by Kirsty Ferry
‘I definitely think these woods have something going on in them,’ he says, stepping over a fallen log. ‘I’m just not sure what it is yet. And I don’t want to scare you by talking about it if you don’t want to.’
I truly believe he thinks he is doing the right thing by not discussing the ghosts in this place.
So of course, because I’m an idiot, I have to shatter his illusions by letting him know I’m not a properly girly girl like Fern, who would be scared of the woods and would let him take the manly lead. No. I have to make a comment that just makes me sound like a whack-job.
‘It’s the Roman soldiers,’ I tell him.
I don’t think it’s a coincidence when he stumbles, then suddenly stops and turns to stare at me. Even his torch app is wavering, as if to highlight the fact I am a truly non-girly-girl whack-job.
‘Sin. Dex. Sin. Dex,’ I say. ‘You know?’
Clearly Ewan doesn’t know. ‘What?’ he says. His voice is ever so faint.
‘Sin. Dex. Sin. Dex,’ I repeat. ‘What they say when they’re marching. Yes? Didn’t you hear them?’ Then I think I should probably shut up but it’s too late. It’s like when we were in his flat and I told him all that other stuff.
He’s so easy to talk to and I think that’s the problem.
‘Um, yes,’ I continue, my voice as faint as Ewan’s was. ‘They marched right past me. Never mind. Come on. Let’s go. Chop chop.’ I pull at his hand, hoping he’ll start off again and it’s like pulling at a lump of granite.
‘Ewan, were you a prop forward in rugby?’ I ask him, just to be sure. I tug at him again and he remains immobile, just staring at me.
‘No,’ he says. ‘I was a fly-half. Nessa? What the hell—’
‘Shhhh!’ I snap. ‘Don’t say that around here. The witches aren’t here anymore, but it’s the principle of the thing!’
‘The witches?’
‘Yes. Aggie said—’
‘Aggie?’
‘Oh dear. Oh my.’ I improvise. ‘Perhaps I stumbled and hit my head. Oh well. Let’s go and find that car. Come on, Ewan.’
This time, he allows himself to be tugged along. Suddenly, I’m in the lead, taking us out of the woods. Ewan’s torch wobbles again, then it steadies and he lifts it up and it’s shining over my shoulder but I haven’t the heart to tell him I really don’t need it.
I think he thinks he’s being helpful.
EWAN
Nessa pushes forward and Schubert is glaring at me over her shoulder. I try not to catch his eye and concentrate on lighting the way for Nessa. I wonder if she really has fallen over and hit her head – otherwise what she’s saying doesn’t make any sense at all.
Then I remember the funny feeling I had at the Maggie Wall monument and the whisper of a breeze that whipped past me in Kincladie Woods and I stop thinking because that way madness lies.
It doesn’t take Nessa long to get us out of the woods and soon we are standing at the edge of the path and Winnie is there, looking awfully welcoming. I try to guide Nessa towards Winnie and back to some semblance of normality, but she pulls me towards the main road and heads along the path to where that car is parked. Then she stops and disconnects her hand from mine. My hand feels weird now she’s no longer holding it – like it’s missing something.
But that’s soon rectified.
‘Hold him,’ she commands, and shoves Schubert into my arms. I stiffen, expecting the gargantuan creature to hiss and spit, but he snuggles into me and I find myself stroking him. We follow Nessa to the parked car.
She walks right up to the car and leans in towards the driving window; then she raps on the window with enough force to terrify anyone in there. ‘Get out. Now!’ she shouts.
I’m not surprised when nobody answers. If the inhabitants are persons of a weak constitution, then being confronted in their car beside a haunted wood just before Halloween is not going to make them get out of it. God knows, they might have died from a heart attack by now.
‘Is that wise?’ I ask. Nessa leans even further towards the window. From the inside she is going to look like some freakishly weird squashed-face person, which is definitely not going to encourage the driver to come out and tackle her.
She ignores me and addresses the window instead. ‘I have a torch,’ she yells. Then she thrusts her hand out and I guess that she wants my mobile. I manage to hand it over to her, encumbered as I am by cat, and she holds the phone right up against the glass. There is a cloudy circle on the window where she has been breathing and the outlines of two people huddled in the car.
‘Have it your way then,’ she says, and I can hardly believe my eyes when she raises her forefinger and begins to draw a pentacle in the vapour.
The passenger door suddenly flings wide open and a woman leaps out of it. She’s shouting something, and it’s pretty garbled, but I can pick up a few uncomplimentary phrases, mainly accusing Nessa of being a witch – or a bitch – it’s hard to make it out – and also accusing her of something else:
‘You’ve had your evil eyes on him forever,’ the woman screeches, ‘and you expect me to believe this wasn’t planned? And what are you doing to the car? Is that going to make us crash and die? Will you be happy then? God, you’re a foul, nasty, ugly little—’
‘Good evening, Fern,’ I say, and Fern seems to see me for the first time. She gawps at me and I sense the stream of vitriol will soon be directed to me. ‘Fancy seeing you here,’ I say, in order to stop her in her tracks – and also because yes, it is very odd to see her here.
‘Nope. Not at all,’ says Nessa, before Fern can respond. ‘It won’t make you crash and die. But I think you’ll find your car won’t start.’
At that point, the driver door swings open and it catches Nessa on the leg with a horrible crunch, throwing her off-balance.
‘Ouch!’ she says and sits down hard on the tarmac, banging her head on the wing mirror on the way down. The wing mirror shifts with the impact and the glass itself splinters.
‘Hey!’ I yell and run forward, ready to punch the nose of whoever did this to her. Well. I try to run. I sort of stagger due to the Beast; but then Schubert kind of tenses his muscles (I’m actually surprised to feel he has got muscles under that fur, but I definitely feel something tense up) and he springs out of my arms and is in the car before I can stop him.
There’s a nasty few seconds of yowling and crashing and masculine swearing and then a man leaps out of the car, fending the cat off him. Schubert has turned into a fiendish mass of fur and teeth and talons and I do not pity the bloke beneath him.
I pity him even less when he finally throws the cat off and stands gasping at the side of the road. I can see by the car’s courtesy light that it’s the paparazzi reporter bloke from the paper – and God love him, he’s all dressed in camouflage tonight. There are also quite a few holes in the clothing now, thanks to Schubert trying to rip the fabric to shreds.
‘Get a tip off, did you?’ I growl, and I’m a bit surprised to hear my voice come out like I’ve chewed a ton of gravel. I take a step towards him with my fist curled up ready to strike him and he cringes as if he knows what’s coming; but Nessa raises her hand ‘Stop!’ she says, quite firmly.
It’s so weird, because I automatically stop.
‘But Nessa, he’s hurt you.’
‘I’m fine,’ she replies and struggles to her feet. Then she kind of collapses again and whimpers, ‘Ouch.’ Then she shakes her head and holds her hand to her forehead. She pushes her hair out of the way and then looks down at her hand in some surprise.
‘Well this wasn’t meant to happen,’ she says. There’s blood on her fingers, dripping down from a nasty cut where she connected with the mirror.
Schubert makes a little whimpering sound and clambers up onto her knees. Then he licks her forehead. I can’t quite help myself from recoiling at the thought of that whiskery little tuna-face so close to mine and the idea of that rough tongue dragging across my skin, but Nessa doesn’t seem b
othered.
‘Thank you, Schubert. I’m fine now. Really fine. Thank you,’ she says. She lowers her face and kisses him, then stands up again – more carefully this time – and I hurry over to help her. She must be feeling a bit fragile because she doesn’t try to shake me off.
Then she turns and sees Fern.
Nessa narrows her eyes at her and points at her. It’s rather Gothic, because some blood drips off her hand and she really does look like some medieval witch standing there with her black hair and her white face with the red streak across it. She’s a little hunched up as well and all her weight is on her right side, so her left one must have really got a good bashing; if I didn’t know her so well, I think I would be a little scared of her right now.
‘I think you’ll find—’ she says in a low voice ‘—that the car will not start. Like I told you. Go on.’ She lurches around to face the paparazzi guy, and points at him. ‘Try it.’
‘Load of—’ begins Fern, and Nessa whirls around to her as well, accompanied by a sort of reeling waddle as her weight shifts. I can see her face close up and it’s all pinched and closed like it’s really hurting her but I know she’s not going to give them the satisfaction of seeing it.
The pap man doesn’t need telling twice. He jumps in the car and turns the key. I can see that his hands are shaking. Fern is hanging onto the passenger door, clearly ready to jump inside and have him drive her off into the distance.
But the car won’t start. It turns over and over and over.
But it will not start.
I cast a quick, shocked glance at Nessa and she looks quietly triumphant.
‘Excellent,’ she says. She looks at me and her eyes are shining in the light coming from inside the car. ‘I wasn’t sure about that, but it looks like I’ve succeeded.’
Suddenly, ditsy, loveable Nessa is back and that Gothic Wuthering Heights Nessa has vanished back into the haunted forest.
Gothic Nessa was kind of creepy, I have to say.
‘Only one thing for it,’ says Nessa. She turns back to the car and leans on the still-open driver’s door. It’s probably to give the impression of power and the fact that she is in charge, but I think it’s more to do with the fact that her leg is hurting again and there’s a fresh stream of blood coming from her head and she’s probably going to pass out with it any second now if she doesn’t support herself. ‘Back to Winnie. I think we need to talk about this, don’t we?’
Then very quietly and very elegantly, she slides down the passenger door and lies in a heap at the bottom of it with her eyes closed.
Chapter Fifteen
NESSA
I wake up in Winnie, wrapped in the hairy crocheted footstool cover and for a moment I can’t remember what happened or why I’m here. Then Ewan’s face swims into focus and I remember.
‘Hey you,’ he says.
‘Hey you,’ I say.
‘Mow wow,’ says Schubert.
‘Hey Schubert,’ I say.
‘For God’s sake, can we go now? She’s not dead, so we can go, yeah?’
‘Good evening Fern,’ I say.
‘Ignore her,’ says Ewan. ‘She was just as worried as we were. I didn’t like seeing you flat out like that and she even suggested her friend here should give you the kiss of life.’
I’m not surprised she volunteered Camo-Man rather than Ewan, but I’m not going to split hairs. I just wish I could remember being carried in Ewan’s arms though, because I bet that happened and I bet, under other circumstances, I would have very much appreciated it.
My head is a little bit sore and the skin feels tight so I reach up to give it a prod. It seems as if someone found the first aid kit, because I’ve got a sticking plaster on the cut. Unfortunately, by the feel of it, it’s one of those weird shaped sticking plasters that you put on heel injuries, so it probably looks a bit stupid but I don’t really care right now.
‘It was the biggest one in the box,’ says Ewan frowning.
‘That’s fine. Thank you, Ewan.’ I make to sit up and he rushes forward and helps me.
Fern makes a sound like a strangled fox. ‘You should have taken her to A&E and left her there,’ she says.
‘How could I do that?’ says Ewan coldly. ‘We discussed it, remember? Your friend’s car isn’t working and I don’t know where the keys are for this one and there’s no bloody mobile signal.’
‘You got inside this thing, didn’t you?’ says Fern. ‘Surely that key fits the ignition?’
‘Winnie’s back door doesn’t lock,’ I say. ‘It would have been open. So no, that key wouldn’t help. Because there is no key.’
‘When will my car work?’ whines Sticky. ‘I want to go home.’ He’s all huddled in the corner, dressed in his awful grungy, shredded camouflage gear and clearly trying to get as far away as possible from Ewan and his fist.
‘When I say it can,’ I snap back. Sticky cowers again and licks his lips. I look at him and say, more kindly, ‘what is your name, Mr Paparazzi Person? I don’t like to keep calling you Sticky.’
Maybe he doesn’t realise I call him that? Oh well. I have a head injury. I can plead confusion.
‘Clarence,’ he mutters. ‘Clarence du Bois. That’s my professional name.’
‘Clarence Wood,’ I say. ‘Okay then, Clarence Wood. I won’t sue you this time, but please feel free to tell me why you and her were stalking us? Oh, Ewan!’ I turn and smile at Ewan. ‘Isn’t it funny how he’s called Clarence Wood when we’re near Kincladie Wood?’
‘Shhh,’ says Ewan. ‘He can’t help his name.’
‘I have a head injury,’ I say. ‘Maybe that’s why I find it funny. I didn’t have a head injury before when I mentioned the ghosts. Just to clarify. Anyhoo.’ I smile at Clarence Wood in what I hope is a friendly manner. ‘Please tell us why you stalked us. And more to the point, how did you know where we were?’
Clarence is more than happy to talk. I think Schubert has taught me well. Go for the weakest link every time and you’ll usually get an answer.
‘I got a call from my source,’ he begins.
‘And that lady over there is your source?’ I ask, pointing at Fern. Schubert growls. ‘I must say, I use that term loosely. Lady that is.’
‘Yes. That lady is my source,’ he says, nodding like one of those noddy dogs you get in the back of cars.
I must get a noddy dog for Winnie.
‘And?’ I say.
‘And she said she had a feeling you were trespassing somewhere. You,’ he says, waving his arm around encompassing me and Ewan Grainger – then, after a brief windmilly sort of movement, encompassing Schubert as well. ‘You lot. She said she thought it was an historic monument in Perthshire, a listed building that nobody should be going near as it was on private land. And worse than that, she thought you were planning on defacing it and then you were going to those woods to destroy the evidence. She said it was because a rival author had written a successful book about it so you, Mr Grainger, needed to address that. And you, Miss McCreadie – or may I call you Agnes—?’
If looks could kill the man would be a corpse.
‘Okay, I guess I can’t call you Agnes,’ he says, shrinking into the corner even more. ‘But as I was saying, you, Miss McCreadie, were aiding and abetting by erasing the trail so the police couldn’t pin it on you when questions were asked. And after all, it’s not really fitting behaviour for a famous author, Mr Grainger, Sir, so she thought you were being coerced in some fashion. We were here to protect your reputations.’
Now, I know I’ve suffered a head injury tonight, but when did we ever concoct a plan like that? And “protect our reputations”? My foot. She would have made him plaster my photo on the front of the paper and have a pained picture of Ewan inside, saying I’d kidnapped him. ‘Oh, oh, oh, my boyfriend got kidnapped by the mad marijuana lady who hates puppy dogs …’
‘Mr Clarence Wood. If you will excuse me from saying this, you are, in fact, barmy,’ I tell him, as kindly as I can. ‘Ewa
n and myself—’ Schubert growls again, ‘—and of course Schubert my cat, are here researching witches for Ewan’s next novel. That’s all there is to it, really. Ms … ummm … well, her, anyway, I’ve never bothered to learn her surname, would probably have hated it. I can’t see her enjoying haunted woods and witchy monuments to be honest. And the three of us were very well-behaved. The man in the pub can vouch for us.’
‘The pub?’ bellows Fern, who is now a shade of puce. ‘So you took her to the pub as well? For a drink?’
‘No. For a meal,’ I say. ‘Unlike you, wine is not one of my five a day and anyway I paid because Ewan has made tea all day for us, so it was only fair.’
She chooses to ignore that, but goes for the jugular in another way. ‘There’s a lot of cars not starting around here, isn’t there?’ she hisses back. ‘One of your many talents is it? Wrecking cars?’
‘Not really. Mr Wood’s car isn’t wrecked. As you will see when it drives back home.’ I choose to ignore the fact about Ewan’s car not starting because that should never have been any of her business. ‘But what I am interested in, is how you knew where to find us? Did you spy on Ewan? Did you have his phone chipped with GPS?’ I challenge her.
‘A GPS chip!’ cries Ewan who has been very quiet and has been, I know, watching me with eyes as big as saucers. He drags his gaze to Fern with some difficulty. ‘In my phone? Fern! Did you really do that?’ He looks angry and shocked at the same time.
I thought only Schubert could do that expression, so this is a bit of a revelation to me.
‘Of course I bloody didn’t!’ she says, crossing her arms and throwing herself back on the bench chair. I must wash that throw rug now she has sullied it. ‘It was when I rang you and she was singing and shouting and demanding things. I did some research and found this place.’ She leans forward again and flings her arms out wide. ‘So sue me. You’re my famous boyfriend and you’re off with other women. What was I meant it do? Sit at home and let it happen? Seriously, Ewan, if you want me to get us some decent publicity with Vinnie and Jude, you’re going to have to rein yourself in. We’ve got the potential to go even further and I can make that happen. God, I’ll never get to meet Guy Ritchie if you blow this chance by messing on with her. You’re becoming a loose cannon, Ewan. We have to stop it.’
