by Will Harker
Emerging into the huge clearing, I parked in one of the hundreds of bays that had been spray-painted onto the ground just outside the fair. It was late afternoon and dusk was already stealing in. Soon, every generator would be switched on and those vague columns and spirals that loomed against the sky would define themselves into thrill rides and Ferris wheels. In the meantime, only the glow of trailer windows and my own headlights relieved the gloom. That, and a border of multicoloured bulbs flashing around the billboard that overlooked the carpark:
IN PARTNERSHIP WITH JERICHO FAIRS, EVERTHORN MEDIA
WELCOMES YOU TO
PURLEY RECTORY
THE MOST HAUNTED HOUSE IN BRITAIN!
JOIN US THIS HALLOWEEN NIGHT
FOR A LIVE EDITION OF TV PHENOMENON
GHOST SEEKERS
WITH RENOWNED MEDIUM DARREL EVERWOOD
SPOOKY FUN FOR ALL THE FAMILY!
I got out and stood beneath the pulsing glare. I liked this no more than my father, but in recent years special events around which a fair could open for a few days were a necessary evil. For some time, the travelling fair had been a dying industry, its overheads enormous, its appeal to the public little more than a fading sense of nostalgia. To survive we had to piggyback on more modern spectacles. This haunted house bullshit was just the latest in a long line of stunts that, to my mind, cheapened the purity of our heritage.
The aspect of the whole thing that grated most was to see our family name associated with a two-bit chancer like Darrel Everwood. In principle, I had no problem with harmless con artists. In fact, it could be argued that showpeople themselves had their roots in thrills and spills trumpeted with dubious claims. But Everwood was no benign sideshow huckster. His claim to communicate with the dead was not only absurd but deeply damaging. For one thing, there was the case of Debbie Chambers, the little girl who had gone missing from her front garden just before Easter.
In an interview with a leading tabloid newspaper, Everwood had claimed that the child had died only hours after being taken and had been buried somewhere close to the Chambers’ residence. For Debbie’s parents, clinging to any scrap of hope that their daughter might still be alive, the subsequent media shit-storm had proved devastating. If I remembered rightly, Mrs Chambers’ attempted suicide had been prevented only because her husband had forgotten his briefcase and returned home unexpectedly. Even then, cutting her wrists had led to permanent nerve damage and a vow from Mr Chambers that, if he should ever meet Darrel Everwood face-to-face, he could not be held responsible for his actions.
As if echoing these thoughts, a voice called out across the carpark, “Revolting man, isn’t he?”
I turned to find Angela Rowell coming towards me. When we’d arrived yesterday, the housekeeper of Purley had received us by storming out the door of the Victorian rectory and shrieking at Big Sam Urnshaw like a banshee. His lorry had trespassed over the agreed boundary of the fair; didn’t he know the stipulations of the contract? No vehicle must come within fifty metres of the house. If he didn’t get his load shifted right away, Miss Rowell would be on the phone to the Earl of Aumbry, absentee owner of the property. Looking suitably horrified, Big Sam had jumped back into his cab and backed up halfway across the clearing.
Standing beside me, she now jabbed an outraged finger at the billboard.
“As I said to your father when negotiations for this absurd spectacle began, I’m not a tremendous fan of travelling circuses.” I let the mistake pass. “But next to this charlatan, I would welcome a hundred carnivals. The sheer nerve of that man!” I turned to her. Miss Rowell’s hands were clasped so tightly together that the knuckles stood out, sharp and bloodless. “They… That’s to say, they…” She shook her head. “They don’t like it up at the house, you know.”
“You mean the Earl?” I said. “I thought he never came here?”
“Not in years. As far as Lord Denver is concerned, Purley is a mere curiosity in his property empire. I think he enjoys the bragging rights of owning the most haunted house in England, but otherwise, he’s pretty much indifferent.”
“So you’re talking about?”
“The residents.” She held my gaze for a moment before letting it slip to the ground. “The personalities who call the house their home. They cannot abide an imposter, Mr Jericho.”
“You mean the ghosts?” I said, making a heroic effort to keep a straight face.
“Personalities,” she corrected. “And jealous ones at that. Mark my words, they shan’t tolerate the likes of Mr Everwood within their walls. There have been consequences in the past for those who have sought to exploit this place.”
“Really?”
“Oh yes,” she said matter-of-factly. “Madness. Suicide. Murder. However it manifests, the residents of Purley always take their pound of flesh.”
CHAPTER THREE
It might have been easier to dismiss Angela Rowell had she been anything like the ludicrous figure on the billboard in front of us. In his guise as celebrity medium, Darrel Everwood was cradling a crystal ball while simultaneously holding out two hooked fingers to the viewer in what I supposed was either a warning or a blessing. Mascara gave a piercing quality to his stare while his trademark cocky grin completed a look that set many a bereaved heart aflutter. Still in his twenties, cynics argued that Everwood owed his success as much to a pretty face as to his dubious hotline to the dead.
Miss Rowell, meanwhile, was a very different kettle of fish. With her bouffant hair cemented into place, she looked like a Margaret Thatcher clone that had fallen upon hard times, her once-expensive Harris Tweed patched and mended so often there were probably only scraps of the original suit remaining. Her shoes too were old and scuffed, one buckle hanging on for dear life. And yet this sixty-something held herself with a kind of faded dignity, like a battle-scarred warship, docked and awaiting decommission. Everything about her appeared constrained. Even the sleeves of her blouse were pinched so tight that the fabric dug into her skin. Around her left wrist hung a rubber band which she touched self-consciously when she saw me looking at it.
“An old habit,” she said sharply. “Picked up from the first housekeeper I ever worked under. You glance down at your watch to check the time and the sight of the band acts as a kind of aide-mémoire, reminding you of any task that might have slipped your mind.”
“Except you don’t wear a wristwatch,” I observed. “And surely if it’s an old habit you’d get used to the presence of the band. It wouldn’t remind you of anything.”
“That hasn’t been my experience, Mr Jericho,” she said. “Not at all.”
A pause, filled by the shush of the trees.
“You were saying something about the gho—” I corrected myself. “Personalities of the house punishing anyone who tries to exploit Purley Rectory. But what about the tours, Miss Rowell? Don’t you guide those yourself? And what about us?” I nodded towards the sprawling hulk of the fair, all set up a stone’s throw from the imperious Victorian building. “Aren’t we risking bringing down the curse on ourselves?”
If she detected any playfulness in my tone, she didn’t bite. “I show utmost delicacy and respect whenever I take a tour around the house. As for yourselves?” She almost allowed herself a smile. “Your father has assured me that he has nothing but the highest regard for the history of Purley.”
I very nearly rolled my eyes. The number of people in this world immune to my dad’s charm could probably be squeezed into one of his Waltzer carriages. Figuratively at least, he certainly appeared to have got under Miss Rowell’s tight tweed.
“What did you mean, though, about the consequences of disrespecting the residents?” I asked.
It wasn’t an idle question. What with helping to build up the fair and then checking on Garris, I hadn’t yet had time to look inside the rectory myself, but those Travellers Miss Rowell had taken on the tour had almost all returned with stories of an unnerving, oppressive atmosphere; of sudden cold spots and indecipherable whispers
behind the walls. Admittedly, many showpeople are congenitally superstitious, but even some of the harder-headed specimens appeared to have been affected by the spell of the house.
“An early example came in the interwar years,” Miss Rowell said. She spoke almost robotically, as if reciting from a tourist brochure. “By then, the rectory had already gained a worldwide reputation for its hauntings. So much so that the International Institute for Psychical Research sent down a small team to look into it. No one really knows what happened the night of their séance, only that in the months following, both lead investigators died in separate railway accidents and that the medium they’d employed succumbed to a sudden and aggressive brain tumour.”
“Sounds like a few unlucky coincidences,” I said.
“If you like,” Miss Rowell retorted. “Though I mistrust coincidences.”
I gave a wry smile. “A former friend of mine used to say the same thing. And I suppose there have been other tragic stories associated with the house since then?”
“You’ll have to take the tour, Mr Jericho,” she said flatly.
“But have you always sensed them?” I asked. “I think my dad told me you’d been housekeeper here for almost twenty years. Was it an immediate thing as soon as you walked through the door or did it take a while for you to pick up on their presence?”
I was genuinely curious. Garris had called me a rationalist, and I suppose like most sceptics, I’d always been fascinated by the conviction of true believers. This believer hooked her forefinger through the elastic band around her wrist before blinking hard and letting the band slacken again.
“Are you mocking me?” she asked quietly.
I shook my head, a little stunned. “I swear, I’m not. But you seem completely convinced of your ghosts and yet dismissive of Darrel Everwood’s. I just wondered why.”
“Men like that,” she spat out the words, jabbing her finger once again at the billboard. “Duplicity runs through them. Their kind of deception is wilful, unforgivable, cruel. Honesty is a precious commodity in a world like this. It shouldn’t be thrown away on the altar of mere entertainment. But I…” She appeared to catch herself, her hand moving to cradle her stomach. “I can’t stand here gossiping all night. I have a to-do list a mile long from these television people. Apparently, Purley isn’t ‘old-timey’ enough for the Ghost Seeker audience. How on earth they expect me to make a 19th Century rectory more old-timey, I have no idea.”
She turned on her heel, and battered shoes squelching in the mud, stalked back through the sleeping fairground towards the darkened house.
I looked after her for a moment. Something in her condemnation of Everwood had jarred with me. For all his absurdity how could she, a believer, be so convinced he was a fraud? And really, even if she was certain of it, what did it matter to her? There had been something like venom in her words, but of a distant, almost abstract kind. I watched until she entered the blank portico of the house and then headed into the fair myself.
It had been raining heavily for days before we pulled onto the clearing. Strips of metal grating and good old-fashioned wooden duckboards ran in grids between the rides and stalls. I hopped between them now, making for the side ground where Haz and I had set up yesterday morning. A few Travellers were stirring as I passed through, torches in hand as they fired up their gennies and wiped down their cashboxes, old aunts tottering behind in fingerless gloves, clucking their tongues, and handing out flasks of tea. I spotted my dad talking to Big Sam Urnshaw and chucked them both wave.
“All right, son,” my dad grunted.
“How’s the fella?” Sam called out.
“Haz is fine,” I shot back. “Says he’ll find you a hook-up on Grindr when he gets a minute.”
“Cheeky joskin!” Sam laughed.
Dad shook his head while his oldest mate slapped him on the back. I couldn’t help but smile. It’s amazing what familiarity could achieve. Just a few months ago, I would never have dared make a joke like that on the fair. Half-convinced the community had never really accepted my sexuality, I suppose I’d harboured a lot of grudging resentment. And truth be told, I thought prejudice still existed in the hearts of some of them. It was, after all, a tough, hardscrabble sort of existence, built largely around stereotypes of masculinity. So it was ironic that an outsider like Harry had been the one to break down many of those barriers, just by being his warm, open, generous self.
After what had happened in Bradbury End, he’d found a kind of refuge with me at the fair. The only reason he’d been in the town at all was because Garris had blackmailed him into playing a role. Another piece on that blood-soaked chessboard. But when the game was done, we had both wanted to put the town and its horrors far behind us. The easiest exit route was to hand the keys to Haz’s rented bungalow back to the estate agent, and in effect, run away with the circus. After all, that’s the beauty of communities like mine—if you’re willing to work hard, you can make yourself a new life from scratch. You can be happy. That’s what we told ourselves anyway, and we were.
For a time at least.
I moved away from the main strip and into the side ground where the novelty games and less showy attractions were stationed. These didn’t require the same safety checks as the big rides and so their owners were not yet stirring. I was debating whether to check on mine and Harry’s new ride or to head back to our trailer when I suddenly realised I was being followed.
The creak of a duckboard behind me, the flick of a shadow out of the tail of my eye. You might think, so what? Over two hundred souls called this fairground their home. But Travellers are a chatty, boisterous breed. To see someone up ahead and not call out a greeting would be considered the height of rudeness, even if you’ve spoken to them only a moment before. And then there was that low, threatening grumble emanating from behind the side ground where the trailers were set up. In my mind’s eye, I could picture the juks starting out of their boxes, Webster among them, straining now at their leads, nostrils flared, black lips pulled back over vicious teeth. A stranger had entered their world and they were eager to make his acquaintance.
I willed them not to startle him. Not yet.
I wanted words with him first.
CHAPTER FOUR
I welcomed it at once. The chance to unleash those brutal instincts that I’d denied myself for four long months. I wanted this man who pursued me to be my enemy. The implications of this, I could fret about later. For now, I focused on the opportunity to indulge my rage. If he intended me harm then he would pay, not only for his sins but my own—my inability to save the victims of Peter Garris, my complicity in the murder of Kerrigan, my faltering relationship with Harry.
All of it.
I flexed my fingers, remade my fists. But who was he? Approaching the warped mirrors that fronted Tommy Radlett’s funhouse, I chanced a sideways glance. There a figure rippled in the glass, half a dozen paces behind me. Allowing for the distortion of the mirror, I made out a broad-shouldered man, slim at the waist, long limbs, a build not unlike my own. Black jeans, a cap of some kind shadowing his features, dark T-shirt straining to accommodate pale biceps ribboned with veins. Lightly dressed, but not a hint in those smooth, fluid movements that he was bothered by the cold. Maybe it was the adrenalin coursing through him, maybe some other less natural substance. Whatever, this was no cringing roid-head like Lenny Kerrigan. I could see I was going to have my work cut out.
My mind blazed through possibilities as we approached the end of the side ground. My friend was patient, purposeful, a practised hand. I could tell from the noiseless way he moved that, like me, he’d once been trained in the art of the shock takedown. No tension in his body language to alert his target, nothing threatening at all apart from the sheer size of the man. But I knew even without looking that he’d also possess the innocent, open face of a gentle giant. The kind you could take home to tea with your granny. The kind that wouldn’t betray itself, even when the beating started.
I knew be
cause his face was my face.
Only one real possibility then. They’d caught up with me at last. Not some knuckle-dragging follower of Lenny Kerrigan, come to seek answers about his leader’s disappearance—though I had briefly considered the idea. No, my friend was a professional. A foot soldier of one of the big gangland bosses I’d worked for and then ‘betrayed’, simply by joining the force. Despite the fact I’d never revealed any of their dirty secrets, a few had promised they’d deal with me nonetheless. Once you’re in you’re never truly out, you see? In that way, organised crime isn’t all that different from being a showman.
I made a sudden turn, off the duckboards and across the sucking mire of the side ground. Nimble as he was, my shadow couldn’t levitate and I could hear the slurp of his boots behind me. We passed between the hoardings of a shooting gallery and a hook-a-duck stall. Up ahead stood the corral of trailers, and off to their right, a web of washing lines with a few damp sheets fluttering dankly in the breeze. The question as I headed towards the lines was, which of them? I knew I’d been practically untouchable during my time on the force–even the most psychopathic of mobsters is wary of taking down a serving police officer–but after my disgrace and release from prison? I could think of one or two who might still nurse a grudge.
We were within a few metres of the clotheslines when the juks’ persistent grumble broke into a scattershot of barking. My gaze snapped to trailer doors and windows, caught the glow of TV lights on drawn blinds. Travellers always protect their own, but I didn’t want backup. Not tonight. However it came off, I wanted this confrontation all to myself. And so, ducking under the first bedsheet, I shouted a command and the juks fell silent.
