Free The Last Revelation Of Gla'aki by Ramsey Campbell Page A

said.
    Did a wig come with the title? The hairline above the chubby brows that overshadowed her sizeable eyes seemed unusually regular, while the black hair that hung straight down beside her cheeks looked as inert as the grey light through the ceiling of fog. As she offered Fairman her disconcertingly small hand she said "Thank you for everything you're doing for us."
    "I'm just doing what's expected of me."
    "I wish some others of us would. Please accept my apologies on behalf of the town for the hindrance." Before he could tell her they weren't necessary the mayoress said "Do come and take over."
    Fairman refrained from wiping his hand until she turned along the gravel drive. "Are you visiting someone?"
    "Regrettably I had to," she said and stalked loosely although purposefully towards the central building. "Rhoda Bickerstaff."
    Beyond a wide hall a pair of broad staircases not unlike pincers framed the entrance to a room full of old folk in armchairs. French windows let in the murky daylight, which seemed to tint all the ageing flesh. One old man was opening his mouth wide and circular to expose his greyish gums, and several of his companions joined in, as thought they were competing to produce the roundest mouth. An old woman was dangling her arms on either side of her chair to touch the carpet, and Fairman might have thought her hands were too long for the arms. Outside the windows a number of apparently unsupervised residents were shuffling and wobbling about the grounds; several had gathered to stare through a gap in the wall into the ill-defined depths of the woods. Fairman didn't want to distract anyone from keeping an eye on the residents, but Eunice Spriggs was gesturing him towards a room to the left of the stairs. She didn't bother knocking on the door.
    A dumpy woman stuffed into a suit not much greyer than her face and hair sat behind a desk on the far side of the office. If she wasn't grimacing, a good deal was wrong with the left side of her face. Her lips were drawn towards it, and that eye was half shut, while the cheek harboured a purplish tinge. She was flanked at a distance by a policeman and a woman in the identical uniform. Fairman could almost have taken them for twins, not least because their rounded faces bore the same blank determined look. "Here he is at last," Eunice Spriggs said. "I believe someone owes you something, Leonard."
    She gazed at the woman behind the desk, and then the police did. Since none of this broke the silence, Fairman felt he should. "Thank you for making time for me, Mrs Bickerstaff."
    The woman sat forward and folded her arms with a thump on the desk. The sound seemed to echo, but the repetitions grew louder as they continued to reverberate. Fairman felt as if the floor were growing unstable, even when he realised that she was drumming a heel beneath the desk. "Rhoda," the mayoress said.
    Rhoda Bickerstaff dug her fingers into her upper arms as she raised her head. "I've got to say I'm sorry, Mr Fairman."
    "I'm sure I understand." When her eyes denied it Fairman said "Why should you?"
    "For not scurrying to let you have your book like everybody else."
    "I don't think anybody's quite done that."
    "Then you don't know much about our town."
    Fairman almost retorted that he knew there was so much more to see; it was like hearing a chorus in his head of all the voices that had told him. This time the mayoress brought a silence to an end. "Safe, Rhoda," she said. "Safe." Though it could have been a reassurance, Fairman thought it was an order. Rhoda Bickerstaff's eyes remained defiant while the drumming of her heel seemed to dissipate through the floorboards, and her gaze seemed to retreat without leaving him. She lurched to her feet so abruptly that her suit bunched up around her midriff, and Fairman could have thought her flesh had. The floor shook again as she paced to the safe behind the desk. She spun the combination wheel and hauled the door wide, leaving the interior in