by Amanda Mason
‘We were thinking that Olivia would conduct the next session,’ said Michael. ‘She would be able to assist Lucia, amplify Tib if you like, and—’ The rest of his explanation was drowned out by the sound of feet rushing down the stairs, of garbled voices calling out.
Bee got to the door first, barging her way into the room. ‘Upstairs,’ she said. ‘You have to come, Michael. You have to come and see.’
It was chaos.
The girls had divided the room in half: the walls on Bee’s side were plastered with posters of American TV actors from the programmes she was no longer allowed to watch. Loo’s walls were a jumble of bands and singers she’d already begun to outgrow. The grown-ups were crowded in the doorway, none of them willing to follow the girls in. The mattresses on both beds had been overturned and bedding lay draped over the rest of the room; pillows were sodden where one of Loo’s jars of flowers had shattered; the contents of the dressing table had been swept onto the floor; and over the walls, plastered over the smooth shiny faces with their perfect smiles, were scraps of paper.
‘We went and got dry,’ Bee said, ‘and then we came in here and – Jesus, what’s that?’ She’d stood in something, a dark damp patch on the carpet. ‘God, that’s disgusting.’ She hopped clumsily to the window ledge, where she could perch and examine the sole of her foot, wet and sticky.
More paper was scattered over the room, over the mess and destruction, yellowing pages, closely printed, shivering in the soft breeze from the open window, as if they had only just come to rest.
‘Someone’s ripped up my books,’ said Loo, her voice bright with tears. ‘Why would anyone do that?’
Issy worked methodically, working with the available light, taking wide shots of every aspect of the room and then working her way around clockwise, taking close-ups of every possible detail. Focusing in on the torn scraps, the dust, the tacky yellowish substance that had dribbled over the bedding and the floor.
‘You OK?’ Simon asked.
‘Fine.’ It was glue, that was all, wallpaper paste. Someone had torn apart the books, paperbacks for the most part, and had glued them across the furniture and the walls. Occasionally a single word had been torn out, and several were plastered over the mirror. Michael was copying them into his notebook.
Heart
Maiden
Fear
But they made no sense.
The remnants of the books lay scattered across the girls’ belongings. The most disturbing thing, Isobel decided, was the intensity of it all, the sheer energy it must have taken. The rage.
‘Have you ever seen anything like this before?’ she asked.
‘Not first-hand,’ said Simon.
‘Borley Rectory,’ said Olivia, standing in the doorway.
‘Excuse me?’
‘There were messages written on the wall at Borley Rectory, back in the 1930s.’ Olivia stepped into the room, examining the walls carefully.
‘“Get light, mass, prayers”,’ said Simon.
‘Well remembered,’ said Michael.
‘What?’
‘I was reading about it last week,’ said Simon. ‘There was a message scribbled on a wall, and others left on scraps of paper. The book’s in my tent. You can borrow it if you want.’
‘Did she do it?’ Issy doesn’t want to say the name out loud.
‘I suppose so,’ said Michael.
‘And what are you going to do about it?’
‘Issy,’ Simon said.
‘No, no,’ said Michael. ‘Isobel is quite right – we’ve let things go on far too long as it is. We need to – regroup.’
Downstairs Loo had fallen asleep on the sofa, clutching one of the dolls she’d temporarily reclaimed from the baby. Cathy was sitting by the empty fireplace, and Bee was curled up in Michael’s armchair, watching her through half-closed eyes.
She was definitely thinner, her mother; the last of what she’d been calling the baby weight had melted away. But she seemed to be losing something else too; Bee couldn’t quite work out what. Joe was still away, still in Glasgow teaching, or seeing someone about a commission – something, anyway. Glasgow or Edinburgh now. Cathy didn’t seem too sure what he was up to, really. She said that she rang him when she could, from the phone box in the village, but none of them had spoken to him for ages, not even when the phone in the hall was still connected, Bee was almost certain of that. No one except Cathy.
She sat as still as she could, thinking about the mess upstairs. They’d have to throw all their stuff out now, they’d have to paint over the walls; maybe Cathy would let her choose the paint. Maybe they wouldn’t be made to share again, maybe she could get Cathy and Joe to agree to give her the downstairs room after all. Maybe she could get Cathy to let her ring Joe and ask – she’d like that. She was considering how she might go about suggesting this when the door opened and Michael came in.
‘Do you have a moment, Cathy?’ he asked.
21
Now
They sit in Lucy’s car, looking at the house. The morning is cold and damp, a fine mist is clinging to the garden and the path is riddled with fat black-green slugs.
She doesn’t know about Hal, but Lucy feels exhausted, almost hungover. She had managed to sleep for a few hours in the end, but that sleep had been punctuated by Lewis and Nina’s insistence that they stick to their schedule, checking the batteries in the cameras and changing over the SD cards, although Hal had at least persuaded them both to wait before looking through the rushes.
At around eight Lucy had volunteered to drive into the village to fetch some breakfast. Hal had offered to keep her company, but they hadn’t spoken much.
Lucy’s eyes are gritty and sore; the prospect of spending another day here fills her with something like dread and Hal seems to feel the same way. They’d spun it out as long as they could, the two of them wandering slowly through the village shop, picking out more pre-packaged sandwiches, biscuits, apples, a bag of oranges, cobbling together their change to use the automated coffee machine installed by the door, all under the uninterested gaze of a pale young girl at the counter, before setting off for the farm. Now they’re here neither of them can quite manage to get out of the car.
‘Come on then,’ says Hal eventually.
She walks slowly towards the front door carrying their shopping and only at the last minute does she remember to turn and take the path round to the back of the house. She’d forgotten where she was for a moment; no, she’d forgotten when she was.
She steps into the kitchen and flicks on the light.
‘Watch your step.’ Hal’s voice is mild, but closer than she expected, and it makes her jump. She looks down and sees more slugs, two of them tracing a lazy path across the kitchen floor.
‘Thanks.’ As Hal closes the door, the silence of the house seems to swallow them up. The kitchen light is bright, too bright, bouncing off the yellowing walls and boarded-up window. Lucy leads the way to the dining room. ‘Morning,’ she says. ‘We’re back.’
‘This is great, thanks,’ says Lewis, helping himself to a sandwich and a coffee.
‘You’re welcome,’ says Lucy.
‘Have we caught up with the SD cards?’ Hal asks as he sits in front of a laptop, scrolling through the files on-screen.
‘Mostly,’ says Nina, looking at Lewis, her expression a mixture of guilt and excitement.
‘The downstairs footage is all up to date,’ says Lewis.
‘But we’ve had a few problems with the girls’ room,’ says Nina.
‘Problems?’ Lucy is standing by the window.
‘What happened?’ asks Hal.
‘Nothing’s recorded there,’ says Lewis. He sounds almost triumphant.
‘We must have something,’ says Hal.
‘We don’t. We have the files, but they won’t play.’
‘Well, you’ve made a mistake.’
‘We didn’t—’
‘There’s a card error of some sort, or the files are cor
rupted, empty.’
The camera from the girls’ room lies discarded on the table.
‘We’ve checked,’ says Nina.
‘And they’re not empty,’ says Lewis, ‘they just won’t play. Look.’ He leans across Hal, clicks on the mouse pad and a message appears on the screen.
The document ‘GBR5’ could not be opened. QuickTime Player cannot open files in the ‘data’ format.
‘It’s the same on the other files,’ says Nina, ‘but only from the camera in the girls’ room.’
Hal frowns at the screen, glad perhaps to have a simple problem to deal with, something technical, fixable. ‘Let me have a look,’ he says.
Nina sits down at the table, folding her arms. She looks pale this morning, fragile.
‘Haven’t you got enough now?’ Lucy says. ‘Shouldn’t we think about leaving? Especially after—’ She hardly knows how to go on. ‘I mean, the window.’
‘Absolutely not. We’re here to investigate, aren’t we? And anyway, it was … amazing – almost as if, as if it knows that we’re here. As if it’s trying to get through.’ Nina takes a sip of coffee. ‘Did it happen to you too?’ she asks. ‘The bruising?’
‘I don’t remember,’ says Lucy. Nina’s enthusiasm is exhausting and she needs time to think. ‘I need to speak to my mother,’ she says. ‘I won’t be long.’
It’s cold and damp, but at least outside Lucy feels as though she can breathe. She pulls her phone from her pocket. She checks the time. Only a few more hours, she tells herself, and if she can get them away from the house before it gets dark again, so much the better.
She sits down on the kitchen step, gently placing her cardboard coffee cup on the damp stone next to her. The sky is low over the moor, a dark, slushy grey. Cathy answers straightaway.
‘Mum.’
Lewis is on his second sandwich. Nina has taken herself off to use the bathroom and Hal has abandoned the computer and is slumped on the sofa. Now he’s back in the house he really doesn’t feel too well, although Nina and Lew seem fine. They’re all a bit spaced out from lack of sleep, maybe, but it’s obvious that whatever was going on last night hasn’t put either of them off.
He closes his eyes, tilts his head back and sighs. It’s happened before, this problem with the files, he’s sure of it. Only he can’t remember where or when. Maybe renaming them would help. The room smells of bacon and coffee – and cigarettes, even though they’re not supposed to smoke in here. There’s something else too. It’s a comfortable smell, familiar, anyhow. Lewis says something, asks another question, and Hal mumbles a reply.
If the data is in the wrong format then—
The tape is going round and round, but all it’s recording is the tick of the clock on the mantelpiece.
The question was
The question was
Where are you?
Here
It was a stupid question anyway. He clears his throat and moves in his chair. He always sits in the same chair, by the fire, and he always starts with the same questions.
Who are you? Where do you live?
Here.
Who else is there?
Mam.
What do you do there?
But he’s not in the house any more; he’s walking through a field, down a hill. He should have his boots on, but he can feel the sharp prickle of the grass under his feet.
What do you do there?
Work.
He’s walking with great effortless strides, the way you do in a dream, towards—
Towards
How old are you?
I don’t know.
The barn. Someone has left the door open. He reaches out and the hand that isn’t his pulls at the door and
What’s your name?
Tib.
Hal jerks awake so violently he almost falls onto the floor. Across the room Lewis is staring at him, the camera in his hand, his bacon sandwich on the table, forgotten.
‘That was fucking awesome,’ he says.
Nina finds them more or less where she’d left them: sitting side by side at the table, hunched over the laptop. She picks up the Sony. ‘Is this good to go?’ she asks. ‘Can I take it back upstairs and try again?’ But there’s something wrong. Hal looks dreadful, as if he might collapse.
‘You need to see this,’ says Lewis. ‘Go and get Lucy.’
It’s infuriatingly brief. An image of the table, too close, swooping in and out of focus, swims onto the screen and then the camera moves on to Hal who is sitting on the sofa, his head tilted back, his eyes closed. The image is a little unsteady, but clear enough.
He seems to be talking in his sleep.
I don’t know.
He seems to be listening to someone.
Tib.
Then there’s a sharp exhalation as the camera slips momentarily and Hal wakes up.
‘Is that all?’ Nina is staring at the screen, as if she could will more video to appear.
‘You’re lucky I got that,’ says Lewis. She didn’t understand. He knew she wouldn’t. The video doesn’t quite capture it: one minute Hal was flaked out on the sofa and the next … It wasn’t like he was talking in his sleep, it wasn’t like he was talking at all. More like something was talking through him, and the voice – Jesus, the voice, whispery, hoarse. Lewis has heard the tapes, they’re easy enough to find online, but he doubts Hal has.
Tib.
‘I was dreaming. I thought it was a dream.’ Hal rubs his hand over his face.
Nina is looking at him as if she’s never seen him before. ‘How did you do it?’
‘I didn’t do anything.’ Hal stands. ‘I didn’t—’ But he can’t finish the sentence, and in his rush to get out of the room he knocks his chair to the floor.
They leave him alone for a moment or two, for which he’s vaguely grateful as he throws up in the bushes underneath the kitchen window. Once he’s vomited up his breakfast he wipes his mouth with the back of his hand and sits on the back step.
‘Here.’ Lucy appears, holding a bottle of water.
‘Thanks.’
She sits down next to him as he drinks, careful not to touch him. ‘If it’s any comfort,’ she says, ‘I think everyone’s feeling – something.’
‘Right.’ He takes another sip. ‘And what about you? What are you feeling?’
‘I feel it might be time to pack up and leave,’ says Lucy.
‘Hal?’ Nina calls out as she walks through the kitchen.
He stands, wiping his hands on his jeans. Nina is standing in the doorway now, her leather satchel swinging from one hand.
‘Hal,’ she says, ‘can we talk?’
22
Then
They travelled back to the village in silence. Simon drove with Olivia next to him, apparently absorbed in the landscape, Isobel and Michael side by side in the back seat. Simon and Issy had offered to help, but Cathy had insisted she would clean the girls’ bedroom herself.
‘Thanks for the lift,’ Olivia said to Simon as she got out of the car in front of the Red Lion. ‘I expect I’ll see you tomorrow.’
‘Why don’t you drive Isobel back into town now?’ Michael said to Simon, opening the passenger door. ‘Take the evening off, enjoy yourselves for a little while.’
‘Are you sure?’ Simon was torn between the chance to spend time with Issy and the opportunity to plan the next session with Michael and Olivia. Cathy had finally agreed to a séance – the destruction in the girls’ bedroom was an escalation they couldn’t afford to ignore.
‘Quite sure,’ Michael said. ‘Have a good evening, both of you.’ He slammed the car door shut.
Isobel watched them as he and Olivia walked into the pub, neither looking back. ‘We’ve been dismissed,’ she said.
‘Don’t be ridiculous,’ said Simon, but he looked younger, somehow, a little lost, and Isobel felt the need to cheer him up if she could, to at least make him smile, and to find herself some little distraction. Things were changing, and she
wasn’t sure that it was for the better.
‘Come on then,’ she said. ‘Take me home and I’ll cook you some proper food.’
‘Shit.’ Isobel looked up from the fridge. ‘I don’t really have very much in.’ She’d forgotten that she barely had time to shop these days.
‘It’s OK.’
‘No it isn’t, I promised you dinner and now—’
‘Don’t worry about it.’ Simon was standing a little too close, filling up the attic flat. She was wondering if he was going to make a move and what she should say if he did when his stomach growled, making both of them smile.
‘I have eggs,’ said Issy. ‘We can have scrambled eggs.’
‘Great.’
‘And beer. Have a drink.’ She handed him a bottle of lager, cool, not really cold enough but welcome nonetheless, and he sat at the table watching idly as she moved around the tiny kitchen.
‘Do you think she’ll be able to help?’
‘Sorry?’
‘Olivia. Will she be able to get rid of – it?’
Tib.
‘I don’t know,’ said Simon. ‘I suppose so. She’s pretty famous.’
‘Well, I’ve never heard of her.’
‘In research circles.’
‘Ah.’ She set the cleanest of her saucepans on the oven, dropped a slice of butter in it and lit the gas ring.
‘There’s a lot of stuff about her in the archives, back in London.’ Simon watched as Issy found a bowl and began to crack eggs into it. ‘You’re not really interested, are you?’ he said. ‘In this bit, in the Society?’
‘I’m interested in this story,’ she said, putting the bread under the grill and lighting that too before looking at Simon. ‘So it follows that I’m interested in the Society, I suppose. But only as background. What I really want is some answers, a solution.’
‘We want answers too.’
‘No, Simon. You want proof.’ She began to whisk the eggs with some milk, a little more briskly than necessary.
‘Isn’t that the same thing?’
‘No, I don’t think it is. In a way, you need Tib and all the fuss and chaos she seems to bring, because she proves your case. But what about Bee and Loo? Aren’t they getting a little lost in all of this?’
