by Neil Spring
I raised an expectant eyebrow.
‘Be tremendously careful. I mean that, all right, Sarah? Even if this is just a question of local folklore, why did the army keep what happened to Sergeant Gregory Edwards a secret? What happened to him, and where is he now? I don’t want to sound melodramatic but I’ve heard enough stories about the village now to give me a bad feeling I can’t shake.’
‘You’re right,’ I said doubtfully, ‘that does sound a trifle melodramatic.’
He smiled. ‘I just have a . . . I don’t know, a sense that there’s something deeper out in that village. Something darker.’
‘You want me to find out what’s actually going on. Is that what this is really about, Vernon?’
‘Yes, if you can. Listen, once you’ve got Price on board, let me know. You can expect a direct communication from Commander Gordon Williams to follow.’
Just then, the last church bells of the afternoon began to chime. Vernon looked up, sighing.
‘Well, deadlines are looming. Walk with me to Fleet Street?’
I hesitated, looking over his shoulder at the young mother and her baby. She looked happy, smiling proudly down into the pram. She checked her wristwatch and I realised now that she was waiting for someone – a barrister, perhaps? Her husband?
‘Actually,’ I said, ‘if you don’t mind, I’ll stay here a while and reflect.’
‘Oh. Yes, of course. No problem.’
‘How will I contact you?’
‘Telephone the news desk. That’s if you can find a telephone out there.’ He began walking away, but then, abruptly, he stopped and turned on his heel. ‘Maybe when this business is concluded . . .’ He cleared his throat, adjusted his hat. ‘That is to say, perhaps we could . . . step out together?’
Pleasure warmed my cheeks; I hadn’t even dared to hope. But then Vernon added, ‘We could take in a picture?’
A picture. Albert, the projectionist. Troubled eyes, hollow face. Stillness and flicker, light and shadow.
‘Sounds lovely,’ I said, ‘but perhaps dinner instead?’
– 7 –
TO WESTDOWN CAMP
It was late on Friday afternoon, four days later. The winter sun was sinking beneath the spires of Westminster and casting a pink hue across the London skyline. Tantalising and hopeful – rather reminiscent of my current situation.
While the train snaked out of Waterloo, I settled into my compartment with a copy of The Times, pleased to be escaping the city’s din and gloom; even more pleased to have caught a direct train to Warminster well before rush hour. All being well, three hours from now I would rendezvous with Commander Gordon Williams in Wiltshire; and, assuming he kept to the plan we had agreed, Harry Price would be there too.
As London rattled by I thought back to the telephone conversation I’d had with the stubborn mule on Tuesday.
‘You have a worthy case for me?’
‘Yes, commencing this Friday evening.’
‘This Friday!’
‘And there’s a handsome fee. If you want it.’
‘A handsome fee? Well.’
‘Look – those are the terms, Harry.’
‘A worthy case, commencing this Friday, and for a handsome fee.’
‘Do you want it or not?’
His satisfaction when he had answered the phone and realised it was me had turned quickly to suspicion.
‘You’ll understand, Sarah, I find this a very perplexing proposition.’
‘Why?’
‘Don’t be disingenuous. Only the other evening, you were absolutely insistent that you never wanted to work with me again.’
‘I haven’t changed my mind about that.’
‘No? Yet here you are. Telephoning me. About a worthy case . . .’
‘Don’t see this for something it’s not,’ I replied. ‘I’ll give you the background, all the information you need, if – and this is imperative, Harry – if you do one thing for me.’
There was a pause. I pictured him ensconced in his laboratory, standing rigid and alone at the highest window, curiosity glittering in his eyes, his free hand at his side opening and clenching in defiance at the idea that somebody younger and vastly less experienced in this business he called ghost hunting was, for a change, directing him.
I took no pleasure in manipulating him; he was still the father of my child, and in my own way I suppose I still loved him, at least a little. Sometimes all I could think about was the magnificence of that passionate moment we had shared together. That one intoxicating, breathless night. Part of me yearned to relive the warmth of his skin against mine, the caress of his touch. Part of me even wondered: what if we had been together? A traditional family? Sometimes I’d allow myself to picture that other life, like you do when you imagine how you might spend an unexpected winning or inheritance. The problem was that imagined life didn’t feel real to me. It felt like a story in a book, only one that was doomed never to have a fairy-tale ending. No matter how I rationalised it to myself, the fact remained: Harry Price was married.
Nonetheless, I needed him now. Since my conversation with Vernon I couldn’t stop thinking about all that had happened recently – about the village of Imber, and that night at the cinema. And for no reason I could rationalise I felt there must be a connection between them. My mind returned to the hand-painted lantern slide I had found in the dusky gloom of the Brixton Picture Palace, how I flashed into another place, as if transported somewhere else when I touched it. Was that uncanny moment in any way connected to what was to come?
Just as I had promised myself, I had gone back to the Picture Palace to return the lantern slide to the projectionist, only to be met with a further mystery: the doors beneath the shining glass canopy were shut and chained, and attached to them a sign read Closed. It was unsettling, and so, on the telephone to Price, I made the sudden decision to deviate from my planned conversation: to first ask him about the Brixton Picture Palace and what might, or might not, have happened there.
I started with the painted lantern slide I had found on the floor of the auditorium – how picking it up had sparked in me a powerful sensation of dislocation. I finished with my conviction that there was something about this lantern slide that had attracted me to the Brixton Picture Palace in the first place; maybe a connection with the image of whoever appeared on the slide.
There was a very long pause.
‘Harry?’
‘You realise how this sounds?’ he said, with more than a hint of scepticism.
‘That’s not very helpful.’
Another pause. Then he said, ‘The lantern slide. Bring it with you, and I’ll examine it.’
‘Fine.’
‘So, back to your original reason for contacting me, where exactly are we going?’
‘Wiltshire. A little place called Imber.’
‘Hang on.’ The phone clattered down and I heard him rustling some papers in the background, probably retrieving and unfolding an Ordnance Survey map. ‘Imber?’ Seconds passed. ‘No, no, can’t see it.’
That’s because it’s lost, I thought. A stolen village.
‘Sarah, your source for this assignment – is he, or she, known to you?’ Price sounded dubious.
‘Oh yes. And I can trust them.’
‘But you won’t tell me who they are?’
‘No. But I will tell you what I know about the case.’
The abandoned village, former residents up in arms, the approaching church service and the soldiers too spooked to do their jobs properly – I covered the basics, knowing that deep down he wouldn’t be able to resist. It was just too tantalising.
‘Well, it’s certainly different,’ he muttered, and I surmised from his tone that he had privately resolved the matter: this investigation was about to receive his fullest attention. ‘I’ll pick you up on Friday at—’<
br />
‘Thank you, but no. I can find my own way to Imber.’
An awkward silence. I hadn’t meant to sound ungrateful, but this was a matter of pride.
And that was how I came to be sitting alone in a train compartment on Friday afternoon, gazing out of the window at the city, and then its outskirts, and then mile upon mile of idyllic countryside, a patchwork of fields and woodland beneath a sky of orange and gold – so serene, with no hint of the strange and dark terrors to come.
The solitude and silence afforded an opportunity to prepare myself for the case. Keen to familiarise myself with some of its finer and more sensitive details, I drew from my small suitcase the letter I had received that week from Commander Gordon Williams and read it over a second time.
Dear Miss Grey,
On behalf of the War Office, I am obliged to you for arranging our meeting this weekend with the Honorary Chairman of the National Laboratory for Psychical Research. Mr Price has already sent word to inform us that he will arrive by car on Friday and that your train is expected in Warminster by seven o’clock that evening, at which time a car will be waiting to bring you the remaining distance to Westdown Camp – the base for soldiers training on the Plain and the home of the Defence Infrastructure Organisation.
Before your journey, I should like to impress on you the importance of our meeting and the subjects under discussion being regarded with the utmost sensitivity. I realise that I have initiated this meeting through a newspaper reporter, but I should tell you now that upon your departure, nothing you see or hear in Imber is to be discussed in public.
You have already heard that we need your unique expertise, but you should be aware that I do not lend any credence whatsoever to the more outlandish stories associated with our abandoned village, and I fully expect your investigation to vindicate that view. If we are dealing with a practical joker, I dearly hope Mr Price will identity the perpetrator, so that they may be punished, and so we may continue with the planned opening of Imber to its former residents and their families on Imber Service Day.
Finally, it is my duty to warn you that you will be travelling into an active military training area, which is extremely dangerous to civilians. Imber is located within a desolate parcel of land, a dip on the Plain, and the village is used by full-time professional soldiers and by the Territorial Army, army students and cadets from all over the region. Many people are surprised, even cynical, when they hear that Imber and the surrounding areas are littered with unexploded debris. Live ammo, unexploded grenades and the like. Why would you endanger your own soldiers, they ask?
The answer is that the village is located within a live firing range on Salisbury Plain. We do our utmost to clear the range at appropriate times, but beyond the public roads, there are always substantial risks, and we should remain mindful of them.
Should you miss your rendezvous in Warminster, you should telephone Westdown Camp and ask for me. You should not, under any circumstances, attempt the journey alone.
On that note, I wish you a safe journey. I look forward to meeting with you.
Yours sincerely,
Commander Gordon Williams
– 8 –
STRANGERS AT DUSK
‘Excuse me, miss?’
I opened my eyes gradually. The train manager – tubby, but smartly attired in his fitted green waistcoat – was at my compartment door. Stirring, I reached for my bag to present my ticket.
‘Not necessary,’ he said primly. ‘My apologies, miss.’
‘For what?’ I asked, and then I realised – the train had stopped.
‘There’s danger up ahead, along the line. Will be a while before we can set off again.’
I turned to the window, peering past my reflection. The quiet twilight seeped over miles of fields, giving the rugged landscape a stark, sombre look. We certainly weren’t in Warminster. We weren’t anywhere.
‘How long, exactly? I need to reach Warminster by seven o’clock.’
The train manager checked his pocket watch, and shook his head doubtfully.
‘It’s Warminster where the problem’s at. Most likely a fallen branch on the tracks. We’ll need to divert to Dilton Marsh. If you’re lucky, you can take a carriage on from there.’
‘Well, actually I’m headed for the Westdown Camp, and eventually Imber.’
His eyes widened. ‘Visiting a soldier friend, are you?’
I thought it better to avoid that question. ‘Imber sounds a fascinating place,’ I said, hoping he might offer some useful information. ‘A whole village out there, so isolated, abandoned and forgotten.’
Apparently, that was a poor choice of words.
‘It may be abandoned,’ he said, with a trace of hostility, ‘but Imber is not forgotten.’ He shook his head resentfully. ‘Bloody soldiers. What right did they have, eh?’
I nodded, to imply I agreed with his view. Then I tried again: ‘Still, I’ve never actually been to a lost village before.’
He bristled visibly. ‘The village is not lost either, miss. You’d do well to remember that. Imber is where it always was, waiting for its people to come home.’
*
As the train manager had predicted, we were diverted to Dilton Marsh: a poor excuse for a station, looking half-abandoned and consigned to the deepest Wiltshire countryside. I descended from the train there, cursing whatever ‘danger’ had obstructed the line as I found myself standing alone on the platform. The other passengers must have alighted at the previous stations when I was fast asleep. Ahead of me, a few isolated gas lamps washed the platform in an eerie glow and lit a solitary sign at the exit: ‘Time is important to the City Worker. “Dead-on” arrivals, please, passengers.’
I was twenty minutes behind schedule already. Commander Williams’ car would be waiting for me in Warminster, but that was two miles away, and the cold was like an ice pick in my bones. Even if the army did learn about the diverted train and sent a car on for me, I hardly relished the prospect of waiting here alone, in the cold, at this morbidly depressing platform, listening to the wind and the wires in the mere hope that someone would come for me.
I made my way along the platform, determining that the sensible thing to do now was to wait until the next train arrived and perhaps find someone to give me a lift on to Warminster. Or, if I could find the stationmaster, he might be good enough to telephone Westdown Camp on my behalf.
Ahead of me, at the end of the platform and looking down the track, was a figure in a black uniform. This, I soon learned, was indeed the stationmaster, but to my dismay he was less than helpful. Apparently, there would be no more trains diverted here this evening – no trains at all.
‘This is an ill-frequented route, miss,’ he explained. ‘Trains only stop here on request. And this service terminates here.’
‘Is there a telephone I could use?’
He shook his head. Apparently, the line was down. ‘Only temporarily,’ he added.
I gave him a look, conveying my bewildered frustration. What a complete farce! Now what was I to do? That was the question running through my mind as I gathered up my case and bag and emerged from the station into a quiet country lane.
No houses visible. No motor cars. No people.
There was clearly only one direction to take.
Should I try walking? If I was lucky, someone would pass me and offer me a lift, or at least show me the way to the barracks.
The thought passed through my mind that traversing country lanes unaccompanied might not be so wise for a young woman, especially now dusk was falling. How many stories had I read in the newspapers of women mugged – or worse, raped and strangled?
But then I thought, what are the chances, really, of something bad happening to me? In London, during the summer months, Mother was constantly telling me not to walk home from town when darkness fell, but I did, often, and time a
nd time again nothing happened.
Far too often we fear the unknown, but if there was one thing I had learned from working with Harry Price, wasn’t it this: that sometimes, the unknown just felt right? Seductive and dangerous, maybe – yet sometimes it still felt right. Exciting.
Besides, what choice did I have? Commander Williams’ letter had advised me not to make the journey on foot and alone. Fair enough. But there was no one else around.
Resolutely I set off along the deserted country lane that wound its way through high, spiky hedgerows stripped bare by winter; but as the hedge dropped away on my right side, I was brought to an abrupt halt by a geographical marvel: a vast expanse of utter wilderness which stretched to meet the brooding sky.
Salisbury Plain.
Dusk was creeping over the chalk valleys and the coarse open grasslands, but in the trembling light I could still make out the shapes of the burial mounds and Iron Age hill forts that fringed the distant and craggy slopes. At my feet, the goosegrass gave way to an exposed patch of white chalk, which was gleaming eerily in the fading light.
A breeze carried drifting scents of wild thyme and chalk dust. For a moment, all was utterly silent, but after a few seconds the song of a skylark made itself heard, and then a different, less peaceful sound: the rumble of distant artillery fire.
I flinched. Somewhere out there, hidden in a low valley, were the fragmentary remains of Britain’s loneliest village.
I scanned the darkening landscape. A vast expanse of nothingness. Then, in the distance, a single spire soaring out of a gully. Imber church?
Had I seen that spire before? Was it the church?
It had been eighteen years since I had last set foot on Salisbury Plain, when my father had brought me here in that hard winter when war broke out. I still remembered we had happened by chance upon a village funeral. But – and this was crucial – I did not remember the name of the village, or why we had come.
Logic told me my father already knew he was to be sent here, to train in one of the camps or secret establishments with the other soldiers who were to be sent into battle. I thought he would be back within the year – that was what Mother had said – but one year turned into two. Three. Four. And before the war was over, the telegram that had haunted my mother’s dreams dropped through our letter box and changed our lives forever.
