by Paul Finch
So thinking, he stuck his hands into his pockets and set off for a walk. He hadn’t seen a great deal of the island as yet, and with the death of Craig, it didn’t seem like he was going to. Not unless he made a few forays of his own. This seemed like a good time … if any time could be called ‘good’ in such a predicament.
For several minutes he strolled up through the woods in a vaguely north-westerly direction. Though he could hear the distant hushing of the waves, there was a pleasant coastal calm. Blue-green shadows lay between the trees. Alan saw a flash of red as a squirrel scampered along a low bough. At length, however, the trees thinned and he found himself at the head of a gorge or ravine lying between high granite bluffs. It was narrow – perhaps 20 yards across at the most – and deep in lush grasses and fallen stones. It ran in a reasonably straight line for about a quarter of a mile. At the far end of it he could see open hillside and, surmounting that, a tall whitewashed spear-like structure with a glazed section at its top.
The lighthouse.
Alan knew it was private property up there, but he didn’t see any harm in taking a look. The building might well be fenced off, in which case his problem would be solved for him, but if it wasn’t, what was the harm in a quick mooch about? He set off at an easy pace, hands still in his pockets. As he strode, the sounds of the ocean grew louder, clearer. Now he could hear the crashing of surf, the calling of gulls and gannets.
And then, somewhere close behind him, there was a faint skitter, something like a small pebble rolling over rocks.
Alan stopped and turned, but there was nothing and nobody behind him. In all probability, eroded pieces occasionally fell from the walls of the ravine, while there were almost certainly animals around here too. He’d have thought a remote isle like Craeghatir wouldn’t be home to the larger north British mammals, like the wildcat or pine marten, but one never knew. He’d just seen a squirrel, after all. It also seemed highly likely there’d be wild hare around.
He continued on his way, though he had to admit the noise had unnerved him. Despite the warmth of the sun and the mellow feel of the land and sea, Alan was now on edge, distinctly uneasy … the way a trespasser might feel when he knows he’s on somebody else’s land and is constantly expecting to be spotted. Even when he emerged from the gorge and found himself way out on a headland with sheer drops to either side, he felt no great relief.
Shaking his head at the curse of his imagination, he progressed up a shallow slope towards the lighthouse and its associated buildings. None of these was fenced off, but all were closed up and wore heavy-duty padlocks on their solid steel doors. On the lighthouse itself, there was a red sign, reading ‘DANGER’ and painted with streaks of electricity. Alan gazed up. So close, the white-washed signal tower seemed colossal in height. The lowest window in it had to be 20 or 30 feet from the ground. Not that he envisaged trying to get inside for any reason.
He glanced around. In the age of pre-automation, this must have been a desolate post indeed. Having said that, he still found it difficult to shake himself of the conviction that he wasn’t alone here. He glanced again towards the high lantern-gallery, to see if someone was up there, gazing back down at him. Of course, nobody was. The feeling lingered, however, even when Alan made his way among the outbuildings; the electricity sub-station, the storage houses, the heli-pad. At length, he moved on past the far perimeter of the complex, and progressed over the final 50 yards of thistle, clover and sea-campion until he reached the tip of the headland. A few feet short of it, he stopped cautiously. He’d just had the brief but chilling sensation that if he went right to the edge, somebody might come sneaking up from behind and push him over. He looked back, but not only was nobody there, nobody could have got within 30 yards of him without his becoming aware of them.
Even with that knowledge it was a dizzying sensation finally to approach the precipice and gaze over it. Cape Wrath, it seemed, was well named, for a spectacular vision of elemental fury now confronted Alan. Some 200 feet below, a bottle-green swell – monumental in size and strength – rose and fell around the jagged black rocks, sending eruptions of surf to phenomenal heights, roaring in the zawns and crannies of the cliffs. Farther out over the tempestuous seascape, the tide drove in via an endless succession of gigantic waves. Here and there among them more shoals of rocks were visible, protruding like teeth through the cascades of foam, creating currents and whirlpools all of their own. These weren’t even storm conditions, yet the wind here howled at gale-force, threatening at any moment to pluck Alan from the headland and cast him into infinity, a dust-mote in Nature’s blinking eye.
Almost breathless, he finally backed away, turned and staggered towards the station. The very ground had seemed to move beneath his feet back there. It had left him lightheaded.
In comparison, the silent buildings and their aura of desertion, were strangely homely … almost comforting. Alan hung around them for a moment longer, wondering just when it was that the manned operation here had ceased, and figuring that it must have been at some point in the mid-1980s – 15 years ago, at least. A long time for a modern structure to be left disowned; though no time at all, of course, in comparison to the Viking barrow. Eventually, he started walking back. A glance at his watch showed that it was now a quarter to seven. Things might be starting to happen in the camp.
He strolled down the ravine at a gentle pace. The sea-wind had dropped remarkably when he’d moved back from the precipice, but down here it was almost non-existent. Overhead, the sun had gone among the clouds, but a still, sultry heat remained. Alan couldn’t help thinking that had he been here for a holiday, he couldn’t have asked for finer weather. As it was, it might make work on the dig difficult, assuming he could bear to do any. He took his sweater off and tied it around his waist as he walked, mopping sweat from his brow with his forearm.
And then, once again, several pebbles came down from above.
As before, Alan stopped immediately and glanced around. Also as before, the gorge behind him was deserted, but this time he looked up as well. He saw nothing there, but some extra sense was now tingling. He held his ground for a moment, listening. Silent moments passed. Then he heard it: a low, drawn-out snarl; the sound a dog might make when squaring up for a fight.
Alan felt the skin on his neck start to crawl. Perplexed and frightened, he backed away into the middle of the ravine. Just as he did, another stone came bouncing down towards him, this one larger and more jagged. Had it struck him, it might have inflicted injury. Alan didn’t wait to see where it had come from. He continued on his way, hurriedly, determined not to panic, though he glanced overhead constantly. The snarling had ceased, but he imagined that whoever – or whatever – had made it was now stalking him, following him along the high shelf. Even as the student considered this, more dirt was dislodged from above and came trickling down. There was a further, prolonged snarl, this one more a throaty growl. It was still abreast with him. There was no doubt now; whatever it was, it was trailing him.
Alan began to run. Moments later, he was out of the gorge and back among the trees, but the pursuit, he fancied, continued. It sounded as if a heavy body was close behind. Underbrush thrashed, there was a muffled thumping of feet in the heaped pine-needles. The student glanced over his shoulder as he ran, but in his wild, haphazard flight, it was difficult to see anything clearly. Evergreens bounced past, filling his vision, but something was back there, coming at speed, following him in leaps and bounds. And now he heard the growling again, hideous and feral, rising steadily in intensity, punctuated by guttural grunts for breath.
Alan’s heart was pounding as the adrenaline took over. His lungs were fit to burst, but he charged on all the same. So frantic was he now that he could hardly think straight. He wasn’t even sure which direction he was headed in. He began to shout, to scream. Flailing branches tore at his face and body. He darted left and right to avoid tree-trunks, stumbling, staggering, but keeping g
oing. Still it came after him, now howling with animal rage. It couldn’t have been more than two or three yards behind. Alan felt that raw, bone-chilling peril that only an unlucky few in life ever experience … that death is right behind you, clawing at your collar, its fatal touch terrifyingly imminent.
Alan gasped for air as he ran, felt the sweat streaming down into his eyes. His lungs exhaled and inhaled in agony. He wanted to plough on, oh how dearly he wanted to plough on, but his strength was ebbing, he was tiring, he wasn’t going to make it.
And, more by luck than design, the triangular outlines of the tents hove into view ahead.
With muted sobs of relief, Alan blundered towards them. The sudden smell of wood-smoke was Heaven-sent; the sight of his colleagues moving lazily back and forth – yawning, stretching with the morn – was the finest thing he ever saw. He didn’t know whether or not he was still being followed, but he plunged on at full speed.
The others turned questioningly as he finally tottered in among them and fell onto his face, gesturing wildly, stammering as he tried to explain. Even then, at that late stage, he expected something to come and leap onto him from behind, to tear and rend his flesh and clamp its inhuman jaws over the nape of his neck … so that when someone knelt down and tapped his shoulder, he threw himself over, kicking out, swearing hoarsely.
“Jesus … Alan!” Nug fell backwards.
“There was something,” Alan blathered, his face red as a lobster, his lips flecked with froth. “I’m telling you, there was something …”
He scrambled to his feet and gazed out into the encircling woods. They were still, silent, laced with morning sunlight. Tendrils of mist still hung there, but nothing moved.
“What do you mean, ‘something’?” Clive asked. He and the rest approached curiously.
Alan stared around at them. David and Linda looked surprised, Professor Mercy dubious … perhaps a little sceptical.
“It came after … it came after me,” Alan added, suddenly acutely aware how bizarre a figure he must be cutting.
“What came after you?” Again, it was Clive who asked the question.
Alan was about to try to explain when there came a sudden movement to the west of the camp. Instinctively, everyone went on their guard. Alan turned madly, gazing into the depths of the trees. Something was approaching, that much was obvious. They heard heavy footfalls, saw branches being pushed aside. There was a loud puffing and blowing; something wasn’t just approaching, it was approaching at speed.
“Jesus Christ,” Alan whispered.
He began casting around for a weapon, any kind of weapon. At last he put his hands on a spare tent-pole, and swung it up, ready to brandish it like a club. He wheeled towards the approaching noises ... and, like everyone else, was then nonplussed to see Barry Wood emerge from the trees in shorts, vest and sneakers, coming at a slow, easy trot. The athlete’s flesh was pink and gleaming, his blonde hair a wet, tousled mop.
“Morning all,” he said, as he finally reached the camp, slowed up, then commenced a series of stretch exercises.
“Y … you!” Alan stuttered, approaching him on unsteady feet. “You bleeding mental case! What did you think you were playing at?”
Barry looked up, apparently baffled. “What are you on about?”
“You scared the crap out of me!”
Barry considered this, then shrugged and shouldered his way past. “Sorry pal. Can’t help it if you’re a chicken-shit arsehole.”
The athlete was just in the process of taking the water-bottle out of his kit, when Alan grabbed him by the elbow and yanked him about-face.
For tense seconds they eyeballed each other, nose-to-nose. Barry was reacting in his normal aggressive fashion when someone hassled him, though on this occasion he was just slightly surprised at the way his height and breadth didn’t seem to be giving him the usual advantage of intimidation; there was also, of course, the not insignificant matter of the tent-pole Alan was wielding. Alan, for his part, was more than ready to fight. Taken to the edge of fear and beyond, a red mist now possessed him … but even if it hadn’t done, with his Lancashire coal-town upbringing, he certainly wasn’t going to back off from some Home Counties public school-boy, star rugby union player or not.
Alan muscled right up to the big guy: “You. Fucking. Wanker.”
“You’d better watch it, bud,” Barry warned.
“Or what?”
“All right, that’s enough,” Professor Mercy said, coming between them. The others stepped in and helped, Nug hauling Alan backwards, Linda putting her arms around Barry and glaring at Alan. The two parties separated, though eye-contact remained locked.
The Professor turned to Barry. “What exactly have you been doing?”
He indicated his sports get-up. “Jogging. What does it look like?”
“He’s a lying sack of shit!” Alan snapped.
“I said enough, Alan!” the Professor shot in. “And I mean enough!”
Another second passed, as she surveyed them both. “Now look,” she finally said. “Back off, the pair of you. We’ve had a shock, a nasty one … but Alan, you’re handling it worse than anyone else here. And Barry, you’re not helping one way or the other. We’ve got to get a grip, do you understand? That goes for all of us. We’ve got to pull ourselves together. We’ve invested a lot of time and money in this dig, we’re not screwing it up by going crazy on each other.”
“He’s the one who’s screwing it up,” Alan retorted, jabbing at the big athlete with the tent-pole.
“Put that bloody thing down,” the Professor said coldly. “Right now.”
Grudgingly, Alan threw the item away. His eyes never left Barry’s, however.
“Come over here,” said the Professor, beckoning to them both. Sheepishly, rather like chastised schoolboys, they followed her to a spot several yards outside the camp, where she turned to face them again.
“I’m going to have to go back to the mainland tomorrow with Craig,” she said quietly. “Alan, you’ll probably have to come too, as the person who found the body. It may be that the police will want to question all of us. We don’t know yet. But the point is this: tomorrow, as soon as that, I’ll be in a position to turf anyone off this expedition who isn’t fitting in. Do you understand?” There was a steeliness about her as she spoke, a tautness in her voice that betrayed real anger underneath. “Be under no illusions. I know why you two are at odds with each other. I’m sure tensions have been heightened by the accident, but I’m damned if I’m going to blow something as important as this find over a teenage-type squabble!”
She paused. They waited in guilty silence.
“That’s how the situation stands,” she finally said. “Another incident like this, and you two are both going home.” She paused again. “Now, is there any chance at all that you might shake hands and make up?”
Barry seemed the keener of the two. He offered his hand first. Alan eventually took it, but only sullenly, with extreme reluctance.
“I still don’t know what you were talking about,” the athlete said. “I’ve just been jogging, that’s all.”
Alan didn’t bother to reply. He shook hands, then turned and strode away. This wasn’t so much rudeness or defiance on his part, it was determination. Determination not even to contemplate the possibility that it hadn’t been Barry back there in the woods.
10
With the semi-fossilised warrior protected by his burial mound, normal stratigraphic procedures were unnecessary. Aside from the dust, time hadn’t added its own layers of dirt or topsoil to the interior of the site, animals hadn’t disturbed any of the artifacts, there was no danger of contamination of the find by the relics of other periods. Even so, in order to assist in the planned reconstruction of the site back at the lab, before any digging and picking could commence everything had to be carefully measured and photographed. This
took up much of the rest of the morning.
Linda laid out the trays and brushes and bags, then prepared her fold-out stool and table, and began sterilising the various tools they’d need in a dish of chemicals. Barry wandered back and forth, writing up the notes of the dig thus far, while Alan, David and Nug put everything on film. This latter task involved shooting the exterior of the barrow with the video-camera, and squirming back inside it with a Polaroid, to take additional snaps of the remains before they were removed.
Professor Mercy, meanwhile, brooded over the engraved serpent on the portal-stone, then went back to the megalith, crouching and re-studying the runes carved there. Alan noticed that she was diverting from her normal methodology. Ordinarily, when puzzling over an inscription, she would first and foremost sketch it out in detail, so that it could be dealt with back at the lab, where source-materials and data-banks might be accessed. Not on this occasion, apparently. She had her sketch-pad and pencils in hand, but no attempt was being made to jot anything down. She seemed determined to try and translate these symbols on the spot.
“She’s pretty engrossed,” Alan finally observed.
Clive, who was just about to worm his way back into the barrow, having started to make delicate trips to and fro bringing items out, turned and looked. The Professor was still so busy with her analysis, that she wasn’t aware she’d become the object of scrutiny.
“This dig could potentially put her in the history books,” the tutor said. “I suppose it would be nice for her to find evidence that she’s on the right track straight away.”
This made sense, Alan thought. Clive then hunkered down, clambered under the awning and began the complex and fatiguing process of working his immense body through the narrow gap that was the access-tunnel. From inside it, repeated bright flashes indicated that Nug and David were still photographing. Even these were blotted out, however, when Clive finally got in there.
