Say Her Name

by James Dawson

  Bobbie screamed as loudly as she could, the cry shaking the walls. Millar tried to clamp a hand over her mouth, but she squirmed away. ‘Keep still!’

  ‘Help me!’ she cried. Adrenaline coursed through her body and she made a final, mighty bid for freedom, but Millar yanked on her arm, swinging her like an Olympian hammer thrower. Twice her size, he sent her reeling across the room. Unable to stop herself, with no time to even cover her face, Bobbie careered into the gilded mirror. As her nose made contact with the glass, she both felt and heard a painful crack. She wasn’t sure which broke first – bone or mirror.

  Dazed and woozy, Bobbie crumpled to the floor, trying to use the giant frame to keep herself upright. Her head was spinning, black stars dancing in her blurred vision. There was a loud snap – like a violin string pinging free. The floor beneath her felt like it was leaning in.

  ‘Mary!’ Kenton Millar cried.

  It wasn’t the floor tipping up, it was the wall tipping in. No, not the wall, the mirror. It had come clean off the wall. There was nothing that could be done.

  The mirror crashed down on top of her, and the last thing that Bobbie saw was Mary Worthington’s bloody, terrified face.

  Chapter 26

  Ellen Price

  Bobbie was falling. Arms folded over her face, Bobbie crashed onto Dr Price’s desk, scattering pens, papers and empty coffee mugs. She felt the impact on her hips, elbows and knees, the edge of the desk hitting her right in the gut and winding her completely. Bobbie slid to the floor, her eyes adjusting to the gloom in the empty office.

  Outside, the sky was almost pitch-black – how long had she been in Mary’s realm? It had felt like minutes, but the dark skies said otherwise.

  The echoing drip was louder than ever. Pushing Price’s desk chair out of the way, Bobbie clambered to her feet, aching all over from the impact of the fall. ‘Ow,’ she groaned, brushing down her crumpled pyjamas. So that was what had happened to Mary Worthington. The final piece of the puzzle fell into place. She’d died in this very spot sixty years ago. An accident, but an accident that was Kenton Millar’s fault.

  Something flickered in her peripheral vision, and Bobbie knew just what it was. What a rookie mistake to make …

  She had her back to the mirror. It isn’t over.

  Oh-so-slowly, Bobbie turned. No … sudden … moves. There she was in the reflection, inching across the room towards Bobbie’s mirror image. Bobbie finally saw Mary properly. Judy was correct, Mary was beautiful in a way – full, defined lips, high cheekbones and icy blue eyes. She had a strong, Roman nose though, which, instead of pretty, made her almost handsome.

  To get to that conclusion, however, Bobbie had to see past the blood. The falling mirror and shattering glass had left dozens of cuts all over Mary’s face and body, and, unlike Bobbie’s phantom cuts, Mary’s bled. Vivid scarlet blood ran all down her face in thick, worm-like rivulets. Her uniform was saturated in crimson and her lank black hair was matted to her head.

  Mary’s eyes, burning through the blood, never left her. With each step, she edged closer to Bobbie, her hands reaching for her. Bobbie knew her time had come. Acting on instinct, Bobbie did the only thing she could think of. Grabbing the smaller chair at the side of the grand desk, Bobbie swung it at the glass at the very same moment Mary’s red fingers reached through the mirror’s surface.

  With a shriek, Bobbie struck the mirror. There was an ear-splitting crack and Bobbie felt her arms strain as the chair bounced back. It was enough though. Jagged triangles spilled out of the ornate frame, jangling and shattering to the floor. Not leaving anything to chance, Bobbie took another swing, attacking what was left at the edges. Soon glass was piled up around her feet and she took a cautious step backwards. ‘Good luck getting through that.’

  Hands shaking, she let the chair fall to the floor. If the room would just stop spinning she might be able to figure out what to do next. Bobbie clung to the desk for support. All she could feel was sadness and despair circling around her, but she couldn’t let them win when she still needed to work things out. Caine and Naya. She’d lost them. She’d failed them. That emptiness she’d felt in the darkness behind the mirror – was that what death was, just nothingness? Eternal nothingness, but a nothingness that you’re aware of – it was too awful to comprehend. The thought of Naya and Caine falling through that vacuum forever …

  Can they feel it? Are they awake? For their sakes she hoped not; she preferred to think that they were sleeping – dreaming of something nice.

  There was a shrill creak behind her and she whirled round, half expecting Mary to burst out of a mirror on the far side of the room. Bobbie clutched her chest. It was just a wardrobe door swinging on a hinge that needed a drop of oil. For a horrible moment, Bobbie wondered if it had a mirror on the inner door like the ones in the dorms, but she remembered it didn’t from when she’d helped Dr Price tidy up.

  Wait a second. Bobbie no longer believed in coincidence.

  ‘That cupboard again,’ she said to herself, switching on the table lamp for a better look. Bobbie gave the heap of shattered glass one last check before stepping out from behind the desk. She recalled Mary lingering by that cupboard the last time she’d been in here and that it had tumbled open then too. Now that she thought about it, the very first time she’d followed Mary (when she’d taken her glasses), she’d been led to this room. For whatever reason, Mary wanted Bobbie to see inside.

  Bobbie decided that if she did somehow get through the next few hours, she was so expelled that a little cupboard break-in couldn’t hurt. Tucking her hair behind her ears, she got to work. The cupboard contained files and files, most marked as some sort of policy: Food Policy, Religion Policy, Policies Policy. The top two shelves were made up of pupil records – the very top shelf held files called ‘Former Pupils’. Bobbie knew exactly what she was looking for: 1954. There was a folder for every five years or so (Bobbie guessed about the time it took a girl to go through the school). Not caring how much mess she made, she tossed irrelevant files to the floor in her search for the right one. She was soon standing in a crisp, white sea of paper.

  It was no good – they were all too recent, only dating back to the 1990s. On the very top floor of the school was a records room, where Bobbie guessed most of the older files were kept. But if that were true, Mary wouldn’t have directed her here. ‘Where is it?’ Bobbie hissed through gritted teeth. She stopped and squashed all the remaining files to one end of the shelf. Behind the other files was a simple manila folder bound with a leather strap.

  Bobbie pulled it out. The file was marked ‘Confidential Pupil Records – For Head Teacher Only’. What the hell – Bobbie tore the band off and sat on the floor in the midst of her file destruction.

  It was a folder full of girls’ portraits. Taylor Keane and Abigail Hanson were on top, along with police and newspaper reports of their disappearances. There were more girls – all Piper’s Hall Ladies, all missing. All Mary’s. Now Sadie and Naya could be added to the gruesome roll call. Instinctively, Bobbie turned the pack upside down to find the first girl who’d gone missing – Mary herself.

  Sure enough there was everything she hadn’t found online. A school portrait, a year-group photo (with Mary stood slightly apart, no other girl wanting to be shoulder to shoulder with her it seemed) and her report cards. A life story too; Bobbie lingered on her registration forms.

  Mary Eloise Worthington, born 1938. Father: unknown. Mother: Eliza Worthington (no fixed abode). There was a letter on Radley Comprehensive headed paper too – the school that would one day become Radley High, no doubt: ‘Mary has struggled to settle at Radley, but due to her excellent attainment in all fields we firmly feel she could flourish at Piper’s Hall. We have no doubt she would excel in such an establishment. Mary is a shy, withdrawn young lady who would benefit from the more nurturing environment boarding could provide.’ Bobbie scoffed at that; there was nothing like sending your kids away to school to put an end to any nurturing one
might have had. Bobbie didn’t hate boarding school, but while she had felt safe, secure, even encouraged, she had never felt nurtured.

  There was a separate sheet – a different handwritten letter to the then Head, Mr Fisk. ‘Dear Mr Fisk,’ it read, ‘I am writing to you to insist that my daughter, Phyllis, is moved from her current dormitory in Brontë House. Her letters home are increasingly agitated since she was placed in a room with a young woman called Mary. Phyllis is quite simply terrified of her and has been struggling to sleep since she arrived at your school … ’ It went on in much the same tone.

  The final sheet was a typed letter to Eliza Worthington from Mr Fisk. ‘Further to our conversations, we wished to write to express our sorrow that we were unable to provide a safe environment for your daughter. All evidence suggests that on the evening of the 17th September, Mary absconded from Brontë House. You must understand that we operate a school, not a jail, and try as we might, if a Piper’s Hall Lady chooses to leave the premises there is little we can do to stop her. We have fully cooperated with the police and I understand the search continues … ’

  A tear splattered onto the page, blotting even the old ink. Bobbie wiped her cheek. Poor Mary. It all made sense – a horrid sort of sense. Kenton Millar, on purpose or not, had killed Mary Worthington and her unborn child. God knows how, but a part of her had got stuck in that, and every, mirror.

  Another tear rolled down her cheek. Mary was lost in that awful blackness, listening for her name. They’d called her, some sort of lighthouse, guiding her back from the other side of the ocean. The same way Caine had somehow brought her back.

  Millar must have done something with her body. Bobbie rifled through the remaining sheets on her lap, but knew he’d never be stupid enough to leave evidence behind. There was nothing about a body in the pages, cementing Bobbie’s certainty that the key to the haunting was finding Mary’s resting place. Think, brain, think! She struggled to put herself in the guilty teacher’s shoes – if it were her, what would she do with a body?

  Bobbie didn’t even notice the door opening. ‘There’d better be a really, really good explanation for this … ’ Dr Price’s eyes cut through the gloom like lasers.

  Bobbie dropped the folder, shocked.

  ‘And let’s start by talking about how you got out of the Isolation Room.’

  She was so over this. ‘Or we could talk about how you left me in there even when you thought the school was on fire.’

  ‘Touché. We knew it wasn’t a fire. We decided to focus on locating whoever had set the alarm off. I imagine it was your friend from Oxsley.’

  Bobbie glowered at her, no longer intimidated by the ginger witch.

  ‘Now, given that your entire future at Piper’s Hall depends on this, I suggest you explain yourself. Just what do you think you’re doing?’

  ‘You lied.’ Bobbie stood, fighting to maintain her composure. Screaming and shouting wasn’t going to get her taken seriously. ‘You knew full well that girls go missing from Piper’s Hall, and you’ve done nothing to stop it, and now Naya and Sadie are gone and I’ll be next.’

  ‘You don’t know what you’re talking about.’

  ‘Yes I do and so do you. This is about Mary Worthington.’

  ‘There was no such girl.’

  ‘I have proof!’ Bobbie raised her voice and pointed at the array of paperwork at her feet. ‘There’s actual evidence – although I see the school did a pretty good job of covering it up.’

  Dr Price put her hands on her hips and smiled. ‘Roberta, I have to hand it to you, you don’t give up. Creativity, enterprise, perseverance. A perfect Piper’s Lady.’

  Bobbie bit down on her jaw, resolute. ‘Mary Worthington died right where you are standing.’

  In the dim lamp light, Dr Price’s gaze looked to her office wall. ‘Oh my God, what have you done to my mirror?’

  ‘Listen to me!’ Bobbie yelled. ‘Kenton Millar got her pregnant and then killed her right here! Well,’ she conceded, ‘it was an accident, but it was his fault.’

  The temperature in the room dropped to way below zero. Dr Price advanced and Bobbie had no choice but to back into the corner. ‘What did you just say?’

  Bobbie withered under the intensity of her stare. ‘I … I said that the old Head, Mr Millar, he was having an affair with Mary – not while he was Head, but before that, in 1954.’ She backed into a potted palm next to the wall. There was nowhere left to go, but Price continued to advance on her, cornering her.

  ‘How dare you?’ Price breathed. ‘Kenton Millar was one of the most brilliant and generous Heads this school has ever had.’

  ‘I swear on my life it’s true. When Mary told him she was pregnant they had a fight and she died. He … he must have hidden the body.’

  Price pinned her to the wall, both hands clamped on her shoulders. Bobbie was scared, far more scared than she’d ever been of Mary; there was nothing ghostly about the vice-like grip. The older woman’s nostrils flared. ‘I think I’d know if my father had killed someone, don’t you?’

  The ‘sudden plummet’ sensation in Bobbie’s stomach was getting far too familiar. ‘Wh-what?’

  ‘My maiden name was Ellen Millar. Are you really trying to tell me my father murdered someone? I want you to think very, very carefully before you answer … ’

  Bobbie’s lips opened and closed like a fish out of water. Price was trembling with rage – her knuckles white and veins swollen in her forehead. Kenton Millar had killed to keep his secret buried and Bobbie couldn’t help but wonder if his daughter would kill to keep it that way.

  Chapter 27

  Bobbie’s Run

  ‘How? How can you be Millar’s daughter?’ Bobbie was finding it so difficult to make sense of what was unfolding.

  Price frowned. ‘It’s no big secret. I don’t advertise the fact; I want to build my own legacy here, not just trail after my father’s. However, he was a great man and a fantastic teacher and what you just said is slander!’ Her lips curled, the anger firing up again in her eyes.

  But Bobbie had come too far and seen too much to crumble now. ‘I’m sorry, Dr Price, but it’s true. Why would I make it up?’ Her voice wobbled, but didn’t break. ‘You’ve seen how many girls have vanished. Don’t you think it’s weird? There’s no way it’s coincidence. It’s all because of what your dad did to Mary. I know it sounds crazy, but it’s like she can’t rest because no one ever found the body.’

  Dr Price’s gaze fell to the floor, her eyes twitching like she was trying to solve an equation in advanced algebra.

  ‘Please let go of me,’ Bobbie said softly. ‘You’re hurting me.’

  Price let go, her arms flopping to her side as if they were made from spaghetti. Shoulders hunched, she fell into the spinning office chair, which she pulled away from the shattered glass and gaping gold frame. ‘Oh God. Is that what … ? All that time … ’ She seemed to be talking to herself. Her head fell into her hands.

  Bobbie backed away to a safe distance. ‘What?’

  ‘I don’t believe it.’

  ‘Dr Price, please. She’s coming for me … ’

  Price deflated like a balloon. ‘Just before my father died, he was very, very sick. On his deathbed he was talking absolute gibberish, but he kept saying this one thing over and over.’ She stopped, shaking her head.

  ‘And?’ Bobbie urged.

  ‘He kept asking to confess. He kept asking for a priest, saying that he needed to confess his sins before he died.’ Price muffled a laugh. ‘We weren’t even Catholic! I thought he was delirious … but now … ’

  ‘Mary was pregnant. He was responsible for her death,’ Bobbie finished.

  Price looked her dead in the eye. ‘Oh God. He also said he was sorry. Over and over again. We never knew what for … ’ A tear fell off her cheekbone and splashed onto her skirt.

  Bobbie shook her head. This whole situation was awful, but she wouldn’t feel sorry for the man who’d preyed on a vulnerable schoolgirl. ‘I
t was a little late for sorry.’

  Price didn’t reply.

  ‘Did he say anything that might lead us to her body?’ Bobbie asked. ‘She died in here – he wouldn’t … couldn’t have gone far.’

  ‘I have no idea.’

  ‘Please, Dr Price, there must be something that stood out –’ Bobbie stopped as she became aware of a steady dripping noise. The lamp on Price’s desk flickered before dying entirely. ‘Oh no.’

  Price frowned and tried to turn the lamp back on. ‘Strange … ’

  Behind Price, near the wheels of her desk chair, there was one broken fragment of glass larger than the rest – a vicious-looking scalene triangle reflecting the ceiling as it lay flat on the floor.

  A dripping hand burst through, closely followed by the top of a head. Bobbie shrieked and stumbled away from the desk. Price sprang off the chair. ‘What? What are you looking at?’

  ‘You can’t see her?’

  ‘What on earth are you talking about? There’s nothing there!’

  Mary squeezed a second arm through the narrow shard, dislocating her shoulder with a moist crack to fit through the narrow gap. Splinters of mirror jangled as Mary pulled her body through into the room. Dripping crimson dots all over the carpet, she moved unnaturally fast, her joints and bones clicking and clacking as if she hadn’t used them in a very long time. She emerged fully from the mirror and drew herself upright.

  Bobbie backed away, colliding with an office chair. ‘She’s here! She’s right behind you! We have to get out of here!’

  ‘Bobbie, there’s nothing there.’ Dr Price’s voice was cold with impatience.

  Mary started towards them, heavy spots of blood splattering as she went. It ran from her fingers. The dead girl moved slowly, on uncertain legs, as if she wasn’t accustomed to solid ground beneath her feet. Bobbie remembered the infinite darkness behind the mirror and shuddered.