand. If you’re willing to be flexible, I don’t anticipate any difficulties. Perhaps you could show me around. I need to get some measurements and a few photos.” He hesitated, and then quickly added, “Oh, forgive me if I’m being presumptuous. I’m assuming that you want Addisons to market the property, that you haven’t also been in touch with any of our filthy rivals.”

  Eric smiled, a jaded yet genuinely amused expression…or perhaps one of relief. While leading Mark through to a large lounge, he said, “No, you’re the first agent I contacted. It’s funny—I just plucked you out of the Yellow Pages. It was only afterwards, last night, that I did a bit of online research on your company and learned that you’re considered the best in town.”

  After entering the lounge, Mark saw the Yellow Pages parted on a coffee table in front of a leather sofa. It must have been a breeze from a window ajar at the far end of the room that caused its pages to stir.

  “Yeah, we’re well-established and have a pretty comprehensive mailing list,” he told Eric, drawing his mind back to the task at hand. “Our adverts are cheaper, too, since we promote our houses en masse in a color center-page spread every Thursday in the Hantley Gazette. I guarantee that if we can’t shift it quickly, no one can.”

  “That’s good to hear,” said the man, and hid his latest expression behind the rim of his cup while slurping his tea.

  Mark rested his own drink beside the telephone, which stood on an antique cabinet that might be as old as the property itself. It certainly hadn’t been dusted in a while, he noticed, and nor had much of the other furniture. But that was none of his business, either. From his jacket pocket he produced a sonic tape measure and his digital camera. After using the first device to calculate the room’s size, he scribbled dimensions on his sheet, and then switched on the camera to capture a decent image of the attractive décor.

  “Are you happy for me to choose a good angle to take a picture from? Or do you and…your wife want some input into that?”

  “She’s not here at the moment,” Eric replied, too quickly to be convincing. But then he added more brightly, “Please go ahead. I’ll…I mean, we’ll leave it to the expert.”

  It didn’t matter that the woman was absent at this stage: Mark needed only one signature on his documentation to set the sale off. Nevertheless, the man
’s evasiveness had again aroused his suspicions, but at the same time, Mark wondered whether he was projecting onto the vendor his own confused emotions, most of which arose from Gayle’s affair last year and the breakup of their marriage. After all, Mrs. Johnson might simply be out this morning with her child; it was the autumn school break.

  Mark took a few photographs of the lounge. Next he measured the hallway, a utility room and the kitchen, before taking several snaps of each. He finished his tea and set the cup next to the kettle. Finally he was ready to go upstairs.

  “You’re all right looking around on your own now, aren’t you, mate?” asked Eric after joining Mark at the foot of those steps. Mark’s earlier impression had been no illusion: the risers were canted at an uneasy angle.

  “Yeah, sure,” Mark replied, ruling out a ridiculous idea that the homeowner was scared to go upstairs. “I’ll be five minutes. Then perhaps you could sign a contract. That way, I can get the house on the market ASAP.”

  “That’s f-fine,” said the man with an audible stutter, and then disappeared back inside his lounge, presumably before his undeniable edginess could give anything else away.

  How strange, thought Mark, trudging up the steps for a smartly decorated landing. He’d come across vendors in the past trying to sell property behind the backs of partners, but that was an issue of ownership linked to mortgages, deeds and the like, and little to do with estate agency. Mark had nothing to lose by adding this house to his office’s books. After signing the contract, Mr. Johnson would be legally responsible for expenses incurred during the marketing period. Nevertheless, wasn’t there an ethical issue here? If Mark suspected something was amiss, shouldn’t he refuse to take on the sale?