Three Mile Drove, Chapter Fifteen (standard:horror, 1430 words) [16/29] show all parts
Author: Brian Cross	Added: Apr 21 2007	Views/Reads: 2833/1990	Part vote: 0.00 (0 votes)
serialisation of a completed story involving a faded pop musician who inherits a smallholding in the English fens. There is far more going on in Three Mile Drove than initially meets the eye.

Click here to read the first 75 lines of the story

anything.' He sighed, wishing for all the world he could light the 
cigarette he knew she would vehemently object to. ‘I think I know you 
well enough to discount you on that score, I'm just trying to persuade 
you to tell me all you know, to emphasise the importance of it all. You 
see they won't take me seriously enough at headquarters to warrant a 
full-scale search of the area. They're obsessed with budgets these new 
chiefs, and to them the wilderness of the fens doesn't warrant taking a 
quart from a ten gallon tank. Can you see what I'm getting at? I need 
to prove to them...' 

‘Listen to me Tim,' she said, a noticeable impatience in her voice now,
‘if the police won't take you seriously then why should I. I think it's 
getting late, don't you?' 

McPherson felt as angry as he could ever recall, if he'd thought there
would be any point in trying to drag the information out of her, at 
this point in time he would be sorely tempted to do so. 

Claire was concealing something, why the hell wouldn't she open up?
Besides, it didn't add up, she was a strong woman, he could rule out 
fear being the cause of her reticence. And yet her stubbornness might 
be holding the case back, holding him back. 

McPherson glared at her in stony silence before turning away, hurling
the door open and sweeping down the drive. 

*                                     * 

She stood motionless on the step, relieved to see him go, his whole
stance had become one of aggression, she'd seen a side of him in those 
last few minutes that she never would have believed had she not 
witnessed his outrage first hand. He'd been visibly trembling with 
anger, she'd thought for a moment he'd been within an inch of going for 
her, but whether or not she'd have been able to fight him off it 
wouldn't have changed anything – not a thing. 

She slammed the door shut a lot more firmly than was her norm, but then,
despite her own anger with McPherson her thoughts switched quickly to 
Darren. She'd seen his mood change the moment he'd spotted McPherson on 
the doorstep. In a single second he'd seemed to change from a friendly, 
amiable man, into a jealous, resentful suitor. She liked Darren 
Goldwater, in truth she liked him a lot, and she'd liked to think that 
such, childish, brainless reaction was beneath him. But was it? Had she 
just witnessed the male “thing” raising its ugly, jealous head again, 
because if she had, then that would be a crying shame. 

She abhorred the concept. The possessive entity. Darren, she had been
sure, did not have that weakness in him. Had she been wrong? 

* 

Darren couldn't remember much about the drive back to his hotel. If
there had been any close call, any serious demands upon his driving 
skills along the way, his reacts would have been unable to cope. 

He was gutted. It was as though emotional steel, the size of a sabre,
had pierced clean through his mind. He wasn't just unable to think 
straight, to concentrate on his driving for a few simple, bone-headed 
moments until he reached the hotel, and then let his mind return to its 
pointless, image-ridden swirl, he wasn't able to think at all. 

He'd suspected there was more between McPherson and Claire than met the
eye, and the sight of McPherson standing on the front porch like a 
worried father had made his blood boil. He'd struggled to control his 
emotions but in the end he'd failed. 

Why hadn't she told him they were more than just friends? Now, as he sat
glassy eyed in his room, the whirlwind of useless thought that swept 
around his head cleared for a moment, and he could see the reason why 
she shouldn't have to reveal anything to him. She shouldn't have to, 
because in any case what were he and Claire? Nothing other than 
friends. 

What had made it unacceptable to him was the realisation that she was
the single, decent woman he'd ever known. She'd impressed him so much 
and he'd fallen for her totally. 

He felt sick. And right now he felt sick to death of the whole desolate
place. 

What had it brought him other than trouble? 


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