Darkness Rises

by Jason Foss

  Another bloody dog, thought Flint, swapping turf-cutter for a mattock.

  ‘Oi!’ The challenge came from long distance, then was repeated as the challenger drew closer. ‘Oi, what the hell are you doing?’

  ‘Hello,’ Vikki yelled back.

  ‘What the bloody hell are you doing?’

  ‘We’re excavating!’ The girl was so irrepressible, she could make grave-robbing sound blasé.

  The dog reached the diggers and halted, growling. Flint kept the mattock at the ready.

  ‘You, what are you doing in my field?’

  ‘Are you the landowner?’ Flint asked, one eye still on the dog.

  ‘I farm it, same difference! And who the hell are you?’ Ruddy features were further reddened by anger.

  ‘We’re looking for a buried body,’ Vikki said.

  ‘Body? What body?’

  The dog took interest in the hole, ceased being hostile and began to scrabble by Tyrone’s spade.

  ‘You know, a dead person,’ Bunny added, ‘a stiffie.’

  ‘You’re all crazy, now just clear off.’

  The man stood immobile and impotent, his gun clearly reserved for rabbits. Whilst he blustered threats and abuse, Tyrone, Bunny and the dog continued to dig. Pawfuls of dirt spattered over the farmer’s wellingtons. Vikki scrabbled in the soil, arising triumphant with a strip of sodden white cloth.

  ‘I’ll make an archaeologist of you yet.’ Flint took the strip from her.

  ‘I’m calling the police,’ the farmer exploded, ‘this is trespass.’

  ‘Good, ask for Inspector Douglas,’ Flint said, ‘and tell him to bring the forensic boys along.’

  ‘I’ll bring the bloody green van to lock you lot away!’

  The farmer retreated, yelling threats and calling his dog to heel. The hole was two feet deep now, with Flint urging them to dig with care, not to go too deep but work across the site to keep the digging platform level.

  ‘Doc, we know what we’re doing,’ Stuart protested.

  ‘Just testing.’ Flint stepped out of the hole to direct, rather than interfere. The two diggers expanded the hole into a rough square, tossing their soil into a bucket, which Flint would pass to Tyrone. Each bucketload was poured through a sieve and scoured with a trowel, Vikki helping pick out possible clues into a seed tray.

  ‘Grave cut, Doc.’ Stuart straightened his back and stood out of the hole.

  The sub-soil lay red-orange and undisturbed below where Stuart had worked. In Bunny’s half of the hole, the brown topsoil continued downwards, mixed with disturbed clods of orange clay and grass. Stuart bent down and flicked away at the top of the disturbed soil with his trowel. Within moments he had exposed the clear junction of the two soil types.

  ‘Okay team, spades down, trowels out!’ Flint said, sniffing against the cold, wondering how long the farmer would be in bringing back the police.

  Even Vikki fell to her knees and learned how to trowel. Once the edge of the grave cut had been identified, they began to work systematically along its edge, clearing away the topsoil to reveal an oval of brown earth within the cleaner orange. This was what the aerial photograph had revealed: the shadow of the last resting place of Lucy Gray. A blurred frosty patch had been her only marker.

  ‘Do we go on?’ Vikki asked, wiping at her clay-caked knees. ‘Do you really want to go on?’ Flint asked.

  ‘She won’t be very pretty,’ Tyrone added.

  After ten months in the ground, Lucy would not be pretty at all. A distinctive smell was already issuing from the hole.

  ‘No,’ Vikki said, after toying with the idea for a moment. ‘I suppose the police would be narked if we did. It’s a crime scene now.’

  The diggers suspended work and moved a respectful distance away from the hole. All but Vikki had known Lucy, albeit briefly, so the jokes had stopped and few words were exchanged as they sat on the gate, or on upturned buckets and waited.

  First to arrive was the local bobby, walking down from his panda car in company with the farmer. Whilst the lawman listened to, and disputed the story, the farmer stood in the background muttering, ‘Bloody students.’ Vikki subdued both men with her press card and the voracity of her interview technique. Grudgingly the farmer gave his name, brightened up, then fleshed it out with a potted life history. The constable walked to the hole, refused the offer of a spade, then radioed for assistance.

  A procession of policemen flowed from headquarters: a mobile patrol, the scene-of-crime officer, the murder squad and at last, Chief Inspector Douglas.

  Flint sat back on the gate awaiting the inevitable interview with Douglas, coping with the mixed emotions which ran through him: pride, sadness, and a sense of anti-climax. Barbara would have to be told before Vikki’s inevitable scoop hit the news-stands and it was not a prospect to be relished. He managed a grin to his comrades as the figure of the Chief Inspector could be seen working his way down the stubble field.

  ‘Now, let him ignore this!’

  Tyrone hummed an objection. ‘Mind you, we’re going to look ridiculous if this turns out to be a Neolithic warrior burial.’

  ‘Wish it was,’ said Flint.

  Vikki was not entirely responsible for the blown-up Hammer Horror fantasy which appeared in the late editions of the Advertiser that night. Flint had encouraged her in order to throw confusion at the hidden enemy, and make them think he was still wide of the mark. On her part, Vikki needed a story so sensational, no editor could refuse to print it. The front page headline ran: ‘LONELY GRAVE FOR WITCH SACRIFICE. Victim of Demon Curator Found Murdered.’

  Chapter 26

  Vikki spent the following day hanging about the fringes of the official police excavation, with Vince taking reel after reel of photographs. The once deserted field was full of men in blue boiler suits and the lane choked with police and media vehicles. Her story had been syndicated to radio and national press, so Vikki would have felt good but her pride was tainted by the tragedy to which she almost felt witness.

  She had wanted to interview Mrs Gray, or Barbara Faber as second choice, but something held her back. Flint had been unusually silent after he had made the phone call, but the police had already delivered the news. To pry too quickly would be to injure his grief too.

  The great grey finger of sarsen reared above her as she watched Flint coming down the field once more, his wellingtons caked with mud and storm clouds running across his face.

  ‘Hi, what’s wrong?’

  ‘Effing imbeciles!’ He looked sideways at her. ‘Is it okay if I say ‘effing’?’

  ‘Say anything you like. What has Douglas been saying to you?’

  ‘He won’t believe me. Even after Tyrone has gone all the way back to London to fetch his data, PC Plod doesn’t believe it and I don’t blame him.’

  ‘What?’ She was suddenly alarmed.

  ‘Everything we have is at best circumstantial. We have circular arguments which rely on all the other arguments being true, and of course they are all logical deductions, but the law demands fact, not logic.’

  Tyrone squelched his way across the path churned to sludge by police boots. ‘No dice, boss?’

  ‘Did you tell him about Temple-Brooke?’ Vikki asked.

  ‘What was the point? We have nothing on him, he’s clean.’

  ‘He plays golf with Douglas, you know,’ Vikki informed them, ‘and Arnold, my editor, which is how I found out. One can’t accuse one of the chaps, can one?’

  Flint simply stood with his hands on his hips and let the freshly falling rain spatter on his face. He thumped the megalith. ‘Go on, Gaia, give me pneumonia too.’

  ‘Who’s Gaia?’

  ‘Mother goddess.’ Flint thumped the stone again.

  The reporter looked at the other two, willing something to happen to break the stalemate.

  ‘If only I’d got the number of that Range Rover,’ Tyrone moaned.

  ‘What Range Rover?’ she asked idly.

  He retold the encount
er on the country lane with the Range Rover on Halloween.

  ‘The great poet drives a Range Rover, I chased him back to it after the poetry reading.’

  ‘What colour was it?’ Tyrone interrupted.

  ‘Green ­– aren’t they all green?’

  ‘No. It didn’t by any chance have a little picture of a dog...’

  ‘…in the window behind the driver?’ she asked, with a warm sensation welling within her. ‘A Red Setter?’

  ‘Yes, it’s him, it’s him!’ Tyrone gave a little jig.

  Vikki almost burst with the chance discovery, her prayer had been answered, instantly. Perhaps there was a power hidden within the stone. She turned to Flint. ‘So, what do you think now?’

  He clapped them both on the shoulders and pulled them into a close huddle. ‘Liking Red Setters is not an indictable offence.’

  ‘It should be,’ Tyrone said.

  ‘But it’s proof!’ Vikki burst out. ‘Go back and tell Douglas.’

  Flint began to walk away from them.

  ‘I’m coming.’ Vikki clutched at his sleeve. ‘I want to see his face.’

  ‘I’m not bothering with the flatfoots any more, I’m going to see Monica, to find out how we get to talk to Temple-Brooke.’

  *

  Flint drove the Land Rover back to Kingshaven and wasted time trying to find somewhere to park amongst the eager Christmas shoppers. He had changed into his driving shoes, but still wore his old donkey jacket and the digging jeans with clay caked up to the thighs. He tinkled the door chime in Monica’s shop.

  ‘Jeff, Jeff, my!’ She stopped mid-sentence to look at his unwashed, unshaved state.

  ‘Sorry, this is my business suit. I haven’t much time, so I’ll come straight to it.’

  Her face creased with concern.

  ‘Did you hear the news?’

  ‘You found your student?’

  He nodded. ‘Now I need your help to get me to her killer.’

  ‘Jeff, I’ve done all I can.’

  ‘I must speak to Temple-Brooke, I know he was involved.’

  ‘No, he can’t be.’

  ‘Yes he can, he fits the bill perfectly.’

  Monica shook her head furiously. ‘Jeff, you’re mistaken, he’s brilliant, he’s gentle, he’s not a murderer.’

  ‘Okay, so he knows who the murderer is, because any ordinary killer couldn’t have covered his tracks without money and influence and organisation, and your Mr Temple-Brooke has all three.’

  ‘Have you told the police?’

  ‘No.’ He repeated his doubts about the evidence. ‘I’ll give it some thought over the weekend.’

  Monica stood wringing her hands and making well-meaning but ultimately hopeless suggestions. He gazed around her shop for inspiration, taking in the sign saying ‘Closed for the Week-End’ and its sister, ‘Wednesday is Half-Day Closing’. Down on the floor were sacks labelled ‘Split-peas’ and ‘Kidney-beans’. Monica had a very neat writing hand and had mastered several styles. She had probably done calligraphy once.

  ‘Just phone him, Monica, tell him he’s my number one suspect and that I’m taking the story to the cops unless he talks to me and finds me a better suspect.’

  ‘Jeff, that’s cruel. It’s moral blackmail.’

  Flint felt his eyes watering. Monica had a store of sympathy for every troubled soul in the world.

  ‘I have to go. When this is all over, we’ll have to have dinner some time.’

  Monica laid on a bright veneer for a few moments. ‘Fine, that will be nice.’

  *

  Jeffrey Flint left Kingshaven once more, collected Tyrone and asked him to drive back to London. It had been a cold, muddy, tiring week of conflicting moods. He would spend the weekend bathing, sleeping, eating, watching anything on the video, but not listening to a single news broadcast. He wouldn’t hear Vikki repeating her story for the agencies, nor see anguished pictures of Barbara or Mrs Gray. He would not be reminded of his agonising telephone call with its clumsy words of regret. For a day he would put the trauma aside, then on Monday, he would start again.

  His first Monday lecture was at two, and he habitually turned up late on Mondays. Flint made no exception for the last week of the autumn term, arriving just after eleven in a sombre, determined mood. Sally stopped him at the top of the stairs with a comment along the lines of, ‘Oh Jeff, how totally ghastly.’

  He followed Sally into the office and went for his mail on reflex, finding thirty items, most of which were seasonally stamped and Christmas-card weight. All these were forgotten in a moment, when Sally opened the cake box which sat on the counter.

  ‘You have a secret admirer,’ she said.

  He let his eyes roam around the chocolate cake, its centre overflowing with butter icing, its top rippling with thick, real chocolate and six Cadbury’s mini-flakes added to boost the calorie intake.

  ‘This is a cake and a half, who left it?’

  ‘One of your FE people; she said she hopes you soon feel better.’

  Guilt twangs hit him. More sickness excuses had all but killed his night school class. Lucy had drawn him away from all normal responsibilities. The neatly written card simply read, ‘Hope you are better after the Christmas-holiday Doctor Flint’.

  ‘Which one was it?’

  ‘Forty-ish, grey, wears a head-scarf and glasses, dresses a bit dowdy. Susan? Sharon? Sheila?’

  ‘Sheila?’

  ‘Probably.’

  ‘The old darling, get me a knife and you can have a chunk. If you spot Tyrone, drag him in too, he needs building up.’

  Sally answered the external phone and handed it directly to Flint, who was within sniffing range of the cake.

  ‘Doctor Flint?’ It was him.

  ‘Rupert Temple-Brooke, I presume.’

  ‘We must talk.’

  ‘Well, I’ve been wanting to talk to you for…’

  ‘Now I’m ready.’

  ‘Ready huh? What was that supposed to mean? ‘Okay, your place or mine?’

  ‘Look, we need to meet, without that girl reporter present. I would just like you and I to have a quiet walk and a talk. I think we have a misunderstanding.’

  ‘Right.’

  Pretty big misunderstanding, thought Flint.

  Sally returned with a knife and half-a-dozen plates and cut generous slices, oblivious to the nature of the negotiation taking place.

  ‘This affair must end. We must meet, alone, tomorrow.’ The Poet started to give instructions. A lonely road out in the marshland beyond Kingshaven, a telephone box, a footpath. Four o’clock; it would be almost dark by then.

  Flint signalled that Sally was to tuck in, then accepted a plate with his chunk of cake, vowing to munch it in defiance of etiquette. The anti-snob rose to the fore, and just to insult this pompous voice, he would wipe the crumbs from his chin with his sleeve. ‘I’ll be there…’

  ‘Good,’ the caller concluded.

  Sally had a mouthful of cake and was mumbling delight, so Flint bit into his piece. How many people knew about his chocolate fetish? Was it written on his face? Had he told Sheila? No, but he had told someone. Someone who had an expertly neat writing hand. Someone who was a rabid hyphenator, writing ‘Christmas-holiday’, ‘Week-End’ and ‘Kidney-beans’. Someone who knew Temple-Brooke. Someone who was an expert in herb lore.

  ‘Monica,’ he murmured, then spat out the cake. ‘Sally, spit it out!’

  ‘Mmm?’

  He grabbed the plate from her hand. ‘Poisoned.’

  ‘You crazy... mmb.’

  Flint threw his arms around her and forced her to bend double, then began to thump her back. Seconds later, Sally was dragged across the hall to the ladies’.

  ‘Puke it up.’

  ‘Jeff...’

  He kicked open the toilet door and reached the sink. ‘Puke.’ She squirmed as he thrust her head down.

  ‘They are trying to kill me, Sally, stick your fingers in now!’

  ‘Ca
n’t!’

  Flint grabbed Sally’s chin and stuffed a finger past her tongue. She gagged, she struggled, then she was sick on reflex.

  Two students rushed to the door, imagining an assault. He brushed them away in a barrage of slaps and misunderstandings. ‘Look, cretin! She’s ill, get her to a doctor!’

  Sally was still struggling, and was released. ‘Flint, you bastard,’ she coughed.

  ‘Get down to the Health Centre, quick, you’ve been poisoned! Understand, poisoned, like all those other people I told you about.’

  At last she seemed to get the message and stood panting, hands on her thighs. She allowed the students to take her quivering arms.

  ‘Take her to the Health Centre. Get them to supply some sort of purgative. She’s ingested a natural poison. Hurry, for God’s sake.’

  Which god? he thought, amongst the confused hubbub outside the departmental office. Ignoring the chaos, Flint elbowed his way towards the remains of the cake and picked it up.

  ‘Evidence,’ Flint said aloud, hands trembling.

  ‘Flint, what is going on?’ It was the Professor, speaking from the doorway.

  ‘Evidence!’

  ‘Are you still playing detectives in my department?’ he shouted as the junior lecturer pushed past him. ‘You’re in serious trouble, I say, Doctor...’

  He continued to shout, but Doctor Flint was running through the building, down the stairs and into the forensic archaeology laboratory. ‘Doc’ Savage and her staff were in the middle of some meeting. ‘Doc’ ceased reading from a document, whilst Jules and Sasha turned their heads in awe at Flint’s frantic, panting state.

  ‘Jeff?’ Doc Savage asked.

  ‘Hi, sorry to barge in, folks, but I need cast-iron evidence, to use an old cliché. I need you people to do some quick i.d.’s on this.’

  ‘It’s a cake,’ Jules offered.

  ‘It’s a poisoned cake. It may look yummy, but don’t eat it. What I want is fingerprints from the goo,’ Flint panted, ‘traces of body hair, clothes fibres. Most of all, I want to know what poison she used. Check for natural chemicals, mushrooms, belladonna, things of that nature.’