Creed by James Herbert

entrance.
    Spitting curses, he hauled himself up as the mob followed Nicholson along the pavement – followed him from the front, that is, for they hobbled backwards, snapping all the while, tripping over each other, but never losing their feet. Creed scrambled after them, then dodged between two parked cars, guessing the actor’s intention. Nicholson abruptly stepped off the kerb and, to the amazement of everybody, crossed the street. The diners watched the fuss from the large windows with equal amounts of disgust and amusement.
    There were no vehicles parked on the other side, so the photographers couldn’t understand what he was up to. Nevertheless, the change of direction allowed Creed to reel off some choice shots unhindered by the other lensmen.
    The pack swarmed after the star, but Creed hung back. He’d seen this trick of Nicholson’s a few years before.
    A car engine started up behind Creed. A Ford Scorpio began to move away from the kerbside. The photographer backed away from it as someone in the passenger seat leaned over and, with some difficulty, pushed open the rear door on the road side.
    Suddenly the movie star was hurtling across the street, his body aimed at the slow-moving car.
    Creed got shots of Nicholson running, then diving full length on to the back seat of the moving vehicle. It was a magnificent manoeuvre which left the photographers gawping.
    The Scorpio sped away leaving the pack mesmerized. A good few seconds went by before they scattered for their own transport.
    The idea had been to prevent the paparazzi from following and discovering which hotel he was staying in, and the ruse appeared to have worked, for the Scorpio’s rear lights were already disappearing round the corner of Stratton Street.
    Normally, Creed would have taken up the challenge; even if he lost the Scorpio, he could have whizzed around the top hotels in the locale in the hope of catching the car parked outside or nearby. Tonight, though, he felt he’d had enough. It’d been a long day and there were still other things to do before he could hit the sack. Maybe he was getting old. Maybe the thrill was beginning to fade. Maybe he didn’t give a fuck.
    Creed dropped that night’s film off at the Dispatch ’s processing lab and called it a night.
    Well, he thought he’d called it a night.

 

5
     
    Creed, his sleep disturbed, snuggled up closer to the pillow, pressing his face into its softness. A child might do the same with a teddy bear or favourite doll; in Creed’s case, the pillow substituted for the cushiony flesh of a woman. Occasionally he liked to sleep alone (and of late he’d had little choice), but generally he favoured the warmth of a female body next to him. He mumbled something that might have been quite rational in the dream he was still half involved in, then twisted in the bed, taking the pillow with him.
    His eyes flickered open.
    Light from a streetlamp further down the mews came in through the window, but it wasn’t much and certainly not enough to make sense of the objects in the room. The chair over which he’d hung his coat resembled one of the gravestones he’d so recently wandered among. A navy-blue dressing gown hanging on the open door could have been a figure watching over him. The tall wardrobe in one corner could well have been the entrance to a tomb. The ornaments on the mantel—
    He blinked twice, rapidly.
    His dressing gown lay over his feet on top of the duvet (his feet got cold at night in the winter when there wasn’t another body present to steal heat from). He lay on his back and looked towards the door without moving his head.
    He’d been mistaken: there was nothing there at all.
    He allowed his head to follow the movement of his eyes. He frowned in the dark. He was sure there had been . . . Dickhead. Obviously the dream hadn’t let go quickly enough, an image had lingered. Creed turned on to his side, bristle on his cheek scratching against the pillow’s fabric. That was