The Scarlet lady

“Help, police” Rose screamed down the phone. It was New Years Eve, 1919 and
she was still wearing her scarlet satin dress from her performance at the crow club. She was
desperately trying to get home to spend her first new year with her husband and newborn
daughter. But a strange man had been trying to take her picture all night and now the creep
had followed her out of the club and towards the gothic spiked phone box. The dark shadow
of the fedora wearing man came closer and closer. He drew near to the box and then
vanished just as the operators voice came through.

“Hello Hampshire Police, how can we be of assistance?”

“It’s OK. Sorry to have bothered you” uttered Rose in an apprehensive voice. Relieved that
the scary man had gone she hung up the phone. Suddenly a silver scythe crashed through the
glass ripping into her spine. The last thing she heard has the life poured out of her was the
sound of a camera.

Simon Chapman parked his BMW outside the village photo shop. Both the car and the shop had been left to Simon ten years ago in his dad's will. He ran the short distance quickly fighting through the howling storm. He pushed the door open and stood soaking wet in his father’s old brown leather jacket.

He looked around his Dad’s empire. It was a tiny, old fashioned looking shop, clean and tidy with everything in its place cameras all laid out in a row and a faint smell of polish lingering in the air. Walking into the shop always brought a tear to his eye. Even after 10years his dad losing the fight against cancer still upset him.

When his granddad had purchased the shop back in the nineteen-twenties it had been a popular little shop full of customers. Today it was almost empty, apart from an amateur photographer and his wife scanning the shelves for a reasonably priced, reliable compact camera. Simon watched Donna serve the two customers.

When she had finished with them she turned to Simon and spoke in her strong Irish accent. “Stop dripping, and get some bloody work done!”

“Much to do?” Simon asked the red-headed girl as he dried himself with some blue paper towel. He watched her make her way to the shop’s exit.
“Na, it’s been pretty dead but there’s one film you can do for me.”
She paused for a moment. “The man who came in scared the hell out of me.” she shivered then changed the subject..
“Anyway I’m going for lunch, see you in an hour”.
Simon watched Donna walk out of the shop. He had strong feelings for her, but was too scared to ever ask her out. He was happy being her friend even though he often wished there could be more between them.

Simon nervously picked up the strange camera. A black leather cover had been tightly pulled over its frame. Imprinted on the leather appeared to be fingernail marks and hair, it felt like human flesh. Simon took out the film and placed the evil looking camera on the table. He prayed that it was just made to look like that.

He fed the film into the machine and waited for the black shiny negatives to spill out of the other end. This antique method brought back childhood memories of watching his dad work. Simon hated that so many people used digital these days. He put them into the computer. This was the best part; he got to look at everyone’s photos and select which ones to print. What came out on the monitor sent a chill down his spine.

Thirteen photos appeared on screen; the rest were a reddish-yellow blur. The first three were of an attractive raven-haired lady in an old style scarlet satin dress; she wore long black silk gloves and a headband with a crow’s feather in it, which complemented the colour of her hair. In the next five she was making a phone call in the old gothic phone box at the end of the village, the one with the black Gothic spike. The next four eerie photographs were a close-up of the misted glass of the phone box. Written into the mist were letters dripping down the glass like blood; they read ‘Help me’. The last photo made Simon’s heart miss a beat. It was a picture of the scarlet lady lying in a pool of crimson.

Simon paced up and down the shop. The photos started to print. He tried not to look at them while he packed them into the folder, but accidentally glanced at one. It was of the scarlet lady in the phone box. He became transfixed by the photo. He looked beyond her dark eyes, almost seeing into her soul, the feeling of uncontrollable lust adsorbed him. Two pale hands reached out of the photo. In a daze Simon took hold of them; they felt cold, they gripped hard pulling him into the photo.

Simon stood there with the scarlet lady. She embraced him. He ran his hands down the silky, satin dress and rested them on her hips. They kissed; he felt as if he had known her forever and never wanted this moment to end. He started to kiss her neck. The smell of her perfume excited him, it was like summer flowers. He lifted her dress up and she wrapped her legs around his body. Then she pushed him away a little and said in a frail, haunting voice, “Simon, don’t let this happen”. Just as the last word left her rose, red lips a silver scythe shattered its way into the phone box, severing her spine. Smashed glass lay scattered around the broken woman. She reached up for Simon, he reached back. His hand grabbed hold of hers tightly and then her arm started to fade away until it became invisible. Simon looked around and everything was fading. Eventually he was standing in a blinding white area. Bit by bit the familiar surroundings of the shop morphed in to focus.

Simon ran to the computer and searched the internet for clues. He found two articles of interest. The first told of a local nightclub singer from the nineteen-twenties who had mysteriously disappeared. He clicked on the image of her and even though the picture was faded and grainy he could tell it was the same lady he had just held in his arms. The second article told of a local myth about a soul collector who used an old skin-covered camera to steal people’s spirits. Suddenly the door opened and an evil looking man walked towards the counter.

He wore a dirty brown trench coat and a matching fedora. The hat cast a shadow over his face, leaving only his jaw visible. An earthy smell came from him; it reminded Simon of graveyards. The man mouthed the word “film” The menacing figure held out a claw of a hand and Simon nervously handed over the folder. The man left the shop just as Donna returned. Simon grabbed his brown leather jacket and ran out after him.

The heavy rain crashed down hard on Simon. He was determined to pursue this sinister looking man. The storm made it almost imposable to see. Simon quickened his pace the creepy looking man had disappeared. Just in front of Simon, rain smashing down over its black gothic spike, was the old phone box. The downpour made it hard to see inside but Simon could just make out a red blur.

Simon ran towards the box shouting, “Get out!” The red blur did not move. He could make out the perfect female form inside. “GET OUT!” Still no response. He opened the door. She stood there on the phone. He recalled how amazing he had felt kissing her, but this time she did not notice him. She just did the same thing over and over. She started by picking up the phone, talking into it then putting it down, then starting the whole process again.

A ghost like shape in the rain lingered outside the phone box. Simon could see it was holding a scythe. “Get down” he nervously shouted Still the scarlet lady repeated the pre-recorded motions. Simon flung himself at her, expecting to feel the silky satin of her dress, but as soon as he touched her she turned into a red mist. The scarlet smoke was absorbed into the air, leaving the lingering smell of summer flowers.

Confused and frightened, Simon rested on the glass to get his breath back. The silver scythe came smashing into the box. Shattered pieces of glass surrounded Simon’s broken body. His brown leather jacket was torn and soaked in blood. His fingernails screeched down the fogged-up glass. Just before he blacked out and faded into darkness he heard the shutter of a camera. In a short moment death had taken him.

Weeks passed and Simon Chapman was considered a missing person; no evidence existed of that nightmarish day. Donna was upset but felt she owed it to Simon to keep the shop running. Donna had feelings for Simon and sometimes wished they could be more than just friends. She shuddered when she saw the familiar old black camera. It had a note attached written by Sammy, one of the part-timers, the note read ‘Process for creepy guy’.

Slowly Donna began to process the film. She took the negatives and fed them into the computer. Thirteen pictures came on the monitor, the rest were the colour of October leaves. The photos were of the old village phone box. She looked at the last photo and to her horror it was of a man in a brown leather jacket. He lay face down in a pool of his own blood. At first Donna did not recognize him. A painful cramp hit her in the stomach when she finally worked out who it was. She looked closely at the crimson-stained glass; she could just make out the words ‘Help me’ written in Simon’s blood. Donna grabbed her coat from the hook and ran towards the old phone box.
THE END