The Midnight Hour by Neil Davies Page A

the consequences.”
    If there was a moment of fear, of doubt, in Baphomet he did not show it. He simply smiled and shook his head almost sadly.
    “I regret, Lord Satan, that the only consequence of this meeting will be the rapid cooling and eventual dying of the boilers. As of tomorrow morning the Stokers of Hell are on strike!”
     
    The walls no longer dripped with flame. Patches burnt sporadically, fizzed into existence and then died. A bleak and sharply chilled atmosphere had settled over the throne room in the two months since the Stokers’ strike had begun.
    Satan sat on his throne, angry, unsure, perhaps even a little confused. He had tried everything, short of capitulation, to bring this strike to a close. True, he had not actually sent the Legions against the strikers, but he had threatened it. He had threatened everything he could think of and yet Baphomet and his followers remained unmoved.
    Baphomet!
    It didn’t matter how long you kept them here, or what you called them, humans were trouble. He would much rather deal with demons any day.
    He sat back and drummed his fingers on the carved demon head. He had run out of ideas, other than to give in. He didn’t know whether he could bring himself to perform that particular humiliation.
    Deep in the bowels of Hell the boilers were cold, the fires of Hell flickering out all over the reality. And far above, on the surface of the planet Earth, the next great ice age advanced on humanity.
     

PHOTOGRAPHS
     
     
    “I don’t remember you.”
    Karen peered at the photograph pinned to the corkboard. She reached behind her, fingers pushing through the papers, pens and rolls of undeveloped film that cluttered her desk until she found what she was looking for. She lifted the magnifying glass to her eye.
    “Now why don’t I remember you?”
    The photograph, one she had taken several weeks ago, showed a simple beach scene. Sand, water, people in swimming costumes. And standing off to one side, where she surely wouldn’t have missed him, a tall, slim man in what looked like a double-breasted, black business suit. Most unusual was the wide-brimmed hat tugged low over his eyes. Not quite a cowboy hat. In fact, unlike any hat she had ever seen before. It was black, tall, conical, with that wide, stiff brim.
    She remembered the day, bright and hot. She had been wearing a sleeveless top and shorts, her shoulder length black hair tied back away from her face, and had still been too hot. Had she noticed a man in a business suit and that hat on the beach she would have focussed on him, made him the centrepiece of the photograph. The sheer strangeness of the picture would have made it fascinating. As it was, she had been disappointed when it was developed. It was a nice reminder of a sunny day, but it had no artistic merit. She had pinned it to the corkboard in her office for her private memories.
    If she now reframed it, making this strange man more of a feature, she might yet make something worthwhile of the shot. She peered closer through the glass. Pity the face, what could be seen of it beneath the brim of the hat, was out-of-focus.
    Strange that, how the suit and hat seemed so sharp and defined and yet the face was blurred?
    I still don’t understand how I could have missed him.
     
    “One of these days I’m going to get to use that precious camera of yours!”
    Karen smiled, knew her friend Jackie was at least half-joking, but nevertheless placed a protective hand over the camera on the cafe table between them.
    “Sorry, for my use only.”
    “I can’t help thinking that it’s your relationship with that camera that gets in the way of you and men.”
    “At least my camera doesn’t lie to me and betray me.”
    Jackie shook her head, smiling, and took a sip of her Espresso.
    “You’re 26 years old, almost two years younger than me . You can’t let one bad experience put you off forever. Not all men are Steven you know.”
    “Prove it!”
    Jackie laughed and,