The Dark Frontier A. Decker (i like reading TXT) 📖

alone. Gathering overhead was a whole murder of crows with sinister design. And the sky turned black with their menace.

If only he had looked up…

But he kept moving at the same slow pace, and – just as the black squadrons were making their descent to inflict the first vicious tweaks on the side of his neck, drawing blood – his dogged motion down the road was abruptly swallowed by the tunnel of trees. The hunter crows veered away. For a moment he appeared to be reprieved.

From somewhere in the distance the yapping of a dog became audible.

As Frank surfaced for a brief instant, he eased open his eyes and caught the gloom of the afternoon through the hotel window. Heard a dog barking on the street outside. And fell back into sleep.

The tunnel was short and curved to the right before it began to let in light from the other end. Even at his slow pace it was not long before the silhouette of the man showed up against the blank wall of the customs house at the end of the tunnel. Just the other side of the trees.

The building appeared lifeless. And the traveller paid it no attention as he continued on his path. Past a shutter on the house that swung helplessly in the wind. Every now and then, driven by a sudden gust, the shutter would smash with a crack like gunfire on the wall. Swing back, then smack again against the brick. An unnerving reminder that no storm has respect for borders.

No one challenged him as he passed the barrier. Only the starting drizzle had anything to say. He was already some way past the border when a figure with the look of a customs officer emerged from the doorway of the building, draped in a grey cloak that matched the sombreness of the clouds. Hidden by the foliage of the trees, the yapping dog could still be heard.

The shutter smacked against the wall again, louder this time, and echoed away through the woods. A large patch of the rendering around the window had been pared off by the shutter to reveal naked red brickwork, which glistened slightly where streaks of rain had splashed across its bruised, indurated flesh. The customs man paid no attention to the banging shutter. It was not his concern. It swung its senseless rhythm on the other side of the house. In another country. Across the border. What worried him was the sky – by now a dark uniform grey above his head, leaden with its imminent deluge. He cocked his head diffidently at the brewing storm. Blinked slightly as a raindrop caught him in the eye. And turned his gaze on the slowly diminishing form of the overdressed pedestrian in the black homburg hat.

The shutter smacked against the wall. Bang. The man in the homburg hat stopped and turned his head. Looked back just briefly at the customs house. Bang. Then again. Bang. In quick succession. But even louder now. The crack this time reverberated through the low-slung clouds, which seemed to take this as their cue. They opened the hatch and let the storm finally run its course.

The black homburg hat, already glistening wet, rolled erratically over the camber of the road and came to a halt in the gutter. The two suitcases had found their rest instantaneously beside the slumped figure. They lay now half-concealed by his coat. A small dark crater between the eyes lay exposed to the downpour. A hole quite unremarkable, except for the trickle of blood that ran a steadily dilute path down the neck and mingled with the rain. The only suggestion of life that remained in the crumpled heap was nothing more than movement created by reflections of light on the blood and rainwater coursing over the blanched skin and the folds and furls of the huge coat, where the water quickly gathered in pathetic small black reservoirs.

From the undergrowth of the trees, a mangy collied mongrel, limping heavily on one of its hind legs, trotted over to the scene and sniffed around the fur collar of the man’s coat. The customs officer blinked the rain out of his eyes and cast his gaze towards the amorphous mass that lay some 500 metres down the road. Across the border. On the other side. It had not happened on his patch. It was no concern of his. He stood in the incessant teeming downpour and stared at the body on the side of the road. Only the rain seeped a way into his consciousness. Only the water got through to him. It was cold and wet. He shivered slightly as it made its presence felt down the back of his neck. Was there anything he could have done to prevent this? Could I not go back? Frank asked, briefly surfacing again to wipe the sweat from his brow with the pillow.

That was long past. A trickle of rain ran down the neck. It felt cold. And he glanced again at the crumpled figure, wet and motionless in the road. For an instant, the soaked black bundle appeared in close-up. The right side of the face, where blood had flowed, had taken on the cold white look of marble where it had been washed clean by the rain. The haemorrhage had long since ceased. And the hole now gaped as large as life.

The irony nourished an urge to smile, and brought a sense of relief. It was a dream after all, Frank told himself. But he also knew that the soaking shirt and the trickles of water over his face told another story. He ran his fingers over the buckled bridge of his nose. Explored the unevenness of the dent. Recalled his father’s words: “Shot between the eyes at birth”. And then another familiar voice:

“Aber was tun?”

Frank was still struggling to free himself from the dream…

Uneasy pangs of conscience gave way to panic. The familiarity of the sheet-white face. Seeing suddenly that it