Out of Sight

by Stella Cameron

  Mario bopped out behind him, his whiskers covered with dirt, and Marley’s Boston terrier, Winnie, followed, dragging a huge and yellowed plastic bone.

  Sykes put an arm around her neck and hugged Poppy’s face into his shoulder. “Have I ever told you how much I like an outstanding worm? Very tasty.”

  She put her arms around his waist and held on.

  “Poppy, I don’t go around killing people for fun.” His voice was suddenly tight.

  “Of course you don’t.” She eased away from him. “I shouldn’t have asked what I did.”

  “It doesn’t matter as long as you aren’t wondering if I thought of…you know I would never hurt you, don’t you?”

  “Of course.” She stared at him. “It never crossed my mind. I want to help you look for whatever it is you’ve lost.” Her heart beat wildly.

  The bluest eyes she had ever seen were very serious. Sykes was weighing the truth in her denial. “I never actually had it,” he said. “But it’s something we need to clear up. I’ll tell you why later—if you want to listen, that is.”

  “I do. What are we looking for?”

  He dug a tiny gold key out of his pocket and showed it to her. “With this one we’ve got four of them. I want to know what they unlock.”

  “Four keys. For four different things, you think?”

  “No. Probably one thing. It could be that we’ll need whatever these unlock to help with the Embran friends.”

  Poppy shook her head.

  “You need to know more about the Embran,” Sykes said. “That’s what we’ll talk about later. Over a really good bottle of wine. In my flat. Where I keep my etchings.”

  Poppy laughed and poked him in the chest. “I know all about your etchings.”

  “Oh, no, you don’t,” he said and kissed her cheek. “You’ve only begun to explore my etchings.”

  His expression changed abruptly, the smile disappeared and he glanced to his right, then back at her.

  Mario whimpered and took off in the direction Sykes had looked.

  “Do you hear anything?” Sykes said.

  Poppy’s scalp tightened and her face felt stiff. “I don’t know. What sort of thing?”

  He was already concentrating again. A light wind picked up, ruffling his hair and distracting Poppy. She could look at Sykes forever, or pretty much forever.

  Shushing, or what sounded like several people shushing each other came to Poppy on the wind and she frowned, suddenly even more edgy. “Do you hear that?” she said, catching hold of Sykes’s sleeve. “Where are they?”

  She could have sworn he gave her a satisfied glance.

  The sound grew louder.

  Scraping brought her attention to Winnie who made for a flight of stairs leading to the flats, her bone dragging on the ground. There was no sign of Mario.

  “It’s happening,” Sykes said. “Ben used to tell me about it but I wasn’t aware of anything for a long time. Do you see it changing?”

  His hand folding around hers was a relief. “I’m not sure. Do you mean the colors!”

  “What are they?” Sykes asked, squeezing her fingers. “The colors.”

  “They’re mixing together. Sliding down. Green and violet. And dark purple. Like they’re running over each other.”

  “It’s something to do with the angels,” he told her. “There’s a particular one we’re supposed to find but I can’t. I keep looking at them but not one of them is right.”

  “How do you know what the special one should look like.”

  “I’ll explain,” he said. “Give me time on that, okay?”

  “Okay.”

  “Help me look at them again. I think our angel has long hair. Nothing on her head, no headdress or anything like that.”

  “How would you know if she has long hair?”

  “Because I’ve started to see her.” He faced Poppy. “Why didn’t I know that until now? Of course I’ve started seeing her. That’s why the stone came.”

  “You’re being very mysterious.”

  “I don’t mean to. Look for an angel with long hair that sweeps away from her face.”

  Poppy went to the first stone angel she saw. A veil completely covered her head. But there was something about her face that stopped Poppy. “She’s not the one but she’s lovely. She’s smiling.”

  Sykes joined her. “Not usually,” he said without inflection.

  A door slammed and they both looked up. Marley waved and started down the steps.

  The closer she got, the more vivid her expression seemed. “Winnie ran upstairs to hide,” she said. “I figured something was going on down here. Where’s Mario?”

  “Digging something up,” Sykes said. “How are you doing, Marley?”

  “They’re here,” she said, her green eyes almost unfocused. “Listen. Oh, you can’t hear them, can you? I always wondered where they went and they’ve been here in the courtyard all the time.”

  “You two are starting to scare me,” Poppy said. “That’s not easy to do.”

  “What do you mean?” Sykes asked Marley.

  She turned bright pink. “I have some, er, friends I call my Ushers. They talk to me when I need them, usually when I travel. This is the first time I’ve ever heard them when I wasn’t traveling.” She glanced at Poppy and swallowed. “Out of body, that is.”

  “Yeah,” Poppy said. “Some people might think we’re a pretty weird lot. Imagine that. You’re not getting ready to…to go somewhere right now, are you?”

  “Oh, no.” Marley rubbed her rounded belly. “Not at all, that wouldn’t be a safe thing to do.”

  Sykes grinned at both of them. “This is a landmark occasion. There are three of us here and we’re all hearing the angels communicating.”

  “You hear them, too?” Marley’s voice rose, then she frowned. “The angels? You think the sounds are coming from the angels?”

  “They are,” Poppy said.

  “Yep,” Sykes agreed. “Ben told me about it for years but I didn’t hear it so I didn’t believe it. I wonder how long before we figure out the significance. Or if there is some significance at all.”

  Poppy wanted to ask Marley if she saw all the color but decided not to push her luck.

  “We’re looking for an angel with long hair but no headdress,” Poppy said. “We just started.”

  Immediately, Marley looked in one direction after another, obviously seeking out angels where she already knew they stood, or knelt, or sat. “I don’t remember one like that.”

  Mario snuffled his way across the gravel path, lifted his head as if listening, and streaked out of sight again.

  “That dog is weird,” Sykes said. “Cute, but weird.”

  “He’s lovely,” Poppy told him, watching the exit of the lovely, weird animal. “At least he moves as if he’s got a purpose. Look at all of us standing here, not knowing what to do next.”

  “And the dog does?” Sykes sounded tolerant but amused.

  Poppy started out, looking at one statue after another until she assumed the other two were also looking. Then she took off after Mario. When she could, she would have a dog of her own.

  A tiled pathway ran in front of all sides of the buildings fronting the courtyard. The lowest floor housed storerooms, some with barred windows, all with very large doors painted green.

  “There are some on the door and window lintels,” Sykes said, catching up with her.

  She frowned. “Oh, you mean angels? Those things mostly look like gargoyles to me.”

  “Most of them are,” Marley said, appearing around the next corner.

  “Why is this blocked off?” Poppy checked out a concreted-up area in one wall. It was hard to tell if there had once been a door there or if the bricks had needed repair.

  “Don’t know,” Marley said. “It was always like that.”

  Scrabbling sounded and they all searched for the source.

  Sykes shrugged, but more scratching and scrabbling followed.

  P
oppy stared at the foot of the patched wall, pointed, then got down on her knees. A gap the size of a tennis ball showed where the wall met the tiles.

  “This is where the noise is coming from,” she said.

  Both Marley and Sykes came to take a closer look.

  “Ew, mice,” Marley said, leaping back.

  Several animal whiskers poked through the hole. Grubby whiskers.

  “Not mice,” Poppy said. “Mario.”

  “Damn dog.” Sykes went to the nearest door and slid it open on rusty tracks.

  They all crowded inside only to find a high-ceilinged, empty and very dusty space. Exploration showed it didn’t extend to the repaired section of wall.

  Single file behind Sykes, they left the place, closed the door and headed for the one on the other side of the patch. The door into this one revealed piles of broken pieces of furniture.

  “Don’t laugh,” Marley said. “But I store some of my stuff here.”

  Poppy knew Marley was a restorer, particularly of lacquer, silvering, gilt and various exotic finishes.

  Sykes was already examining the exterior wall. He worked his way to the corner and threw up his hands. “I’m damned,” he said. “Know what I think? There’s a space between this room and the one we were just in. It looks like it was walled off years ago and I don’t see any way in.”

  Marley looked stricken. “There has to be. Mario’s in there and he didn’t crawl through that little hole.”

  25

  “Okay,” Sykes said. “Stop panicking, you two. We’ll get him out.”

  “Who’s panicking?” Marley said.

  He crouched beside the hole, poked a finger through and felt Mario’s tongue giving it a lick. “I am,” he said. “Shoot, I’m going to have to break in there and if I’m really unlucky, I’ll hurt him in the process.”

  “Cool it,” Poppy said.

  “Cool it?” Sykes and Marley replied in unison.

  “He got in there somehow, didn’t he? He’ll get out again when he’s ready.”

  “If he can find the way in and out again,” Marley said. “You know how that goes sometimes. Sort of like a maze.”

  Pascal’s voice thundered through the courtyard, “Where are you? What’s going on?”

  To Sykes it seemed as if the soft whispering sounds around them rapidly rose to hoarse bellowing. “Over here,” he called back. He dropped his voice and added, “Do we have to tell him?”

  “I’m not lying to Pascal,” Marley said.

  David accompanied Pascal, his arms behind his back and his step tentative.

  “Hey, David,” Sykes said. So far he hadn’t found anything in the boy to dislike—other than the multiple piercings.

  “Hey,” David said.

  “Is your dad dragging you into a family fracas already?” Poppy said.

  The boy laughed politely.

  So, Sykes thought, if Pascal had told Poppy about his son then the fatherly instincts were already in full bloom. “Have you met Marley, yet, David?”

  “Yep. And Anthony and Gray.”

  Pascal beamed. “So what’s all the racket about out here?”

  Sykes looked silently at the ground and he didn’t hear either Poppy or Marley rush to explain.

  “Oh, you might as well know. Mario’s got himself into a jam. He’s in there.” Sykes pointed to the small hole at the base of the wall. “We can’t find where he got in and I doubt he can remember, so it looks as if I’ll have to start knocking down walls.”

  Puffing with exasperation, Pascal headed for the door on the left.

  “You won’t find him in there.”

  Pascal halted and set off for the door on the right. This time they didn’t say anything and he went inside. They heard the overhead light snap on and very soon, Pascal’s exclamation.

  Out he stomped, glaring at them as he went by, and back inside at the door on the left.

  This time he didn’t say a word but emerged after a few minutes and stood before the patched wall. “Walled off,” he muttered. “This bit. It’s always looked like this and I never thought anything of it. How big is it in there, d’you think?”

  “Six or seven feet wide,” Sykes suggested. “And probably the same depth as everything else on this side.”

  “Poor little Mario,” Poppy said. “We’d better keep talking to him. We can push food through if we have to.”

  “I want Gray to get home,” Marley said, sounding forlorn and not at all like herself. “It’s getting dark. He’ll figure out how to get him out.”

  Poppy elbowed Sykes in the ribs and gave him a sideways smile.

  He knew when he was being told to bury his ego.

  “Easy enough,” Pascal said. “We’ll knock the wall down.”

  “You could kill Mario,” Marley said.

  “Not if we take a pickax, stick it in that little hole and work till it’s bigger. Dogs are smart. He’ll back off while we’re making a lot of noise and dust.”

  “Hey, fella!”

  They all turned to David who dropped to his knees at the edge of the nearest planting bed and gathered good old Mario into his arms.

  “How did you get back out?” David said. “We’re gonna change your name to Houdini.”

  26

  “Okay, folks. Disaster averted. We can all go home.” Sykes stood against the patched wall and raised a hand as if to wave the rest of them off. He settled a hand on the back of Poppy’s neck.

  “No, no, no,” Pascal said, turning up one corner of his mouth. “Not this time, my friend. Don’t forget I know all about your ego. You want to find out what’s inside that space and you want to do it all on your own. Then you’ll announce it to the rest of us so we can tell you how brilliant you are.”

  “Maligned,” Sykes said and kept a straight face. “No such thing. It’s getting late and we all have more important things to do. Maybe we should wait till Ben and Willow come home before we fess up to almost losing their dog.”

  “We didn’t almost lose him,” David said, still holding the happily settled Mario. “He went in there and got bored. So he came out.”

  Sykes avoided congratulating him on saying the obvious. “You’re right,” he said. “I’ll take him up with me if you like.”

  Mario launched himself from David’s arms and Sykes had to catch him. “Whoa. Welcome, I guess. You’d think he understands what we say.”

  Nobody was moving.

  “I’ve got an idea,” Pascal said. “You said something about a pickax, Sykes. If you know where one is, why don’t you get it. There’s a heavy flashlight in Willow’s store at the end—if the Mean ’n Green group hasn’t nicked it.”

  Mean ’n Green was Willow’s concierge company, run in her absence by one Zinnia, and assistants Chris and Fabio. Chris and Fabio had almost been Embran casualties, together with Caroline who was now Chris’s constant companion.

  As soon as Pascal set off, Sykes said, “The rest of you don’t need to hang around. I’ll let you know if we find a stash of Rembrandts in there.”

  Marley leaned her back against the wall.

  David widened his stance and put his hands behind his back. Without the sunglasses his eye was a mess.

  Poppy smiled up at Sykes. “I wouldn’t dream of leaving you here on your own to work. You must be tired after all you’ve been though.” Her voice was sweet but the look she gave him, definitely suggestive.

  “Okay, okay.” He shook his head, gave Mario to Poppy and went back into the storeroom to the left of the concreted wall where he thought he had seen a pickax. He found it too quickly and actually considered saying he hadn’t found it at all. “Shape up, Millet,” he told himself under his breath.

  Pascal arrived outside the door as Sykes emerged with the pickax.

  “We’d better go through from the inside,” Sykes said. “Keep the rain from getting through the outside wall.”

  Leading the way, Pascal chose the storeroom on the right because it was empty and switched on a big
and brilliant flashlight as he went. Bricks in the added wall looked as old as the rest but Sykes didn’t comment.

  “Maybe they changed their minds when they were building the place,” Marley said.

  “Could be the spans were too wide or something,” Poppy added.

  “Mmm” was all Sykes said. He wasn’t sure what he thought except that the space was damn strange.

  “Now,” Pascal said. “I wonder where the best place would be.”

  The rest crowded in behind Sykes. If he swung the pickax, he’d kill someone.

  “Eye-level,” David said. “Doesn’t make much difference but that way it’ll be easier to look in there.”

  Sykes placed the pointed end of the pickax against the wall and gave a significant look around to make them all back off.

  “Lower,” David said. “Marley wouldn’t be able to see through there without a ladder.”

  Muffling a retort about smartass kids, Sykes moved the tool down the wall and gave an experimental tap. Dry old mortar crumbled away easily. He tapped again and broke straight through. A bump with the end of the handle sent first one, then two abutting bricks through to the other side.

  “What can you see?” Marley said.

  The look she got from Sykes only make her snigger.

  He used the straight edge of the pickax head and pulled the next brick in his direction, stepping out of the way when it fell. Four more and there was enough room to put an arm and a head through. “Flashlight,” he said without meeting Pascal’s eyes.

  He got the rubber-coated flashlight slapped into his palm and aimed the business end through the hole.

  Carefully, he put his head into the space and gradually swept the light beam around then swept it carefully back and forth. Cobwebs draped his hair and he couldn’t brush them away.

  He felt hands on his back.

  “What’s in there?” Poppy said. “What do you see?”

  Sykes worked himself forward until his head was all the way through and looked all around. “I’m damned,” he said.

  “What?” It was a chorus.

  Slowly, he withdrew. He made for the door and fresh air. “Stinks in there. Stale.”