XI.

Their house was the largest one in the village. Mister Malcolm, their father, owned a large property which their ancestors earned by serving the king decades ago. It consisted of four bedrooms, bathroom, large dancing hall with a magnificent glass chandelier, grand dining room, a living room, their father's working room and basement hallway with servants' rooms and kitchen. Stuart liked escaping there in the cold winter mornings and nights because oven warmed up the space from the early morning hours. The cook would wake up at five o'clock each morning to bake bread and Stuart enjoyed keeping her company. This was formally forbidden. Master's son shouldn't have been so friendly with servants, but Oliver was the only one who knew about Stuart's unusual habit and he kept his brother's secret.

When their parents were out, two brothers liked playing hide and seek. They could hide anywhere they liked. Grown ups weren't here to stop them from peeping wherever they wanted to.

It was a cold November evening and the dark had already fallen. Malcolms had gone to the theatre and little boys were left with their nanny and servants. But their nanny was old and evermore sleepy, so their freedom was unlimited. It was Stuart's turn to count while his brother was hiding. He could count only up to hundred at the time.

He looked at their bedroom first, though he knew Oliver wouldn't be there. It was too easy to find him there. He entered their parents' bedroom. It was usually locked, but when master and mistress were out servants would leave it unlocked on purpose so that kids could play to the fullest. Oliver wasn't under their bed nor in the closet. Mum's private room was empty too and so was his father's working place. Stuart didn't dare enter his father's private chambers. Papers were spread all over his desk, the bed was unmade and strange objects were scattered all over it. Mister Malcolm was a very busy man.

He went on to seek for his brother in the basement. Servants' were relaxing and drinking vine in their dining room. He didn't want to bother them, so he silently continued to the pantry, one of Oliver's favourite hiding places. It was extremely dark inside. Combination of heavy smells overwhelmed Stuart; cheese, beef jerky, pickled vegetables and strong spices made it almost unbearable to stay inside. Stuart wondered whether it was possible for a human being to die because of such intense odour. "Oliver?". He got no answer.

Touching the wall, his hand found a soft bulb. He squeezed it. Light erupted through the room. Stuart saw someone standing behind a cabinet filled with food. This person was taller than Oliver. Besides, it wasn't male, but a young woman wearing black dress, with brown hair tied in a bun. "Wait", Stuart's voice wasn't childish at all, but a grown man's baritone. "You should be dead!"

Like so many nights earlier that week, he woke with a start, heavily breathing and face full of sweat drops. The voice of young lad selling newspapers was hearable from the outside. It was morning. He had no time to think over his dream. Regina was due to come any minute.

She wasn't her usual merry-self. She paced inside without a word of greeting. Not caring to take of her coat, she went right onto taking something from her pocket and threw it on the desk. Stuart recognized the little bag he saw when she brought her equipment to his studio.

"I thought a lot last night", touching her forehead with fingertips, she finally spoke, "thought and drunk. I understand why you refused to show me those photos. Woman's grimaces haunted me until the morning came..." She nodded towards the desk. "I realized how unfair I was when I denied you my own secret photos. I changed my mind. You may take a look at them."

Stuart was unsure whether to do what she permitted him. "I had my fair share of fear", he whispered, "those photos might have haunted you last night, but I've been struggling with my knowledge of them for days..." He barely heard his own words, lost between the recently interrupted dream and the incomprehensible reality. A touch on his cheek was like a flutter of a falling leaf. Regina's body was nearer to him than ever, but her presence never awoke a manly lust in him. It made him feel at ease and he was thankful for her help. He was worried she might run away after he showed her the photos, but her gesture reassured him that wasn't one of her considerations.

"But I thought a lot about those photos, too", she continued very silently. "About their anomalies, if you like. They haunt us both now, Stuart, but we can't allow them to do so. There must be a logical explanation. You hear me? I won't accept any superstitious theories."

But my dreams, he wanted to say, but was too scared to express his true fears aloud. Last night that woman was in my dream. She came of her own will, escaped from the photos and broke into my mind.

He truly believed the person he found in his brother's hiding place in his dream didn't belong there. He sensed its alien force and still felt it after waking up. He was afraid the mark it left shall never be erased.

"Now look", she put the bag in his hands. He did as she commanded. The photos which came out of it were all prints, hard, high-quality paper pictures newspaper's editors used. Stuart was prepared for grotesque crime scenes with loads of blood, but these photos showed no such scenery. Most of them were quite dark, with only contours of furniture visible. One showed a luxurious hallway with two stairways on each side, another a smaller apartment with radio, third one a pub. Not a living nor dead soul on any of them. "You're confused", Regina noticed, "you thought it will be something terrifying, but it's not." Stuart nodded. "I found these photos only recently. I hadn't known they existed until my father told me on his deathbed. Told me that he had hidden photos he never showed anyone. He wasn't the man behind the camera with which they were taken, but it was indeed his camera which took them. They're all similar, right?" Stuart confirmed. The colour tones, slight stains on the edges of the objects and high concentration of light around its source resembled themselves in each exemplar. "But they weren't taken in the same time. My father got one every few years."

"Got? But you said they were taken by his camera."

"That's what I'm trying to explain. It's complicated. My father knew nothing about these photos. They'd be delivered to our residence by mail, but no sender address was ever written on the envelope. This was the first one", she pointed to the photo of a pub, "and my dad knew nothing about this place. He thought it was some kind of a joke The next day he was called to the crime scene. It was this exact pub. A fight broke out the night before and one man was stabbed to death, but the murderers ran off. My dad thought then that it was some kind of a warning, but it couldn't help with the case, so he put it aside and soon forgot about it. Two years later he got this one." She pointed to the photo of a small apartment. "And the next morning he was called to take photos of the crime scene. A man had beaten his wife to death in this same room and escaped never to be found. The photos continued coming, always one day before my dad would be called to the crime scene. The criminals connected to those cases always managed to flee."

"Who was sending them?"

Regina sighed. "That's where it gets really weird. My father never found out, and guess what? It was impossible for these photos to be taken. The pub was always crowded, so how was it photographed without a single person in the photo? Only if someone broke in during the night, but why would someone do that only to take a photo? I said they were taken by my father's camera. After he got fifth photo", she nodded towards the one which showed a nursery room, "he contacted an expert for photography. He hadn't told him why the photos mattered, but he wanted to know with which camera were they taken. Not many people owned a camera back then, so he figured it might bring him closer to the sender. It was concluded that the camera was one he actually used at that time. He brought it for examination and the expert was pretty sure it was the camera with which the photos were taken. Now tell me", she raised her gleaming eyes, "you think someone sneaked in our home, which often altered its location, to take one of our cameras and somehow take a photo of a completely empty place which was to become a crime scene that same week?"

"Psycho criminal", Stuart muttered.

"No criminal could do such a thing", Regina shook her head. "But my father's first impression was the same as yours. He was scared that someone was stalking him and me. First he destroyed the camera and then he decided we should take a break. We went to Ireland. One month of relaxation in the village. He told nobody where we were."

"But the photo came anyway", Stuart assumed.

Regina nodded. She took a photo of a big hall with two parallel stairways. "But we weren't called to the crime scene this time. Nobody knew where we were anyway, so they couldn't reach us. But as soon as we returned to Scotland, my father was wanted to take photos at the recently discovered crime scene. A huge Victorian house, rich people. All had been dead for two weeks or so and nobody knew until a neighbour started wondering why hasn't anybody come out for such a long time. Murderers never found."

"What are you implicating?"

"Photos of that dead lady we took", she looked at the sofa, "aren't the first unexplainable images I'm dealing with."

"You never found out who was the photographer?", Stuart asked while trying to sort new informations.

"No. I gave them to another professional after my father died. All definitely taken by the same camera. Legit, no hocus-pocus phantasms added. But impossible to be taken at those sceneries."

"Is there a connection among the crimes following arrival of each photo?"

"No. These murders were committed across the whole country, the victims had nothing in common. Nothing except for my dad." Her hands were slightly trembling. She calmed them by engaging them in fixing her hair, though it was braided in a perfect bun. "My dad said he had nightmares every night before a photo would be delivered. As if he knew what was coming. He'd dream of people he never saw. They seemed so real in his dreams, he claimed to have seen details of their faces and would later conclude he dreamt of the future victims."

Stuart's head was pounding with unspoken words. He had dreams of dead people from the photographs just like Regina's father had dreams of people who were missing on the photos.

"But I'm still looking for a logical explanation",, Regina said eagerly, "and I'm sure we can find one together! Now listen", she adopted a calm stance, ready to reveal her ingenious plan. "Would you consider entering the crime business?"

"What?", he asked with his mouth dry from anticipation.

"Taking photos of the crime scenes like my father used to. I still have all the contacts, I'm familiar with the chief of police in Edinburgh. They're not very fond of me there. It's because I'm a woman." She rolled her eyes. "They consider females to weak to deal with such things, but my father was really admired among police circles. He was known as one of the best crime scene photographers throughout the whole Kingdom. You're a man", she folded her hands and came one step nearer to him, "and if I recommended you, the police chief would employ you."

Stuart had an urge to escape right through the door. The door of his studio. When did his own home become unsafe? Where could he escape to? Erwing and Carol's place where ghosts of the past haunted him even more than where he was now? Regina's eyes grew bigger and bigger as she awaited his response. "What's the point?", he asked.

Her answer was simple. "Experiment." He didn't understand what she meant. "There must be a logical explanation, so we'll use a scientific approach. Take more photos of the dead to see if the peculiarities shall repeat. And wait for that bastard who stalked my father to start his game anew."

"I don't like the idea."

"Stuart", her voice was incredibly persuasive, "we're up against something strange, you and I, and neither of us can avoid it. You must face your fears and get out of the safe zone in order to gain back control over your life. Pranks like these", she nodded towards the photos, "might make us lose our minds, but only if we let them. Well? What say you?"

He didn't really have a choice.