by Gary Gibson
One paragraph in particular made her sit up: I’ve already alluded to Christian Ashford’s involvement with the local drug scene, Summerfield wrote, the details of which are a matter of public record. He was arrested twice, first in September 1986 and then in March 1987, in both cases on charges of possession of marijuana and amphetamines with intent to supply. Christian was a familiar sight in Wardenby at the time, often to be found sitting in the Grey Lady or roaring around the local countryside on his bright red two-stroke Suzuki.
That Christian Ashford was in all other respects the archetypal rich kid goes without saying: he hardly needed the money he made from dealing, but thrived on playing fast and loose with the law. On the surface, at best, he appears to be no more than a peripheral player in the story of Clara Ward, to whom he almost certainly sold marijuana and amphetamines on a regular basis; traces of both of which were found in her blood following her autopsy.
There are, however, some aspects that have not been fully explained to date. Christian’s alibi for the night in question remains that he was drinking in Soho with some of his Oxbridge chums. Yet there are those in Wardenby who claim to have seen someone wearing Christian’s trademark leathers roaring down a road leading away from Ashford Hall on his familiar cherry-red Suzuki in the small hours of the morning following Clara’s death. And can there be any truth to the persistent rumours that he had been the lover of both Claire and Clara Ward, without the knowledge of either party?
Christ, thought Susan, putting the book down. Summerfield had all but accused Ashford of being at the scene of Clara’s murder.
By now, the day was heading towards late afternoon. She picked up the book and carried it back inside and took one last look at the Beast before packing everything into her rucksack and heading for the door.
Back in her rented flat, she ate a microwave dinner before picking up Ashford’s autobiography. Even a glance at the first pages made it clear the book was more hagiography than objective journalism. She flipped through to some colour inserts that included a blurry Polaroid of a much younger Christian Ashford posing in front of his Suzuki. He had shoulder-length hair and bike leathers, and looked just the kind of man to lead a teenage girl astray.
Even so, Ashford’s life in England, prior to his departure for California, was covered in a bare half-dozen pages, and his drug convictions got no more than a couple of sentences. The way it read, one might easily have come away with the notion that Ashford’s drug-dealing career had taken place over a couple of weeks, and had been little more than a tentative brush with the law. Yet Summerfield’s book showed he’d been dealing drugs in the area for at least two years by the time of his first arrest.
After that, it seemed as if Ashford’s life consisted of one grand success after another. The front cover had a red sticker proclaiming it the number one bestselling business autobiography of 2015.
She fell asleep on her couch with the book open beside her, then jerked awake several hours later to find she had a text message from Rajam, asking her to meet him at the Grey Lady as soon as possible. Which was strange, because he was supposed to be in Taskerlands.
Susan found Rajam sitting in another alcove near the one she’d occupied with Metka the previous night. He was sitting with his elbows on the table, staring sideways at a TV mounted above the bar, shovelling crispy noodles into his mouth.
‘I hope you’re not about to tell me you’ve been harbouring secret feelings for me all this time,’ she said, sliding into a seat across from him.
He made a snorting sound as if this was the most hilarious thing she could possibly have said, then put his fork down. ‘I cancelled,’ he said, swallowing a mouthful of noodles. ‘I decided to visit my brother next week. I just didn’t think it was right to leave you in the dark.’
‘What are you talking about?’ she asked, feeling a stab of apprehension.
‘Just to be clear,’ he said, ‘I don’t want to get in any trouble over this.’
Dread descended over her like a dank fog. ‘For God’s sake, spit it out, Raj. What is it?’
He sighed, drawing it out. ‘Christian Ashford called me and offered me a job.’
‘Oh.’ Why on Earth would he think that was bad news? ‘Well, that’s great, Rajam. I’m pleased for you. I mean, we’re almost certainly done here, so –’
‘No.’ He shook his head. ‘You don’t understand. He told me some things but said I had to keep them in strictest confidence, or I could –’ at this, he actually glanced from side to side, as if afraid someone might be listening ‘– I could get in legal trouble. So I’m not even supposed to be here talking to you. But I had to, do you see?’
‘I’m not sure I do,’ she said, her apprehension swiftly returning at a gallop.
‘He wants to keep your project going,’ said Rajam. ‘He doesn’t want to end it.’
She blinked at him. ‘So... that’s a good thing, isn’t it? Why would you get in trouble because...?’
‘He wants to keep it going without you. He offered me a job to keep working on the Beast after you’re gone.’
‘Without...’ She leaned towards him, the roar of blood in her head louder even than the football match on the TV. ‘How is that even possible?’ she demanded, outraged.
‘Ashford said something about having sunk too much money into the project to want to scrap it altogether. He wants to work on the potential patents associated with it, however, and he needs me, he says, because I know the array inside-out. He told me not to say one word to you.’
‘Oh my God,’ she muttered in dismay.
He nodded sympathetically. ‘He’s intending to give you your notice this coming Friday.’ He shook his head violently. ‘I just don’t think it’s right. I’d get a lawyer to take a look at your contract’s fine print and find out exactly what it says you can or can’t do about this. It’s your project, and it feels to me like he’s trying to stop you knowing what’s going on, or maybe preventing you getting any credit from any patents that might come out of the project.’
‘I promise I won’t tell anyone what you just told me,’ she said with deep-felt gratitude. Of all the underhand...
She thought, then, of her conversation with Metka, of the things Pat the security guard had said and the voices in the recordings. As dismissive as she had been, she knew she was coming around to the idea that something was going on she didn’t quite understand. Metka had started it by suggesting there might be a connection between the aural manifestations and her own work.
What if Metka had hit on something, she wondered? What if there were some hidden variable underlying entanglement nobody had ever found evidence for before – and her experiment was the first tangible proof of its existence?
It was an outrageous idea, but with so few days left, perhaps, before Ashford found a way to eject her from her own experiment, just what did she have left to lose?
‘What do I have to lose?’
‘Sorry?’ Rajam was staring at her. ‘Lose what?’
‘Nothing,’ Susan said breathlessly, feeling in that moment as if she were standing on the edge of a precipice. ‘I need to go. Thank you.’ She stood and came around the table and kissed Rajam’s stubbled cheek. He blushed like a five-year old being fawned over by an elderly aunt.
‘Hey,’ he said, his voice suddenly gruff. ‘No fraternising with the staff.’
‘Absolutely,’ she said, pulling her coat back on. ‘I’ll leave you and your noodles in peace.’
Back home, she dug out her contract and skimmed through it rapidly. The phrasing seemed worded just vaguely enough that perhaps Ashford could keep a project going without the permission or involvement of the person who’d instigated it. The devil is always in the details, she thought: she’d need a lawyer, and a good one, to even begin to make sense of all the legalese.
She leaned back from her kitchen table where she’d been sitting with the radio playing quietly in the background. If she took Ashford to court, she’d not only be facing off a
gainst a billionaire, she’d just be proving to the scientific community at large that she was still more interested in picking fights than carrying out research. Either way, she’d lose.
She opened her laptop and checked her email: no word yet from Ashford about the fate of her project. It was late Wednesday night, and there was still a chance Ashford wouldn’t make any firm decisions until the start of next week.
So that gave her possibly the entire weekend to look into Metka’s ideas.
Susan next tried calling Metka, but got a recorded message saying she’d be out of town until Friday. She left a message, then stared around her kitchen and realised there was no way she could just sit there for the rest of the night. She had to do something.
But what?
She picked up the David Summerfield book and flipped it over, finding a photograph of a rumpled-looking man in his early forties, wearing a thick cardigan over a creased shirt with shelves of books visible behind his head. A short biography said he’d written a dozen books since starting as a junior reporter in the 1980s and still lived in Great Yarmouth.
Great Yarmouth: that wasn’t far away at all. Just an hour at most, unless he’d moved away in the intervening years.
Susan opened her laptop, an idea slowly taking shape. She typed his name into Facebook and saw the same photograph appear at the top of the list of people with the same or similar names. She clicked on it and found a basic profile that hadn’t been updated in nearly two years. There was, however, an email address. She opened Gmail and began to compose a message, thinking the chances of his replying to her were slim.
But if she didn’t try now, she knew, she would probably never try again. She hoped he might be able to give her his hopefully objective opinion on the EVP’s.
Dear Mr Summerfield, she wrote.
My name is Susan MacDonald. I’m a senior researcher in advanced physics under contract to Ashford Innovations at the new research centre based in Ashford Hall, Wardenby...
She paused, and decided she needed some bona fides to prove she wasn’t some random nutter. She added her LinkedIn address at the top, along with a link to one of her published papers.
I hope this doesn’t sound strange, she continued, but I came across your book and I’d like to ask you some questions about the history of Ashford Hall and some of the observed phenomena there.
She hesitated. Did that make her sound reasonable enough? Even using a phrase like observed phenomena sounded, given the context, like the kind of thing a person might say before trying to persuade you they’d invented a perpetual-motion machine, or had a radio that could talk to God.
But then again, this was a man who’d written a whole book about EVP’s and séances. What do you have to lose?
Everything, she thought. My reputation. My career.
She laughed to herself and continued writing: If it might be possible to speak to you, even for a few minutes, on the telephone or otherwise, I’d greatly appreciate it.
Yours, Dr. Susan MacDonald, Ashford Hall Research Centre, Wardenby.
That should do it, she thought, pressing send.
Thursday July 9th 2020
When she checked her email the next morning, she found a reply had arrived from Summerfield sooner than she’d expected. It had been nearly midnight when she’d sent her email, so Summerfield must still have been up at that time. Metka, however, still hadn’t returned her call.
Dear Miss MacDonald,
It makes a delightful change to receive an email from someone who doesn’t urgently want to discuss my aura, although in all honesty I haven’t had a single letter or query about Ashford Hall in very nearly five years.
If you’ll pardon my indiscretion, I did very quickly look you up online, and judging by what I see and what little I understand I think I’m safe in assuming at least for the moment that you’re sane. However, do be aware I keep a baseball bat within reach at all times.
If you’re working at Ashford Hall, I’d very much like to talk to you.
He’d left his telephone number. Susan finished her coffee and toast and called it. He picked up after six rings.
‘Mr Summerfield?’ she said. ‘I’m Doctor MacDonald.’
‘Delighted to make your acquaintance.’ His voice sounded dry and gravelly. ‘I am to understand you’re familiar with Ashford Hall?’
‘Yes. It’s been refurbished as a –’
‘Some kind of research centre, yes.’ She sensed caution in his tone. ‘Does that mean you, ah... work for Christian Ashford?’
‘I’m under contract to carry out a research project in Ashford Hall that’s funded by his company. I don’t think I work “for” him in the sense you mean. I’m speaking to you in my own private capacity. It’s got nothing to do with him.’
‘I see. So tell me, have you heard something, Miss MacDonald? Is that why you wrote me so late at night?’
‘I consider myself a very rational person, Mr Summerfield. But...’
She heard him sigh down the line, his words crackling faintly with static. ‘I’ll tell you what, Doctor MacDonald. I’ve rarely if ever had the chance to speak to someone scientifically qualified on the matter of Ashford Hall without being dismissed outright as a charlatan. Neither do I get many visitors where I am who aren’t trying to sell me some variety of voodoo nonsense. If you should care to visit, I’ll give you the benefit of my company for a few hours, along with the benefit of my doubt, and I’ll tell you more about Ashford Hall than you probably ever wanted to know.’
Susan passed through the outskirts of Great Yarmouth at midday that same day, her phone’s GPS guiding her to a rambling cottage located behind tall hawthorn hedges. She pulled onto a short gravel driveway and saw Summerfield standing in the doorway of his house, his hands pushed deep into the pockets of well-worn slacks.
He was clearly a few decades older than the photograph, with a prominent belly and hair that had thinned on top. He wore a tatty jumper over a peach shirt, a pair of crumbling slippers on his stockinged feet. He raised a hand in greeting as she got out of her car, then guided her inside a living room dominated by numerous mismatched bookshelves stacked horizontally with hundreds of books. Typewritten sheets were haphazardly piled on a coffee table, while an antique-looking desk faced towards a four-paned window with what would have been a clear view of the English Channel were it not for the large iMac sitting on it.
‘Sorry,’ he said, picking up some books and notepads that had been discarded on his sofa. ‘Research.’
‘You’re still writing?’
He glanced at her and smiled. ‘You assumed I’d retired by now.’
‘Sorry.’ Her face warmed. ‘I shouldn’t have assumed...’
‘Writers can’t afford to retire,’ he told her. ‘And I have more debts than most.’ He motioned to her to take a seat and she perched on the sofa while he pulled over the office chair before his desk. ‘Ghost-writing mostly, these days – you won’t see my name on most of the books I write. Appropriate, though, isn’t it?’
She regarded him with confusion. ‘I’m sorry?’
‘Ghost writing.’ He chuckled to himself. ‘Never mind.’
‘I nearly turned around a couple of times on my way here,’ she admitted. ‘I find it hard to talk about these things.’
‘The supernatural?’
She returned a smile that was half-grimace. ‘Trying to think of it in rational terms helps, but...’
‘“The supernatural is the natural not yet understood”,’ said Summerfield. ‘Or at least that’s the quote I remember. Does that help any?’
‘A little.’ She brushed her hands down the thighs of her jeans. ‘In your book, you described people hearing voices in Ashford Hall.’
‘EVP’s.’ He nodded as if he’d won an argument. ‘That’s what brought you here?’
She nodded. ‘Christian Ashford is funding my research project. I wasn’t even aware of the building’s history until Ashford hired parapsychologists to investigate someth
ing going on there.’
Summerfield nodded. ‘I heard.’
‘You did?’
‘The Fortean Times asked me if I’d like to write an article about it, but I declined.’
‘The Fortean what?’
He waved a hand as if to suggest it didn’t matter. ‘So what happened, exactly? Did you hear or see something out of the ordinary?’
‘Not at first,’ she replied. ‘This is difficult for me to talk about, because I’ve started to wonder if there’s some connection between the EVP’s and my research.’
‘Which is?’
‘That’s the difficult part,’ she explained. ‘I can’t tell you anything in any real detail. I signed a non-disclosure agreement that means Christian Ashford could sue me just for speaking to you about it in any capacity.’
Summerfield’s expression soured. ‘That does sound like the Ashford I know.’
‘You’ve met him?’
‘Personally? No. But I’ve dealt with him.’ He nodded to her. ‘Do continue, please.’
‘I want to know what you think of the EVP’s,’ she said, ‘if you think they’re real or fake. I badly need an outside opinion, and you’re the only person I can find right now who can give me one. I read your book, and it gave me the feeling you didn’t believe in them.’
‘I was trying to maintain an objective balance,’ he replied, ‘which is why I never presented any firm conclusions. I did hear something in those ruins, if that’s what you mean, but as to their origin or nature, I remain undecided.’ He shifted in his seat. ‘I visited Ashford Hall three times in the company of people who invited me there. We spent one night in the room where Clara Ward died. I work hard to maintain my scepticism, but sometimes in the face of sheer evidence it can be hard to do so.’
‘You wrote in your book about it.’
‘Then you already know that the moment I heard something out of the ordinary, I left the room and searched the nearby ruins in case someone was hiding there.’