Colm & the Lazarus Key

by Kieran Mark Crowley

  ‘Yeah, that was lucky,’ he said. He waited until the girl looked away, then stuffed his hands into his pockets to hide his dusty fingers.

  ‘It’s a bad curse. I mean, I know all curses are bad, but this one’s a real kicker,’ Lauryn said. She took out a packet of gum and offered it around. The Brute shook his head.

  ‘This curse, what does it do?’ Colm asked, trying to sound like he hadn’t a care in the world.

  ‘Whoever touches the book is supposed to die within a day,’ Lauryn said.

  The Brute found his voice again.

  ‘Cool,’ he said.

  ·•·

  The Book of Dread (1)

  February 29th, 1896

  Today I journeyed south. It was an unpleasant experience. On the train I was hemmed into my seat by the most boorish man I ever had the misfortune to meet. He was fat and smelled of beer and turnips and every ten minutes he broke wind (with no sense of shame; the scoundrel even laughed).

  The train only took me to within ten miles of my destination. From there the only transport I could find was carriage by an uncovered horse and trap. Naturally, it rained and all of my belongings were soaked through. I wished I had not been so hasty in accepting the offer of employment given to me by my uncle, the esteemed R.B. Stowely. I had been proud that he had entrusted the job to me, yet when the horse clip-clopped over the unpaved road making me sick (and causing the loss of at least one of my leather satchels) I heartily wished I was back in my comfortable home in Dublin rather than the wretched countryside. I was in a dark mood.

  All that changed when I saw the Red House. It is a magnificent estate nestled in the countryside, a stone’s throw from a river and surrounded on three sides by a large forest. There is a strong smell of pine in the air.

  It won’t be easy to transform this place from a wealthy family home into a hotel, but I shall succeed.

  Four

  Cedric Murphy sat in his car, thinking. Thinking and eating a fat, greasy breakfast roll, but mostly thinking. He had eleven hours to find the man in the photograph. The one thing he didn’t think about was what would happen to him if he failed to find the man. He definitely didn’t want to think about that.

  His assistant climbed into the car. Her name was Kate Finkle and she wasn’t pleasing to the eye. She wasn’t pleasing to the ear either. Her voice was a shrill, grating thing that could make even the most beautiful poetry seem like torture, but none of that mattered to Cedric. He liked her. Kate was his only friend in the world.

  She lived in a tiny council flat with three cats, two gold-fish and a broken doorbell. She worked three days a week for Cedric and the days she spent in the office were the only time she truly felt happy.

  They usually communicated by being mean to each other. They both enjoyed this. Some people are like that.

  ‘This is exciting,’ Kate said, lighting up a fat cigar.

  ‘No smoking in the car,’ Cedric said. He added a cough for effect, but she ignored him and continued to puff away. Cedric started up the car, drove out in front of a lorry and made a rude gesture when the lorry driver beeped his horn.

  ‘Wait a second. What do you mean exciting? My potential death is exciting to you?’

  ‘That’s not what I meant. Usually we’re stuck in the office, looking up financial records or addresses, maybe putting in a few phone calls to get some information for someone who wants to check up on an employee, but this, this is different. It’s life or death. It’s the open road. It’s adventure. It’s not boring is what I’m saying.’

  ‘Boring is good. Boring pays the bills. Give me boring any day of the week.’

  ‘Come on, Ced. You know what I mean.’

  She was the only person who called him Ced. Only two others had ever tried and both of them had ended up in hospital. He had never tried to stop Kate calling him Ced. He liked it.

  ‘You don’t know this guy. Him picking me for this job, well, it was a boot load of really bad luck for us.’

  Cedric put his foot down on the accelerator. He was a reckless driver and he pushed the Ford Focus as close to the edge as was possible. He’d have preferred to drive a really fast car – something flashy like a Lamborghini – but he imagined that it would be difficult to engage in undercover work in a yellow Italian sports car. They sort of stood out.

  ‘So, tell me about the bad guy.’

  ‘They call him The Ghost,’ said Cedric Murphy.

  ‘Why?’

  ‘Because when someone came up with the nickname The Phantom, most of his gang didn’t know what a phantom was. They’re not the brightest.’

  Kate arched an eyebrow. This meant he hadn’t answered her question and she wanted an answer. Now. Cedric under-stood. They got each other that way.

  ‘The Ghost? Right. It’s because no one’s ever seen him. He’s the head of one of the biggest criminal organisations in the world and none of the people working for him have even met him.’

  ‘How does he get anything done?’

  ‘Telephone calls. The internet. Mail drops. Leaves cash out for employees. Notes telling them where to be, what to rob, how to do it and so on.’

  ‘But how does he stop them stealing from him? If he never sees them how does he know what they’re up to?’

  ‘That’s the good part. He always knows what they’re up to. Nobody has figured out how, but he does. One time, one of the gang tried to rip him off. Stole a small amount, fifty thousand dollars, something like that.’

  Kate whistled. ‘Fifty thousand is a small amount?’

  ‘Not to you or me. But to him it’s like change you’d find down the back of your couch, stuck between cat hairs and a melted bar of chocolate. Anyway, the story goes that he wasn’t that bothered about the money. Like I said, it was a small amount for him, but he couldn’t have anyone steal from him and think he’d get away with it. Next thing you know, all of the gang would be at it, fifty thousand here, half a million there. He couldn’t allow that to happen.’

  ‘I get it,’ Kate said. ‘He killed him to make a point. To show the others what would happen if they stole from him.’

  ‘No.’

  ‘No?’

  ‘The thief disappeared. The others in the gang thought he’d just gone on the run, but then his family disappeared, and his relations and his wife’s relations. Twenty-eight people disappeared in six weeks. Just like that,’ said Cedric with a click of his fingers.

  Kate let the thought sink in. Suddenly this didn’t seem like much of an adventure anymore.

  ‘They were never seen again,’ he added. This last remark was unnecessary.

  ‘And no one has any idea who The Ghost is?’

  ‘No. There’s gossip, but nothing concrete. They say he moves around. From city to city, town to town. If he thinks someone even suspects who he is, he moves. No hesitation. He has no family. No friends. No ties.’

  ‘He must be lonely,’ Kate said. She stubbed out her cigar in the car’s ashtray.

  ‘Yeah. That’s what I’m worried about. The world’s most dangerous criminal is lonely. Boo hoo.’

  ‘I was just saying.’

  ‘Well don’t,’ Cedric snapped. He apologised immediately.

  ‘It’s okay. You’re just a bit stressed,’ she said.

  ‘Just a bit,’ he agreed.

  They drove in silence for a while.

  ‘So who are we looking for?’

  Cedric leaned across her and grabbed the photo from the glove compartment. He took his eyes off the road for a moment and the car lurched onto the footpath. A surly teenager who was slouching along the path with his hands stuffed into his hoodie pockets suddenly came alive, shrieked and leaped into an old man’s garden to avoid being mangled. Cedric swerved back onto the road. Kate watched in the wing mirror as the teenager reappeared on the footpath hotly pursued by the old man’s German Shepherd.

  She turned her gaze back to the photo.

  ‘You don’t know him, I suppose?’ Cedric asked.

 
; ‘The man in the photo? Never saw him before in my life.’

  ‘It was a long shot.’

  ‘Is that all we have to go on?’ she asked.

  Cedric nodded. ‘Oh, wait. There’s a note. Hold the wheel.’

  Kate steered the car while Cedric rummaged around his jacket pockets until he found the piece of paper. He handed it to Kate and retook the steering wheel.

  ‘The Lazarus Key,’ she read. ‘What does that mean?’

  ‘I didn’t know either so I googled it.’

  ‘You googled it? Top notch detective work there, Ced.’

  ‘Thanks.’

  ‘So what is it?’ she asked.

  ‘Oh, just some magic mumbo-jumbo. Bit of nonsense really, like that astronomy you’re into.’

  ‘You know it’s astrology. You’re just trying to wind me up,’ she said.

  He was. It usually worked too.

  ‘I’m not going to fall for it this time,’ Kate added.

  Cedric waited. Any minute now.

  ‘Astrology is a real science, you know.’

  ‘Kate, astrology is about as real as the rubies in your earrings.’

  ‘You can hardly expect me to wear real rubies on the wages you pay. So what did you find out about this Lazarus Key?’

  ‘Bits and pieces. I don’t think it’s going to help us. Some-thing about a secret society in the US in the 1800s. Nasty beggars it seems. They believed the Key gave them some sort of eternal life, but it was stolen from them by some English guy and never seen again.’

  ‘Eternal life? Right. Lazarus. Like in the bible. The man who came back from the dead,’ Kate said.

  ‘Yep. I presume that’s it. Probably just some scary story to frighten the kids. No truth to it,’ he said. ‘There was even a tattoo they all used to have on the inside of their arms. A skull inside a diamond shape. I copied it on the back of the page.’

  Kate flipped the page over. Just like he’d described it. ‘Pleasant lads, aren’t they?’ she said with a shudder.

  The picture made her uncomfortable. The people she usually came across in her line of work were ones who faked an injury after an accident at work and then were spotted dancing in a nightclub when they were supposed to be tucked up in bed with a bad back. This secret society sounded dangerous. ‘You think this Ghost is after the Lazarus thingy?’

  ‘Key. Yeah, but not for its supposed life-giving properties. It’s probably worth a fortune. Guys like him are only interested in one thing and that’s money,’ he said.

  Cedric took a left turn and soon they were surrounded by cars filled with impatient drivers who beeped the horns, flashed the lights and looked angry, stressed and on the verge of tears, all at the same time. They were on the M50, Dublin’s ring road. From here they could take the main road to anywhere in Ireland. Cedric eased the car into the fast lane which was moving so slowly that Colm’s father wouldn’t have felt uncomfortable driving there.

  ‘What’s the plan, Ced?’

  ‘The man we’re looking for is American and two days ago he was still in America. If he came to Ireland in the last forty-eight hours he had to pass through a port or airport.’

  ‘Unless he was smuggled in,’ Kate added.

  Cedric’s shoulders slumped. ‘If he was smuggled in then we haven’t a hope of finding him,’ he said.

  Kate gave him a moment to feel sorry for himself. ‘So what did you do?’

  ‘I called a few friends at the airport and ports. Faxed them a copy of the photo. Promised them a big reward if they found him on CCTV.’

  ‘If they were real friends you wouldn’t have to pay them a reward.’

  ‘If I was relying on your friends then the only ones I could show the photo to would be a bunch of cats.’

  ‘Don’t forget the goldfish,’ Kate said.

  Cedric smiled. That was more like it. Being mean to each other. But the smile didn’t last for long. Relying on his friends – OK contacts – in the airports and ports was as much a long shot as Kate knowing the man in the photo. Two days of CCTV footage meant looking at thousands and thousands of people and hoping someone looked at the camera at just the right time so that they could be recognised. And what if the man was wearing a disguise? The chances of finding his target were as likely as finding a lost contact lens in a swimming pool. But then Cedric’s mobile rang and he had his first and last bit of good luck.

  ·•·

  The Book of Dread (2)

  March 14th, 1896

  The last fortnight has not been easy. The work has been hard – knocking down walls, landscaping the overgrown gardens – but that is not what concerns me. I expected no less. What troubles me is the men I have hired from the local village. They are not bad fellows and they toil well enough, but they are not happy here. At first I thought it was that they did not like me. Occasionally I have heard them snigger as I passed – at my dandyish clothing and my Dublin ways – but it is more than that. There are certain areas of the estate where they refuse to venture. They mutter darkly about ghosts and ghouls and things that go bump in the night. They whisper of strange visions and more than once I have heard mention of a mysterious Key, but they stopped talking whenever they saw that I was listening.

  Finally, my patience grew thin and I cornered one fellow – a skinny, miserable wretch who goes by the name of Mahony. He explained to me that the villagers do not like this place. They believe that something evil lurks here. I cannot abide such superstitious nonsense and I was sorely tempted to give him a good beating to knock some sense into him. Instead, I told him to carry on with his work – which was to thin out some of the forest so that there will be walking paths for the guests – but he begged me not to force him to undertake the task. He didn’t want to go into the woods. He was terrified! I told him that if he didn’t then he would be unemployed by the day’s end. He had no choice but to do the work as he has a wife and nine children to support. He went off in glum spirits.

  Five

  Colm wondered if being cursed was ever a good thing. Probably not. The American girl had said that anybody who touched the book was dead by the morning. Dead definitely wasn’t good. He liked being alive. Sure, there were plenty of annoying things in his life – homework, getting up early on winter mornings when the heating was broken, boiled cabbage; but there was good stuff too – lying in bed reading a book when everyone else in the house was asleep, DVDs, summer holidays.

  ‘Is there a cure for the curse?’ Colm asked.

  ‘Not unless they’ve discovered a cure for death,’ Lauryn said.

  The Brute laughed long and loud. A little too long and too loud.

  She frowned. ‘Is he all right?’

  ‘He’s fine. I think he’s just happy to be here,’ Colm replied.

  ‘Weird. Why are you so worried about the curse anyway? You didn’t touch the book, did you?’

  ‘Me? No. Definitely not. But supposing someone did, then is there some, you know, way to stop it?’

  Before Lauryn had a chance to answer Mrs McMahon barrelled into the library. She had a portable phone clamped to her ear and was in the middle of a conversation.

  ‘I don’t care who gave you the day off, Brendan. I’m your boss and if you’re not at work in an hour, don’t bother turning up tomorrow,’ she said into the phone. She hung up. ‘I see you’ve met my granddaughter. I hope you were polite enough to introduce yourself to the lads, Lauryn.’

  ‘You bet, Grandma.’

  ‘Don’t call me Grandma. You know I hate it.’

  ‘Sorry, Grandma.’

  Mrs McMahon gave her a look that would have terrified a rampaging bull, but it didn’t appear to bother Lauryn in the slightest.

  ‘What’s wrong with you, Conor? You’re white as a sheet,’ Mrs McMahon said.

  ‘Car sick,’ Lauryn replied.

  ‘Good for you,’ said Mrs McMahon, who wasn’t really listening. ‘Where’s your mother, Lauryn? I need to have a word with her.’

  ‘She’s gone for a wa
lk, I think.’

  ‘A walk? The useless article. Do you know why she closed the hotel? Was it too much work for her to run it for a night or two?’

  ‘No, it was rats,’ Lauryn said.

  ‘Rats? What do you mean by rats?’

  ‘She saw a rat in one of the rooms. A huge guy. As big as a cat or a small dog. It had cruel black eyes and a mean look on its face. She said you couldn’t have guests staying in a hotel that had been taken over by rats.’

  Mrs McMahon couldn’t have been more offended if you put her in a suit and called her Bob.

  ‘There are no rats in this hotel,’ she thundered.

  ‘Er, Gran, maybe you should keep your voice down. Any-way, there’s no need to worry. There’s an exterminator due here any minute.’

  ‘An exterminator! I’ll exterminate her. Rats. I never heard the likes of it. This hotel has won seven hygiene awards and I go away for one night and a rat turns up.’

  She must have forgotten about Colm and The Brute be-cause suddenly she turned to them and smiled her biggest smile. It wasn’t a pleasant sight.

  ‘Now lads, you’ll have to forgive my daughter and her wild imagination. She’s been in America for twenty years and she’s a bit flighty. She probably thought she saw a rat, but I guarantee you she didn’t. Anyway, two big strong lads like you aren’t scared of a harmless little rodent are you?’

  ‘No way,’ said The Brute. He puffed out his chest. It gave him the appearance of a preening gorilla.

  ‘My mam hates rats. She says they carry loads of diseases,’ Colm said.

  ‘Creep,’ muttered The Brute under his breath.

  ‘Nonsense,’ said Mrs McMahon. ‘Rats get a bad press, but they’re cute auld things really. All that stuff about diseases is just an exaggeration. Sure, what disease could a furry little rat carry anyway?’

  ‘Rabies,’ said Lauryn.

  ‘Bubonic plague,’ said Colm.

  ‘Weil’s disease,’ said Lauryn.

  ‘OK, I get the point. Anyway, the rat, if he exists at all …’ said Mrs McMahon glaring at Lauryn, ‘will soon be an ex-rat, so your parents don’t have to find out, do they?’