‘How the fuck should I know where it is? All she said was look out for a jewelled egg. It'll be about this big. You check the fridge, I'll do the cupboards.’
Julius listened in outrage as drawers and cupboard were opened and closed and things fell on the floor. The woman placed a warning hand on his knee.
‘Right, let's try in here. I don't want to be the one to tell her we failed.’
‘Jesus, look at all this crap. I bet one of these books has a secret compartment. Come on, let's do this.’
A large book thudded onto the floor and Julius flinched, then stood up.
‘Get down,’ hissed the woman, ‘I've got this.’ She threw a small round object the size of a conker down the stairs. Turning, she grabbed Julius’ arm and squeezed it. ‘Get back! This is going to be unpleasant. Close your eyes and block your nose. If you can also block your ears that will help. It won't last long. Remember that everything you see is a hallucination.’
She pulled him away from the top of the stairs, towards the back window, just as he heard one of the men shout out in alarm. As she went to watch from the back window, he was about to ask what she thought she was doing when he heard screams of pure terror from downstairs, followed by a foul smell that wafted up the stairs to him. It was the smell of abattoirs and rotting meat, fear and blood and excrement, and something rotting underneath that made him want to gag. The air around him became chilly, and suddenly the very marrow of his bones froze as a wave of primordial revulsion raced across his skin. Looking down, he saw wet fingers wrap themselves around his ankle. He shrieked in alarm. The strange woman by the window hurried toward him as a monstrous creature coalesced from the ceiling, its abnormally wide mouth opening wider and wider, saliva dripping from its teeth and ready to bite him in half.
‘Block your ears and close your eyes,’ she said as she pinched his nose. Instantly, the room warmed up and fell silent. He was sitting on a carpet, and apart from the strange woman, nothing else was touching him. He opened his eyes and saw the walls dripping with black ooze. His body juddered, and she turned away from the window and tapped his eyes with her free hand. He clamped them shut again.
What the hell was going on? He was switching between full-on panic and mild annoyance. Of the two, he preferred peeved, and sat in silence like the proverbial monkey. Then, just as he was wondering how long this would last, she let go of his nose and gently removed his hands from his ears. Opening his eyes, he saw her face was awfully close to his. She was smiling.
‘Okay?’
He cautiously looked around the room. There was no monster on the ceiling ready to eat someone, and the walls were free of arms trying to tear the skin from his limbs. The air smelled of Charlie’s aftershave and carpet dust. The house was silent.
‘What the hell just happened?’
‘Wow bang. Clever little device, designed to get rid of bad people. Some make noises, others make monsters.’
‘How did you know they were bad people?’
‘You mean, besides them throwing a book on the floor?’
‘Well, yes, obviously they'd marked their card at that point. But you were already treating them as the bad guys.’
‘Only bad guys break in through the back door,’
She had a point. He would expect the police to knock on the front door, or anyone for that matter. She was right, only people up to no good came in through the back door.
‘How did you get in here by the way?’
‘I picked the lock and came in through the back door.’
He paused and looked at her as she left the window and headed downstairs, ignoring him.
‘Hang on!’
In the study she had already picked up the book and put it back on the bookshelf, and now was tiding up the other objects that had been moved around. Picking up the set of wooden dolls, she opened up the first one and looked inside.
‘How long has he had this?’
Julius was about to reply when the events of the last ten minutes finally caught up with him.
‘Who the hell are you? And put that down.’
The woman put the doll down and held out her hand. ‘I'm Neith, and I'm trying to find out why your friend was killed.’
Julius was reluctant to shake this strange woman's hand, as memories of dead limbs seeping through the wallpaper to grab at him still lingered. Still, an outstretched hand was hard to refuse, so he leant forward. ‘Are you the police then?’
‘A special branch of them, yes. We believe your friend was killed for something he had just found. Something that he may have brought back from Poland. Oh, you've got something on your nose.’
She swiped the side of her nose with her fingers, and he followed suit. ‘All gone,’ she said and smiled. ‘You were saying?’
Julius suddenly felt an overwhelming compulsion to talk. ‘No, the dolls were just a clue. They tipped off Charlie to the idea that he might be on the track of a Fabergé egg.’ He paused. Why the hell was he telling her all this?
‘I am with the police, remember?’
He stared at her and shook his head. ‘Yes, sorry about that. So anyway, he flew back to England and asked me to research the family. Sure enough, there was a strong connection to early twentieth century Russia. And I found the man's brother living in London. Charlie called me last week. He had the egg, and had it hidden all these years in the large outer doll. I think that's what this sand is. I think the sand cushioned the egg in the doll.’
‘Did he tell
