A Spookies Compendium

by David Robinson

  “No.” Trent swept his hand left to right to emphasise his words. “I based my chapter on the Venerable Disciples of Loki on Michael’s ramblings, nothing more. I was very young at the time and naïve enough to believe that he had done his research properly. It’s one of the reasons I chose to disown the book later. If I were to rewrite it, I would eliminate that chapter completely.”

  “I stand corrected,” Sceptre said. “However, it doesn’t matter where or from whom the Venerable Disciples of Loki found their ideas, the fact remains that there is an active sect in this town, and what’s more they’re quite prepared to resort to murder.”

  Sceptre would not have believed it possible for Trent’s features to pale further, but they did. “Murder?”

  Maintaining an air of professional detachment, she nodded. “Nordqvist was pulled out of the coffin yesterday and his throat had been slashed.”

  “And what’s more,” Kevin said, “Pete believes that Danny Corcoran was up to his greasy hair in it, else why did he turn up here the other night?”

  “Oh dear. Oh dear me.” Trent floundered. “But this is dreadful.”

  “Nordqvist,” Sceptre explained, “disappeared just over a month ago, on the night the Wicked Witches played Eastlands. His spirit now haunts this school just as the girls are to open the Ashdale Arena. You’ve just told us that Michael Andersen claimed there was a Viking settlement where the arena has been built. What are the chances of the two events being linked?”

  “I really don’t know, Ms Rand. Professionally, I knew Michael well. Socially, not so well. Yes we had the occasional drink, yes we had the occasional chat by the fire, but it wasn’t until much later that I realised how badly his mind had deteriorated.” Trent sucked in a deep breath. “However, I feel I must point out that Michael has been dead over a year. He was in Long Bank Hospice for most of the time. In fact, he died about three weeks after it was closed down. They moved him to another place out at Watersend, you know.”

  “Near the old brewery?” asked Kevin.

  “Quite near, Mr Keeley, yes. Poor Michael.” Trent’s eyes assumed their distant look again as he meandered through his memories. “He was happy at Long Bank. I suppose it was the thought that he would reach the end of his life on a piece of land that he considered a part of his Scandinavian heritage. And then they moved him to the other side of town. He was quite distraught.” Trent gave them a wan smile. “Incoherent, of course, but nevertheless distressed.”

  Silence fell. Sceptre could think of nothing she need ask and she waited to see whether Kevin had anything. When he did not, she stood. “I don’t think we need trouble you any more, Mr Trent. Thank you for your time.”

  “It’s my pleasure.” Leaving his chair, Trent led them to the door. “This can be a lonely job, you know, and I welcome company.”

  “You never married?” Kevin asked.

  “I was never fortunate enough to meet the right woman,” Trent confessed.

  “Me neither,” Kevin said. “And I don’t ask much. Good looking with a big bank balance would —”

  “Kevin?”

  “Yes, Sceptre?”

  “Shut up.” At the door she faced Trent again. “Thank you once more, headmaster. If you do think of anything that may help us, you will get in touch?”

  “Yes. Of course.”

  They shook hands. Kevin and Sceptre climbed into Kevin’s van and with Trent watching them from the door, drove off.

  “What I wouldn’t give to be a fly on the wall in there right now,” Sceptre said as Kevin bunched the gears. “Fishwick?”

  “Yes, Madam?”

  “Would you check on what Mr Trent is doing right now?”

  “Of course, Milady.”

  Passing through the school gates and along All Saints Rod, Kevin tutted. “You’re using your ghostly pal as a spy now?”

  “Naturally,” Sceptre replied. “What’s the point of having a friend if you don’t make maximum use of his talents?”

  Kevin considered this for a moment, and as he reached the end of the road and waited for a gap in the cross traffic, he said, “I don’t think Pete would be happy about that.”

  “What? Me making use of Fishwick’s talents or Pete’s talents?”

  “No. I was thinking of using old Fishcake as a spy,” Kevin said. “I mean if Pete’s getting it on with some chick and you sent Fishy to spy on him, he’d —”

  “The spirits understand the meaning of discretion, Kevin,” Sceptre interrupted.

  “If you say so. Just remind me to make sure I don’t bring my dates home, in future,” Kevin said, pulling out into the main road.

  “Madam.”

  Her butler’s voice sounding in her head, Sceptre left Kevin to negotiate his way out of All Saints Road. “Yes, Fishwick?”

  “Trent was on the telephone to someone called Alec.”

  “Thank you, Fishwick.” Sceptre’s face split into a broad grin.

  “Won the lottery or something, have you?” Kevin asked.

  “Better than that, Kevin,” she gloated. “Trent was straight on the phone when we left. To someone called Alec.”

  “First name smart?”

  “Don’t be facetious,” Sceptre scolded. “Didn’t Pete say that one of Danny Corcoran’s associates was an Alec somebody or other?”

  “Alec Minton.” Kevin grimaced. “Nasty piece of work. In charge of demolition at Ashdale Construction these days, but he used to be pure muscle, nothing else.”

  “Ashdale Construction?” Sceptre asked. “Didn’t they build the arena?”

  Turning left onto Chapel Road, Kevin said, “Sure did. Big signs all over the arena saying ‘completed a year ahead of schedule.’ Not surprising mind. Minton would have been chucking his weight around, bullying the workers and ten to one Henderson used the cheapest materials he could get his hands on along with the cheapest labour.”

  He pulled in to the left, outside a large electrical shop, its sign proclaiming, Stringer Electrics for all your audio/video/computer needs.

  Killing the engine, taking the keys from the ignition, Kevin half turned in his seat. “Sceptre, why do you assume that Trent is ringing Alec Minton? There are probably hundreds of Alecs in Ashdale.”

  “Because, Kevin, as I keep saying, I don’t believe in coincidences. Look at what’s happened.” She ticked the points off on her fingers as she ran through them. “Michael Andersen invented the Venerable Disciples of Loki. Michael Andersen was moved from his hospice in a place he considered his birthright. We met the spirit of Michael Andersen, known to us as Loki. Gus Nordqvist disappeared at Eastlands, and turned up in the school crypt. Gus, too, was a member of the Venerable Disciples of Loki. We investigated the school. Danny Corcoran, another member, turned up and was killed by Gus Nordqvist’s spirit. We put the proposition to Trent who just happens to have written a book in which the Venerable Disciples of Loki were mentioned. Then, when we left, he rings someone called Alec and we know that someone called Alec was not only a friend of Danny Corcoran’s but also involved in the construction of the arena. It’s too much for it to be a coincidence.”

  Kevin checked his wing mirror and opened his door. “You can’t half dream ’em up, Sceptre. I’ll just have a few words with Bent Benny and then we can go wherever you want.”

  “Well don’t be too long,” said Sceptre and concentrated on her butler. “Fishwick?”

  “Yes Madam?”

  “Fishwick, did you get anywhere checking out the school for Loki’s banner and the great circle?”

  “I’m afraid not, Milady.”

  *****

  Kevin tucked the pinhole camera in his pocket, and handed over the money.

  “I don’t suppose I get a guarantee with it, Benny?”

  Benny Stringer was known as Bent Benny for his habit of dealing in goods that were above board, and reserving those that did not quite have the same pedigree for special customers like Kevin. A weasel-faced man in his mid-fifties, he had been a semi-permanent fi
xture behind the counter of his shop for the last two decades. Surly and often uncooperative, he was reliable to those who knew him, slippery and bad tempered to those who did not.

  Kevin was one of his best customers, and for such people he reserved his most pleasant attitude. Even so, it was not charitable.

  “Problem with guarantees, Kev, is that they cost money. If you want a warranty with it, I’ll have to take that one back and give you another, which will cost you another forty sovs.”

  Kevin clucked. “You mean the one I got is nicked.”

  “Now I didn’t say that,” said Benny, wagging a disapproving finger. “I bought it in good faith. As far as I’m aware it wasn’t stolen.”

  “As far as you’re aware?”

  “Well I don’t actually know that it wasn’t stolen, either, but it came from a reliable supplier, and he assures me it did not fall off the back of a lorry.”

  “Knowing your ‘reliable suppliers’, it probably never even made it to the lorry,” Kevin grumbled. “It’ll have been nicked direct from the production line. Okey-dokey, Benny. I’ll catch you later.”

  He stepped out of Benny’s shop and into the mid-morning lull of Chapel Road, rounded the front of his van and opened the driver’s door to climb in.

  There was a screech of tyres from somewhere nearby. Kevin looked around in alarm, in time to see a dark Ford hurtling towards him. He fled to the front of his van, ducked out of the way, his left foot trailing.

  There was a loud bang as the car struck the side of his van. It bounced off and caught his foot a glancing blow.

  Kevin howled and fell to the ground, clutching his injured ankle. His head swam, darkness descended upon him. The rogue car screeched to a halt twenty yards ahead. To his horror the reversing lights suddenly shone. With a scream of tortured engine, smoke coming from its tyres, it reversed straight at him.

  Chapter Sixteen

  The bump to the side of the van, the dark Ford careening forward several yards before screeching to a halt, and Kevin’s cry were slow to permeate Sceptre’s brain. By the time she realised what had happened and climbed out of the van, the car was already hurtling back at Kevin, its engine screaming.

  She, too, screamed. “Kevin!”

  He lay on the ground, staring at the dark Ford rushing back at him. He could nothing. Sceptre could only watch as he prepared to die.

  And then, to her amazement, he moved backwards, under the van.

  *****

  Fishwick hovered above the scene torn with indecision. He wanted to rush in to help Kevin, but the mistress was stood by the nose of the van and he was worried that she might step into the road to help. He could not help Kevin and stop her at the same time.

  A crimson blur hurtled in with a cry of, “Vali!”

  It ducked under the van until it smothered Kevin from view. It grabbed him by the ankles and yanked him under the van, out of harm’s way.

  While the car smashed into Kevin’s van, Vali flew off across the Spirit Plane.

  “Thank you, friend,” Fishwick called after it.

  *****

  Kevin lay there, frozen, expecting nothing but the agony of the car riding over him, crushing his bones, and crushing his skull judging by the angle of those wheels coming at him.

  Then his feet felt cold and numb and he began to move backwards. And his eyes glazed.

  *****

  Headlights flashed from behind. About to turn into the Bower, he checked his mirror. It looked liked Corcoran’s beat up Vauxhall. He braked and wound down the window.

  Danny drew alongside. “The Master wants to see you. Now.”

  He nodded.”I’ll follow you.”

  Instead of turning into the Bower, he turned back onto the dual carriageway.

  *****

  The Ford rushed back, rammed the van’s bumper, its tailpipe stopping inches from Kevin’s forehead. And then it was gone. Rushing off along the road, in the direction of Ashdale Arena, its boot buckled, rear lights smashed, number plate broken, scored and unreadable.

  Relief flooded Kevin. He became aware of people chattering on the pavement, a babble of excited voices. Others came to his van, crouching to look underneath and check on him. Sceptre’s hands appeared, helping him out, his throbbing ankle made itself aware, transmitting shocking messages of pain through his body.

  Nausea overtook him. Blackness engulfed him.

  When he came to, he could hear the wail of sirens in the distance. He was sitting on the kerbside, leaning back against the dented front of his van, Sceptre alongside him, patting his hand, Bent Benny hovering with a beaker of sweet tea.

  Bewildered, Kevin allowed the sugar in the tea to energise him, and tried to recall the sequence of events.

  “Did anybody get the car’s number?” he asked, only to be greeted with Sceptre’s blank face.

  “I’m sorry, Kevin. It didn’t occur to me. I was frightened for you.”

  “You didn’t try to sell the driver one of my computers, did you?” asked Bent Benny.

  “Hard to say,” Kevin said, clutching at his sore ankle. “I didn’t even see who the driver was. Did you?”

  “I was still in the shop,” replied Benny, “until I heard it back up and ram you.”

  Kevin frowned. “So who pulled me under my van?”

  Benny shrugged and looked around at the crowd but no one owned up.

  Sceptre, too, shook her head. “I thought you’d crawled under of your own volition. I mean, it’s the obvious place to go when someone’s trying to reverse over you.”

  “Yeah … yeah.” Kevin frowned again and fished into his pocket for his mobile phone. “I’d better ring Pete.”

  Sceptre took the phone from him. “You just relax until the ambulance gets here. I’ll call Pete.” She punched in the number and made the connection, only to receive an automated message telling her Pete’s phone was switched off. “He must be busy,” she said, handing the phone back.

  Kevin stuffed it in his pocket as PC Robb and two paramedics arrived. “What is it with people like Pete,” Kevin moaned. “They don’t understand channels of communication.”

  While the ambulance attendants began to examine his ankle, and Dave Robb began to take statements from witnesses, he put together a text, and sent it off to Pete.

  Robb took a confused statement from him and Sceptre and when the ambulance attendants insisted that he go to A & E, he handed his keys to her. “Why don’t you follow in the van?”

  “I don’t think I could drive it, Kevin,” she said. “I’ll come with you and we can get Pete to come for the van later.”

  They carried him to the ambulance, Sceptre joined him in the back. The doors closed, one attendant sat in the back with them, the other climbed behind the wheel, spoke briefly into the radio, and they were on their way.

  Kevin relaxed. “That was a near miss, Sceptre. I still don’t know who dragged me under the van but I had another vision. Corcoran stopped Swede as he was turning into the Bower Hotel. Told him the High Master wanted to see him.”

  With a wary eye on the ambulance attendant, Sceptre shushed him, patted his hand and he began giving his details to the paramedic.

  *****

  “Milady?”

  At the sound of Fishwick’s voice ringing in her head, Sceptre shrank back into a corner and kept an eye on the paramedic. “Yes Fishwick,” she whispered.

  “It was Vali who pulled Mr Keeley under the van.”

  “Vali?”

  Sceptre forgot to keep her voice down and the paramedic looked round. “Sorry?” he said. “Did you say something?”

  “Nothing.” Sceptre smiled. “Thinking out loud. Bali. Going there for my holidays next year.” She lowered her voice again. “Did you say Vali, Fishwick?”

  “Indeed, Madam. I think we can rely on Vali to assist us, or at the very least look out for Mr Keeley. Obviously, he has a rapport with Mr Keeley. He’s been channelling through him for the last few days.”

  “Fishwick,” Sc
eptre whispered, “did you or Vali see who was driving the car?”

  “No, Milady. I was busy ensuring that you did not step in front of the vehicle to save Mr Keeley. It would have killed you. And Vali was busy with Mr Keeley, but even if he did see who was driving, he is still incapable of communicating. All I sense is great anger, which is turned to our assistance at times.”

  Sceptre agreed. “If, as we suspect, it’s the spirit of Gus Nordqvist, then I’m not surprised he’s angry.”

  “Are you all right there, luv?”

  It was the paramedic again, giving her the kind of look his profession reserves for those about whom they have doubts.

  “I’m fine, thank you,” Sceptre said. “I often talk to myself.”

  “Do you now?”

  “Yes. It helps me clear my thoughts.” With the thought that the paramedic considered her slightly batty, she whispered to Fishwick, “Thank you,” and relaxed in her seat, giving the paramedic a sweet, sweet smile.

  *****

  Behind the wheel of his car, the engine running, debating which way he should go next, Pete switched on his mobile and found the familiar envelope icon indicating a text message. He opened the menu, found a new message from Kevin and as he read it his face creased to a worried frown.

  Accident hurt hospital cum.

  His visit to Ashdale Construction had been unproductive. Minton was not in and hadn’t been seen for a couple of days.

  “His mobile’s off, too,” said an irate Oliver Henderson, the chief executive, “contrary to company policy, and when he does show up, he’s in deep shit. If you find him, you can tell him that from me.”

  Pete had all but decided that the next port of call would be the Ashdale Arena, and a word or two with Ginger Green, but Kevin’s text changed his mind. Instead, he turned right out of Henderson’s yard, onto the main road for the two-kilometre journey to the hospital, glad of the efficient heater in his car. Even with the sun climbing into the sky, the temperature outside was barely above zero.