Father and daughter rolled off the low wall and dropped exhaustedly onto the cellar floor. But Gabe soon pushed himself up on an elbow and searched behind him. And saw that the creature that had intimidated Pyke to his death was no longer there.
'Did you see her, Mr Caleigh?' Percy asked earnestly as he knelt beside the engineer. There was an elated shine to his faded eyes. 'Did you see her, my beautiful Nancy?'
78: THE LIGHTS
The engineer made no comment. If Percy's ghost was different to his, then so be it. Who knew how the supernatural presented itself to different people? The old gardener saw what he wanted to see, memory ruling his vision. None of that mattered though, Pyke was dead, drowned, and Loren was safe. Hell, they were
Gabe had to wonder at himself. He had accepted that he, the sceptic, the unbeliever, had just seen a ghost, a ghost that had sent Pyke to his certain death, an apparition that had vanished when the deed was done. It was incredible to Gabe, but he had undeniably witnessed everything with his own eyes. Now there was no doubt that Crickley Hall really was haunted.
He helped Loren to her feet and hugged her tight. She had run out of sobs, but she was still shaking.
'Percy,' he said, looking round at the gardener, 'thanks. I'd have lost her if it wasn't for you. I owe you again.'
Percy stood there catching his breath, a glow still in his moist eyes. He gazed round the cellar as if he might catch sight of his lost love once more; or at least, sight of her ghost.
Gabe interrupted his search. 'We oughta get back upstairs to Eve. She didn't look so good.'
The old man nodded once, the noise from the well drowning the deep sigh he gave.
The engineer picked up his daughter and bit into his lower lip at the stab of pain in his shoulder. Loren wrapped her thin legs round his waist and he carried her to the stairs; he began to climb them with weary effort, glad to be leaving the dank and dingy basement.
With one last lingering look towards the black portal to the boiler room, Percy followed.
•
On the hall's wide staircase, Lili tended Eve as best she could, while Cally fussed over her mother, patting her shoulder, anxiety causing her little lower lip to tremble. The psychic dabbed a folded handkerchief on Eve's head wound, staunching the small flow of blood.
'It's not too bad,' she told Eve. There's not much blood now, but I think you'll have a sore head for a while.'
There was a dull, throbbing ache in Lili's own head, the consequence of being knocked out by the swing earlier (or maybe the results of the nightmarish visions that followed as she lay unconscious on the ground, she thought). She took the bloodied handkerchief away from Eve's head to examine the injury and was relieved to find the bleeding appeared to have stopped completely.
The hall was growing darker and Lili peered up at the ceiling, frowning at what she saw. She had been aware of it as soon as she entered the house with the old man when they had come after Gabe Caleigh: a slowly swelling darkness hung over the hall, a smoke-like substance from which dusky wisps descended like tendrils, the blackness sinking after them, deepening gradually so that soon the hanging lights of the iron chandelier were consumed. The smell, though, the fetid stink of corruption and bodily waste, seemed to permeate the hall, as did the extreme chill.
Eve tried to rise from the stair she rested on, but Lili pressed down on her shoulders to keep her there.
'I won't lose her, I won't lose her,' Eve repeated as she tried to resist the psychic's efforts.
'Loren will be all right,' Lili assured her quietly but firmly. 'The other man went down to help Gabe. Everything will be okay, you'll see.' But the psychic was more concerned than she let on. The person who now called himself Pyke was very strong. And fast. He had attacked Lili so quickly she'd barely had time to duck away from the blow. She hoped Gabe Caleigh was as capable as he looked.
Cally was the first to see the three figures emerge from the cellar and she shouted excitedly, 'Daddy, it's Daddy! He's got Loren!'
Eve moaned with relief, swaying so that Lili had to hold her steady.
•
The first thing Gabe noticed as he carried Loren from the cellar was that the great expanse of darkness overhead had deepened and become even denser than before. It had swallowed up the hall's upper reaches, almost smothering the chandelier and landing lights so that it was difficult to see across the vast room. Nevertheless, he could just make out Eve, Cally and Lili Peel on the stairs.
He was assailed by the stench that ruined the air, but he ignored it in his haste to reach Eve. As he splashed through puddles, Loren in his arms but looking round towards her mother, lightning flashed outside and washed the hall with its stark silver-white brilliance. The thunder that followed was like the boom of close cannon fire. He had never known a thunderstorm go on so long.
With Percy behind him, Gabe mounted the stairs and settled Loren in Eve's arms. Mother and daughter clung to one another, and their tears mingled on each other's cheeks. Gabe knelt beside them and squinted through the gloom at the blood smeared across his wife's forehead. She opened her eyes and they shone mistily with an emotional mix of joy, relief, fear and gratitude. He leaned forward and kissed her gently.
Lili interrupted. 'What happened to Pyke?' Her expression was anxious as she twisted the blood-soiled handkerchief in her fingers. Even in the encroaching gloom, Gabe could see her face was deathly pale.
'He's gone,' he replied, looking up from his wife.
Now there was alarm in the psychic's eyes.
'Pyke fell into the well that's down there,' Gabe added. 'It was an accident.' This wasn't the time to give her the full story.
'He's dead?' It was said in disbelief.
'I goddamn hope so,' he replied bitterly. Then: 'Yeah, he's dead. It's over.'
But his sense of smell picked up another odour amidst the concoction of foul stenches that polluted the atmosphere, one that was oddly familiar: a harsh aroma of strong soap. He noticed that Lili was looking past him, staring at something lower down on the staircase.
'Oh no,' she said in a low, quavering voice.
79: THE FLOOD
Despite the noise of the storm, the howl of the wind and the beating of rain on the tall windows, and as quietly as the words were spoken, each one of them looked up at Lili, who was on a higher step, then followed the direction of her stare with their own eyes.
It had no definite form to begin with—it was stronger than a mist, yet of no particular substance—but it evolved quickly, forming a definite shape as they watched in total silence. Within moments it had taken on the configuration of a man. A naked man, who held a slender stick in one hand. A man whose pallid body was cross- hatched with livid red stripes and blood spots over old weals and scars. A man with white hair that was shaved above the ears and whose black penetrating eyes glared back at them from dark shadows beneath a high, prominent brow.
He stood on the small, lower landing and Percy, who was a few steps below the others, voiced his name.
'Augustus Cribben,' he said in dismayed awe.
As if to dramatize the announcement, lightning strobed through the window over the stairs and the naked figure on the landing lost substance again, became translucent, nothing more than a vague apparition through which the landing rail and the torchere with its empty vase could be clearly seen. But when the searing light flickered away and thunder filled the air, it took on bulk once more, became a seemingly solid entity.
Gabe heard Loren give out a little shriek and Eve froze in his arms. Cally gripped his injured shoulder tightly, but the pain did not distract him. Percy took a stumbling step up, moving away from the pale spectre.
'Oh dear God…' Gabe heard Lili say from behind.
