I DIDN'T BURN ROSEMARY ALIVE

by Noel Scanlon

  A piece of thatch was ripped off the low roof above our heads. The sparks and pieces of red peat being blown out of the grate began to hurtle up through the opening.

  Dominic pulled me across the snug and into the bar area but not before I had grabbed Manju and called out to Maya. The bar was a mass of lurching, fighting figures. The counter had been ripped out and I caught a glimpse of Mr Carmody, his eyes aflame, kick a man on the ground and crack his ribs. There was an insane viciousness about the way he did it.

  We followed Dominic as he shouldered his way through the snug.

  Stepping over thrashing bodies, he pulled us through a side door marked “Gents”. The door gave on to an open field.

  We ran across the field and into another. I never thought I could be glad to feel the wet boggy earth underfoot or that melancholy weeping sky overhead. The fields and the road were empty of people. The few animals that were there seemed disturbed. The black cattle were lowing and trying to break out of the field. A herd of donkeys made off clattering along the road. Dominic’s sheepdog scampered ahead of us as if all hell was chasing it. It was whining, its tail tucked firmly between its legs. Other sheepdogs left to guard the cottages cowered and howled.

  Behind us the noise of the Annexe had turned into terrified screams. Sparks were pouring out through the roof and I had the impression of walls swelling and contracting like a concertina.

  Augustus John’s boat was gone from the pier. But Dominic pointed to another currach down there in the lapping darkness. We all jumped into it.

  CHAPTER 24

  Sitting here in the ashram garden, I have thought over the events of that night in Carmody’s. I have even considered asking the guru’s opinion but it is not a line of questioning he would consider productive or respond to.

  This morning here in India, Inishwrack seems very far away. It is early and I can hear the rhythmical brushwood sweeping as the disciples sweep their cells, the temple and the reception hall. From the outside world comes the distant creaking of a bullock cart and I can smell the acrid smelling blue smoke that rises from the cow-dung fires in countless villages and is the most pervasive smell of rural India.

  The outside world, I am all too well aware, is very different from our own secluded and contemplative world. Nor are most Indians in any way like the ashram devotees. Indian villagers, from what I have seen of them, must be among the most superstitious people on earth. It is impossible for them to move without consulting an astrologer or one omen or another. They believe in the evil eye and wear specially prepared lockets and charms to ward it off. The existence of evil powers, which is not always admitted in the west, is here enshrined in religion itself, being represented in various forms in the Hindu pantheon. It is, I suppose, one way of coming to grips with it.

  For all that, the superstitions in India, the miracles which take place (and they do take place frequently) seem to me to be of a different order, to be somehow more benign than their western counterparts. Perhaps this contrast occurs to me because there is so much more light and brightness here than in the west. In any event, remarkable as are the paranormal occurrences common in Indian, it is difficult to visualize psychic happenings here as dark and ugly and terrifying as our last days on Inishwrack.

  The crossing back to the island was rough and hazardous but Dominic, so awkward on land, managed that frail currach with brilliant seamanship. He steadied her on toppling precipices of water, sent her gliding through long smooth valleys. One missed stroke would have been the end of us. But Dominic seemed perfectly at home among the heaving mass of watery hills.

  I was thrown about in the boat but the experience I had just been through and the generally turbulent state of my mind anaesthetized me against the worst of the physical fear I would normally have felt.

  As we moved through the sea I was aware of the island. I had the feeling that it had become a huge magnetic force which was pulling us towards it, dragging us through heavy seas in wild plunges of the boat. Manju and Maya, braver than I, sat through all this with apparent serenity. For the last few hundred yards, we rode a breaker and were thrown up on the beach above the water-line.

  The minute I stepped ashore I could feel the heartbeat of the hill, a steady thumping sound much stronger and clearer than anything I had heard before. Stepping on to the island was like stepping on to some huge living animal. It had that feel about it. It was sentient. It was aware. At the same time I had the immediate impression of being watched.

  I heard a noise and, looking up, saw Augustus John approach. He was carrying a sickle probably the one I had seen him use on weeds in the graveyard. He kept swinging this sickle in a cutting movement. His whole demeanour made me fearful so much that I told the girls to go on to the church.

  “Do you have a moment, sur?” Augustus John asked. “There’s something I want to show you.”

  “You’ve no right to be on this island.” I said. “What are you doing here?”

  I had an awful premonition as to why Augustus John was there.

  “Ah now, sur,” Augustus John said. “I have a bit of unfinished business.” With that he swished a bloodied sickle he was carrying through the air.

  “What business?” I asked and my throat was dry. I had picked up the vibrations coming from Augustus John, and despite the softness of the voice he used, those vibrations unnerved me. There were forms and shapes and presences all around him, shapes that I could not quite see hovering behind the thinnest of veils, just a blink out of sight in a barely removed dimension. “I’m not going anywhere with you, Augustus John, I’m going to my cottage.”

  “If I might say so respectfully, sur, I think you’d better come.” He stepped forward and pressed the tip of the bloodied sickle into my back. Where had the blood come from? Who or what had he killed? I could feel the tip of the sickle penetrate my clothing. I looked around for Dominic; perhaps he would help. In the Annexe he had been unaffected by the entities. But there was no sign of him. He must have slipped away.

  “I think we’d better be getting on then, sur,” Augustus John said.

  He began to lead me or more correctly to force me up the hill, which was the last place I wanted to go.

  “This way, sur,” he said, leading off on a short cut and swinging the sickle from which blood dripped. I knew now that Augustus John had been taken over. He was still outwardly the same Augustus John. But the timbre of his voice was different. His eyes were quite different. There was something in there lurking, hiding, not wanting me to see it. The figure escorting me like a prison warder escorting a prisoner was at best a good imitation of Augustus John. It was his body but it was not he.

  “Up that way, sur,” Augustus John said pointing with the sickle.

  I floundered into a gully which had become a roaring torrent.

  “Not that way, sur,” Augustus John said, “more to the right.”

  I kept to the edge and splashed through side pools where boggy brown water bubbled and foamed. Even through the water I could feel the heartbeat of the hill.

  As we climbed higher, I could feel the hill’s magnetic pull grow stronger and stronger. I was moving more and more into its orbit. I could feel the whole hillside now throbbing with power, its bare flanks growing more luminous, the energy radiating from it intensifying with each upward step I took. And, all the time, Augustus John was behind me seeing I didn’t turn. I was trembling again. I was an exposed vulnerable dot on the side of the hill. “I think we have the place all to ourselves tonight,” Augustus John said, swishing his sickle and grinning insanely. “Unless the others decide to come out.” His mouth was quivering in a leer.

  The feeling of being watched intensified. It was stronger than I had ever felt it. It was as if a searchlight, composed not of light but some other form of energy, was beamed on me. The forms were sneaking out from the shadows, entering our dimension, oozing up out of the bog holes and gibbering into life.

  “We’re nearly there now, sur,” Augustus John said with
that horrible, unearthly grin. “I hope the climb hasn’t been too much for you, sur.”

  The thumping beat of the hill was a roar in my ears. Its inner vibrations hummed more and more intensely until I thought my head would burst.

  “Here we are, sur,” Augustus John said as we topped a rise.

  I knew well where we were headed, had known for some time. What now came into view was the Stone Man, the megalithic tomb, the Druidic altar. Only something was different. What was it? Of course. The Stone Man had moved. He had stepped inside the Druidic circle.

  A sound was coming from the tomb, an eerie sound that seemed perfectly to evoke the dark, ancient spirits which had somehow been unleashed. The sound, stumbling in the air, seemed perfectly in accord with those spirits.

  “I won’t keep you a moment, sur,” Augustus John said. “just a little bit of business I have to attend to.” His voice was horrible and unearthly. He strode down the slope and into the Druidic circle. Immediately a fire appeared on the stone altar. The fire flared high into the air rather like the oil waste being burned in a desert oil-field.

  The goat I had seen in the graveyard reappeared. Except that now, as he moved, his legs were abbreviated, appearing only in the upper half. Behind him trotted three female goats. It was to these goats that Augustus John turned his attention. Catching the first one by the horns he hurled it to the ground.

  “Easy there now, girl,” he said, and slit its throat over the pagan altar. He repeated the process with the other two, severing their heads with a powerful swipe of the sickle. Blood gushed and pumped on to the pagan altar spattering his clothes.

  While this was going on I was aware of the gathering around me, the materializing of the presences which had been just out of sight. As the third goat was sacrificed I could clearly feel them rush past me and into the circle.

  The Stone Man lurched, stepped forward, then stopped. Around him the psychic presences were assuming grotesque and horrible forms. Augustus John stood there holding the bloodied sickle aloft. “Could you step this way a moment, sur?”

  It was Augustus John and yet it was not Augustus John. He was strangely energized. His eyes glowed with a murderous glow. Whatever was hiding behind his eyeballs was showing itself more clearly.

  “It won’t take a moment, sur.”

  I felt myself being sucked down the slope to the very edge of the circle. I stumbled against one of the dead and bloodied goats.

  “Can I give you a hand, sur?” Augustus John said.

  He was coming towards me, moving through those horrible presences, swinging the bloodied sickle with a sharp swish through the air.

  CHAPTER 25

  I tried to move back down the hill but Augustus John cut me off.

  “You shouldn’t have done that, sur,” he said. “You’ll get me into trouble.”

  It was not only Augustus John who was barring my way. All the vegetation had risen up against me. The gorse, the brambles and the rushes had formed an impenetrable barrier.

  “All we want,” Augustus John said, “is a little co-operation. We need you. And you can do so much for us.

  I turned and ran in the only direction I could which was towards the Black Bog over which a white mist now hung.

  From a physical point of view, it was the most dangerous part of the island. The surface was covered with a light growth, with a scraw of heather and rough grass which made it look solid, but this appearance of solidity was deceptive. The scraw was only a thin layer. Immediately I put my weight on it, my feet burst through into the soft sogginess beneath. In the days when the island was inhabited, this had been one of the areas the people had kept away from, one of the forbidden places the old man had spoken of. I found a part where the skin seemed a little thicker and scrambled along it. I could feel the thumping sound, the beat of the hill coming up through the soles of my feet.

  But more terrifying than the physical danger were the dark forces which had burst out from the tomb and had followed me into the bog. I was surrounded by a myriad of disembodied eyes, some floating free, some in gibbering faces. They had come out of the tomb and were tearing at the thin veil which normally separates them from the dimension in which we live. Other ghostly forms brushed past me, forms not yet made visible.

  At the same time these forces were again trying to take over my mind. They were floating up from the depths of my subconscious as if they wanted desperately to possess me.

  I could hear Augustus John slapping along behind me, the only other human being in that area of intense desolation.

  “Hould on a moment, sur,” Augustus John said. “Don’t go a step further. That oul bog’ll suck you down. It sucked a lot of people down in the past. Hould on till I get to you.” He still held the sickle in his hand. The sight of it made me try to go faster.

  A desolate dirge came whispering across the bog, fashioned by the wind. It had the dimension of other, darker worlds. It pierced my brain, making my head throb. It hurtled down at me from the sky. It converged from various directions to make the air around me vibrate with its cords, utterly eerie and ancient. As it increased in resonance I screamed out loud.

  “Isn’t that a grand bit of music, sur,” Augustus John said. “Why don’t you join us? A man like you could be very useful, sur. A man with your talents.”

  His voice sounded nearer and I knew that he was closing on me.

  I was on a thin patch again. The ground underneath was quaky and mushy. One foot broke through the fragile surface. Once through, it was caught by the soft gluey substance which closed around it. I was afraid of being sucked down. Catching my foot with both hands, I tried to pull it out. It was like pulling against a suction disc. As I wrenched my foot free it made a deep squelching noise.

  Even if Augustus John didn’t get me, I was going to be sucked down into the Black Bog. Was I going to sink into the oozing, quaking blackness? There seemed to have been something purposeful and alive about the way the ooze had clutched my foot. I was on the skin of something that lived and breathed. My foot going through the scraw had gone into its body, into its blood. Had it not felt warm? Could I not still feel its heartbeat? There had been something personal about that gluey grip. It was going to suck me down into its black heart.

  “We want you,” Augustus John’s voice said coming from the mist somewhere to the right. “We’ve had our eye on you for a long time, sur. We’ve been waiting for you for a long time in a manner of speaking.” The voice, which was not Augustus John’s voice at all but only an imitation of it, came from a slightly different direction. Had he found a path?

  I plunged on. My legs were being lacerated now by the ancient oak buried in the bog. This bog oak was buried deep in the peat with only its upper parts protruding. Preserved for thousands of years, it felt as sharp and hard as steel. I tripped over its writhing shapes. Branches tore the flesh on my legs. And yet I was thankful for it. The little islands which formed around it were the only solid ground in all that wild oozing morass.

  I was able to pick these islands out now. Pockets of green light had begun to glow a little above the ground lighting areas here and there.

  I reached one of these bog oak islands and clung on. The bog oozed and gurgled all around me. If I went on I would sink.

  “Where are you atall atall, sur?” Augustus John’s voice came from close by.

  I tried to quieten my breathing which was coming in highly audible gasps that tore at my lungs. My whole body felt as if it had been flayed. My body was in a wild panic. But, despite the attacks and threats and blandishments of the entities, my mind remained detached.

  I turned to face the thing that what had been Augustus John. I could hear him floundering around calling my name.

  I clung to the bog oak deeply rooted in the peat. Holding my breath, I could distinctly hear the licking and lapping sound of water in a bog-hole right beside me.

  I waited.

  “Don’t be hiding now, sur. Hiding won’t do no good at all.”


  I could hear him flounder nearer. Then, through the ghostly white mist I got a clear view of him. Very close now and struggling towards me. His rubber boots had gone, sucked down into the bog. He was covered from head to foot in slimy liquid peat. His body had about it an unnatural rigidity. The features of his face had become swollen and horribly distorted. The entity was glaring balefully from his eyes.

  “Ah, there you are, sur,” the voice said. It was a mockery of a voice. Augustus John drew the sickle high in the air and brought it down in a powerful stroke. He began moving towards me with a stiff automated piston-like movement.

  There was increased activity in the air around me. The dirge rose to an ear-splitting screech.

  Augustus John was only a few yards away. Another squelching step and he stopped. “I’ll be with you in a moment, sur,” he said, swinging the sickle through the air, measuring his distance.

  He took a step forward and into the bog-hole. He tried to reach me with a swipe of the sickle. But he could not reach me. It was only then he tried to check the descent of his own body which was sliding into the bog-hole. He pumped his legs but they only sank into the thick, oozing, throbbing glue. He began to thrash wildly about. My island was only yards away but he could not make it. Thrashing wildly with his arms, he found a momentary grip for his sickle in a clump of rough grass that grew by the side of the bog-hole. With his powerful arms, he actually pulled himself upwards a few yards against the suction of the bog. He would have extricated himself had not the clump of grass given way, torn out by the roots.

  The activity in the air all around reached a new height of frenzy.

  Augustus John, flaying his limbs wildly, embedded his body more deeply. He was now down to his armpits. The entity in him said slyly, softly, “just give me a hand out, sur.” The voice was oddly persuasive. I didn’t move. Augustus John was only a few yards away but those yards might as well have been miles. He was beyond my grasp. The entity screeched in coarse abuse, “I’ll get you. I’ll kill you. I’ll possess you ...” The voice went off into a language I could not understand. It rose to a hideous scream, then cut off.