“Ow, it’s burning!” said Linda tossing it back in the car.
Kieran turned to walk away.
“Don’t piss around. Find the woman who damaged the car. I’ll make her pay,” he said, and left Linda alone in the garage.
“What are you?” said Linda to Charlie.
Was it an accident that Charlie fell into the hands of Linda Tempest? Or was it part of the grand scheme of things?
Chapter 54
“So you got rid of Charlie?” said Sophie gripping her mug of coffee in the lounge of their parents’ house.
Heather nodded.
“I regret it now, but you need to understand that yesterday I’d had all I could take. I’m not sure whether you understand the things that have happened, and to be honest Sophie, I don’t care. But the fact of the matter is the strange things that have occurred have happened since Rosie and I painted that rock.”
Heather took a sip of coffee, wiped a tear and continued to tell her sister what happened the day before.
“I’d decided to get rid of the head because I’m certain it’s behind what’s been going on.”
Sophie said nothing. She wanted her sister to get everything off her chest. She had enough of her own problems to contend with, but needed to be there for Heather during what appeared to be a breakdown and obsession with speaking with the dead.
“I’ve not told you this, but since Rosie and I created Charlie, the stone emanated warmth, as if it was alive. Sometimes I really believed it was. But when I took it from my flat to bring it here, the warmth had gone, as if Charlie had died.”
“So you threw the rock off the Suspension Bridge?” asked Sophie.
“That was my plan until the crazy woman in the sports car nearly drove into me. We ended up rowing, and she drove off taking Charlie with her.”
Sophie reached over and took her sister’s hand.
“I’m sorry to bother you with everything that’s been going on in my life, but I need to tell someone. I don’t want to bother mum and dad, and you’re the only person I can talk to.”
Heather felt Sophie squeeze her hand. She couldn’t blame Sophie for not believing her. She had no proof to back up what she’d been telling her.
“The most infuriating thing about these ghosts, is none of them tell me what’s happening. Even Elizabeth seems to play games with me. They only give me snippets of information and tell me how important I am and that I’ve been chosen to protect someone who’s dead from a terrible evil……., and also something about a sacrificial ritual with children.”
What Heather didn’t fully appreciate was how hard it was for Elizabeth, Charles, Alice and the old lady in the graveyard to materialise. It drained them of their energy just to stand before her and it took considerably more to communicate with her. It was as equally frustrating for the ghosts as it was for Heather.
Sophie shuddered. Her sister was coming out with macabre talk of evil and sacrifices. Heather needed professional help and counselling. She was going along with her story while doing her best not to sound patronising.
“Do you think you need to stop the sacrifice of children?”
“I don’t know, I mean I guess so. I only get to hear part of the story before the ghosts disappear. Although, there's something of which I'm certain, the children who Alice told me were to be sacrificed, died long ago.”
“Alice, who’s Alice?” asked Sophie.
“Alice Donaldson, a ghost who visited me the other day in the hospital.”
Heather had Sophie’s attention.
“Alice Donaldson, did you say Alice Donaldson?”
Heather nodded.
Sophie trembled, let go of her sister’s hand and stood up.
She recalled the night Finn had been talking to himself in the bathroom. It was when he’d really changed and become more out of character than ever before. He’d told her he’d been talking to someone called Alice Donaldson. He’d mentioned children. Something about them not being his children.
Suddenly her attitude towards her sister changed. She paced around the room and remembered Rosie’s imaginary friends. Her friends who were perhaps not so imaginary.
“Heather, what did Alice Donaldson say about the children?”
“They were brother and sister. She’d helped them escape on their fifth birthday.”
“Escape from who?”
“Their father, although he wasn’t their father.”
Sophie cast her mind back to Rosie's picture. The picture of kids in the well, a burning woman, and children in a handcart chased by dogs. She remembered Rosie told her the woman in the fire was Alice and she was their nanny.
Sophie rubbed her forehead and swallowed hard as the enormity of the situation sank in.
She turned to Heather, and in a hushed and wavering voice she spoke.
“Heather, the children………. their names……….., I know their names.”
Heather stared at her sister, whose pallor changed to a light shade of grey.
The silence seemed to last forever as Heather waited for her to speak. She watched Sophie’s lips tremble as she formed the words she was about to say.
“The children……., William……., William and Louisa. Their names are William and Louisa aren’t they?”
Heather nodded and flinched as Sophie’s coffee mug smashed to the floor after dropping from her hand.
Chapter 55
Ruth Jackson awoke to a thud. She rubbed her eyes and checked the clock. It wasn’t even seven thirty.
And then another thud. And another, followed by another.
Thud – thud – thud – thud.
Slow and regular as a pendulum. A thud so loud that her bed shuddered and her window rattled.
She got up, threw on her dressing gown and peered from the window overlooking her back garden. She couldn’t see where the noise was coming from.
Thud – thud – thud – thud.
She marched out of the room, across the landing to the front bedroom overlooking the road. She’d expected to see council workmen digging, but there was no one there.
It continued.
Thud – thud – thud – thud.
Ruth wasn’t a morning person. Since she’d retired, one of her luxuries was hours of uninterrupted sleep. She normally woke around nine, so to be wrenched from slumber at such an unreasonable hour angered her.
Downstairs it was even louder.
Thud – thud – thud – thud.
Her hands clenched the kitchen worktop as the floorboards juddered.
And then it stopped.
She relaxed her grip as the tension in her body lessened. She waited in anticipation for the sound to continue, but it didn’t.
“Thank God that’s finished.”
She poured cereal into a bowl, threw on a splash of milk and took it to the lounge. She was about to put the spoon in her mouth when she heard voices.
Peering out of the window she saw the top of Gabriel Butler’s head above the fence.
“What’s going on,” she muttered.
“Good morning Finn, I can hear from across the road that you’ve started early this morning. Good man!”
Finn stood at the door. His hands and face where filthy and he had an old T-shirt wrapped around his head to keep his hair away from his eyes.
“May I come in and inspect your work?”
Finn opened the door and Butler followed him into the kitchen.
“You have been busy. You should open the back door, it’s warm in here.”
He did as Butler suggested.
The cool air of the early morning was good.
Butler surveyed the kitchen.
Floorboards were removed and lay in the hallway. Finn had left enough boards remaining to allow him to walk around the edge of the kitchen.
He had cut and removed the rafters which had supported the floorboards. Luckily there were no gas or water pipes beneath, which had given him space in which to work.
He'd started t
o break through the concrete foundations, but made little headway as the concrete was hard work. He had over a metre to get through before he’d make it to the hard-core below, and once he had cleared it, his job of finding the bodies would begin.
Ruth returned to her kitchen and wondered what was happening. Strange noises early in the morning and neighbours knocking at such an unearthly hour. Her inquisitive mind was getting the better of her.
She took her empty breakfast bowl to the kitchen and placed it on the work surface. She stopped in her tracks and cocked her head to one side.
Voices. She could hear voices. It was Finn and Butler talking in Finn's back garden.
She opened the kitchen door and strained to listen.
She tiptoed into the garden and ducked behind the fence which separated their gardens.
“You’ve made good progress,” said Butler.
Finn nodded.
“Once you’re through the concrete and the shit below, you’ll be down to the clay and the rock. Compared to what you’re digging through today, it should be easy work.”
“It’d better be! How deep will I have to dig?” asked Finn.
“That's anyone’s guess, they've been there over two hundred years.”
Finn cursed under his breath
“Don’t forget young man, I’m paying you seventy-five thousand pounds. Even if you take days or even weeks, it’s good money for little work,” snapped Butler.
Finn nodded again, wiped his forehead and stepped into the garden. The air was damp, and it felt good against his hot skin.
Ruth ducked even further below the fence when she heard his footsteps on the gravel.
“What happens if I find them?” asked Finn.
“It’s not if you find them Mr. Maynard, it’s when you find them.”
“Okay, so what happens when I find them?”
Butler stared at him with a look of pure evil.
“I want you to come and get me as soon as you find the bodies. And you need to be careful. When you find their skulls you mustn’t damage them, and I mean not even a scratch. I need them in perfect condition. If you make so much as a mark on them, you won’t be paid a penny. Do you understand?”
“Okay, okay I get it,” said Finn shaking his head.
“What about their bones? Don’t you want their skeletons?”
“No. You can throw them to the dogs. It’s just the children’s skulls I need, and the sooner the better, so I suggest you stop talking and dig.”
Deep down Finn knew where he’d discover the bones. He’d find them in a well right below his house. Just where his daughter’s drawing had depicted them to be.
Ruth Jackson huddled behind the fence with her hand over her mouth. Her heart beat loudly in her head and her body shook. She couldn’t believe what they'd said.
She considered what to do next. Ruth knew she should call the police. But something deep inside urged her to wait it out. Intrigue and curiosity gnawed at her and she was desperate to know why the elegant and dashing mysterious man needed the skulls of two-hundred-year-old bodies buried beneath her next door neighbour’s house.
Chapter 56
Sophie found it hard to take on board what her sister had told her the night before.
They had talked in hushed tones until the early hours. Heather had told her everything that happened since the first encounter with Charles Nash until the recent apparition of Alice Donaldson in the hospital.
Sophie had listened with disbelief when she’d heard of the resemblance of the man in Heather’s vision to Finn and shuddered when he’d ordered Alice to be killed by Morris.
What scared her the most was Finn’s connection with what was happening. She needed to find out his association with Alexander Drake’s past life. According to Alice, Drake’s spirit had infiltrated Finn, which explained the changes in her husband.
Heather was equally shocked when Sophie told her what she knew of William and Louisa, and that Alice had been burnt alive because she’d seen it in her daughter’s drawing.
“Heather you need to speak with these spirits and find out what's happening,” demanded Sophie.
“Good God, I’ve tried, I really have tried! I’m telling you, it’s not as easy as calling them up. They speak when they’re ready.”
“Well, you can tell them I need to know what’s happening to my husband and I need to know now!”
After a pause, Heather spoke.
“The thing is, I may have lost it.”
“Lost it! Lost what?”
“The ability to speak with them. I noticed the other day when I felt how cold Charlie was. I’m sure he was the link I needed to talk with them.”
“Do you really think this is all down to Charlie?”
“No, not entirely, but I think it helped me make contact. It’s as Elizabeth told me, I needed a channel to speak with the dead, despite Charles Nash saying that all I needed was to believe.”
“And do you?”
Heather nodded.
“Tell me again what Elizabeth told you when she said you were the chosen one?”
“That I’d been blessed with the veil of tears.”
“That's right! You have this gift and you must use it.”
“But I'm not sure I am the one. Elizabeth told me that my connection with the afterlife was much stronger than hers, which is why I’d been chosen, but I don’t think it’s true. I don’t feel it. I’m nowhere near as in touch with the dead as Elizabeth was.”
Sophie sighed.
“Okay, okay….. but in the meantime Finn is having a breakdown and is barricading himself in our house. I need to help him, and I need your help too.”
Heather nodded.
“I understand,” replied Heather in a despondent tone.
“It’s ten o'clock, Rosie’s in class and we can leave Jack with mum and dad. We need to go now,” said Sophie.
“Dad should be there too, in case Finn gets violent.”
“No,” replied Sophie. “I don’t want mum and dad involved, at least not right now.”
Sophie grabbed her keys, kissed Jack and handed him to her mother.
“Where are you going?” asked Grace.
“Sister stuff,” replied Heather and gave her mother a hug.
Chapter 57
It was midday and Ruth Jackson’s mind worked overtime. She was intrigued and excited by what was happening in her road. She’d watched Gabriel Butler return to Kieran and Linda’s old house and was desperately thinking of a reason to speak with him and find out what was going on.
As hard as she tried, she couldn’t think of a reasonable excuse to knock on his door. Or maybe she could?
She lifted the lid of her slow cooker and sniffed the beef stew which had been cooking overnight.
“That’s one way to get to a man,” she whispered as she took a spoon from the kitchen drawer and tasted the food.
And, of course there may be another way, she thought to herself.
She walked upstairs to the bathroom, turned on the taps and ran a bath. She slipped off her dressing gown and looked at her naked body in the mirror.
“Not bad for an old ‘un,” she whispered as she admired herself.
The long bath soothed her and gave her time to think of what she would say to Butler. She needed a reason to start a conversation, find out more about him and what on earth was going on in her neighbour’s house.
She climbed out, dried herself and looked through her wardrobe to find something nice to wear.
What the hell am I doing?
She hadn’t had the company of a man since her husband had died, which was too many years ago. The thought of inviting herself over to the handsome stranger’s place excited her. He was in his seventies, good looking and judging by the car he drove, she guessed he was a man of class. She wanted to find out what was happening in Whitcombe Fields Road, and she planned to have a little fun whilst finding out. She was ten years younger than Butler and confident her female charm would h
elp get the answers.
After she’d dressed and applied a little subtle makeup, she picked up the pot from the slow cooker and took it to the hall. She placed it on the floor, had another check of her face in the mirror, took a deep breath and left the house with the gorgeous smelling stew.
Ruth stood outside Butler’s home. She was as nervous as a school kid and giddy with excitement as she knocked on the door.
“Hello Ruth, what a pleasure to see you.”
Ruth blushed and smiled. When she smiled, her face lit up. It wasn’t very often that she did these days, but when she smiled, she radiated a beauty difficult to ignore.
“What do we have here? It smells wonderful. That’s not for me is it?”
Ruth smiled again, and began to spin a web of white lies.
“I expected a friend for lunch, but she had to cancel at the eleventh hour. I didn’t fancy eating alone and wondered if you would want to share this with me?”
He leaned in and lifted the lid from the pot.
“It looks gorgeous, please come in.”
Butler opened the door wide to let Ruth in and she carried the pot to the kitchen.
“Shall we have a glass of wine to go with your wonderful cooking?”
Ruth looked around the Tempest’s home. She’d not been there for several years, but recognised paintings and furniture from last time she’d been there.
My God, something really did make them leave in a rush, thought Ruth as she looked around. She recalled the day Kieran and Linda took off in a small transit van. Most of their furniture had been left.
“I’ll lay the table,” said Butler.
Ruth made herself busy and served the food.
The two of them ate and to begin with, the silence was a little awkward until Butler broke the ice.
“You’re a wonderful cook. I’m honoured that you considered sharing this with me.”
“It’s my pleasure Mr. Butler.”
“Please call me Gabriel.”
The Third Skull (Book Two - The Revelation): A Paranormal Mystery Thriller Page 4
