SOLITARY BEACHES AND BAD MEN
by Grant Watson
Copyright (c) 1993.
First published in Gallifreyan Graffiti #103, December 1993.
If you wish to reprint this work of fiction in a newsletter or fanzine,
please e-mail Grant Watson at nzone@iinet.net.au to arrange sending a
contributor's copy.
(23rd August, 1996)

The child was watching him as he walked along the beach. A solitary,
lonely man with grey-black hair and a frightening, satanic beard. He
was dressed in black, all black, as if he was somehow forced to
separate himself from the light grey of the cold winter morning. The
girl shivered in the breeze; she was cold. He was colder.
   He reached within metres of her, barely noticing her presence as he
walked past. His eyes never flinched from the horizon in front of him.
   'Are you a bad man?' the young girl asked, looking at his back that
glistened with seaspray and an overcoat blacker than night. He stopped,
turning his head to examine her for the first time. He had evil eyes,
deep and malignant, that bored through her soul with an unnerving style
that made her back shiver in the chilly winds. He started to walk back
towards her.
   'Why do you ask?' he said, his voice rich and dangerous. He didn't
return her smile, he just looked at her.
   'You look like a bad man. You're very black.' she said. He took a
long look at his clothing before watching her again.
   'I suppose I am.' he agreed. 'I may be seated?' She moved across
slightly and he rested beside her on the cool, grey rock. She watched
him as he studied the sea, the rocks on the beach, the seagulls making
wide arcs over the surf. He looked back at her. 'It's a cold day for
a young girl such as yourself to be out alone.' She looked awkwardly
at her feet, and he understood exactly. 'Is there something you don't
like at home? Your father, perhaps? What is it?'
   'I promised I wouldn't tell.'
   'You can tell me. Everyone tells me things,' he said, his eyes
watching her with interest. 'Sometimes even when they don't want to.'
   'My daddy sometimes hits me,' she admitted, 'when I'm naughty. He says
that I never learn.'
   'Does he now?' he said, and could almost see the bruising on her legs.
He watched the seagulls, circling around the ocean in endless patterns.
   'My daddy is a bad man.' she told him, and he nodded. 'Are you a bad
man?'
   'I'm a very bad man. Oh, I don't hit children, mind.' He stared at the
ocean, his eyes light years away. 'I look for power. I want to be better
than anyone else, you see. I betray whole worlds, and kill many people. I
sometimes enjoy it.'
   She stared at him while he watched the sky. 'That's very bad, you
know.' she told him. He looked down at her and smiled.
   'A storm's coming in. Perhaps you had better run home.'
   'But my daddy-'
   'Never mind your daddy. Go on.'
   She faltered. She didn't want to go home, never ever, but the tone of
his voice compelled her to take his advice. She turned and hugged him
tightly.
   The stranger looked down on her with considerable surprise, and patted
her back gently. She jumped off the rocks, and started fumbling through
her coat pockets. 'Here's a present.' she said, holding out a tiny,
crushed flower in her hand. 'You're not a bad man,' she said, 'you're my
friend.' And then she skipped off down the beach. The man looked down at
the flower he had taken, that rested in his palm, so fragile. Then he
looked out to sea.
   'Your friend...' he whispered, his heart empty and hollow.

She did walk home. Along the beach and across the road and down the lane.
She walked into her house and into her mother's arms and endless
affection. Her father vanished that day. The police came and asked her
questions, but she didn't tell them about the man in black on the beach.
That was her secret. It was two weeks later, while watching the news on
BBC3 that the screen flickered, cut and died. She knew the bad man was
there, in Devil's End, being very bad.
   And in the garden, behind the woodpile, between an old rusty gardening
trowel and a spider-infested flowerpot, a tiny, doll-like body lay alone
in the evening frost.