THE SIXTH GUEST: Chapter Six - Part Four

 “What did you say?”

The man showed no glimmer of mirth, no indication that he was joking. He just kept looking at her from near the window, his eyes calm and level. He looked like he was in his mid thirties; no particular signs of aging visible; but a maturity and bearing that a younger man wouldn’t have had. A presence. He was wearing a dark grey, almost black, V-necked sweater, his hardened pecks bare and hairless beneath. And jeans: Clare could see the creases, the weathering around the cuffs from walking on damp earthy ground: nothing vaguely supernatural. But his feet were bare, even though they were cleaner than they should have been if they’d been where the bottoms of his jeans had gone. There was nothing grotesque about his musculature as there tended to be in body builders, but his physique looked almost like it was from the pages of a comic book: perfect tone, a strong neck, a chiselled face. His curly hair and beard didn’t follow any fashion that Clare was aware of but stood outside of those things, neither extravagant nor repressed.

But those eyes! He fixed her still in his gaze; eyes so purely grey they were almost white, locking on hers, making her come close to blushing that she’d taken her eyes off his while she scanned the full height and breadth of his body.

“Who are you?” said Clare.

“I am your God,” repeated the man. “I have travelled here to speak to you.”

“To me?”

“To all of you.”

The sound of conversation was going on in the kitchen as the others settled themselves in. They still didn’t even know there was an intruder.

“What have you done to Henry?” asked Clare. The old man was still shivering wordlessly in his seat, oblivious to all of this, palsied hands curled in at the wrists, flecks of spittle on his lips and chin.

“He came to me first,” said the man, “while you were still out of the house. We spoke together.”

Henry’s eyes were open but his irises were rolled up half beneath his eyelids. His head lolled to the side. “You... spoke to him?”

“Of private things. But he did not like what I had to say.”

Clare rubbed her face with both hands then ran them over and down the back of her skull. She kept them there, clenching two fistfuls of hair at the nape of her neck. “I don’t understand any of this. Who are you? Who are you really?”

The man smiled, apparently benignly, but there was something in his cold grey eyes that said warning... danger. “I am your God. Did you not recognise the signs of my arrival?”

“The signs... What signs?”

“You were not in this room. Your beast was barking. You saw movement where there could be no movement. You felt...”

“The heat...”

“Yes.”

“How did you know about that?” The man didn’t speak. “You... That was... That was you?” Clare released her hands from her neck but lowered them only slowly, crossing them protectively over her bosom.

“Yes.”

She recalled the wind in the trees, the movement of objects in the kitchen as though something invisible had pushed through the room before ramming into her and into Henry. “What did you do to us? To all of us?”

He blinked and Clare realised it was the first time she’d seen him do it, as though it had almost been a conscious decision, a recollection it needed doing rather than a physical need. “I tasted you.”

“What?”

“To find out if you suited my needs.”

“Tasted?”

“I sipped your insides so that I might know you better. Each of you in turn.”

Henry, her, Joey, Selina, Mike, Rosalie: one by one.

“And now I know you well,” he said.

“You know me?”

“I know you have lied to all of them,” he said. “But not as much as you have lied to yourself.”

Clare lost track of what she had meant to say. She glanced at his straight colourless lips then back to his sober eyes.

“You will not die because of it,” said the man, “but no human can be touched by me in that form without being stricken. Even the tiniest fraction of my essence is enough to overwhelm the physiology of any man.”

“You’re saying that you... scanned me; and Henry and the rest. Like a mind reader. You came into me and...”

“And your body could not function for a moment. Yes. But there will be no lasting harm. You need not worry. You will continue to exist for the period you are required.”

Clare nibbled nervously on the back of her finger, her eyes sore, her head pinched, skin too tight around her scalp, not knowing how to respond to any of this. “You’re saying that you’re God.”

“Yes.”

“The God.”

He didn’t speak, only returning her gaze.

“The God of the Bible. Maker of Heaven and Earth. God. The flood, the burning bush, the ten commandments.”

Still he said nothing, only watching her unravel in front of him.

“What do you want with us?”

“You have a purpose.”

“What purpose?”

He took his eyes off her for the first time and looked toward the open door. “Fetch the others. Then I will speak.”

“The others?”

“Bring them to me and I will tell you all why I have come here.”

Clare shivered, clutching each opposite arm with her hands. “You aren’t going to hurt us?”

“Fetch them here and I will speak to you all.”

Clare looked again at Henry. His teeth were quietly chattering behind half cracked lips. He looked like a winding down clockwork automaton, no longer with the strength to function properly. He did not like what I had to say.

“Fetch them,” said the man. “I do not like to wait.”