Never Forgotten

by G H Mockford

  Once they were off the main road, Stephen called out further directions as Bryonny weaved the bike through the mess of potholes in the track they were following. Roadside hedges in need of a good trim snatched at them as they passed deeper and deeper into the isolation of the countryside.

  ‘It should be this next turn,’ Stephen called.

  The bike slowed and shifted as Bryonny put her foot on the ground. ‘It’s blocked.’

  The road was littered with large concrete cubes just as Stephen had seen on the satellite photograph. What he’d not seen from the photo were the demotion warnings and security signs which hung from rusting fencing and decaying wooden posts.

  The house sat in darkness at the end of the drive.

  ‘What a pleasant place,’ Bryonny said.

  ‘It’s worse than I expected, I have to confess,’ Stephen said. ‘Can you get any closer?’

  ‘I think I can probably get through the blocks. They’re placed to stop larger vehicles and travelers getting in.’

  With expert skill, Chambers took the bike up the drive, swerving through the chicanes. Brambles and overgrown bushes clawed at them as they made their way closer to the farmhouse.

  Bryonny brought the bike to a stop and turned off the engine. ‘You can get off now.’

  Now they were closer, Stephen had a clearer view of the building. It must have been a beautiful place to live – once. Now it lay deserted. Soon there would be no need for a demolition crew. Nature would do it for them. One nearby tree had grown so large it had spread its branch through an upstairs window and into the house.

  ‘Are we having a look around the outside first, or going straight in?’ Bryonny asked once she’d removed her helmet.

  ‘Are you sure about this? Won’t you get into trouble?’ Stephen replied as he handed her his helmet. She put them both in the top box and retrieved a torch.

  ‘It’s five o’clock. The light’s almost gone. Let’s get inside,’ she said ignoring the question.

  ‘Ladies first,’ Stephen said.

  Sixty-Eight

  The house dominated the view ahead despite the revenge that nature had wrought.

  In front of the huge brick structure was a sweeping driveway with a small island in the middle. Stephen suspected that once it would have been home to a precisely manicured lawn, or perhaps a fountain. Now it was just a tangled mess of bindweed and tall grass that had turned to seed and was now dying back.

  The lawns that had once joined the gravel drive were filled with wild flowers and runaway self-seeded plants. Thousands of pounds and man-hours all back the way nature intended.

  Stephen and Bryonny walked side-by-side towards the house.

  ‘What are you hoping to find here?’ Bryonny asked.

  ‘I don’t know. A clue. Perhaps Felicity revisited here.’

  ‘Felicity? I thought we were looking for Georgia?’

  Stephen quickly filled Bryonny in on his theory.

  ‘I think it’s your father you need to talk to,’ she said, mirroring the thoughts both he and Cliff had.

  ‘I did. I don’t think he’s got anything to do with it.’

  ‘Then who has?’

  Stephen shook his head.

  ‘We need suspects who fit the picture, not just a random wild goose chase. To be honest, all I think you’ll find here are rats, needles, burned spoons and tin foil. If you’re lucky – a ghost.’

  ‘It’s all I’ve got,’ Stephen said. ‘She’s my sister. And no offense, the police are getting nowhere. I’ve got to look somewhere, even if I’m grasping at straws.’

  ‘Well, what are you standing there for? Let’s get started. If I’d known, I’d have brought a crowbar,’ Chambers said, eyeing the boarded up windows.

  ‘If druggies have been using this place, there’s got to be a way in somewhere.’

  ‘You know your Felicity’s likely to be one, if she’s here,’ Chambers said as the pair followed the left-hand side of the house.

  ‘I’m prepared for anything,’ Stephen said, snagging his jeans on some barbed wire.

  ‘Even her dead remains?’

  Stephen stopped and turned to face her. Her skin was pale in the moonlight. ‘I was under the impression you thought it was unlikely she’d be here?’

  ‘I just want you to be ready for whatever we find. Maybe she came here ten years ago…and never left.’

  Stephen nodded in the growing darkness and felt her warm hand slide into his. A brief smile flashed across his face, then he turned and together they continued their grim expedition through the brushes and shrubs.

  The size of the house was surprising. The walls kept going and kept turning. Stone and brick were used as building materials in different places, clearly showing the different wings that had been added over the passage of the last four hundred years.

  What Stephen found most surprising was how intact the defenses, for want of a better word, were. It wasn’t easy to see in the gloom, but some of the panels that covered up the windows looked newer than others. No doubt the security company that watched the place were tasked with maintaining it to a certain degree as well as protecting it.

  The undergrowth grew thicker in several places and, fighting and forcing branches out of the way, Stephen emerged into what would have once been the back garden. If he looked carefully, Stephen could still make out the shapes of paths, decorative hedges and borders.

  He tried to imagine the house in its heyday. Not the evil parties that were held at the beginning of the twenty-first century, but the seventeenth and eighteenth.

  ‘Look,’ Bryonny breathed in his ear as she stepped past him. Her leathers creaked as she crouched down and picked up the object that caught her attention.

  It was a piece of boarding. Four nails stuck out of it. One in each corner. They were curved slightly. ‘Looks like they were ripped out,’ the detective said, pointing at them.

  ‘Look,’ Stephen said, his heart beating faster. ‘There’s more of them.’

  Together, they looked up and saw the open window on the top floor.

  Sixty-Nine

  ‘I think these have been removed from the inside,’ Bryonny said, turning on her torch to get a clearer look. ‘Look. These marks. It’s like something’s been rammed against it.’

  ‘Someone’s been trying to get out?’

  ‘Would look like it. Either that or whoever’s inside wanted to let in some fresh air, and I’m not sure crackheads are going to be that concerned with air quality.’

  ‘Do you think we should call up?’

  ‘It’s not like we’re being quiet,’ Bryonny said.

  Stephen walked out into the thick undergrowth so he could get a better angle to look into the window. There was nothing but darkness inside it. ‘Hello,’ he called.

  He got the response he expected.

  Nothing.

  ‘Look. I think that’s the back door,’ Bryonny said, pointing to her left. She ducked past Stephen and led the way toward it.

  The heavy looking door was above ground level and three steps led up to it. The barbed wire that had blocked the entrance had been flattened by several large chunks of concrete. Planks of wood were laid on top of the concrete and made a bridge over the defences.

  ‘Looks like that’s been there some time,’ Stephen said, pointing at the bridge.

  Bryonny stepped onto the crossing. It wobbled and rolled unsteadily beneath her. Stephen changed his initial assessment. With the torch held above her left shoulder, Bryonny tried the doorknob.

  Stephen looked at her, eyebrows raised as the door opened. He’d not been expecting that.

  ‘It’s a bit stiff,’ Bryonny said and then cursed when the door came to a sudden halt. Before Stephen could join her, Bryonny jammed her shoulder against the peeling black paint that half-heartedly covered the door, and pushed.

  Once it was open, a stench assaulted their nostrils. Decaying wood. Sodden plaster. The smell of rotting paper.

  The beam of light f
rom the torch seemed insignificant in the darkness of the room beyond. Stephen hesitated and then followed the police officer in. They both stood in silence for a moment as Bryonny swept the torch around the room, exposing its secrets.

  ‘That explains why it was difficult to open,’ Chambers said. Behind the back door were several sandbags.

  Stephen swallowed and didn’t voice his fear that he thought it might have been a dead body. ‘But it doesn’t explain how they got there. Someone on the inside would have needed to put them there. And they weren’t much of a deterrent, either.’

  Bryonny’s only response was a grunt of acknowledgment. She walked further into the room, exploring the rest of the space. ‘This must be what? Twice the size of your living room?’

  ‘At least,’ Stephen agreed as his eyes followed the beam of light just as his steps followed Bryonny’s. His nose twitched. The smell was getting worse.

  Great strips of flocked, embossed wallpaper hung from the walls. The ends, which draped on the floor, looked like they’d been nibbled by rodents. Much of the ceiling was covered with a large, dark stain. Perhaps, Stephen thought, it was a dark spirit trapped here from all the evil that had occurred. It was waiting for new misery to feed upon.

  ‘There are three doors,’ Chambers said, sweeping the torch across the far wall – one near each corner and one straight ahead.

  ‘We need to find the stairs,’ Stephen said. ‘Let’s take the middle one. It looks like it should take us through to the front.’

  ‘Good thinking,’ Bryonny said before stepping out across the floorboards. They creaked beneath their feet. Stephen could feel them bend. Damp or wood worm, or both, had taken their toll on the building.

  ‘I’ve a bad feeling about this,’ Stephen said.

  ‘It’s just an old house, Captain Solo. Nothing to worry about. Nothing at all.’

  Stephen wasn’t sure who she was trying to convince. ‘You don’t know what happened here.’ When Stephen saw Bryonny raise her eyebrows, he filled her in on the past of the house and the activities that went on here.

  ‘Okay. I wish you hadn’t told me all that,’ Bryonny said and reached for the door handle. It was solid brass judging by the thick green tarnish that covered it. Despite the rot and entropy, it was clear that the house had once been beautifully decorated and maintained.

  Bryonny went through first. Stephen couldn’t resist a look back over his shoulder. It was dark outside now, and the only light came from Bryonny’s torch.

  ‘Stephen? Come here. This is weird,’ Bryonny called.

  Stephen turned his attention to the new room, passed through the door and followed the torch beam. There were no windows, just three more doors.

  ‘Keep going,’ Stephen said. The warmth of Bryonny’s hand touched his and then he felt her slender fingers curl around his again. Was she feeling the way he was?

  ‘I agree. I don’t like it here either, especially this room. There’s something about it, like...’

  Stephen stared straight ahead into the beam of light, his eyes fixed on the door handle which would allow them to leave the forsaken room. Who knew what spirits lurked in the darkness.

  He felt vaguely ashamed of the fear he was feeling, but he took solace and strength from the fact Bryonny was evidently feeling it too. There was something deeply unsettling about the building, but would he have felt it if he’d been unaware of its past?

  Bryonny lit up the door handle, which Stephen took as an invitation. The metal felt cold in his hand. Who knew when light and heat last saw this room.

  Stephen began to suspect why he had such a bad feeling about the place. Was this where it all happened? In a room in the heart of the house – a heart with no love – where no one could see inside and the locks prevented the children from escaping. It made a certain, if disturbing, sense.

  Eager to leave, Stephen turned the door handle. They both stepped through. Stephen shut the door, trapping whatever demons remained in the sealed off room behind them.

  Bryonny passed the torch beam over the new room. A dust covered chandelier hung from the ceiling. It’s grandeur dulled by the passage of time. In the corner, something tall was shrouded in a sheet. To their right, a sweeping staircase went to the next floor.

  The tall windows, one on either side of the front door, were boarded up, but plants had managed to weave their tendrils trough the gaps and smash the window panes with their ceaseless growing. In some places, they had crept through the woodwork of the old sash windows. The double front doors had a thick metal bar across it to prevent it being opened from the outside.

  Stephen walked towards them. Two more doors sat in the centre of each adjacent wall. They quickly explored beyond them. The one on the left led to a kitchen, the right a large space. Perhaps it had once been the music room his mother had mentioned. In that room, there was another door that was bound to lead all the way back to the first room they had entered.

  They both looked at the staircase.

  They had put it off long enough.

  It was time see what was up there.

  Seventy

  The stairs creaked with each step they took.

  Bryonny explored ahead with the torch, leaving Stephen a few steps behind. At the top of the stairs, she stopped and looked down both sides of the landing.

  ‘Left?’ she asked, shining the beam down the long hallway.

  Stephen nodded, unwilling to talk, but then realized she probably wouldn’t have seen the movement, so he was forced to break his silence. ‘Yes. I guess it’ll be the last door on the right-hand side.’

  ‘Let’s get going before I change my mind.’

  Stephen smiled. ‘Thank goodness. I thought it was just me.’

  Bryonny laughed, the sound echoed, filling the entrance hall below them. Stephen’s blood turned to ice, though he was sure her intention was to cause the entire opposite. He searched for her hand and once again they joined them.

  A sharp crack filled the air. Stephen felt the step give way below him. He jumped back, dragging Bryonny with him. Her hand shot out and grabbed the banister before they both tumbled down the stairs. Feeling foolish, Stephen let go of her and stood upright. The step was broken, but he’d managed to jump clear before he’d fallen through it.

  ‘Perhaps we shouldn’t stand together,’ Bryonny said. ‘And stick to the edges, that’ll help.’

  ‘Yeah,’ Stephen panted. ‘Good idea.’

  ‘After you.’

  Stephen took the offered torch, and with more care than was probably needed, climbed the last couple of steps to the landing and turned left. The hallway felt tight and claustrophobic despite the high ceiling.

  ‘You smell that?’ Stephen said, after a few steps.

  ‘Oh yes. It’s excrement and...’

  She didn’t finish the sentence, probably trying to save Stephen from pain, but he’d a pretty good idea what the smell was. Thank goodness it was late October or the house would probably have been filled with flies, and God knows what else. At least they hadn’t seen any rats – yet.

  They passed a door on the right and then two on the left. They stopped at the final door on the right.

  ‘This has to be the one, going by the position of the window when we were outside,’ Stephen said.

  ‘Agreed. Let’s get on with it, while I still have some courage left.’

  Seeing the look in her eyes, Stephen nodded and reached for the handle.

  ‘Wait,’ Bryonny said, her voice low.

  ‘Why are you whispering all of a sudden?’

  ‘Look,’ she said, grabbing the torch and redirecting the beam.

  A wire followed the painted architrave of the door and up into the coving above.

  ‘Why’s that there?’ Stephen said in equally hushed tones.

  ‘Exactly. Follow the other end.’

  Stephen did as Bryonny suggested. The wires led to a bank of four car batteries that were all connected up with what seemed like a haphazard collection of m
ulti-coloured wires. ‘A booby trap?’

  ‘Maybe?’

  ‘So what now?’

  ‘I don’t know, but there’s worse. Look,’ Bryonny said, swallowing.

  Stephen looked down at where the torch was pointing. A rusty red smear covered the floor. ‘Is that what I think it is?’

  Bryonny nodded. ‘But there’s something not quite right about it.’

  ‘What if it’s Georgia’s?’

  ‘We’ve wasted enough time. We need to get in that room.’

  ‘What do you suggest?’ Stephen felt Bryonny’s hand on his chest.

  ‘Get back,’ she ordered, her voice full of confidence once again.

  ‘Why?’

  ‘I’m going to do what Chambers’ always do.’

  ‘What’s that?’

  ‘Take the most direct route.’

  Certain he knew what she meant, Stephen took a step back, took the torch from her hand and watched as her motorcycle boot kicked the door.

  A terrific crack rolled down the hallway as the door flew open and hit the wall inside the room.

  The torch waved in Stephen’s shaking hand, illuminating an ornately designed fireplace. Bryonny shifted behind him and then he felt her touch his arm. The light cleaved through the darkness as Stephen moved the torch from right to left. He stopped as soon as the beam revealed the grubby side of an armchair. There had been no other furniture in the house so it had to be there for a reason. He needed to know if anyone was sitting in it, but he was unable to move the light any further and expose the seat.

  The heat from Bryonny’s hand made him jump as she closed her hand over his. He hadn’t realized how cold he’d got.

  ‘Give me the torch,’ she said, her tone commanding, yet comforting. ‘Ready?’

  ‘Yes, do it.’

  Bryonny pushed Stephen’s hand and swung the light onto the seat of the chair.

  It was empty.

  Seventy-One

  A strange mixture of emotions came over Stephen. The empty chair gave him hope, but it didn’t mean that either girl was safe and alive.