“The truth.”
“The truth is that you are seriously getting on my nerves. I went to the hospital because I thought you needed help.”
“And fought like a fighter.”
“Whilst we’re on the subject of the truth? Why not tell me where the hell you were those hours you were missing?”
Seth shifted. The pew was hard against his back and his muscles were sore. “I’ve told you; I don’t know.”
“You’ve seen those doors since you were a kid. It’s not a coincidence that the one that shows up in the vicarage is the one you're thrown out from.”
“No, it’s not a coincidence.”
“So, what was it?”
“Kelly put it there.”
A pause, then Malc breathed, “Kelly’s dead.”
“That doesn’t seem to matter with the Almost Doors. There’s a connection. Something that I don’t understand.”
“This is why Georgia’s so pissed off. She doesn’t understand either. I can just about live with the fact that for whatever reason, you survived a fall from the top of a building by falling through a magical doorway, but since I can’t exactly recount all of those details to my wife, she’s struggling to understand how a man thought dead, turns up hours later in our front room, confused and claiming that the end of the world is upon us.”
“I didn’t exactly say that.” Seth knew exactly what he said, but he did not understand what it meant. He’d mentioned the Unravelling, but it was an alien word. He had no idea why the word was planted in his head and what it could mean, only that it was something to guard against.
Malc nodded. “So, we both have things we’re not prepared to talk about.”
Not prepared to talk about? Malc noticed his choice of words and hesitated, switching the conversation around to something safer. “So, you will get in touch with this solicitor, let him know you’re not going to the reading?”
“I don’t know what I will do, yet.”
“Have you not been listening? Whatever is in that basement, you don’t want to treat it lightly. You can’t take it on as a pet project. Lamont had other plans, let those pan out. It’ll be safer for everyone.”
“I can do this,” Seth murmured. “I should do this. He came to me after the pair of us barely crossing paths for a decade. He knows that I can do things that others can’t. He talks about my gift.”
“After what happened at the nursing home, you really want to go there?”
“That was a bad day, yes. But that doesn’t mean I can’t do this.”
“You told me you couldn’t connect to the other side. That there was nothing to hear. You told me that Charlie had gone. Are you saying he’s come back?”
“No, he’s not come back.”
“But isn’t he your connection to the other side? You’ve seen that you can’t do it without his help.”
“He helps, but he’s not all of it. Jeez, you’re really trying to rub it in, aren’t you?”
Malc sighed. “You’ve been through so much. You lost your hitcher at Ravenmeols, you’ve potentially lost your medium powers. I don’t think you’re in the right place to take this on. You need time to reflect and to adjust. Whatever has happened to you, you need to learn to deal with it. You won't be able to do that whilst taking on Lamont’s collection. Promise me, you’ll say no.”
There was a pause so heavy it could suffocate.
Seth nodded. “I promise.”
11
Seth arrived at Noble and Chesterton’s at half past ten, half an hour late. He thought that was pretty good time-keeping for him, especially after the crap night’s sleep he’d had. Sleep. Ha. No chance. Not really. He didn’t think it was fair to call his night’s tossing and turning and hating the thoughts racing through his head as sleep.
He’d gotten out of bed in a worse frame of mind than when he’d gotten in it, and it had taken twenty minutes in the shower to bring him back to a semblance of life. Georgia had driven Joe to school and had gone to work herself. Malc was in his makeshift gym in the garage but had left a handwritten note on the kitchen table instructing Seth to find him before doing anything today. It was a last-minute attempt to keep Seth away from the solicitors and to leave the collection to whatever Lamont had referred to as Plan B.
“Just take a seat, and I’ll call through.” The receptionist gave Seth a steely look that let him know that she didn’t take crap from anybody, especially people who were late for meetings. Seth kept his mouth shut about the doughnut crumbs that had gathered on her silk scarf and about the jam at the corner of her mouth. Small victories.
Malc was right about Plan B. There was no way that Seth should get involved—unless of course there was value there—no, even that was disingenuous. How could he sell something that had become so important to his uncle? It wasn’t that he was particularly concerned about letting these artefacts back out into the wild, after all, he had no idea what any of them were purportedly capable of or why they were dangerous. No, it was more the thought of splitting up what had become one man’s life’s work. His obsession deserved a little respect. If Lamont’s other plan had any merit in it, he’d have sought that out before contacting a nephew he quite possibly wouldn't even recognise walking down the street.
The receptionist returned and led Seth into an office. The man he’d met at the cemetery yesterday got up and shook his hand.
“Glad you could make it,” the man said. He had a cheap-looking nameplate on his desk. Thomas Chesterton.
“Yeah, sorry about being late.”
Chesterton sat down again and nudged the folders in front of him. When he’d finished, they were aligned perfectly with the bottom edge of his desk.
There was only one guest chair in the room.
“Is it just me here for the reading?”
“You are the sole beneficiary,” Chesterton replied.
“Ah.” Seth had thought there might be others. He’d half expected to see his father waiting for him in the office and was grateful that he wasn’t.
“Shall we begin then?” Chesterton nodded and didn’t wait for a response before opening his folder and beginning to read from the top page.
He didn’t finish until five minutes later.
Seth felt like someone had punched him in the stomach and quickly scanned the room for a bin in case he actually was going to be sick. The moment passed and became a sense of falling. He thought the last five minutes had been some twisted dream.
“What?”
Chesterton was speaking but Seth couldn’t work out whether there were real words coming out of his mouth or just sounds. And then Seth’s brain reengaged.
He’d been left the collection. That was a given from the letter he’d received from Lamont.
But he only got the collection if he took immediate custody of the house as well. The collection was not to be removed or any artefact to leave the confines of the building under any circumstances. Were that to happen, Seth was to lose the right of occupancy and the house and the collection would fall into the possession of Mrs Olivia Gwinn, whoever she was.
“That can’t be right. He barely knew me.”
“It’s true. I did all the legal on his will. I was there when he signed it. It’s all correct.” Chesterton’s frown lines had deepened. He’d taken up a defensive posture, arms folded, looking for all the world like a headmaster telling off an unruly pupil.
“I have a copy of the will for you,” Chesterton said and handed an envelope over. Seth picked his up and scanned the contents quickly, eager to confirm what Chesterton had already told him.
“I don’t really understand. He hasn’t discussed any of this with me.”
“That’s not unusual,” the solicitor replied. “I’m sorry for your loss, and I hope you can draw comfort from your uncle thinking of you. There is a clause that allows you ten days to consider whether you accept the terms of the will. Do you think you’ll need the time to think?”
Seth shook his head, imagin
ing a new place to settle and money to live off. “No, I don’t think I’ll need any time to decide at all.”
12
Chesterton had told him there were papers to sign and Seth decided to get it all done there and then; there seemed little point in coming back another day. Truth was, Seth didn’t want to give himself any room to wriggle out of this. The process would take several weeks, but Lamont had insisted that a key be given to Seth so he could tend to the collection as soon as possible.
“There’s also the matter of the police investigation,” Chesterton had told Seth as he was leaving the office.
“What about it?”
“They’ve given permission to go back into the house, but from what I’ve been told, they rarely leave things as cleaned up as you’d expect. There may be some distressing things left behind. You might want to organise a specialist cleaning team.”
Seth’s stomach had lurched at that idea. “Specialist?”
“They clean crime scenes after the police have gathered evidence and lifted the access restrictions. It’s to save the victim’s family undue distress.”
“Do I need them?”
Chesterton had shrugged. “I’m sorry. I don’t know. You might want to call them, anyway. Get them to check things out for you.”
Seth had turned down the suggestion but promised Chesterton that he’d get in touch with them if things were bad. The truth was, it had sounded expensive and Seth just didn’t have the spare cash to pay anyone for special cleaning services. His bank account was almost flat-lining and Chesterton had indicated it might take a few weeks before he would receive any money from the estate.
Chesterton had also given him another letter.
This was to be opened once he was inside the property and would give him advice as to how to take care of the collection and whom to call should there be any trouble. Seth took the key and the letter and left the solicitors with a degree of trepidation. The initial buzz that he had somewhere else to live had waned, and he was left with a terrific sense of impostor syndrome. He couldn’t reliably remember when they’d last met and yet Lamont had placed his most prized possession in his hands.
On the way back to his car, he paused, then feeling the inevitable reflex in his stomach darted for the closest bush and let nature take its course. A minute later he straightened and wiped the vomit from the edge of his mouth. There was a suspicion that he’d made the most terrible mistake.
He found the street easily enough, on a major shortcut from the promenade to the main shopping street where several large Victorian villas had been converted into private hotels. Half way along, he found his uncle’s place. He’d never been here as a child—back then, his uncle had a semi-detached in Churchtown. The house was bright and cheerful from the outside and didn’t seem out of place alongside the smaller hotels on either side of it.
He drove onto the driveway and switched off the engine. Clutching the key and the letter in his hand, he left the car and approached the front door. He glanced along the front of the house and noticed the large basement windows had been bricked up at some point. It hadn’t been finished neatly, really deserving of a skim of plaster, and Seth could sense something behind the barrier. Was this where the collection resided?
The key slipped into the lock with a reassuring click and he pushed the door open. The hallway smelt like the back of a wardrobe and his nose wrinkled in discomfort. The floorboards, once polished and varnished, now tired and faded, grumbled with every step. To his right, a grandfather clock stood as sentry at the base of the stairs, burning away the seconds. Reluctant light from an oval window on the landing slunk about the space, uneasy like a candle in a storm. Something crunched underfoot, and Seth recoiled at the sight of a dead mouse on the doormat, curled and withered.
Seth closed the front door behind him. The entrance was wide with wood panelling and had an ornate staircase leading up to the first and second floors. He peered up the stairwell but didn’t get a sense of anything worth investigating up there just yet.
There was a single framed photograph hanging in the hallway. Seth paused to look at a younger version of Lamont’s family. Lamont, with more hair than he remembered but already thinning, had his arm around a warm-faced lady, presumably his late wife.
Seth followed the corridor into a large spacious kitchen at the rear of the house. Wide windows in need of a clean, revealed a wonderfully deep garden beyond. Out there, were weeping willows, cascading branches and linked limbs, providing an excellent cover from the properties on the street behind. The back door had a wooden board screwed over the section where the glass must have been broken by the intruder. He shivered at the sight—an unpleasant reminder of how he’d ended up here. The kitchen units were white and functional, maybe ten years old, and had none of the upsells you’d expect in a residence this grand. The handles were plain; the skirting boards absent, and the countertop thin and clearly MDF pretending to be marble. There was a curious smell coming from the kitchen sink and Seth saw plates had been left in a washing-up bowl of clouded water. Three dead flies were lined up on the windowsill.
The floor trembled, a strange vibration that tickled the backs of his knees. He reached for the countertop, but it passed in a second and a tugging sensation in his belly drew his attention to the door at the corner of the kitchen. Plain and unassuming. Not an Almost Door, it wasn’t giving off any of the vibes, but it was something equally troubling.
Before Seth could investigate any further, the doorbell rang.
He peeked through the spy hole and saw a woman waiting patiently on the other side.
Seth opened the door.
The woman was shorter than Seth but had the bearing of someone far taller, somehow managing to look down on him despite being several inches shorter. Dressed in a light-grey skirt and a thin knitted cardigan, she could have been an aunt on her way to a wedding. Her face was lined with pencil-fine wrinkles and she had thinning white hair, cropped short with a flicked fringe. When she glared at Seth, it was all he could do to not wither under her imperious gaze.
“You must be Seth,” she said, extending a hand. Seth took it without thinking. “I’m Olivia Gwinn. I need to speak to you about your uncle’s collection.”
They were eyeing each other up.
The pair of them had retreated to one of the reception rooms on the ground floor. A large room at the front of the house, it might once have been the family lounge, but since Lamont had lived on his own, it had become a jumble of papers, mugs, and boxes of what Seth could only describe as junk. Within this dump of a room, they’d found two chairs to sit on. Olivia sat, took the coffee that Seth had prepared for her and smiled politely. Seth perched on the arm of a tired armchair.
“How did you know my uncle?” Seth asked.
Her blue eyes focused on Seth. There was an intensity that made him shift on his chair and reminded him of being in trouble at school. “I’ve known him a long time—over thirty years. He helped found the Vigilance Society, along with myself and three others. Unfortunately, I’m the only founding member left now, but I’m here to represent the group.”
“And what is the Vigilance Society?”
“We’re collectors, the same as your uncle.”
“Collectors of the occult?”
“Collectors of many things but yes, we have an interest in keeping occult artefacts out of the hands of the public.”
“And Lamont was part of your group?”
“For a time, he was. But, after many years representing the interests of the group, there was a… misunderstanding, and he left to focus on his own work.”
“You kicked him out?” Seth asked.
“He no longer wanted to be part of the society. He was a stubborn man. It’s of some regret to me we could never put the past behind us and find a new way to work together. As to leaving him with his collection, obviously we would have preferred he not have a separate collection at all, but he wouldn’t listen.” She rubbed at her earlobe. “Hav
e you had a chance to see it yet?”
Seth shook his head.
“Don’t underestimate it. Never take it for granted. There are things in his collection that we would have been hesitant to keep at our facility, let alone in a family home. If he’d have stayed with the society, he’d have benefited from the expertise and support of the entire group. I understand that he’s left the collection to you.”
“How would you know that?”
“We have many talented people,” Olivia replied. “You should work for us. I’ve heard good things about you. Your performance at Ravenmeols has been commented on by many. We have noticed you.”
A shiver traced its way across Seth’s shoulders. Being noticed was not part of the plan. Possibly the very opposite of his plan.
“I don’t think I’m qualified.”
Olivia smiled thinly. “You could let us be the judge of that. A single man dismantling an attempt by the Adherents of the Fourth to re-establish a hold in the region. You’re a celebrity in certain circles.” Olivia checked her watch. “I’ve taken up plenty of your time. I’d like to offer taking possession of the collection from you. We’d move the items to a safe place and ensure they are kept out of the reach of the public—exactly what Lamont wanted.”
“Did Lamont ever suggest this to you?” Seth was remembering the Plan B that his uncle had mentioned in his letter.
She hesitated before answering. “Yes,” she said finally. “He contacted the society and told us that he would transfer ownership to us should certain conditions be met.”
“His death being the most obvious condition,” Seth said.
Olivia nodded. “It’s as distressing to me as it is to you that he's no longer with us. But we’ve got the environment and the people.”
“If it’s all the same with you, I’ll stick this one out. It’s what my uncle wanted.”
Olivia’s eyes narrowed, lines that had been hidden around her eyes, deepened. “Are you quite sure? I don’t think I can impress upon you enough the dangerous nature of this collection. If you agree to take it on, it will become your whole life. You must own it and it will own you. There won’t be any last-minute weekend breaks, or late nights out on the town. You’ll spend most of your time here, making sure the collection is calm.”
The Dark Corners Box Set Page 29