by Nick Brown
The first part of the process went quickly; all the women had an alibi for the time of the supposed attack on Olga: they’d all been together in the house. Similarly, their alibis for the attack on Ken were confirmed and verified by an independent witness, Claire Vanarvi, who’d been with them. Theodrakis didn’t have time to wonder why she was mixed up in this because Jenna kicked off.
“I don’t see why you’re here harassing us; we’re supposed to be the victims.”
Viv tried to explain.
“We understand that, but the circumstances have become more complicated and, as you know, the original suspect has been killed.”
It had no effect.
“But that doesn’t mean that he wasn’t behind all this, does it? And why are you questioning us about Olga, she’s a sister? You don’t know what you’re doing, do you? Easier for you to harass us than catch the men who attacked Olga, threatened us and killed those poor women.
“Please, stop this.”
The voice came from behind them; they turned to see Olga, her face bruised and stitched, enter the room.
“It’s my fault you’re here, we’ll go through to the conservatory, it’ll be quieter in there.”
They followed her, aware of the eyes of the other women following them. For Theodrakis it was unsatisfactory. He’d wanted to talk to the three archaeologists about why they were here and how they felt now they were. He could tell just by looking at one of them, Jan, that she was willing to talk, more than willing -she looked lost and desperate.
The conservatory looked out over neat lawns spreading towards the vague grey bulk of the Pennines. Olga attempted a smile, then said:
“I suppose you know about my time in prison?”
They nodded.
“Do we need to go over it?”
Viv answered her.
“Not unless you think it’s relevant. Is it?”
Theodrakis was impressed. Viv was good, he could afford to sit back and listen. Olga cleared her throat before replying:
“No, it’s not relevant. Keep it in the past where it belongs. I learnt from it, never been with a man since.”
Olga looked at Theodrakis as she said this. He smiled back and said:
“No, me neither.”
To his surprise she laughed and said:
“Good, I like you for that.”
He saw that it also made Viv smile and reflected that this was probably the only thing he’d said since arriving in this damp pudding of an island that had gone down well. It came to him that the attack on Olga was something different: not part of the pattern and therefore significant. In his experience these things didn’t make mistakes: if it suited them that you die then you died. She wasn’t dead, assuming this assault was connected, so it was either a warning or something that they were meant to see. Viv asked:
“So, if it isn’t too painful to go over it all again, would you think back to what happened to you, Ms Hickman?”
“Something chased me, chased me through the back alleys of Manchester, like it was herding me, you know, shepherding me in a particular direction.”
“What makes you think that?”
“Looking back, I realise that it could have caught me any time it wanted to. It touched me a couple of times, a filthy touch. I’m still trying to wash it off.”
“You keep saying it, not he.”
“And so would you if it had chased you. I think it followed me from Rylands to Chethams College, and then decided it needed to frighten me. It certainly did that.”
She fell silent and Viv prompted.
“And that’s all?”
“Yes, that’s all”
She seemed to hesitate, then added:
“Except, well except I think it wanted me to knock myself out on the glass of that particular restaurant.”
“Why would it want you to do that?”
“Because it achieves two things in one action, frightens me and links me up with two other victims of Skendleby who happen to be sitting in that window and are therefore the first to help me.”
Theodrakis could see that Viv had lost patience.
“With respect, Ms Hickman, this is a police investigation, not an episode of Dr Who. It would help if you’d stick to the facts.”
“These are the facts; do you think I’m enjoying this?”
Theodrakis cut in.
“Why do think this thing was following you?”
“Because of what I found in Rylands library.”
“And that was?”
“I was looking at some documents that Ed, that is, Reverend Joyce, had shown me.”
“Oh yes, the companion of your last two unfortunate misadventures.”
Viv snapped the caustic remark before Theodrakis could stop her. He signalled they should let Olga continue whilst wondering why it was that powerful women so often treated others with less empathy than they did their weaker sisters or men. After the ensuing silence Olga asked:
“You want me to continue?”
Viv nodded.
“The documents were some pages from the Manchester diaries of John Dee, which for some reason had been extracted and hidden. Dr Dee was…”
“I know who he was, I saw the opera at the Palace. Why were they of interest to you?”
“Because I’m in them.”
This should have been a conversation killer, but something tingled in Theodrakis; something raw and partially surpressed in his psyche intuitively recognised the authenticity. He didn’t want Viv, who looked as if she was about to laugh, to blow this: he took over the questioning.
“I believe you.”
Olga exhaled heavily; she was a tough woman on the verge of tears. She mumbled something back that might have been thanks.
“Take your time and tell us about it.”
“Ed found the documents for me, they’re just scraps of jottings Dee made, no big deal really, most of his time in Manchester seems pretty dull.”
She paused and Theodrakis prompted gently.
“There’s an exception though, isn’t there?”
“Yes, sadly there is. Dee was asked out to Skendleby Hall; from there he was taken to a farm some distance away to perform what he calls ‘certain acts’. It’s clear that what he found terrified him and his attempt to perform these actions failed, or even made thing worse.”
“And that’s all?”
“No. When Dee was at the height of his power he used a type of sensitive, they called them skryers back then, but he’d parted company with his skryer who died somewhere in Hungary, so he had to use a local man who claimed he had the gift. This man’s name was Hikman.”
“Same as yours.”
“Same as mine and what’s worse is that Dee didn’t trust him and he was proved right. When Dee arrived at Skendleby he found Hikman and a hooded man in the crypt under the chapel with the body of a dead girl. The lord of the manor wasn’t there, seems he’d gone away to avoid whatever Dee might do. Dee is at pains to say that the girl was already dead and had been cut before he got there.”
“Well he would, wouldn’t he?”
Theodrakis put his finger to his lips, indicating Viv should stay quiet.
“Dee’s part in this was to accompany them and take the bones that had been cut to the farmhouse, which Hikman’s scrying had disclosed, and bury them with ‘a significant undertaking’. The situation of the farm and the earth beneath was supposed to have special properties. Or maybe the Davenports just wanted the evidence shifted elsewhere.”
Theodrakis asked:
“What about the rest of the body?”
“I wouldn’t be surprised if Ed’s archaeologist friend doesn’t find it under the Davenport chapel.”
“And the farmhouse?”
“I’m very much afraid that you’re sitting in it. The farmhouse is certainly old enough, this used to be a house and barn. Margaret’s husband had it converted.”
Viv started to ask:
“So that would mean tha…”
>
Olga finished the sentence for her.
“That these unspeakable things are buried in the cellars somewhere beneath our feet.”
She paused, looking close to tears. Theodrakis asked gently:
“Is there more, Olga?”
“Only if you know how to look for it. After the piece about Hikman and the dead girl there’s some rambling about fear and dark shadows, then the diary peters out. There are a couple of blank sheets then the same account ordered differently.”
“Why? That doesn’t make sense.”
“No, that’s what I thought at first. Then I looked again, sometimes being a mathematician comes in handy. I put the two versions together and in the differences there lurks a simple numerical code. Probably quite tricky back then but a teenage computer hacker wouldn’t be taxed by it today.”
“And?”
“And there are a couple of simple differences: the girl was alive when Hikman cut her and the dark shadows have a specific, as well as metaphorical, application. They refer to the hooded figure, hooded not to conceal his identity but to hide his appearance from anyone unlucky enough to be forced into contact with him, if it was a he, which I’m not sure.”
An image of the time-eaten figure of Father John on Samos awakened in Theodrakis’s memory. Olga hadn’t finished.
“There’s one other detail. This thing of shadows had a name, Edward Davenport, and that would make him…”
Theodrakis finished the sentence for her.
“About two hundred and fifty years old.”
Theodrakis expected this to provoke some protest from Viv, or at least a derisive laugh, but he was wrong, she didn’t even react. Instead she asked:
“What do you think is happening then?”
Olga must have noticed a more open attitude because she blurted out:
“Something outside my experience, certainly beyond yours, but I think your colleague, sorry, I don’t know your name, may understand more than either of us.”
“Call me Alexis.”
He noted the look of surprise on Viv’s face as he said this: surprise and a touch of hurt maybe. But this wasn’t the place to unpack all that, Olga was speaking again.
“But have you any answers for this? Why are Jan, Leonie and Rose here? Three women threatened by the Skendleby outbreak? Why do I find myself living in the same house in which my ancestor performed a piece of magic that involved the brutal murder of a girl? Why was Kelly killed here and the Eastern European girl at Skendleby Hall? Why was I attacked? What happened here last year? They’re all related. Put the answers to these together and I think the picture of what’s going to happen will become clearer.”
Viv placed a hand on her arm, asking softly:
“But what do you think all this means?”
“Something terrible is coming: I think that we’ve been collected. The elements for some terrible ancient reckoning are being put in place. Soon the gathering will be complete; until then we wait for the agent who will set things in motion. I don’t think we’ll have to wait long.”
*******
Shortly afterwards, as Theodrakis and Viv were walking to the car, another vehicle pulled up in the drive. The door opened and Claire Vanarvi got out. Viv noticed that she was wearing the necklace of ivory, it looked bigger somehow. To her surprise Claire made no acknowledgement. Her attention was focused on the passenger door of her car, which was slowly opening. A pale, nervous looking young woman emerged and Claire took her by the arm, shepherding her towards the open front door of the women’s house.
Chapter 24: Carcass Breath
“Listen, Ed, it’s under the chapel, that’s where it happened, that’s where we have to look.”
It was the third time she’d said this since he answered the phone and he was still trying to get his head round what had happened to her in Manchester. The news of the attack was shocking but in a way he wasn’t surprised, he’d noticed the dark energy gathering again.
“Ed, are you listening? We need to get down there, you can fix it, the archaeologist is your friend. Don’t you understand that there’s a pattern to this? He was the one who looked after me outside the restaurant. Or do you think that’s just another coincidence?”
“No, but we have to be sure, wait till I’ve spoken to Claire.”
“She’s the last person you should go near.”
They agreed to differ and she rang off. He was feeling squeezed and needed someone to lean on. The news that Lisa Richardson was now in the women’s house didn’t feel right either. He had to talk to Claire.
Before Olga rang him he’d made another connection with the past: Marcus Fox had called him from a phone box somewhere on the Welsh borders following a sleepless night of dark visions and foreboding. Apparently his cottage had no mains services and Marcus didn’t have a mobile so he had walked the miles through intermittent snow to the nearest village. In his state of health he must have been desperate to make the attempt. It had been down to the ex-priest’s certainty that they’d come up with the plan to neutralise the entity from the Skendleby mound the previous Christmas.
Marcus wasn’t so certain now, he’d sounded desperate: desperate and frightened. So much so that it had been difficult to follow his ramblings at first, but once he caught the drift, Ed felt a chill pass through him.
“I don’t think it worked, Ed, I’ve been seeing things that couldn’t be real if it had worked.”
Ed asked what things, but in his heart he knew and what Marcus said next confirmed it.
“The exorcism, Claire’s exorcism of that unfortunate girl. I shouldn’t have asked Claire to do it, she hadn’t the strength. The creature must have detected her weakness, must have wriggled into the fault lines of her earlier mental illness.”
“How can you be sure, Marcus? Everything went the way you said it would and Claire was fine afterwards.”
For a moment Marcus seemed reassured, asking:
“Are you sure she’s fine? You haven’t noticed any change in her?”
“Well, a little perhaps, but that’s only to be expected.”
“I knew it! Had it worked I wouldn’t be haunted by these things. The creature left the Richardson girl but didn’t return to the tomb. So where did it go? Oh, sweet Jesus.”
There was a pause, Ed found himself shouting down the phone:
“Marcus, Marcus, are you alright?”
Then, from the phone somewhere in the dark among the snowy borders:
“We have to rethink this, Ed, you must be very, very careful, I’m out of time, try to....”
The line went dead. Ed tried to ring back but there was no answer, just endless ringing. He called Gwen in Shrewsbury but only got the answerphone so left a message for her to check that Marcus was all right. Then he fetched the whisky bottle from the dining room and poured himself a stiff drink. He was finishing the second of these when Mary popped her head round the door, telling him to come to bed.
He thought he’d never sleep with the burden of responsibility and the fear of what was coming chasing crazy rhythms through his overheated mind. Gradually he focused on what Olga had said about Hikman and the shadows under the chapel. His last fully conscious thought was that maybe what had happened down there had put a spoiler on their ritual last year.
*******
“Sorry to wake you so early on a Saturday, Ed, dear, but I’ve got Mrs Carver on the phone, she says she needs to talk to you.”
Mary passed him the handset and swept the curtains back, allowing a smear of sludgy grey light to creep into the room. He sat up and pressed the handset to his ear.
“Hello, Mrs Carver, is anything the matter?”
“I told you, call me Suzzie-Jade, for the present at least.”
There was a giggle and he wondered if he was being mocked but the thought evaporated with what she said next.
“Today’s your chance. Si’s gone into town and taken them shaven-headed fuckwits with him. I’m going to Barton Oaks so the place is empt
y. Come in through the gate in the estate wall. I’ve left it open, the chapel’s unlocked.”
Ed started to protest but it was too late.
“Good luck, vicar, see yaaa.”
Now he knew events were conspiring and an unavoidable decision was microseconds away. His gut instinct was pulling him towards something his rational mind rejected. But he wasn’t a rational man any more: he’d seen too much for that to still be an option. However, a glimmer of rationality must have still been fighting its corner because he decided to seek advice before taking any action. He rang Claire, first at home where there was no answer, then on her mobile where he got the answering machine. At the bleep he found himself saying:
“Hi, Claire, it’s Ed…er…I just wanted to check something with you.”
He stammered to a halt and then added, before he had chance to think about it:
“Oh, and I spoke to Marcus. He thinks your exorcism failed and the thing didn’t return to the tomb.... so where did it go? Ring me when you get this please.”
He got out of bed and shivering, dressed slowly, hoping she’d ring back but the phone remained silent and inert. It was cold, frost on the windows; the rectory was too big and expensive to heat. Downstairs, Mary wanted to know:
“What did that woman want you for? It’s the first time I’ve spoken to her since they moved in.”
But Ed wasn’t listening, his mind was elsewhere and after a quick slurp of coffee he got up to go.
“Sorry, Mary, I’ve a couple of visits to make.”
He could see that she was disappointed.
“Oh, Ed, we were going into town to shop for Christmas, you said today was free.”
He hated to disappoint her, after all, without her he’d have cracked up long ago, but he had no choice.
“Sorry, but it shouldn’t take me long. I’ll be back in a couple of hours, we can go then.”
