by Ryan Casey
Brian stared at the headstone. It was old and cracked at the sides. The markings on it were barely readable, but the name was ever-so-prominent. Harold Harvey. 1558—1618. No message. No notes on family or how likeable a guy he was. Nothing.
David Wallson pulled a pack of chewing gum out of his pocket and held it out to Brian, who shook his head in refusal. David popped one in his mouth and chewed anyway, as the wind picked up and battered the trees that surrounded the churchyard. “I know what you’re thinking. ‘Why do I always get so attached to the complicated shit?’”
Brian shook his head. His cheeks were burning. He knew there was nothing he could technically do about what he had discovered other than inform the police. And yet he just couldn’t let it all go. He knew too much. He was in too deep. “What now? What little bullshit activity do you want me to carry out for you now?”
David grinned. Minty breath emanated from his mouth and covered Brian’s face. “I guess we’re at square one, aren’t we? The real Harold Harvey is dead. Somebody is using his name as an alias for one reason or another.”
Brian turned back to the headstone and peered at it. Harold Harvey. “These witch tales. The Pendle Hill and Longridge Fell stories. They’re pretty common knowledge, right?”
“Local folklore,” David said. “Half the little inbred towns around here probably hear it as their first stories on their mother’s laps. A way to stop them heading into the woods.”
“The woods?”
David pointed at the triptych of hills in the distance. There was a large tree-filled area in between each. “That’s where all these apparent witches used to go up to do their…well, their witchy shit.”
“‘Witchy shit’?”
“Y’know. Animal sacrifices. Eating babies. The standard witchy activities.”
Shrugging, Brian headed further away from Harold Harvey’s headstone and to the concrete wall that lined the churchyard. He rested on it and stared out at the hills. “If our killer wanted to remain anonymous, then why would he choose the name of a commonly known witch slayer as his alias?”
“Oh, now what’s this? First, it’s our killer, and now you’re going all superstitious on me. This is good, Brian. I feel privileged.” He punched Brian on his arm and winked as he too rested on the concrete wall and looked at the scenery. “Perhaps it’s somebody who’s obsessed. Somebody who doesn’t like witches and, I dunno. Maybe the Brabiner and the Davidson groups stepped on this guy’s witchy land or something.”
Brian shook his head. His stomach tingled. Little ticks of clockwork chimed inside his head as it accelerated to the next gear. “No. You’re forgetting a crucial part of things here—Harold Harvey’s imitator…let’s just call him Harold Harvey II for sake of ease. Harold Harvey II wanted the Davidson and the Brabiner groups to step on that ground. He paid them a lot of money to step on that ground and start digging. A very peculiar amount of money, too.”
David was silent for a few moments, other than the sound of saliva-drenched chewing gum squelching from tooth to tooth. “So you think the killer’s set these archeology guys up? A revenge sort of thing for nicking some witch bones?”
A smile of satisfaction inadvertently grew on Brian’s face. He couldn’t help it; it was just something that happened when he felt solutions pulling together in his head. “I think Harold Harvey is trying to send out a message. I don’t think the killings are anything more than a symbol. The killer is trying to tell us something. He wants us to know the history of the Pendle witches.”
“Or at least, he wants the police to know the history.”
David’s words caught Brian by surprise somewhat. “Yeah. The police. Of course.” Often, he had to remind himself that he was no longer a Detective Sergeant, as much as he felt the familiar old curiosity tingling through his body.
“This is all good,” David said, yanking a notepad out of his never-ending pocket and flipping a few pages. “Very good. Perhaps not front page stuff, but second or fourth at least.”
“Whoa,” Brian said. He grabbed David’s arm as he held the pen above the pad. “What the fuck do you think you’re doing?”
“I’m reporting. I’m a reporter. That’s what I do.”
Brian pushed David backwards. “The first people we inform about this are the police. We have to give them a chance, or our arrangement is as good as—”
“The same police who forced you to cover up the truth of Nicola Watson’s death? The same police who had the whole fucking department believe that Cassandra Emerson’s death was all your fault? The police who have you suspended, right now?”
Brian’s jaw tensed. Butterflies sped around his stomach like unruly kids riding the dodgems. The words of response were caught in the back of Brian’s throat. “They are my old colleagues. And no matter what happened, they—”
“They don’t give a shit about you, Brian. That’s one thing you and I do have in common. So the way I see it, there’s only one correct way to go about all this, and that’s by royally screwing the police over. And hey—they’ll get the latest info first thing tomorrow when the papers go live. They’ll have caught up with the case then at least, right?”
Turning away, Brian rested on the concrete wall again. David had a point. What had the police done for him besides ruining his life? What did he owe them, really?
“Okay,” Brian said. He lifted his head and inhaled a deep breath of the country air. The clouds over Pendle Hill and Longridge Fell were thickening. A few specks of rain peppered Brian’s skin. “Okay. You can have your fucking story. Just make sure you…”
His speech trailed off as he turned to face David and the front of the church. His knees went weak. He wanted to say something—to understand what was happening—but there was no explaining his way out of this one.
Two men wearing balaclavas were either side of David. One of them was holding an archaic-looking gun to his head, as the other gripped his mouth. Snot dribbled down David’s face, tears pouring down his cheeks and a patch of piss spreading across the front of his trousers.
Brian’s heart raced and his mouth went dry. “Please. Just…We don’t…” He didn’t know what to say because he didn’t understand.
But even if he had understood, it wouldn’t have mattered anyway, because the next thing he felt was a sharp thump on the back of his head, as his body crumbled to the ground.
Chapter Eleven
At first, Brian was convinced he must be in bed somewhere. But the surface he was resting on was cold and hard. It dug into his back. His head was killing. Had he had a drink the night before? No. He couldn’t have. He didn’t drink anymore. When he tried to move, he realised he wasn’t lying down at all. He tried to open his eyes but something was blocking his vision. He tried even harder to budge but he just couldn’t, as his hands were tight and his wrists were bound. His heart began to race. Where had he been last night? What had he done?
And then it came to him. His stomach sank as it all came flooding back. David Wallson and he had been at the churchyard; the location of the long-deceased Harold Harvey. They’d been talking about potential motives of the Pendle Hill and Longridge Fell murderers, which looked very much like the work of one person with one motive. And then he’d turned from the wall to face David, and the two figures in balaclavas had been holding him. Black balaclavas, completely covering their faces. Frames muscular enough to suggest they were men.
After that, a sharp pain on the back of his head, and darkness.
He tried to struggle free of his restraints once again. His voice came to life without even meaning to. He attempted to shout at the top of his lungs, moving from side to side, but he just couldn’t. Something was blocking his mouth. He was trapped. The killer—or killers—had him. They’d sniffed out David Wallson and they’d sniffed out Brian as his source and they were going to cause them both a world of pain.
Just as the thought of his potential fate entered his
mind, Brian heard a sound somewhere up ahead. A metallic noise, and a creaking, like an old door. Instead of trusting his instincts and shaking for his life, Brian realised he was completely still. He was holding his breath. Waiting. Listening.
He heard a few whispers. Footsteps approaching. His heart was rattling his entire body. He wanted to just sink into a hole in the ground and go back to the start. He wished he’d never even got involved in this stupid fucking case. It wasn’t his case to involve himself in. A tear dripped down his cheek, also taking him by surprise. The footsteps were getting closer. He thought back to that one man with his gun. If they had guns, then they meant business.
In an instant, and with a harsh jolt of the neck, light returned to Brian’s vision. He could tell right away that he was in some kind of cellar area. He’d noticed the musty metallic smell earlier, but had been too panicked to think much of it. As the sharpness gradually returned to his vision, the intensity of the solitary light bulb softening, Brian could see the two figures standing above him. They were still wearing their balaclavas.
And one of them still had a gun in his hand.
“This was a bad idea, Tony.”
The man with the gun—Tony—smacked the other man in his stomach. “What the fuck did I tell you about not saying my name? Fucking prick. Pull yourself together. This has to be done.” Tony turned to face Brian again and yanked a piece of cloth that had tightly gripped his mouth shut. The corners of his mouth were chapped and sore. But the way the other guy—not Tony—had just spurted out his friend’s name reassured him somewhat. These people didn’t seem all that organised, or even methodical.
But why did they have him tied up, with a gun in his face?
It was at that point that Brian heard a coughing somewhere to his right. He tried to turn his neck so that he could look, but it was very stiff.
“Fuck,” Not Tony said. “The other one’s awake.”
Tony sighed and stomped out of Brian’s line of sight, leaving Not Tony in front of him. Even though Not Tony’s face was still covered by a balaclava, Brian could tell this guy was nervous and uncomfortable just from the way he stood there scratching his forearms.
“Please,” Brian whispered. He didn’t intend for it to be a whisper but it was about as much as he could manage right now. “I don’t understand why I’m…why I’m…”
A sharp pain hit the side of Brian’s face. Not Tony flinched.
“You don’t talk until you’re spoken to, understand?” It was Tony who’d hit him. David Wallson—at least, the person he assumed was David Wallson—had gone silent again.
Brian held his breath. The smell of the room was damp and musty. Droplets of water dripped from somewhere above. He figured they were downstairs somewhere. In a cellar or a basement. Somewhere out of sight.
Somewhere where nobody would hear them protest.
Tony leaned in towards Brian. Brian could smell his strong, sickly breath even from behind the black balaclava. “Why the fuck were you sniffing around us today, hmm? I told you we’d behave. We both did. But you just couldn’t help but sniff around, could you?”
Brian squinted. The guy called Tony was making less and less sense. “I don’t know what you think I’m doing or who you think I am, but—”
“Don’t bullshit me, ‘Detective’,” Tony said. “My little brother and me saw you in the pub earlier, just like you were the last time you got us wrongly locked up. So what is it this time, huh? Because I swear, we ain’t done nothin’. Nothin’ at all.”
The situation was almost dreamlike to Brian at this point. He truly did not know what to say. Clearly the bloke knew him from somewhere, or had him mistaken, or…
Shit. He hadn’t arrested him, had he? Fuck. The last thing he needed was some revenge stunt from a nutter.
A cough sounded from Brian’s right-hand side again. Tony tutted and moved back to his feet, squaring up to his brother. “Can you get that fucker to shut up for five minutes, please?”
Tony’s brother cowered slightly, then rushed over towards David Wallson, who would be totally clueless as to what was going on.
“You’ve got this wrong,” Brian said, speaking a little loudly. “I…I’m not here to arrest you. Fuck, I couldn’t arrest you if I wanted to.” Brian immediately regretted his honesty. Informing his captors that he was no longer a special detective might just tip them over the edge and make them believe they could get away with whatever they were planning to do. He just had to hope these mystery people didn’t hate him too much for some petty arrest however many years back.
Tony returned to Brian’s sight and stood beside his brother. “You ain’t? But then…then who’s your mate? Like last time. When you was undercover.”
Brian shrugged—or at least, attempted a shrug, but it sent a shooting pain down his spine. “That bloke you caught me with is not a police officer. Far bloody from it, in fact. He’s…He’s a journalist. We’re doing a story on something else.”
“Ah,” Tony said, cutting through Brian’s speech. He tapped the gun onto his palm. “That’s what this is. Big police report on our dodgy activities. Fallen officer tries to rise to fame again. That what it is? Well, you won’t find fuck all here.” He squared up to Brian and pointed the gun at his chest, which rapidly shook with every heavy heartbeat. “No drugs. No immigrants. No nothing.”
“Okay,” Brian said. His throat was wobbly and he felt like he’d pissed himself ten times over. “Just—just please. We aren’t here for you I swear. We aren’t—”
“And if you do find owt,” Tony said, pressing the gun further into Brian’s shaking chest, “then I’ll take care of it. And nobody will bat an eyelid around here. I promise you that, officer. You journalist sellout scumbags are not getting a smidgen of a story out of—”
“We couldn’t give a fuck about whatever dodgy shit you’ve been up to.”
The voice caught Brian by surprise. Judging by the way Tony and his brother swung their necks to their left, it surprised them, too. But it was David. No doubt about that.
“What did you just say, journo twat?” Tony rose to his feet again and walked slowly in the direction of David. His gun hand was shaking.
“Please, Tony—”
“Fuck off,” Tony said, pushing aside his brother. “Twats need to learn some manners. So what story is more important than us, eh? You think we’re that dumb we’d fall for your bullshit attempts to get out of here? Shat yourself yet?”
“We’re investigating the Pendle Hill and Longridge Fell killings,” David said. “We’re looking into the history of this…the churchyard we were in. We’re looking into the past to try and understand the future.”
The room was completely silent for a few moments. Brian wasn’t totally sure whether David had made the right decision singing about the massacres to these two unknown foes, and the longer time dragged on in silence, the more he questioned the decision to speak.
But eventually, Tony lowered his gun and sighed. He muttered a few inaudible words to his brother, then the two of them turned back to face Brian and David again. The brother protested initially, but it seemed like Tony had won out their little debate.
Which scared Brian to death.
“Sorry for the confusion, gents,” Tony said.
Then, he gripped the top of the balaclava and pulled it from his head.
It was in that instant that Brian recognised the man. The bald, crinkly-headed man from the pub earlier with the bloodshot eyes. He remembered in that moment why he’d recognised him, but at the time, he’d been too caught up with David to remember.
“Tony Mcphee,” he said, offering a hand. Realising Brian couldn’t shake it, he crouched down to untie him. “And that’s my brother, Phil.”
He stuck a thumb in his brother’s direction. Phil was a gaunt, younger guy with narrow cheekbones and yellowing teeth. He had a gold piercing in his right earlobe, and a lone bogey
stuck to the top of his mouth.
“Well, ‘urry the fuck up, Phil, and let the other gent go.”
Phil nodded his head in a rush, then sped over towards David Wallson, who offered a few curses in Phil’s direction before finding himself free. Tony and Phil Mcphee. Brian had arrested them a couple of times in the past for their drug dealing at various Preston pubs, not to mention their links to the international sex trade. They were shits, there was no doubt about that, but Brian wasn’t in a position to be throwing accusations at them right now, there was no doubt about that.
The second they were free, Brian and David nodded at one another in acknowledgement. It was in that moment that Brian understood the root of the musty damp smell, as David’s trousers were clearly stained with piss. He looked like he’d gone a few shades greyer in the last however long, too. He figured he’d never been in a hostage situation before.
“I am sorry, officer,” Tony said. He lowered his head and stared at the ground in front of Brian’s feet. “I…I let myself get a bit out of control. It’s just when I saw you, I was convinced, y’know? I was convinced you two shits were trying to stitch me and my brother up again. But…but…Oh, and the…er…the gun,” Tony said, waving the gun in Brian’s face. “Doesn’t work. Just a shitty old replica, officer. I swear it’s just a—”
“Okay, okay,” Brian said. His entire body was shaking. He wanted to call back his police powers in that instant and send the pair of fuckers directly to a cell for the problems they’d caused.
But mostly, he just wanted to get the hell out of here before they changed their minds.
“I ain’t done no drugs for…for years,” Tony said. He smacked his brother on his arm. Phil flinched, then offered a half-smile in Brian’s direction. “No women either. We’re clean as owt these days, I say. We own the Grey Goose, and all. Seriously, this is just a—a misunderstanding. Tell you what, wife bought me a watch that I don’t want. You can have it. Both of you. I mean…I mean, you can sell it and share the—”