Composite Creatures, Caroline Hardaker [best ebook reader for laptop txt] 📗

on the handle of a paper knife. Bainbridge gasped, and he whispered, “Don’t hurt it.” Nyquist swore at him. Or tried to. Nothing made sense, not a single thought or word. Had he been poisoned? Was he hallucinating? Only one thing mattered now. He placed the blade against the tendril and started to slice into it. It was awkward using his left hand, and the thing was resilient, but eventually the knife did its work and the tendril snapped in two. Bainbridge groaned aloud. His wife looked on, her eyes turned at last to the scene before her, a lone silent member of the audience at an absurdist drama.

One section of the tendril was still wrapped around Nyquist’s fingers, but it was weaker now. He pulled it loose and threw it to the floor.

“I felt that.” He could speak again, after a fashion.

“What? You’re mumbling. I can’t hear you.”

Nyquist rubbed at the fingers of his hand. “When I cut into it, it really dug in. Holding on for dear life.” He grabbed the cup from Bainbridge’s hands, and examined the remaining half of the tendril. There was a green ooze seeping from the severed end.

“Is that blood?” Bainbridge asked.

“It’s green. Like sap.”

“So it is a plant then.” Bainbridge’s mood had changed again. He now looked like a man in a puzzle palace, trying to find his way out.

Nyquist put the cup down on the table. “I killed one half of it. But this section’s still alive. It’s like a worm that’s been cut in two.”

“You said it wasn’t a worm.”

“Well then, I don’t know…” Nyquist couldn’t finish the sentence. He tried to gather up the photographs, but his hands wouldn’t quite do what he asked of them.

“I’m sorry I can’t help you further,” Bainbridge said.

“I can taste it.”

“What?”

“That thing you put in my tea.” He steadied himself against the table’s edge.

“I didn’t put–”

“It’s nasty. Bitter. It tastes like…”

“Like what?”

“Like biting into a moth. Not that I’ve ever…”

Bainbridge grinned. “Oh, I’m sure the effects are temporary.”

“I don’t feel too good.”

“You see, I’m just trying to…”

“Yes?”

“To live my life. And to look after Hilda, that’s all.”

Nyquist felt sick in his stomach. “All I need is… all is need is information… relating to my father.” His body was slowing down.

“I’ve told you everything I know.”

He looked into Bainbridge’s face. “I’ve interviewed lots of men.” He had put on an act, forcing the words out. “Tougher guys than you.”

“You have?”

One last effort: “I know when someone’s lying.”

Hilda Bainbridge clapped her hands together, just the once.

The sound was shocking.

It set the budgerigar fluttering and chirping madly. It took Nyquist’s every last ounce of strength, just to stay upright. He looked at the woman in the armchair. She was staring at him intently, without a flicker of her eyelids. The room trembled.

One shiver, a second shiver.

He placed a hand against the wall, holding on.

Like so. Concentrate. You can…

The third shiver.

The budgie started to ring its little silver bell, over and over and over.