The Turnkey of Highgate Cemetery

by Allison Rushby

  Flossie met Grace’s angry expression. “Yes,” she said. “Yes, I do.”

  Again, Grace scribbled furiously, her writing spiky and disturbed.

  The drone of enemy planes outside seemed to become louder.

  Flossie had no time for this. She had to go. If she didn’t find a way to stop Viktor Brun, there would only be more planes. More and more and then . . . invasion. There would be no choices for anyone — dead or alive — if Viktor Brun had his way.

  Flossie struggled to think of a good answer to Grace’s question because there was no good answer. As she tried to think of something to say, she clenched her iron key tighter in her hand.

  “You should choose to live because your life matters, Grace.” Flossie felt a flare of anger as a picture of Viktor Brun standing over the crystal skull came into her mind. He’d taken her father, and now he wanted to take her cemetery, her country, even Grace. Well, he had taken enough. Flossie wouldn’t let him take one more thing. Not one. She got down onto her knees next to Grace. “Every life matters. Even more so than usual right now. Don’t give yours away easily.”

  Grace didn’t move, holding the notebook and pencil still in her hands. When she eventually went to write something, her face crumpled as soon as the pencil hit the paper.

  “Oh, Grace.” Flossie squeezed Grace’s shoulder. She didn’t want to promise her anything, but surely they would send her father to her soon. Surely he would be granted compassionate leave. Perhaps that might change her mind.

  It felt like an eternity before Grace’s pencil connected with the paper again.

  Flossie exited the hospital. Michael was sitting on the stairs, observing the night sky, his scarlet coat spilling out around him.

  “Hello,” Flossie said, her voice flat.

  “Hello there.” Michael took off his tricorn hat and patted the place beside him.

  “I’m sorry, I have to go,” Flossie said, her mind already on Viktor Brun.

  “Oh, you can sit for a moment. We have all the time in the world, remember?”

  If only that were true. Flossie did what she was asked and sat down.

  “Grace has a good head on her shoulders,” Michael said. “I think she’ll make the right decision in the end.”

  “I hope so.”

  “There’s nothing else you could have done or said, love,” Michael told her. “For Grace, I mean. It’s up to her now.”

  Flossie shrugged. She didn’t know how to help Grace. “You know, my father was a rear admiral,” she said, taking in Michael’s kindly face and twinkly eyes. “Sometimes I wonder if there’s any of him in me at all.”

  “What? Of course there is! Is he buried in your cemetery, too?” Michael asked.

  “I wish he had been, but no. He was lost at sea.”

  In life, whenever Flossie had met anyone who had served with her father, they would always tell her of his skill as a leader. How they trusted him. How they would have followed him anywhere. Every single time she had met someone who had known him, they had told her what a courageous man he had been. Oh, she wished he were here so he could tell her what to do. He would have worked out what to say to Grace. He would have persuaded her to stay in the land of the living.

  With a start, Flossie realized that she’d wasted too much time here. She had to get back to Highgate. The full moon was coming, and she had to be ready for it.

  Just as she was about to get up, she felt a presence behind her — the Turnkey of Brompton. She couldn’t handle explaining everything again. Especially to another Turnkey.

  “Hello! And good-bye!” she called out to him as she darted down the steps and away. “I really must go.”

  “Hazel? Hazel!” Flossie had fled through the cemetery gates and to her Turnkey’s cottage.

  “Mistress Turnkey.” Hazel materialized in an instant. “Is everything all right?”

  “No, Hazel, it most certainly is not,” Flossie replied, sitting on the small upholstered footstool, gripping her iron ring and key tight. She spent the next few minutes filling Hazel in on everything that had occurred. “Violet believes the only way we can stop Viktor Brun from delivering even more harmful information is by destroying the crystal skull in the living world. But I don’t see how that’s possible. Even though she thinks it will be in a good position when it’s taken to the rock formation, we’d have to be able to move the skull in the living world in order to destroy it, and we don’t have the ability to do that.”

  An ominous silence filled the room.

  “Hazel?” Flossie spoke slowly.

  Hazel stood stock-still.

  “If it’s possible to move objects in the living world, you have to tell me now. Don’t you understand? Highgate is at risk. Our country is at risk!”

  Hazel’s eyes slid to meet hers. “Mistress Turnkey, there are things you are not meant to know about the Magnificent Seven. That no Turnkey is meant to know. There is information that I am not at liberty to divulge.”

  “Hazel”— Flossie’s voice had a warning to it — “how can you not tell me if you know something? You’re supposed to advise me. Remember?”

  “I do apologize, Mistress Turnkey. But to part with this knowledge could put Highgate at just as much risk as you are suggesting it is already facing.”

  Flossie couldn’t believe her ears. Hazel knew the way out of this mess and was deliberately withholding information that might well save the cemetery and all those within it from devastation. Not to mention their city. Their country, even!

  Flossie crossed her arms. “So that’s it, then. You won’t tell me.”

  There was another long pause before Hazel spoke again. “I will say no more other than that there is one person in the twilight who is privy to this information.”

  “And who would that be?”

  Hazel’s golden eyes bore into those of her mistress. “The Turnkey of Kensal Green.”

  Flossie stormed out of her own cemetery, away from Hazel. Her Advisor’s cryptic answer infuriated her but didn’t surprise her — things often worked this way in her cemetery — Highgate had always been full of dark shadows, whispers, and secrets.

  This could sometimes be most annoying.

  So intent was she on rapping on the gates at Kensal Green that she startled herself by arriving there with her nose pressed almost to its iron bars. She retreated a fraction and then tapped away insistently with her iron ring.

  Hugo Howsham attended to her tapping within seconds, Violet by his side. When he saw who was at the gates, he glared that ever-present glare of his. As usual, his Advisor was not with him. Flossie knew he had brought forth his Advisor in the form of Princess Sophia, who was buried within his cemetery. Hugo Howsham’s Advisor had a low-key role. It was so like him to think he knew it all. And also so like him to think he was fit company for a princess.

  Oh, how she despised him.

  “Miss Birdwhistle,” he said, acknowledging her.

  Flossie didn’t care for formalities right now. She concentrated on Violet. “Apparently your brother knows a way to move objects in the living world. Did you know that?”

  Violet frowned, turning to her brother. “Hugo?”

  But Hugo Howsham wasn’t interested in explaining himself to his sister. Instead, he unlocked the gates to his cemetery, then took two long steps to tower over Flossie, forcing her to withdraw so her back pushed into one of the entrance’s high columns.

  “Hugo!” Violet rattled on the locked gates, trapped inside the cemetery. “What are you doing? Stop that at once and —” Her words were drowned out by the air-raid siren’s whine.

  Flossie squared her jaw. She had to appear as if she weren’t scared of him, despite the fact that she always had been and he knew it. She had to show him that she was a worthy Turnkey. A Turnkey of a cemetery just as important as his. A cemetery that was just as at risk as his.

  Hugo Howsham used the rise and fall of the siren to mask his words. “I saw those building plans — the plans for the barracks at
Highgate and Kensal Green.” He brought himself to his full intimidating height. “And I agree with Violet. The skull must be destroyed.”

  Flossie’s eyes bored into his. “Well, then, how are we going to do that? It seems you’re the one with all the information here.”

  He laughed then. “Plucky, aren’t you?”

  Flossie didn’t know how to reply.

  “I will help you if you require, because I must. But only when the time comes.”

  “So you do know a way to move objects in the living world?” Flossie said.

  His mouth twisted, amused. “Now, I never said that. I only said I would help you if required. Until then, you must promise that you will not speak of my involvement. To anyone. Is that clear?”

  Annoyed at another cryptic reply, Flossie didn’t answer him, tilting her chin farther.

  He moved back a tad, giving her some space, and his expression changed. “All I can tell you is that when the time comes, you will know what to do, and I will help you to do it. It is most important that you don’t reveal anything about this. Most important.”

  What did he mean? Flossie caught sight of a slight vulnerability in his eyes. Was this something to do with Violet? She wasn’t sure.

  “I don’t understand. Why can’t you tell me? Why can’t you explain?”

  His eyes flashed with anger then. “Because I cannot. And that will have to be good enough for you if you wish for my assistance.” He paused. “Is it good enough, or should we part ways right now?”

  Still not willing to give the man what he wanted, Flossie offered up a shrug.

  He took this as her agreement. “Violet will tell us when the time is right,” he continued. “Until then, Miss Birdwhistle.” He bowed slightly and headed back to the gates, which he unlocked swiftly, already flicking Violet’s concerns away with a shake of his keyed hand.

  Flossie gasped when she saw the view from the Golden Gallery. She had retreated there in the hope of finding a quiet place to think. It was anything but quiet. Smoke filled the sky, and London below was dotted with flames, the horizon of the city ablaze. Searchlights roamed the hazy sky, ready and waiting for enemy planes. In the distance, a searchlight homed in on a plane and an ack-ack gun opened fire.

  And beneath that noise something else. A low drone.

  Louder.

  And louder still.

  Flossie took a step back and watched as the planes passed overhead. She remained transfixed as the scene played out before her: the flashing of the incendiary bombs, the tearing apart of buildings, the grinding machinery of the planes, the flames whipping the air.

  She moved up to the ornate iron railing, anger flaring inside her. Anger at Hugo Howsham. Anger at Viktor Brun. Anger at this stupid, senseless war.

  “Stop it!” she screamed. “Just stop! Stop it now!”

  She was being ridiculous. She knew it. She was screaming at nothing and no one. The living couldn’t hear her, and even if they could, they wouldn’t listen to her anyway. She was just a child, and a child of the twilight at that.

  With the planes gone, a brief reprieve saw her eyes roam the heavens for answers.

  And then she found one.

  There. There in the night sky.

  One single small, lonely star.

  For some reason, the star reminded her of Grace, who, in turn, reminded her of her interred. All those people she had been entrusted to care for at Highgate. She could see their faces. Knew their names. Cared for them all.

  And right now she felt powerless to protect them. Another Turnkey held all the cards. A Turnkey who had always despised her.

  Flossie sank down the wall onto the floor below.

  Now more than ever, she couldn’t let Highgate down. She had to make sure that skull was destroyed before Viktor Brun’s soldiers trampled their way into her country and her cemetery.

  Flossie simply couldn’t imagine it — St. Paul’s gone. Kensal Green and Highgate cemeteries flattened to make way for armies of men.

  It would be terrible enough for her interred, but the living, all those people below . . . All those Londoners . . .

  To be honest, she hadn’t given them much thought until now. After spending so long as a Turnkey, she felt as if she barely knew them.

  She knew what they had to do, of course, each time that air-raid siren wailed — take to their Anderson shelters in their back gardens, run to the Underground shelters far below the city. Caught up in her own little world at Highgate, she had never seen it. Never seen what they were going through — the fear in their eyes. The not knowing.

  Maybe she should see that, she thought.

  Maybe she should see them. See the people she was begging Grace to remain with.

  Flossie closed her eyes then and thought of the steep escalators of Piccadilly Circus station.

  “Oh!” was her immediate reaction. Deep down in the Underground, she hadn’t expected to see what she did — people had set up camp all over the steep escalators. Children slept; people chatted. A woman knitted a long sock. A girl read a book. A man read a newspaper, the headline LONDON CAN TAKE IT! jumping out at her.

  She picked her way through the crowd, wandering toward the sound of a violin that wafted from one of the platforms.

  On the station platform itself, she was greeted with yet more people, sandwiched between suitcases. Some had blankets and pillows; some did not. Some dozed, fully clothed in suits and ties, hats on their heads. Some sat, their backs against a curved wall, and listened to the man and his violin. A baby cried and was soothed by its mother.

  Flossie watched them — all these Londoners — for some time. She hadn’t expected this. No one quivered in fear or seemed panicked. They went about their business, uncomplaining, tired more than distressed. As if they knew they must simply bear this to get through to the other side.

  This was what got to her — that they believed there would be a life on the other side of this war.

  They were like that star in the sky — like Grace — faint but still shining, despite everything.

  Seeing them gave Flossie a sudden burst of faith. And hope. If they could do this, she could, too.

  She wouldn’t give up now, or be put off by Hugo Howsham.

  So, Hugo Howsham wanted to keep secrets? Well, she had a secret as well. He still had no idea about her personal connection to Viktor Brun. Maybe that was something she needed to explore in greater depth. After all, the more she knew about what was going on here, the more likely she was to find out something that might be of use.

  Flossie appeared atop a high cliff. Down below, the wintery North Sea crashed and rolled, booming as it hit the jagged rocks. A fierce wind buffeted the tiny tufts of plant life that could be seen through the snow. Flossie stood steady in the twilight, impervious to it. She stared far out to sea at the white-tipped waves — her father’s domain.

  So this was the place it had all happened — those events she’d read about so many times. The Battle of Jutland had been the strangest of battles, with each side claiming victory. The British had lost almost twice as many ships and men as the Germans, but had then controlled the North Sea for the rest of the Great War. However, Flossie saw it only as she saw this war. There were no victories. No winners. Everyone lost. Over and over again, as relentlessly as the waves crashed onto the rocks beneath.

  The upcoming confrontation with Viktor Brun looming over her, Flossie could think of nothing she needed more right now than her father’s advice. She had no idea how she was going to defeat Brun, and only the sketchiest promise of help from Hugo Howsham to fall back on. She also knew she didn’t have the power to awaken her father and wouldn’t want to do so even if she were able to. It was wrong for a Turnkey to awaken the dead from rest unless absolutely necessary. She would simply have to wait and hope that he might sense her.

  Flossie closed her eyes and began to think of her happiest memories of her father. Their time together had been short. Even before he was taken from her, he had always be
en torn between his family and the ocean. However, the memories she did have she treasured, and they came to her mind vividly now. Walks in Hyde Park and boating on the Serpentine. An outing to the seaside where their beach chairs kept being blown away — her father cursing the wind and then laughing at the futility of it all. The time a squirrel had somehow found its way into their house and she had seen her father panicked for the only time in her life. Flossie laughed out loud remembering that and opened her eyes.

  And there he was.

  Resplendent in his dark-blue uniform with its shiny gold buttons — tall and solid and, oh, so very real.

  Flossie’s mouth opened, ready to say all the things she hadn’t been able to say for so many years. And then she found she didn’t have any words at all, so she ran into his already open arms instead.

  The pair clasped each other tightly. But beneath the happiness of being together once more, Flossie could feel an undercurrent pulling as strong as the North Sea below them. It would have been possible to talk for days about all that had passed since they had last seen each other. But she could feel him being called back to the sea. Back to his men. He might not have been a Turnkey, but he commanded his men even in the twilight world. His men needed him more than Flossie did — they were already asking him to return.

  She pulled back then.

  “You’re a Turnkey! And taken too young, of course. How beautiful you are,” her father said, smiling down at her, “and how much I have missed you. Though you are always with me, you know.”

  “I know,” Flossie said. “I also know you have to go, Papa, but there’s something I need to ask you before you do.”

  “Azure,” her father replied, with a laugh. “You came all this way to ask me that?”

  Flossie chuckled. As a small child she was always insisting her father tell her his favorite color, and the answer was forever a shade of blue. A shade of the ocean. She was amazed at how many shades there were. He never failed to come up with a new one for her: celeste and cerulean, teal and turquoise, verdigris and viridian.