The Secret of Crickley Hall

by James Herbert

  The reporter was a slimmish individual in a TOPMAN suit, his age around thirty, thirty-five. His prematurely balding head was an embarrassment to the thick black growth of hair beneath his nose; the circle of hair above his ears was also darkly lush.

  ‘What is it you want?’ asked Eve, one hand behind the open door, ready to slam it shut.

  ‘My paper was informed there was an incident here this morning and the police had to be called.’

  ‘It was nothing, just a mistake.’

  ‘Not according to our source.’

  There was very little West Country in his accent. In fact, Andy Pierson had been studiously trying to lose any hint of it for the past ten years, because his ambition was to become a London reporter on one of the nationals, not with the Times or Telegraph or anything grand like that, but a red-top, the Mirror or the Sun, either one would do. Unfortunately, he was not getting any younger and he was still only on the second step of his career ladder, cub reporter and obituary writer being the first.

  ‘Actually, Mrs Caleigh,’ the journalist went on as he held up a micro-cassette recorder between himself and Eve, ‘I’ve already spoken to the boy and girl involved, as well as their mother who, I believe, cleans this very house on a regular basis.’

  ‘I don’t know what they’ve told you,’ Eve quickly said, ‘but what they said happened to them is impossible. I think they’re both overimaginative, or they made up the story for their own reasons.’

  ‘They told me – and the police, of course – that they were confronted by a naked man . . .’

  ‘As I said, it’s impossible. The house was empty; my family and I were in Merrybridge this morning. There was no one here for them to see.’

  ‘Ah yes, but they claimed it was a ghost, they could see through it, and their mother, Trisha Blaney, told me that folk hereabouts—’ he gritted his teeth; he hadn’t meant to say ‘folk’, too Devonshire – ‘local people, I mean, believe the house is haunted. Have you got anything to say about that, Mrs Caleigh, have you seen any ghosts in Crickley Hall yourself? You’re new to the area, aren’t you? Mrs Blaney tells me you’ve hardly been here a week. But even so you must’ve seen or heard something that’s puzzled you, maybe even frightened you? You know the kind of thing: bumps in the night, footsteps when there’s nobody there, furniture moving by itself, stuff like that. Our readers would be very interested.’ He held the mini-recorder almost up to her chin.

  ‘It’s utter nonsense,’ Eve replied with a conviction she hardly felt. She turned aside slightly to avoid the recorder, but it followed her.

  ‘Well, the house does have a history, doesn’t it? S’what I’ve been told. People – children – died here in the Forties, didn’t they? All drowned, I believe. D’you think what happened today is anything to do with that?’ He gave a glance at the photographer. ‘Doug, why don’t you go round to the front of the house and take some pics. Maybe from the bridge, eh? You’ll get a nice backdrop. Make it look sinister, though, right?’

  ‘It already does,’ Doug replied without much enthusiasm.

  ‘Well, you know, use one of them funny lenses of yours.’

  Doug, an untidy-looking person with long lank hair and a drooping moustache, grunted something, then slouched away, Pentax held before him in one hand, finger on the clicker as though he would be taking pictures on the way.

  ‘Come on, Mrs Caleigh – Eve,’ Pierson said, leaning closer as if in confidence. ‘There must be something a little bit scary about Crickley Hall, with its history. I mean, you only have to look at the place to feel creeped-out. Give me something to tell the readers.’

  The truth was, it was another slow night and day for the Dispatch, as it often was midweek. Why do the really juicy murders always happen at weekends? the reporter wondered to himself. What was it about Saturday nights that appealed to killers? Too much weekend booze and disappointment? And Sunday evenings; they often brought out the worst in people. Depression, he supposed; the drudgery of work the next day, the thought of another week’s grind ahead. Monday mornings accounted for a lot of suicides.

  ‘The Blaney kids said the place was flooded.’ Now he leaned even closer to Eve and lowered his voice as thought the conversation was only between himself and Eve and not for general consumption. ‘Also . . .’ Because she was looking to the side, her head tilted downwards, he ducked a little to make eye contact. ‘Also, they told the police there was someone – no, something, they said – in the cellar that scared the – that frightened them very much.’

  ‘It’s nonsense, Mr . . .?’

  ‘Pierson. But call me Andy, Eve, everybody does.’

  It came out fast, as if she were deliberately not giving herself time to think. ‘They must be on drugs, or sniffing glue, doing something to give themselves hallucinations. You can see for yourself.’ She waved her free arm at the kitchen behind her (her other was still on the back of the door ready to close it at any moment). ‘No flooding, see? The only water is in the sink. As for something in the cellar, well, the police searched the house from top to bottom and found nothing.’

  ‘So you’re saying the kids were on drugs, have I got that right?’

  Eve could already see the newspaper headline. ‘No, I’m only suggesting that what the boy and girl saw – while they were trespassing, by the way – all they saw was in their own minds. The house is big, and it’s dark, and yes, it is rather spooky if I’m to be perfectly honest, but . . .’

  She had run out of words; she did not know what more she could say to this man.

  ‘Look, Mr Pierson—’

  ‘Andy, call me Andy.’

  ‘Look, all I know is what the policeman told me when I arrived back here with my husband and daughter this morning.’

  ‘You’ve got two little girls, haven’t you? One’s called Laura, but I don’t have the other one’s name . . .?’

  ‘Cally. And my older daughter is Loren, not Laura.’ She knew the reporter would probably get the spelling wrong, calling her Lauren instead, but she couldn’t be bothered to explain it to him. Obviously, Seraphina Blaney and her brother had told the journo enough already. But if she herself played dumb, the story might go away due to lack of detail. It would just be something the brother and sister had made up between them.

  Andy Pierson was not about to give up, though. ‘Now come on, Eve, tell me something that’s happened to you or any other member of your family in the house, you know, something spooky, something for our readers. The public likes a good ghost story now and again.’

  ‘There’s nothing to tell,’ Eve lied, her voice rising in anger. She remembered Cally was still at the kitchen table, no doubt taking everything in and Eve didn’t want her to be upset again. She forced herself to be calm. ‘I’ve got nothing more to say,’ she told the reporter and began to close the door on him.

  ‘Wait, Mrs Caleigh, Eve. Give me a proper statement.’

  The door was shut in his face.

  But he was grinning.

  40: THE VISITOR

  Eve was tucking Cally into bed for her afternoon nap when the doorbell went. It was loud and an ugly sound, an electronic croak rather than a musical ring.

  Cally’s eyelids were already flickering with tiredness and she took no notice of the interruption. Her soft Bart Simpson doll peered over the edge of the duvet close to Cally’s face and she sleepily hugged him even closer, her nose pressed into Bart’s cheek. Eve bent over to kiss her young daughter’s curled hair but straightened when the doorbell sounded again.

  She wondered who could be at the front door in the middle of the afternoon. Had the reporter from the North Devon Dispatch returned to nag her with more unanswerable questions? What if it was the Blaney children’s mother come to remonstrate with her? Eve couldn’t face that; she hadn’t the energy left to deal with irate mothers. But she would certainly ask how Seraphina and her brother had got hold of a door key to Crickley Hall and why they had brought a dead rat into the house! Gabe told her he had found a dead
wood pigeon on the doorstep yesterday morning when he was about to go on his regular jog. Had the children planted the bird there? Was it Seraphina’s way of getting back at the family because Loren had stood up for herself on the bus? Perhaps they’d intended to leave some poor dead animal every day just out of spite.

  Brurrrr – brurrrr . . .

  The doorbell made its irritating croak, the kind of sound whose repetition could put a person on edge. Nothing melodic, nothing galvanizing about it. Instead, it filled the house with a dull dread.

  Tiptoeing out to the landing, she looked over the rail down at Crickley Hall’s big front door as if it might provide some clues as to who was outside.

  Brurrrr – brurrrr . . .

  It echoed round the stone-floored hall, the acoustics making it louder than it should have been. Whoever was out there was persistent. Why not just knock on the kitchen window? Eve asked herself. Everybody else seemed to do that. She was reluctant to open the door, and she didn’t know why. Perhaps she was on emotional overload; it had been a rough day so far. Then again, she had been on emotional overload for almost a year now.

  Brurrrr – brurrrr . . .

  All right, all right, I’m coming. I don’t want to know who you are, I don’t want to talk to you, but I’m coming down because I know I have to.

  She went to the stairs and descended, glancing out of the tall window as she went by. The sky was clouding over again and the sun, on its downward journey, reddened the clouds’ craggy edges. Their dark bulk was laden with rain.

  The doorbell grouched yet again and Eve quickened her pace, both annoyed and anxious. Perhaps another local newspaper had got hold of the story – she knew the county had more than one daily journal – and this time she would make no comment, she would politely but firmly close the door on any nosy reporter or photographer who stood outside. A new thought entered her head, causing her to pause at the foot of the staircase. Perhaps the policeman had come back with more inquiries. What could she tell him? Why yes, of course Crickley Hall is haunted, I’ve seen the discarnate spirits of children myself and we’ve all heard unaccountable noises, and my daughter, Loren, was thrashed in her sleep last night by something I think might have been the evil ghost of a man called Augustus Cribben, who lived here over sixty years ago. Could she say all that? Could she say it and expect to be believed? She could scarcely believe it herself.

  Eve crossed the hall – the perfectly dry hall – but took a diversion towards the cellar door. Bloody thing! Why wouldn’t it stay shut?

  Brurrrr – brurrrr.

  Okay!

  Eve pushed the cellar door closed and even turned the key in the lock for all the good it would do. Gabe really had to fix it; it was driving her to distraction.

  She finally got to the front door, slid back the floor bolt and twisted the long key. Angrily, she pulled open the door and stared at the visitor on the doorstep.

  Lili Peel’s smile was weak, hardly a smile at all. She seemed nervous, uncertain. As if she were afraid.

  ‘I was beginning to think you weren’t in,’ she said by way of an opening. ‘I kept ringing the bell . . .’

  ‘Yes. I’m sorry – I was upstairs.’ Eve’s heart was pounding: she hadn’t expected to see the psychic again.

  ‘I’m . . . I’m sorry too. About yesterday.’ Lili looked down at the doorstep for a moment as though truly contrite. ‘I know I was a bit brusque with you. I didn’t mean to be. I’ve had time to think about what you told me.’

  ‘You mean you’ll help me – us?’

  ‘You didn’t leave your phone number, but of course I remembered the house. Wednesday is half-day closing in Pulvington, so I was able to get away from the shop.’

  She hadn’t answered Eve’s question. Eve asked it again.

  Lili’s blonde hair was turned reddish gold by the setting sun. It also gave her face more colour than Eve recalled, but she knew the psychic’s skin was pale, almost washed-out looking. Her green eyes were serious.

  ‘I’m willing to try, Mrs Caleigh,’ she said at last. ‘I’ll help you if I can.’

  Eve was curious. ‘What made you change your mind?’

  ‘You told me you’d seen the spirits of children. There must be a reason for that. When we spoke yesterday, I could feel something was wrong, not just about you and your own suffering, but wrong with whatever it is that surrounds you. It has to come from this house.’

  ‘Sorry, I don’t understand.’

  ‘There has to be a reason why the children who died here haven’t passed over, why they’re still attached to this place. They need to go on; they shouldn’t be lingering here. I felt their misery in your own aura and I want to help them. Psychics, clairvoyants, spiritualists have a duty towards the dead.’

  Eve was confused. ‘And my own child?’

  ‘I don’t know. Once, when I was very young, I communicated with a boy who’d been in a coma for three months. They thought he was going to die and, if they’d turned off the life-support machines, he would have.’

  There was a deep sadness in the psychic’s manner that touched Eve. Perhaps she’d got Lili Peel all wrong; perhaps the psychic cared too much. Rejecting Eve was her way of protecting herself. It was a sudden insight that Eve intuitively knew was correct, and it made her warm to this young woman who had been so cold towards her yesterday. Standing outside under the darkening sky, Lili looked small and vulnerable; frail even. Completely different to how she had appeared before.

  ‘Please, come in,’ Eve invited.

  But the moment Lili Peel stepped over the threshold and entered the great hall something seemed to happen to her. She went deathly white and swayed on her feet as if about to faint. She reached out to Eve for support and Eve quickly took the psychic’s arm and allowed her to lean against her.

  ‘Are you all right?’ Eve was perplexed. ‘What’s wrong?’

  ‘I . . . I don’t . . . the presence is so strong. Can’t you feel them here?’

  ‘I don’t know what you mean.’

  ‘Their spirits – all around, everywhere.’

  ‘The children?’

  ‘Yes. But there’s something terribly wrong. There’s something else here . . . something, someone, wicked. Dark. Evil.’

  She swooned and Eve held her tight.

  ‘I must . . . must sit down. They’re draining me. So strong, so strong. But they don’t have enough power yet. They’re waiting . . .’

  ‘Let me take you into the sitting room,’ Eve urged. ‘You can rest there.’

  She began to lead the psychic across the stone floor, supporting her as much as she could, but as they neared the cellar door, Lili drew back, horror on her face.

  Eve had gone out of her way to close and lock the cellar door, but now it was half open again. The darkness inside seemed almost solid, a physical thing. Lili backed away and Eve clung to her, moved with her.

  ‘That’s where the children were found,’ the psychic murmured almost to herself. She began to take sharp, rapid breaths as though hyperventilating and Eve, concerned for her, led her in a semicircular route towards the sitting room. For such a petite person, Lili was surprisingly heavy; it was as if something more than her own body was weighing her down.

  At last Eve got her to the couch in the sitting room and gently lowered her on to it.

  ‘I’m sorry, I’m so sorry,’ Lili said between short breaths. Eve sat next to her and watched the psychic’s drawn features anxiously, not knowing quite what she could do to help. But gradually Lili’s breathing calmed and a smidgeon of colour returned to her pale face. She closed her eyes and rested her head back against the couch.

  Eve fretted. ‘Can I get you anything? Tea, coffee, something stronger?’

  The faintest, drained smile appeared on the psychic’s face and she opened her eyes again. She turned her head to look at Eve. ‘No, thank you,’ she said. ‘I think I’m okay now. It was just the . . . the oppression inside this house. It’s overwhelming. I think I can deal with
it now. I hope so.’

  For want of anything better to say, Eve ventured: ‘Before you spoke of a boy who was in a coma; you said you were able to communicate with him. Will you tell me what happened?’

  Lili took in a long, deep breath, perhaps to chase away the smaller breaths, and it seemed to work. Her green eyes studied Eve’s for a few moments, searching for some kind of empathy. Many people thought psychics were a little mad, but there was no suspicion, no challenge and no distrust in Eve’s expression; only hope.

  There was a fire blazing in the room’s hearth, but Lili felt chilled; she often did when there was a strong sense of spirit. Incorporeal energies tended to sap warmth from the atmosphere. Nevertheless, she asked Eve if she could take off her coat.

  When Eve nodded and said, ‘Of course,’ Lili stood and removed her brown suede jacket. Underneath, she wore a tight, beige, long-sleeved sweater that emphasized her small breasts, and a loose wine-coloured skirt that ended just below the top of her knee-length burgundy boots. A pretty pink coral necklace adorned her neck and Eve noticed she still wore the wide wristbands from yesterday.

  Lili folded her arms but it seemed more like a defensive gesture than a ‘don’t mess with me’ one, because her hands clutched her upper arms. Today she did not wear the thin leather headband; her hair fell over her forehead in a natural fringe. Her light green eyes checked Eve’s before she began.

  ‘The parents of the boy who was in a coma didn’t know me personally – I was seventeen at the time – but they had heard of my ability through a neighbour of ours.’

  Now she unfolded her arms and leaned forward on the couch, wrists resting on her knees, her hands clasped together.

  ‘The boy – Howard was his name – was only eleven years old and he’d been knocked down by a car that failed to stop. It was found later, abandoned; police thought kids had stolen it for a joyride.’

  She was gazing at the fire, tiny flames reflected in her eyes.