[Brenda & Effie 07] - A Game of Crones

by Paul Magrs

  ‘From the islands of Finland, far away,’ said the old lady. ‘And he has lost them forever, he fears.’

  ‘But,’ I broke in, trying to grasp the situation. ‘The giant squid was stuffed, wasn’t it? We saw Maude Sturgeon’s sisters sewing it themselves in their backroom. Rather like a shroud. Surely, if there were jewels inside the beast’s body, then…’

  Denise Wheatley was staring at me and her eyes were hard and glittering with excitement. ‘Yes! Yes, you’re right!’

  I looked at Nellie and she was shaking her head at me fiercely. ‘But, I just thought,’ I began.

  ‘We must go at once,’ said Denise, slinging back the last of her brandy. ‘Where do they live, these Sisters Sturgeon? Where are they hiding the Eyes of Miimon?’

  And then, rather like your own dear self, Doctor Watson, I was left to straggle in the wake of the others as they dashed from the bar area, and out of the Hotel Miramar, into something of a balmy evening.

  Dear Doctor Watson,

  I am writing this on the back of a laundry list I have found in my coat pocket and using a nub of pencil that has worn almost to nothing. This is possibly the most futile and hopeless message demanding help that you will never receive. Still, it seems preferable to write it all down, rather than sit here in the dark, doing nothing. At least my hands aren’t tied, I suppose. That is something. I can twiddle my fingers at least.

  Nellie is with me, absolutely furious at our predicament, for which she blames me. At this present time my malformed sister is refusing to speak to me.

  ‘You had to blunder in, didn’t you?’ was one of the last things she said. ‘Everything was proceeding just as it ought, and you had to go opening your big fat trap.’

  Never have I heard such coarseness from my sister’s rather blubbery and unattractive lips. For a few moments I was convinced that the vile spook she claims to harbour in her soul was speaking through her, but alas, no: it was Nellie herself who was livid with me. It turns out that I had burst out with quite the wrong thing, and shouldn’t have told Denise the exorcist about the Sturgeon sisters and their skills in the art of taxidermy. Everything, it seems, was already in hand, and Nellie was on the point of ensnaring the blue-haired woman in a trap. My sister and Maude Sturgeon had had everything worked out, and the idea was, apparently, to lure Denise Wheatley up to the ruined Abbey. There, to meet and greet her ultimate fate, as befitting a being as magically powerful as herself. She was to be lured there by the promise of having these magical Finnish crystals handed over to her by Maude, as the senior Sturgeon sister. Such had been the idea, anyhow.

  But because of me, everything has gone to the bad. I never could hold my tongue, could I?

  This house is silent now. The pair of us have been imprisoned in one of the attic rooms. We’ve tried to break out, smashing the few bits of old furniture against the solid door. We have shouted for help, but there is no one here. The Sturgeon house is quite empty. The lower rooms lie in messy chaos, following that terrible fight between the three Sturgeon sisters and Denise Wheatley. Shelves, jars, furniture and fittings – everything was smashed into smithereens by those… what would you call them? Lightning bolts? That they were all shooting out of their hands and eyes at each other. It was a terrible to-do. And all over a few bits of old jewellery that came out of a gutted fish.

  LATER:

  Maude Sturgeon eventually arrived to let us out. By then I was exhausted and in no mood for a long disquisition or inquisition about what had been going on. She was filling in her partner-in-crime, my sister Nellie, about the latest developments. How it turned out that Denise Wheatley was, in fact, a powerful sorceress, and the supernatural powers of all four Sturgeon sisters combined hadn’t been enough to hold her back. She had stormed into their home and stolen away the jewels she was after.

  Both Nellie and Maude gave me a hard stare at this point, for giving away their location. I merely tutted and set off down the stairs of the Sturgeon residence, eager to be out of that dusty deathtrap, filled with antiques and black magic paraphernalia.

  I can tell you, Doctor, I wasn’t at all impressed by this talk of sorceresses and so on, for all I had seen them shooting bolts of fire out of every which way.

  Maude told us that the Finnish jewels had been discovered by her sisters during the stuffing process. They had been hidden inside the dead eyes of the giant squid. Maude had cleaned them up and popped them into the safe in her bedroom, which Denise Wheatley had no compunction about breaking into, blasting it apart with those queer bolts of lightning she manifested out of her limbs.

  This was all rather too much for me. I didn’t care who got hold of the jewels, and said so. What did Finland matter to me?

  Maude glared at me angrily. By now we were in the smashed up herbalist shop downstairs. ‘With the eyes of Miimon, a powerful sorceress like Denise could do untold damage to the world.’

  Nellie was biting her lip. ‘We were going to shove her in the Bitch’s Maw, up at the Abbey. The idea was to dispatch her to hell.’

  ‘But now she’s on the alert,’ said Maude. ‘There’s no way she’d let us lead her there. She knows full well now that we are set against her.’

  I was seeing the extent to which I had scuppered their plans. ‘Oh well, never mind. I’m very sorry and all that. I think my sister and I ought to be going, actually. It’s terribly late and we’ve been through a great deal. Ah… where are your sisters now, Maude?’

  It turns out they were out hunting Denise, who had gone to ground. They didn’t come back until the early hours of the morning, apparently absolutely furious. By then, however, I was safely asleep in Nellie’s spare bedroom. I was trying not to feel guilty for messing up their plans, and listening to the muffled voices of Nellie talking with her demon spirit guide, Raphael, in her bedroom. Really, it sounded just like Nellie talking to herself in a deeper, gruffer voice. I wasn’t at all sure I believed in any of this occult stuff they were all talking about.

  I went to sleep at last, and dreamed of those mesmerising squid eyes I had seen the other day.

  Dear Doctor Watson,

  Tonight we shall return to the Christmas Hotel for another night of Exorcisms. I’m really not sure it’s a good idea at all.

  Nellie demands (she’s become rather forceful of late, and I’m not sure it’s all down to her purported spirit demon) that we both don our finest gowns for the evening. I have told her that I prefer something I can run in easily, given the danger element inherent in these evenings out in Whitby. Nellie replied that it is possible to be mobile and ready for action, as well as maintaining an attractive and glamorous appearance. I did think this a bit rich coming from a hunchback with a clubfoot, one eye and permanently greasy hair, but I didn’t say anything.

  I did, in fact, wear my nicest gown – the emerald green silk – for our second Tuesday with the Exorcists and I think we made rather a splendid entrance into that festive foyer. Again the elves were serving their punch and taking coats, and again there was yuletide music and frivolity in abundance as we moved graciously through the crowd.

  We saw the raddled Mrs Claus again, dolled up even more extravagantly and cackling madly. She drew Nellie closer and whispered something about the missing jewels and the stuffed squid. She seemed to find the whole thing hilarious. She is remarkably well-informed about goings-on in this town, it seemed.

  Through the crowd we caught glimpses of folk we have met in recent weeks. I spied the Mayor and his tiny mother, both looking none the worse for being crushed beneath the collapsing sea monster. I noticed the witchy Sturgeon sisters moodily browsing the occult bazaar in the ballroom, but they took no heed of us. Clearly they were most vexed by my involvement in the Eyes of Miimon affair.

  All of this fuss over some foreign jewels! It is ludicrous, is it not?

  Then a crowd formed for the Exorcism part of the evening, and my sister and I stood near the back to observe the same species of shenanigans as we were forced to witness last Tuesday night.
It was clear, upon second viewing, that it was all a piece of well-rehearsed melodrama. We watched volunteers expelling quantities of ectoplasmic Scotch broth. Even the spinning heads and the forked tongues didn’t impress me much, now that I was becoming a regular at these soirees at the Christmas Hotel. I knew it was all fakery and quackery.

  Then, however, there was a hush of expectation, and the lights were lowered, as if for a special act. Mrs Claus trundled onto the stage, helped by two of her heftiest elves, and she made a rambling introduction for the winners of the Christmas Hotel’s ‘Exorcist of the Year’ competition. This was the first, actually, I’d heard of a competitive element to the proceedings. There was even a small trophy – in the shape of a disembodied and daemonic soul – which the proprietress presented to the winner.

  Which turned out to be Denise and Wheatley. He – sweating and red-faced in his evening dress – shuffled onto the podium first in order to accept the award. He seemed especially pleased by the engraved plaque on the front of the thing. Denise was beatific in a lacy black gown, holding up her hands for applause. Her blue hair was teased out very glamorously, and she seemed so very different from the shambolic and distraught creature in the bar of the Miramar hotel, when she had hoodwinked information out of me.

  I think you’ll agree, Doctor Watson, that I am far too soft-hearted and ingenuous for these kinds of adventures and investigations.

  The winning exorcists were persuaded to put on a little demonstration. A kind of jubilant, celebratory rite. The lights were lowered once again, and the husband fetched out his Bible while Denise turned to the audience and considered who could do with her attention.

  And thus it was that my sister was called, once more, ineluctably, onto the stage at the Christmas Hotel.

  There was something very odd about Denise’s eyes as she called my sister forth, and a gap opened up in the audience. Nellie started walking through that channel to the stage and I grabbed hold of her stick-like arm. ‘Nellie, no!’ I cried. ‘Can’t you see? Her eyes… her eyes are the Eyes of Miimon!’

  And it was true, though no one else seemed disturbed by the fact. Her human eyes were seemingly gone and Denise had glittering jewels in her cavities instead.

  Maude Sturgeon appeared as if from nowhere at my side and held me back. ‘There is nothing you can do. Poor Nellie is under the spell of the sorceress now.’

  I stood helplessly by as my sister galumphed her way onto the stage. She was fighting the influence with every iota of her strength, I knew – but it was to no avail. Denise Wheatley had the upper hand.

  ‘Raphael… Raphael…’ cooed Denise, once she had Nellie where she wanted her. ‘Come out of this broken body. Leave this pathetic form and manifest yourself for me. Raphael… come to me…’

  Denise’s crystal orbs lit up in her head and seemed to shot beams of blue light that bathed my sister in a spectral glow. The audience cheered at this. They obviously felt they were getting their money’s worth this week.

  Maude grunted and said, ‘That’s what she’s after. She wants Raphael for herself, the scheming besom.’

  My sister cried out, and writhed painfully as the demon struggled within her. She cried out, ‘No! Raphael, beloved! Do not leave me…!’

  But it was very plain that something drastic was going on inside of her. Under the baleful influence of the purloined Eyes of Miimon, my sister was being exorcised, even though – it turned out – that was the last thing she wanted.

  But what could I do? Tell me, Doctor Watson, what would you have done? What could you have done? What could any ordinary, mortal being do in such circumstances?

  Well, just then, something very unexpected happened.

  Remember the gypsy? The woman we had seen on the previous Tuesday? The one who had seemed possessed of the true magical powers, who had first called my sister’s demon hence?

  All of a sudden, she was back on the stage. She darted forward, with her hooped skirts and her long black hair fanning out around her. The Romanish exorcist looked absolutely livid.

  ‘What’s this?’ shouted out the jocular Mr Wheatley, as his wife continued her arcane ritual. ‘The stage has been invaded! Hie thee hence, gypsy, and leave the exorcisms to your betters! Avaunt! I cast thee out, Romany witch!’

  The gypsy woman snarled at this. She was well nigh feral, I thought. Maude and I exchanged a glance at this sudden turn in events. Denise’s concentration had lapsed, and my poor sister sagged back onto the stage floor.

  ‘You are dabbling in things you do not understand,’ said the gypsy, in rather screeching tones. She thrust a finger in the face of Denise Wheatley, who was out of breath and venomously cross.

  ‘Get off the stage, Romany whore!’ the prize-winning Denise thundered, and took a swing at her.

  The gypsy dodged the blow and swung back with a rather swift upper cut to the jaw. Denise staggered backwards and put her hands up to her face. She shrieked and called the gypsy something I will not write down nor send through the Royal Mail. Soon, both female exorcists were engaged in a hand-to-hand catfight while the audience roared their approval.

  ‘Someone should stop them,’ I said nervously to Maude.

  She tossed her head. ‘Nothing wrong with a good grapple to sort things out. I just hope Nellie doesn’t get hurt in the crossfire…’

  Mr Wheatley was hovering anxiously as he watched his wife fighting the gypsy. He clutched his Old Testament to his chest and looked worriedly at Mrs Claus. ‘Fight! Fight! Fight!’ cried the owner of the Christmas Hotel.

  It seemed that all her magical powers couldn’t help Denise Wheatley in a fair fight. Soon the gypsy had her pinned to the floor and was clawing at her face.

  ‘Oh my god!’ Mr Wheatley bleated. ‘She’s pulling out her eyes…!’

  But that wasn’t happening at all. The gypsy was, in fact, removing the Eyes of Miimon, which Denise had affixed into her sockets in front of her already rather deepset eyes using rather a lot of eyelash glue. We all cheered as the gypsy held up the two glittering jewels. We watched her clamber to her feet and keep the so-called champion exorcist on the ground by standing on her blue hair. Behind them, Mr Wheatley noticed that his prized trophy had been smashed in the kerfuffle.

  ‘The Eyes of Miimon!’ cried the gypsy, in a rather grand voice. Then she tossed them into the crowd, which I thought was a rather cavalier gesture. But the gypsy’s aim was good and true. Maude Sturgeon plucked them out of the air and stowed them swiftly in her handbag. ‘Take good care of them,’ warned the gypsy.

  And then she basked in a warm round of applause from the crowd.

  Mrs Claus took the stage again, and declared the evening’s bizarre entertainments over. She told us all to fetch ourselves another drink and to have fun. The dancing would recommence, just as soon as the band could set up.

  We saw her in earnest conversation with the gypsy, and I hurried over to help Nellie, who seemed rather woozy after her ordeal.

  ‘Are you all right, my dear?’

  ‘I am… fine,’ Nellie struggled to hear feet. ‘Raphael is still inside of me, which is the main thing.’

  ‘Oh good,’ I said, though I still felt very dismayed by the thought of my sister actually wanting to be possessed by this being, whatever he was.

  Maude slapped her shiny leather handbag triumphantly. ‘And thanks to the gypsy, I’ve got the Eyes of Miimon! Safe, where no one can make mischief with them!’

  Nellie looked rather pleased by that.

  But we all had one remaining question, and it was to do with the gypsy woman. Why had that beaky-nosed creature helped us like that, in our moment of direst need?

  It was some time later, in a quiet corner of the public rooms, near the roaring fire in the lounge, when we caught up with her.

  ‘Look here, gypsy woman,’ said Maude Sturgeon, with her usual bluff heartiness. ‘I suppose we owe you our thanks for your intercession tonight. If that dreadful woman Denise had been allowed to keep these jewels, who knows what t
errible sorceries she might have unleashed.’

  ‘Where is she now?’ asked the gypsy sharply, glaring at the three of us in turn.

  ‘That’s a good point,’ said Nellie. ‘She vanished into the crowd, once you let her go. And so has her husband.’

  ‘They live to fight another day,’ shrugged the gypsy. ‘Ah well.’

  She was pulling a shawl around her, clearly ready for the off.

  ‘Look here,’ I said, stepping forward. ‘You still haven’t explained anything…’

  The gypsy laughed. ‘I trust Maude Sturgeon to do the correct thing with the crystals. They were stolen from the Finnish people and they must be returned. Miss Sturgeon will act in accordance with the law.’

  I looked at Maude and she seemed determined – on the contrary – to dispatch the things straight into the Bitch’s Maw, as planned.

  ‘Well, yes,’ Maude said. ‘Quite right. I will contact the authorities tomorrow.’

  ‘Excellent,’ the gypsy nodded. ‘Then my work here is finished.’

  Nellie was frowning and her single eye was blazing. ‘Hang on a moment!’ she cried. She had to yell over the noise of the band playing Christmas tunes. They were getting louder by the minute. ‘Contact the authorities? Return the Eyes of Miimon to the Finnish people?’ She sounded scornful. ‘What kind of gypsy exorcist are you, woman?’

  The gypsy started laughing at us then. It was a harsh, gasping, somewhat sarcastic laughter that came bubbling out from under the shawl and her dark ringlets.

  It was a laughter I took only a second or two to recognise.

  The Romany woman reached up and dragged off her shawl and her wig and gave us one of those quicksilver grins I was so used to seeing.

  A grin I was in no way expecting to see in a hotel on a cliff above the dark North Sea.

  ‘Good Goddess!’ cried Maude Sturgeon.

  ‘I don’t believe it,’ Nellie gasped. ‘Hettie,’ she turned to me. ‘Did you know about this?’

  I stared at her and then back at Mr Sherlock Holmes. I couldn’t help but laugh out loud. ‘I most certainly did not!’