‘If I was you, mate, I’d keep meself to meself, and leave our business to us. You with me?’
The voice was harsh, with an East London accent, and there was no mistaking that this was a warning. Rob felt as if he were being threatened from beyond the grave by one of the Kray brothers. He was so frightened that he couldn’t move, but stood with his shoulder against the door, still holding on to the ice-cold handle, staring wide-eyed into the blackness for any faint flicker of light that would show him who had entered the room and was now standing so close to him. And how had this man entered the room? He hadn’t come through the door or climbed in through the window. He couldn’t have walked through the wall.
‘Who are you?’ he said, quite loudly.
There was no answer, but he could still feel that breath against his face.
‘I said, who are you? What are you doing in this house? You’re trespassing, do you know that?’
After a long pause, the whisperer said, ‘Trespassing? You can’t trespass if you don’t have no choice. And you know what it says in the Lord’s Prayer. Forgive them nasty bastards what trespasses against us.’
Vicky stirred and mumbled, ‘Rob? Rob, what’s going on?’
Rob yanked down the door handle and tried to pull the door open, but he felt somebody throw their whole body weight against it, and it slammed shut again. He was thrown violently backwards, losing his balance and toppling sideways over the end of the bed and onto the floor. He tried to get up, but then he was kicked in the hip by what felt like a leather boot, and then a second time, even harder, just below his kneecap.
‘Rob!’ screamed Vicky, and switched on her lamp.
Rob rolled over and managed to climb up onto his hands and knees, like a beaten dog. But when he lifted up his head and looked around, there was nobody else in the room – nobody that he could see, anyway. He listened, and the whispering had stopped.
Vicky was sitting up in bed, looking terrified.
‘Rob, what’s happened? What on earth are you doing on the floor? Are you all right?’
Rob climbed to his feet. He limped over to the door, opened it, and looked out into the corridor. By the light from Vicky’s bedside lamp he could see that there was nobody there.
He closed the door and went back to sit down on the edge of the bed. ‘I’m okay, darling. But you know how somebody pushed you over? That just happened to me. And I was kicked, too. Look.’
He lifted up his knee and it was already red and starting to swell up.
Vicky pulled back the covers and came across the bed to sit beside him.
‘I heard whispering,’ he said. ‘Right outside the door, at least three people whispering by the sound of it. When I went to see who it was, somebody came right here into the room and wouldn’t let me open the door. Then he pushed me over and kicked me.’
‘I don’t understand. He actually came into the room? How?’
‘Don’t ask me. I can’t think how the hell he got in and after he’d kicked me I can’t think how the hell he got out.’ He looked around the bedroom, holding his knee and wincing. ‘He could still be in here, for all we know. He could be standing right here in front of us.’
‘Oh, don’t say that, please! Whatever it is in this house, Rob – whether it’s ghosts or spirits or demons or God knows what – we need to get out.’
‘But how can we, if there’s any possibility that Timmy’s still here? Supposing he’s here and he can see us and hear us but we just go and leave him behind?’
‘We could go and stay at one of the local hotels and come back and search for him during the day. All this whispering, it’s much too scary. And now we’ve both been pushed and you’ve been kicked. Supposing it doesn’t stop there? What if they throw us down the stairs? What if they strangle us when we’re asleep, or cut our throats? What if it was one of them who murdered your father and they come and hit us with a hammer?’
‘It’s scary, Vicks, I agree with you. I mean, it’s more than scary. But there has to be an explanation. Even Ada doesn’t believe in ghosts and she’s a witch. She’s coming back in the morning to do some tests to try and find out what these presences actually are. I think we should wait and see what results she comes up with before we decide what to do next.’
‘Rob, I can’t get over you sometimes. You’re so bloody – pragmatic. You’ve just been pushed and kicked by some invisible person who couldn’t possibly have got into the room, and you’re still saying that there has to be an explanation.’
‘Our only son has disappeared, Vicks! There has to be some explanation for that! If he’s disappeared the same way that these – presences – have disappeared – we need to find out how they do it.’
Vicky closed her eyes and lowered her head. ‘You’re right. I don’t want you to be right, that’s all. This house terrifies me and it confuses me and I wish we’d never come back here. I wish I’d never even heard of Allhallows Hall. All I want is to hold Timmy in my arms again.’
Rob held her close and hugged her and kissed her hair. Then he said, ‘Listen… I’m just going to do a quick tour of the house. I don’t think I’ll find anything, but I won’t be able to go back to bed until
