Master of the Scrolls

by Benjamin Ford

  Situated off the A272 between Mayfield and Five Ashes, Neville Hill was a peaceful, tranquil village with its roots deep in the past.

  Gloria had moved to Neville Hill from London five years ago with her boyfriend, Louise’s brother, Allan, purchasing a small end of terrace cottage with the American advance for her first two novels. Rural Sussex had a charm all of its own, and the pace of life was a marked change from the frantic lifestyle they left behind in London… a life Gloria seldom missed.

  Then, in the autumn of last year, they had sold the cottage and moved to their current abode. Snowfield House was a moderately sized four bedroom detached house surrounded on three sides by woodland, with a private, secluded expanse of flower filled gardens to the rear, and a beautiful front garden, separated from the lane by a neatly clipped yew hedge and the dried up stream.

  The Grade II listed house might have been of moderate size compared with the London home of her parents – small even, when compared to Ravenscreag Hall – but it was by far the largest house in the village. The others were all quaint country cottages, with thatched roofs and outside lavatories, and at the most two bedrooms. The only thing they all had in common was the enormous size of their gardens.

  When they moved to the village in 1982, the couple had been outsiders, viewed with nothing short of suspicion. The village was a close-knit community. The locals did not like city people encroaching on their rural idyll. They mistrusted strangers, and that included Gloria and Allan, who had to prove themselves. Gloria was friendly towards her neighbours, always polite. She kept to herself and never bothered anyone. She certainly never boasted of who she was, but then, at the time, she was not a household name.

  The locals, however, knew from the start who she was, and six months after moving in she had endeared herself enough to them, and they welcomed her into their fold: she was now as much a part of village life as if she had lived there all her life, with generations of ancestors before her.

  Being a photojournalist, Allan was frequently on assignment somewhere in foreign climes, covering some major international incident, and spent little time at home. Had he done so, he would have seen little more of Gloria; when writing, she locked herself away in her study, and when her literary juices were in full flow, nobody dared disturb her.

  Two years senior to the soul sisters, Allan was not only very handsome, but he was also possessed of great intellect. He was one of the very best of his chosen field, and he was the one who first inspired the girls to study a degree in journalism when they were fresh from college. He and Gloria had always been great friends, but in their youth, there had been little indication of the burgeoning romance that was to come in later years.

  As he was such a great photographer, Allan had been very willing to take the official photographs of Gloria that adorned the dust jackets of her novels, even though it was far from his usual body of work.

  That, as they say, was that. The couple realised they were in love at the first photo session, and often wondered why they had not felt the unimaginably strong physical attraction before.

  Despite the fact that they saw so little of one another, or perhaps because of that fact, their love for each other remained fresh and pure. Neither was in any particular hurry to marry and by mutual consent, both agreed to wait at least another year, perhaps even two, before trying for a family – although if a child came along before then it would not be a catastrophe, and would certainly not force them into a hasty marriage.

  Gloria wandered from her study and into the glorious sunshine beating down on her summery garden, alive with the multi-hued delights of countless varieties of flora. With writing and promotional work taking up much of her time, she had precious little free for gardening, so she hired someone to come in three days a week to tend the gardens.

  Today, thankfully, was not one of those days.

  Although forty-two year old George Palmer worked miracles with the garden, he also worked his jaw too much and could easily have talked both Joan Rivers and Terry Wogan into early graves. When George was around there was no peace, and Gloria remained in her study, knowing that not even George would be foolish enough to disturb her if he thought she was writing.

  She recalled the time he had knocked on the window of her study while she was working, hoping to strike up a conversation with her. She had shouted at the poor man so ferociously he had quit, and it had been his first day. It had taken a full week of persistent sweet-talking, using her charms to their best advantage, plus a pay rise and a personalised autographed copy of each new novel she wrote to get him to return.

  They made a pact: he would not disturb her while she occupied the study, and she would never shout at him again. It had worked well so far, but Gloria knew there would come day when George had such a juicy piece of scandal to impart that he would be unable to help himself. George was a worse gossip than any woman Gloria knew, and she was well aware that a motor mouth was not forever silent.

  Today though, the garden was peaceful, and Gloria lifted her face skyward, feeling the glorious warmth of the sun as it shone down on her.

  She was not a great sun worshipper. Though she hated sunbathing, sometimes, if she was reading during the summer months, rather than stay indoors she preferred to be outside in the shade. Usually though she had to be doing something outdoors. On holidays with Louise, she would go off exploring while her friend lay on the beach or by the pool, cultivating a tan. In recent years, she had managed to drag Louise sightseeing with her, and liked to think it was due to her influence that her friend had gone on her exploratory world trip.

  ‘Morning, Miss Schofield,’ called a cheerful, heavily dialectal voice from behind her, disturbing her peaceful reverie.

  Oh God! Gloria thought sourly as she instantly recognised the voice. She fixed an artificially false yet friendly smile to her face, shielded her eyes with her hand, and turned to the neatly clipped hedge at the front of the garden, beyond which a forty-something man with a ruddy complexion and a shock of untidy, thinning grey-brown hair grinned at her. ‘Good morning, George,’ she replied. ‘What brings you this way on your day off?’

  After ten minutes of banal chatter, Gloria escaped to her study, claiming the sun was getting too much for her. However, no ideas came to her that day, so she settled in her living room to read the latest by Jackie Collins.

  Not being a particularly adept cook, most days Gloria sent out for a takeaway: Chinese, Indian, pizza… she was not fussy, just as long as it was edible. Her own miserable efforts were about as inedible as was possible, and to call it food was an insult to the stomach, not to mention the taste buds. She could not even make toast in an electric toaster without burnt results. When she did not fancy a takeaway, she made do with simple bread and butter.

  Tonight, she made do.

  After she had eaten she read some more of the book, wondering whether life in Hollywood really was like that, then watched some television, before finally, bored, she retired to bed earlier than usual.

  She was asleep in no time at all.

  *

  Gloria did not awaken as she tossed and turned feverishly on the bed: neither the dampness of the rumpled sheets, nor the frantic mewing of a cat outside, could rouse her. Fine dew beaded her face, pale in the cold moonlight; her lank black hair plastered her face like a fine, straggly cobweb. She emitted a soft drawn out moan of subconscious despair as the icy blackness of the dream swept once more across her mind. Two sweating hands flailed the air violently, uselessly, as though in some other plane of latent reality they fought off some demonic force of evil; a nightmarish ghost from the past; a spirit of the night, or a demon of the mind, intent on harm.

  The low-tog quilt lay upon the floor at the foot of the bed where it had fallen, unnoticed, as Gloria thrashed around, alone, fighting a losing battle with nothing. The echoes of darkness attempted to re-emerge as the moon vanished behind a bank of night-time cloud.

  Gloria moaned, louder than before. Incoherent words s
lowly became clearer: names and places, people she did not know.

  The moon made a speedy return, as though sensing her plight. Any observer would have been shocked at the look of abject fear on her face, but there were no witnesses to the mask of horror this night.

  A long drawn out scream of agony issued forth from her dry, cracked lips, echoing around the muggy darkness. ‘No… please, don’t kill me!’

  At once Gloria’s eyes snapped open. Sitting upright, fighting to control her furiously racing heart, she glanced all around her, recognising with profound relief the familiar surroundings, and burst into tears.

  Struggling to regain her composure, she dried her eyes with the back of her hand, realising for the first time how sodden with sweat she was.

  She remembered the last time she had experienced the dream; it was as clear as if it had been yesterday.

  But she was not at Ravenscreag Hall now, so what was the nightmare doing, invading her sleep down here?

  With a chill, she realised the dream had a specific meaning, meant for her. It was a dire warning, and it frightened her.

  Why was it occupying her mind?

  Why was it so much more frighteningly real than before?

  What did it mean?

  ‘Pull yourself together, Gloria!’ she muttered. ‘It was only another dream.’

  It was a dream, yet not quite the dream. As far as she could recall the events were the same as in each previous dream, but this time the perspective was different – and it was no mere subtle alteration: instead of witnessing the murder of a woman she did not know, she had been in that woman’s place. She had seen other rooms of the strange house, had shared the woman’s jumbled thoughts. The killer had lunged at her with that horribly long dagger, and that was what made it even more horrifying. Since the dream’s first visitation, she had merely been an observer to the brutal slaying, but now, quite suddenly, she was the victim – and this change in the dream frightened her.

  Like her grandmother, she had come to believe that dreams held hidden meanings. Though she knew neither what, nor when, she knew something was definitely going to happen, and that realisation alarmed her.

  Having thankfully awakened before that wickedly long knife plunged into her body, she thought of the dream and was possessed of a vague recollection: a voice, warning her, pulling her back into reality. She gave a small, ineffectual laugh. It’s all in the mind, she calmly reminded herself. Even if that knife had plunged into your body, you wouldn’t have felt anything… it’s only a dream.

  She reminded herself once more of Nana Turner’s comforting words. No dream, not even that of a particularly violent nature, could ever harm; it could merely frighten.

  Stepping from the bed, she discarded the soaking night-dress. A cold shower, Gloria decided, would rid her of such idiotic notions, but as she walked towards the ensuite bath-room, she gave a cry of pain and collapsed on the carpeted floor, clutching her left foot. She peered at the sole, surprised to see the dirt caked onto the flesh, and then she saw the cause of the pain: a nasty looking splinter embedded deep in the tender flesh.

  Hobbling over to her dressing table, she pulled a small sewing kit from one of the drawers and chose a needle. Perched on the edge of the bed, she carefully prised the long splinter out, wincing in pain as she held it up to the light, wondering how the wretched thing came to be in her foot in the first place. She always wore shoes outside, and carpet slippers when inside.

  The only bare floorboards in the house are downstairs.

  Had she perhaps been sleepwalking? It would not be the first time – on a few occasions in the past she had awakened to find herself in different parts of the house with no recollection of how she got there.

  With a chill, she recalled that in the dream, the floors had been bare wood and she had been barefoot!

  Gloria gave another small laugh. What she was imagining was impossible. She shivered with unease; that explanation was ridiculous: she must have been sleepwalking.

  Trying to dismiss the notion, she took her shower, making certain her feet were spotlessly clean, and then, clad in her comfortable towelling robe and soft carpet slippers, she made her way down to the kitchen, where she proceeded to make herself a mug of strong black coffee.

  As she waited for the kettle to boil she thought once more about the dream, wondering why it had become increasingly potent. Why had it come to her here, in the sanctity of Snowfield House? Why had it been so radically different this time? It was not merely the different perspective, nor the increased sense of reality; there was also the small matter of the soft voice that had invaded her mind.

  No, not invaded: it was not a threatening voice; it was a quiet pleading voice; a frightened female voice begging for help.

  Was it really a dream? Had it ever really been only a dream?

  Gloria was beginning to doubt her sanity.

  Was she experiencing somebody else’s memories? Had the spirit of the murdered woman been drifting through time in search of a responsive, open mind, finally finding a way into her dreamscape? If that was so, why her; surely there must be some other equally receptive realms of sub consciousness, suppressed within the tortured dreams of some other person more willing to believe?

  There were so many riddles, so many unanswered questions

  Such implausibility!

  It was the sense of the absurd that finally made Gloria believe she was not going mad. It was quite a mystery, and she was determined to find the underlying cause, even if it turned out to be nothing more than a case of hypnotism, or indeed really just a dream.

  Whatever had been going on, she could feel the germ of an idea for a new novel beginning to emerge

  ‘Isabella!’

  Gloria was neither sure why she had said the name, nor indeed where the name had come from, but there it was, hanging like an echo on the still air.

  The steam from the boiling kettle seemed like a window to another lifetime. Gloria sat upon the stool at the breakfast bar, staring entranced at the swirling eddies of steam as they rose, twisting and turning, billowing like the morning mists across the Sussex Downs. Images, faint and distant, became visibly clearer: a cave; a house; the woman; the hooded stranger whose face she could not see; two men, both handsome, the taller red haired, the shorter raven haired like the woman; another man, older, a twisted look of hate and fury etched upon his countenance.

  They were familiar in some vague way, but Gloria was certain she had never met any of them: the woman and the hooded man were from the dream, but the others she could not place.

  The focus of the images shifted, and at last there was a face to which Gloria could put a name: King Henry viii.

  The kettle boiled, the button clicked, and the steam rapidly began to dissipate. With their medium gone, the images vanished, and Gloria shook her head, trying to clear out the turmoil of thoughts.

  ‘Isabella,’ she whispered to herself. The name rolled off her tongue as easily as that of her best friend.

  Suddenly it was clear. Isabella was the woman in the dream, and it happened during the reign of King Henry viii. What Gloria could not decide, as she poured the water into her mug, was whether the events she had witnessed were real or just figments of her fertile imagination, which had used the dream as a medium with which to communicate a plot for her next novel.

  For the sake of sanity, she decided it was her writer’s mind going into overdrive, and other events, however odd, were mere coincidence. ‘Maybe if I get it all down on paper the dream will go away!’

  She laughed as she recalled all the things other authors had said in the past about their dreams being the plots for their novels, about ideas springing to their minds while they slept, which was why more than one author she knew of always slept with the light on and a pad and pen on the bedside table.

  As she sipped her coffee, watching the new day coming to life through the window, she began to feel the excitement building within her, a comfortingly familiar sensation she alwa
ys had when working on a novel. Yes, this would form the basis for her next novel: a mysterious murder at a country Manor House during the reign of King Henry viii. Although she had no real idea yet of which direction the story would follow, she wanted to find out all she could about that particular period of history, and so decided to pay a visit to the local library in nearby Crowborough later that day.

  ‘And it’s going to be called Isabella,’ she said, nodding to herself. All of her prior books, each one set in a different period of England’s rich and glorious past, had been eponymously titled after its heroine.

  In her desperation to make sense of it all, and satisfied with her own clever explanation, Gloria forgot that the dreams had started when she was six, and with her mounting excitement at the thought of finally having the germ of an idea for her new novel, she also forgot about the splinter that had been embedded in her foot.

  *

  Gloria strode purposefully into the library at the centre of town shortly after ten, and since she was a regular visitor, the librarian immediately approached her.

  ‘Good morning, Miss Schofield,’ uttered the bespectacled old lady in hushed tones, pushing wisps of straggling grey hair from her forehead.

  ‘Hello, Sarah,’ Gloria responded softly, frowning as she always did at the way the elderly spinster always insisted on formality when addressing her, yet would never allow the formality to be returned.

  Sarah Nicholson had worked at the library for over thirty years, and had never once before met such a charming, polite and courteous celebrity as Gloria. True, not many famous people graced this particular library in Crow-borough with their presence, but those who did were frequently loud and brash and so full of themselves they demanded constant attention. Sarah had begun to think them all alike, but then, like a proverbial breath of fresh air, one day in walked Gloria to research her second novel. Sarah recognised her and, prepared for the usual demands, what she found instead was a courteous woman who always politely insisted that Sarah tended to the needs of the other patrons before her own.