by Peter Laws
As he reached down, the bale of hay groaned underneath him. The shift of his weight made it tip forward. With a start he thought he might tumble off and fall headlong into the picture. If he did that, he might never climb out again.
But he stayed upright and didn’t fall. He just pushed the bed sheet to one side then grabbed the piece of paisley material from under it. He ran it across his fingers. Soft. Perhaps not silk, but something close. Karl, a friend of his, had cancer once. A baptised believer who would be in heaven right now. Karl used to wear one of these headscarves around his head for months during the chemo. Seth pushed it to his face and sniffed it, just to see if cancer had a scent, common to all sufferers, male or female. Then he was suddenly aware of the tears rolling down his cheeks.
He didn’t want to get Tabby’s headscarf wet so he set it onto the picture. It slid across it, covering up Eve’s nakedness, stopping just at her neck. She looked less like a succubus now and more like just a sleeping girl, tucked up under the covers.
He needed both hands to press the tears away. Then with a short prayer he closed the Bible and folded the corners of the bed sheet back into place. Tabby’s picture and headscarf were covered again.
It was time.
He grabbed the ladder from the hayloft floor and wheezed a little as he lifted it. He slipped it into the metal runners then slowly lowered it to the ground floor below. It still rattled loudly when it hit the dirt down there. Then he picked up the painting and wedged it under his arm. Tight. Eve and the serpent felt ice-cold against his skin, like their cold little tongues were licking him frantically through the sheet.
The ladder groaned as he climbed down, and his pensioner knees groaned louder. When the pigs spotted him they squealed and yelled. They often did that when he walked in. He liked to think that it was because they recognised him. A sort of look-daddy’s-here sound. But today there was a jagged edge to their tone which he didn’t like.
Unsurprising, really.
He tried to avoid the bead of their eyes watching him. One of them hissed at him. And he had to look away from their stare.
They’re whispering to each other. Because they know.
When he finally looked over at them, they just looked sad. They pitied him.
‘And he did maketh his home with the swine,’ Seth said to himself and shuddered. Then he headed off towards his office, face pointing down, set like flint.
‘Bloody hell, boss.’ Dale pretty much spasmed in surprise when Seth appeared round the barn door, nearly dropping his bag of feed. ‘Where’d you spring from?’
‘I’m sorry. I didn’t mean to startle you.’
‘I thought you went into town. Where’ve you been?’
‘Thinking.’ Seth tried his best to smile but such skills seemed beyond him now. ‘Praying.’
‘Right, well a friend of yours was here just now. Sorry I thought you weren’t—’
‘That’s alright. I’m sure I’ll catch up with him later.’
Dale looked at the sheet-covered thing under Seth’s arm and frowned. ‘Called himself Matt Hunter. Said he was a friend from the church. I let him look around for a bit.’
‘I noticed.’
‘You don’t mind, eh?’
A moment of silence. ‘I’m going to make a phone call now.’
‘Are you alright, Mr Cardle? If you don’t mind me asking, like.’
Seth set his shoulders back and lifted his head, noticing that the pigs were quiet now, listening for his answer. ‘I’m not alright, actually.’
Before Dale could speak Seth was already walking to the office. When he was inside he set the wrapped picture on the paper-strewn desk and closed the door tightly. Through the smeared window he saw Dale looking over, pushing himself up on the balls of his feet. Seth yanked the blinds cord and they shut with a dust-cloud snap.
Seth sucked in a survival breath and grabbed the phone from the desk. Pressing the number was the hardest part. Each digit like a step towards the edge of some hideous drop. The phone rang four times and after that, the world started to fall.
‘Hi, this is Chris Kelly.’
A pause.
‘Hello? Is anyone there?’
‘Chris, it’s me, Seth.’
‘Hey.’
‘Are you alone?’
‘I am.’
‘Then we need to talk.’
‘Sounds ominous.’
Silence.
‘Well, you can come straight over if you like. I’m at home. I’ll put the kettle on.’
‘No, we need to talk right now.’
Chris waited before speaking, and when he did his voice was lower. ‘What do you want to say to me?’
‘We need to talk,’ Seth said, as he stared at the covered painting. ‘We need to talk about what we did.’
CHAPTER FORTY-EIGHT
Animal protester Paul Mears curved his Toyota Prius round the country roads at a stately pace, with Matt following behind. At one point they reached a set of lights and there was room to draw up alongside him. Matt wound the window down and called over, ‘You don’t have to break the speed limit but do you mind if we get a move on?’
Mears smiled behind his beard then he saluted Matt and buzzed his window up. When the lights changed he wheel-span out of there and Matt, shaking his head, lurched the car forward to catch up.
Country roads flashed by the car while in the fields farmers were climbing down from tractors, finishing for the day. They looked timeless, apart from all the Samsung Galaxys pressed to their heads.
Twenty minutes out of Hobbs Hill and the fields grew smaller, less frequent. They were replaced by villages, a town, then an industrial estate and a leisure park. Matt looked at it through the window and felt an overwhelming desire to go bowling, not because he was into bowling, but because it was normal and banal and innocent. He spotted a family peering at the menu in the window of Pizza Hut and part of him despised and envied them simultaneously. That the biggest issue in their lives right now seemed to be deep-pan or thin.
Right on cue the image of the pig incinerator flashed up in his brain again.
– slam them in like a pizza –
He winced the vision into nothingness. Thank God Wren and the kids were in Oxford today. It was 7:40. They’d be settling down for in the cinema right about now, stealing each other’s popcorn.
Mears eventually pulled his car into a huge grey brick of a building. The sign said it was one of the halls of residence for Oxford Brookes.
They parked up. Got out.
‘The hard drive’s in my room,’ Paul said.
Matt followed him across a courtyard lined with pretty, skinny trees. In the centre was a piece of metal art that looked like a giant wasp, hovering. Paul pushed through blue-painted doors and headed up a few flights of stairs. The walls were brick, all painted a sickly yellow.
Term didn’t start for another couple of weeks. So he only spotted one or two overseas students who couldn’t afford to go home for the summer holidays, and a few British ones who just didn’t want to. Quite a few of these latter types pottered around Goldsmiths too, where Matt worked. Sometimes he’d buy the especially lonely looking ones a coffee and chat about random stuff on the University lawn. Maybe Paul Mears was one of these guys. The students that seemingly had nowhere else to go.
His room was on the top floor.
‘These rooms are prison cells pretty much, aren’t they?’ he said as Matt stepped inside.
‘At least you have a coke machine.’
Paul flashed a sharp, sarcastic smile.
He’d done his best to cover the yellow-brick walls with posters. Either the guy liked irony or he had some ‘interesting’ tastes, because in the centre of the wall was a huge My Little Pony poster. The rest were of bands Matt had never heard of, vintage French movies, multiple photographs of David Hasselhoff and quite a few newspaper clippings on animal rights issues. He couldn’t decide if the right word to describe it was eclectic, ironic or swivel-eye weir
d.
‘What are you studying?’ Matt sat in the creaky wooden chair. The only seat in there.
‘International politics. But it’s less impressive than it sounds.’ He reached under his bed and dragged out an old-looking MacBook, then an external hard drive. He put them both on the desk. ‘Pass me that power lead.’
Matt handed it over and Paul poked the USB cable in. He tapped the power switch. The hard drive started whirring and the lights flickered.
‘What are you looking for, exactly?’
‘For now,’ Matt said, ‘I only want to see the feed for one of the barns. The one with the incinerator in it.’
‘Oh, you mean the KFC room?’
‘The what?’
‘Sorry, that’s what we call it. The Kill, Fry and Crumble room. And no we’re not being irreverent, before you say anything—’
‘I don’t care what you call it,’ Matt glanced at his watch, ‘just show it to me, please.’
‘Don’t be pushy.’ Paul swept a few textbooks off his desk to make room. They fell in a heap on the floor. ‘So do you have a particular time frame in mind? Because we have a lot of stuff to go through.’
Matt pulled up some notes he’d made on his phone and flicked to the dates of disappearances. ‘Go from July 7th, up until now. Just the KFC room.’
‘Okay. And by the way, don’t expect moving images. This webcam’s old school. It takes a new shot every five minutes. It’s enough to get a feel for the conditions in there, but don’t be expecting Ultra HD. Alright?’
‘That’s fine,’ Matt said. He just hoped that any potential evidence didn’t fall in the gaps between when the stills were taken.
‘Give me five or so minutes to get it all ready for you. Might be longer.’ Paul drummed his fingers on the desk while the Mac booted up. ‘Man, do I need a new machine. This thing’s getting clogged.’
It took longer than five minutes. Enough time for Matt to sit there and realise that he was actually starving. Those Jammy Dodgers he’d had at the library were not nearly enough for his groaning stomach.
‘Paul … I’m going to grab something to eat. You want anything?’
‘I refuse to use that machine. It stocks Nestlé.’
Matt shrugged and wandered down the corridor. The corporate monolith hummed and glowed in the corner. It had Dr Pepper written on the side with the picture of a young Chinese guy looking so transfixed by the sugary taste that he might as well have been witnessing the birth of the universe.
He threw some coins in it and pulled out a Peperami, a White Nestlé Crunch Bar (screw it, he needed the sugar) and a strawberry milkshake. Nice to see that students were so health-conscious these days. Next to the vending machine was a large open window looking out onto an empty field. He took a few swigs of the milkshake and looked over at the sun. It hadn’t started to sink yet, but it was prepping itself. Making itself a cocoa and checking the news for an hour before it would slowly trudge down the stairs to bed down. A pink looking cloud was passing it and for a moment the light seemed to dissolve so it threw finger shadows from the trees, across the concrete pavements outside. By the time he was done here and drove back to Hobbs Hill, it’d probably be getting dark. That’s pretty much an entire day rushing around the shires, avoiding Miller’s call. This was not good form, at all.
He gulped at the inevitable. His heart was beating so quickly he thought it might scamper up the shaft of his throat and flop up into his mouth.
Just do it.
With a quick breath he grabbed his phone and finally switched it back on. It had been off for the last couple of hours. He waited for the signal bars to show and then dialled.
‘Hello? Terry?’
A moment of silence. A swish of activity. Matt pictured old TV cop shows where a flurry of officers gathered around a single phone, plugging in headphones and tracing the call. Miller’s voice was all friendly. Uber-friendly. ‘Matt. Finally! Where’ve you been? I’ve been calling you.’
‘Sorry, I was in Hemel.’
‘What? Why?’
‘I was looking into Chris Kelly. Listen, I think there’s something odd going on. I’ve got a lead which I’m following up right now.’
‘A lead? Well, how about you pop down and fill me in. There’s some stuff I want to talk to you about, anyway.’
‘You could tell me on the phone.’
‘Well no, I’d like to see you, really.’
‘Any progress with Isabel Dawson?’
When Miller breathed through the earpiece it sounded like hard static. ‘The fiancé got in touch. The one who stood her up at the altar. Turns out Isabel left a message on his machine last night recording the whole thing. She was crying and said she was a bad person and just threw herself off the waterfall. The phone must have landed in the water because it’s nowhere on the rocks. His machine managed to record most of the screaming.’
‘What about the dog collar that PC Boyd found?’
Miller sniffed and seemed to pause.
‘Well?’
‘Yeah, I checked that out and it’s a no-go. It wasn’t a dog collar at all.’
Matt felt a bubble of disappointment pop in his gut. He was hoping that if Chris or Seth really were involved in this, that might be a concrete link. ‘What was it then?’
‘Her wedding garter. She’d raked it off on the barbed wire fence and cut herself.’
Matt sighed hard and didn’t attempt to disguise it.
‘It wasn’t frilly or anything so I see why Boyd thought it. But then you were the one to suggest that to him, remember? That it was a vicar collar …’ He waited. ‘Oh, and one other thing. A big thing. Chris has an alibi. The fiancé says he got Isabel’s message just before midnight. So we know when she jumped. Chris was at some midnight prayer vigil at the time. There were three other people with him up at the church.’
‘Which people?’
‘Seth Cardle, from the church. The youth worker, Billy. Another man, whose name I forget. I wrote it down.’
‘I see. And what was the vigil for?’
‘They were praying we’d find Nicola and Tabitha … and Isabel.’
Matt took another sip. ‘Is that it?’
‘There was one other thing. It turns out that Isabel Dawson can’t swim. I asked her mum.’
‘Meaning?’
‘Well, I thought it might explain why she jumped onto the rocks and not the water. Because she was scared of it.’
‘Terry, she was killing herself.’
‘I know, I know. But suicides aren’t always thinking straight at the time. Why else would she not want to die in the water?’
‘I have a theory,’ Matt said.
‘Oh, do you?’ Miller barely hid the beat of suspicion in his voice.
‘She was supposed to be baptised in that lake on Sunday morning, wasn’t she? But she kills herself on the rocks instead.’
‘And your point?’
‘I think it was defiance. A rejection of being baptised. I think she resented it being forced on her and she wanted to die. So she jumped on the rocks and not the water.’
‘Well, that’s a frigging bizarre theory.’
Matt pondered the thought of it and watched the clouds. ‘Unless she just didn’t think she deserved forgiveness.’
‘Look, the bottom line is that it’s almost definitely suicide. So that just leaves Nicola and Tabitha,’ Miller said. ‘So how about you come in and we rattle this out? I’d appreciate your help.’
‘Give me an hour.’
‘No, now would be ideal for—’
‘Give me an hour. Just to test a theory … after that I’m all yours.’
Miller paused. ‘Where are you?’
He thought of hanging up just then. Not even hissing pretend interference into the phone as if they had a bad connection. Just a straight hang-up … but then he thought about it some more, as the silence ticked between them, and said, ‘I will be coming back, Terry. And by the way, I swear I’ve done nothing wrong i
n this. I’ll show you that … somehow.’
A pause. ‘Matt, I think—’
Click.
He hung up and slid the phone back into his pocket, then he hurried nervously back down the corridor. He began peeling the foil from his Peperami. The smell wafted up and he shoved it in his mouth for a quick bite.
‘You ready yet?’ Matt hovered in the corridor, calling through Paul’s open door.
‘Two minutes. Soz, but this thing’s ancient.’
Matt was mid chew when he spotted a poster on a black door that led to a kitchen. It was the typical thing he saw back on his own campus. The sort of we-so-clever joke that students like. The poster had the Latin phrase Carpe Diem written on it, with the words ‘Seize the Carp!’ written in bold next to it. Under it was an eagle carrying a carp fish off and up into the air.
Oh please, Matt thought, a rim-shot clicking in his mind. You’re killing me.
He was about to groan at the way they’d given the Latin two meanings when he suddenly stopped chewing.
He gulped, in fact, then reached into his back pocket and yanked the folded A4 sheet out that Ryan the librarian had given him. He pulled it out so quick he almost tore it.
‘Mr Hunter?’ Mears called through. ‘It’s ready for you.’
‘Two seconds …’ He ran his finger down the sheet of paper to the book he was looking for. St Augustine’s Confessions. Then he jabbed at the title a few times, like it was some sort of button, opening up some dusty old door in his subconscious. With his mouth still full he whispered the word, ‘Verecundus.’
That Latin phrase fell from his mouth and back into his ears. But when he heard it there was a much different ring to it now. Another meaning. ‘Verecundus’.
Finally, it sounded right.
That feeling of déjà vu when he first read that phrase in Tabitha’s text message made sudden sense. Because Verecundus may well have been a Latin phrase meaning shy or shameful, but it also had another meaning.
It was also a name.
And he could almost picture himself back at Kimble Bible College, sitting on the fat window sill of his room, listening to Jeff Wayne’s ‘War of the Worlds’, reading St Augustine’s Confessions because Principal Wilder insisted it would be worth it. Chris had read it too, according to Ryan’s library sheet. Heck, hadn’t they even discussed that book, over a pint one night?