The Lazarus Tree

by Robert Richardson

  ‘Wh ... wh ...’ Michelle sobbed as she tried to speak. ‘What happened?’

  Mildred held up her hand, indicating she was still recovering. After a few moments, she nodded as though she had explained something to herself.

  ‘It’s this man. This visitor.’

  ‘What do you mean?’

  ‘He’s an outsider and he’s interfering. The vibrations are very bad.’

  ‘But ... but what’s he done?’

  ‘We don’t know. That’s the problem.’ She glanced at the girl sharply. ‘He’s been seen in the churchyard, you know. I should have realised that would cause a disturbance. Have you seen him there?’

  Unthinking admission came out of her terror. ‘That’s where I talked to him.’

  ‘Then that’s it! Why didn’t you tell me before we started?’ Mildred was suddenly accusing. ‘Did you let something slip out?’

  ‘Of course not. I’m not stupid.’

  ‘You’ve got to be careful. I’ve told you that time and time again. He’s only here for a few days, isn’t he? Have as little to do with him as possible. Once he’s gone, it will be all right.’

  Michelle looked at the cards strewn across the table, mute reminders of desperate agitation. She had never been as scared in her life as during those endless seconds of insane violation. The room’s mildewed sense of age now carried a chill of malevolence; the game had become nasty and the knowing adolescent was a frightened little girl. The thought of home was a promise of sanctuary.

  ‘I’ve got to go. I said I’d be back by ten.’

  Mildred Thomson did not move as the girl walked out. She heard the outer kitchen door close, then gathered the cards together in claw-bent fingers and tapped the pack on the table top. She would have to be cautious now if she was to keep her precious hold over Michelle Dean. She was also aware that she did not understand what had happened.

  *

  Out of compulsive habit, Gilbert Flyte had set out his notes and reference books in order before inserting the disc in his word processor and calling up ‘Chapter Twenty: The Scent of the Sea’. But the regular and regimented had provided no retreat. Incapable of rationalisation, he could only worry, conjuring up increasingly threatening possibilities, each convincing him that it would become reality. Madcap imagination whipped tiny details into tidal waves of panic. The first thing the man ... what the devil was his name? ... had asked was about the cottage. What did he suspect? What did he know? Had he been spying? Asking questions? Who had sent him? Each theory his mother had produced at dinner seemed plausible until Maltravers assumed the proportions of every authority figure in the world; and Gilbert Flyte held such people in excessive and fearful respect.

  He tried to force himself to be calm. There had never been the slightest suggestion of anyone suspecting anything. While he had at first tried to find the courage to defy the police, he had of course let them take his fingerprints and nothing had happened — which meant they were satisfied. Or did it? Had they gathered some evidence together and were looking for the rest? There had been strangers in Medmelton during the summer, not many and they had been ignored as tourists, but tourists hardly ever came. One man had taken photographs in the churchyard ... and at that cricket match when Flyte had been scoring. Had he taken a picture of him, passing it off as a holiday snapshot when it was actually for an official file?

  Like new outbreaks of flame in a forest fire, fresh worries flared in his mind. How long had this man been here? Had he already talked to Doreen — she’d chat to anybody — probing with subtle skill, extracting more fragments of information? Had he met Mother when she was wandering round the village? She was worse than Doreen, telling complete strangers the entire family history. He probably carried a hidden tape recorder, now filled with unguarded comments to be analysed against what the police already knew as they relentlessly built up their case. And tonight in the Raven, he had made his approach seem so casual — they were trained to do that of course — as he began to close in. The little finger of Gilbert Flyte’s right hand began to twitch ... he jumped violently as there was a hesitant knock on the study door.

  ‘What is it?’ Accumulated panic burst out in his voice.

  ‘Gilbert? Are you all right?’ Through the door, Doreen sounded bewildered; nothing less than the house being on fire would have allowed her to open it. ‘News at Ten has started.’

  ‘I’m not ... I’m busy ... I’ll be down shortly.’

  Conditioned by years of never entering the study while her husband was working in the evening, Doreen Flyte gave a little nervous whimper then went back downstairs. Gilbert’s cocoa and two chocolate digestive biscuits were on the table by his chair, the newscaster had just completed the headlines and was starting the main story, everything was in its immutable place in the room. Sitting on the hearthrug, Bobby looked at her, mutely seeking an explanation for his master’s absence. Doreen clung to her own routine for reassurance, clasping her hands round the comforting warmth of her mug of cocoa and staring at the screen; if they had announced the assassination of the entire royal family, she would not have registered what they were saying.

  *

  Familiar since childhood with life in the country, nights of silence and unbroken darkness had held no alarms for Michelle Dean. But when she escaped from Mildred Thomson, it was into the familiar become menace. Invisible goblin presences crouched all over the green she had to cross and the tower of St Leonard’s, shadowed in clouded moonlight, waited like a hungry creature whose lair she had to pass. Tears of panic blurring her eyes, she ran through one terror towards another, the tower growing bigger and more dreadful as she approached it. She overcame a shrieking, insistent impulse to look towards the Lazarus Tree as she raced down the path alongside the churchyard wall, crying as she stumbled on a root, then dashing on to where Dymlight Cottage’s high hedges promised protection. She burst through the front door as though devils howled at her heels.

  ‘What the hell’s the matter?’ Stephen snapped with alarm as she crashed in, slamming the door behind her and leaning against it, panting. He was sitting in the wingback chair by the fireplace. Maltravers and her Uncle Ewan on the chaise-longue opposite him; all of them were looking at her. There was no sign of her mother. It was painful as she swallowed and heartbeats pounded through her head.

  ‘I ... I’ve been running,’ she gasped. ‘I’m late.’

  ‘It’s only five past,’ Stephen said. ‘We weren’t worried.’

  ‘Where’s Mum?’

  ‘She’s just gone to bed. Bit of a headache ... are you all right? You look as though ...’

  ‘Of course I’m all right.’ Safe now, Michelle’s self-confidence was beginning to return. It was childish to let adults know you were scared of anything. ‘Hello, Uncle Ewan. How’s Auntie Ursula?’

  ‘She’s fine.’ Ewan Dean dismissed the conventional inquiry. ‘Where’ve you been?’

  ‘Just out. To see Ann and Frances ... Can I finish these?’ She crossed to where a couple of stuffed olives remained in a dish on an occasional table next to Maltravers. She had regained enough control to know that the best way of deflecting interrogation was to behave normally.

  ‘Help yourself,’ Maltravers said. Her uncle and stepfather seemed to be relaxing, persuaded there was no immediate crisis, but he still watched the girl closely. A terrified child had burst through the door, cloak of adolescent false courage in shreds. The previous evening she had returned home nearly an hour later, irritatedly impatient towards criticism and concern.

  ‘Who are Ann and Frances?’ he asked as she took the olives.

  ‘What?’ So bland a question should not have produced the apprehension that flashed across her face. ‘Just girls from school. I often go and see them. They’re twins ... we’re in the same class. We help each other with homework ... then play records and that. Talk ... we don’t do anything silly, like ... well like anything.’

  She hated the way she could not stop offering explanations when non
e was needed. She suddenly realised how blue Maltravers’s eyes were — like Patrick’s, but lacking that metallic glint. She swallowed again and gagged on the half-chewed olive.

  ‘I’ll get some water,’ she choked and ran to the kitchen. Maltravers watched her back as she stood at the stainless steel sink and noticed the spasm of agitation that shivered across her shoulders. He exchanged a concerned glance with Stephen, then picked up the conversation he had been having with Dean when they were interrupted. It seemed best to lay down natural cover for what he was certain would be Michelle’s retreat to bed.

  ‘Is there enough business in Exeter to support a specialist model shop?’ he asked. ‘Or do you do mail order as well?’

  Dean began to explain the differences between serious and casual collectors, but Maltravers noticed that his eyes kept flicking towards the kitchen door and he broke off when Michelle came back.

  ‘Better now?’ he inquired.

  ‘Fine. I’m going to bed. Goodnight.’ Nervous loquaciousness when Maltravers had spoken to her had been replaced with minimal communication again. As she left the room, Dean appeared to have forgotten that he had been talking.

  ‘Which are the most popular models?’ Maltravers prompted.

  ‘Pardon? Oh, it goes in cycles. After the Gulf war everybody wanted Tornados or the Stealth bomber. Some even asked if we did Scud missiles. Proper collectors are more consistent.’ Michelle disappeared upstairs and Dean turned back to him. ‘Are you interested?’

  Maltravers laughed. ‘Hardly. I’m hopeless at things like that. When I was a kid I tried building a model Spitfire out of a kit and it ended up about as aerodynamic as the British Museum.’

  Stephen began telling his brother-in-law of how he had once found Maltravers helplessly surrounded by the wreckage of a toaster, having failed to establish at the outset that the fuse in the plug had blown, and of the time when ... Long unapologetic for his practical incompetence, Maltravers had the sense that Dean’s attention was somehow detached. After a few minutes, he glanced at his watch and said he had to go. The two men remained silent as they heard the kitchen door into the back garden close behind him.

  ‘Well?’ Stephen finally asked elliptically.

  ‘I think the first thing to do is check with this Ann and Frances,’ Maltravers replied. ‘Obliquely of course. You’ll see them at school tomorrow?’

  ‘Yes, they’re in my fourth-year set. Do you think she was with them tonight?’

  ‘Frankly, no. And lying when it could be checked so easily was either stupidity or panic. But she’s not stupid. The point is, where was she? And what was she doing?’

  ‘God knows.’ Stephen shook himself as though to break claws of unease. ‘What the hell is happening, Gus? You said you knew something.’

  Maltravers lit a cigarette. ‘I don’t know anything. I’ve told you there’s a bizarre theory ...’

  ‘Whose? Who’ve you been talking to?’ Stephen glared at him. ‘I asked you here to help, not throw up more bloody mysteries!’

  ‘All right,’ Maltravers agreed. ‘It’s not fair and I’m sorry to have held out on you. I’ll tell you as long as you agree not to say anything to Veronica — or anyone else — at this stage and you don’t fly off the handle and start charging in like the Seventh Cavalry, however much you may want to. You’re in danger of becoming too emotionally involved. Anyway, I’ll now tell you about my chat with Sally Baker.’

  ‘Sally Baker?’

  ‘That’s it. Shrewd lady.’ Maltravers glanced towards the kitchen through which Dean had left. One thing he was not going to mention was his suspicion about Ursula and Bernard Quex; there was enough salacious gossip in Medmelton without him adding to it.

  TEN

  ‘Is Tess Davy about? OK, I’ll hold. Thanks.’

  Maltravers stood by the front-room window with his portable phone, looking at the tower of St Leonard’s rising over Dymlight Cottage’s high hedges. Stephen had remained very calm the previous evening, accepting Maltravers’s insistence that the idea of Michelle being involved in the sinister churchyard rituals was still only a theory, and that there was nothing concrete at this stage. He had phoned the parents of the twins Michelle said she had gone to see with some spurious excuse that she might have left something behind. They confirmed she had been with their daughters, but had left some time before nine thirty — and they lived less than five minutes’ walk away. So there was half an hour unaccounted for. She had not been dressed for hanging around the churchyard on an October night, so had she visited someone else? Stephen was going to check casually with another girl in the village, but Maltravers privately doubted that she had been with her. Michelle had told the truth; but saying where she had genuinely been for part of the evening was only cover for whatever else she had done — and that something else had sent her racing home in terror. Stephen was uneasy, but had agreed to leave the situation with Maltravers until something more definite emerged — if it ever did. Faced with walls of silence, Maltravers could think of nothing to do except agitate Medmelton’s surface again.

  ‘Hello, darling. How are you?’ Sanity was a voice from BBC Bristol.

  ‘Being chased by ghoulies and ghosties and long-legged beasties and things that go bump in the night.’

  ‘What? You can’t be pissed this early in the day.’

  ‘Protective humour,’ he explained. ‘Have you got a few minutes?’

  ‘I’ve got as long as you want. They’re trying to untangle a snarl-up in editing. What’s the matter?’

  ‘I want to tell you some tales of ancient witchcraft in darkest Devon and how I have become persona decidedly non grata in Medmelton. If they still had stocks on the village green that’s where I’d be calling from.’

  ‘You’re sounding paranoid, but I’m afraid it’s another couple of days before I can come and stop them throwing things at you.’

  ‘I’m not paranoid — they really are out to get me.’

  ‘Oh, stop it!’ Tess protested. ‘I don’t need this first thing in the morning. What are you raving about?’

  Maltravers turned from the window and sprawled on the chaise-longue. ‘Here beginneth the reading and you can ask questions at the end.’

  It took twenty minutes to explain known facts, bizarre theories and his own thoughts, after which Tess was exploding with questions. Most of them he had already asked himself — and had no answers — but one leapt out at him like a light going on.

  ‘Who is Michelle’s father?’

  ‘Why?’ he demanded sharply, ahead of reasoning out implications.

  ‘Because if you’re right about suspecting that Patrick Gabriel wasn’t bothered about the fact she was under the age of consent and her father learnt about it ... come on, you can work it out yourself. But was he from Medmelton and does he still live there? Have you asked Stephen?’

  ‘He doesn’t know. Veronica’s always refused to talk about it. To anybody. But ... Michelle’s birthday is some time in May, so if Veronica was here in ... May, April, March ... some time the previous August, then it could mean her father is from Medmelton.’ Maltravers gave a grunt of frustration. ‘But how do I find out?’

  ‘If her parents are still around, ask her mother,’ Tess advised. ‘She’d be a very odd woman if she hadn’t worked out the timing and tried to guess who it was. Have you met them?’

  ‘No, but Stephen’s told me where they live. He vaguely said we might call on them.’

  ‘Take him up on it ... and he might have discussed it with them anyway. It’s all I can think of, but it’s worth a try.’

  ‘It certainly is,’ Maltravers agreed. ‘Good thinking, Batwoman. But it still leaves the question of what the hell’s going on with Michelle and this damned Lazarus Tree.’

  ‘That’s really weird,’ Tess said. ‘Surely the kid can’t believe in conjuring up the dead?’

  ‘She believes in something — and somebody’s leading her on. And it certainly can’t be her father, whoever he is. That ...’


  ‘Hold on,’ Tess interrupted. ‘You say Veronica hasn’t told anybody who he is. Not even Michelle?’

  ‘Not as far as I know.’

  ‘Well, when she’s eighteen, she’ll be legally entitled to find out for herself, of course.’

  ‘She could find that difficult,’ Maltravers said. ‘Stephen once told me that her father’s name doesn’t appear on her birth certificate. Veronica simply refused to give it and there was no way to make her.’

  ‘But Veronica must accept that Michelle’s got a right to know,’ Tess protested. ‘What is she hiding, unless ... just a cotton-pickin’ minute! Why did Patrick Gabriel choose Medmelton to retreat to? How about he’d been there before ... fifteen years ago, perhaps? Is what I’m thinking insane or am I just going too fast for you?’

  ‘Don’t be patronising ... but it hadn’t occurred to me,’ Maltravers admitted. ‘But there are a lot of holes in it. They remember strangers in Medmelton and I’m not aware of anyone suggesting that Gabriel had been here before. And even if he was Michelle’s father, why didn’t Veronica name him?’

  ‘You know what she’s like,’ Tess commented. ‘She keeps secrets for her own reasons. However, he comes back, meets Michelle ... and perhaps incest is one of the things he hadn’t tried. From what you’ve told me about Patrick Gabriel, it’s horribly plausible.’

  ‘Assuming, of course, that he knew about Michelle in the first place ... but the more you think about it, the more preposterous it becomes. This was enough of a mess before I rang you.’