Brad looked at her. She had never seen such desperation. “She’s out there, Ella.”
“Who?”
“She’s out there. She’s hungry.”
“Who’s out there? Honora?”
“No no no no no. Not her. She.”
“But who is she? You must tell me.”
“Out there. She’s hungry. She wants to eat me… the little girl.”
“How can a little girl hurt you, Brad?”
“She’s not a little girl. Just pretending. Disguised. She hates me. She wants to eat me. Stop looking at me like that.” Brad buried his head in the sofa. “Stop it!”
“Why can’t I look at you?”
“Because I’m disgusting. I’m a leper. Don’t look at me, Ella.”
Ella pulled Brad to her, and cradled his head in her lap, stroking his filthy, matted hair as he cried. It was an hour before his sobbing subsided.
They were standing in the kitchen. “When did you sleep last?”
Ella had salvaged and scoured four of Brad’s biggest saucepans. She had filled them with water and they were heating on the front and back plates of the filthy electric cooker. The water began to bubble.
“I haven’t slept for three days and nights. I’m too scared to sleep.”
“Like the rest of us then. Well? Are you going to bring it in?” Brad shuffled uncomfortably. “Come on, do it,” said Ella.
Brad went out of the back door and returned clumsily manoeuvring an old tin bath. “Where shall I put it?” he asked pathetically. Ella wiped the tin bath with a damp rag until she was satisfied that it was as clean as she was going to get it, then poured in the hot water. It amounted to about three inches in the bottom of the bath. This was topped up with cold water, and the four saucepans were immediately refilled and set to boil.
“What are you waiting for?” she said. “I’m certainly not going to undress you.”
Brad stared back at her, and eventually began fumbling with his underclothes. Undressed, he climbed into the bath and drew his knees up around him. “It’s not very warm,” he said sulkily.
Ella produced her leather holdall, from which she withdrew soap, sponge, scrubbing brush, towels, razors, shaving brush, shaving soap, scissors, combs, shampoo, deodorants and cologne. She lined them up on the kitchen table like a surgeon’s equipment. Then she set to work, vigorously scrubbing Brad’s neck and shoulders.
“Steady!” shouted Brad.
Ella didn’t ease up. “It’s disgusting.”
“You’re enjoying this, aren’t you!”
“It’s what I live for.”
She splashed soapy water over his head, and drew the line at washing him below the waist.
“You would have, once.”
“Never; and don’t forget it.” She tossed a jug of cold water over his head by way of emphasis.
The water turned black. She refilled the bath with more hot water from the stove, reheating pans all the time. After washing his hair, she proceeded to cut it none too carefully, telling him that it was fashionable to look like someone from a thirties soup kitchen. He said he doubted it.
“I met someone on the way down here,” said Ella as she snipped recklessly close to Brad’s ears. “I gave him a lift. He gave me some advice before he got out of the car. He said…”
“Watch my ear for chrissake!”
“Sorry… He said we should undo what was done.”
“Big help.”
“Do you know what he meant?”
“Christ! Watch my ears will you! That was deliberate!”
“Sorry. This man—at least at first I thought he was a man, then I thought he might be just a phantom, from dreamside—was helping me. He was a friend. At least he seemed to be.”
“Other things have happened.”
Ella was careful to release only part of the story. If she mentioned the girl at this point, it would all be over. “That’s the trouble. Not being able to tell the difference, I mean. That’s why it’s dangerous.”
Brad just stared into the murky water which was turning cold around his genitals. He was pink with scrubbing. His ears were sore from clippings gone wide of the mark, deliberate or otherwise. He was beginning to feel sober and he was beginning to feel ridiculous. Ella whisked up a lather of shaving soap, sculpted it around his jaw and set in with the razor.
“I’m relieved you’re doing this with us Brad. It’s the only way.”
“Did Honora agree to it?”
“She will.”
“I don’t see what good it can do.”
“Just don’t change your mind.”
“Did you ever tell Lee about us?” he said suddenly.
She didn’t stop shaving him. “There was nothing to tell.”
“I mean about that one time. Us. On dreamside.”
“It never happened, Brad. Not between you and me.”
“I know different. We discussed it years ago; you denied it then.”
“And I deny it now. Whatever dream you had that time, even if I was in it, I wasn’t there.”
“You can say that now.” He flicked water from his eye.
“You’re wrong.”
“No, I’m not.”
“Careful while I’m holding this razor. I’ll say it again: I wasn’t there.”
Brad went to contradict her; but he saw a cold gleam in her eyes like a reflection of the razor she was wielding. It made him stop. It was so long ago even he couldn’t pretend that the contours of truth hadn’t folded a little. Lucid or otherwise, it was all dreaming. “I’m getting cold,” he said.
Ella stood him up, poured another pan of cold water over his head and wrapped him in a towel. She gave him sweet-smelling lotions together with instructions for liberal use; and a complete set of clothes belonging to Lee. He disappeared from the kitchen to try them on.
When he returned, with his cropped hair combed back and wearing the oversized clothes, Ella started giggling. Brad retreated angrily, slamming the door, refusing to come out again and threatening not to make the return journey to rejoin the others. But finally she got him into the car. He climbed into the passenger seat and sat with arms crossed and with head bowed.
“I need to tell the others we’re on our way,” said Ella.
She stopped the car at a telephone kiosk to make a progress report to Lee. Stepping out of the car, she had a second thought, and reached for the keys.
“What’s that for?” Brad demanded. It was the first time he had spoken since leaving the cottage.
“Reflex.”
“What’s the matter with you? Do you think I’d drive off in the car or something?” He was angry.
“Relax. I’m just going to make one phone call.”
“You’re taking the keys anyway, I see!”
Inside the booth, and away from Brad for the first time in over six hours, she sighed, leaning her head against the dial. Brad’s behaviour was still unpredictable, and he was in a suggestible state. So far he had followed, but if he was to have a change of heart she would never be able to bring him back again. If she could keep her own head clear she might do it. She was terrified by the idea of what might happen if he or she experienced an attack en route.
She carefully phoned Lee’s number. When the answer came, it was Honora on the line, though her voice could hardly be made out. The line was full of interference, strange electronic chirpings, and innumerable unfathomable ghost conversations, as if a hundred other people were trying to claim the line. Ella put the receiver down and tried again, but got the same results.
“Phone’s out of order,” she told Brad, back in the car. “It’ll have to wait.”
Brad only stared sulkily ahead of him. “This car will never make it,” he said.
Ella could sense two forces working in Brad. One surrendered him completely to her judgment, and with blind faith asked her to take charge and deliver him from his nightmares. The other was a palpable terror, growing so fast she could smell it on his breath: a fear both of facing the source of his horrors, and of facing his fellow dreamers with whom he had brought the living nightmare into being. This terror, she knew, was already telling him that in coming with her he had made a mistake; and his apprehension of that mistake was increasing with each mile of their journey.