She placed a hand on Sammie’s doorknob and wondered if she imagined the subtle vibrations coming from it. The door creaked as she opened it and she was certain it hadn’t done so on previous occasions.
Sammie was in his bed, staring at a blank television screen, yet mesmerised by it. A stack of South Park DVDs peeked out from the open drawer of a candle-lit dresser, but without power they were useless.
“Sammie,” she said. “Sammie, will you talk with me for a moment?”
The boy ignored her.
“Sammie, have you seen Graham?”
No answer.
Angela had a sudden thought. “Sammie, is your friend’s name Chamuel?”
Sammie continued to ignore her, but this time there was a brief flicker of his eyes. It was a physical response to her question. Whether or not Sammie was ignoring her, he could definitely hear her. But maybe he isn’t the one in control. Maybe he wants to answer me but can’t.
“Chamuel.” Angela said. “Are you here with us now? Can you speak to me?”
“I don’t know what you’re talking about,” said Sammie. “I’m trying to watch my program and you’re interrupting me. Please leave.”
Angela carried on. “I will, Sammie, but first I want to know who Chamuel is? What does he want?”
Sammie looked at Angela and shook his head. He looked angry – angrier than a ten-year old boy should. “He wants to kill me,” Sammie spat irritably. “Happy now?”
“No,” Angela said. “I’m not happy at all. Why does Chamuel want to kill you?”
“Because I wouldn’t be what he wanted me to be. He’s a nasty bully.”
Angela took a step towards Sammie’s bed and was almost close enough to touch him. “What did Chamuel want you to be, Sammie?”
Sammie cleared his throat. It sounded full of phlegm. He looked worried for a moment, just an innocent child again. “He…he…he wants me to become something I’m not. He wants to change me. He never stops trying to get his own way and I’m getting tired of fighting him.”
Angela felt her heart beating. “I want to help you, Sammie. I want to make him go away.”
Sammie stared at her, his dark eyes swirling with a mixture of emotions she couldn’t work out. “Please, help me,” he pleaded. “Please make Chamuel stop.”
Angela placed a hand on Sammie’s naked shoulder and knew she was just meeting the boy for the first time. “It’s good to finally meet you, Sammie,” she said. “My name is Angela and I’m going to help you. If it’s the last thing I do.” I just hope that it isn’t.
The door swung open behind Angela and she turned around. Tim was standing there, panting and sweating. “It’s Graham,” he said. “We found him.”
CHAPTER TWENTY-SEVEN
Angela hurried after Tim, struggling to keep up with his rocket-like pace. He’d not yet told her what had happened, just said to follow him and follow him fast. They headed up one flight of stairs and were now on the second floor. Tim took a door on the right about midway down the corridor. It was already partially open and Mike was inside waiting for them.
Angela was almost sick when she saw Graham.
The room was some kind of spa room. A sauna cubicle sat back against the far wall and there was a small steam room beside it. At the adjacent wall was a partitioned changing area and in the centre of the room was a large hot tub. Hanging out of the hot tub, upside down, was Graham.
The man’s head and shoulders lay crumpled against the carpet while his legs were pointed upwards, still hanging inside the bubbling hot tub. His arms were outstretched at strict right angles from his body. From where Angela was standing, Graham’s body looked as though it had been positioned into a cross. Or, more accurately, an inverted cross. The calling card of the Devil and his minions.
Angela repeated a prayer quickly in her head. It made the scene in front of her a little more bearable.
Saint Michael the Archangel,
defend us in battle;
be our protection against the wickedness and snares of the devil.
May God rebuke him, we humbly pray:
and do thou, O Prince of the heavenly host,
by the power of God,
thrust into hell Satan and all the evil spirits
who prowl about the world seeking the ruin of souls.
Amen.
Angela’s eyes began to pick up more details, but she had to turn away and leave the room. The sight and smell of fresh blood was just too much for her to handle – it brought back too many nightmares. Graham’s naked body was plastered with gore, but Angela had not looked long enough to figure out where it had come from.
Mike followed her outside, which was surprising, as she would have expected Tim to be the one to go check on her. “You okay?” he asked her.
Angela walked a few steps further down the corridor, wanting to put more space between her and the room. Finally, she slumped against the wall and rubbed at her eyes. They suddenly felt like lead ball bearings inside her skull. “I-I…” She cleared her throat, took a second. “I’ll be fine. I just don’t like the sight of blood.”
Mike clamped a hand on her shoulder and gave it a friendly squeeze. “I don’t think anybody does.”
“What the hell happened to him, Mike?”
Mike shook his head and looked down at his shoes. When he looked back up again he was chewing at his bottom lip. “Damned if I know what happened to him. From what I can tell, he bled to death from a gash in his genitals, just beneath his scrotum. There’s a broken whisky glass in the hot tub and a near-empty bottle on the floor. I think he had some sort of freak accident.”
Angela shook her head. “Bullshit! He was murdered. No man accidentally severs his genital artery or whatever it is you’re suggesting made him bleed to death. This was murder, anyone can see that. Just look how he’s been positioned.”
Mike frowned. “What do you mean?”
“He’s been placed into an inverted cross. His feet are submerged in water like a reverse baptism. The slicing of the genitals in and of itself could be construed as an act against God – it’s a condemnation of procreation and the spreading of the Lord’s creation.”
Mike huffed at her. “Who are you? Perry Mason’s religious sister? The psychological forensics is all very good, but if you’re suggesting that Graham was murdered, then who the hell is responsible?”
Angela ran the possibilities through her mind. “Tim has been with me all night, Ms Raymeady is asleep, and Frank is gone, which just leaves Sammie – a ten year old boy – and you.”
Mike laughed, but was obviously insulted. “You think I killed Graham? That’s rich! I’ve worked with the guy for a whole year. It’s you and Tim who are the new faces around here.”
“I had nothing to do with it and neither did Angela.” Tim joined them out in the hallway. His face was pale, but he seemed in control of himself. “But Graham was definitely murdered. I can prove it.”
“How?” Mike asked.
Tim held his arm out between them. He opened up his palm to display two long slivers of metal. “Iron nails,” he explained. “I found them embedded into Graham’s feet. The tub water was mixed with blood so they were used on him while he was alive. He hung there bleeding. There’s no way he did this himself. He’s been crucified.”
“Fuck this shit,” said Angela. “I’m going to the police. Someone in this house is a goddamn psychopath. That same person is probably behind Joseph Raymeady’s death, too, and everything else that has been happening.” Angela sighed and scooped her hair back behind her ears. “I’m sorry, Mike. I like you, I do, but you seem like the most likely candidate for this. I’m not staying around you or this house anymore. Tim, will you drive me to the nearest police station, please?”
“With pleasure,” he said. “I was already out of this madhouse before someone sliced Graham’s ball bag like a joint of ham.”
Angela hurried down the corridor, making sure that Tim was following her. She hoped he would be okay lea
ving his equipment to collect later. She didn’t want to be kept at the house any longer than she had to. I can’t believe I got drawn into all this bullshit. There was me, convinced Sammie was possessed by a demon and the whole time there’s a goddamn psycho pulling the strings.
Angela took the staircase, two steps at a time, and quickly made it down to the foyer. Tim went with her and Mike was right behind them, shouting his protests and insisting they shouldn’t leave. “You’re needed here,” he kept saying.
Angela ignored Mike’s pleas and headed straight for the front door. She placed her hands on the door handle and pushed.
The door did not budge.
Angela fumbled with the deadbolt. She tried to open the door again.
It still wouldn’t budge.
She spun around and faced the foyer, focusing her glare on Mike. “Open this goddamn door right now.”
Mike stopped his pursuit of her and stood still on the marble floor. “It isn’t locked,” he said. “Just turn the deadbolt.”
“I just did,” said Angela. “It won’t open.”
Tim stepped up to the door. “Let me have a look.” He began fiddling with the locks and pulling at the door. After a few attempts he gave up with an apprehensive look on his angular face. “It’s stuck.”
“What are you trying to pull?” Angela demanded of Mike.
“Nothing. I haven’t touched the bloody door.”
Angela examined Mike’s expression. The guy seemed to be telling the truth, but there was something else going on, too; something he wasn’t telling her. A brief glint in his eyes spoke of something more than pure ignorance.
“Come on, Tim,” Angela said. “We’ll try the door in the piano lounge.”
Panic spurred Angela to race across the marble floor so quickly that she almost slipped. Tim grabbed a hold of her arm just in time to steady her. Together they entered the lounge.
The French doors leading to the gardens were set behind the piano. As they passed through the room Angela smelt the metallic tang of blood again. It was still a mystery where it had come from and how it had soaked the piano. Graham was dead, but he had bled to death two floors above.
Tim rattled the handles on both French doors. They did not open. “These are locked too,” he explained dejectedly. “Looks like someone doesn’t want us to leave.”
Angela grabbed a chair away from the nearest table. She shot a quick glance at Mike and said, “Send me the bill!” Then she threw the chair in the direction of the French doors and watched as it tumbled through the air. It hit the glass panes with a resounding clatter.
The chair broke into a dozen pieces. The glass panes of the French doors remained intact.
Angela looked around the room, frowning with consternation. She headed behind the bar and rifled through the various shelves. The most suitable thing she could find was a heavy crystal decanter. She hoisted it under her arm and took it back over to the French doors. Tim was still standing there, jaw agape, and she told him to take a step back. Then, with all of her might, she hurled the decanter at the doors.
It bounced off the glass panes and shattered on the floor, just like the chair had. The French doors remained intact.
Tim ran his spindly fingers through his hair and blew air into his cheeks before letting it out in a blustery sigh. “What the hell, man?”
Angela picked up another chair and this time swung it like a bat towards one of the room’s windows. Again the chair broke before the glass did. “This is impossible,” she said, looking around frantically for a solution and feeling more and more like a trapped rat. Her heart raced.
“We’re trapped here,” said Tim. “Stuck in a box with a ball-slicing maniac on the loose.”
“Let’s just calm down,” said Mike, moving up beside them. “It’s time to take a breath and stop panicking.”
Angela glared at him. When she’d met Mike she’d had a good feeling about him, but now she felt distrustful of him – his demeanour had changed somehow since Frank had left. “If you’re behind this, Mike,” she said, “I’ll leave you in worse shape than Graham, I swear it.”
Mike laughed. “Some spirit you’ve got there, sweetheart, but once again I’m telling you I had nothing to do with any of this.”
“Then who did?” Tim asked. “Who would want to keep us in this house so bad?”
Mike shrugged. “I guess we’ll find out soon enough.”
CHAPTER TWENTY-EIGHT
Tim didn’t like this at all. He was locked inside a house with no power, no light, and no way out. Once upon a time he’d been in a similar situation, which had not ended well.
When Tim and his brother, Steve, agreed to stay the night at the vacant Grey Gardens Hotel, both of them had expected to find some rational explanation for the five deaths which had occurred during the previous six months, and always after midnight. In a previous investigation of a similar hotel, Tim and his brother had found a slow gas leak in the kitchen. It had been making the staff light-headed and accident prone, which had led to rumours of the place being cursed. Of course that wasn’t the case, but Tim and his brother spun the owners a tall tale all the same. Tim fixed the broken gas main while his brother performed a dramatic séance. After ‘speaking’ to a malevolent spirit called Lloyd, who didn’t actually exist, Tim and his brother had declared the building ‘cleansed.’
The pay had been decent and the owners were happy. It was on to the next job. Despite the worrying number of deaths, Tim expected to play the exact same simple prank at the Grey Gardens.
But things hadn’t gone as planned.
With no one in the building other than Tim and Steve, there was no need to perform a fake séance – they could just tell the owner that they’d done one anyway. Instead, they drank heavily and made good use of the hotel’s amenities. It seemed like a good gig at first.
The first warning sign had occurred when they were sipping from a bottle of the hotel’s best champagne in the bridal suite’s Jacuzzi. Very gradually, to the point that they hadn’t even noticed it at first, the water began to heat up. The thermostat was already set to a cosy 40-degrees-C, but when Tim began sweating and glanced at it again, it was over 50. By the time he and Steve leapt out of the tub, the thermostat was reading 68C. They both looked like lobsters as they flung themselves onto the cold granite tiles.
But they didn’t learn their lesson then. They carried on drinking, playing pool on the table in the downstairs bar. Steve was twice the player Tim was, his extra five years on Earth having been spent hustling various pubs and clubs. Tim still enjoyed the game, though, despite losing constantly. It was time with his big brother.
When the eight-ball left a long streak of blood behind it on the baize, they thought it odd, but still they did not let it bother them. They were obscenely drunk and the supernatural was a job to them, not a reality. They ignored what they were seeing, like a pair of fools. Tim wished he could go back in time and shake some sense into himself and his brother.
Once the evening got late, Steve and Tim retired to one of the hotel’s twin rooms. Their drinking had slowed down and now both of them were feeling drowsy. Tim plopped down on one of the beds and closed his eyes, while his brother took a bath. It was a peaceful ending to a wild night. And in the morning they would get paid.
Tim must have fallen asleep at some point, because when he checked his watch it was almost 3AM. It was then that he realised Steve was still in the bathroom.
The lights were off, but sounds of trickling water crept out from the en suite. Tim dragged himself off the bed and moaned in agony. It felt like an elephant was running loose inside his head. His mouth was as dry as an overfilled ashtray.
His bare feet took him across the room. The sounds of water from the en suite grew louder. “Hey, Steve,” He shouted out. “You fall asleep in there?”
The bathroom’s door was ajar and Tim pushed it open all the way. He strained his eyes to see through the darkness and, though it seemed impossible, there was a
glow in the room that slowly brought everything into view.
What Tim saw then changed his life forever.
The monsters he invented to scam money out of innocent people were real. There was one standing before him right now.
And it had Steve.
Standing in the room’s bath tub was an old lady. Her ancient face was a withered mess of flaking skin. Her black, sunken eyes seemed to drip crude oil. Kneeling in the bath tub at the old hag’s feet was Steve. He was half-conscious and shaking with hypothermia. A pair of talon-like hands, wrapped around his skull, held him in place. The old woman’s crooked, brown teeth formed a smile as Tim stood in the doorway.
“S-Steve?”
The old hag hissed at him. Her voice sounded like an oven full of burning snakes. She yanked Steve up by his skull, lifted him in the air, offered him to Tim like a weightless ragdoll. “Taaaaake him. Iffff youuuu dare…”
Tim looked at his brother’s dangling legs and saw the pleading terror in his eyes. Steve was trapped inside some impotent hell, but he was still aware, he knew what was happening. He could see his brother, Tim, standing before him and doing nothing to help.
The old hag cackled, started to squeeze Steve’s skull. Tim still did nothing. Even as blood began to run down Steve’s temples from where the bony fingers were piercing his skull. His eyes began to bulge. Tim still did nothing. His heart was a clenched fist inside his chest. His knees were stiff and useless.
Tim did nothing as he watched his brother die.
The old hag crushed Steve’s skull until it cracked like a chocolate egg. She released her grip on his misshapen skull and let his body tumble to the floor like a stringless puppet. Then she turned her malevolent gaze on Tim and opened up a mouth full of rotten fangs.
Finally Tim’s legs obeyed him. He bolted out of the room; ashamed that he had only managed to move once his own life was in danger. His brother’s peril had not been enough to make him act, only his own pathetic cowardice.
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