The Mystery of the Haunted Cottage

by Derek Landy

  The Doctor smiled again. ‘I don’t find you suspicious at all.’ He turned to Martha and whispered, ‘I find him incredibly suspicious.’

  ‘I heard that,’ said Cotterill.

  ‘You were meant to,’ said the Doctor, rounding on him. ‘I was lulling you into a false sense of security. Now that you are sufficiently lulled, I will increase the intensity of my interrogation. Mr Cotterill, these allegedly strange lights in the woods you keep referring to – what are they?’

  ‘I don’t know what you’re –’

  ‘Answer the question, Mr Cotterill,’ the Doctor said, suddenly angry. ‘The lights. In the woods. The strange ones. What are they?’

  ‘I don’t know!’

  ‘So you admit they exist!’

  ‘What? No!’

  ‘Are you responsible for the lights, Mr Cotterill? Do you know who is? What is your agenda? What do you want? What are you after? What are you hiding, Mr Cotterill, if that is your real name? Answer the question, Mr Cotterill!’

  ‘It is!’

  ‘It …’ The Doctor stopped and blinked. ‘Right, I’ve lost track of what question that was an answer to.’

  ‘Mr Cotterill,’ Martha said, smiling as she stepped forward, ‘could I ask you something? As caretaker, have you ever witnessed anything … unusual? Unusual activity, unusual occurrences, unusual visitors?’

  ‘You mean like you two?’

  ‘Like us,’ Martha said, nodding, ‘but more so.’

  ‘No,’ Cotterill said emphatically. ‘Apart from the two of you, I have not seen anything unusual, especially not ghosts.’

  ‘We never mentioned ghosts.’

  ‘Good!’ Cotterill said. ‘Because there’s no such thing! Superstition, that’s all that is! Now if you will excuse me, I have a lot of work to do!’ He stepped back and slammed the door.

  ‘I’m not sure,’ Martha said. ‘Did that go well or not?’

  ‘That went brilliantly,’ the Doctor said, beaming. ‘Now what do you say we go investigate those woods?’

  2

  The woods didn’t require a whole lot of investigating. It was all oaks and birches and ashes and dappled sunlight and bushes and moss – everything that went into making up a woodland was present and accounted for. But it did have one other feature that Martha reckoned could be a clue – a network of ropes spanning the gaps between branches high overhead. She may not have remembered anything about The Mystery of the Haunted Cottage apart from the cover, but she did remember that most of the clues in the Troubleseekers books were fairly obvious. The Doctor barely glanced up, however. He was too busy looking down.

  ‘Have you seen these ropes?’ Martha asked. ‘They’re a clue, aren’t they? I’m observing them, like you told me to, and they have got to be a clue. Right?’

  The Doctor murmured something, then started walking into the undergrowth. Martha sighed, and followed.

  They walked until they met a steep incline, and the Doctor made straight for a tangle of bushes. He pulled them apart far too easily. Martha caught up with him, and saw a rusted iron door built into the earth. The Doctor seized the handle and opened the door.

  ‘A secret passageway!’ he said.

  Martha frowned. ‘Looks dark. Creepy. Lots of cobwebs.’

  The Doctor grinned. ‘Want to investigate?’

  ‘Nope. No. The ropes are our clues. We should concentrate on them.’

  ‘Oh, come on! The ropes are boring clues! When was the last time we investigated a secret passageway?’

  ‘We’re always investigating passageways.’

  ‘Not secret ones! Come on, Martha! The Troubleseekers would investigate. I think you owe it to your childhood self to do this. Didn’t you say something about taking the Troubleseeker Oath?’

  ‘I didn’t take it. It was written on the first page of every book.’

  ‘Did you read it?’

  ‘Yes, I read it, but that doesn’t mean I –’

  ‘Can you remember it? Can you recite it for me? I’d love to hear it.’

  Martha frowned. ‘Um … yeah. I think so. Let’s see … I hereby swear to seek out trouble, wherever mysteries boil and secrets bubble. I won’t tell adults until the crime is solved, and report back to my friends at the double.’

  ‘It rhymes!’ the Doctor said, delighted. ‘More or less. It doesn’t flow particularly well, but it has words that rhyme and so it is a binding contract.’

  ‘What do you mean it’s a binding –’ Martha started, and then shut up. The Doctor’s grin grew wider.

  ‘You spoke it aloud, you took the oath,’ he said. ‘That’s how oaths work. Splendid. Let’s go exploring.’

  The stone steps were slippery with damp as they descended into darkness. Martha kept one hand out in front, splayed against the Doctor’s back, and the other trailing along the cold wall.

  ‘Of all the things your screwdriver can do,’ she whispered, ‘why on Earth is a torch not among them?’

  ‘Because it’s a sonic screwdriver,’ the Doctor whispered back, ‘not a laser spanner. The next screwdriver I design, though, that will have a torch. I promise.’

  Below them, the darkness turned to gloom, then to grey, and gradually Martha’s eyes adjusted to pick out details around her. She heard voices, low and muffled, and the light splashing of water. They got to the bottom of the steps and peered round the corner. Three men stood by an underground canal, loading wooden crates on to a boat tied up to a small wharf.

  ‘They look like smugglers,’ she whispered.

  ‘I know,’ said the Doctor. ‘Brilliant, isn’t it?’ He took her arm and stepped out from hiding before she could protest. ‘Hello there!’

  The three men spun round. One of them dropped a crate in surprise. It burst open and gold coins spilled out, some of them dropping into the canal.

  ‘Doing a spot of smuggling, are we?’ the Doctor asked, stuffing his hands in his pockets as he strolled forward. ‘Can’t beat it on a sunny day, can you? There’s nothing I’d rather be doing on a sunny day than scurrying about down here in the dark, indulging in the illegal transport of some presumably stolen goods.’

  The biggest smuggler, and by far the ugliest, was the first to focus his gaze. His eyes flickered from the Doctor to Martha, and back to the Doctor. ‘You coppers, then?’

  ‘Us?’ the Doctor said. ‘Coppers?’ He puffed out his chest. ‘Yes, actually we are. Well, sort of. Well, not really. But if you want to see us as the living embodiment of justice and the primary moral laws, then who am I to argue? Who am I, indeed? Who are you, for that matter? Does it matter? Probably not. I doubt you have interesting backstories anyway, and your motivations are most likely ill thought out to begin with. But, again, who am I to judge?’

  ‘What is this?’ the shortest one said. ‘What are you doing down here? What do you want?’

  ‘We’re investigators,’ said the Doctor. ‘Amateur sleuths, if you will. Well, I say amateur … She’s a Troubleseeker. She took the oath and everything. But me? I’m just a man. A man with good hair and a great screwdriver. Do you mind?’

  Without waiting for an answer, the Doctor took out the sonic screwdriver, scanned the crates and checked the results. He grunted.

  ‘What is it?’ Martha asked.

  ‘Exactly what it appears to be,’ the Doctor said. ‘Crates of gold coins, hundreds of years old. Spanish, I reckon. Are they? Yes. This is interesting. This is very interesting.’

  ‘We found ’em,’ said the smallest smuggler. ‘We found ’em when we were on the run, and we hid ’em in various spots around the woods. But there were four of us originally, and when we were rearrested the fourth … well, he died. And he was the only one who knew where the rest of the crates were buried. So we’ve been lookin’ for –’

  ‘Don’t care,’ the Doctor said, moving past all three of them to stand on the edge of the wharf. He scanned the area with the screwdriver.

  The smugglers looked confused. The smallest one looked back to Martha. ‘D
on’t you want to know what we’ve been up to?’

  ‘Not really,’ she admitted. ‘Sorry. I’m sure it’s very interesting. If you’re eight years old.’

  The smugglers looked at each other.

  ‘Are you … are you going to try and stop us?’ the biggest one asked.

  ‘Don’t know,’ said Martha. ‘You’re not harming anyone, are you?’ When they all shook their heads, she shrugged. ‘Then carry on. Don’t mind us.’

  The smugglers hesitated, then slowly picked up the spilled coins and resumed the loading of the crates on to the boat. Martha walked up beside the Doctor.

  ‘Anything?’

  He looked deeper into the dark tunnel. ‘There’s something down there,’ he said. ‘Something that needs investigating.’ He lowered his voice. ‘We’ll need a boat, though.’

  They looked at each other and turned. The smugglers were staring at them.

  ‘You really need to work on your whispering,’ Martha murmured.

  ‘Gentlemen,’ the Doctor said, smiling again, ‘slight change of plans. As you have heard, yes, we do need to commandeer your boat. We understand that you have waited a long time to retrieve this gold, and we sincerely regret any inconvenience caused.’

  ‘Sincerely,’ said Martha.

  ‘But our investigation must take priority, I’m afraid. Let me assure you, however, that when we are done we will return this boat to you in tip-top condition, or whatever condition it happens to be in when we’re done with it. All cards on the table, it’ll probably sink.’

  ‘Probably,’ said Martha.

  ‘You ain’t taking our boat,’ said the big smuggler. ‘Not without a fight.’

  The Doctor shook his head. ‘Ah, no, violence really isn’t my thing. Unless it’s swords. Do you have swords? No? Ah. Running is my thing, to be honest. Give me a corridor to run down and I will run down that corridor like nobody’s business. How about a race? Winner takes the boat.’

  The smallest smuggler cracked his knuckles. ‘No race,’ he said. ‘Violence.’

  ‘Hmm,’ said the Doctor. ‘So that’s two votes for violence. What about you, sir? You haven’t spoken up yet. It’s three votes or nothing, let’s all agree on that. Has to be unanimous. Sir? Violence or race?’

  The middle smuggler looked up. ‘Neither. If you can beat me in a match of wits, you can borrow the boat.’ With a grand flourish, he gestured towards a low table on which sat a chessboard.

  ‘How convenient!’ the Doctor said happily. ‘Martha, am I to understand that one of the Troubleseekers is a chess player?’

  She nodded. ‘Humphrey. He was taught by his grandfather.’

  ‘Well, that’s not contrived at all! I accept your challenge, sir: a match of wits it is! You go first, I insist.’

  The middle smuggler sat at the chessboard, rubbed his chin thoughtfully, and the moment he picked up a piece to move it the Doctor said, ‘Checkmate.’

  The middle smuggler looked up. ‘What?’

  ‘Checkmate,’ the Doctor repeated, stepping into the boat. ‘I win. I won the moment you sat down. I won the moment you mentioned it. I won the moment the great-great-great-nephew of the Maharaja Sri Gupta introduced me to the game, back when it was called chaturanga.’ He took Martha’s hand, steadying her while she joined him, then untied the mooring rope.

  The middle smuggler stood up. ‘You can’t win without playing.’

  ‘But of course I can,’ said the Doctor, picking up the long wooden pole. ‘My winning is inevitable, and since it is inevitable what’s the point of playing? I’ve never lost a chess game. Well, I lost once, to a mechanical dog, but that barely counts. You stay right where you are and we’ll be back in a tick. Hopefully.’

  They left the smugglers standing there, open-mouthed, and Martha resisted the urge to wave. She sat on the seat while the Doctor stood before her, using the pole to push them along.

  ‘I’ve never been on a gondola before,’ she said, smiling. ‘It’s kind of romantic.’

  ‘Not a gondola,’ the Doctor said without looking back. ‘It’s a punt.’

  The smile faded. ‘Right.’

  The canal was lit by flickering torches in rusted brackets that were hammered into the brick walls on either side. Martha peered into the dark water, watching leaves and broken twigs float by. It was cold down here.

  ‘So how do you think the smugglers fit into the mystery?’ she asked.

  ‘Mystery?’ the Doctor said. ‘There is no mystery. The mystery’s been solved. Cotterill’s the villain.’

  ‘He is?’

  ‘Of course he is. I’ve shaken hands with caretakers – they work hard, and they’ve got the calluses to prove it. Mr Cotterill’s hands were callused in all the wrong places, and there was old scarring round his wrist. Handcuffs, on far too tight for far too long. He’s the fourth smuggler, the one the others thought had died. He’s already rounded up the gold he hid, but he’s still searching for the gold hidden by his old partners-in-crime. He wants to keep it all to himself, the sly little fox. The lights in the woods were to scare people away while he searched – lanterns on pulleys to get people talking about ghosts. It’s all so disappointingly rubbish.’

  ‘It seemed pretty good when I was eight,’ said Martha, a little hotly.

  ‘If it was good,’ the Doctor said, ‘you would have remembered the story. Ah, now this is interesting …’

  Martha craned her neck. The water stopped ahead of them. The tunnel stopped. The bricks and the light stopped. It wasn’t blackness ahead; it was emptiness. It was devoid of actual colour. It was devoid of matter.

  Martha slumped. ‘I feel sick.’

  ‘Don’t look at it,’ said the Doctor.

  A buzzing sensation filled Martha’s brain, numbing her thoughts. ‘My head hurts …’

  There was no disturbance in the water, no wild rocking, no whooshing of air. The emptiness wasn’t sucking them in. It was just … there. The Doctor moved the pole in front, jammed it down, stopping them from getting too close.

  ‘Interesting,’ he murmured. ‘It feels like my brain is trying to leak out through my eyes.’

  Martha turned her head away and immediately her thoughts began to clear. ‘What is it?’

  She heard the excited whirr of the sonic screwdriver.

  ‘It’s nothing,’ said the Doctor after a moment. ‘Literally, it’s nothing. It’s a pocket of nothingness, down here below the surface. It’s like someone took an ice-cream scoop and scooped out a piece of reality. Marvellous. Terrifying, but marvellous. Do my thoughts sound weird to you? They sound weird to me. They sound old, and cracked.’

  ‘We’re not going to go into it, are we?’

  ‘No we are not,’ the Doctor said, urgency creeping into his voice as he changed his stance and started to push them back the way they’d come. ‘As beings of matter, as beings of good and solid reality, any contact with that nothingness would presumably lead to an extreme case of non-existence. And I don’t know about you, Martha Jones, but I’d hate to non-exist. The universe would miss me. I know it would.’

  Martha sat up a bit straighter, the strength returning to her body. ‘I feel better.’

  ‘Me, too,’ said the Doctor.

  She kept her eyes on the water as the last of the buzzing left her mind. Back to normal, she let her gaze sharpen in the gloom and immediately frowned. ‘Do you see that?’

  ‘See what?’

  ‘There.’ She pointed. ‘In the water. See?’

  ‘What is it?’ the Doctor asked.

  She peered closer. ‘Is it … is that a person? Hey, whoever you are, standing in the water. We can see you.’

  ‘Are you sure that’s a person?’

  ‘That’s obviously a head. You can see the shoulders. Hey, you. Hello?’

  The boat slowed. Martha narrowed her eyes, trying to pick out features. It looked like a head. It was head-shaped. She was sure that it was a head. Even though she couldn’t see any ears, or hair … and it wasn’t moving
.

  ‘It might not be a head –’ she conceded, and then a figure burst up from the water beside her, half-landed in the boat and grabbed her arm.

  The boat bucked and the Doctor cried out. Martha screamed as the figure tried to pull itself in, or pull her out, or whatever it was trying to do, and around them there were more figures, surging forward, gripping the boat, nearly tipping it over. Martha tore her arm from the figure’s hand, fell back and planted her boot right in its face as it tried to clamber on board. It fell back, splashing into the water. The boat lurched violently and the Doctor fell on top of her.

  ‘Sorry, sorry,’ he muttered as they figured out which arms and legs belonged to whom, and when Martha regained her bearings she became aware of how fast the boat was moving in the wrong direction.

  The Doctor looked up, his eyes wide. ‘They’re pushing us into the nothing.’

  He lunged for the pole, but it vanished over the side. Martha glanced up, saw the nothing over the Doctor’s shoulder and felt that buzz cloud her thoughts again. She whipped her head away and scrambled to her feet.

  ‘What are you doing?’ the Doctor called, but she was already putting one foot on the stern, and then she leaped off, over the heads of the dark figures. She splashed into the cold water, submerged for a moment, then got her feet under her and stood up, breaking the surface and gasping. The water only came up to her shoulders. She looked back in time to see the Doctor splashing down next to her.

  ‘Good plan,’ he spluttered.

  The figures let the boat carry on into the nothing, and turned silently. They had sunken depressions for eyes, another for a mouth and a slight bump for a nose. They started walking back towards Martha and the Doctor, arms outstretched.

  Martha dived, arms cutting through the water, legs kicking out behind. She glimpsed the Doctor swimming behind her.

  She reached the wharf and hauled herself out of the canal. The Doctor did the same.