JC looked at him steadily. “Why did you call for us, Adrian? What’s really going on here?”
“I used to work for the Carnacki Institute before I retired,” said Brook. “Though never as a field agent, like you. No, me and my crew, we would turn up long after you were gone, to clean up. Remove the bodies, clear up the mess you left behind, and do whatever was necessary, or practical, to remove the psychic stains from the environment. Not glamorous work, perhaps, but necessary. We all did our best, to prevent nightmares. Anyway, I put in my years, stuck it out as long as I could, then I took early retirement. I’d had enough. I came back here, to my old home-town, and bought this pub. Something to keep me busy, in my twilight years. A chance for a little peace and quiet, at last.
“I should have known better.
“I knew all the old stories, you see. I knew all about the ghosts and the strange happenings. Heard them from my old dad, who heard them from his dad, and so on. . So many stories, and all with the same point if you took the trouble to listen. That the King’s Arms was an unquiet place and always has been. But I thought they were stories, something to give the inn character and pull in the tourists. Tourists love a good ghost story. Money in the bank, as they say. And at first, everything was fine. .
“But, slowly at first, then more and more, I started to see things. Hear things. Experience things. . Things I knew from my time in the Institute were well out of the ordinary. And well out of my league. Worse still, my customers started to see them, too.”
“What sort of things are we talking about, Adrian?” JC said carefully.
“Not traditional ghosts, like in the stories,” said Brook. “Nasty things. Unquiet spirits. Dangerous presences. So I called up my old contacts at the Institute and told them I needed a field team here, to investigate. And a damned good one! I’ve never seen anything like this, Mr. Chance. . You’ve got to Do Something! Put the ghosts to rest or drive them out, or. . something!”
“So you can get your customers back?” said Melody.
“Because,” said Brook, “Something bad is coming. I can feel it.”
JC looked at Happy, who nodded slowly. “He might be right, JC. This inn gave me the creeps from out in the car park. Inside, it’s like standing in a slaughter-house, listening to the man with the hammer creeping up on you.”
He looked slowly around the empty bar. JC could see in Happy’s face that he was Seeing something. He moved in close beside the telepath.
“What is it, Happy?” he murmured. “What do you See? The face of the monster?”
“It’s not a presence,” said Happy, frowning. “Not as such. I’m not picking up any individual ghosts, or poltergeist activity, no real feeling of supernatural manifestations at all. . but this whole place feels bad. Not only the bar, the whole damned building. Steeped and soaked in psychic nastiness, going back. . centuries. Embedded in the stone and brick and wood. Like Chimera House, only worse. Much worse. Something spectacularly bad happened here, long and long ago. And I think it’s still happening. Calling the dead to it like moths to a flame.”
“There was nothing like that in the briefing files,” said Melody. “But they were. . pretty basic. Maybe I should get my kit out of my suitcase. See if I can turn up some solid evidence. .”
Happy was so disturbed he didn’t respond to her open dig at all. He was scowling now, turning his head back and forth in a troubled sort of way.
“Something’s here, JC. I mean right here, in the bar, with us. Watching. Listening. Making its plans against us.”
“Where?” said JC, looking quickly about him.
“Everywhere,” Happy said sadly.
“You’re not really going to wait till tomorrow, to make a start, are you?” said Brook, anxiously.
“Not after what our marvellous mutant telepath just said, no,” said JC. “But I do think we could all use a break before we get stuck in. A few minutes alone, to get our heads together, get our second psychic wind. . Do you have rooms prepared for us?”
“Of course, of course,” said Brook. “I dusted and aired them out as soon as I knew for sure you were coming. No-one’s stayed in them for years, you understand. I never even go up there at night, these days. I have a room, in town. . But I’ll stay here as long as you’re here. So let me show you to your rooms, so you can. . freshen up, and settle in.”
“Yes,” said JC. “And then we’ll come back down, and you can fill us in on all the details you’re holding back from us.”
Happy turned his head abruptly to look at Brook. “You didn’t just happen to come back to your old home-town, to retire. You didn’t just happen to buy this pub. Something important to you happened here. You have unfinished business, with the King’s Arms. .”
“Get out of my head!” said Brook.
“I don’t need to read your thoughts,” said Happy. “Simple deduction. Nice of you to confirm it, though. What did bring you back here, after all these years?”
“Like you said,” muttered Brook, looking away. “Something bad happened here. And it’s still happening.”
He walked over to the back of the main bar and opened a concealed door, uncovering a narrow staircase. “Your rooms are this way.”
JC took Happy by the arm and got him moving. They all gathered up their suitcases and followed Brook up a set of thinly carpeted wooden steps. The wallpapered walls were so close on both sides there was only room to go up single file. The lights were all off, upstairs. Brook stopped at the top and switched on the landing lights. He looked quickly about him, as though expecting something to happen; but nothing did. He seemed as much disappointed as relieved. He stepped quickly back, out of the way, to allow the others to join him on the landing. More dully wallpapered walls, distinctly old-fashioned, and more very thin carpeting. And rather more shadows than JC was comfortable with. Brook pointed out their three rooms, close to the top of the stairs. He slapped three large metal keys into JC’s hand, then hurried back down the stairs to the relative safety of the main bar.
JC looked at the three keys on his palm. Large, heavy, old-fashioned things. Melody hauled her heavy suitcase up the last few steps and bent over it, breathing hard. While she was preoccupied, JC looked at Happy.
“Your face is flushed, and you’re sweating. Have you taken something?”
“Not everything about me is down to the pills,” said Happy. “I don’t always need them.”
“Why do you need them now?” said JC. “What started you off again?”
“You want the straight answer?” said Happy. “Because I ran out of reasons not to.”
JC wanted to say more, but there was a cold finality in Happy’s voice that stopped him. So he moved over to join Melody.
“You have to talk to Happy,” he said quietly. “He’s in a bad way. He’ll listen to you, where he won’t listen to me.”
“He got himself into this situation; he can get himself out,” said Melody.
“Harsh, Mel,” said JC. “It’s not that simple, and you know it.”
“Of course I know it!” said Melody. She looked right at him for the first time; and she looked horribly tired and worn-out. “You can’t help someone who doesn’t want to be helped, JC. He doesn’t need you, or me, or the job. He needs his pills. I thought I could change that, give him something else he could depend on. But I couldn’t. He’s on his own now. Because that’s the way he wants it.”
“But why does he want that?” said JC.
“I don’t know!” said Melody.
She stuck out her hand for the key to her room. JC gave her the key to Number Seven, and she stomped over to the door, dragging her suitcase along behind, rucking up the thin carpet. She unlocked the door, went inside, and slammed the door shut behind her. JC turned back to Happy, who suddenly threw his arms around JC and held him tight. JC held on to him, not knowing what else to do.
“I’m lost, JC,” said Happy, his face pressed into JC’s shoulder. “I don’t know what to do! It’s like I’m drownin
g, and I’m going down for the third time. .”
He let go of JC abruptly and stood back. He held out a hand for his key, and JC gave him the key to Number Eight. Next door to Melody. Happy took his suitcase, unlocked the door, and went inside, shutting the door quietly behind him. JC looked at Happy’s closed door, then at Melody’s. The only thing he knew for sure was that you should never reveal your weaknesses, out in the field. Because the opposition will always take advantage. . He walked over to his room, Number Nine, then turned abruptly to look back down the length of the landing. All the other doors were closed, everything was perfectly still. Outside, he could hear the wind rising and the rain battering against the single window at the far end.
A bad night to be outside. Or, probably, inside.
FIVE
ENCOUNTERS IN EMPTY ROOMS
JC sat listlessly on the only chair in his room and looked about him, for want of anything else to do. It wasn’t much of a room. Dusty, airless, the bed-clothes probably only put on the bed that very day, after Brook was sure they were coming. JC didn’t need to be told no-one had used this room in ages. Any sane person would have taken one look around and moved out immediately.
It was a typical country-pub room-barely big enough to hold the bed and some very basic furniture. The bed itself was a single, deliberately undersized to make the room look bigger. JC didn’t expect to be spending any time actually sleeping in the bed, which was just as well. He was pretty sure his feet would stick out the end. A battered, old-fashioned wardrobe stood to one side, its unpolished wood covered with scrapes and scratches; and an equally uncared for chest of drawers stood on the other side of the bed. No television, not even a radio. A door at the rear led off to a frankly tiny bathroom. A low ceiling, deeply dull wallpaper; and not even a carpet to cover the bare floor-boards. The pale yellow light from the single bulb seemed flat, lifeless, even oppressive. At least the shadows were staying still. The wind rattled the only window in its frame, while rain spattered against the glass. It sounded cold, and desolate. JC felt like he was a long way from anywhere.
He looked at his suitcase, standing alone and unopened on the bed. The suitcase he always kept packed and ready in his apartment, for those occasions when he had to leave in a hurry, on the Boss’s word, for some mission that wouldn’t wait. He didn’t need to open his suitcase and look inside to know what was in there. The contents never changed. Only the essentials; and a few nasty tricks that the Institute didn’t need to know about. Because he wasn’t supposed to have them. There was a lot to be said for planning and preparation; but JC had always been a firm believer in cheating. Your opponent can guard against plans and have contingencies in place for what you’ve prepared; but they’re always baffled and helpless in the face of blatant cheating.
JC looked almost fondly at the suitcase, then sat up straight in his chair as the suitcase began to move. It rocked slowly back and forth at first as though making up its mind and gathering its strength, then it edged slowly forward along the bed, humping along in a series of slow, jerky movements, rucking up the counterpane as it went. JC rose out of his chair and glared at his suitcase.
“Stop that! Right now! Or there will be trouble!”
The suitcase stopped moving. It stood very still, half-way along the bed, as though trying to pretend it had never moved at all. Only the crumpled counterpane remained to show the length of its travels. JC stood there for a moment, watching the suitcase carefully, then reached forward and pushed the case hard, with one extended finger. The case rocked back and forth, very slightly, and was still again.
JC opened the suitcase and looked inside, but no-one had sneaked anything in. Everything was as it should be. So he closed the suitcase again, lifted it up, and placed it on the floor by the far wall, where he could keep an eye on it. The suitcase remained where he put it, as though it had got the whole moving thing out of its system.
The door to the oversized wardrobe swung slowly open. The heavy dark slab of wood moved slowly and silently, and the brass hinges didn’t so much as creak once. JC waited until the door had stopped moving, then he edged cautiously forward to look inside the wardrobe. Nothing there. Not even any coat hangers. Only shadows and dust. JC shut the door, and looked at it; and it didn’t move. Instead, the door to the landing swung slowly open.
JC caught the first movement out of the corner of his eye and spun around quickly to watch the door open all the way, all on its own. Out on the landing, the somewhat brighter lights were still on; and it was clear there was no-one out there who could have opened the door. JC strode forward and stepped through the open doorway and out onto the landing. He looked up and down the long corridor, but no-one was out and about. Happy and Melody’s doors remained firmly closed. JC took a firm hold of the door-handle, stepped back inside his room, and pulled his door shut.
He could have locked it. But somehow, he had a feeling that wouldn’t make any difference.
On the other side of the room, the door to the tiny bathroom swung open. JC glared at it. There was something eerie and even upsetting, about the refusal of his doors to stay shut. It made JC feel. . that he wasn’t in control of things. And he hated that. He hurried over to the bathroom door and slammed it shut. The wardrobe door swung open. JC slammed that shut as well. And while he was doing that, the door to the landing opened. JC ran across the room and slammed it shut with all his strength; and then stood with his back pressed against it, glaring round the room. Breathing hard, and not only from the exertion of running back and forth. It was all happening so quietly. . There was no actual threat, or attack, nothing jumping out from behind any of the opening doors. It was as though the room was mocking him and defying him to do anything about it.
“All right!” he said grimly. “Among the many things I’m not supposed to have with me, there is an exorcism grenade in my suitcase. Packed full of holy light; just the thing to dispel unruly spirits. Do you really want to play hard core, this early in the game?”
There was a long pause. JC stood stiffly with his back to the door, glowering around his room, from door to door. . but nothing moved. JC nodded and allowed himself a small smile. Some phenomena bluff really easily.
Kim walked into his room, passing effortlessly through the outer wall. Which was disconcerting given that they were on the first floor. JC couldn’t bring himself to give a damn. He moved away from the door, smiling at Kim. She smiled happily back at him and shot him a sultry look. She’d shifted her ectoplasm again, changing her appearance just for him; and now she was dressed in a traditional tweed suit, complete with strings of pearls. She’d even shortened her gleaming red hair and arranged it in a serious country-set cut. On her, it looked good. JC grinned.
“Someone down in the bar was wearing an outfit exactly like that.”
“I know!” said Kim. “I was there, watching unseen, and listening. Honestly, darling, such a bunch of story-tellers! Wouldn’t know a real ghost if it manifested in their living room, right in front of the television.”
“Was that your face at the window?” said JC.
“Of course not,” said Kim. “I had a damned good look, and I didn’t see a face in any window. I think someone got caught up in the drama of the moment.”
The two of them were standing face-to-face now, looking deep into each other’s eyes. It was as close as they could come to holding each other. The living and the dead might love each other, but they could never touch. Which was one of many reasons why such relationships were frowned upon, by. . pretty much everybody. JC and Kim stood so close together, they could have felt their breath on each other’s faces if more than one of them had been breathing.
“Why didn’t you join us before?” JC said finally. Because it was easier to talk about the job than so many other things. “You could have come with us, on the train. I could have used your company. Happy and Melody were sniping at each other all the way down. .”
“I travel more quickly on my own,” said Kim. “I used the low r
oad, the hidden path of the dead.”
“Oh yes?” said JC. “And what was that like?”
“Busy,” said Kim.
“I don’t really want to know, do I?”
“No, sweetie,” said Kim.
“It is good to see you again, my love,” said JC.
“And you, my darling,” said Kim.
They high-fived each other, their palms not quite touching.
“There are things I can’t talk about,” said Kim, “And there are things I won’t talk about because I’m dead and you’re not. One of us has to be the sensible partner in this relationship. So I’ve been here at the King’s Arms for some time, waiting for you to catch up. . looking around, moving unseen, pushing my nose into things.”
“And?” said JC.
“I haven’t seen anything supernatural,” said the girl ghost, frowning prettily. “But I can say, very definitely; that I don’t like the feel of this place. It’s hiding things from me.”
“So is Brook,” said JC. “He knows a lot more than he’s telling.”
“But he’s the one who called you for help,” said Kim. “Why would he hold back information that might help you help him?”
“Good question,” said JC. “Did you see what was happening just now, here in my room?”
“No,” said Kim. She listened carefully as JC explained about the doors that didn’t want to stay shut. Kim’s eyes gleamed eagerly as she pattered noiselessly round the room, studying everything with great interest.
“I don’t See anything, darling. The doors are quite definitely nothing other than doors.”
“I never got the sense there was anyone moving them,” said JC. “But it wasn’t any kind of illusion. And my suitcase really did move, on its own, just like the doors.”
“Physical phenomena,” said Kim. “Never a good sign. It takes a lot of power, of accumulated energy, for the dead to affect the material world directly. But I don’t smell any poltergeist residue. .” She turned abruptly to grin at JC. “I wish I’d been here to see it!”
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