The Strings of Murder

by Oscar de Muriel

  He’d been mighty clever, though. He knew that he could not beat the two of us, so he had disarmed and blinded us before we could do anything.

  I felt my lighter in my pocket. How tempting it was to ignite it and rush for my gun; or my lantern – I had dropped it but I’d not heard it shatter. However, my lighter would be like a beacon amidst such darkness, revealing our position long before I could reach for weapon.

  Just when I thought that we would be waiting for ever, a coarse, venomous voice resounded throughout the cave. The words bounced on the walls in otherworldly echoes: ‘I kill four …’

  It was an odd voice, its open vowels and the rolling ‘r’ undoubtedly Mediterranean, yet not entirely.

  ‘Want to know why? ’ The question was asked in a mawkish tone that chilled my blood.

  Neither of us replied. With that echo we could not tell where the voice had come from, but our adversary undoubtedly had a much finer ear.

  ‘Youse don’t wanna know? But youse are too interested in me! ’

  The voice was wicked indeed, and it had a childlike quality that made it even more terrifying. It was the kind of voice we dread in our infancy; those voices we think we hear in the darkness of our childhood bedrooms.

  ‘I a creepy crawly … everybody say to me … lock me away when visits come … but ’tis handy to be a creepy crawly … I see and hear everything! I go everywhere! ’

  I heard the brushing of clothes dancing around us. The sound came and went from every direction.

  ‘Sure youse don’t wanna know? Youse shy! ’ The voice became a startling howl. ‘Then I show youse! ’

  Again the sound of brushing clothes, this time frantically, and then I heard a wooden echo; one I’d heard every time Elgie picked up his violin.

  Low notes filled the cave. It was a frantic melody embellished with flashing trills; enthralling yet terrifying, like those tempestuous organ fugues by Bach.

  Then silence.

  A moment later there was second burst of notes. It was the same melody, but in a higher key and played twice as fast. Again it stopped abruptly, only to be resumed a third time in an even higher key and tempo. Then it stopped.

  Just as I thought there could not be a higher pitch or a faster rhythm, the fourth outburst came, shrilling and maddening. It pierced my ears like nails scratching glass, yet part of me wanted to light up the cave and see those fingers pressing the strings in a crazy blur.

  Thank goodness it stopped, but then Giacomo’s voice resounded again.

  ‘Youse can’t guess? Stupid fools. Then I do it!’

  I saw a tiny flame igniting on the other side of the gallery. It was only a match, but to my eyes it looked as bright as a roaring fire. I caught a glimpse of the five-eyed mask and the red knife. He was standing by the entrance to a narrow passage. ‘I take knife. I kill tonight …’

  McGray ran towards the light, shooting compulsively, as the creature dropped the match and ran away. Using my lighter I found my gas lantern intact, but as soon as I lit it Nine-Nails snatched it and went after Giacomo.

  I shouted, ‘It’s a trap! McGray! ’ but he would not listen; he was already entering the passage. I had no time to think so I yelled the first thing that came to my head: ‘Killing yourself won’t bring your sister back! ’

  McGray halted. I had touched his most sensitive nerve.

  He stood still for a moment … then panted and grunted in a terrible inner struggle. God knows how many thoughts haunted him in those brief seconds … and then he thrust himself forward recklessly.

  ‘Bloody, stubborn Scot!’ I yelled, running after him. Two would stand more chance than one.

  By then McGray had run a good stretch, carrying our only remaining light. I had to follow him blindly, running hysterically and stumbling among the rocks until I finally found the gleam of the lantern.

  ‘Where is he?’ I asked, but McGray was motionless; in front of him the passage branched in three directions.

  ‘I think I lost –’

  McGray leaped forwards as soon as he saw a faint gleam in the central tunnel. Again we ran madly, this time along a snaking, claustrophobic tunnel that seemed to stretch for ever.

  The terrifying voice was gabbling madly, the echoes bouncing across the cave: ‘Come on! I show youse! Youse led me to it, now I lead youse! ’

  I do not know how far we ran, but McGray stopped dead all of a sudden. I crashed against him and we almost fell into a wide channel that opened before us.

  It was a perfectly round tunnel: lined with bricks, three yards wide, with a gush of stinking water running through it.

  ‘The cave’s connected to the sewerage,’ McGray spluttered. ‘That’s how he brought Caroli’s –’

  By then McGray was already jumping into the murky waters. He’d seen the creature.

  ‘Christ, why when I am wearing fine clothes?’ I moaned, jumping right behind him.

  I sank in the brown stream up to my thighs, wincing at the foul stench. I tried to run but my overcoat dragged me backwards like an anchor. I saw McGray getting rid of his own coat and I had to do the same (even then, a part of my brain regretted the loss of my fur-trimmed garment).

  ‘I’m losing him!’ McGray shouted, lighting the channel ahead of us. The black figure was swimming merrily against the current while we painfully kicked and splashed in the sludge.

  ‘He doesn’t want to get away, he wants us to follow him,’ I grunted, feeling my legs burning. The stream was a constant onslaught and very soon we were panting.

  I will never know how I managed to keep on among the squealing rats and the dreadful stench. I envied McGray: he just clenched his lantern and progressed stoically.

  From time to time the hooded head turned back to catch a glimpse of us, the five eyes gleaming under the lantern’s beam. A couple of times McGray was tempted to shoot it, but decided to save the bullets until he had a closer target.

  We lost sight of him after he turned a corner in the sewer. We had lagged behind quite a gap so it took us a worryingly long time to reach that point. When we turned we found the wide channel going on indefinitely; even the lantern’s white beam could not reach its end. Right next to us we found the mouth of some side pipe that discharged a scanty flow into the main channel.

  There was nobody around.

  ‘Did he go that way?’ Nine-Nails asked desperately, pointing at the inlet pipe. ‘Or did he go straight? What did he do?’

  ‘Could have been either,’ I said. ‘We should separate. You go straight and I –’

  ‘Nae. We need to fight him together. He can take one of us, but not two.’

  McGray looked at both channels, waving the lantern in frustration. ‘Well, I can play his game too.’ Then he hollered, ‘Come on! Come on, Giacomo! Yer aunty told us everything about ye!’

  There was no reply. McGray shouted louder. ‘She told us how yer mother kept ye locked with the hounds when ye were a wee child! How on her deathbed she made yer aunt swear she’d never show ye to the world!’

  We listened intently, but there was nothing besides the dull sound of the waters.

  ‘We ken it’s been difficult for ye!’ McGray shouted. ‘But we can help ye! Even if ye look the way ye –’

  ‘I can help you to Hell! ’

  It was not a yell but a bitter, scornful whisper. We barely heard it and instantly rushed into the side channel. We heard some splashing ahead; frantic steps not too far away.

  ‘Aye, ye betrayed yerself, laddie!’ McGray said.

  We ran through so many bends and bifurcations that I completely lost track of our way. I remembered the mess of dotted lines I’d seen on the city plans; we were somewhere underneath the Old Town.

  Without the current coming against us we gained ground swiftly; we could hear Giacomo’s steps ever more clearly, and even his panting breath.

  ‘Come on, laddie! Yer in over yer head!’

  It was Giacomo’s turn to cackle. ‘I think otherwise …’

  We made it
to another wide channel, and as we entered we saw the edge of Giacomo’s cloak hurrying into a very narrow side duct.

  McGray pushed me forward. ‘Go! I won’t fit in there!’

  The pipe ascended to the street; the light of a lamp lit Giacomo as he crawled upwards.

  I did my best to follow but the duct was wet and slippery, and almost as soon as I jumped upon it I dropped my gun and slid all the way back.

  McGray pushed me upwards as if I were a puppet. This time I dug my very nails into the bricks, feeling myself slide down while the dark cloak moved agilely towards the open drain.

  Roaring and thrashing my legs, I managed to push myself upwards, but it was too late: I felt sick when I saw Giacomo contorting in an unthinkable way, almost squeezing himself as if he had no bones, and passing through the narrow drain towards the streets.

  Out of pure rage I reached the drain and stretched my arm out of the sewers; a feeble attempt to reach the bastard. No normal adult could get through that opening.

  Giacomo cackled again. I could see the eyes of his mask and the red knife reflecting the light of the street lamps. He kneeled by the drain and made a stab at me, so I had to retreat.

  He whispered as eerily as before: ‘Four murders. One for each string …’

  ‘McGray, toss me the gun!’

  ‘You know what the letters mean? The wee letters on the paper?’

  McGray was throwing both weapons but I could not seize them without falling down.

  ‘The names of the people you have killed,’ I snorted.

  Again Giacomo laughed: ‘You know nothing of music. Four strings on a violin … a quinta of notes between each string …’

  ‘What the Hell?’

  He spoke slowly, as if talking to a retarded man. ‘The lowest string, where it all begins. String of G … G for Guilleum.’

  ‘Gui – Guilleum?’

  ‘Then five notes higher, the string of D, Danilo, my uncle the idiot … then string of A, the fat man Alistair … then I have problems to find next string. Can you tell me what note follows?’

  My heart went ice cold.

  ‘Oh, I see you know! And you know well: string of E, which of course is …’

  ‘Elgie.’

  I experienced a panic I had never felt before; a wave tearing through my chest, as the memory of a gypsy’s whisper rushed into my head: You’re about to lose your most beloved one.

  Giacomo cackled cruelly and again spoke in his terrifying, sly tone. ‘I spy youse from the chimneys, I hear him play. I find him fit for me … Now I get youse lost down there. No way youse get out in time to stop me … I win! I get my fiddle set for Satan! ’

  And then I saw him run maniacally down the street.

  34

  Defeated, I slid down the pipe, my entire body shaking. My legs sank in the murky waters and McGray had to pull me up.

  ‘Yer brother’s still in the New Club?’

  A fit took hold of me. ‘Yes, but how do we get out? How-do-we-get-out? We’ll never be –’

  ‘Calm down, Frey! We just need to find a manhole –’

  ‘Oh, do we? ’ I shrieked. ‘And how are we going to find it in this fucking mess?’

  ‘Yer forgetting I spent hours looking at those plans! I may remember. Now tell me: what did ye see up there? Any landmark ye recognized.’

  ‘N-no, I –’

  ‘Then get up there again and tell me!’

  I did so at once, this time clinging with all my strength. ‘We are right under the Royal Mile …’

  ‘All right. Whereabouts?’

  ‘Erm … I see a church. It looks funny … curved outline and a tiny portico.’

  ‘Canongate Church,’ McGray said at once. ‘I think I remember one main pipe running along High Street … and …’

  Then I lost my temper. ‘How are you possibly going to remember a single spot you saw days ago on a five-foot-long piece of paper?’

  ‘Och, shut it and let me think!’

  McGray then covered his face with both hands, mumbling to himself.

  I paced around frenetically, my nerves tumbling down. How could I have been so stupid? Following Nine-Nails into that blasted race had been my worst choice. And while he tried to remember, that murderer – that monster – was running entire blocks towards my youngest brother! The dreadful image of those hanging bowels made me shudder again, and I could not repress an anguished roar.

  A burning rage followed. I was about to punch McGray in the face but right then he opened his eyes in exhilaration.

  ‘I’m so stupid! Of course! ’

  ‘Did you remember?’

  ‘Aye, but not from the plans … There’s a huge manhole right in front o’ the Ensign Ewart pub! So if this is the Mile’s main pipe and Canongate Church is right there … Follow me! ’

  I ran after McGray in an anguished sprint until we found a wider drain that let in the yellow light of the street’s lampposts.

  We both pushed the manhole plate, grunting and cursing. I did not expect the blasted thing to be so heavy! For a frightening moment it would not move, but then its rusty hinges squeaked and, painfully, we managed to push it aside. The aperture was barely wide enough to let me through.

  ‘I’ll have to find another way,’ McGray said, pushing me ahead.

  I jumped out of the sewer and as I stood up McGray howled something I could not catch. Only after having run halfway down the street did I realize he’d told me to take a gun, but it was too late to return now. I had no time to ponder my options; I set my mind on getting to the New Club and protecting my brother, trying not to think that it might be already too late.

  Suddenly I was running at full speed, my legs about to collapse, ignoring puddles and passing carriages, but the world still seemed to move more slowly than ever. I descended through the closes of Castle Rock, crossed Princes Street Gardens, passing right next to the deserted art gallery, and almost lost my balance when the Georgian façade of the New Club finally emerged in front of me. I was so desperate I crossed Princes Road without even looking – I can only tell that there were no carts passing by because I made it to the entrance in one piece.

  I stormed through the lobby, showing my credentials, and shouted at the sleepy clerk to fetch as many guards as he could. Then I darted upstairs and, after what had felt like an eternity, arrived at Elgie’s corridor.

  My heart skipped a beat when I saw that the door to his room was ajar. I kicked it open, and then …

  The room was empty, dimly lit by a weak fire and a lonely gas lamp.

  It became hard to breathe; a suffocating pressure on my chest …

  ‘What is it?’

  I cannot describe the relief I felt when Elgie’s head peered at me from behind an armchair. I ran towards him, pulled his slender body to me and squeezed him in the tightest embrace.

  ‘Good Lord, Ian, you stink!’ I could not expect warmer words from him.

  ‘Oh, shush! I need to get you out of –’

  I turned around and a monstrous vision made us both scream.

  Giacomo had arrived, the five glassy eyes of his mask gleaming as he slithered out of the fireplace. The edge of his cloak was ablaze but he carelessly extinguished it with his bare hand. He seemed shapeless, and bending like a snake he hurried into the room and stood right before the door. We heard the ghastly crack of bones as he moved his dislocated shoulders back into place.

  I stepped in front of my brother and together we retreated to the very back of the room. ‘If you want him you will have to get me first!’

  Elgie crouched behind me, trembling uncontrollably, and I knew that my words were empty. I had no weapon of any kind and Giacomo knew it. He cackled as he produced the long knife.

  I gulped as the terrible truth hit me: we would die there and then. The face of that five-eyed demon would be the last thing I’d ever see …

  ‘Come on! ’ I roared in a last act of bravado. ‘Come and get this sack of bones! He doesn’t have enough gut to give
you half a string!’

  I saw the shiny blade rising, so sharp it would slice us effortlessly. Giacomo was hissing like an angry bull.

  Then a roar and a deafening blast … An explosion of blood spilt all over my face and then I saw the shiny blade flying away.

  Giacomo’s hand had been shot clean through and he fell sideways, roaring like the beast he’d become. I saw a tall figure by the doorframe and instantly recognized the square shoulders of Nine-Nails McGray, holding a gun in each hand.

  The knife fell to the floor and McGray smashed it with his boot, pieces of red glass ejected all around. Giacomo tried to rise and attack him, but McGray hit him in the head with a gun’s butt. The misshapen devil fell unconscious onto the floor.

  It had all happened so quickly … it had been barely a blink. After the thump on the carpet we fell into deep silence, our minds struggling to take in what we’d just seen. The first voice I heard was Elgie’s.

  ‘What the Hell is that?’

  McGray leaned over Giacomo to pull off the hood and mask. I was astonished by how childlike he looked. Mrs Caroli had implied his young age, but I did not fully realize it until I saw his very sparse beard and thick locks of dark hair.

  ‘He’s a fiddler,’ McGray told Elgie. ‘Around yer age, laddie.’

  At last I managed to take a deep breath, and exhaling felt like unloading the weight of the world off my shoulders.

  It was all over.

  All we had left to do was to face Campbell and explain everything.

  35

  Campbell’s office looked as compulsively neat as always, and the white snow that could be seen through the window made the room appear even brighter. As a result, the mighty bruise McGray had given him right in the eye stuck out like a raw steak on an immaculate china plate.

  No wonder he did not want Nine-Nails around for the time being.

  ‘Will you please summarize your report, Frey?’ he said, leafing distractedly through the thin file.

  ‘By all means,’ I said, thinking that reading a four-page report was evidently beyond the man’s attention span – the fact that I’d spent hours questioning Lorena Caroli for the finer details was obviously irrelevant to him. ‘Basically, it all began seventeen years ago, when Lucía Zangrando – Mrs Caroli’s sister – sadly gave birth to an awfully deformed child, who she named Giacomo. I am not familiar with the young man’s condition – it is something I have never seen before – but it appears to be some sort of bone disorder that runs in their family; Mrs Caroli, for instance, has an unusually advanced case of arthritis for a woman of her age, and she told us that her mother and sister showed similar symptoms.