‘Not when I knew him.’
‘Earlier?’
‘That I wouldn’t know.’
‘Did you?’
Pearson glanced to the side and looked down. ‘As part of my research I felt it was important to know how these things worked. To see if there was anything to it.’
‘And was there?’
Pearson kept his head down but Watts saw his eyes dart to the side again. He glanced the same way. Avril was looking in on them through the window, her face still without expression.
Watts unaccountably blushed and looked back at Pearson. Pearson was watching his face. ‘There were hints,’ Pearson said quietly. ‘Possibilities.’ He looked down again. ‘But certainties?’ He looked almost wistful. ‘Not for me.’ He spread his hands. ‘I’ve taken enough of your time. I’m sure you’re eager to get on your way.’
Watts and Pearson stood. Both men glanced at the window at the same time. Avril had gone.
Pearson escorted Watts to the front door. ‘You know,’ he said, ‘I really do believe I’m a genius. But I told that to a friend of mine in the French House and he used it in an article. That did for me. An Englishman who was unwilling to be self-deprecating? One who was also known to call himself an intellectual? Just not done, old boy, just not done.’
Watts smiled and nodded. ‘The French House in Soho? I think my father used to go there.’
‘Everybody did – especially all those poof artists – not all of whom recognized they were queer. “Hey, I paint bare-chested and hold my trousers up with my old school-tie but that doesn’t mean I want to take it up the arse.” Of course it does, you public school tit, however many women you fuck. The giveaway is that you fuck your women so badly they go elsewhere.’
‘Say goodbye to Avril,’ Watts said, shaking Pearson’s hand. ‘Thank her for the hospitality.’
‘Oh, I will, Watts, I will. I’m sure she got as much pleasure from your stay as you did.’
Pearson gave that strange smile again and went back into the house. Watts got into his car with his books and briefcase and drove slowly away.
Karen Hewitt was wearing a tight two-piece that made the rest of her as immobile as her face.
‘What is happening, Sarah? Apparently there was some Devil Goat casting its shadow over the town yesterday evening.’
Gilchrist had heard. ‘Turns out there’s a whole lot of sick black magic stuff that’s been happening across the region before this. It’s just that nobody had put it together before.’
‘Tell me,’ Hewitt said.
‘At the moment, as you say, we have these reports of this goat-headed man casting a shadow over the city. We have the Wicker Man and the missing vicar—’
‘Is he the victim inside the Wicker Man?’
‘It’s a possibility, of course. I’m waiting for confirmation from forensics. Then we have the stolen painting. The desecrated church. But it’s not the first church to suffer in the region – there have been almost a dozen. Plus a few graves despoiled.’
‘When you say despoiled . . .’
‘Broken into. Bones scattered.’
‘Not the recently buried, I hope?’
‘No, ma’am, all very old.’
‘Do we know what this means?’
‘Not yet, ma’am.’
Hewitt nodded and made a note on her pad. ‘These churches broken into – not just for copper?’
‘Copper and lead long gone, I think, along with the gold and silver. No: altars trashed, crosses turned upside down, symbols sprayed on walls. Faeces left on the altar.’
‘Anything significant about the symbols?’
‘Too early to say.’
Hewitt made another note. Nodded. ‘That’s it?’
‘Pets have gone missing.’
‘Nothing new there. We had that spate of petnapping a couple of years ago.’
‘A couple of them found nailed to church doors. Crows too.’
‘Hope the animal rights folk don’t find the perpetrators before we do.’ Hewitt sighed. ‘There’s a lot going on that we have to deal with. We’re stretched. What I’m saying, Sarah, is that I need results from you, fast.’
‘I’m aware of that, ma’am. All the members of my team are working long hours.’
‘Do you think there’s a coordinated attack from black magicians going on? People who believe they are black magicians, I mean.’
Gilchrist shook her head. ‘It’s my understanding that black magic appeals mostly to mixed-up teenage boys who feel powerless.’
‘In my day, they’d just listen to The Smiths and have done with it.’
‘But this is something else.’
‘What?’ Hewitt said.
Gilchrist threw up her arms. ‘I have no idea.’
Hewitt grunted.‘A religious nut – that’s all we need,’ she muttered. ‘Pray it ain’t so.’
‘Ma’am?’ Gilchrist said.
‘Religious nutcases feel they have to explain everything with reference to the scriptures on single-spaced paper in very small handwriting. You’ve seen Seven – thousands of pages of madness – with diagrams. You’ve read the serial killer novels. Reams and reams of justification in italic writing.’
‘Oh, I get you,’ Gilchrist said. ‘An unhealthy interest in the poetry of William Blake or the rantings of some medieval self-flagellant.’
Hewitt looked sharply at her. ‘Self-flagellant?’
Gilchrist felt awkward. ‘Although in Brighton there’s probably a club for them.’
Kate Simpson phoned Plenty. A recorded message stated that the restaurant was closed for a week but then she was given options. She got through to administration and introduced herself.
‘I wondered what the news was on the food poisoning?’ she said.
‘We still don’t know what caused it. Our produce is being tested.’
‘Where do you source your ingredients?’
‘Local organic farms, usually. As you know we look always for the unusual ingredient.’
Kate told her what she had chosen from the menu. ‘Anything unusual in there?’
‘Lily bulbs, maybe, although they’re not that unusual.’
Kate remembered each table in the restaurant had a lily on it. ‘Eating dandelions I know about – but lilies?’
‘The bulbs are essentially a root vegetable. Some can be bitter but the non-bitter ones – especially lilium pumilum – are used in cooking. They’re like potatoes – equally starchy, although much smaller. If you’re in China you can’t get away from them. Often sold in a dry form. You reconstitute for stir fry or to thicken soup.’
‘Are they poisonous if cooked badly?’
There was a pause on the other end of the phone. ‘They’re like potatoes – eat them raw and they can upset your stomach. But otherwise they’re fine. Unless you’re a cat.’
‘What have lilies got against cats?’
‘Lilies are toxic to them – especially the Easter lily. Causes acute renal failure.’
‘But cats know this, right?’
Another pause. ‘I would know that how?’
Kate laughed. ‘Where do you get the bulbs from?’
‘An organic farm near Poynings. Saddlescombe Organics. You can buy them yourself at the Brighton Farm Market up on North Road. On Wednesdays and Saturdays Saddlescombe Farm has a stall there.’
SIXTEEN
Bob Watts was drinking coffee in the café on the balcony at the rear of the Brighton Gallery and Museum. He liked to drop in from time to time. There was something peaceful about the place, notwithstanding the racket of schoolchildren rising from below to the iron rafters as they clattered around the ground-floor gallery in search of the objects listed on their teaching sheets.
He could see, just below him, Bernard Rafferty in conversation with a much younger, androgynously good-looking man. God, Rafferty irritated him. So self-regarding. In Watts’ past life as a high-flying chief constable they had shared many a television and radio studio. So
mewhere, Watts had a signed copy of one of Rafferty’s books that the pompous man had pressed upon him. He was some sort of expert on Sussex churches, which interested Watts not in the least. He couldn’t remember even opening the book.
Rafferty was standing beside yellow and black police tape that protected a small area at the edge of the gallery. He was pointing at the wall and speaking earnestly. The androgynous man was nodding slowly. Watts didn’t know what that was about.
He called Sarah Gilchrist. He knew she was back on duty. He had read about the Wicker Man on the beach and seen her name as officer in charge. He thought she’d be interested to know about the other construction on the Devil’s Dyke.
He and Sarah had briefly been an item – the cause of his break-up with his wife – and he felt their story wasn’t yet over. But he was drawn to Nicola Travis, no doubt about it.
Travis had invited him down to Glyndebourne opera house this coming weekend. She said she had a spare ticket as a friend had bailed. He was excited at the prospect of seeing her again.
Gilchrist’s mobile rang when she was standing with Donaldson and Heap. Bob Watts. She excused herself and took the call. He wanted to meet.
‘I thought you were pretty much in Barnes these days until your father’s house sells.’
He explained he was trying to find out more about some books on the occult his father owned.
‘Especially one by Aleister Crowley. The Great Beast?’
‘I’ve heard of him vaguely,’ Gilchrist said. ‘But the occult – not you as well.’
Watts laughed and picked up the leaflet from his table. ‘There’s definitely something in the air,’ Watts said. ‘I’m looking at a flyer for a vampire club in the Laines. They were advertising a screening of a film about Abraham Lincoln as a vampire killer on telly the other day.’
Gilchrist laughed too. ‘I think Jane Austen characters now hunt zombies.’
‘You know there’s a Wicker Man up on Newtimber Hill near Devil’s Dyke?’ Watts said.
‘I didn’t.’
‘Local hippy commune put it there.’
‘How local?’
‘Saddlescombe – they run the organic farm there.’
‘Thanks for that, Bob.’
Donaldson had gone when Gilchrist put the phone down. She glanced at her watch. Probably gone for his lunchtime workout. She was restless. There would be little progress until the forensics results came in and the beach footage was fully examined. She called Heap over.
‘Any joy with the Imperial Arcade trace?’
‘I was going up there in a minute.’
‘I’ll come with you. Then we need to arrange a visit to Saddlescombe Organics out on the Devil’s Dyke.’
Bob Watts walked through the North Laines to the station and took a ten-minute train journey to Lewes through flooded fields. It hadn’t rained all morning but black clouds tumbled together in the sky and the light was leaden.
The antiquarian bookseller, Vincent Slattery, had his shop just beside the Archaeological Museum in a cobbled courtyard opposite the old castle keep.
It was like something out of Dickens. Sagging shelves packed with large books. Creaking floorboards pitched at all kinds of odd angles because of dips and declivities. Soft light coming through small, square-paned Georgian windows, augmented by lamps in the corners and on the long, heavily varnished desk at which Slattery sat. And the smell – that musty, leathery smell of old books.
‘You’re here to sell the Crowley?’ Slattery said without looking up.
‘I’m afraid not but I hoped you might be able to give me some information.’
‘About Crowley? What would you want to know?’
‘Just about the book really. Is it for you or one of your customers?’
Slattery looked surprised. ‘That’s actually none of your business but it’s for an American client.’
Watts nodded. ‘It was the price offered made me ask. Sorry. What do you know about Crowley?’
Slattery laughed. ‘How long have you got? He was the son of a rich Midlands brewer. He went to Cambridge in the 1880s. He had a reputation as a mountaineer. Climbed in the Alps. Walked across the Sahara, he claimed. He paid to have his never-ending poetry published. Probably paid to get into Cambridge.’
‘You don’t sound too much of an admirer.’
Slattery tugged at his ear absently. ‘When Crowley got interested in magic that’s when I get interested in him.’
‘You’re interested in the occult?’
‘An academic interest only. Crowley’s own interest led him to the Golden Dawn, the quasi-spiritual, quasi-occult society of which W B Yeats was a member. The members were trying to access the power of the Other Side. Crowley tried to take it over so they threw him out. He developed his own magic centred round Thelema – his posh word for willpower. If you willed it, it would happen. Another credo of his was: “Do what you want is the whole of the Law”, which essentially means do whatever you want.’
‘I read that. So it was a philosophy of absolute self-indulgence?’
‘In some ways. But his magical practices were designed to raise demons and spirits. His usual practice was sex magic with a succession of Scarlet Women – usually drug addicts or prostitutes or the mentally unbalanced. At the same time – and sometimes literally at the same time – he liked being sodomized. In Cefalu in Sicily he started a community in 1920 where he had sex with men and women and tried to force his then Scarlet Woman to have sex with a goat.’
‘All in the name of revealing hidden knowledge?’ Watts said.
Slattery nodded. ‘And he must have been on to something because the Germans tried to kill him in 1942.’
Watts spread his hands. ‘I’ve heard that mentioned but it makes no sense to me.’
Slattery smiled. ‘In the early part of the Second World War Crowley performed secret rituals in Sussex to cast spells on the leaders of Nazi Germany. The same magic John Dee used to raise the storm that blew the Spanish Armada off course.’
Watts laughed. ‘You’re going to have to run that last bit by me again.’
‘John Dee – the Elizabethan magus? Damon Albarn did an opera about him not so long ago?’
‘I know who he is,’ Watts said. ‘He seems to be cropping up in every conversation I have lately. But Dee did what at the time of the Spanish Armada?’
‘You know there was nothing to stop Philip of Spain conquering England in 1588? Our nobles were resigned to it even if Queen Elizabeth wasn’t. The rest of us knew bugger all outside of our own villages – probably didn’t even know what year it was. The Spanish Armada dwarfed our puny navy. Spain was the greatest sea power in the world. Our ships were out-gunned and out-classed.
‘And then a storm blew up in the Channel. Sent most of the Spanish fleet to the bottom of the sea or wrecked it on the British coast.’ Slattery raised an eyebrow. ‘What were the chances of a storm starting up at just that moment of England’s greatest need? That’s the kind of coincidence you pray for – or conjure up demons for.’
Watts was sceptical but nodded politely. ‘And that’s what John Dee did?’
‘So they say.’
‘And here they were doing something similar in World War Two to defend our shores.’
‘It would appear so. But not Crowley’s usual sex magic, as far as we know. Crowley did battle on the astral plane. The details of the rituals are sketchy but the occasion we know about seems to have involved dressing up a dummy as a Nazi sitting on a throne. Among the people attending this particular ritual were Ian Fleming, Dennis Wheatley and Victor Tempest.’
Watts looked sharply at Slattery, whose grin had turned to a sly smile.
‘You didn’t know your father was there?’ Slattery said.
Watts didn’t know. For a moment he couldn’t think what to say because he was thinking through the idea his father had been part of this. It just didn’t compute. He didn’t think Victor Tempest had known Fleming and Wheatley until later in the wa
r. And his father had been fighting in Europe and then been a prisoner of war – in 1942 was he even in the country?
‘They tried to blow Crowley up at Saddlescombe Farm, didn’t they?’ Watts finally said.
‘That’s right.’
‘Where did they get a throne?’ he said. ‘Not that easy to come by, I would have thought.’
Slattery laughed. ‘Exactly. These things are a lot of speculation. But it’s certain there were bombs dropped on Saddlescombe when Crowley was staying there. The official line was that this was a German plane returning from a bombing raid on London with a few bombs left that the pilot decided to jettison over the South Downs.’
‘Was Crowley hurt?’
‘Apparently not. Nobody was. Some windows of one of the farm cottages were blown out. The farm worker who lived in it was cheesed off because he’d only just cleaned them. He said if he’d left them another day he needn’t have bothered.’
‘The ritual was at Saddlescombe Farm?’ Watts said.
Slattery nodded. ‘Where else?’ He glanced at his watch. ‘Listen – there’s an archaeologist I’d like you to meet. Expert on Saddlescombe and a lot more round here.’
Gilchrist had always had her feet on the ground. When she was a teenager most of her friends went to fortune-tellers and read their stars and went in for all of that but she just thought it was rubbish. As far as she was concerned, what happens, happens – and what happened to her was pretty shitty when she was a kid.
She walked with Heap up to the clock tower in the centre of town. ‘So how religious are you?’ she said to Heap.
‘It soothes the soul,’ Heap said.
‘What soul?’ she said. ‘Who can genuinely believe we have a soul?’
Heap glanced at her. ‘Well, religion soothes something in us,’ he said.
‘Listen,’ Gilchrist said. ‘God is absence. Either that or he’s deaf.’
‘But even if God doesn’t exist I really want him to,’ Heap said. ‘And so do most people.’
Their way was blocked on the pavement outside the chain bookstore by a group of some twenty young men and women in white sweatshirts. Written on front and back of each sweatshirt was the slogan ‘For Christ’s sake – give God a chance’. One of them had a guitar and they were singing, though what they were singing wasn’t exactly clear.
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