The Horror of the Crowford Empire Read online

  Ignoring him, Angie kept her gaze fixed on Susan.

  “What's wrong with you?” Susan sobbed. “Why aren't you helping us?”

  She waited, but something about Angie's expression was starting to make her feel deeply uncomfortable. She opened her mouth to beg her again to fetch someone, but in that moment she realized that she recognized the unusual quality in Angie's eyes. She told herself that she had to be wrong, yet at the same time she knew that what she was seeing couldn't possibly be a coincidence.

  And then, looking down, she saw that Angie's hands were covered in blood.

  “Babe, seriously,” Charlie said, putting an arm around Angie, “you really don't need to be here. This is, you know... grown-up stuff.”

  Angie's eyes narrowed slightly.

  “No,” Susan whispered, horrified by what she was seeing, “Angie, please...”

  “Get her out of here,” Charlie said to his two friends, “and try to call Roger one more time. I'd rather -”

  “Roger Bell is dead,” Angie said flatly, still staring at Susan.

  “What was that?” Charlie asked her. “Did you... I'm sorry, did you just say...”

  His voice trailed off.

  “It took a long time,” Angie continued, tilting her head slightly. “Thirty years, give or take, but the important thing is that he paid in the end.” She slowly turned to Charlie. “You should have seen the look on his face at the end,” she added. “In his very last moment, he knew exactly who was killing him. I even put on this nice old dress that I found at the golf club, just to complete the effect. I like to think that he died in absolute, abject terror.”

  “Okay, now you're freaking me out,” Charlie said, turning her around and gently pushing her away. “Go home, Angie. Get some sleep or whatever. If you've taken something new, wait until you come down off that high.”

  “It's not just about killing the man who ordered the fire all those years ago, though,” Angie replied, stopping with her back to him. “It's also about making sure that the same thing doesn't happen again. And again. And again...”

  “Angie,” Susan said cautiously, “if you can hear me -”

  “Angie's a good girl,” Angie replied, her voice sounding strangely blank as she slowly turned to look at Susan again. “Angie didn't resist, not like you resisted. Then again, I think I learned from you, Susan. My experience with you made me better at this.”

  “That's enough,” Charlie said, stepping over to her. “Babe, you -”

  Suddenly Angie grabbed him by the throat and squeezed hard, instantly forcing him down onto his knees.

  “Hey!” the two other guys shouted, rushing over to stop her. “Let go of -”

  Before they could finish, they both dropped to the floor as well, clutching their throats as if they too were being strangled by some invisible force.

  “This is so much easier than I expected,” Angie said with a growing smile, as she tightened her grip on Charlie's throat and watched him gasping for air. “I never dared dream that I could do such things. I should have got this over with sooner, but I thought I had to keep getting stronger. Now it appears that I could have made them all suffer years ago.”

  “What the hell's going on?” Sam asked. “What's wrong with your friend?”

  “I'm not sure how to explain,” Susan told him, as she struggled frantically to slip out of the ropes. “We need to get free! Fast!”

  “Do you think it's fun to die in a fire?” Angie asked Charlie as his face began to turn red. “Is that something that you'd be willing to do to someone on purpose? Are you really so utterly without character? Are you so callous?”

  “What's she talking about?” Sam stammered.

  “The ropes!” Susan snapped. “Hurry!”

  “There's already so much pain in the world,” Angie continued. “Why create more? Why bring suffering to this town, when you could just leave it all alone? I was an innocent woman, just waiting in the music hall to meet my sweetheart. I never hurt anyone. I was never cruel or angry or greedy, I was just living my life and trying to find a little happiness in this frantic world. And how was I repaid? I died in a fire set by people who just wanted to make more money. That's how little my life was worth.”

  Charlie tried to respond, but he couldn't get a word out as his eyes began to bulged from their sockets. Nearby, the two other men were also choking.

  “Stop!” Susan shouted. “Angie, I know you're in there! She can't make you do this! Angie, please, you have to let them go!”

  Chapter Thirty-Seven

  Suddenly Angie released her grip on Charlie's throat, letting him – and his two friends – slump down to the floor.

  “What's this?” Angie sneered. “A moment of rebellion?”

  She looked at her bloodied hands.

  “You're too weak to retake control, girl,” she continued. “Let me do what I must do, and then you can have your body back.”

  “Angie, listen to me,” Susan said as she finally managed to get her hands free from the ropes. “Angie, you can force her out. I know it's hard, but you can resist her. If I managed it, you sure as hell can. Once she realizes she can't use you like this, she'll leave you alone.”

  “She can hear you,” Angie sneered. “She just can't do anything about it. She's simply sobbing in a tiny corner of her own mind.”

  Behind her, the two other guys stumbled to their feet and ran out of the auditorium. Charlie, meanwhile, was still gasping for breath on the floor, even as Angie slowly looked back down at her.

  “You've got to fight her,” Susan said firmly, as she worked to free Sam from the ropes. “Angie, I know you're probably terrified, but I was terrified too and I found enough strength to stop her. You just have to remember who you are, and she'll have to leave you alone.”

  “I can't,” Angie sobbed, her face changing in a flash as fear filled her eyes. “Susan, I -”

  In an instant, she began to smile again.

  “This can all be over soon enough,” Angie continued, before looking down at Charlie as he tried to crawl toward the door. “This pathetic wretch's father was one of the people who burned the music hall all those years ago. Now look at him, following in his father's footsteps, determined to make a name for himself through corruption and greed. I won't allow that. They're all going to pay for what they did to me.”

  Suddenly Charlie slammed against the nearest row of seats, and then his body was sent crashing into the pile of petrol-soaked film reels.

  Reaching down, Angie picked up the lighter and stepped over to watch as Charlie struggled to sit up.

  “You can't do this!” Susan shouted, stepping forward before Sam grabbed her and held her back. “If you kill him, you're just as bad as them,” she continued, desperately trying to find some way to make her stop. “Is that what you want? Do you want to be dragged down to their level?”

  She watched as Angie held the flame above Charlie.

  “I know you're in there, Winifred,” Susan continued, “and I know that what happened to you hurts, but there's another way to get justice. We'll make sure that everyone knows the truth about your death, that they all know who was responsible for that fire.”

  She waited, and at last she began to think that she was getting through to her.

  “Becoming like them is not the answer,” Susan added. “If you killed Roger Bell tonight, then isn't that enough?”

  Angie stared down at Charlie, before slowly lowering the lighter.

  “That's better,” Susan told her. “You know I'm right.”

  “You stupid bitch!” Charlie snapped as he began to get to his feet, with petrol splashed across one side of his face from the reels. “What the hell's got into you, Angie? You're acting like a -”

  Screaming, Angie lunged at him and pushed him back down, while pressing the lighter against his cheek. Charlie immediately cried out as flames rushed up one side of his face, and then he pulled away and began to clamber across the pile of reels. More flames were rippling a
cross his shirt now, and Susan and Sam immediately raced over and tried to help him.

  “Are you insane?” Susan shouted, looking back over at Angie as more flames spread across the reels and began to consume the front row of seats. “You've done the one thing you came here to stop! You've done their work for them!”

  Racing over to the wall, she grabbed the fire extinguisher and then hurried back to use it on the flames. To her relief, she was able to stop the fire, although the fumes began to sting her nose and mouth and she quickly pulled away.

  “We have to get out of here,” she said, before starting to cough violently. “That stuff's toxic.”

  “No-one's going anywhere,” Angie sneered, as the doors swung shut at the far end of the auditorium, “until I've been served justice.”

  “What more do you want?” Susan shouted, as Sam tried to help Charlie up. “You're dead, Winifred! I know it's a tragedy, but how many more people have to die before you accept that it's time to rest?” She waited, but Angie merely stared at her. “You've got to stop now,” she continued. “Angie's my friend, and I know how she must be suffering right now. Please, I'm begging you, let her go. You killed the man who was responsible for what happened, and now the cinema's safe. Isn't that enough?”

  She waited.

  Angie hesitated, before finally furrowing her brow a little and then – in an instant – letting out a gasp and dropping to the floor.

  “Angie!” Susan shouted, racing over and supporting her. “Angie, say something! Can you hear me?”

  “I don't know what happened,” Angie stammered, struggling to sit up. “I went home to fetch some things, I was going to bring them to you in the hospital, and then...”

  She paused for a moment.

  “I went into the bathroom for a moment,” she continued, “and I happened to look at myself in the mirror, and something just seemed to rush into me. I don't remember anything after that.”

  “Probably for the best,” Susan muttered as she helped her up.

  “What are we doing here?” Angie asked, before starting to cough. “What's that smell? Did someone set fire to the cinema?”

  “I'll explain it all later,” Susan said, supporting her as they began to limp to the door. “To be honest, you're probably going to struggle to believe me.”

  Stopping, she looked back and saw that Sam was helping Charlie out. Badly burned on one side of his face, Charlie seemed barely able to stay conscious, but at least he was alive.

  “We've got to go!” Sam shouted. “The fumes from that extinguisher aren't good!”

  Together, they all managed to reach the door, only to find that it was firmly held shut. Susan tried several times to pull it open, before stepping back and looking around the empty auditorium.

  “Winifred!” she yelled. “It's over! You know that as well as any of us! I'm begging you to just let us go!”

  She waited, and after a few seconds the door shuddered and then began to creak open. As she helped Angie out into the corridor, Susan took a deep breath of relatively fresh air, and then she helped Angie to the foyer before gently settling her down onto the carpet. Nearby, Sam did the same with Charlie.

  “We need to call the police,” Susan said, before hurrying through to the office and grabbing the telephone. Once she was through, she asked for police and an ambulance, and then she set the phone down and turned to see that Sam had made his way through to join her.

  “I still don't entirely understand what happened here tonight,” he told her.

  “It's going to take a long time to explain.”

  “That wasn't really Winifred Thorpe back there, was it?” he continued. “Susan, seriously, tell me that your friend was just a little... high, or something.”

  “The police will never believe us,” she replied, and now her mind was racing as she realized that they'd have to explain not only the events at the cinema, but also whatever had happened at the golf course. What if someone had seen Angie kill Roger Bell? They'd never believe that she'd been possessed at the time. “We need to get our stories straight,” she continued, trying not to panic. “We need to make sure that they understand the truth.”

  “And how are we going to do that?” he asked.

  She hesitated, before shaking her head.

  “I don't know,” she said, as her voice trembled with fear. “Honestly, I have absolutely no idea.”

  “We'll figure something out,” he replied, putting his hands on the sides of her arms. “It's going to be pretty crazy for a while, but we'll get there in the end.”

  He hesitated, before leaning close and kissing her gently on the cheek. When she failed to pull away, he kissed her again, this time on the lips. The kiss lasted for a few seconds, until Susan finally stopped and looked up at him in the darkness. She could just about make out his features, and somehow she felt strangely comforted, as if deep down some part of her knew that everything was going to be okay.

  “We should get back out there,” she said, feeling a little embarrassed, unable to hide a faint smile as she began to blush. “You know, to check on the others.”

  “Absolutely,” he replied, “and then... when this is all over, we should go and grab another drink.”

  “I'd like that,” she told him, before glancing at the open door, “and -”

  Suddenly she froze as she saw Winifred Thorpe's ghostly figure standing out in the foyer.

  Chapter Thirty-Eight

  “What do you want?” Susan asked, stepping back out of the office.

  Looking down, she saw that Angie and Charlie were unconscious on the floor. She turned to Winifred, but the dead woman simply stared back at her.

  “It's over,” Susan told her, as she noticed the temperature dipping in the room.

  “It's never going to be over,” Winifred sneered. “I see that now. I always believed that killing Roger Bell and stopping another tragedy would be enough, but I was wrong. The truth is, they're not the ones I was angry with, not really.”

  “I don't understand,” Susan replied, as Sam stopped next to her. “It's over, you -”

  “Stop saying that!” Winifred snapped angrily. “It's not over, because the people of this town haven't paid for what happened to me! The ones who started the fire in the music hall are only the first to be punished. The rest of this town let my death go, they didn't even bother to investigate properly! I shouldn't have had to come back and bring my killers to justice! The people of Crowford should have done that, but they didn't and now I'm going to make them all pay!”

  “You can't punish the entire town,” Susan told her.

  “Every single person who let my killers walk free must pay,” Winifred told her. “And the ones who tolerated it, too. Every weak, accepting fool who chose an easy life instead of asking the difficult questions, every person who preferred not to think about the truth, must answer for their crimes. There's not a soul in this town who doesn't bear some responsibility for supporting a system in which my killers were allowed to go free.” She took a step forward. “I will not rest until they have all seen the errors of their ways.”

  “Please,” Susan replied, “don't -”

  Suddenly she felt a tight choking sensation in her throat. Reaching up, she grabbed her neck and tried to find some way to breathe, but after a moment she dropped down to her knees.

  “You'll be the first to pay,” Winifred snarled, staring down at her with contempt. “You could have helped me and you chose to fight back. You're culpable, just like all the rest.”

  “Leave her alone!” Sam shouted, rushing toward Winifred. “She's done -”

  Before he could get another word out, Winifred sent him crashing across the room until he slammed into the far wall with a sickening thud.

  Looking over in horror, Susan watched as Sam's body slumped to the floor, and then she turned back to Winifred. Clawing desperately at her own throat in an attempt to escape from the invisible grip, she could only manage a faint choking sound as she tried to beg for me
rcy. After a few more seconds, rolling down onto her side, she reached over toward Sam, only to see that he still hadn't moved since hitting the wall. She tried to crawl over to him, but even this was beyond her as she felt her throat starting to collapse. Reaching up, she tried to pull invisible fingers away from her neck.

  “Winifred, stop this at once.”

  Instantly, the pressure on her throat ended and Susan rolled onto her front as she gasped for air. For a moment, gasping for air, she could barely even register the fact that she'd recognized the voice that had just spoken. Even when she understood where she'd heard the voice before, she still took a few more seconds to realize that she couldn't possibly have heard it again.

  Slowly, she turned and saw another figure standing in the foyer, a little way back from Winifred.

  “This is not you,” Harry Gough said, his ghostly features seeming very pale in the light. “The Winifred Thorpe I knew and loved was a happy, generous woman.”

  Keeping her back to him, Winifred stared straight ahead with tears in her eyes.

  “Not a day has gone by that I haven't blamed myself for your death,” Harry continued. “If I hadn't been late to meet you that night, you wouldn't have been lingering in the hall, and you wouldn't have been caught in the fire.”

  “I was wearing that dress you always loved,” Winifred replied, and now her voice was trembling with sorrow.

  “By the time I got there, it was too late,” Harry explained. “After the hall was rebuilt as this cinema, I began to work here because I hoped that I might see you.”

  “I've been here all along,” she told him. “You never even looked at me.”

  “I think I was too scared to admit the truth,” he replied. “Every time I sensed you, I forced myself to look away. I wanted to see you so badly, yet I was terrified to actually look at you. Can you ever forgive me, Winnie, old thing?”