The Children of Cthulhu

by John Pelan

  “You go,” he said. “Like I said earlier, I'll take a hike up to Halkin Grange, speak to Lady Langdon.”

  “Want me to call ahead … let them know you're coming?”

  “No, it's alright,” he replied. “Don't want to get them uptight or anything.”

  She nodded and moved away.

  “There is one thing,” he called after her. She turned. He indicated the spot where Caleb's body had been found. “We could use a tarp or something… over this. I mean, it's a murder scene now.”

  “I'll sort it,” she said. “See you later.”

  A moment passed, Nick standing alone in the middle of the circle. Despite the serenity of the environment, pagan monuments like this always seemed to have an appeal for nutballs. Even if the crazies who came here weren't actually practicing magic, they might be deluded enough to think they were. No… Alun Caleb hadn't staggered half way across the country, to drop down dead here, purely by accident.

  So thinking, Nick turned his steps toward Halkin Grange.

  5

  To either side of the gates there was a high brick post, and on each post, a gargoyle.

  And such gargoyles. They glared down at Nick with an intensity that belied their ivy coats and granite stillness. In return, he regarded them warily. They weren't devils or dragons in the normal fashion, but ghastly hybrids… part insect, part mol-lusk it seemed, with tentacles rather than claws, mandibles instead of beaks, and multiple rows of eyes beneath odd crowns of thorns and barbs.

  For all the ferocity of these guardians, however, the gates weren't locked, and Nick passed through them with ease. A few moments later, he was strolling up the long drive, hemmed in on either side by thick rhododendrons. He'd walked about half a mile, when he heard the thruh of an engine coming from behind. A second later a Toyota SUV, with mud splashed over its wheels and fender, came around the corner. It skidded to an immediate halt, the driver winding the window down. It was a woman… burly and thickset, with wiry black hair and a menacing frown.

  “Hi,” he began, stepping forward.

  But she cut him off. “You're on private land.”

  Nick flashed his warrant card. “It's okay, I'm a police officer.”

  She shook her head. “Sorry… this is still private land.”

  “Not to me,” he replied, unfazed. “Perhaps you could give me a lift up to the house?”

  She seemed less sure of herself now. “What's it about?”

  “I'd like to speak to Lady Langdon.”

  “Concerning?”

  “Alun Caleb.”

  The woman eyed him for a moment, then opened the door. The moment he'd climbed in, she gunned the engine and drove on. Nick gazed out through the window. More rhododendrons drifted past, beyond them the green shadows of fathomless woodland.

  “Isolated up here, aren't you?” he observed.

  “That's the way we like it,” she mumbled.

  He looked at her with interest. “We?”

  “Me and Lady Langdon.”

  “Just the two of you, then?”

  The woman bit her lip, clearly uncomfortable answering questions. “No… Lady Langdon's daughter will be around somewhere. There's also a couple of village girls, who come up to help around the house.”

  “No men allowed, eh?” Nick gave a jocular grin.

  The woman said nothing more, and eventually he looked back to the road. Bearing in mind the unhappy history, he'd possibly overstepped the mark there, but her reaction had been interesting all the same. Her body language was decidedly tense. When he'd first made the decision to visit Halkin Grange it'd been on spec … to cover all bases, so to speak; he hadn't seriously thought Barbara Maynard might be involved. Now he wasn't so sure.

  The house was a rambling eighteenth-century affair, constructed from mellow sandstone. It had two long wings, each comprising tall Georgian windows, and a stepped frontage complete with the obligatory Ionic columns. Its windowboxes were full of spring flowers, while ivy hung in tendrils from the roof gutters. Nick was shown in and asked to wait in the lounge, a wide airy room with leather-upholstered furniture and a huge painting by Constable over its ornate fireplace. There was also a wall of shelves, each one crammed to bursting with books. Nick glanced at them as he waited. To a one, they were massive and weighty, bound with leather but ancient and splitting. Most bore lettering on their spines, though in the odd case where this hadn't faded to illegibility, it was unreadable … inscribed in some obscure alphabet he'd never seen before. Three of them, however, had modern labels attached. These read:

  HSAN III HSAN V HSAN VII

  “How may I help you, Officer?” came a polite but imperious voice.

  Nick turned from the bookcase, and found Barbara May-nard standing in the doorway. He hadn't seen her for quite a few years, but he was certain this was she. A tall, willowy woman, she was perhaps fifty years old but agelessly beautiful, with flowing ash blond hair. She was dressed in jodhpurs, leather boots, and a brown tweed jacket, as if she'd just been out riding. Her poise and bearing were pure aristocracy.

  “Sorry about this, ma'am. Detective Sergeant Brooker.” He showed his warrant card again. “I need to ask you some questions.”

  Lady Langdon indicated the sofa. “Please sit. I've arranged some tea. I take it you'll join me?”

  “Er … yes, thanks.”

  The pair of them sat, Nick on the sofa, Lady Langdon in the armchair. Several awkward moments passec as Nick explained the purpose of his visit, deliberately omitting the details and whereabouts of Caleb's death, though the very mention of the rapist's name brought a tinge of red to the woman's cheeks.

  When Nick had finished, she delicately cleared her throat. “I presumed your visit would have something to do with this, I confess. But I can't say I'm sorry the man is dead.”

  “Well… you aren't alone in that,” Nick replied. He looked up, as a red-haired girl in a bright summer dress came in with a silver tea service.

  When Lady Langdon had thanked the girl, who departed with a smile, Nick resumed: “Er, the thing is, Lady Langdon … I won't beat around the bush. I'm a fella … I can't even begin to understand what it's like to be raped. I can only hope the fact it happened so long ago makes it easier for you to talk about.” She calmly poured two cups. Nick scratched his jaw. “Er… you see, I need to ask you…”

  “Go ahead, Sergeant,” she said, handing him his tea. “I'm tougher than I look.”

  “Er… right. Yeah. I appreciate that it's eighteen years ago and all that, and I'm sure you've tried to blot it out of your mind, but—what actually happened… that night?”

  She took a sip of tea, then began: “I was driving home from Little Salkeld. It was around eight o'clock. Clarence — my husband—was away on business, and I'd made an appearance at our annual Summer Show. Lady-of-the-manor sort of thing…”

  “Were you on your own?” Nick interrupted.

  She half-smiled. Nick could've kicked himself … as a rape victim, she'd be well-used to lines of questioning which seemed to imply she'd brought the attack on herself.

  “I had a little MG, which I enjoyed motoring around in,” she patiently explained. “We've never had many airs and graces up here, Sergeant. No chauffeurs, no bodyguards. Anyway, I'd taken the road through Barrowby.…”

  “The one that goes past the stone circle?”

  “That's right. It wasn't used very much, especially at night. As I say, I was on this road… when I came fo a fallen tree. It was completely blocking my way.”

  For the first time, Lady Langdon's voice faltered. Her eyes glistened. Nick listened grimly as she spoke on. He still remembered certain details, himself … as far as he recalled, Caleb had cut the tree down, almost as if he'd known his victim was due along that route.

  “Of course, I was stunned,” the woman adced. “I'd gone that way earlier and there'd been nothing there. It wasn't as if we'd had a storm or anything.…”

  “Were you frightened?” Nick asked.


  “Puzzled more than frightened. And foolish, I suppose. I got out of the car to have a look, and…” Now her words tailed off.

  “He was there,” Nick finished for her, as gently as he could.

  She made an effort to steady her voice. “He came out of the bushes. He was dressed in … in black…”

  “It's okay,” the cop said. “I know the rest.”

  She dabbed at her eyes with a napkin frorr the tea tray. Nick waited for a moment while she did. During their careers, police officers were frequently assaulted, often very severely, but to them it was a hazard of the job, never something to lose sleep over. You were more likely to brag about it in the pub than be haunted by it at night. How different an experience like this must be … a young woman, alone on an isolated road, confronted by a masked man with an axe. Little wonder his other prey had all died young: The memory alone was a killer. It struck Nick that maybe he should feel strong and manly at this moment, proud to be the ane who'd finally caught the maniac, but he didn't; he felt the way he usually did in the face of female suffering that resulted from male brutality … sullied, helpless, and mildly guilty.

  “Excuse me,” she said after a moment. “I'm—I'm alright now.”

  “Lady Langdon,” Nick asked, “these last few days… did you know Caleb had escaped from prison?”

  “I read about it, yes. It was all over the newspapers.”

  Nick was careful how to phrase the next question. “Were you concerned that he might come here?”

  “It crossed my mind,” she admitted, “but I'm not some foolish child. I also knew he was old and in poor health. I didn't expect to be attacked by him again, if that's what you mean.”

  “So you weren't worried by it?”

  “As I say … it crossed my mind.”

  “Did you,” he said, “by any chance, make any preparations … I mean, on the off chance he did turn up?”

  “Preparations?” She seemed puzzled. “Sergeant, am I being questioned as a suspect?”

  He held his hands up. “Of course not. I won't deny it, though. Caleb died in what we consider peculiar circumstances.”

  “I see. And you think that, as the only surviving victim, I may be responsible?”

  “We have to consider every possibility, ma'am.”

  She appeared to understand this, and nodded.

  Nick cleared his throat. “So … er, at the risk of being thrown out, where were you last night, between ten and twelve?”

  “Here,” she replied.

  “Do you have any witnesses to that?”

  “Two. Cora, my daughter. And Jenny—you've already met her. She's my estate manager.”

  Nick nodded. “And you were here all that time?”

  “I was here all night. We played bridge till nearly midnight. Then we retired.”

  “Okay.” The detective smiled and stood up. “Well… that's fine. That's all I needed to know.”

  Lady Langdon smiled politely. She also stood.

  “Oh… there is one other question,” Nick said. “You don't… have any sort of refrigeration unit here?”

  She seemed bemused. “I—I have a deep freeze for frozen foods and such.”

  “No … I mean, perhaps something to do with farming. For hanging meat. Something like that?”

  “This isn't a butchery, Sergeant. It's a family home.”

  “Of course,” Nick said. “Just a thought.”

  She accompanied him to the front door. Outside, on the gravel drive, the estate manager's SUV was p£ rked. Lady Lang-don seemed surprised not to see a police vehicle there. “Are you on foot?”

  “Afraid so,” Nick said. “No worries, though. The exercise will do me good.”

  “I'd get Jenny to run you, but I don't know where she is at present.”

  Nick waved that aside. “It's alright.”

  Lady Langdon persisted. “Where is it you're going to?”

  “Barrowby.”

  “Oh… well, that's not too far. You can even take a short cut.” She pointed across the front lawn toward a wall of foliage. “There are deer paths through the coppice. Follow any one of them. They lead downhill to Croglin Beck. You'll have to get across that, of course, but it's only shallow and there are plenty of stepping stones. Should cut half an hour off your journey.”

  Nick thanked her and set off across the lawn. A few minutes later, he reached the outer cover of the trees, and glanced back. To his surprise, Lady Langdon was still watching him… as if to make sure he was really leaving. As casually as he could, Nick raised a hand. She raised her own hand in return. Then he plunged into the thicket.

  For several moments, he fought his wa} through meshed branches, but at last he broke out onto a pith. It was narrow and cluttered with fallen twigs, but it led clearly away in a more or less southerly direction. Nick started along it. On all sides, the leaves had that bright green, freshly painted look so consistent with spring. The undergrowth had yet to become thick and tangled, and indeed there were still swathes of bluebells between the gnarled boles of the trees. The air was fragrant with blossom and bud. Above his head, a red squirrel darted like a streak of flame over a low-hanging bough. There was an aura of solitude that Nick found pleasant. In this May of the year 2000, there was much debate in Britain between country and town: Who had the right to go where? Should fences be put up or taken down? Was it really humane to ban blood sports when they provided jobs for a legion of rural dwellers?

  Nick couldn't comment on any of this. He'd been born and raised in a dismal urban district… its grimy sights and smoky scent were second nature to him; without the clangor of shunting locomotives and factory sirens, he found the world oddly silent. Yet this vast tranquil acreage, which still made up so much of England, had a special place for him, too. He'd enjoyed enough countryside holidays to know how lulling it could be, how secret and secluded, how much safer than the concrete jungle.

  Then a twig popped.

  Nick stopped and turned. He saw nothing untoward. Mellow sunlight dappled the woodland floor, but among the budding twigs an eerie breeze was suddenly stirring. All at once, inexplicably, the cop knew he wasn't alone.

  As casually as he could, he strode on. Another branch snapped—this one loudly, as if something of considerable weight had brushed past it. There was also now an odor, a rather sour odor, tickling at his nostrils. Nick sniffed the air. It wasn't so much an odor, in fact, as a stench… cloying, sul-furous. What was more, it seemed to be getting stronger.

  Then there was a loud rattle of vegetation; more twigs crunched. Nick imagined the reckless trail an elephant might plough through the jungle… and all at once he didn't want to look behind him. Whatever it was, it was coming from that direction… and it was coming fast. Heavy boughs fell to earth. The smell had become intolerable. Nick wanted to gag, but now there was something else: a dank slithering noise, as if some moist bulk was oozing forward through the dry debris of the undergrowth.

  Nick strode stiffly on, trying with all his will to steel himself. Was he going mad? This was an English coppice, not some lost tract of the Amazon. He now felt the urge to run, however… the frantic urge. He could sense something immense in pursuit of him… thirty or forty yards away at the most, and approaching rapidly. With a further ripping and thrashing, it tore through a dense patch of thickets. It knew that he knew, Nick realized. It wasn't trying to conceal itself any onger.

  He made a wild dash. The terrain thinned before him but sloped downward. His speed increased accordingly. Veering sharply to avoid fallen logs, hurdling briars, he went at it like an athlete. But whatever was behind him, was also moving at pace and drove a deluge of sticks and leaf rubble before it, making it sound to Nick as if there was a landslide at his heels. The stink had become overpowering, all-engulfing.… Nick's head swam. More branches broke, loud as gunshots.

  At six foot one and 196 pounds, Nick was hardly overweight, but he hadn't exercised properly in ten years or more. His heart slammed his ribs, sweat streamed off
him. But he ran all the harder. He slid through banks of straggling ferns, turned an ankle on a loose boulder, but at last hammered down onto level ground and saw the airy light of open spaces not too far ahead. Yet if the stalking thing was perturbed by this, it showed no sign; in fact its blind charge grew in ferocity, for now it sounded as if trees were crashing down before it. Nick sucked in fresh air for one last effort.

  Up ahead, the forest ended abruptly. Beyond it lay pastures, dotted with sheep and their lambs. If he could just make it that far, Nick hoped he would be safe; it was like the boundary between day and night, dream and nightmare.… Yet might the thing catch him at the very last moment? Could it be reaching for him now? No… the next thing Nick knew, he was out from the trees and staggering down a slope of wet pebbles. He tried to stop at the bottom but was catapulted forward by his own velocity … to land face-first in a shallow river.

  Croglin Beck was only a foot deep at the most, but swollen with meltwater, and breathtakingly cold. Like a stinging slap from a hand, it shocked Nick out of his panic. Drenched and coughing up lungfuls of brackish fluid, he jumped up and still tried to stumble away, turning and glancing over his shoulder as he went, only to slip and fall again. At any moment, he expected something the size of a mammoth to burst out from the forest… and indeed something large and mobile was still fast approaching. With sharp rustles of foliage, and a dull thudding on the woody earth, a shape appeared far back under the trees, moving swiftly forward through the sun-flecked shadows. A moment later, it had resolved itself into two different shapes, distinct from each yet fixed together… though in no unnatural way.

  It was a girl, quite a young girl, and she was mounted on a roan mare.

  Once she reached the riverbank, the girl reined up and stared at Nick with a mixture of surprise and mirth. The detective gazed back from his sitting position in the middle of the beck. He was still too shaken up to feel as silly as perhaps he ought.

  “You look as if you've seen a ghost, Sergeant,” the girl said.

  Nick rose slowly to his feet. “You… you know who I am?” he stuttered.