On the Edge of Darkness

by Barbara Erskine

  They ran round the side of the house and Ken used his own key to Adam’s back door. He slammed the door shut behind them and scrabbled for the light switch.

  ‘It doesn’t help to think that wretched cat might be lurking somewhere around,’ he said soberly.

  Beth and Liza exchanged glances.

  ‘It doesn’t look as though he’s been back,’ Beth said slowly. ‘Nothing has changed from last night.’

  They walked through into the living room. Beth went over and pulled the curtains closed with a shiver. ‘I can’t help wondering if there is someone, or something out there watching,’ she said quietly.

  Liza grimaced. ‘I think it’s a fair bet that there is. Go and check upstairs, sweetheart. Make sure the old reprobate isn’t asleep in his bed.’

  Beth took a deep breath. She made for the staircase. Even with the lights on she could feel her fear returning, every nerve jangling as she climbed, her eyes frantically searching as she stepped onto the landing and looked at the open door of Adam’s room.

  It was very quiet up here. Suddenly she could no longer hear the subdued voices below her where Liza and Ken were standing at the table looking down at Adam’s books.

  Icy trickles of panic were creeping over her skin as she took first one step then another towards the darkened shadows ahead of her.

  You have made my A-dam unhappy …

  The voice was suddenly there, inside her own head. Beth clutched at the top of the banisters. Her mouth went dry.

  I do not like people who make my A-dam unhappy …

  ‘Oh God!’ Her whisper sounded loud in the silence of the landing. She turned and fled downstairs.

  ‘Beth, what is it?’ Liza, peering at her over the top of her spectacles, had seen her white face.

  ‘It’s nothing. I just felt – ’

  ‘You felt what? Did you see something? He’s not there, is he?’

  She shook her head. ‘I’m sorry. I didn’t look.’ She sat down at the table and put her head in her hands.

  Ken looked from one to the other. ‘I’ll go,’ he said. He took the stairs two at a time and they heard his footsteps stride across the landing, followed by the snap of a light switch.

  ‘I heard a voice. Inside my head. Was it Brid?’ Beth looked desperately at Liza.

  Upstairs they heard Ken retrace his steps and repeat the manoeuvre in the bathroom and the other bedroom, then he reappeared on the stairs. ‘He’s not there. There’s no sign of him.’ He smiled at Beth. ‘My dear, I’m not surprised you’re worried. That cat could have got in when the door was open, but to be honest I doubt if it would. They are very shy beasts. It is unusual if not unheard of for them to hang around human habitation as far as I know. The police were very puzzled. They assumed you must have cornered it in some way and it felt threatened. I doubt we’ll ever see it again.’

  Liza looked at Beth and frowned. The meaning of the expression was clear. Not in front of the minister. If Giles had initially found Adam’s story impossible to believe, how much more so would a man of the cloth?

  ‘What are we going to do? He can’t stay out all night in this weather.’ Beth was trying hard to get a grip on herself.

  Ken shook his head. ‘I think I’d better ring the police again. Discuss it with them. I don’t know if we should suggest a search party? The thing that worries me so much is that his car is still here. But on the other hand we don’t know someone didn’t come and collect him.’

  ‘He would never have left the door open like that,’ Liza put in. ‘He might be old but there is nothing wrong with his memory. Is there?’ She turned to Beth.

  Beth shook her head. ‘He seemed all there to me.’ She sighed. ‘How would a search party know where to look? He could be anywhere if he has gone out into the hills.’

  ‘And he wouldn’t. Not without his coat. He’s a sensible man,’ Liza added.

  Beth raised an eyebrow. ‘Why didn’t he have a phone here? Surely he could afford it.’

  ‘I’ve asked him that.’ Ken sighed. ‘That, I’m afraid, was sheer stubbornness. He was very sharp with me and said there was no one he wanted to talk to on a phone and that he was perfectly capable of looking after himself. I asked him what would happen if he had a fall or something and he said if he had a fall it was his own damn silly fault and he would take the consequences.’

  Liza smiled. ‘That’s my Adam.’

  ‘Not very helpful though, in these circumstances.’

  ‘No.’ Liza hesitated. ‘Mr Maclaren, can I ask, were there any signs that Adam was drinking heavily?’ She too had spotted the whisky bottle on the side. The level of alcohol in it, Beth had already noticed, did not seem to have moved.

  Ken shook his head. ‘He told me he had been an alcoholic as near as makes no difference and he said he had it controlled. I’ve certainly never seen him drink.’

  ‘Liza!’ Beth’s eyes had strayed down to the books on the table and she realised suddenly that they had been rearranged since she had been there last. Several were lying open, others had bookmarks and one, on the top of the pile, had been marked in red ink. ‘Look!’ It was entitled Psychic Self Defence. She pushed it over the table.

  Liza drew it to her and lowered her glasses from her hair onto her nose. She studied it for several minutes.

  Ken frowned. ‘I deplore the content of most of those books.’

  ‘They consist mostly of history,’ Liza retorted. ‘And philosophy. They contain a great deal of wisdom.’ She went on reading.

  ‘They contain evil. Black magic. Witchcraft.’

  ‘Rubbish.’ Liza pushed her glasses back onto her hair. ‘Listen, young man, why don’t you go and make us all a cup of coffee whilst I look through some of these? They may give me some idea of where he is.’ The briskness of her tone told Beth that she was thoroughly irritated.

  She watched as Ken made his way out of the room. ‘What is it? What have you seen?’

  ‘Look.’ Liza pushed the book across the table at her. ‘You spotted it. Read it.’

  Beth sat down. Slowly she flipped through the book, reading the passages

  which had been marked and underlined in red:

  It is a well known fact that if an occultist, functioning out of the body, meets with unpleasantness on the astral plane, or if his subtle body is seen, and struck or shot at, the physical body will show the marks.

  And again, further down the page:

  The artificial elemental is constructed by forming a clear-cut image in the imagination of the creature it is intended to create, ensouling it with something of the corresponding aspect of one’s own being and then invoking into it the natural force. This method can be used for good as well as evil …

  Was Liza suggesting that that was how Brid made the cat? Or did she actually turn herself into it? Or had she somehow gone inside the body of a real cat? Beth looked up at Liza. ‘You believe all this stuff, don’t you?’

  ‘Yes, Beth, I believe all this stuff. Look at this. And this. And this.’ Book after book on Celtic magic had been marked in red. The sections were all on shape-shifting and out of body experience, pathworking. ‘He’s been trying it. Or he’s been planning to try it. And it’s all linked to that stone.’ She threw the sketch on the table in front of Beth. ‘Do you see? He’s been working out what these symbols mean.’

  ‘Giles knows about those.’

  ‘I doubt it.’ Liza frowned. ‘He might think he does, but I think Adam has worked out some totally different system. You see how he’s annotated this book?’

  ‘The carving of a mirror. He’s ringed that. ‘Brid’s mark, it says. The sign of a Druidess or female magician, able to transcend “reality”. These stones are signposts; they direct the way through parallel worlds, not to places in our own.

  A man that looks on glass

  On it may stay his eye;

  Or if he pleases through it pass

  And then the heaven espy.

  She hesitated, squinting at the tiny scribbled
writing: Into the past or the future. Place where the veil is thin. She looked up at Liza. ‘Veil?’

  ‘Between the planes.’ Liza smiled. ‘Esoteric stuff again. He is implying that that is where Brid comes and goes between our time and hers.’

  Beth shook her head. ‘I’m sorry. I just can’t get my head round this stuff. I’m not being obstructive, but it sounds like some kind of fantasy world.’

  ‘There is often truth behind fantasy, Beth.’ Liza smiled. ‘Read your Jung. Don’t worry about it for now. Let us just assume that that is what Adam believes. Has he gone to the signpost?’

  ‘The standing stone thing? Ken Maclaren says it isn’t far from here. You walk up the ridge behind the house, apparently. He said Grandfather had been obsessed with the stone.’ She paused. ‘You think he’s gone up there? In the dark?’

  ‘It wouldn’t have been dark when he went.’

  They stared at each other.

  ‘Beth, darling. I don’t know if it has occurred to you but tonight is Halloween. That is one of the nights when the veil, if you will allow me to use that term again, is thin. It is traditionally supposed to be easier for spirits to pass between their world and ours on a night like this. Supposing he has chosen tonight to try and go and look for Brid?’

  ‘But why should he want to look for her if she keeps chasing him? If she was here, as a cat? If I could hear her, just now?’

  Liza bit her lip. She shook her head and shrugged, then she sat down again, and rested her head on her hands. ‘I don’t know what to think. I just can’t get this vision out of my head, of him up there on the open mountainside, in the pouring rain, perhaps taken ill, perhaps too tired to come home, perhaps injured or lost.’

  ‘You think we should go and look for him don’t you?’

  ‘Yes, I do.’

  They both glanced up as Ken reappeared with a tray of coffee mugs. Sliding it onto the table amongst the books he sighed. He had heard her last comment. ‘I think we should look for him too. Drink this whilst I ring Moira. We’ll stop off at the manse and collect torches, and some of my camping stuff and survival equipment.’

  Beth looked at Liza doubtfully. The thought of going out in the dark terrified her. ‘Do you think you should wait here – ’

  ‘No.’ Liza glared at her. She was indignant. ‘I’m probably fitter than you, and this young man, and his wife as well. I walk miles each day in Tuscany and I have lived in the hills all my life. If you think a bit of wind and rain are going to put me off, you are very mistaken.’

  But they put me off, Beth thought miserably. And so does the thought that out there somewhere there is a vicious female magician fourteen hundred years old and spoiling for a fight, or a wildcat bent on slitting my throat. And the fact that it is Halloween. But she said nothing.

  ‘We’ve both got strong shoes and good coats,’ Liza went on. ‘Beth, I know what you’re thinking but I’m guessing that she won’t be there.’ She glared at Ken again, challenging him to ask who they were talking about. ‘If Adam has gone into her time, then she will be there with him. If he is ill or injured she will want us to find him. Believe me, whatever else she does or doesn’t do, she loves him.’

  Beth did not see, luckily, the surreptitious crossing of her fingers under the table as she spoke.

  ‘If you go after her, I am going to get a divorce.’ Idina had screamed the words after him as Giles climbed into the car and sat for a moment staring up at his wife, who was standing in the hotel doorway, sheltering from the streaming rain. Lightning lit the front of the hotel for a fraction of a second then all was darkness again except for the small square of light seeping round her slim figure from the lamps in the hall behind her. He shook his head. ‘I have just spent three hours telling you that that is what I want.’ He sighed. ‘I’m sorry. I have to go.’ He paused for only a second. ‘Didn’t you say Damien is waiting for you, to take you to a party, Idina?’ The look he gave her was one of complete contempt. ‘I’d say that was more important than waiting to see if an old man has died in a storm, wouldn’t you?’ Without looking at her again he backed out his borrowed car – from one of the waitresses this time – and turned it towards the drive, wincing at the sharp pain in his elbow. When he glanced in the mirror he saw her still standing there in the rain, watching him drive away.

  He reached Shieling House as Liza and Beth were getting into the minister’s car. ‘Giles?’ Beth stared at him, her face alive with hope. ‘Where is Idina? What’s happened?’

  ‘Idina is going back to London,’ Giles commented tersely. ‘For good. I am here to stay. Wherever you want me, my darling.’ He put his arms out and gave her a quick hug.

  Beth looked up at him. She smiled incredulously, then she reached up and kissed him on the cheek. ‘Oh Giles – ’

  ‘Come on, you two.’ Ken pushed his wet hair out of his eyes. He grinned at them. ‘If a celebration is in order, I suggest we do it later.’

  They stopped at the manse. Moira was ready for them with thermoses of hot soup and two rucksacks, one large, one small, and all the torches she had been able to find. She was already dressed in stout walking shoes with a thick quilted jacket and scarf. Ken frowned at her, worried. ‘Are you sure you want to come?’

  ‘How could I not?’ She reached up to kiss him, standing on her toes. ‘I’m very fond of old Dr Craig. And don’t worry. I phoned and told the police the situation. If we run into any kind of problem they’ll come out or call Mountain Rescue for us.’

  They parked the car in a lay-by at the foot of a hillside path. A sign, slightly askew amongst the brambles, pointed up the hill indicating that the footpath led up to the Symbol Stone one and a half miles away. Somewhere out of sight to their right Beth could hear the rushing of the mountain stream, as it cascaded down the hillside through its ravine of rocks. On either side of them the trees, clinging to the steep path, were festooned with dripping lichen. Her feet were slipping on the wet rock, and the roar of the wind in her ears blocked out everything but the rush of water. The footpath followed the bed of the stream fairly closely, climbing the ravine between the trees, winding round rocky outcrops, swiftly growing steeper and steeper until in places the footholds were almost like a staircase amongst the entwined tree roots. The water was deafening as the burn, swollen by the storm, hurled itself down over waterfalls and cataracts. When Ken, leading the way, turned off his torch for a moment they could still see the luminous foaming white in the darkness and feel the trembling of the ground beneath their feet. Lightning flickered between the trees and Beth shivered. She glanced up at Ken’s back in its shiny waterproof and heavy rucksack to where he was shining his torch along the path until the beam of light grew feeble between the serried trunks. He had handed out the torches, spare batteries, and woollen scarves before they set off and had tried very hard and without success to persuade Liza to stay behind in the car.

  Every nerve tense and alert, Beth plodded on, every now and then glancing back to see that Liza was still there beside Moira, aware that Liza, at nearly seventy, was not kidding when she said she was fitter than any of them.

  Giles, stumbling on the scree, hurried to catch her up and she felt his hand take hers. She glanced at him and smiled. She felt safer with him there. Behind them Moira, her own small rucksack loaded with coffee and sandwiches, stumbled on the steep path. They waited for her and Liza, their torches bright on the slippery rock. ‘Okay?’ Giles felt his words being drowned in the roar of the water nearby. Moira looked up and smiled. She nodded. ‘Okay.’

  There was a sudden rush of wind, stronger than the rest, and Beth stumbled on a loose piece of scree. They were coming up out of the treeline now, and it was getting colder. Ken stopped. He turned and waited for them. ‘Everyone all right? It’s a bit further, I’m afraid, and it gets quite a bit steeper. Shall we take a breather?’ He turned off his torch to save the batteries and they stood together for a moment.

  ‘What happens if he’s there?’ Liza asked, raising her voice agains
t the scream of the wind.

  ‘If we need help getting him down we ring the police.’

  She nodded, staggering against him as another gust of wind caught her.

  ‘We’d better get on,’ he bellowed, trying to make himself heard. ‘I don’t like the way the weather is deteriorating. And we don’t want to get chilled. Come on.’

  They walked closer together now, their torches illuminating a faint path through the rocks and heather, the bright circles of light blocking out their night vision so that when Beth looked up into the teeth of the wind and sleet she could see nothing at all. She stumbled and almost fell.

  Liza caught her arm. ‘Are you all right?’

  Beth shook her head. Her fear was growing. There was something out there watching them, she could feel it strongly now. She saw Liza’s eyes on her face, and she saw her grandmother smile reassuringly. She wanted to cry out, but the words wouldn’t come. Already Ken was moving on without them and all she wanted to do was to catch him up.

  ‘Not far,’ Liza mouthed. ‘Keep going.’

  Beth shrugged herself deeper into her coat and forced herself to move on, Giles close beside her. Whatever it was out there wasn’t coming any closer. It was pacing them.

  It was Liza who stopped next. She bent over and caught her breath. ‘Sorry. Stitch. We’re going a mite too fast even for me!’

  Ken waited, his eyes going out at last into the darkness beyond their small circle of light.

  Then at last Liza felt it. She straightened and looked round. ‘There’s someone here.’

  ‘What?’ Ken stared round. ‘Where?’

  She turned off her torch, and gestured for the others to do the same. ‘I can feel someone watching us.’

  ‘Adam?’

  She shook her head.

  ‘I’ll shout – ’