Salt Snake and Other Bloody Cuts Read online

  “It’s obvious. She thinks that whistling poacher is this anti-Hendrix beastie. He’s got no ruddy ear for music anyway, that whistling’d drive anyone barmy.” Tufty wiped a drop of tomato juice from his chin. “So, if you get the poacher, you get Sandy Kitson’s nightmare man. My God…Vic Curtis to the rescue!” The thought amused him and he was still laughing when Vic left, furiously slamming the door behind him.

  * * *

  Vic found a store full of gardening equipment in the garage. And all that afternoon he worked. First, he cleared the ivy from the windows of Kissbryde Hall, hacking and cutting like it was the enemy. It was if he were trying to sweat something out of himself. The cloud hadn’t lifted and it rested on the hills and disfigured mountain like the lid sealing a pressure cooker. Vic felt his internal pressure increase with the temperature until he felt something must burst. He couldn’t explain it. Was it the Kitson woman? In a way she was… foxy. He smiled grimly at the quaint expression. Then there was Tufty, doing his I’m-the-young-rebel act and becoming increasingly unpredictable as his hair vanished. Frustration? He knew he should have the guitar in his hands trying to improve Howls From A Blinding Curve. Instead, the place sapped his strength, his drive; soon it would begin to sap his sanity, and he didn’t doubt that he too would be prostrating himself before the altar of James Marshall Hendrix, the Electric God.

  When the windows were clear of the cataract-like ivy he began to rip up the weeds growing through the driveway, dock leaves, brambles, nettles, poppies; it would be futile to try and clear the lot but the rush of activity blotted everything from his mind.

  Occasionally, Sandy Kitson would appear to watch him wordlessly.

  As he yanked at the deep roots of a tenacious dock leaf Tufty strode up and announced he’d found mushrooms growing in the wood.

  “Great,” said Vic, without enthusiasm, “fry some eggs, bacon and we’ll eat.”

  “Not those kind of mushrooms. Magic mushrooms!”

  Vic knew perfectly well what magic mushrooms were, the poor man’s LSD.

  “You can forget them!” snapped Vic. “We agreed. No drugs, no piss-ups. We’ve got to get ourselves working, get shit-hot again. This group’s not carrying any damn zombies.”

  Tufty looked stung.” Okay, okay… just thought you needed cheering up… you’re as miserable as flaming sin.” Then, with his jaw working angrily, he left.

  Vic continued his assault on the creeping greenery until Sandy Kitson came out to invite him to dinner.

  “Be there at eight. Come alone—and bring your single. I’d like to hear it.”

  Between returning to the flat at seven and leaving for the house at two minutes to eight, Vic showered, changed and waged another slanging war with Tufty who had managed somehow to “acquire” a full bottle of gin from the house. Usually, Vic got on well with Tufty; and a struggling band has to get on well together to survive, but Tufty’s behaviour was way out of order, and this, with Vic’s darkening moods, only made matters worse.

  Sandy Kitson had made herself look good. She’d brushed back her long hair, and her blouse (white silk) and calf-length leather skirt looked new. To Vic’s surprise she took him straight upstairs to the Hendrix shrine, where she switched on the Marshall amps and invited him to play a guitar. Taking the big white Strat (playing left-handed) he fumbled through the melody line of Howls From A Blinding Curve, acutely aware of the way she stared at him. Then he knew why—Hendrix had also been left-handed. With the volume low he played a loose medley of Beatles ballads, Springsteen, Ultravox, U2; and above, the Hendrix portrait gazed steadily down.

  Occasionally, Sandy disappeared to check the oven or bring another bottle of frosted white wine. Outside, it grew dark, and although the long window was still grimy, he could just make out the mountainside quarry gleaming palely like a monstrous face.

  Sandy ate little, but Vic quickly cleared two helpings of the spiced casserole as they listened to the single on the ultra-modern hi-fi tucked away in the corner. Vic realised, thankfully, that Sandy Kitson had no desire to return to the crazy talk of the Hendrix spirit/anti-spirit. He wondered why she was so keen to hear the single. Maybe it was an excuse to get him there; perhaps after all these years of solitude she was suddenly afraid to be alone. She listened to the song intently, her eyes fixed on the reproduction of Hendrix’s Cry Of Love album cover on the wall. Eventually, Vic drained his glass and said, “Well, what’s the verdict?”

  “You know your way around the fretboard. The guitar…” Glancing out of the window she tensed as if she’d seen something in the dark but she didn’t let it interrupt her flow. “The guitar; biting, energetic roar; it grabs you.”

  “And the songs?”

  “The ‘B’ side, Turbomania. With better production, a score more overdubs,” she turned away from the window, “you could have a reasonable commercial success.”

  He kept the disappointment from his face. Turbomania had been a group effort. He hated it. What about Howls From A Blinding Curve? He’d bled that guitar sound from his soul. Why had he wanted this woman’s opinion? He didn’t know, but it seemed important.

  “Howls From A Blinding Curve, yes.” She poured more wine. “Again, great guitar. A build up that feels as though you’re waiting for an explosion, and…”

  “And what?”

  “And nothing. It promises but it doesn’t deliver.” She must have seen something in his face because she added quickly, “Look, Vic, it’s nearly a great song. I’m not completely cut off from the rest of the planet. I know that insipid electro-pop played by pretty boy-girl clones passes for contemporary music. It’s limp, it’s flat, it’s without vitality. And I know the electric guitar has been emasculated; reduced to a limp rhythm instrument. In the sixties Hendrix liberated the guitar, he made what had been an electrically amplified guitar into the electric guitar—a completely different instrument. He brought it to life, he made it sing its own song.” She sipped at her wine. “And believe me you’ve got the potential to do the same. But… but it’s as if there’s something in the way, a barrier between being talented and being, well, brilliant.”

  “My God…” Vic sounded bitter. “An artistic hymen. And all I have to do is bust my way through?” What hurt most was that Vic knew she was right. Sure, Nighthouse were shit-hot, and a contract waited just around the corner — it had to. But they lacked some unidentifiable, though vital, component. Like a bundle of gelignite, all it needed was the spark. But where was that spark?

  As they talked Vic began to feel over warm. It occurred to him that it must be the wine, stronger than it tasted. He glanced about the room. It looked the same; row of electric guitars, big amps humming softly, the pictures of Hendrix. But—he couldn’t place it—but everything looked different somehow. He blinked. And the wall, ever so slightly rippled.

  It happened again, flexing as if made from soft plastic. He shook his head and forced himself to make conversation, anything, to concentrate his mind. The meal? The casserole?

  “Nice meal. The mushrooms tasted different,” he said as the room tilted, “are they marinated?”

  She looked at him, raising her eyebrow. “Mushrooms?”

  “Yeah. They’re spicy.” He held up a black spongy morsel on his fork.

  “I didn’t have any mushrooms… there’s none in there.”

  As the realisation slammed into his brain, a fire seemed to catch light in his stomach. “Tufty!” He jumped up. “Tufty. The moron…”

  “What is it?” asked Sandy, quite startled.

  “I’ll be right back.” He ran downstairs and out into the night air, but that was too warm to help.

  “Ah…” He swallowed. “The stupid bastard.”

  He now blinked continually, trying to squeeze the coloured lights from his eyes. Even though it was dark, shining pools of silver light materialized to illuminate a tree or a clump of weeds. It lit the van, the path to the flat, the blind face of the quarry grinning down at Vic… silly old Vic…

 
; The whistling started. A note of triumph.

  Vic shook his head, pull yourself together, keep a grip. He made it to the flat.

  Tufty sat with his feet on the sofa, the stolen bottle of gin in his hands. He chuckled drunkenly. “Hey, wanna party?” He sucked at the bottle. “Mr Hendrix is coming home, yippee!”

  “You bloody cretin! I… I know what you’ve done, you’ve spiked the food.” Vic plucked a black stalk from the plastic bag at Tufty’s side. “Jesus Christ. What’s this?”

  Tufty sighed melodramatically. “God, you’re boring when you’re sober. Join the party! Or… or haven’t you finished screwing our Miss Kitson yet?”

  “Do you know, hey Tufty… do you know what these are?”

  Tufty, grinning idiotically, tried unsuccessfully to reach one. “M-m-magic mushrooms.”

  Vic’s voice rose. “They’re not. These are toadstools. You… you’ve fuckin’ well poisoned us!”

  Tufty never even heard him. The huge grin vanished as if it’d been switched off by remote control. The bottle slipped from his fingers to glug out its contents onto the carpet and he clasped his hands to his shaven head. “Jesus… oh Jesus. I feel rough.”

  “Tufty… Tufty. You’ve got to bring it up. Look, it’s poison.” By this time the pain in Vic’s stomach had flared up like a personalised chunk of hellfire burning in his gut.

  Outside, the whistling grew louder.

  Vic saw that Tufty was losing control. He had to vomit—they both had to. Abruptly, Tufty jumped to his feet as if yanked by an invisible rope, pushed Vic back into a chair, then raced from the fiat. Vic followed, willing his legs to carry him.

  ‘Tufty! For Christsake, get yourself back here!”

  Outside, Vic looked around wildly. No Tufty, but approaching through the trees came a dark figure. It resembled—

  Impossible!

  The poison from the toadstools dissolving in his stomach hit his brain; the sky turned from black to bloody red. Hang on, Vic old son, hang on.

  Then he saw Tufty heading unsteadily toward the back of the house. Vic ran, he seemed to be crossing the grass at a tremendous pace, but a whole minute must have passed before he reached the rear of the house and the silted up swimming pool.

  The swimming pool… surface slime bubbled. Beneath it something stirred and the slime began to take form, shaped by something pressing upwards from its murky depths. Faces. Like kids pulling sheets across their changing expressions, leaving only the shapes of noses, mouths, foreheads in the fabric. Vic saw faces (and blisters, oh, tight little blisters) pressing up against the slime—

  noses and mouths and eyes

  —and a hundred dead rock stars, oh yes, yes.

  A volcano burnt and rumbled in his belly.

  (They’re singing our song again, clicked a voice in his ear, ear-ear, oh my…)

  One two three:

  …whistle, whistle, you mothers of darkness

  you sisters of pain

  Whistle oh WHISTLE…

  The lawn flexed and rippled, a green ocean beneath his blundering feet.

  …with joy in our hearts

  we part your soul from its flesh

  with our

  HOWLS FROM A BLINDING CURVE!

  He ran into a body lying on the grass. Tufty.

  Vic tried to shake the loud whistling from his head. “Keep a grip,” he said under his breath. His head throbbed and his mouth tasted like he’d licked clean every urinal in Clydeside. With an effort, he pulled Tufty to his feet until they were face to face. Tufty wobbled, but seemed capable of standing.

  “Listen… you’ve got to puke,” panted Vic, “it’s poison, it’s—” With a nervous lurch of his stomach, Vic realised that Tufty wasn’t looking at him, but something behind—and above—his shoulder. He wanted to turn and look, but couldn’t take his eyes away from Tufty’s face. That look. Sheer horror.

  And the loud breathing which filled his ears wasn’t his own, it wasn’t Tufty’s, it came from behind. Not a constant exhale, inhale, exhale, but an irregular rasping, punctuated by sudden, excited snorts.

  Louder, louder. And he felt a cold breath of air on his neck; air which smelt of—

  In a single spasmodic movement, he twisted to face… the poacher?

  But he knew as surely as the toadstool poisoned his body it would be no mortal poacher.

  When his brain interpreted the image sent by his eyes an intense emotion hit him. Fear? Terror? Horror? He didn’t know. All he did know was that he stood face to face with—not a ghost—no, a shockingly solid figure. Not for a million pounds would he, but if he’d been crazy he could have reached out and touched it

  Man-shaped. The creature reared out of the shadow. Hairless, its head gleamed faintly in the house lights, its yellow eyes fixed on Vic. The enormous head was the size of a stallion’s and as white as an egg. Its skull appeared far too big for the skin, tightly stretched across the heavy jaw, flattened nose and cheek bones, which were close to bursting through the flesh. Thick grey veins ran worm-like under the skin of its bull neck and broad forehead. The mouth, running across the face in a red slash, twitched, then its lips pulled into a tight crimson circle. It began to whistle.

  Vic didn’t know exactly what happened but his poisoned brain chose attack rather than retreat. He lunged at the beast, fists windmilling savagely.

  He might as well have punched at a gorilla.

  When he opened his eyes his face was pressed to the earth, the breath driven from his lungs by the numbing concussion. Then came shouting. Tufty fired a blistering salvo of insults at the creature as it walked toward the house. When that failed he leapt and, wrapping his arms round its huge head, clung to its back like a monkey.

  Shrugging Tufty off effortlessly, it tossed him into the pool, where he fell with a thick plop. Then, arms casually swinging loose at its side, it strode confidently in the direction of the house.

  Vic pulled Tufty coughing and vomiting from the slime of the pool. Then, pausing only to ensure that Tufty wouldn’t lie back and choke on his own puke (the vision of Hendrix lying back in that London ambulance one night in 1970, slowly suffocating on his own vomit, now burnt in fire inside Vic’s head) he ran to the front door of the house.

  “Christ… Sandy…” he panted. The twin front doors had been burst inward, ripping the wood like balsa.

  The whistling. It came from the house—inside.

  Before Vic ran inside, some impulse made him look up the avenue of trees, to see another figure in the wood; this time dark, shadowy. Jesus help us, thought Vic, if there are two of them. He entered the house through the smashed doors, then sprinted upstairs to the large upper room.

  He stopped. The whistling echoed thinly, monotonously, about the room. Sandy lay on the floor; the monstrous white beast squatted on her chest casually poking its fingers into her eyes like a child pokes a stick into sand. Sandy lay still, completely unconscious.

  When the creature saw Vic it leered grotesquely before turning contemptuously, its vast white back to him. Then it began to run its thick, raw sausage fingers through her hair, never pausing in whistling its morbid dirge.

  The first weapon to reach Vic’s hands was the white Strat. Enraged, he swung it like an axe at the creature’s head.

  The heavy guitar never made contact.

  Leisurely, the creature flicked Vic away with a sweep of its long arm, sending him crashing flat on his back.

  The guitar, still plugged to the live amp, landed across his legs, and with nothing to dampen the vibrating strings, the sound from the amps rumbled on until by the time Vic had sat up, a slight whine of feedback began to climb through the discordant sound.

  Instantly, the creature stopped torturing (dead?) Sandy, shook its head and rubbed its tiny ears as if the sound irritated it.

  Vic didn’t waste a second. Before the creature could move, he snatched up the guitar, scrambled to the amps, turned the volume to full, hit the over-drive pedal and heard the speakers crack. The amps
buzzed as the juice coursed through them.

  The creature looked up. Its yellow eyes glared with tarantula malice; fury contorted its face and the mouth curled into a snarl.

  Vic felt the energy flow through the guitar in his hands; it seemed to come alive; to become something animate that sensed the awesome energies at its command. As the creature tensed, ready to spring, Vic hit the first note.

  So loud he didn’t hear it but felt it, the great avalanche of sound swept from the amps to crack windows and bring flakes of paint and plaster swirling from the ceiling. His head spun as he felt a great surge of power, of exultation, erupt within him.

  The creature clutched at its head, its ferocious expression dissolving into a liquid mask of pain.

  Vic realised it must have been the toadstool that made him do it, but… he played. The fingers of one hand slipped up and down the neck while the fingers of the other hit the strings, wringing out a blistering volley of notes.

  As if it had been doused in petrol and set alight, the creature writhed in agony as the guitar howled and sang like some ancient spirit liberated at last.

  Vic played. He played until he felt he and the guitar had merged into one; until he didn’t so much play it as join his soul with it and fly across the heavens. The barrier was broken; spark met explosive and he was hurling out sounds he’d never even dreamt of before. It roared, building into crashing waves of sound which curled and broke into a spray of needle-sharp notes that speared the writhing monster and ran it through.

  At that point, Vic became aware of someone playing alongside him. Someone who played faster, higher, more sonorously, more lyrically—like some magic-man of old, inspiring his apprentice to greater, more daring heights.

  Then the dark figure he’d seen in the woods—it had to be—was at Vic’s side, unplugging the white Strat and shouldering the strap, carrying the guitar across its back like a rifle. Vic hadn’t the strength to fight another. But even as the thought entered his head it was superseded by another. This second figure was no enemy.

  The shadow-man went to the still twitching monster which lay like a huge, pale statue that had been toppled to the floor. Its dry mouth, as rough as sandpaper, gaped open. Vic wondered how the shadow-man would deliver the final death blow. Crush its skull? Snap its spine?