Mean Spirit

‘Oh, shit, you’re right!’

‘Don’t look, child. Might be as well if he didn’t remember us.’

‘Are we sure it’s him?’

‘A few more lines than the face on the cover of the book, a little less hair, a little more jowl. So unless he has a slightly older brother …’

‘Shit, we gotta tell Bobby.’

‘It doesn’t prove a meaningful link, him simply being here.’

‘The fuck it doesn’t!’

It was like a psychic experience. The manifestation of Seward by the stairs changed everything — made the great hall darker, full of shadows, turned the electric candles in the iron chandelier from sparkling orange to a menacing blood-red.

Cindy appeared unmoved, squinting out through the conservatory. ‘No sign of the furniture.’

She remembered what Cindy had said before they met Campbell and Callard. About egos and survival. Huge and cosmic, it is, and yet also so terribly small and sordid. She looked up at the window and the walls and decided she really hated Victorian Gothic. She needed fresh, cold air and trees and sky. She pushed her hands into her raincoat pockets, kept her eyes fixed on the stairs.

Cindy said, ‘I wonder if Miss Callard knows what she’s really here for.’

‘You mean you do?’

… yet also so terribly small and sordid.

Grayle saw Kurt Campbell come around the landing and start descending the stone stairs. ‘You were right,’ she said. ‘We shoulda gone while we had the chance.’

Arriving back at The Vision’s stall, Bobby Maiden found it deserted. A few copies of the magazine had been blown away and were stuck in the mud, pages fluttering miserably like seagulls in an oilslick.

‘I’ve been trying to keep an eye on it,’ a woman called from the next tent. ‘I don’t know where they’ve gone.’

The sign on this tent said,

Lorna Crane, Etheric Massage.

Lorna was fiftyish and fit-looking. She had close-cut red hair and lip rings. She wore apple-green sweats.

‘They — is it your wife and her mother? — they went off with the dog, must be nearly an hour ago. I mean, I can understand them not wanting to hang around here. We’ll do bugger-all business if the weather doesn’t improve. Bloody stupid idea starting midweek, this time of year, but if you’re getting four days for your money you think it’s worth it, don’t you? You want a cup of tea, love? I’ve got a big flask inside.’

‘Oh. Thanks.’ Maiden followed her into the tent, which was bigger than The Vision’s, better carpeted inside. There was a table with leaflets on it, a couch covered with Mexican blankets, a Calorgas heater. The polythene window was tinted red, putting a warm blush on the canvas walls.

Lorna Crane said, ‘Buggered if I’m forking out what they’re asking for a cup of tea in the restaurant. You been in there? Ridiculous! And we’re expected to pay the same as the punters. Ye gods, the stall fees were enough, they never told us there were gonna be surcharges and overheads.’

‘Market forces.’

‘Dark forces. I never liked the look of Campbell.’ Lorna grinned. ‘I’m quite fond of The Vision. It’s quirky. What do you do?’

‘Take pictures.’

‘They pay you?’

‘Sometimes.’

‘That older woman,’ Lorna said. ‘You know, for a minute, I thought that was Cindy Mars-Lewis. Because he did used to write articles for you, didn’t he?’

‘Cindy Mars-Lewis is my mother-in-law? No wonder I never have any luck.’

‘It’s a load of crap, isn’t it?’ Lorna said. ‘All that Lottery hoodoo. Papers must be desperate for something to write about.’ She poured tea from a chrome flask into two white china mugs. ‘It’s Earl Grey. Got no milk or sugar, I’m afraid.’

‘That’s fine.’

Lorna handed him a mug. ‘Not your mother-in-law then?’

‘A friend.’

Maiden sipped his scented tea. He felt reality receding again. The police at Gloucester were saying simply that Superintendent Foxworth was unavailable. They’d offered to put him through to someone else. He’d asked when Foxworth would be available. They couldn’t tell him. He assumed there’d been a development on one of the two murder inquiries. But what development?

‘What’s etheric massage?’

‘I work with the aura. Healing and relaxation. Does it work? Yeah, course it works. Sometimes. Can I see auras? Too bloody right, and it isn’t always a blessing, when you look at people and see they haven’t got long.’

‘Can you see mine?’

‘Yep.’ She bit off the word, held out a packet. ‘Ginger biscuit?’

‘Thanks.’

‘You’re hungry. Take two.’

‘What do you charge?’ Maiden asked.

‘When I’m working, twenty-plus for fifteen minutes. I’m not doing you, though, you’ll never relax long enough. I’ll just give you some advice. Stop thinking about it, you’ll not work it all out on your own. Go home. Lock the door. Go to bed.’

‘What will I not work out?’

‘I dunno. Seriously, go home.’

‘What colour is it? My aura.’

Lorna shook her head.

A voice outside shouted, ‘Hello?’

‘Sounds like it’s from your place,’ Lorna said. ‘Could be a wholesale newsagent wants to place an order for ten thousand copies a month.’

Maiden handed her his cup, stuck his head outside the tent.

‘Excuse me, sir …’ One of the Forcefield men, standing by the fallen Visions. ‘The little blonde American lady? You with her?’

‘What’s wrong?’

‘You might want to come with me, sir.’ Big, stolid-looking bloke, greying beard. ‘She’s had a bit of an accident, nothing to worry about.’

‘Accident?’ Maiden stumbled out.

‘She’s just over in the first-aid tent.’

‘Where’s that?’

‘This way, sir.’

He led Maiden around the side of the toilet block, where a second Forcefield man was peering nonchalantly at the grass around his boots. He looked up when Bobby Maiden appeared.

‘Shit,’ Maiden said.

The bearded man hit him in the gut. As Maiden doubled up, the other man hit him in the face. At the same time, Maiden felt a foot pulled from under him.

He was lying, hurting, with his face in the cold mud. He couldn’t move; there was a heavy boot on his neck. Something which felt both hard and sharp, like an axe, went agonizingly into his back.

He felt very cold. I’ve been stabbed, he thought. I’m going to die.

It was as quick as that.