by Zoe Drake
Incredible, he thought in genuine admiration. The guidebook said that this tower and gallery had been built in the 1340s. It was hard to believe that something like this could be built in the 20th century, let alone the 14th.
For a handful of change Gareth entered the Stained Glass Museum, in the North transept. He squeezed himself up the tiny, winding stone staircase and wandered around the upper chamber, observing the interplay of light on the colored glass. He stood in front of one display, admiring the craftsmanship. An angel spread wide her arms, fanning her wings out like peacock feathers behind her. A banner held in the angel’s hands declared:
‘SUFFER LITTLE CHILDREN TO COME UNTO ME AND FORBID THEM NOT.’
“You can’t say that these days,” Gareth muttered to himself. “Someone would take you to court.” He turned away, and walked back down the stone spiral.
It was almost five o’clock when he left Ely Cathedral, and darkness hung in the cold air like snow. As he walked back toward the park where he’d stood looking up at the cathedral, he noticed the library where he was supposed to meet Littlewood at the corner of Lynn Road, its array of windows glittering softly, making it look like a densely populated aquarium. He walked closer and realized the figure standing outside the entrance was Littlewood, already waiting.
“Hi! How did it go?” Gareth asked, as he came level with the other man.
The corner of Littlewood’s mouth twitched in a way Gareth was becoming familiar with. “I’m more familiar with the Internet than groping my way around a library, but I did find some interesting stuff. Shall we grab a bite to eat?”
They found a café on Lynn Street called – with a touch of local history – the Cromwell Café, and both ordered fish and chips in its white pseudo-Puritan ambience. The waitress brought two steaming mugs of tea and they sipped them gratefully, the warmth taking away the taste of the chill air.
“How did the interviews go?” Littlewood probed.
“Very interesting. I stuck to your questionnaires, for the most part anyway. I’ve got all the reports in the folder.”
“It’s quite rewarding, isn’t it? Once you get people talking, I’ll bet you were surprised at how much they wanted to talk to someone.”
Surprised isn’t the word, thought Gareth.
“This morning,” Littlewood continued, “I checked some web sites to see how the investigation’s going. It seems like Coveney’s getting a name for itself. People have been posting fresh sightings over the weekend. Two went up yesterday.”
“Really?” Gareth felt surprised and somehow unsettled. “What did you find out in the library?”
“I was looking for historical precedents for the sightings, to see if this is an actual window area, so to speak. Here, listen to this.”
Littlewood lifted the battered briefcase onto his lap, withdrew a slim plastic folder, and slid out a photocopied sheet of paper. He began to read from it in his seesaw New Zealand accent:
“It came on steadily… and when it got near me… I thought it made a sudden stop as if to listen to me… it blazed out like a wisp of fire and made a crackling noise like straw burning which convinced me of its visit… the luminous halo that spread from it was a mysterious, terrific hue and the enlarged size and whiteness of my own hands frit me… the bushes seemed to be climbing the sky, everything was extorted out of its own figure and magnified, the darkness all around seemed to form a circular black wall… I held fast by the stilepost till it darted away, when I took to my heels and got home as fast as I could.”
Littlewood looked up from his notes. “That was written by a local poet named John Clare. What does it sound like to you?”
“Well, you could say it was a man seeing a UFO, but it also seems like a good description of a will-o-the-wisp, if you ask me.”
“Probably this John Clare fellow called it a will-o-the-wisp too, because there was no other way to explain it in those days. But what we’ve got here is a classic close encounter, first kind. Perhaps even an abduction.”
“In those days? When was it written?”
“Let me see… in 1836. But this happened in Helpston, over near Peterborough. I’m afraid there’s not much of a record of sightings there, it’s all a bit mysterious. In fact, this UFO flap in the Fens that started last year… it seems to have come out of nowhere. Excuse me for a second. Little boy’s room.”
When Littlewood was away, the waitress arrived with the food. Gareth looked with trepidation upon his scampi and chips; the portion of chips was so large it smothered everything else on the plate.
Littlewood returned, looked at his meal, and muttered something inaudible.
“What’s up?” asked Gareth, shaking malt vinegar over his chips.
“Mushy peas. She’s given me mushy peas. I didn’t order them.”
“Give them to me, I’ll eat them.”
“No, no, it won’t take a minute.”
Littlewood picked up his plate and walked off. Gareth munched on battered scampi and grinned at an infant who was staring at him from a nearby table. The kid’s parents were grumbling to each other in low voices, and the infant looked terrified; he seemed to be trying to get down from his high chair, and had no idea how to go about it.
“There we go.” Littlewood was back. The plate was once more on the table, with a green smear where the offending mushy peas had been. “So, anyway, it was a good day’s work,” he continued. “I don’t often get a chance to take time off for decent research. Not as often as I’d like to.”
Gareth peered at his dinner companion. “What do you do, Brian?”
“I work for Giles Amusements. I’m the accounts manager. I spend most of the time in the car at the moment, going around the Cambridgeshire branches… it’s not a bad job. I earn a crust.”
Probably been there for donkey’s years, thought Gareth. If you’ve got your feet under the table, nobody really cares if you’re a bit eccentric. Just as long as you turn up on time every day and don’t make waves.
“Brian, how long have you been… well, you know, when did you set up the UFO group?”
Littlewood poked daintily at his food. “Oh, we’ve been going – in various incarnations – for about ten years now. The students working with us this week have only joined recently, and there’s not many of the original membership left. I spend most of my time liaising with the main UFO groups in the UK, and emailing the ones in the US.”
Cards on the table, thought Gareth. “So do you really think that flying saucers are buzzing over Ely, then?”
Littlewood smiled his secretive little smile. “You’ll see.”
“You know that Dr. Bennings has got a different theory as to what UFOs really are, don’t you?”
“Yes, of course. The Earthlights theory. LATER.”
“Oh, okay.” Gareth returned his attention to the dinner polishing off the scampi and chips. After the rubbery chewing, he leaned across the table and muttered, “Why can’t you tell me now? Is it some kind of secret?”
“What? Er – no, I mean L-A-T-E-R. The Light At The End of the Road. Do you remember that poster for the film ‘Close Encounters’? The highway stretching out forever, and the blue glow of light rising over the horizon? The Earthlights theory tries to explain that kind of visual phenomenon.” A pause for breath, and a large swig of tea. “It’s a nice theory, and its supporters are very clever at how they use it to cover a lot of mysteries. But Earthlights don’t explain the radar sightings, they don’t explain abductions, and they don’t explain the hard evidence of alien spacecraft. I mean, something crashed at Roswell back in 1947, Gareth, and it wasn’t marsh gas, I can tell you that! It was made of some kind of metal, it had artificial propulsion, and…” He laid down his knife and fork with a flourish. “It had a crew.”
“Yeah, yeah, I’ve seen the documentary about that black-and-white autopsy film that came out last year. I thought it was proved to be fake.”
“Of course it’s a fa
ke. A scheme cooked up by the US Government to deceive and discredit the people trying to get to the truth.”
“Oh come on, Brian, if there were really dead alien bodies in the Pentagon, do you think they’d manage to keep them secret for so long? Someone would screw up, or they wouldn’t be able to resist slipping something to the newspapers for a wedge of money.”
“Listen, Gareth, I think you’re being a bit naive here. If the Government, especially the Pentagon and the CIA, want to keep something secret, they can make pretty damn sure that nobody talks about it. Their Black Ops teams have ways of making evidence and witnesses disappear.”
And of course your career driving around the Fenlands collecting cash on behalf of Giles Amusements makes you an expert on American Black Ops, thought Gareth.
“They might throw out a scrap of information there, a fake tidbit here, like the Majestic–12 documents,” continued Littlewood. “But that’s only to throw us off the track. To keep us away from what they really have in those underground bunkers.”
Gareth laughed nervously. “Brian, that’s even scarier than the idea that aliens are flying around the countryside.”
The eyes behind the greasy spectacles widened for dramatic effect. “Exactly. I know the arguments against the existence of UFOs, and I realize the objections you must have to the concept. But remember the words of the Astronomer Royal; ‘Space travel is bunk,’ he said, and that was back in 1960. ‘Space travel is bunk’. One year later, Yuri Gagarin made the first manned space flight. I rest my case.”
Gareth nodded in deference. “Okay, so if space aliens really do exist, then where do you think they come from?”
“There are all kinds of different opinions. Some people claim they don’t come from another planet at all, but from right here. They come from a hollow space at the center of the Earth, and they enter and exit from a tunnel at the South Pole. Ha! What a crazy idea.”
Gareth chewed his lip and refused to comment.
“My own personal guess,” Littlewood ventured, “is that the visitors are coming from Sirius. You see, there’s an African tribe called the Dogon, who live in Mali, south of the Sahara desert. Their way of life has remained untouched for thousands of years, and they still live in mud huts and hunt for their food. But you know what? They’ve got the most extraordinary knowledge of astronomy, of the solar system and stars that are light-years away, and they used this knowledge to make works of art hundreds of years ago. There’s no way they could have got it by using telescopes, because they didn’t have any technology, and they still don’t. They claim that the information was given to the wise men of the tribe ages ago, by a visitor from the stars. They called him Nommos, the fish-god.”
“Nommos, the fish-god,” Gareth repeated, trying his hardest to keep a straight face. The infant opposite was being lifted off the high chair and put into a baby buggy already overloaded with shopping. Gareth was sure he could see a plea for help in the little boy’s eyes. “Yes, yes, go on.”
“The Dogon aren’t the only example of visitors from Sirius. The ancient Babylonians wrote of an amphibious creature called Oannes, who seems virtually identical to Nommos. Oannes is said to have given the Babylonians the secrets of agriculture, mathematics, as well as astronomy. In other words… ancient astronauts, from beyond the stars, put early human beings on the road towards civilization.” Littlewood sat back and folded his arms, looking around the cafe with an air of faint disdain.
“And you think these fish-gods… were aliens?”
“I’ve no doubt about it. The Dogon recorded the arrival of Nommos in an ark, a mighty ball of light that caused a fierce howling wind as it landed. I’d say that the Nommos, or whatever their real name is, have always been around, since the dawn of civilization, and every once in a while they check up on us. To see that we’re not getting too big for our boots, so to speak. Their appearances have been captured for posterity in the world’s religions, and everybody gets to argue about what the whole thing really means. I’m sure that the visitors must be laughing their heads off about all the crazy religious beliefs. If they have heads, that is. Or perhaps not. They might be tearing their hair out in frustration.”
“If they have hair, that is,” Gareth said, and they both laughed. Gareth felt a huge sense of relief because now he could let off steam without Littlewood thinking he was laughing at him.
“Speaking of religions,” Gareth continued, “I figured out the locations of the churches, in the photos you sent me.”
“What photos?” Littlewood exclaimed, looking alarmed to be thrown out of his intergalactic reverie.
“These.” Gareth opened his briefcase and handed over the envelope. “Didn’t you send these to me at the B & B?”
“I didn’t send you any photos.” Littlewood opened the envelope and shuffled the prints. “Hmm. I don’t know much about churches, I’m afraid. Interesting! It looks like a disc-like craft, in this one here… reminds me of the Gulf Breeze pictures. Where did you get these?”
Anger flashed across Gareth’s mind, but thankfully, didn’t stay. “I told you, they were sent to me at the B & B. Are you saying that you didn’t send them?”
“Gareth, I’ve never seen these prints before. I suppose one of the lads in the group could have posted them, but that’s unlikely… or maybe it was SIAP. Yes, that’s probably it. They might have been posted by the national group and they went to you instead of me, or Doug. Wasn’t there a letter with this? A return address? No? That’s strange. I’ll get them checked out for you, if you like. I’ll ask the rest of the group…”
Gareth stretched out his hand. “Thanks, but I’d rather keep them for the moment, if you don’t mind.”
“Okay. Maybe you could run off a couple of transparencies, if that’s okay. I’ll pay you, of course. They do seem to be genuine shots of a sighting, and this is my catchment area.”
Gareth nodded. “I won’t forget.”
After saying goodbye to Littlewood, it was time for a couple of phone calls and a trip back to the B & B to check in again, before he drove over to Cambridge. As Gareth wriggled into place in the driver’s seat, he looked at the briefcase holding the mystery envelope. It must have been Dr. Bennings who sent them, he thought. Only a few people knew he was staying at the B & B. But why hadn’t Bennings mentioned them yet? And why send them to the B & B at all? He could have waited and handed them over personally.
Why, why, why?
“Don’t ask me, mate,” Gareth said out loud. “Ask Nommos the fish-god. He knows.”
He pulled out aggressively into Main Street, cutting up a Vauxhall Cavalier that pumped its horn at him.
CHAPTER ELEVEN
Monday, March 25th
Two feet, and the legs attached to them.
A pair of leather shoes that had definitely seen better days. The shoes made scuffmarks in the dense black soil over which they were passing. No, not black: not completely. The ground was silvered with frost and moonlight. They were only a pair of shoes, but the sight of them made Gareth want to laugh. They were so funny. Why were they so funny?
“Gareth, you are becoming more aware of your surroundings now.” Dr. Bhaskar was a disembodied presence somewhere to his left, a friendly voice in the cold wilderness. “What can you see?”
“Not much. It’s dark and it’s cold. There’s some kind of mist over to one side. Over by a clump of trees. It’s getting brighter. The mist is going away.”
“Can you see the truck?”
“Yes. The truck is coming up the road, but6 it’s still a long way away.”
The truck, headlights flaring, eventually slowed down as it approached the place where Gareth had slumped on the ground. Inside the cab was the driver, about to poke his shocked face out of the window and shout. Gareth wished he would hurry up. It was cold sitting there.
“Gareth, how did you get to the road?”
“I don’t know.”
“Are you in any pain?”
“No, but I can’t move my legs. I don’t think I can stand up.”
“Do you think you’ve broken your leg?”
“Yes. I know it’s injured pretty badly. I only got to the road because they took me there.”
A pause. “Who took you there, Gareth?”
“I don’t know.”
That’s what was funny; Gareth’s feet, black shoes against the silvery frost of the soil… but his feet hadn’t touched the ground. They’d been skimming over the surface, only lightly brushing the soil as he was pulled towards the road.
“My hands. They’re holding my hands.”
“Do you mean the driver, Gareth? Do you mean the doctors at the hospital?”
“No.”
“Tell me who’s holding your hands.”
“I can’t. I can’t say. Now I’m lying on something. It feels like a hard table.”
“Is it the road, Gareth?”
“No, it’s not the road. They’ve taken me inside. My face… my face feels puffy.”
“They’ve taken you inside. Is that what you said, Gareth?”
“Yes. I’m lying on a table. There’s wires and stuff all over the table.”
“Who put you on the table, Gareth?”
“They did.”
“Why did they do that?”
“I don’t know.”
A flu jab, when Gareth was eleven. Gareth remembered the friendly face of the doctor as he put a steadying hand on his shoulder. The slight ache, after the injection. The raised, rouged mark on the shoulder that he kept inspecting for days afterwards as it gradually faded.
A light goes on that dazzles and reflects off everything in the room. Everything is gleaming, everything is chrome and silver. The dentist’s face looms into view, upside down, his smile inverted, his tools held up as he hesitates before beginning…
A face without a mouth. Upside down. Covered with some sort of mask. The world explodes and Gareth is left wet and cold.
“Gareth? Gareth, can you hear me?”
“Yes. Yes, but I can’t feel anything.”