Department 18 [04] A Plague of Echoes

by Maynard Sims

  “Carry on then,” Crozier said, surreptitiously checking his watch again.

  “Do you know what a dybbuk is?”

  “A demon of the Jewish faith, if I’m not mistaken. It latches on to innocent souls, taking over their bodies in order to fulfill desires of its own.”

  Madaki nodded. “The last case Liscombe worked on concerned such a beast. It had attached itself to a young man, a rising star in London’s business sector. His family called in Liscombe when they noticed a marked change in his personality and character.”

  “And did Liscombe get rid of the dybbuk?”

  “Oh yes. Liscombe’s grandfather was Jewish. He knew exactly what he was up against. Unfortunately, although he saved the young man, he didn’t take adequate precautions to protect himself.”

  “It attacked him?”

  Madaki lowered his eyes, staring down at the tabletop. He ran his finger through a small puddle of spilt coffee, creating a wet streak. “Worse,” he said. “It possessed him.”

  Crozier sipped his drink. “How can you be sure?”

  “I have collected a lot of information over the years since I started looking into this. I have many witness statements testifying that, after the confrontation with the dybbuk, Liscombe changed. His behavior became erratic—he was prone to sudden, violent outbursts. Someone even said of him that it was as if he’s been replaced by his evil twin.”

  “Oh, come on, Tevin,” Crozier said, exasperation in his voice. “None of that means he was possessed. It’s all just hearsay and speculation.”

  “I agree, and at first I was skeptical…but more was to follow.”

  A voice floated out from a concealed loudspeaker announcing that the film was due to start in ten minutes. Crozier felt his relaxing evening slipping away from him.

  Madaki continued. “After he resigned from Department 18, Liscombe became quite a celebrity. You must know the story.”

  Crozier inclined his head, showing that he did.

  “He also became very outspoken, pronouncing on matters far outside his sphere of experience…at least, outside Liscombe’s sphere of experience. The Catholic Church was one of his most frequent targets, and they took great offence. There was a move to get him banned from television, led by Cardinal Heenan himself. But Liscombe was too popular. The masses—by that I mean the TV audience—felt he was on their side, that he was their voice. So it appeared he was going nowhere. And then, at the height of his popularity, Liscombe did his disappearing act. But he didn’t disappear at all. Instead he took a flight from Heathrow to Johannesburg. Only when he reached South Africa did he drop out of sight.

  “During his rise to notoriety, he had befriended a very wealthy South African businessman called Pieter Schroeder, and it was Schroeder who made sure that any trail to Liscombe ended in a very dead end.”

  “Tevin…” Crozier said, his patience as thin as gauze, “…where is all this heading?” People were leaving the restaurant, making their way towards the doors of the cinema.

  “I believe that the dybbuk abandoned Liscombe’s body and took up residence in Pieter Schroeder, a much more powerful and wealthy individual, and has been there ever since.”

  “Okay, so how does that affect the Department?”

  “Because Schroeder is now here in the UK and is gathering people around him in a kind of cartel. Rich, powerful and influential people, people whose decisions affect tens of millions of lives.”

  “And you think this dybbuk’s ambition is, what? World domination? Come on, Tevin, you can do better that. This isn’t some James Bond thriller.”

  Tevin Madaki looked slightly crestfallen. “I’m just telling you what I know,” he said.

  Crozier got to his feet. “I’ll have my people look into it. Now, if you’ll excuse me…”

  “Wait! Simon, before you go.” Madaki fished in his pocket and took out a silver chain attached to a thin, spiderlike charm. “Take this, and wear it at all times. It will protect you. The dybbuk can’t enter you while you are wearing it.”

  Crozier took the charm and fastened it around his neck, tucking it down inside his shirt. “There, satisfied?”

  Madaki nodded.

  Crozier extended his hand. He’d make the screening after all, albeit with just seconds to spare. “Well, thank you, Tevin. It’s been good to see you.”

  Madaki shook hands. “You’ll be seeing me again, old friend…when you realize how dangerous the thing inside Pieter Schroeder really is. I’m staying at the Marlborough Hotel in Kings Cross. You can reach me there.”

  As Tevin Madaki left the Institute, Crozier went into the cinema to watch Bergman…and couldn’t concentrate at all as the meeting with Madaki played over and over in his head.

  “So the next day I started researching Alvar Liscombe,” Crozier said. “Dragging up everything I could find out about the man.”

  “What about Schroeder?” Bailey asked.

  “I put Impey on that. Apart from stories about his businesses there’s very little. He keeps a very low profile, very little media exposure. He makes Howard Hughes seem like a gregarious socialite. So I concentrated on Liscombe, especially his last year with the Department.”

  “Did you find the report about his run in with the dybbuk?” McKinley said.

  Crozier shook his head. “There isn’t one. At least not written by Liscombe. He didn’t post a case file.”

  “So why attack you and destroy the Liscombe files? It doesn’t make any sense,” Bailey said.

  “It might do,” Crozier said. “At first I was researching Liscombe and his time with Department 18. For the past few days I’ve been spreading the net wider, looking into his life post Department, up until his disappearance.”

  “Did you find anything?”

  Crozier shrugged. “To be quite honest I was fitting the research in around my other duties. I pulled a few files from the National Database, and I’d made a few telephone calls to people I thought might point me in the right direction but the initial interest, prompted by the meeting with Madaki, had waned.”

  “Well, somewhere along the line, you must have hit a nerve,” McKinley said.

  Bailey’s cell phone buzzed in his pocket.

  “You shouldn’t be using that in here,” Crozier said.

  Bailey took the phone out and checked the caller ID. “It’s Jane. I’d better take it.”

  He walked out into the corridor. “What is it, Jane?”

  “We’ve been sitting with Trudy and the sketch artist. We have pictures on the man who threatened her, and the milkman who gave her the Respark.”

  “Can you send them through to my phone?”

  “Will do.”

  As he walked back into Crozier’s room his phone buzzed again. He glanced at the picture on his screen and then showed them to Crozier and McKinley.

  “Well, I don’t know who this person is,” Crozier said, jabbing his finger at the sketch of Michael O’Brien. “But this one here is Tevin Madaki.”

  “Then I think I’ll go and have a chat with him,” McKinley said. “The Marlborough, Kings Cross?”

  Crozier nodded. “And you, Harry?”

  “Everett Deayton.”

  “Good God, that’s a name from the past. I didn’t know he was still alive.”

  “Well, he is. I saw him earlier but he was evasive. He has something on Pieter Schroeder and I want to know what it is.”

  Chapter Twenty-Three

  Maria Bridge was in her office clearing up some much overdue paperwork. She looked up from her labors when Bailey appeared in the open doorway.

  “He seems to be making a good recovery,” he said.

  “He’s responding well to treatment. It’s quite remarkable,” she said, putting down her pen. “Come in. Take a seat.”

  Bailey pulled a chair up to the desk and sat.<
br />
  “What is it you wanted to see me about?” Bridge asked.

  “I went to see Everett Deayton this afternoon.”

  “Oh,” she said, picked up her pen again and started notating one of the papers in front of her.

  “I thought you might like to hear what he had to say about your family’s case.”

  For a moment she was still. The pen stopped scratching the paper. Her eyes seemed to glisten with tears. Finally she said, “I told you not to go to any trouble.”

  “It was no trouble,” he said.

  Abruptly she got up from the desk and crossed to the window, staring out at the view of the hospital car park, her back rigid, tension straining the sinews of her neck.

  “Don’t you want to know what Deayton said?”

  She gave a small shake of her head.

  There was an awkward silence in the room. “I’ve upset you,” Bailey said at last.

  “You meant well,” she said, not looking round at him.

  From where he sat he could see her reflection in the window. Tears were trickling down her cheeks.

  He got up from his seat and went across to her. “I’m sorry,” he said. “I thought you’d want to know.”

  “That’s just it, Harry. I do know.”

  “You do?”

  The tears were flowing more freely now; her shoulders shook slightly. She nodded her head. “His name was Toby,” she said. “The boy…the ghost. His name was Toby.”

  “Did you tell your parents that he’d made contact with you?”

  “No, I couldn’t. He told me what his parents used to do to him. Horrible, vile things. He just wanted to stay with me.”

  “He was a ghost, Maria.”

  She spun round to face him.

  “But he kept denying it, Harry!” she said. “He kept denying he was dead. At least he tried to. It was heartbreaking. He starting coming to me at night. He’d slip into my bed.”

  Bailey’s eyes widened slightly.

  Bridge shook her head vehemently. “No! Nothing like that. He just wanted to be close to me.”

  “So what happened? Why did the Department and Deayton get involved?”

  “My father caught us together. He came into my room one night and Toby was there. Father flew into a rage. Toby just melted away.” The tears started again. “The next morning I was sent away to stay with an aunt in Rye. When I was allowed to come home, Toby was gone and the house…well, the house was just empty.”

  “He moved on, Maria. They gave him a proper burial.”

  “Yes, I know. I get all that. But…”

  Bailey’s eyes narrowed. “There’s more, isn’t there? Something you’re not telling me.”

  Bridge took a breath and turned back to face the window.

  There was a heavy silence in the room.

  “Which of them was it, Maria? Your mother or your father?”

  Bridge’s silence continued for a few moments longer, finally she drew in another sobbing breath. “My father,” she said. “Toby knew and he was doing everything he could to protect me. He knew what I was going through.” She gripped the windowsill, her knuckles white. “Christ! Why am I telling you all this? Someone I barely know.”

  “Sometimes it’s easier. Did the abuse continue once Toby had gone?”

  She nodded sharply. “For a year or so, and then he had a heart attack. He wasn’t the same after that. He died two years later.” She turned to Bailey. “I rejoiced, Harry. I know that sounds terrible, but I felt such joy and relief. My nightmare was finally over.”

  “So why have followed in his footsteps and chosen the same career?”

  “For all his faults and, my God there were many, Colin Bridge was a fine doctor and a revered surgeon. I followed the same career path because I needed to prove myself, to myself if no one else, that I was better than him, that what he subjected me to hadn’t made me a lesser person. I want to top his achievements, Harry, grind them into the dirt. I need to do this for me. Do you understand?”

  “Yes,” he said. “I think I do.”

  And then she was in his arms and he was kissing her.

  As they parted a single thought ploughed a furrow in his thoughts. And how the hell did that happen?

  As McKinley pushed through the double doors of the hospital he met Tyler coming in the opposite direction.

  “Mr. McKinley. Robert Carter said you might be here. We need to have that chat now,” she said.

  “Could it wait until the morning?”

  “No, not really. Come back inside. I’ll commandeer an office. It won’t take long. I’ll soon have you on your way.”

  Realizing he had no alternative, McKinley turned and walked back into the hospital.

  Tyler flashed her ID card at the nurse on reception. “We need a room,” she said.

  The nurse checked the Detective Inspector’s credentials and stole a suspicious look at McKinley. “Okay,” she said. “Consulting room 3 is vacant at the moment. You can use that.” She pointed to a blue-painted door across from her desk.

  “Thank you,” Tyler said to the nurse. To McKinley she said, “Come on.”

  The room was small, furnished with a tubular steel chair, an examination couch and a screen folded away in the corner.

  McKinley eyed the screen. “You’re not going to ask me to drop my pants, are you?” he said.

  “Only if I find it absolutely necessary.” She hopped up onto the couch and pointed to the chair. “Take a seat.”

  McKinley grinned at her, sat and crossed his long legs.

  Tyler folded her hands in her lap. “Right, Mr. McKinley, what the hell is going on?”

  “What do you mean?”

  “I’ve just spent forty-five minutes with your friend Carter, during which time he told me precisely bugger all. I figure you might be more obliging. You appear to be a more reasonable type to me.”

  “Appearances can be deceptive,” McKinley said.

  “I hope not, because I’m this far…” she described half an inch with her index finger and thumb, “…this far from charging you with obstructing justice.”

  “That wouldn’t be a good idea.”

  “What will you do? Go running to the Home Secretary like your friend Bailey?”

  “No, I’ll tell my current boss and he’ll go running to the Home Secretary.”

  She sighed and pushed a strand of hair away from her eyes, giving him a long-suffering look.

  “Okay,” McKinley said. “I’ll tell you what I know, which isn’t much, but I’ll do my best.”

  “Your best is all I ask for.”

  McKinley uncrossed and recrossed his legs. “I take it you know what Department 18 does?”

  “Ghostbusters without the boiler suits.”

  McKinley smiled. “It’s not just ghosts. We deal with every kind of paranormal or supernatural entities—ghosts, demons, vampires, verani, witches, spiraci; you name it, we handle it and make it safe for the general public to go about their business unmolested by any of the above.”

  “It sounds like a very noble calling.” Sarcasm bordered her words.

  “Not noble, just necessary. In this instance we think we’re dealing with a dybbuk.”

  “And what the hell’s a dybbuk?”

  “According to Jewish lore it’s a wandering spirit that attaches itself to someone and takes them over, body and soul, in order to realize its own ambitions.”

  “So it’s a Jewish demon?”

  “Yes, and no. There are stories of these entities in every religion. It’s just that the Jews have given it a name, and a whole heap of folklore to go along with it.” He stood and walked the length of the room, stretching his legs and warming to the subject. “We believe that Mae Middleton was possessed by a dybbuk when she attacked Simon Crozier. The same entity posse
ssed Harry Bailey when he tried to strangle Simon. He shouldn’t have been arrested and certainly shouldn’t have found himself in jail.”

  Tyler stared at him frostily, wounded by the implied criticism. “I did what I had to do, given the circumstances. Do you think it’s easy for me to wrap my head around all this superstition and myth?”

  “And that’s why dybbuks, vampires, spiraci and the like flourish; because people can’t get their heads around the fact that they exist. The myths and legends muddy the waters; Hollywood and fiction writers down through the ages stir that muddy water up even more and obscure the basic truths. We are not alone on the planet; the fact that we’re still the dominant race is more through luck and sheer numbers rather than any other reasons.”

  “Okay, I’ll buy that for a moment. Let’s get back to the matter in hand,” Tyler said. “Alec Rutherford, the poor sod who cooked his own head. Is his death related to all this paranormal stuff?”

  “I think so, yes. Again, he was possessed, by the same dybbuk that possessed Mae Middleton.”

  Tyler ran a hand through her hair. In truth she wanted to grab a handful and yank it from her scalp. This case was proving more than frustrating. She was trying very hard to get a handle on it, but all this talk of dybbuks, possession and such like was undermining her basic instincts as a copper. Thieves and murderers, even con artists and fraudsters, were easier to understand than this gallery of Halloween monsters.

  “I need some time to think this through,” she said. “One part of me—a huge part of me—wants to dismiss everything you’ve said as superstitious bullshit, but then I have to accept that the government wouldn’t be funding a department like yours unless there was a good reason for its existence.” She pushed herself off the examination couch. “I’ll be in touch,” she said and walked to the door.

  “Inspector,” McKinley called after her. “I don’t mean to sound condescending but, in this case, you really would be better off leaving this to the experts.”

  She turned and held his gaze for a long moment. “I’ll take that, as the Americans say, under advisement. Good evening.”