‘But you knew what he was, didn’t you? You knew he was a Satanist.’
‘Not at first. I just thought he was a man who liked me, who cared about me.’
Nightingale took a deep breath. He wasn’t getting anywhere by asking her directly. She was confused, clearly damaged by the years of medication. He forced himself to smile and gently stroked her hand. He knew from his years of negotiating that sometimes you had to come in from the side, to slip through the defensive barriers that people put up to protect themselves. ‘I bet he was a handsome man,’ he said quietly.
‘Oh, yes,’ she said. ‘The first time I met him, he took my breath away.’
‘Where did you meet him?’
‘Church,’ she said.
‘Church?’ repeated Nightingale. That didn’t make sense because the last place a Satanist would go was a place of worship. ‘Which one?’
‘A spiritualist church in Islington,’ she said. ‘I wanted to contact my parents. They died when I was young and I was in a children’s home. I used to go to the church trying to get a message from them.’
‘And did you?’
‘No.’ She trembled. ‘Not at the church, but later, with Ainsley, they spoke to me.’
‘Ainsley helped you contact your parents?’
‘He helped them contact me,’ she corrected him. ‘He brought their spirits to talk to me, to tell me that everything was all right, that they loved me and were watching over me.’
‘And he did that at the church?’
‘No, it was later, at his home. At the church I never got a message. But Ainsley did. Every time. The spirits were always talking to him.’ She smiled at the memory. ‘Some of the regulars were jealous because the messages were always for Ainsley. It was as if the spirits were queuing up to speak to him.’
‘Then he took you to his home?’
‘He had a lovely house. So big, with a huge garden. Bigger than this, with trees and flowers and a summerhouse. That was where he made love to me for the first time.’
‘And you got pregnant?’
‘Not then. That was later. After my parents spoke to me.’
‘How did they do that, Rebecca? Did you hear their voices?’
‘No,’ she said. ‘Ainsley knew how to use a ouija board and they spoke to me through that. Every night they would talk to me about why they had died, why I had to be strong, and why I should trust Ainsley and let him take care of me.’
‘Rebecca, was it your parents who said you should have a baby with Ainsley?’
She nodded fiercely. ‘They said they wanted grandchildren. They said I was their only child so it was up to me to give them a grandchild and that if I did they would be happy in heaven.’
‘But when the baby was born, you thought it was dead?’
She put a hand up to her forehead. ‘I don’t know,’ she said. ‘I’m not sure.’ Her lower lip began to tremble. ‘I remember telling the nurse that I wanted to hold the baby and Ainsley taking it and saying it was dead, but I think it was breathing.’
Nightingale closed the album. ‘You never saw him again, after you had the baby?’
‘I came back from Blackpool and went to his house but it was empty, and everyone I spoke to said it had been empty for years.’ Tears were running down her face but she ignored them. ‘Why did he leave me?’ she whimpered. ‘Why did he take my baby?’
‘I think you know,’ said Nightingale, harshly. ‘I think you know what he planned to do right from the start. That’s why he paid you. He paid you to have me, didn’t he?’
‘No!’ she wailed. She grabbed the lapels of his jacket, her fingers curled like talons, and pushed her face up to his. He could smell the sourness of her breath and a sickly sweet perfume around her wrinkled neck. He tried to release her grip but her hands were locked rigid. ‘No!’ she shouted, and her spittle peppered his cheek. The photograph album fell on to the grass.
‘Please, Rebecca,’ he said. ‘Calm down, it’s okay.’
He heard running footsteps and twisted around to see the male nurse running towards them. ‘What happened?’ asked the nurse, as he gently prised the woman’s fingers off Nightingale’s jacket.
‘I don’t know,’ lied Nightingale. ‘I was just talking to her about the pictures and she went off again.’
The nurse sat down beside her and put an arm protectively around her. ‘I think you should go.’
‘You’re probably right,’ agreed Nightingale. He bent down and picked up the album, then stood up and put a hand on the woman’s shoulder. ‘Take care,’ he said. She didn’t react, just stared at the stone birdbath, her cheeks still wet with tears. She reached up with her right hand and began caressing the crucifix again.
38
Finding someone to buy the books from Ainsley Gosling’s library was surprisingly easy. On Wednesday morning, before he showered or shaved, Nightingale made himself a mug of coffee and powered up his laptop. He entered ‘shops selling second-hand books on witchcraft’ into Google, which threw up more than six thousand sites. He added ‘London’, which brought it down to around five thousand. He scrolled through them and realised that most were regular bookshops so he put a plus sign in front of ‘witchcraft’ and tried again. He sipped his coffee as he studied the list of sites. One on the second page looked promising – a store called Wicca Woman in Camden Town, close to Camden Lock market. He clicked onto the website. Wicca Woman apparently sold everything that a wannabe witch could need, from clothing to potions to magic wands, and it had a comprehensive list of books, including a second-hand section. The address was on the main page with a telephone number.
Nightingale shaved, showered and put on his second-best suit, then called the number and asked to speak to the owner. Her name was Alice Steadman and she said she’d be delighted to see any books he might want to sell, and that she would be in the shop all day.
Nightingale managed to find a space in a multi-storey car park a short walk from Wicca Woman. It was in a side-street, sandwiched between a shop that sold hand-knitted sweaters and a boutique that seemed to stock only T-shirts promoting drug use. A bell chimed as he pushed open the door. A stick of incense was burning next to the cash register, filling the premises with a cloying, flowery fragrance. There were two pretty teenagers in the shop, giggling as they looked at a display of love potions. The sales assistant was a punk girl with fluorescent pink hair, a stud in her chin, two in each eyebrow and a nose-ring. ‘Don’t they set off metal detectors in airports?’ asked Nightingale.
The girl grinned, showing perfect white teeth. ‘All the time,’ she said. She patted her groin. ‘But this is the one I have problems with.’
‘I bet,’ laughed Nightingale. ‘Is the boss in? Mrs Steadman? I spoke to her on the phone about some books.’ He held up a carrier-bag that contained five he had taken from the basement at Gosling Manor.
‘I’ll get her for you.’ She disappeared through a beaded curtain and returned with a tiny woman in her sixties. In a long black shirt that reached her knees, black knitted tights and black shoes that curled up at the toes, she looked like a pixie’s shadow and had a bird-like, inquisitive face. Like a bird, she cocked her head to one side as she looked at him. ‘Mr Nightingale?’
‘Yes,’ said Nightingale.
‘I thought you’d be older,’ she said. ‘You sounded older on the phone.’
One of the girls held up a small cloth bag. ‘Here – do these fings really work?’
Mrs Steadman tilted her chin and fixed her with a steely glare. ‘My dear, everything in this shop works, providing you believe in it.’
‘But it’ll make my boyfriend fall in love with me, yeah? And not look at any other girls?’
‘That’s what it says on the label, my dear, and that’s what it’ll do. But use it sparingly. No one wants a lapdog for a husband, do they?’ She smiled at Nightingale. ‘Come with me, young man, and show me what you have.’
She led him through the curtain into a small room. There was a circular table, with three wooden chairs, and above them a colourful Tiffany lampshade. A gas fire was burning so Nightingale took off his raincoat and draped it
