The Cold Calling

‘So what’s going to happen?’ He was tense, restless, the impending storm getting to his nerves. Desperate to move, flush out Fraser-Hale. Needed to see him. To know the disease.

‘I’m going to talk to the storm,’ Cindy said.

‘I see,’ Maiden said.

‘Do you?’

‘No.’

‘All right, Bobby. Very quickly: weather control. Marcus knows more about the scientific side of this than me, and I wish we had him with us. But the electrical storm is a terrific source of energy, the most powerful phenomenon in nature’s bag of tricks, and there is evidence that Neolithic people sought to control storms — using megalithic circles — and perhaps to store the energy so that rain could be summoned when it was needed.’

‘How would they use stone circles?’

‘Because they’re invariably sited at places where underground streams intersect, places which are likely to attract bolts of lightning seeking to discharge themselves in the earth. Grayle, this cricket bag of Adrian’s, could it have contained, for instance, rods of iron, or copper?’

‘I guess.’

‘When you were in or around the circle, did you see anything of that nature sticking out of the ground, anywhere?’

‘I don’t recall … I’m sorry, what would they be for?’

‘Lightning conductors, perhaps? Bobby, if you remember, when he is discussing the circumstances of the killing of the birdwatcher, he talks of dismissing clouds and also creating them. By willpower and meditation, yes? So we know he’s studied weather control. Suppose he’s convinced himself he can bring about, by force of will, an electrical storm, like the one in Mr Turner’s picture? Suppose he’s been working on this for quite a considerable time … with this little gathering in mind.’

Grayle backed off from the King Stone. ‘At a wedding? That’s what he meant by sacrificing friends?’

‘I don’t know. This is speculation. Adrian’s view of our remote ancestors has them as rather less practical and scientific and agriculturally minded than we would perhaps like to think. A storm, as your picture demonstrates, is a dynamic killing-force.’

‘Aw, come on,’ Grayle said. ‘He’s just a guy.’

‘Practical guy, though,’ Maiden said.

‘And, at the risk of sounding religious,’ Cindy said, ‘history has shown that individuals who wish to do evil can seemingly attract to themselves an element of, shall we say, back-up. But I don’t want to talk like this. I don’t want to court your scepticism. Let’s just say that if there’s a grain of truth here, we can do three things. We can find Adrian Fraser-Hale and … constrain him. We can stop this wedding. And we can try to hold off the storm meanwhile. Do you see?’

Maiden didn’t see, not really. Adrian was not like Cindy; he was a nuts-and-bolts man; he was practical. ‘Still,’ he told Grayle as they crossed the road between a couple of dozen parked cars, to get back to the circle, ‘you learn not to dismiss anything Cindy comes up with.’

When they took a final look back at the King Stone, there was a big red thing on top with wings and bulbous eyes you could see even from this distance. Cindy must have stood on his suitcase to prop it up there.

‘What the hell is that, Bobby?’

‘I think it’s Kelvyn Kite. His, er, shamanistic totem creature. Something like that. Don’t think about it, you’ll only lose confidence.’

They turned left into the small wood which hid the entrance to the circle. The congregation was hushed. The two candles flickered innocently.

‘OK,’ Grayle whispered. ‘I’m gonna be straight with you. I don’t know what to believe.’

‘Like I said, a problem you tend to have, around Cindy.’ Maiden dropped behind the wooden hut.

‘No. Listen to me,’ Grayle said. ‘Ersula. Do you know she’s dead?’

Her lower face was in shadow. Her eyes, through a soft tumble of hair, were bright with pleading.

‘I …’

‘Bobby, I just need to hear what you believe is the truth.’

‘Well. A body’s been uncovered at Cefn-y-bedd. In the ground. It’s a young woman. Very light, blond hair.’

‘Oh … OK …’ Steadying her voice. ‘That’s … that’s …’

‘I don’t know her, do I? But he says he killed her.’

‘You talked to him? When?’

‘He left tapes. He talks all the details into a recorder. At the High Knoll burial chamber. Laying down his own EVP for posterity. That make sense to you?’

‘Like a confession.’

‘More like a celebration.’

‘Friends!’ From the circle, the minister’s voice rose up, loud and relaxed. ‘We’re gathered here today in the sight of God — Oh, yes, it is! … whatever some of you might think about stone circles …’

Laughter.

Grayle said, ‘And the woman … when he thought he’d killed me?’

‘Was called Emma Curtis. She was my friend. Close friend. She was the woman who collected me last night at Castle Farm, while you were there. It was going dark like now, and she had … light hair, and he thought it was you. He’d followed you down from the Knoll — that was your mistake, the Knoll is his — and he climbed into his Land Rover and he tailed us. To a hotel. And later … when she was on her own … he … he killed her. After he discovered the hotel was at the crossing point of two leys. Serendipity.’

The minister said joyfully, ‘To join together this man and this woman in holy matrimony!’

‘How did he kill her?’

‘With a carpet knife.’

‘Jesus. And Ersula?’

‘We … can’t be sure. It’ll take a post-mortem. But …’

He waited.

‘The cause of death may be … a kind of suffocation.’

She shook a little. She didn’t want to hear any more. ‘You’re not lying to me, are you?’

‘I swear to God I’m not lying to you.’

‘Now,’ said the minister. ‘It says here, in this little prayer book, that marriage is an honourable estate, instituted of God, in the time of man’s innocence, signifying to us the mystical union between Christ and his church. I want us to think about that, about what it means.’

‘Close friend, huh?’

‘Almost,’ Maiden said, and there must have been a fissure in his voice because Grayle suddenly clung to him, for just a second, then let him go, stepped away, blinking hard.

‘Bonding of the bereaved,’ she said. ‘Jesus, he could be in these woods. He could be just yards away from us now.’ She didn’t look around. ‘This shamanic stuff of Cindy’s. You believe he can intercede with nature, head off that storm?’

‘Do I hell,’ Maiden said.

Grayle nodded. ‘So we need to stop the ceremony.’

‘No need to make a drama out of it. We just get everybody together in one place, well clear of the circle, for safety.’

‘I know,’ the minister said, ‘that some members of Janny and Matthew’s families must think a stone circle is a highly unsuitable place for a wedding.’

‘I’ll do it,’ Grayle said. ‘I’m from New York. Everybody knows how crass and crazy we are. I got nothing to lose.’

‘Just don’t start a panic. Be playing into his hands. Be discreet.’

‘Sure. What will you do?’

‘If he’s here, I’ll find him. I have to find him.’

‘How?’