Collected Short Stories Read online

  With each bend Diana was able to gain a little time as the van continued to lurch from side to side, unfamiliar with the road, but she never managed a clear break of more than a few seconds. She checked the speedometer. From the turnoff on the main road to the farm was just over five miles, and she must have covered about two by now. She began to watch each tenth of a mile clicking up, terrified at the thought of the van overtaking her and forcing her into the ditch. She stuck determinedly to the center of the road.

  Another mile passed, and still he clung to her. Suddenly she saw a car coming toward her. She switched her headlights to full and pressed on the horn. The other car retaliated by mimicking her actions, which caused her to slow down and brush against the hedgerow as they shot past each other. She checked the speedometer once again. Only two miles to go.

  Diana would slow down and then speed up at each familiar bend in the road, making sure the van was never given enough room to pull up with her. She tried to concentrate on what she should do once the farmhouse came into sight. She reckoned that the drive leading up to the house must be about half a mile long. It was full of potholes and bumps that Daniel had often explained he couldn’t afford to have repaired. But at least it was only wide enough for one car.

  The gate to the driveway was usually left open for her, though on the odd rare occasion Daniel had forgotten, and she’d had to get out of the car and open it for herself. She couldn’t risk that tonight. If the gate was closed, she would have to travel on to the next town and stop outside the Crimson Kipper, which was always crowded at this time on a Friday night, or, if she could find it, at the steps of the local police station. She checked her gas gauge again. It was now touching red. “Oh my God,” she said, realizing she might not have enough gas to reach the town.

  She could only pray that Daniel had remembered to leave the gate open.

  She swerved out of the next bend and speeded up, but once again she managed. to gain only a few yards, and she knew that within seconds he would be back in place. He was. For the next few hundred yards they remained within feet of each other, and she felt certain he had to run into the back of her. She didn’t once dare to touch her brakes—if they crashed in that lane, far from any help, she would have no hope of getting away from him.

  She checked her speedometer. A mile to go.

  “The gate must be open. It must be open,” she prayed. As she swung around the next bend, she could make out the outline of the farmhouse in the distance. She almost screamed with relief when she saw that the lights were on in the downstairs rooms.

  She shouted, “Thank God!” then remembered the gate again, and changed her plea to “Dear God, let it be open.” She would know what needed to be done as soon as she came around the last bend. “Let it be open, just this once,” she pleaded. “I’ll never ask for anything again, ever.” She swung round the final bend only inches ahead of the black van. “Please, please, please.” And then she saw the gate.

  It was open.

  Her clothes were now drenched in sweat. She slowed down, wrenched the transmission into second, and threw the car between the gap and into the bumpy driveway, hitting the gatepost on her right-hand side as she careered on up toward the house. The van didn’t hesitate to follow her, and was still only inches behind as she straightened out. Diana kept her hand pressed down on the horn as the car bounced and lurched over the mounds and potholes.

  Flocks of startled crows flapped out of overhanging branches, screeching as they shot into the air. Diana began screaming, “Daniel! Daniel!” Two hundred yards ahead of her, the porch light went on.

  Her headlights were now shining onto the front of the house, and her hand was still pressed on the horn. With a hundred yards to go, she spotted Daniel coming out of the front door, but she didn’t slow down, and neither did the van behind her. With fifty yards to go she began flashing her lights at Daniel. She could now make out the puzzled, anxious expression on his face.

  With thirty yards to go she threw on her brakes. The heavy car skidded across the gravel in front of the house, coming to a halt in the flower bed just below the kitchen window. She heard the screech of brakes behind her. The leather-jacketed man, unfamiliar with the terrain, had been unable to react quickly enough, and as soon as his wheels touched the graveled forecourt he began to skid out of control. A second later the van came crashing into the back of her car, slamming it against the wall of the house and shattering the glass in the kitchen window.

  Diana leaped out of the car screaming, “Daniel! Get a gun, get a gun!” She pointed back at the van. “That bastard’s been chasing me for the last twenty miles!”

  The man jumped out of the van and began limping toward them. Diana ran into the house. Daniel followed and grabbed a shotgun, normally reserved for rabbits, that was leaning against the wall. He ran back outside to face the unwelcome visitor, who had come to a halt by the back of Diana’s Audi.

  Daniel raised the shotgun to his shoulder and stared straight at him. “Don’t move or I’ll shoot,” he said calmly. And then he remembered that the gun wasn’t loaded. Diana ducked back out of the house but remained several yards behind him.

  “Not me! Not me!” shouted the leather-jacketed youth, as Rachael appeared in the doorway.

  “What’s going on?” she asked nervously.

  “Call the police,” was all Daniel said, and his wife quickly disappeared back into the house.

  Daniel advanced toward the terrified-looking young man, the gun aimed squarely at his chest.

  “Not me! Not me!” he shouted again, pointing at the Audi. “He’s in the car!” He quickly turned to face Diana. “I saw him get in when you were parked on the hard shoulder. What else could I have done? You just wouldn’t pull over.”

  Daniel advanced cautiously toward the rear door of the car and ordered the young man to open it slowly, while he kept the gun aimed at his chest.

  The youth opened the door and quickly took a pace backward. The three of them stared down at a man crouched on the floor of the car. In his right hand he held a long-bladed knife with a serrated edge. Daniel swung the barrel of the gun down to point at him but said nothing.

  The sound of a police siren could just be heard in the distance.

  OLD LOVE

  Some people, it is said, fall in love at first sight, but that was not what happened to William Hatchard and Philippa Jameson. They hated each other from the moment they met. This mutual loathing commenced at the first tutorial of their freshman term. Both had arrived in the early thirties with major scholarships to read English language and literature, William at Merton, Philippa at Somerville. Each had been reliably assured by their schoolteachers that they would be the star pupil of their year.

  Their tutor, Simon Jakes of New College, was both bemused and amused by the ferocious competition that so quickly developed between his two brightest pupils, and he used their enmity skillully to bring out the best in both of them without ever allowing either to indulge in outright abuse. Philippa, an attractive, slim redhead with a rather high-pitched voice, was the same height as William, so she conducted as many of her arguments as possible standing in newly acquired high-heeled shoes, while William, whose deep voice had an air of authority, would always try to expound his opinions from a sitting position. The more intense their rivalry became, the harder the one tried to outdo the other. By the end of their first year they were far ahead of their contemporaries while remaining neck and neck with each other. Simon Jakes told the Merton professor of Anglo-Saxon Studies that he had never had a brighter pair up in the same year and that it wouldn’t be long before they were holding their own with him.

  During the long vacation both worked to a grueling timetable, always imagining the other would be doing a little more. They stripped bare Blake, Wordsworth, Coleridge, Shelley, Byron, and went to bed only with Keats. When they returned for the second year, they found that absence had made the heart grow even more hostile; and when they were both awarded A-plus for their essays o