Mister B. Gone. Clive Barker

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      “I don’t know. I’m just saying …”

      “Yes …”

      O’Brien’s eyes went from Cawley’s face to the iron bar and back to Cawley again. It seemed I was not the only one who’d endured some hurt from the thing.

      “Nothing, Cawley, nothing at all. Just the wine talking. You’re probably right. I should put it aside a while.” Having spoken, he did precisely the opposite, upending the flagon as he turned his back on Cawley and stumbled away.

      “I am surrounded by drunkards, idiots, and——”

      His eyes came to rest on Shamit, who was still combing and combing, staring wide eyed at nothing, as though the ritual had lulled him into a trancelike state. “And whatever this is.”

      “I’m sorry,” Shamit said, snapping out of his delirium. “Were you asking me something?”

      “Nothing you could have answered,” Cawley replied. And then, after giving me an unsavory glance he said, “All right, haul him up and get him out of the net. But be careful, you know what happens when you rush things and you give the demons room to cause trouble, don’t you?”

      There was silence, but for the creaking of the rope that was now hauling me up again.

      “Mister C. just asked you a question, you witless thugs,” Cawley yelled.

      This time there were grunts and muffled responses from all sides. It wasn’t enough to satisfy Cawley.

      “Well, what did I say?”

      All five men mumbled their own half-remembered versions of Cawley’s inquiry.

      “And what’s the answer?”

      “You lose things,” Father O’Brien replied. He raised his arms as he spoke, to offer proof of the matter. His right hand had been neatly bitten off, it appeared to be many years before, leaving only the cushion of his thumb and the thumb itself, which he used to hook the handle of the flagon. His left hand was missing entirely, as was his wrist and two-thirds of his forearm. Six or seven inches of bone had been left jutting from the stump at his elbow. It was yellow and brown, except for the end of it, which was white where it had been recently sharpened.

      “That’s right,” said Cawley. “You lose things——hands, eyes, lips. Whole heads sometimes.”

      “Heads?” said the priest. “I never saw anybody lose——”

      “In France. That wolf-demon we brought up out of a hole very much like this one, except there was water——”

      “Oh yes, that sprang out of the rock. I remember now. How could I forget that monstrous thing? The size of its jaws. They just opened up and took the head off that student who was with it then. What was his name?”

      “It doesn’t matter.”

      “But I was on the road with him for a year or more and now can’t remember his name.”

      “Don’t start getting sentimental.”

      “Ivan!” O’Brien said. “His name was Ivan!”

      “Enough, priest. We’ve work to do.”

      “With that?” Shamit said, looking at me down the narrow length of his pimply nose. I met him stare for stare, trying to bring a few contemptuous remarks to my lips, to be uttered in my best condescending tone. But for some reason my throat wouldn’t shape the words in my head. All that emerged was an embarrassing stew of snarls and jabbering.

      Meanwhile, Cawley inquired, “When does the burning of the Archbishop and his sodomitic animals begin?”

      “Tomorrow,” said O’Brien.

      “Then we’ll have to work fast if we’re to make some money from this sorry excuse for a monster. O’Brien, fetch the shackles for the demon. The heavier ones, with the pins on the inside.”

      “You want them for his hands and his feet?”

      “Of course. And Shamit, stop flirting with it.”

      “I’m not flirtin’.”

      “Well, whatever you’re doing, stop it and go into the back of the wagon and bring out the old hood.”

      Shamit went off without further word, leaving me to try and persuade my tongue and throat to make a sound that was more articulate, more civilized, than the noises that had escaped me thus far. I thought if they heard me speak, then I could perhaps persuade them into a conversation with me, and Cawley would see I was no eater of limb or heads, but a peaceful creature. There’d be no need for the shackles and hood once he understood that. But I was still defeated. The words were in my head clearly enough, but my mouth simply refused to speak them. It was as though some instinctive response to the sight and smell of the World Above had made me mute.

      “You can spit and growl at me all you like,” Cawley said, “but you’re not going to do no harm to me or to none of my little family, you hear me, demon?”

      I nodded. That much I could do.

      “Well, will you look at that?” Cawley said, seeming genuinely amazed. “This creature understands me.”

      “It’s just a trick to give you that impression,” the priest said. “Trust me, there’s nothing in his head but the hunger to drive your soul into the Demonation.”

      “What about the way he’s shaking his head? What does that mean?”

      “Means nothing. Maybe he’s got a nest of those Black Blood Fleas in his ears, and he’s trying to shake ’em out.”

      The arrogance and the sheer stupidity of the priest’s response made my head fill with thunderous rage. As far as O’Brien was concerned I was no more significant than the fleas he was blaming for my twitches; a filthy parasitic thing that the father would happily have ground beneath his heel if I’d been small enough. I was gripped by a profound but useless fury, given that in my present condition I had no way to make it felt.

      “I——I got——I got the hood,” Shamit gasped as he hauled something over the dark dirt.

      “Well, lift it up!” Cawley shrugged. “Let me see the damn thing.”

      “It’s heavy.”

      “You!” Cawley said, pointing to one of the three men now idling by the winch. The trio looked at one another, attempting to press one of the others to step forwards. Cawley had no patience for this idiocy. “You, with the one eye!” he said. “What’s your name?”

      “Hacker.”

      “Well, Hacker, come give this degenerate half-wit some help.”

      “To do what?”

      “I want the hood put on the demon, double quick. Come on, stop crossing yourself like a frightened little virgin. The demon’s not going to do you any harm.”

      “You СКАЧАТЬ