Darkest Part of the Woods by Ramsey Campbell Page B

right, no, just along. Here."

    He could see without leaving his seat that the new shop window was intact, but he hobbled to check the door was locked. Beyond the window the display of books seemed to consist of little more than lumps of paper. "I can't say I'm surprised you don't want to hang round in a seedy district like this," his father remarked as Sam returned to the car.

    Sam saw a page of last night's newspaper dodging from doorway to doorway like a messenger outdistanced by its message while two beer bottles clashed in the gutter. "Onward then, is it?" his father said.

    "May as well."

    "Where do you suggest?"

    "The pub."

    "I like a mystery as much as the next man, but I wouldn't mind knowing which."

    "Go back. We have to go back."

    They had indeed already passed the Scholars' Rest, which might have been the only one Sam could bring to mind. Beneath a jauntily sagging slate roof the squat sandstone building faced the university campus, where isolated saplings were practising moves. Each window of the pub held a swelling like a great blind eye. Once across the thick doorstep worn convex by centuries of feet and through the small stout door, Sam was reminded that the dim low-timbered interior was lined with old books. He let his father buy him a pint of Witch's Brew, the strongest ale, and downed a quarter of it, then another. Having observed this with a mixture of admiration and amusement, his father said "Are we eating here as well?"
    "There's
    food."

    "I did spot that. Let's see what's tempting," his father said, opening an unnecessarily giant menu that bore a cartoon of a mortarboard. "Lecturer's Lasagne. Student's Salad.
    Graduate's Grill. Professor's Prawns. Coed's Chilli.

    Bursar's Burger. Vice-Chancellor's Veggies. Sophomore's Steak..."

    "Lasagne sounds all right."

    "Does it?" his father said as though he'd failed to make the humour sufficiently obvious.
    "Lasagne it is, then," he told the gowned barman, "and a Porter's Platter for me."

    Sam had halved the remainder of his pint by the time the barman finished typing the order on a till that chirped like a bird. "Another before we sit down?" his father suggested.

    "Do you want me to get it?"

    "No, I want you to get around it." He gave Sam's immediately empty tankard only the briefest of frowns. "Everything's on me," he said.

    Sam carried his second pint to a desk laid with sunlight that couldn't penetrate the empty inkwell. Whenever traffic or pedestrians passed outside, their distorted movements in the bloated windows made him feel as if he were viewing the street through someone else's eyes, too many of them. He tried peering at the contents of the shelves around him-children's novels older than himself, fifties self-help books, outdated histories, forgotten best-sellers-but the act of trying to distinguish ill-lit books seemed inexplicably ominous. "Looking for something special?" his father said.
    "No."

    "I'm sure you are even if it isn't here. You won't be angry if I admit I don't think it's that shop of yours."

    "Maybe I don't either."

    "Then shall we give your future a look?"

    Sam's brain felt full of enough alcohol for any uninvited advice to float on.
    "If
    you
    want."

    "I was rather hoping you might."

    The arrival of lunch-a less than full but steaming dish of lasagne, and a platter laden with the bread and cheese and pickles ploughmen, not porters, were alleged to favour-was by no means the only reason why Sam failed to see ahead.

    He fed himself a mouthful of lasagne to gain time, and was taking at least as long as seemed justifiable with it when his father said "Maths was always my best subject, which is why I'm an accountant. English is yours, so can't you make it work for you?"

    All at once the setting inspired Sam. "I will soon."

    "I feel happier already. Any preview available?"

    "I'll still be in books. I'll be a publisher."

    "Well, nobody could accuse you of not being ambitious."

    "I don't mean right away. I'll get a