Memory Scents: A Psychological Thriller

by Gayle Eileen Curtis

  Alice made her way to her aunt’s house, after saying goodbye to her anxious mother. It was the first time her parents had let her go to a school disco, especially with a boy. But she was fifteen now, and they felt they had to loosen the apron strings at some point.

  It was a beautiful summer evening, and Alice almost skipped down the road to her fate. She stopped at the crossroads and looked left and right. It was to be her last chance to change her mind. Left was a slow stroll, with time to stop at the village shop for some sweets, a quick chat with the owner, Mrs. Newton, and then on to meet Jeremy at the playing field. Right was down the road a hundred yard and right again onto the bumpy track leading to the back door of Auntie Grace’s, where no one was there apart from her Uncle Tim.

  CHAPTER NINE

  Norfolk 1998

  Dear Alice,

  It saddens me to write this letter, and I don’t really know how to tell you, but I think I’ll just have to come out with it.

  Daddy has decided that it would be best if we separated for a little while, and he has gone to live somewhere else. He’s renting a small cottage in the next village, so it gives us some space between us. It’s close enough though in case I need him for anything.

  I don’t know how to feel about it really, or what to say to you. I suppose it was always on the cards if I’m honest. We both want different things and neither of us can meet in the middle. I just hope you understand, darling. One thing we do want you to know is that we don’t blame you at all. It’s just something that often happens between couples. They grow apart.

  Even though we’ll be living apart, darling, we will still both be here for you when you come home. And we love you just the same, even though we’re not together. I still pray every night that you’ll come home again.

  Loving you always

  Mummy xxx

  *

  “Dad, come over here, I’ve found something!”

  “What have you found now? Another piece of pottery I suppose?”

  Carl Meakin wandered over to the clearing where his daughter was standing with her hand on her hip and one foot on the spade she was using to dig with. Attitude oozed from her and she raised an eyebrow at her father’s comment.

  “No, not ‘another’ piece of pottery, I’ve found a necklace actually.” Jessica said, with emphasis. She’d been out metal detecting with her dad for most of the day. They’d got permission from the farm owner, on the condition that he had a share in whatever they found. They’d started the day as always, quite optimistically, only to get towards tea time, tired, and a bit fractious with one another. He was fed up of her showing him pieces of flowery pottery and she with him for calling her over to look at rusty bits of metal.

  Carl examined the tarnished piece of jewellery, soil caked in its links.

  “Well, that’s a bit of a find, girl! It’s not very old, but I think its silver, and it’s got a nice semi precious stone on it. Where’d you find it?”

  “Down there in that hole in the clearing,” Jessica said, feeling quite chuffed with her treasure. “I think there must have been a small pond there, but the sun has dried the water up.”

  “Yeah, there is normally water in there; it’s called a ‘mere’. You can tell by the cracks in the soil, and the slightly different shade of dirt. Let me look.”

  Carl stepped down the slight embankment into the empty mere and peered into the large hole his daughter had dug.

  “You should have marked out a patch with your spade like I told you to; you’ve dug far too wide.”

  “I know Dad. You say that every time we come out.”

  “Well, I wouldn’t have to if you did what I asked. You’re all over the ruddy place. You start with a square foot each time and then if you find anything…”

  “Yeah, yeah, I know, you can widen the square. God, Dad we’re not professionals – Dad what is it?’

  “I’m not sure yet love, pass me my trowel.”

  Carl had noticed some strange, familiar shapes at the bottom of the hole his daughter had dug. They were like pieces of stone embossed in the flat damp pit, all linked together. Something you wouldn’t notice whilst you were digging, but was quite obvious when you observed it from above. Carl scuffed the soil off one of the lumps with his boot and a creamy colour began to appear.

  “Dad?” Jessica passed her father the trowel.

  “Just a minute, please!”

  “Alright, alright!” Jessica sighed and wandered over to the patch her father was working on.

  Carl jumped out of the dried up mere and stared down at the base of the hole. It appeared to be the outline of a human body. Lying almost like a curled up foetus. Carl stepped around the hole to view it from another angle, trying to convince himself that it was an animal. But it didn’t matter which way he looked at it, it was what it was, the remains of a human being. The wiggly outline of the necklace his daughter had found was still imprinted in the mud. Jessica had, without realising it, dug down into someone’s grave. An eerie feeling crept through Carl’s stomach and into his throat. This wasn’t a proper burial site, so why would the remains look like they were lying in a foetal position?

  “Jessica, can you go and get my phone out of the truck please?”

  “Yeah, why, what’s the matter?” Jessica had noticed her father had turned an odd shade. “Have you found something really exciting? Are we going to be millionaires? You’ve found the King John’s treasure haven’t you? I knew it was crap about it being in the Wash–”

  “No Jessica, don’t come over here, just get me the phone.” Carl began to climb back up the embankment to prevent his daughter walking over.

  “I want to see, what is it? Dad, you’re scaring me…”

  “No, just for once will you do as I ask!”

  Jessica didn’t argue with him, she’d never seen her father like this before, and scuttled to the truck to get the phone.

  “Whatever you do, don’t go back over to the hole you’ve dug, sweetheart. I don’t want you to see it, and you mustn’t tread near it. Ok?” His voice softened to try and keep her calm.

  “Why Dad, please tell me what you’ve found, you’re as white as a sheet?” Jessica’s eyes filled with tears, her father was frightening her.

  Carl didn’t know how else to say it, without scaring her. He certainly didn’t want his sixteen year old daughter looking into the grave she’d dug up. It’d give her nightmares for years, something he was sure he would be having for the next few weeks.

  “I think, we’ve uncovered a grave, and I need to call the police and get them to come out and check it over. Nothing to panic about, it’s fine.”

  Jessica dropped the dirt encrusted necklace as if it had suddenly glowed like a red hot coal. Carl bent down and picked it up, noticing his daughters look of horror.

  “It’s probably all above board, sweetheart and has been there for hundreds of years. Now, why don’t you pour us the last of the coffee from the flask and I’ll give the police a quick ring.”

  “But you said that the necklace wasn’t very old.”

  “I don’t think the necklace you found has anything to do with it, so sit down there and drink your coffee.”

  *

  NORFOLK 1965

  The boxes were all laid out neatly on the floor of Tim’s bedroom. He sat before them, proud of the little treasures he’d stolen.

  Each one had been achieved by stealing from people in the village as a dare with his friends. Only, the difference was that Tim’s friends ditched theirs, the thrill having gone once they’d won the game and achieved it without getting caught.

  They looked up to Tim, even though they thought he was a bit strange. But he’d gained kudos at school because of his talent for being the best thief.

  His little trophies meant more to him than they did to the other boys; this was what made him such a good thief. He badly wanted what he was stealing, like a magpie with its beady eye on a prize. Tim’s trophies were significant of his increasing power.<
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  He often sat in his bedroom and surveyed his handiwork, the excitement rising in his stomach. All the boxes looked the same so he had no idea which box held which items. He’d play a guessing game sometimes when he’d nothing better to do, or when Dora had ordered him to stay in his room. He knew better from past experience not to disobey her. She always managed to come up with a punishment that was worse than the last.

  This was one such occasion. His father was at work and it was the summer holidays. Severe rain had put pay to any play time activities outside with the other boys, and Dora couldn’t bear him coming home with dirty sodden clothes on. That just warranted another punishment.

  He began to play his game of guessing the items in the boxes after he’d mixed them all up. He heard Dora running up the stairs giggling. Her foot fall was followed by a much heavier one and her laughter trailing behind a far deeper anonymous male voice.

  Tim hated those days trapped in his room, trying desperately to drown out the noises he could hear coming from his parent’s bedroom. Noises he didn’t quite understand but which he knew would anger his mother and father greatly, had they come home and caught Dora. There was no point in him telling them; his mother scolded him if he bothered his father after work and he’d long given up telling his mother anything. She just accused him of lying, making things up because he wanted her to come home. She was incapable of showing him any attention other than what she really had to. So he moved his affections to his possessions.

  When he got really lost in his game, he could look at each item, smell it and drift into another world of memories. Making up games about where the item had come from. He had quite a collection building up and some of the things he had stolen were quite valuable. He had fine pieces of jewellery, brooches, rings, tie pins, silk scarves and gloves, hats and ties, underwear and blouses. Summer was the best time to steal from people. They tended to leave doors open and things laying about ready to be lifted. That was Tim’s logic, if people took more care of their things and really wanted them, they wouldn’t leave them out to be stolen. It was ingrained in him, a form of conditioning he got from his mother, that possessions were to be stored away. Tim took this school of thought to include people.

  *

  NORFOLK 1987

  Alice excitedly picked at the layers of tape holding the floral paper wrapped around the box, while her parents busied themselves making tea and toast. It was Alice’s birthday and she was sat at the kitchen table ploughing through her cards and gifts. The one that meant the most to her was the one her father had given her. The one she’d left until last. Eve and Jon, her parents, usually gave her a present that was from both of them. They’d still followed this tradition but Jon had wanted to get her something special that he’d chosen and was solely from him.

  This had really touched Alice. She knew that dads didn’t really get involved in going shopping and choosing presents, it didn’t seem to be in their nature. So the idea her father had chosen something especially for her had filled her with excitement.

  “Oh Dad, how much tape did you use, I can’t get it off!”

  “I didn’t want you snooping around before your birthday and peeking. Like you do with your mother’s loose wrapping.”

  “Well, there’s no danger of that here. Can you pass me the scissors please?”

  “Careful you don’t mark the box, I’ll have to take it back to the shop once you’ve opened it.”

  Alice’s face dropped. “Why?”

  “Don’t wind her up on her birthday, Jon!” Eve gave him a swipe on her way to the table with a pot of tea.

  “Dad!”

  “Oh, just hurry up and open it. The suspense is killing me! I’m not used to all this malarkey.” Jon pulled out a chair and joined his daughter at the table.

  Silence descended in the room apart from the snipping of scissors as Alice desperately tried to prize open the tightly wrapped little box, a pained expression on her face. This was rapidly replaced with a look of elation when she finally opened the box and saw the beautiful pendant and chain hanging from the blue velvet cushion inside, a smile was quickly followed by tears, which was then chased with a scream.

  Alice jumped up and flung herself onto her father’s lap.

  “Do you think she likes it, Eve? I was hoping to get a refund.”

  “Daddy!” Alice slapped his arm, and then showered his face in kisses, “I love it! It’s the best thing ever! I love you!”

  “And I love you too, sweetheart.”

  *

  Norfolk 1998

  “Where are you going in such a hurry?”

  “I’m going over to Eve’s; Alice’s remains have been found.”

  Grace glanced at Tim to see his reaction; a shadow passed across his face. She wouldn’t have noticed it if she hadn’t been married to him for so long. But there was a definite flicker of an emotion, although she was unsure of which one. She glared at him with pure burning hatred and repressed the urge to smash open his skull like a walnut in a nutcracker.

  “Alice has been found? Are they sure it’s her?”

  “Of course they’re sure, even you should know that! They’ve done all the tests. A local man and his daughter were out metal detecting and found her a few days ago,” Grace snapped at him.

  “Oh dear. Poor Eve. Does Jon know?”

  This last sentence was said with such insincerity that Grace could only stare at him for a few moments. She was at such a loss to know what to say to him or quite any idea as to what to do.

  “I don’t know, Tim, I should imagine so. Why don’t you go over there and see if he needs some support. My main priority, at the moment, is my sister. She was bad enough before Alice was found, goodness knows what this will do to her.”

  Tim almost fell into the kitchen chair as he watched the back of his wife head out of the door. He was wondering who the hell had found her and why they’d been in such a secluded spot. He didn’t need to worry about that though, he just needed to act as if he knew nothing about it. That would be fairly easy for Tim, it’d happened such a long time ago that he’d become almost completely detached from it. What he most definitely needed to do was to clear out his shed. The police would be re-opening all the cases, once they connected Alice to the others, and they would probably search the whole village again, especially now they had all that new blood at the station.

  He sat for a while, trying to gauge how he felt about it. Alice had been the one that he’d carefully buried, not wanting her to be found. The mere used to dry up in the summer and he knew that years of climate change would cause it to be permanently filled with water, but he hadn’t anticipated the particularly hot summer they’d had. But then, why would he? He’d buried her quite deep in the ground, in the middle of nowhere, where no one ventured. Or so he’d thought. And he’d more or less forgotten about her, apart from the lovely memory scent he had of her.

  She had looked like an angel when he’d laid her in his home made wooden box. He’d caught her stirring slightly just before he sealed the lid and realised she wasn’t dead. But he didn’t have time to mess about and he knew the lack of air in the box underground would finish her off fairly quickly, if the hyperthermia didn’t get to her first.

  He wasn’t worried about the police finding any of his DNA; he was too careful to leave anything. The bonus for any psychopath was having an Obsessive Compulsive Disorder in cleanliness. Anyway, she’d been under the ground for far too long for there to be anything of any significance left.

  The best thing he could do was to burn all the boxes of memory scents and get himself over to his brother-in-law’s house and pretend like he cared. He’d have to get his thrills in some other way for the time being and Chrissie would provide plenty of those. His arrogance had reached nauseating new levels and he wasn’t worried one tiny bit that he might get caught. He’d gotten away with it for this long, who was going to catch him out now?

  CHAPTER TEN

  “Four, three, two, one, and now I
want you to look down at your feet and when you’re ready, tell me where you are?”

  Sarah watched Chrissie as she floated into hypnosis and waited for her to settle and answer her question. Chrissie would either be transported into a significant time in a past life, or one more recent.

  “I’m standing on a grassy cliff….no shoes…the sun is warm. We’re having a picnic.” Chrissie’s voice came out raspy and shallow and slightly childlike.

  “Who are you with?” Sarah kept her voice soft and gentle so as not to startle her out of her hypnosis.

  “My Mum and sisters…. Dad’s gone to the shop for ice creams. Mum’s playing catch with us…”

  “Who are you?”

  “Christine, I’m Christine.”

  “Ok, Christine, I want you to go to the next significant point in your life.”

  Chrissie stirred slightly under the blanket that Sarah had put over her to keep her warm.

  “Where are you now Christine?”

  “I’m…I’m on the swing…”

  “Where is the swing?”

  “In the garden….but it’s not our house. It’s dark…Mum’s calling me for bed…but I don’t want to come in.”

  “Whose house are you at?”

  Sarah watched her friend begin to stir under the blanket; her brow furrowed and she was starting to make peculiar noises.

  “Christine, where are you?”

  But Chrissie seemed unable to speak and her head was swaying from side to side as if she was trying to get away from something. Her hands began to grip the blanket and tears sprung from her eyes; all that was coming out of her mouth was muffled crying.