The House on Widows Hill

by Simon R. Green

  ‘This whole cellar is just one big mechanism!’ I said, shouting to be heard over the raging clamour in our heads. ‘It’s a computer! We’re standing inside an alien computer!’

  A great voice issued from all four walls at once: a deafening, unbearably alien sound. More than just an inhuman voice speaking an unknown language; it didn’t sound like anything a human being could produce or hope to understand. The sheer alien nature of it drove Penny to her knees, unable to cope with the impact of something so utterly other. Arthur flickered on and off, his face contorted by pain and horror. He was screaming soundlessly.

  But I could still think clearly. Because for all the terrible noise in my head, there was something in the alien voice that I recognized. I shouted at it, straining my voice in the effort to be heard.

  ‘Computer! Stop this! Stop trying to make contact! You have to shut yourself down, because you’re damaging us! This is an order!’

  The voice broke off, and there was a long moment of blissful silence. Arthur snapped back into focus, and Penny let her hands drop away from her ears. And then the alien technology lining all four walls just melted and ran away, in long pulsing streams. I grabbed Penny and pulled her away from the wall in front of us, until we were standing huddled together in the middle of the cellar. The molten wreckage heaved and steamed, and then just disappeared, dissipating rapidly into the air until not a trace of it remained.

  The cellar was empty and still, and the stone walls surrounding us were merely walls. Only the collapsed rubble remained to show there had ever been anything else there.

  ‘The atmosphere is gone,’ Penny said breathlessly. ‘It just stopped. I can’t even remember what was so bad about it.’

  ‘What the hell just happened?’ said Arthur.

  ‘We were standing inside some kind of artificial intelligence,’ I said. ‘It’s been trying to communicate with us all along, but its thought processes were so different, so alien, that the human mind simply couldn’t cope. We could only interpret what we were experiencing as horror and madness – an attack from outside.’

  ‘That’s what’s been scaring people all these years?’ said Arthur. ‘A basic misunderstanding?’

  ‘Isn’t that always the way?’ I said.

  ‘Then why did it kill me?’ said Arthur.

  ‘It didn’t,’ I said. ‘That was definitely one of the people upstairs. But I think it made use of your altered state to bring us down here so it could talk to us directly.’

  ‘Then Harrow House really was haunted,’ said Penny. ‘By the thoughts of a trapped alien computer …’

  ‘The AI must have been reaching out ever since Malcolm abandoned it,’ I said. ‘Searching for help. But the harder it tried, the worse it made people feel, filling their heads with images and concepts they couldn’t hope to comprehend. Once I made the AI understand that, it self-destructed rather than do any more harm.’

  ‘So there was something human about it,’ said Penny.

  ‘Human is as human does,’ I said. I turned to Arthur. ‘Harrow House will be just a house from now on. Your family can sell it to our client and be done with it at last. The haunting – or, more properly, the possession – is over.’

  ‘A house with vacant possession!’ Penny said happily.

  I looked at her. ‘You had to go there, didn’t you?’

  Penny grinned. ‘Some things are just inevitable.’

  ‘And now it’s my turn to move on,’ said Arthur. He suddenly sounded very calm, almost serene. ‘Everything’s so clear. I was only allowed to stay here to help bring you to this moment.’

  ‘Do you know where you’re going?’ I said.

  ‘No,’ said Arthur. ‘But … it feels like home.’

  Penny realized what was happening. ‘Goodbye, Arthur. I wish I could have seen you.’

  Arthur smiled at her and looked at me. ‘Do you have any idea why you were the only one who could see and hear me?’

  Because I’m as alien as the computer, I thought but didn’t say.

  ‘We’ll probably never know,’ I said.

  He grinned. ‘You should see the state of your aura … Try to find out who killed me before you leave the house.’

  ‘I’m on it,’ I said.

  Arthur turned and walked away, in a direction I could sense but not name, and a moment later he was gone. I told Penny, and she nodded.

  ‘All the questions we could have asked him … Answers Lynn and Freddie and Tom have been searching for their whole lives.’

  ‘To be fair,’ I said, ‘I don’t think Arthur knew anything.’

  ‘Perhaps he’ll find out, when he gets where he’s going,’ said Penny.

  ‘It would be nice to think so,’ I said. ‘Come on … Let’s go back upstairs and tell the others the haunting is over.’

  She slipped her arm through mine. ‘Do you have any idea which one of them killed Arthur?’

  ‘Not really,’ I said. ‘It has to be something to do with what happened before the seance.’

  ‘I didn’t see anything suspicious,’ said Penny.

  ‘Neither did I,’ I said. ‘But there has to be something …’

  Penny shrugged. ‘I thought Lynn handled the seance really well.’

  ‘She did,’ I said. ‘I was almost impressed.’

  ‘Whether she’s a fake or not, you have to hand it to her.’

  ‘No …’ I said. ‘That’s not it. Not quite.’

  ‘What?’ said Penny.

  ‘I’ve just worked out what happened,’ I said.

  ‘But can you prove it?’ said Penny.

  ‘I need to study the recording one more time,’ I said. ‘And then I’ll be able to explain to everyone exactly how it was done.’

  ‘It’s about time,’ said Penny.

  ‘Well,’ I said. ‘I have been a bit distracted.’

  SEVEN

  Death by Unnatural Causes

  Up on the ground floor, the hallway seemed entirely peaceful. I tried to close the cellar door, but since I’d kicked its lock out, the door had decided it was sulking and didn’t want to shut, so I just left it standing ajar.

  ‘How did you know the computer would listen to you?’ said Penny.

  ‘Because I recognized the tech in the walls,’ I said. ‘I’d seen it before, in dreams of the ship that brought me to Earth.’

  ‘You think the AI was built by your people?’

  ‘It listened to me,’ I said.

  Penny shuddered. ‘But it was so alien. If that thing was created by your people …’

  ‘I know,’ I said. ‘What does that say about me?’

  ‘No,’ she said immediately. ‘What you used to be, before you were human.’

  ‘This is why I need to find the other crash survivor,’ I said. ‘So I can be sure of exactly what it is I’m turning my back on.’

  Penny nodded slowly. ‘What are we going to tell the others?’

  ‘As little as possible, I should think.’

  ‘We’re going to have to tell them something!’ said Penny. ‘The whole feel of the house has changed. It’s not as if we can blame everything we’ve experienced on mass hysteria.’

  ‘I don’t see why not,’ I said. ‘Mass hysteria is one of those marvellous expressions that doesn’t actually mean anything, but sounds as though it does. So we can make it mean whatever we want it to. Which in this case amounts to: It was all in your mind, nothing really happened, move along, nothing to see, mind how you go.’

  ‘They’re never going to accept that,’ said Penny. ‘They’d take it as an insult to their intelligence, and I wouldn’t blame them. And it practically guarantees they’ll take their story to the media.’

  ‘Let them,’ I said. ‘Whatever stories they tell will just add to the legend of Harrow House. And once our mysterious buyer moves in and nothing out of the ordinary happens, even the legend will start to fade.’

  ‘All right,’ Penny said resignedly. ‘Let’s go back and break the bad news to the others.
Though I think I’ll stand behind you while you do it.’

  ‘Yes,’ I said. ‘It’s time we told them how Arthur died.’

  Penny looked at me sharply. ‘You’re certain about which one of them did it?’

  ‘Pretty sure,’ I said. ‘I just need to check one more thing.’

  ‘What?’

  I grinned. ‘Wait and see.’

  I could hear Lynn, Freddie and Tom talking in the far room, as Penny and I approached the closed door. They were all chattering excitedly about the return of the grim atmosphere and its sudden disappearance, and what it all meant. I slammed the door open and strode in with Penny at my side. The others broke off from their arguing to study us suspiciously.

  ‘Where have you been all this time?’ said Lynn. ‘We were worried!’

  ‘You’re the psychic,’ I said reasonably. ‘Shouldn’t you have known what was happening?’

  ‘Play nicely, darling,’ Penny murmured.

  ‘What have the two of you been up to?’ said Freddie. ‘Or shouldn’t we ask?’

  ‘Just taking care of business,’ I said.

  ‘You did something to settle the house, didn’t you?’ said Freddie. ‘We all felt it go suddenly quiet, as though all the darkness had been exorcized. This house is clear now.’

  ‘I wanted to say that!’ said Lynn.

  ‘Then you should have been quicker off the mark,’ said Freddie.

  ‘Penny and I have searched this house thoroughly,’ I said. ‘And we haven’t been able to find anything of a supernatural nature. So our position is this: everything we experienced tonight was just the result of mood and atmosphere, shaped by our own personal beliefs and preconceptions.’

  ‘You didn’t find anything?’ said Tom.

  I raised an eyebrow at him, and he had the sense to stop talking. Freddie caught the look and frowned at me.

  ‘What did you do to Tom? We’ve barely been able to get a word out of him since you sent him back to us.’

  ‘I would have thought that was an improvement,’ said Penny. ‘Did you and Lynn make good use of his water bottle?’

  ‘Turns out I didn’t need it after all,’ Lynn said airily. ‘It was just the thought of needing to go, and not having anywhere to do it, that was getting to me. Once I had the option, I didn’t want to any more. Isn’t that always the way?’

  ‘Penny and I are satisfied that Harrow House is not haunted, and never was,’ I said sternly, bringing their attention back to me. ‘And that is what we’ll be saying in our official report. I’m sure our client will be very happy to hear that.’

  ‘But Arthur died here!’ said Freddie.

  ‘Not because of the house,’ I said.

  ‘You can’t be sure of that,’ said Lynn.

  ‘Yes, I can,’ I said.

  Lynn, Freddie and Tom sat back in their chairs, looking disappointed and not entirely convinced.

  ‘We all saw and heard things,’ Freddie said stubbornly. ‘You can’t dismiss all of it as mass hysteria!’

  ‘That is a very useful term,’ I said. ‘I must be sure to include it in my report.’

  ‘It’s a shame Arthur didn’t live long enough to know his family will finally be free of the stigma of owning the notorious Harrow House,’ said Lynn. ‘I think he would have liked that.’

  Freddie glowered at me. ‘How can you be so sure his death wasn’t connected to the phenomena in this house?’

  ‘Because there weren’t any phenomena,’ I said calmly. ‘And that’s official.’

  Freddie sniffed loudly. ‘We’ll see about that. You wait till I write all of this up on my blog.’

  ‘I think it’s time we were leaving,’ I said.

  ‘We can’t,’ said Tom. ‘The front door’s still locked, remember?’

  ‘Ah, yes,’ I said. ‘About that …’

  I reached into my trouser pocket and brought out Arthur’s house keys. Everyone looked at me speechlessly, including Penny. I smiled around me, entirely unmoved.

  ‘You had the keys all along?’ said Freddie. ‘You took them? Why would you do something like that?’

  ‘Because I didn’t want anyone leaving the house until I could be sure who killed Arthur,’ I said calmly. ‘It was easy enough for me to lift the keys while I was checking his body for signs of life.’

  Tom looked at me suspiciously. ‘What made you decide that was necessary, so quickly?’

  ‘Years of training,’ I said.

  ‘You kept us trapped here?’ said Lynn, her voice thick with outrage. ‘I’ve never been so frightened in my life! Who gave you the right to put us through that?’

  ‘I’m security,’ I said.

  ‘Screw security,’ said Freddie. ‘We’ve been held prisoner in this house against our will, and … Wait a minute. You said you couldn’t let us go until you knew who killed Arthur. Are you saying … that you know who did it?’

  ‘Yes,’ I said.

  They all looked at me, and then at each other.

  ‘Was it one of us?’ said Tom.

  ‘Of course,’ I said. ‘Who else could it be? Now then, before anyone leaves, I think we all need to take another look at the recording of the seance.’

  ‘What’s the point?’ said Tom. ‘It’s not going to change, no matter how many times you watch it. That’s the whole point of a recording.’

  ‘But it’s amazing what you can miss if you don’t know what to look for,’ I said. ‘Set it up please, Tom.’

  He nodded stiffly and moved over to his screen to work his laptop. Lynn and Freddie looked at him, and then at Penny and me.

  ‘Yes, this really is necessary,’ Penny said firmly. ‘Trust Ishmael; he has excellent instincts when it comes to these things.’

  ‘I don’t think I want to go through this again,’ said Lynn, sticking her lower lip out sulkily. ‘I think you take pleasure in watching that poor man die. Leave him alone! You’re not going to see anything. The man is dead.’

  ‘Which is why we have to go through this again,’ I said. ‘For his sake.’

  ‘Got it!’ said Tom. ‘Where do you want me to start, Ishmael?’

  ‘From when we all first sat down in the circle,’ I said.

  We stood together in front of the monitor screen, and I watched the familiar scene unfold with careful concentration. The others did too, sensing something important was happening, even if they couldn’t tell what.

  ‘That’s it!’ I said sharply. ‘Tom, take it back to when Lynn started passing the cups of tea around.’

  He did so, and we all watched closely as Lynn passed her hand over Arthur’s cup in a blessing.

  ‘Freeze it right there,’ I said. ‘Look closely, people. Do you see?’

  They all leaned in, staring intently at the image on the screen.

  ‘I’m sorry, Ishmael,’ Tom said finally, ‘but whatever it is you think you’re seeing, I’m not seeing it. There couldn’t have been anything wrong with the herbal tea, because we all drank it. So the tea couldn’t have been the cause of Arthur’s death.’

  ‘Ah, but it was,’ I said. ‘Arthur didn’t die of natural causes, and he wasn’t frightened to death by the house. He was murdered in cold blood, using a trick carefully worked out in advance. Isn’t that right, Lynn?’

  There was a shocked silence, as everyone turned to look at Lynn. She stared back at us, as wide-eyed as a child behind her Goth makeup. Her mouth was trembling.

  ‘You can’t just say something like that!’ she said loudly. ‘You can’t accuse me of murder, without any proof!’

  ‘I have all the proof I need, right there on the screen,’ I said. ‘You murdered Arthur because he’d boasted he was going to expose you as a fake. He was going to prove to everyone that you were just another confidence trickster, right when you thought you were heading for the big time.’

  Lynn met my gaze unflinchingly. ‘Arthur wasn’t the first to threaten me with that kind of nonsense. There are always going to be those who refuse to believe in things outside their
experience or beyond their comprehension. Little people scared by a bigger world. And no one has ever been able to prove anything against me.’

  ‘But Arthur was different,’ I said. ‘He did his research, and he talked to all the right people. He said he had hard evidence, and you believed him.’

  ‘No,’ said Lynn. ‘No …’

  ‘I was sure there was something odd about your behaviour leading up to the seance,’ I said. ‘And now I’ve had a chance to watch your movements carefully, I know exactly how you did it.’ I looked at Freddie and Tom, who were listening to all of this with stunned fascination. ‘Lynn passed her hand over each cup in turn, before she let us have our tea, but her hand lingered just that little bit longer over Arthur’s cup. So she could surreptitiously drop something into his tea. Look at the screen, people. Look closely, and you can see the packet concealed in her palm. And what appears to be a fine powder falling into the cup. Anyone else might have missed it, but I have very good eyesight.’

  I smiled easily at Lynn. ‘You already told us you have a degree in organic chemistry. So you’d know exactly what to use: something that would be fast-acting as well as lethal. That’s why you made such a fuss about us handing back the empty cups, just in case your poison had left a residue. But we’ll see what an autopsy can turn up, once they’ve been told what to look for.

  ‘Your constant insisting that all of us had an alibi, because we were all holding hands when Arthur died, never meant a thing, because Arthur had already been murdered. The darkness in the door was simply a lucky coincidence, something you could use to distract us from what had really happened.’

  I stopped and waited for Lynn to say something. We were all staring at her now, but she just stood her ground and stared back. Freddie took a step forward. Lynn quickly started speaking as she took in the anger filling Freddie’s face.

  ‘It was just a blessing! I did it for all of you, to protect you from the forces in this house.’

  ‘You killed him,’ said Freddie. ‘You killed my Arthur, my lovely young man. I was just getting to know him, and you took him away from me.’

  ‘I didn’t!’ said Lynn. ‘Please, you have to believe me!’ She turned suddenly to stab an accusing finger at me. ‘It wasn’t me; it was him! Ishmael killed Arthur!’