Ancient Images by Ramsey Campbell Page A

leisurely down the hall. She felt surrounded by his warmth and awkward gentleness, by the smell of his skin and of a sweetish after-shave he must have dabbed on his face for her benefit. The walls beyond the patch of blindness opened out as he led her to the nearest armchair. When he placed her there and made to let go she held firmly on to him. "This won't be very comfortable," he murmured.
        "Then let's go where it will be," she said, and touched his tongue with hers. The contact blazed through her like sunlight, awakening her nerves. To her delight, he lifted her and carried her into the bedroom. However many films this might be like, she could tell he wasn't acting out any of them. Before they reached the bed she had unbuttoned his shirt, and their open mouths were pressed hungrily together.
        His face came into focus as he lowered her onto the bed. She brushed his hair back from his forehead as he pushed up her blouse and freed her breasts for his mouth to excite. She raised her hips so that he could slip her panties down for her to kick away, then she unzipped him quickly and took hold of his rearing penis. She ran her fingertips along it until he moaned, and then she dug her nails into his buttocks and pulled him into her. She felt herself widen, sucking him deeper, and thrust her tongue deeper into his mouth. His hands squeezed her breasts, passed lingeringly down her and lifted her thighs to stroke inside them. She came almost at once, and then again. The second time he cried out and came too, hugging her shoulders helplessly, throbbing inside her as if he might never stop.
        She held on to him and kissed his eyes and lips while he dwindled inside her. Eventually he lay back and pulled the duvet over them. She rested her head on his arm and gazed at him. She felt drowsy, calm, remote from the rest of the day's events, completely at home. At last he said almost apologetically, "I did get some wine, by the way."
        She smiled at his tone and kissed his cheek. "You think we ought to celebrate, do you?"
        "Sure. I mean, if you do."
        "Need you ask? Lead me to it. If I don't match you glass for glass, it's only because I'm driving."
        "You don't have to drive tonight if you don't want to."
        "Well, I don't suppose I do. And do you know, I don't suppose I will. I've nobody to go home to, after all."
        "Except your cats."
        "I'm afraid Bogart and Bacall have joined the great film show in the sky."
        "Sandy, I'm sorry. Is that what was wrong? When did it happen?"
        "Last night. They were run over. It seems much longer ago." That struck her as even sadder than their deaths, but she didn't realize she was weeping until he wiped away the tears. "I think I might like some of that wine now," she said indistinctly.
        "I'll bring it," he said, and swung his legs off the bed, penis wagging.
        She dabbed at her eyes with the duvet and wrapped it around herself. When Roger came back with the bottle he was draped in a black robe edged with gold thread. He insisted on her wearing it, and tramped bare-buttocked to the bathroom for a terrycloth robe for himself. Sandy poured the wine, and they touched glasses. "Here's to beginnings," she said.
        "And many episodes."
        "With lots of action."
        "Leading to climaxes."
        "You needn't worry on that score. You made up for the rest of the day at the very least."
        "Shit, you mean it wasn't only your cats being killed?"
        "Shall we say it's been a varied kind of a day? I've been given time off work whether or not I want it. So I started out to look for Graham's film, and met some people who made me wonder if I should. They write a magazine. I'll show you."
        She glanced through it before passing it to him. Trantom's misspelled editorial was addressed to "all the psychos and sickos like us." An article by John the Maniac described weeks of wandering