Demon's Door by Graham Masterton

Author:Graham Masterton [Masterton, Graham]
Language: eng
Format: epub
Tags: Horror, Fiction, Suicide Victims, Rook; Jim (Fictitious Character), Supernatural, English Teachers, Horror Fiction, Korean Students, Psychics, Occult & Supernatural
Publisher: Severn House
Published: 2010-01-01T05:00:00+00:00

T.D. said, with exaggerated seriousness, ‘You know somethin’, sir. There just ain’t no answer to that.’

Jim closed the book. ‘Maybe it doesn’t seem like it, not at first. But then maybe there is.’

‘Seems to me like there’s two too many horizons,’ put in Teddy.

‘That’s a good point,’ said Jim. ‘What Vasiliev is saying, in effect, is that we can never reach the horizon, no matter how far we travel. It’s always beyond our reach. It’s very short, this poem, and it’s very simple, but it raises all kinds of fascinating questions about the way we see our lives unfolding, and the way we think of time passing us by, and the way we relate to other people.’

‘I think it’s really sad,’ said Janice.

‘Yes,’ said Jim. ‘It’s quite a lonely poem, isn’t it? It has an overwhelming sense of loss. You feel that the love of Vasiliev’s life has disappeared, and he’s not at all sure that he’s ever going to be able to find her again.’

The bell rang. Jim said, ‘OK . . . we’ll talk about this some more tomorrow. Meanwhile, I want you to think about other things that affect us but we can’t control. Like the weather, for instance.’

‘Or growing older,’ said Kim.

‘Yes, Kim. Like growing older.’

He went into the Cat’n’Fiddle for a drink before he returned home. He sat up at the bar, loosened his necktie and ordered a bottle of Fat Tire. He was served by the same bartender who had served him yesterday evening, but then he wasn’t at all sure that he had really been here yesterday evening. Even if he had, the barman seemed to have forgotten that he had stiffed him out of a tip, because he was friendly and chatty and pushed a large bowl of complimentary pretzels across the bar.

‘You teach, don’t you?’ asked the bartender.

‘That’s right. English.’

‘English? Like Shakespeare, right?’

‘Sure. Some Shakespeare.’

‘I always wanted to be an actor, you know. I mean that’s why I came out to Hollywood in the first place. I was an extra in War Of The Worlds, with Tom Cruise. I had to run down the street and get melted by the Martians. Then Portal Pictures were doing this remake of a Korean horror flick, and I got a walk-on part as a doorman. I even had a couple of lines of dialog.’

‘That’s great,’ said Jim. ‘That’s very good. What were they?’

‘Excuse me? What were what?’

‘The lines. The lines you had in this Korean horror flick.’

‘Oh! I had to stop this woman going through this door and say, “You really don’t want to go any further, ma’am. You don’t want to go through this door, I promise you.”’

‘That was it?’

‘Yes. But I had to say them real meaningful. Like, I had to give the impression that if she decided to go through the door, she’d be in real serious shit, if you know what I mean.’

‘What was it called?’ Jim asked him.

‘What was what called?’

‘The Korean horror flick. What was it called?’

The bartender shrugged.

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