by Robin Jarvis
Shiela looked at him, at the sharp features that she had once found attractive: the sly, crafty shape of his narrow eyes and the unhealthy pallor that had marked him out as different and interesting. Then, unexpectedly, he turned his crooked smile on her and she was surprised to find that she still fancied him. She was always surprised. Jezza possessed a mesmeric charm, a way of making her overlook his bullying ego and ruthless self-interest. He exerted it over the others in the group too. He was, without question, their leader, and gathered waifs and strays to him like some kind of street prophet, and in their own inept, confused way, they were his disciples.
Taking the cigarette, he leaned beside her and stared intently up at the great, unlovely house.
“We could live off this dump for a year or more,” he said. “Must be all sorts in there. Might even be stuff left in the attics – or the cellars, and the odd stick of furniture too. You did good, Shee.”
“Wish I’d never said anything about it,” she said softly.
“I might just keep you around a while longer,” he chuckled with a wink, but she knew he probably meant that veiled threat.
Suddenly, inside the house, a man’s voice screamed.
Jezza sprang forward like a cat and rushed back to the porch. Shiela lit another cigarette and waited.
Chapter 2
Bonded to the Ismus, though by no means his only dalliance, is the fair Labella, the High Priestess. She outranks the other damsels of the Court, yea — even the proud queens of the four Under Kings and see how their eyes flash at her when she parades by. Coeval with her are the Harlequin Priests — that silent pair arrayed so bright and yet so grim and grave of face. Let not they point to the dark colours of their motley — dance on and dance by quick, my sprightly love.
RICHARD MILLER WAS sitting on the stairs. He was sweating and shaken and seemed to have shrunken into his shabby camouflage jacket, like a tortoise in its shell. Tommo stood in front of him, looking completely bemused and wondering if he could risk laughing and not receive a thump or a kick in return.
“What’s gone on?” demanded Jezza when he came rushing in.
Tommo put one hand over his heart. “Nothing to do with me!” he explained hurriedly. “Pongo here had a fit going up the stairs.”
“Sounded like you’d fell through them!” Jezza said.
Miller lifted his face and looked warily over his shoulder. “There was something up there,” he said in a hoarse whisper.
“What?” Jezza snapped.
“Dunno… just something.”
“Like what?”
“Like nothing I ever felt before,” the big man answered slowly.
“Where?”
It was Tommo who answered that one. “Just up on that little landing there,” he said, with a definite chuckle in his voice. “Stopped dead in his tracks he did and then, wham – he bawls his head off and leaps about, like he had jump leads clamped to his bits.”
Jezza looked up to where the staircase turned at a right angle to the wall before continuing to the first floor. There was nothing to see in the gloom, except a tall, boarded window and a particularly large patch of black mould that seemed to bleed down from the upper shadows.
“Go on then,” Jezza said impatiently. “What was it, a floating face or a demonic monkey or something?”
“Nah,” Tommo sniggered. “Evil monkeys live in closets.”
“I’m sick of this ghost garbage, man,” Jezza said. “First Shee, now you.”
Miller wasn’t listening. He was tentatively sniffing the back of one hand. Then he pushed his sleeve up to the elbow to inspect his heavily tattooed forearm.
“What you doing?” Tommo hooted. “You madpot!”
Miller looked up at them. “There was a terrible stink,” he said.
“Always is with you!” Tommo agreed.
Miller shook his head. “A stink of damp!” he said. “Terrible stink of damp – like rotting leaves – or worse. Decayed and rotten and rank and death, cold death.”
“Just normal damp and wet rot,” Jezza told him. “What d’you expect in a rancid dump like this, Chanel No 5 potpourri?”
Miller wiped his hand on his clothes. “No,” he breathed. “No, it wasn’t normal. There was something else. When I touched…”
He jumped up, almost knocking Tommo over, and glared back at the staircase.
“That wall!” he cried. “When I put my hand on it. The bloody stuff moved! Ran over my bloody hand and up my arm! I had to shake it off!”
“What stuff?” asked Jezza sternly.
Miller turned a bewildered, fearful face to him. “The mould!” he said. “The black bloody mould! I felt it on my skin – it’s alive!”
He gave the stairs one last look, then blundered towards the front door, only to find Shiela standing there.
“Jezza,” she called. “Let’s ditch this place. I want to go – right now.”
The man looked at her and placed his hand on the banister. “Just cos Miller puts his great mitt in a web and feels a spider run over him?” he said. “Don’t be a stupider cow than normal, Shee.”
“It wasn’t no spider!” Miller shouted.
“Roaches or woodlice then,” Jezza said, not caring either way. “Get real. There’s no way I’m leaving this gold mine. It belongs to me now. I’m going to strip it right down and flog even the bricks, if they’re worth anything.”
“Listen to Miller!” she told him.
Jezza ignored her and jumped nimbly on to the first stair.
“Jezza!” Shiela said urgently as he began to ascend. “Don’t! It’s a bad place.”
“Don’t go up there!” Miller joined in.
“Oh, Mr Ghostman…” Jezza sang out as he climbed slowly, step by step. “I’m so going to kick your see-through arse and evict you off my property. This is my gaff now, you hear me? And unless you can pay rent, in living cash, you aren’t welcome.”
“Ha!” Tommo laughed. “You tell him. Who we gonna call? Umm… just Jezza – he ain’t afraid of no ghost!”
“Belief in the supernatural is cut from the same twisted psychology as the need for religion,” Jezza began propounding. “It’s a man-made hang-up, yet another method of controlling the gullible proletariat by the fat cats at the top to keep us down and scared and not dare to ask real questions of the real people. Instead they made us kneel and pray against the terrors in the night that they invented. It’s always been about control; there is no evil substance to darkness – it’s just an absence of light.
“Like I always say, you should only be afraid of realness. It’s not some vampire that’ll get you along the lonely midnight lane, but the paranoid schizophrenic who prefers junk to his meds and believes his Ricicles are telling him to collect human livers in a blue bucket. Be scared of that poor sod, and the NHS trusts who turf him into the community expecting him to function without proper care because it’s cheaper and they can afford some extra salmon on the buffet when the next bigwig comes round for the usual glad-handing and a mugshot in the local rag.”
“Listen to me, for God’s sake!” Shiela cried. “I know who that kid was, the one with the magazine. I know what happened to him. Jezza – stop. Come down!”
The man reached the small landing. He half turned to grin at them. That conceited little grin which always preceded some proud, pig-headed action. Then, turning away into the wedge of shadow, he reached out with both hands and placed them squarely in the centre of the mould on the wall.
“Stupid to the power of ten,” Shiela uttered in disgust.
The three disciples waited. Staring up at the back of the man they knew only as Jezza, they watched and wondered. Jezza remained perfectly still. He made no sound. He just stayed with his hands against the wall and the moments dragged into minutes. Shiela dug her fingernails into her arms. The tension was unbearable.
“That’s enough!” she said, unable to take it any longer. “This isn’t funny!”
“Yeah,” Miller called. “Joke
over.”
Jezza did not move.
Tommo smiled at the others. “Chill,” he told them.
“Rich,” the girl said to Miller. “Go get him. Bring him down.”
The burly man hesitated.
“Bring him down!” she repeated forcefully, pushing him forward.
Miller moved towards the stairs. Passing a puzzled-looking Tommo, he began to climb, reluctantly.
“Come on,” he called up. “Enough’s enough. You’re spooking Shiela.”
“You two are so over-reacting,” Tommo declared. “Jezza’s winding you up. Whirrrrrrrr – there you go.”
Miller neared the small landing. His forehead began to sweat as he recalled the terror that had overwhelmed him before. He took a deep breath and smelled the same putrid reek of decay, and coughed as it caught the back of his throat.
He took a step closer to Jezza. The man’s head was hidden in the gloom and when Miller leaned sideways to catch sight of his face, he could see nothing but a black profile.
“Jezza, mate,” he said. “Stop this now.”
In the corner of his eye something moved over the wall. He jumped back and stumbled down two steps.
“Jesus!” he cried.
And then Jezza stirred. He jerked his head back then turned slowly around. His narrow eyes danced over his followers as if viewing them properly for the first time and a smile spread across his face.
“Look at you,” he laughed softly. “Doesn’t take much to panic my little chickens, does it? Another minute and you’d be screaming – and all for the fear of nothing at all. Very instructive.”
“You’re bleeding hilarious you are,” Shiela snapped.
“And you’re terminally predictable,” he answered coldly.
His eyes left her mutinous, wounded stare and fixed on Miller in front of him.
The big man was looking past him, at the wall. But there was nothing to see in the shadows there, just the staining mould.
“You’re in my way,” Jezza told him.
Miller shook himself. Whatever he had thought he had seen was no longer there. He lumbered about and stomped back down the stairs, glad to feel the floor beneath him once more. With far lighter, almost dancing steps, Jezza followed.
“I wasn’t scared!” Tommo piped up. “Dunno what’s wrong with these two today.”
“Shut it, you tedious prat,” Jezza instructed, without even looking at him.
Shiela grimaced. Sometimes he repulsed her. He could treat people like dirt, even those closest to him. She saw Tommo react as if he’d been slapped and she wanted to be far, far away from this life she had chosen for herself. Why did she and the rest of them put up with it? Why did they keep coming back and seeking this creature’s approval? What did it ever get them?
“I’ll be in the van,” she declared, moving back into the sunlight that streamed through the door.
Before she even set foot on the porch, Jezza was behind her. He seized hold of her wrist and spun her around. Grabbing the back of her hair, he pulled her face to his and kissed her roughly on the mouth.
Shiela struggled and kicked him on the shin.
“Sod off!” she spat.
“Don’t go yet,” he said, releasing her. “Come on, there’s more to see. Let’s me and you explore on our own. Come on, girl.”
She blinked at him in surprise. He hadn’t kissed her like that for a long time.
“Tommo, Miller!” he ordered, “You two go look through the rest of these rooms down here.”
The men glanced at each other uncertainly. Neither of them wanted to be there any more.
Jezza turned the full power of his stare on them. “Only this floor mind,” he warned. “No one, but no one, is to go upstairs. Do you hear me?”
“I wouldn’t if you paid me,” Miller muttered.
“Be about it then, rabbits,” Jezza said with a nod towards the other rooms.
With a cautious look at Shiela to make sure she was OK, they made for one of the other doors leading off the hall. If they had rechecked the first one, they would have seen that the red leather of the armchair was now no longer covered in mould.
“Just you and me, kid,” Jezza said, smiling at Shiela.
The girl was wiping her mouth on her sleeve. “What have you been eating?” she asked, spitting on the floor. “Tastes like… soil or something. Have a mint!”
“I’m just an earthy guy,” he said and there was that wink again. Then he surprised her a second time by taking hold of her hand, only gently, far more gently and tenderly than he had ever been. “This way,” he said, leading her further into the hall.
“I don’t want to be in here,” she protested. “I want to sit in the van. I’ll wait there.”
But he was so insistent, his voice so coaxing and persuasive, that, before she realised, they were standing before a door in the panelling beneath the stairs. With a flourish, Jezza yanked it open.
It was pitch-black inside and a waft of cold, dead air flowed across Shiela’s face.
“What’s in there?” she asked, backing away.
“Cellar,” he replied.
“There’s no chance in hell I’m going down there! Even if we’d brought torches I wouldn’t.”
Jezza reached into the darkness and caught hold of a Bakelite switch dangling on a corded flex from the sloping ceiling. An instant later a dim bulb illuminated a flight of steps leading downward.
“How did you know that was there?” she asked. “How come the power’s still on?”
Jezza was already descending. There was a strange, barely contained excitement in him. It was as if he knew what was down there, as if he knew exactly what was waiting.
“It’ll be swarming with rats!” she said. “I’m not coming with you.”
He looked back at her – his eyes shining like an owl’s in the light.
“There’s no rats down here,” he assured her with consummate confidence. “They’re not allowed.”
Shiela watched his figure bob further down the steps. “Come back!” she called. “Jezza!”
He disappeared round a corner and she wished she’d kicked him harder.
“Jezza…?” she shouted.
She was alone. “Tommo, Miller…” she said, but her voice faltered and wherever they were they did not hear her.
Shiela looked anxiously at the open front door. The sunlight had dimmed and the outside seemed grey. A wind was shaking the trees.
“Save me, save me,” she whispered urgently. Everything appeared threatening. Shiela thought of the magazine and what had happened to the boy it had belonged to all those years ago. Suddenly a gust of wind banged the front door against the wall. It bounced back and slammed shut. The hall was plunged into darkness.
The girl yelled and flung herself down the stairs.
“Jezza!” she cried. “Jezza!”
She leaped down two steps at a time and whirled around breathlessly. The cellar was built of vaulted grey stone that formed small, dungeon-like chambers, each with a single light bulb suspended from the apex of the ceiling.
The first chamber was empty, but a draught was moving the hanging light and the shadows swung sickeningly around her.
“Jezza…” she called again. “Damn – what the hell am I doing down here? You need your brains testing, you crazy—”
She couldn’t find a word dumb enough to describe herself. She shivered, but noticed that although it was cold down here, it was the only place in that awful house that was not damp.
“Jezza!”
No answer. She moved warily across the chamber to the next archway. That too was empty, except for strange drawings chalked on the walls, but this was not childish graffiti like the scribbles above. Here were intricate geometric patterns, interlocking circles and squares, surrounded by florid lettering spelling out Latin words. Shiela stared at them and her skin crawled. She had seen Howie, another of Jezza’s disciples, tattoo similar pentacles on the backs of many heavy-metal fans and wallowing
emos.
“Beautiful, isn’t it?” Jezza spoke in her ear.
The girl flinched and hit him. “Take me to the van right now!” she demanded.
“Wait till you see this,” he said, leading her to the next chamber.
“I’ve seen enough!” she replied, tugging away from him.
“No, just this,” he said firmly. “Come on, girl.”
They passed into the third chamber. It was larger than the previous two. Three wide, concentric circles had been inscribed into the stone floor, in the centre of which were six large wooden crates.
“What’s them?” she asked.
“The jackpot, girl. Only the ruddy jackpot.”
“But what’s inside?”
With a triumphant laugh, he leaped into the circles. A rusty crowbar was lying across the top of one crate and he grasped it with both hands.
“Let’s open them and find out!” he yelled.
“No,” Shiela objected. “Leave it. There could be anything in there. Jezza, leave it!”
The man took no notice and was busily prising off one of the lids. The old nails squeaked and the wood splintered. Shiela looked around and cursed herself for ever suggesting they come here.
“Bobby Runecliffe!” she blurted, edging away. “That was the name of the boy. He was famous, all over the news back then. My mum knew him. They were in the same class. Bobby disappeared one night when he was thirteen. He was missing for three days. They finally found him wandering out on the motorway, but he was different – mental. He couldn’t speak. When they took him home, he killed all his pets, strangled them. Then he tried to do the same to his kid sister. He’s been locked up ever since. Nobody knew where he’d been, but it must have been here. Oh, God, it was here and it drove him crazy. Jezza – don’t open that! Please!”