The Auld Mither

by Meikle, William

  They’d been here ten minutes now, and still hadn’t got anything useful from the woman. Every time she started to tell her story she burst into tears and wracking sobs so loud that the china plates hanging on the walls rattled in sympathy. Finally, just as Robert’s patience was reaching breaking point, she started to speak, the words coming fast as if she was hurrying before fresh sobs overtook her.

  “I wasn’t even supposed to be there,” she said quietly. “Mary Campbell changed shifts with me.”

  Sergeant MacLeod perked up and raised his head from where he’d been studying the tea for the past five minutes.

  “Did she do that often?”

  Jessie shook her head.

  “That was the first time in years. She’d got some stupid thought about the place being haunted... something about an old woman in a black dress. But Mary’s never been the full shilling, even when we were lassies... I remember when...”

  Roberts nipped her in the bud. It didn’t do to allow Scotswomen of a certain age to get too far off topic. It might be hours before you got back.

  “Jessie,” he said softly. “The office?”

  She acted as if he’d just slapped her.

  “I told you already. And you saw for yourself... them packages, all laid out like meat. And the eyes...”

  She stopped, started to cry again, then wiped the tears away. MacLeod gave her a few seconds before prompting her.

  “We just wondered if you’d remembered anything else? Anything that might help us catch the killer.”

  She continued to dab gently at her eyes with a handkerchief that had seen better days.

  “I haven’t slept right since. Everytime I close my eyes I see that meat... and hear that noise.”

  Roberts started to pay closer attention. His spidey-sense had started to tingle, the old copper’s intuition that he’d just heard something important, even if he wasn’t yet sure why it had any bearing on the case.

  “Noise?” he asked. “What kind of noise?”

  Jessie stared into the fire, remembering.

  “Drumming. Like wood on metal. When I was walking along the corridor towards.... towards...” She paused again, thinking. Fresh tears squeezed out and ran down her cheeks. “Anyway, that’s when I heard it. What a noise. Like somebody banging with sticks on a metal barrel.”

  Roberts joined her in staring into the fire, remembering the sounds in the abattoir.

  Sticks?

  Or bone?

  ~-o0O0o-~

  Dave was still asleep on the sofa when Lucy entered and walked across the room. She kicked an empty whisky bottle as she passed, and the sound it made as it clanked up against the stone fireplace started to rouse him from his stupor. She opened the curtains, letting morning sunlight wash into the room before grabbing him by the shoulder and shaking him fully awake.

  “You didn’t sleep here all night?” she asked as Dave opened one eye warily and moaned as sunlight lanced like a spike into his brain. “Did you?”

  He came awake slowly, rubbing at his temples and groaning. He looked down at the whisky bottle.

  Finished it! A job worth doing is worth doing well.

  “I suppose I must have done. Just don’t let me do it again. Bad dreams.”

  Lucy moved around the room, tidying up the evidence of the night’s drinking. If she was suffering any after-effects of her own binge she wasn’t showing it. She had her shell back on, bolstered by the activity.

  “Best get yourself tidied up. John Fraser is coming round in half an hour.”

  “Who?” Dave said. His brain was refusing to get in gear, and he was starting to wonder whether more whisky might help things along. Lucy didn’t give him enough time to head for the drinks cabinet.

  “Dad’s solicitor. Given the circumstances he thought we should have the reading of the will early.”

  “I told you. I’m not interested.”

  Lucy’s voice took on a pleading tone.

  “Please? I’m hanging on by a thread here.”

  The shell dropped so quickly it was like seeing her break in front of his eyes. She had tears in her eyes, and looked so lost, so bereft, that Dave couldn’t refuse her.

  “Give me half an hour. Put the coffee on would you. The blacker the better.”

  He made his way slowly to the bathroom and stood in front of a mirror checking out his bloodshot eyes.

  Well that was a great idea.

  As usual after a night on the booze, he was ready to swear off it for life. But he knew better than that. Even after only two years at University it was apparent that he had a thirst that took a good deal of quenching, and he knew that it wouldn’t be long before he had the first of the day - just to get me going.

  But first he had to get rid of the remnants of the day before. He undressed and got into the shower, pulling the curtain across. The room steamed up fast, the heat seeming to draw alcohol from his pores. At the same time he felt the memories, both real and imagined, flow away. By the time he’d finished scrubbing he felt almost human. He got out of the shower, grabbed a towel and turned.

  “Make your mind up,” was written in jagged writing across the condensation on the mirror, the letters already starting to run in small streams down the misted surface.

  You’ve got to be fucking kidding me.

  Dave wiped the message way quickly. That way he might be able to pass it off as another booze-induced hallucination. But it wasn’t going to be that easy. The mirror cleared to show the old crone standing behind him, a bony hand reaching for his shoulder. She cackled in his ear.

  He turned, almost too fast, sliding on the damp floor. But haste wasn’t needed.

  There was no one in the room but him.

  ~-o0O0o-~

  D.I Roberts and D.S. MacLeod faced each other over two mugs of coffee. They’d come to the local cafe, more to get away from the job for a few minutes than anything else. Roberts played with his cigarette packet, and the girl behind the counter kept eyeing him warily, ready to admonish him if he even tried to light up. D.S. MacLeod had barely spoken a word all morning, and he obviously had something on his mind. Roberts was prepared to sit and drink as much coffee as it took to find out what it was.

  MacLeod finally broke his silence.

  “You’ve been here what... Three years now guv?”

  Today, it feels longer. Much longer.

  “Nearly four,” he replied.

  MacLeod nodded.

  “More than long enough to notice that they’re a superstitious bunch around these parts?”

  The Sergeant looked serious, but Robert tried for levity. He had a feeling he knew where this was going, and he didn’t want to hear it.

  “Too many long dark nights and not enough women,” he said. “And...”

  “And too many sheep,” MacLeod said, but he still didn’t smile. “Aye, we’ve all heard the jokes. But it’s the stories I’m talking about -- the old stories, the ones that make the hair stand up on the back of your neck. And in these parts, there’s none older, none scarier, than the tales of the auld Mither.”

  With that the Sergeant lapsed back into silence. Roberts ordered two more coffees and got another glare from the waitress as she moved his cigarettes aside to put the mugs down. MacLeod waited until the girl was out of earshot before continuing.

  “If you talk to the intellectuals, they’ll tell you she’s a Jungian archetype, the old wise crone who knows all your secret desires. Others will tell you that she’s a remnant myth, an old Goddess fallen on hard times since the coming of Christianity. But that’s just for the theorists. Round here, they know her as all too real.”

  Roberts made to protest, but the Sergeant put up a hand.

  “Hear me out Boss. I need to get this off my chest. The farmers in these parts have always known her as a protector of the countryside -- Mother Nature if you like. She turns up in old stories and songs all over this part of the country.”

  “So how come I’ve never heard of her?” Roberts asked
.

  “Because if you talk about her, you die a horrible death,” MacLeod said softly. “At least, that’s the story.”

  The implications of that started to sink in. There might not be an actual Auld Mither... but there might be someone pretending to be her.

  ”And you think somebody’s using the story as a cover to commit the murders?”

  “Aye, maybe guv,” the Sergeant said. He lowered his voice to a whisper. “But what if there’s some truth in the old stories? What if she’s real.”

  “What? Ghosts and ghoulies? Halloween fancies for the terminally naïve -- that’s all they are.”

  “Aye... But what if...?”

  Roberts’ patience snapped.

  “You mean, what if I’m next on the list for talking about her?” He waved his hands theatrically. “Oh, I’m so scared. Oops, watch out - I think I’ve shit myself.”

  He left the Sergeant to the coffee and went in search of a place where he’d be allowed to smoke without chastisement.

  ~-o0O0o-~

  Dave almost ran into the front room. All the time he was getting dressed he’d kept his eye on the mirrors, but there was no return of the hallucination - if that indeed was what she was. He was starting to get back more memories of the night before, and his encounter outside the French windows.

  Are ye your father’s son, or are ye your own man? Are ye a herdsman or a butcher? It’s make your mind up time.

  He was intending making straight for the drinks cabinet again - so intent that he almost didn’t notice that the room was already occupied. Lucy was sitting in one armchair, and a sharp-suited elderly gentleman was in the one opposite her. Lucy looked up as he entered, and he saw the concern flash across her face.

  “Are you okay Dave?”

  He pushed down his rising panic. Lucy looked even worse than he felt, and she’d had more than enough grief to deal with already.

  “Yep. Why shouldn’t I be?” he said, trying for nonchalance but hearing the whine again.

  “I’m sorry to intrude on your grief,” the suited man said. As he spoke Dave realised that this must be the solicitor Lucy had mentioned earlier.

  He certainly looks uptight enough.

  “No, go right ahead,” Dave said. “We’re up to our armpits in intruders today anyway.”

  That got Lucy worried again, and he immediately wished he hadn’t spoken. He headed for the drinks cabinet and poured himself a large whisky, ignoring the steaming mug of coffee that had obviously been left for him on the table between the chairs.

  “Don’t mind me. I’m just a bit frazzled,” he said as he downed the whisky in one.

  The solicitor lifted a small briefcase into his lap and took out a piece of folded paper

  That must be Dad’s will. Here comes the humiliation.

  “This won’t take long,” the solicitor said. “It’s just about the shortest will I’ve ever seen.”

  “I can guess,” Dave said bitterly. “Lucy gets everything, right?”

  The man smiled, but it never reached his eyes.

  “Your sister gets the house,” he said, then paused for effect. “He left you the abattoir. His offshore accounts are to be split equally between you, but after death duty and other taxes there’ll only be around thirty grand each for you from that.”

  It took a few seconds to sink in, and even then Dave couldn’t believe it.

  “The abattoir? What the hell would I do with that?”

  “He thought you’d say that,” the solicitor replied. “He said that in the event of you refusing, it will revert to Lucy. All you’ll have is the offshore account cash.”

  Dave poured himself another whisky.

  “She’s welcome to it. I’ll take the cash though... it’ll help pay for my education - which is more than the old bastard was willing to do when he was alive.”

  Lucy looked shocked.

  “You can’t turn it down. It’s disrespectful.”

  Dave knocked the whisky back and reached for the bottle again.

  “You know what they say? Like father, like son.”

  ~-o0O0o-~

  D.I. Roberts reached the end of his tether at lunchtime that day.

  “Enough of this pussying about,” he said to MacLeod. “Let’s get out to the abattoir and rattle a few cages. If they think they’re scared of the old mother, just wait till they see me in a snit.”

  He lit up a cigarette in the car on the way, and MacLeod, after taking one look over, wisely kept his mouth shut. They pulled into the car park at the same time as a local taxi. A slightly dishevelled woman got out.

  “Miss Duncan?” MacLeod asked. “You are Miss Duncan?”

  Lucy Duncan nodded.

  “I’m D.S. MacLeod,” the Sergeant said. “And the D.I. here would like to talk to your staff.”

  Roberts kept quiet. He didn’t trust himself to keep his temper for too much longer.

  “Come on in,” Lucy said. “I’ve called a staff meeting so everyone will be there. I’m sure they’ll be only too happy to help.”

  “I wouldn’t bet on it,” Roberts muttered as he followed her inside.

  I hate being right all the time.

  It was half an hour later and Roberts’ face was grim as the staff shuffled sullenly out of the room leaving Lucy and the cops alone.

  “I’m sorry,” Lucy said. “I don’t know what’s got into them.”

  The meeting had been a complete washout. All Roberts’ questions had been met by a stony, almost fearful, silence.

  “Fear and superstition,” MacLeod said. “It’s a potent blend.”

  “Well I’m sorry anyway,” Lucy said. “You’ve made a trip for nothing.”

  Roberts could feel his temper rise to boiling point and struggled to push it down.

  I’ve had just about as much of this shit as I can take.

  “I’m not done just yet,” he said. “They might open up if we get them one on one.”

  He turned to face MacLeod.

  “You take the office workers... I’ll head out to the sheds. Wee Jimmy’s drinking buddies have got some explaining to do.”

  ~-o0O0o-~

  Dave was making serious inroads into the contents of the drinks cabinet when the French windows burst open from the outside. The black shape of the Hag bounded in along with the glass. She leapt on him before he could breathe, knocking him to the ground, sitting on his chest and staring down at him, the blue eyes unblinking behind the mask of sewn skin. Razor sharp bone clacked in front of his face and Dave flinched, expecting at any second to be carved open.

  “It’s make your mind up time.”

  The ivory-white hand reached for his face.

  Not like this. Please. Not like this.

  She suddenly stopped and sniffed at him, like a dog after some food. She sat back, lifting the hand away.

  “You’re not the one. Not anymore.”

  And as quickly as she had come, she was gone, back out into the garden beyond the French windows.

  Dave lay there, trying to catch a breath, his head pounding with the sound of blood, as if a mad drummer had taken up residence. It was several seconds before he could bring himself to move. He turned his head. The will lay nearby on the floor, fluttering slightly in the breeze coming in the open windows. The import of the Hag’s words finally hit him.

  You’re not the one. Not anymore.

  He left the room at a run, shouting his sister’s name.

  ~-o0O0o-~

  Roberts was getting nowhere. So far he’d spoken to three men that had been in the pub last night, and none of them were talking. The fourth was to prove no different. Roberts knew Alex Price well -- they lived only three houses apart on the same street, and spoke often in the newsagents where they both indulged their nicotine habits. But today the man was acting as if Roberts was the enemy.

  Name, rank and fucking number. Time to take off the gloves.

  “What’s all this nonsense about noticing nothing in the pub last night Alex? You wer
e with the wife, weren’t you?”

  The man nodded sullenly. Roberts pushed harder.

  “I thought so. And we both know that nothing gets past her... She knows every single thing that’s gone on for the past forty years. So tell me... what really happened? Why is nobody talking? Come on man -- your pals are getting slaughtered. Have you no conscience?”

  Alex Reid looked around to make sure no one else was listening. His voice dropped to a whisper, and he leaned forward so that there was no chance of being overheard.

  “That was the problem Mr. Roberts. Wee Jim was talking too much. Everybody in the bar heard him.”

  “Talking about the Mither you mean?”

  Reid looked rapidly from side to side, eyes wide in terror.

  “I shouldn’t have said anything.”

  “Away with your havering man,” Roberts said. “I’ve been talking about the bitch all morning, and I’m fine.”

  Reid made to leave but Roberts grabbed him by the shoulders.

  “You’re going to tell me what’s going on here, or by Christ I’ll knock it out of you. Then I’ll kick the auld bitch around town for afters.”

  Reid squealed like a trapped animal.

  “You shouldn’t mock her Mr Roberts. She’s just looking after her own.”

  Roberts allowed all the rage and frustration to rise up in him.

  “Her own? You mean the folk around here? The folk who’ll let a wee man get brutally murdered and not lift a hand to help catch the killer?” He leaned forward, shouting in the man’s face. “If you’re her own, then she can go fuck herself, she’s no mother of mine.”

  Reid pulled himself out of the D.I’s grasp.

  “You’ve said too much Mr Roberts,” he said in a hoarse whisper. “You’ve said far too much.”

  Above them there was a rattle, a drum roll of bone on metal.

  “I told you,” Reid shouted. “I fucking told you.”

  He fled, wailing.

  Roberts looked up to where the noise had come from.

  “Come on then. It’s time we stopped all this voodoo bullshit. Come and fight a real man.”