by Joseph Kiel
Floyd didn’t believe in a world of consequence, or a world of compassion. He’d been doing what he’d been doing for years and nothing had stopped him yet. Nothing would ever catch up with here, just as nothing would ever catch up with him in an afterlife. Floyd could be as sadistic as possible and it didn’t matter at all. That’s how he’d been taught.
Floyd wasn’t any less human than anyone. He knew he wasn’t mentally deranged or anything, that he could function perfectly in society by paying his taxes and not dropping litter anywhere. And he knew that God was within him just as much as in a Sunday church goer. God was in his Chamber of Fun just as much as He was on that mountain where Moses had received the Commandments.
He’d learnt all about that from The Harbour Master. God loved everyone. God was inside everyone. God loved whatever Floyd did and so life was a game that he could not lose.
Floyd was feeling very pleased this evening. He’d maybe test the other rides before too long, to make sure that they were all working. He wanted a completely functioning Chamber of Fun before he brought Henry here to choose his ride.
Part 10: Back to the Cove
Chapter 10.1
Whether it was a gun, a knife, or just your own blood-scuffed knuckles, it seemed that such weapons were necessary to help you get by in this town.
Michael was a weapon carrier too. He took it wherever he went and had to use it every day: his silver ballpoint pen. The only problem was he’d lost it earlier in the week. He guessed that Larry had taken it. Probably picked it up to do some stupid word search in a television guide.
With it missing, Michael had bought a pack of ten biros from one of those knickknack shops on the high street: Everything is a pound… but everything is complete crap! He’d scattered them around: a couple on the desk in his room, a couple in his bag, a few in the lounge. Hopefully his flatmates would leave his silver pen alone from now on. Assuming it would ever show up again.
As Horrace Goldby, the retired entertainer with the bronzed skin and the pearly eyes continued his diatribe of the Halo of Fires organisation, Michael used one of those biros to jot down his words on a notepad.
Michael’s assignment was alive and dancing like the cancan now, ever since that kick-start interview with the man in black. ‘Halo of Liars’ was the headline, and it buzzed with inspiration. He already knew it would get a first. It was just a shame that it was only a student article. The stuff he was writing surely deserved to be printed in the local newspapers, shining the spotlight on the flies and bugs that crawled in the darkness, uncovering the rot and the toxic rage that smouldered beneath the floorboards of the crumbling shack that was Dark Harbour society.
Right now it seemed that Michael had a kindred spirit before him in Horrace Goldby.
‘See, I knew Ulric was in with them,’ the old man said. ‘I told him they were nothing but trouble but you could never tell Ulric anything.’
What a gem. Although he was in his nineties, Horrace had that Cliff Richard glow of undying youth. In five years’ time he would probably only look one year older. Years ago he’d been the resident compère at the Paragon Theatre on the seafront. Judging by his burgundy dinner jacket, his green shirt, and the passionate way he recounted his memories, Horrace still wanted to entertain, was still ready to take to the stage. If Michael had handed him a microphone, he was sure he wouldn’t need any encouragement to croon off his Oh I Do Like To Be Beside the Seaside routine.
Within the living-room of Horrace’s seaside chalet was an array of black and white photographs of his erstwhile theatre days. He’d explained the story behind just about every one of them before Michael had managed to get in any of his questions.
Lex McLean and Tommy Morgan were two ‘stars’ that Horrace had been photographed beside. Michael hadn’t heard of either of them. In a monochrome poster, Horrace was the star billing himself in ‘An Evening of Giggles and Gaggles With Horrace Goldby’. Michael was sure it was a sell-out in its time.
The chalet was located on Tennyson Avenue, a short way down the road from the flat that Ulric Tuckwell and his grandsons had lived in. With a growing population of old age pensioners, the north end of the town was considered one giant old folks’ village. As with Horrace’s chalet, many of the homes overlooked the expanse of Dark Harbour’s waters, as though their inhabitants could peacefully see out their days awaiting the ship that would take them from their Grey Havens.
Over a couple of decades previously, Horrace was living in the same block as Ulric Tuckwell. He was, as Michael had found out, about the last resident from that era who was still alive, and fortunately his mind hadn’t clouded with age.
‘But apparently Alan Hammond was going to sort things out for him, going to help get him out of the hole poor Ulric had dug for himself,’ Horrace spoke in a loud, gossipy whisper. On certain syllables he made a whistling sound, but it was probably way out of range for him to ever notice.
‘What exactly had he done?’
‘Ulric? Well, from what I gathered, he’d blown the whistle on a ring of crooks. They put him over the rocks. Caused a calamity. That’s why he came running to Dark Harbour.’
‘So he was friends with the Halo of Fires leader? They didn’t kill him?’
‘Oh, no! The Fires were protecting him. What do you think? They did a good job of that? As a matter of fact I don’t know who killed him. Don’t think anyone knows.’
‘But… Jeremy. The youngest grandson. Didn’t he escape?’
Horrace suddenly went cold silent as if he was listening for something in the distance, perhaps the clap of thunder that would tell him to close the chalet windows that were wide open to let in the sustaining sea breeze.
‘Little Jeremy, yes. He escaped. Do you know much about him?’
‘A little bit.’ He could have said more, but he wasn’t the one being interviewed.
‘The poor lad, he ran away. They found some things of his at Moonlight Cove, strewn over the beach.’
‘Were these things dumped there?’
‘Who knows? All I know is that there’s something they don’t want people to know. You know when someone’s got a really dark secret, how they’ll hold on to it so tightly, but it’s the way they’re acting, you just know it’s something really terrible.’
‘What do you think happened to him?’
Horrace sat back in his armchair and breathed in deeply the half fresh, half stale, air.
‘I often passed by Jeremy in the corridor. Lovely little boy he was. Never met a boy quite like him before. And not since. He had these eyes, such absorbing eyes. So clear that you could see yourself in them. But you’d wish you were able to see inside and know what was going on up there in his head. Why such a terrible thing would happen to a lovely boy as him, I’ll never know.’
‘Where is he?’
‘It appeared Ulric told him to go looking for Alan Hammond. Thought that Hammond would look after him, as he was supposed to have looked after Ulric. That’s where the boy went.’
‘Jeremy found Hammond?’
‘Yes.’
‘And where is he now?’
Horrace paused for dramatic effect like a good actor.
‘No one can be certain, but I can only tell you what I think. And of this I’m ninety-nine per cent certain.’
‘What?’
‘He’s dead, the poor lad. Bless his soul.’
‘Halo of Fires killed him?’
Horrace shifted in his armchair and leaned forward. ‘Now from what I heard it goes like this: Hammond realised it was too dangerous keeping hold of the boy, a witness to two murders. Specially not when there’s such a bloodthirsty murderer out there. Hammond knew it was too risky having him on his hands. They knew his killers, and so they handed him over to them. What did it matter? Ulric was already dead! Hammond had no more favours to keep. Not to a dead man. And especially not to some innocent young boy who didn’t have any more family out there. They knew no one would miss him and they didn’t care. Di
dn’t care if he would live or die.’
Michael finished scribbling his words, then paused. His eyes went out of focus as he stared into the ink and the grain of the paper.
‘I challenge you to find that boy anywhere. He’s gone. He’s no longer of this world. You got more chance of walking past Elvis in the street than you have of finding poor little Jeremy.’
Michael looked up again. ‘What about Hammond? He’s dead too, right?’
‘Yeah, he’s a gonner. And good riddance I say. Him’s another mystery. You’d have to talk to someone in the organisation to find out what happened to that slimeball.’
‘Yes. I’d sure like to,’ Michael said with a slow nodding of his head. He looked down on his notes again. There was some more great stuff there.
Horrace eased himself out of his chair and closed the window. Michael guessed that he’d had enough talking for one day and was now retreating into his mind’s dressing room.
‘Thank you very much for your time this afternoon, Mr Goldby. It’s been a big help.’ He replaced the lid on his ballpoint pen and folded over the cover of his notepad.
‘My pleasure. Good luck with this, young Mr Foxbury. If you ever get any of your stories printed in the Harbour Gazette, make sure you remember to do a feature on me. Plenty more of the happy ending stories I can tell you.’
‘I’ll keep that in mind.’
Michael stood up to leave as he zipped up his white jacket. He had a feeling that Horrace was going to go back to talking about his theatre days, and as Michael had many more things to do this afternoon, he felt he should get going.
The old entertainer was staring across at a photograph on his wall of Betty Jalland, evidently another famous star from the sixties. She was standing on stage wearing a costume of a kangaroo and Horrace looked like he was about to explain why doing that was such a crowd-puller back in the day.
‘I was in the flats that evening,’ Horrace resumed. ‘You see, we actually used to live directly above Ulric. I remember hearing someone screaming. Jeremy, it must have been. I can still hear him like it was yesterday. Still makes the hairs in my earholes bristle. I was about to go downstairs to see what was going on, but we could sense that there was some serious trouble. And, Alice, God rest her, she insisted that I didn’t go. So, I waited, and by then he’d gone.’
Michael was silent for a few moments as he replayed Horrace’s words in his head, making sure that he’d mentally recorded it since he’d put his pen away. Why did he always put it away ten seconds too early? He held his breath for fear of the words escaping his head.
‘I see,’ said Michael as he sat back down again and removed the top off his pen. ‘And do you remember anything else about that day?’
Chapter 10.2
After another half hour talking to Horrace Goldby about the mysterious case of Jeremy Tuckwell and only another fifteen minutes talking about hilarious Paragon anecdotes, Michael began his walk back home.
His mind felt stacked full of information, almost like someone had scattered all the pages of the mystery in front of him and on one page there was the answer. He just had to wait for God to direct his eyes to the right one.
Not that this was what he’d initially set out to do. He’d only wanted to write about the reprehensible entity in this town known as Halo of Fires and gripe about vengeance, enlighten the world about another one of man’s futile attempts to play God. But then this subplot had bubbled to the surface, this story of a disappearing young boy.
Although Michael hadn’t even been born when the Tuckwells were murdered, he knew the story of their misfortune quite well. It came from having so many older brothers, Michael being the youngest of five. Between him and his eldest brother, Oliver, there had been a seventeen year gap. Oliver had been a bit of a father figure to his siblings, the one who’d been through school and the adventures of growing up before them.
He arrived every week on time for their Sunday afternoon dinners, a motorbike helmet under his arm, a shaggy main of hair on his head. Oliver was so old that he was an adult now, and he was allowed to grow his hair as long as he wanted.
While they ate, he would always be giving a commentary on everything like he was at a football match. He was always the last one to finish eating.
He told Michael all the lurid stories about their home, but his most fascinating one was the story of the murdered new kid, Simon Tuckwell. Oliver had actually known Simon, the only one to make friends with him. They had many things in common, mainly karate and comic books.
‘We were going to go fishing the next day, Mikey. I was there at the beach all day on my own and he never turned up. I didn’t know he was dead. Never caught a thing that day either.’
Michael remembered during his own time at school how the rougher kids would sometimes crudely speculate on the bloody details of Simon’s murder. None of them really mentioned Jeremy Tuckwell though.
But Oliver Foxbury did.
‘One time me and Simon had biked to the abbey and he was in a really strange mood. Told me things I thought he was just making up. He said his little brother had been born without a face!’
Apparently, these were things that Simon had never even told Jeremy himself, things that had been relayed from one brother to another brother, orphaned stories that had ended up in the sanctuary of Michael’s conscientious mind.
‘You see, Simon reckoned that he’d had to deliver his own brother. When Simon handed the baby to his mother she took off this shimmering membrane. He’d been born with a caul, you see. She said that he was a special child. He never cried when he came out. Simon thought he saw wisps of light around his mother’s head, like fireflies. And the strangest thing is that Simon never knew who the father was, said he didn’t know his mother had a boyfriend or anything.’
The impressionable Michael had instantly felt that he’d been given some important knowledge, and that the missing Jeremy had to be found again. It had been Simon’s role to look after this light bringer, to be his guardian, but without him the boy was lost. Or dead, according to Horrace Goldby.
As Michael walked along the pavement with this mystery being twisted and turned in his mind like a Rubik’s Cube, he eventually realised that he wasn’t walking back home towards the flat at all. He was edging towards Moonlight Cove, the last known location of Jeremy Tuckwell.
The last time Michael had been there was when he was at primary school during his bird watching phase. Other than being a good place for spotting little egrets and black-headed gulls, Michael also vaguely remembered being told about the beauty spot’s mystical reputation. The place was supposed to be haunted. Perhaps it wasn’t famous enough for Derek Acorah and Yvette Fielding to have traipsed down there, but the odd story of the ghostly spirits within the cove had surfaced throughout the years. Michael also seemed to remember that people communed with the spirits there. Or something. He’d never really paid much attention to this superstitious hokum.
The sky was full of activity this afternoon as layers of clouds bustled over one another. With a mixture of grey rain clouds and white fluffy billows, it was as though some mischievous imps had been let loose in a giant cloud factory and spewed vapour out all over the sky. There was a panorama of drama, as their ever continuing movement formed different shapes that blended from one into the other: wizards with long beards, horses galloping across the heavens, snow covered mountains from a fantasy wilderness.
After walking along the meadowland, Michael set eyes upon the magic of the real world beneath the melodrama of the sky, Moonlight Cove. Descending the cliff face where once the boy’s satchel and torch had been thrown, Michael slowly clambered down to the sodden sands.
Where would the young child have gone next? Why did he even come here in the first place? Why would he go to a place that was haunted? To find the spirit of his murdered brother, perhaps?
The crescent of looming cliffs around the cove stood like the wall of a fortress. A lone tree could be seen at the top of the rock
s watching over like a sentinel. It swayed back and forth in the wind, pointing its branches towards the sands as if to encourage people to remain within this retreat rather than go back to the frenzy and frustration of town life. The rocks looked a lot more difficult to climb than they were to descend.
It was very tempting to stay within this peaceful place, to sit on the sands and forget the trivialities that weighed on one’s mind. Nothing seemed to matter here.
After feeling a momentary balancing of the scales, Michael’s persevering mind went back to the issue of a certain missing boy. A journalist first had to experience and then put himself one step removed from the story. He couldn’t allow Moonlight Cove to beguile him to the point of distraction.
So where did Jeremy go next?
He wouldn’t have clambered down the cliff just to clamber out again. There didn’t appear to be any caves anywhere in which he could hide. The beach didn’t expand up the coastline. There was only the crescent-shaped sands and the waves that lapped at their edge.
Michael strolled towards the sea. He could imagine small imprints on the sand, washed away soon after by the soothing tide. Jeremy must have walked over to the water because there was no other place he could have gone.
But where then? Would he have carried on, walking into his grave? Would a six-year-old boy even have a concept of suicide at that age?
Following the trail of those ghostly footsteps, Michael soon arrived at the edge of the shore, which was hugging the cove closely this afternoon, hiding many of the rocks that were scattered out into the sea. The tips of some of them could just about be seen, small islands that would not provide any lasting habitation for anyone; perhaps just the occasional mermaid might sit on them to comb its hair in the light of the silvery moon.