by C. S. Quinn
Bitey waved the torch. ‘That way leads to under the gamekeeper’s hut,’ he said. ‘We’ll not take that path unless we wish to be hunted and gutted for sport.’ He squinted around. ‘Never been too sure about every path,’ he admitted. ‘’S like a labyrinth. But that one,’ he said, pointing, ‘leads to a safe place. Comes out by the edge of a small lake, near the Upside-down Tree. The big beech tree,’ he added, catching Lily’s face. ‘Where Londoners used to make wishes.’
‘How do we find it again,’ asked Charlie, ‘if we lose our way?’
He was trying not to let the shadowy dark spook him. The damp tunnels brought back strange memories from his childhood.
In answer Bitey lowered his calloused hand to the ground. ‘Running water,’ he explained. ‘Not much, but you can feel it at your feet. It flows to the lake. We need only feel the direction the water runs and follow it out.’
Bitey splashed over the watery floor, then stopped suddenly. He raised a warning hand. Then he knelt and drew a stout stick from somewhere in the depths of his coat.
‘Mantrap,’ he said, extending the stick into the dark.
A metallic crack followed, and two steel jaws leapt forth from the water-soaked floor.
‘Nasty things,’ added Bitey.
‘What would it be doing here?’ asked Charlie. His instincts were on high alert now. Someone expected unwanted people in the tunnel.
Bitey straightened. ‘Most likely an old one,’ he said, but he sounded uncertain.
Charlie looked at the trap. Someone had rigged this tunnel for intruders. It gave him a bad feeling.
They went deeper, with Bitey leading the way. The catacombs widened slightly, and now something yellow glimmered in the torchlight.
Bitey paused, shining his torch.
‘What is it?’ asked Lily.
‘Well I never,’ said the old man. ‘Haven’t saw that before. This must be a path I missed.’
A thick swathe of tree roots cascaded down one side of the tunnel, covering the Roman brick in a knotty curtain effect.
‘We must be near the river,’ said Charlie. ‘Willow trees.’
Bitey brought the torch lower, revealing lighter-coloured shapes dotted between the roots. This part of the tunnel had been lined with something.
‘Is it . . . stone?’ asked Lily after a moment. Then her gaze tracked up and she saw the empty eye sockets.
‘No,’ said Charlie grimly. ‘It’s bones.’ He looked further along the tunnel to where the tree roots stopped. ‘There’s more here,’ he added. ‘A lot more.’
They all stared. Countless human bones had been meticulously arranged. Shallow stone shelves held grinning skulls, arranged in neat rows. Femurs and ribcages had been stacked to make patterns.
‘There must be hundreds of them,’ said Lily, moving to look closer.
‘The Temple of Death?’ Charlie suggested. ‘Though no one could live in this tunnel,’ he admitted, looking at the cramped passage.
‘I don’t like it,’ said Lily. ‘There’s something bad down here. I can feel it.’
‘Hyde Woods is a haunted place,’ agreed Bitey. ‘Ghosts of druids and monks.’ He gestured vaguely upwards.
Charlie reached in his coat and removed a flat nail. Then he etched a careful cross on the nearest skull.
‘We’ll mark as we go,’ he said uneasily. ‘Let’s keep moving.’
Chapter 48
The prison boat swayed in the Thames waters. Deep below deck Ishmael Boney sat chained to the floor. On the way to his confinement he’d caught glimpses of the shore and judged them to be anchored near Greenwich or Deptford. Ishmael had made out the tumbledown remains of Greenwich Palace and the old astronomical clock.
The trapdoor overhead creaked open and a darkly cloaked man descended the narrow steps. Ishmael tried to make out the man’s face in the gloom. But all he could see was a pearly cross where one of the eyes should have been. The figure drew into view. It was an eyepatch. Ishmael could see it now. Pearly and glinting darkly next to a single cold blue eye. The man wore the white collar of a judge, with long black robes, giving him a crow-like appearance. Ishmael drew back instinctively. He was a brave man, but there was something truly evil about his captor.
‘I’ve never met a Moor before,’ observed the Judge, taking in Ishmael’s dark skin and thick curling hair flecked with white.
He let his good eye roam disapprovingly over Ishmael’s scholarly outfit, a long, loose brown silk coat tied with a fashionable white cravat.
‘Perhaps your ancestors were transported on a boat like this.’ The Judge swept an explanatory hand around the dank quarters. ‘This is an old slave ship,’ he explained. ‘Already fitted out to hold prisoners. I find it extremely useful for detaining some of my more . . . interesting convicts.’
‘I’m of Arabic origin,’ said Ishmael. ‘No one in my family was ever held a slave. And I am under the King’s protection. You break the law in detaining me.’
The Judge smiled thinly at the mention of the law. ‘I am Judge Walters,’ he said. ‘Perhaps you have heard of me.’
‘The Bloody Judge,’ said Ishmael. ‘Your brutality is legendary.’
‘So you can be sure I break no law,’ said the Judge, seeming pleased at Ishmael’s description.
Ishmael felt a knot of fear tighten in his stomach.
The Judge dropped down to be level with his face. He drew out a familiar almanac from inside his coat.
‘What I would like to know,’ he said, ‘is where is the gypsy girl who came to see you?’
Ishmael frowned in complete confusion. ‘What gypsy girl?’
‘Her name is Lily Boswell. She is a spy and a thief.’ The Judge was twisting a patch of skin on his ring finger. ‘I know she came looking for you.’
‘If she did, she never found me,’ said Ishmael calmly.
The Judge stepped back, considering. ‘We shall see how true that is,’ he decided, ‘when you hear the charges against you.’
This time Ishmael’s dark eyebrows twitched ever so slightly.
‘You are accused of murder,’ continued the Judge. ‘The girls at Deptford.’
Ishmael shook his head. He looked tired rather than frightened.
‘I have nothing to do with those girls,’ he said.
‘Then how do you explain this image,’ demanded the Judge, pointing at the cherubims, ‘carved into the backs of dead girls?’
‘You don’t understand astrology,’ said Ishmael.
‘Don’t patronise me,’ spat the Judge. ‘I am a seafaring man. I understand the stars and their workings.’
Ishmael hid a smile.
‘This prediction for the Halloween eclipse,’ continued the Judge. ‘It is different to your other charts in the almanac. I might even say it had been made by another man.’
Ishmael rubbed his temples. ‘Good astrologers use the work of others,’ he said. ‘There is nothing unusual in it. This depicts a prophecy made a long time ago by a man named Thorne.’
‘And how did you chance upon Thorne’s papers?’ he demanded. ‘The turncoat astrologer who the old King wanted dead.’
For the first time Ishmael’s eyes widened slightly, as if he hadn’t expected the Judge to know about Thorne.
‘That,’ said Ishmael evenly, ‘is something I will never tell a man like you.’ Ishmael looked the Judge up and down. ‘You’re looking for the Eye,’ he decided. ‘Thorne hid it so undeserving men like you would never find it.’
‘You will help me locate it,’ said the Judge icily. ‘I mean to reorder things. The Eye will allow me to root out blackamoors and heathens and put them where they belong.’
‘You mean to grow your slaving business,’ said Ishmael disgustedly. ‘I will tell you nothing.’
The Judge’s face had grown pale with anger. He waved the almanac.
‘You are a heretic. You arrogantly attempt to interpret God’s will.’
‘Ask the King if astrology is heresy,’ countered Ishmael. ‘Hi
s Majesty spent two thousand pounds last year having Isaac Newton build tools to chart the stars.’
‘For navigation at sea!’ said the Judge, outraged. ‘A different science to prediction. Do you deny your almanac predicts the future?’
‘I don’t,’ said Ishmael calmly, ‘but can you explain why I would have predicted my own involvement in the Deptford murders?’
There was a sound above them, and the Judge heard footsteps. He turned sharply. A thickset sailor was moving down the narrow ladder.
‘I was not to be disturbed,’ said the Judge.
‘The gypsy,’ said the sailor, slightly red-faced from the exertion of his descent. ‘She’s been seen at Hyde Woods.’
The Judge’s annoyance melted away.
‘Hyde Woods? You’re sure?’
The sailor nodded. ‘The old executioner from the Maze of Lost Souls recognised her,’ he said. ‘Realised she was the one you were looking for and followed her. Saw her and the thief taker disappear near the entrance to the woods.’
The Judge’s smile vanished. ‘How could she have disappeared?’ he demanded.
The Judge turned to Ishmael without waiting for an answer.
‘She was looking for you,’ he decided, ‘in the Maze. What could she have discovered to lead her to Hyde Woods?’
Ishmael said nothing.
The Judge stared at him thoughtfully. ‘Catacombs,’ he said. ‘There are catacombs below Hyde Woods. Old Roman things. Abandoned.’ His cold smile widened. ‘A perfect place,’ he decided, ‘for an astrologer to hide the Eye.’ The Judge turned to his sailor. ‘Tell the executioner he’s earned my next ten heads,’ he said. ‘Who do we have in Hyde Woods?’
‘The gamekeepers,’ said the sailor.
The Judge considered this. ‘Send them in,’ he said. ‘Tell them they may do what they like with the gypsy. Only return my ring. Come January, every ship on the high seas will be stuffed with my slaves,’ he decided, savouring the thought.
Walters turned to Ishmael. ‘You have a day to decide to tell me everything,’ he said. ‘After which you will join those pirates drowned at Deptford.’
Chapter 49
After several hours in the dark catacombs, Charlie had to admit defeat. The tunnels snaked away, turning in on themselves, and it was hard to get bearings. The catacombs were dark and airless, with an oppressive smell of damp earth. When Charlie’s markings finally told him they’d searched every part of the underground network, the shadowy blackness had begun to throw up strange shapes and tricks of the torchlight.
They found themselves back in the ghoulish corridor of bones. Hundreds of ancient skeletons seemed to close around them, the neatly stacked skulls gaping in mockery.
Charlie’s eyes searched the ordered remains and found the cross he’d etched.
‘We’ve searched it all,’ he said. ‘There’s nothing here.’
Lily twisted her mouth in disappointment. ‘No cryptographer could have hidden down here,’ she agreed. ‘It’s not habitable.’
They turned to leave. But as Bitey lowered the torch to light the uneven ground, Charlie noticed something.
Was it his imagination? Or had the torch in Bitey’s hand flickered?
‘Bitey,’ he said, ‘pass me the torch.’
Bitey handed him the flame, and Charlie held it close to the skulls.
‘What are you doing?’ asked Lily as the torch licked the ancient remains.
‘This is the only part of the tunnel where something more could be hidden,’ reasoned Charlie. ‘The skulls could disguise something. I think the fire might reveal an air pocket.’
He moved slowly, keeping the flame level. The fire burned merrily as he moved it past the skulls, revealing no air current. Perhaps he’d imagined it after all.
His eyes fell on the tangle of thick tree roots further down the tunnel.
‘Perhaps they weren’t here twenty years ago,’ he decided, moving towards them.
As Charlie approached the mass of roots, the flame flickered. Carefully he moved the torch up, then around. Now there was a distinct bowing of the flame. There was no mistaking it. There was air entering the tunnel from somewhere behind where the willow trees had burrowed.
‘Strongest here,’ said Charlie. ‘The tree roots might be covering something,’ he decided. ‘Perhaps that’s why they grew here. Maybe an underground spring or inlet behind them.’
Charlie peered past the torchlight. He thought he could make out the faintest of differences in the texture of the light.
‘Here,’ he said, ducking low and pulling out his eating knife. ‘I think there’s a crawl space.’
Lily moved closer. ‘An entrance?’ she said.
Charlie was hacking at the roots with his blade. They were thinner towards the ground and easier to cut. He grasped the severed ends and pulled. Dry soil and dead insects showered on to the earth floor.
‘I think it leads somewhere,’ he said, pointing to the space behind. ‘The tree roots grew over the way in. I think it’s an old burial chamber off the main catacombs or something like it.’
The opening was just small enough to stoop through. Beyond was gloomy but not quite darkness. Something like distant moonlight glimmered deep behind where the bones had been.
‘It looks like a small room,’ said Charlie. ‘I don’t think anyone is inside,’ he added, listening in the dark.
‘Perhaps it’s only some old Roman thing,’ suggested Lily. ‘Part of the catacombs.’
‘Most likely,’ agreed Charlie, his eyes dropping to the decomposed insects at their feet. ‘I don’t think anyone has been inside for years.’
Suddenly a strange noise echoed through the tunnels. Metallic, like a gate shutting.
‘What was that?’ Lily’s face was pale.
They stood for several tense moments, listening carefully. All was silent.
‘Maybe some animal set off a trap deeper in the tunnel,’ suggested Bitey.
But they all knew it hadn’t sounded that way.
‘Best you keep guard, Bitey,’ decided Charlie, ‘whilst we investigate. If you hear anything or sense even the slightest danger, wave the torch.’
Bitey nodded gratefully and straightened in the attitude of an earnest guard.
‘I’ll listen like a hawk,’ he promised. ‘Me and the badger.’
Charlie stooped and moved inside. Lily followed.
The room beyond was tiny, barely large enough for them both to enter. In the centre of the room seemed to be a kind of stone plinth. But the small chamber was totally dark, with the exception of one muted ray of light.
It took a moment for their eyes to adjust. Then Lily and Charlie drew back in amazement. Something on the plinth was moving.
Lily crossed herself. ‘It’s haunted,’ she breathed. ‘Charlie, there are spirits here.’
‘No.’ Charlie shook his head. ‘I think those people are real.’
Chapter 50
Charlie and Lily stared in disbelief.
‘Ghosts?’ breathed Lily.
The bones in the corridor behind them had suddenly taken on a new meaning. To Charlie’s surprise, she took his hand.
The secret room behind the skulls was small, dug out of the earth and lacking the Roman brickwork that had lined the old catacombs. In the centre was a small raised stone block. And shining on to it was a ghostly image of London, like a mirage, shimmering in the moonlight.
The picture was moving. Tiny figures were walking about.
Charlie stepped forward to investigate, his heart in his mouth.
‘Charlie, no!’ hissed Lily. ‘You mustn’t wake the dead.’
Her face was stricken; her free hand clutched at the talismans around her neck.
Charlie tried to remind himself that gypsies were superstitious. But the ghostly picture looked so ethereal, as though beamed there from another dimension. He reached out a tentative hand to touch it and a portion of the picture vanished, reflected instead on his sun-browned hand.
&nb
sp; ‘Is it a haunting?’ asked Lily. Her terror seemed to have abated slightly.
Charlie shook his head. ‘I don’t think so,’ he said. ‘I think it’s . . . a trick of some kind.’
The glowing image was of London brought low by fire. Blackened stumps of buildings were interspersed with attempts to rebuild. The waterfront near Deptford could just be seen in the middle distance. Tiny figures went about their business.
‘I’ve seen something like this before,’ said Charlie. ‘At the Finchley Circus.’
‘It’s a circus trick?’ Lily was looking warily at the moving image reflected on the stone block. A ghostly picture of London twitching in miniature.
‘It’s called a camera obscura,’ said Charlie. ‘You set up a mirror above a darkened room. If you get the angle right, it reflects something light from outside into the dark part inside.’
Charlie looked up. Now his eyes had adjusted to the darker room, he could see that a patch of the ceiling above them was cut away. Dim light was beaming thinly through it. He stepped up on to the stone block to investigate. He pushed his hands up into the gap and felt the flat, cold surface of glass.
It had been set at an angle. Charlie pushed it up experimentally and found himself looking up into the night stars over Hyde Woods.
‘Someone’s set a mirror above us and another high in the trees,’ said Charlie. ‘It reflects light down into the room.’ He jumped down from the stone block.
‘Why would someone make a circus trick down here?’ asked Lily.
‘Astrologers use them too,’ said Charlie. ‘I think they’re useful to avoid staring directly at the sun. Though this one is particularly clever,’ he added, ‘because it reflects an image from so far away. Perhaps another mirror is set high in the trees.’ He thought for a moment. ‘It feels like something Thorne would make,’ he said. ‘The cleverness of it.’
He turned in the semi-gloom, to see something had been etched on the wall.
‘The path of the sun,’ said Charlie, moving to touch where a sun symbol had been made many times in a distinct arc. ‘Look,’ he said. ‘There’s a picture here.’
