Maxwell’s Curse (20 page)

‘Tell me,’ Hall said.

Jacquie shook her head, feeling oddly better now all this was out in the open. ‘Peter Maxwell went there,’ she said, ‘and found it. It’s just an ordinary calendar, nothing special. It’s what’s written on it that’s odd.’

‘Oh?’

‘Certain dates, ringed, marked. Cryptic rhymes.’ She fished in her bag. ‘I’ve written them down.’

Hall took the piece of paper. ‘Candlemas Day, plant beans in the clay,’ he read for February 2
^nd
. ‘Put candles and candlesticks all away.’

‘Andrew Darblay,’ Jacquie said. ‘We haven’t found the murder weapon yet, but it seems likely that’s what smashed his skull – a brass candlestick.’

Hall read on. ‘He shall be a liar and unsteadfast of courage and will take vengeance on his enemies. The Spring Equinox. 1
^st
March.’

Jacquie nodded. ‘When the day and night are of equal length. It’s the festival of Eostre, the bringer of the light of the day.’

Hall blinked at the girl sitting in front of him. He was entering a strange world which had no relevance to his own time and Jacquie Carpenter was taking him by the hand and leading him through it.

‘A fair maid who,’ Hall read, ‘the first of May

‘Goes to the fields at break of day

‘And washes in dew from the hawthorn tree

‘Will ever after handsome be.’

‘Beltane,’ Jacquie said, ‘the beginning of summer. But it’s more than that, sir. It’s Alison Thorn, isn’t it? Hawthorn, I’ll grant you, but it’s close. Looking at her in her flat – all right, it’s not the fields either – looking at her photograph; wouldn’t you say she was handsome for ever? She’s not going to age and wither like the rest of us, is she?’

‘June 21
^st
’ Hall was reading after a pause. ‘The Midsummer Solstice, “and the Gentleman grew lean and pale with the Frights”.’

‘Albert Walters,’ Jacquie said, leaning forward now. ‘If ever a man looked as if he was scared to death by what he’d seen, it was him.’

The DCI had to agree. ‘Lammas Day,’ he’d found August 1
^st
. ‘Fly over moor and fly over mead, Fly over living and fly over dead …’

‘Witches flew,’ Jacquie told him. ‘On broomsticks or the backs of their familiars. Or they believed they did.’

But Hall was racing ahead, spellbound by the paper’s magic. ‘Oh weans, oh weans! The morn’s the Fair, Ye may not eat the berries more. This night the Devil goes over them all, To touch them with his poisoned paw.’

‘Poison, guv,’ Jacquie leaned back again in her chair. ‘Death-Cap, strychnine, hemlock. It’s all part of the craft …’

‘Jacquie!’ Hall stopped the girl in her tracks. ‘That’s enough. This is the twenty-first century, for Christ’s sake.’

She blinked, suddenly afraid at the turn her life was taking. ‘Christ has nothing to do with this case, sir. Nothing in this world.’

‘Meaning?’

‘Satanic abuse,’ she said, looking him straight in the eye. ‘It’s so fucking obvious and you can’t see it! Why did you send Peter Maxwell to Myrtle Cottage?’

‘Why didn’t you find the calendar when you went there?’

‘It wasn’t there!’ she was shouting louder than he was, her eyes flashing, her knuckles white as she gripped the chair.

Hall leaned back, relenting, letting the calendar details slip from his grasp onto the desk. He was himself again. ‘Then we only have his word that was where he found it,’ he said.

It was Jacquie’s turn to calm down. ‘It’s a word I trust,’ she said.

‘Is it, Jacquie?’ Hall asked her. ‘I hope you’re right.’

The snow came to Leighford that night, a sudden blizzard blowing from the west. John Hammond had missed it on the Met. Office roof, but then the Met. Office roof was not on the south coast of England. By the time Maxwell poked his head out of Beauregard’s, the town lay silent under a carpet of white and the wind had gone. Tomorrow the kids would destroy the sparkling beauty by building snowmen and trying to kill each other with snowballs. The cars would prowl the roads and turn the silent silver to sludge, dirty and brown. Tonight, though, as the old clock of All Saints’ struck eleven, it was pure magic.

‘You can’t cycle home in this.’ It was Prissy Crown leaning out of the window of her Shogun, her breath like dry ice on the night air. Maxwell had already unshackled White Surrey and was wheeling into the darkness.

‘No problem,’ he called.

‘Look,’ Prissy hauled on the hand-brake and killed the engine. ‘I’m sorry I missed you inside, Maxwell. You’re snooping, aren’t you?’

‘Sorry?’ Maxwell could be extraordinarily stupid if need be.

‘You’re on the case, aren’t you?’ She lowered her head, ‘For little old me.’ Maxwell couldn’t believe the woman was actually fluttering her eyelashes at him, like some latter day Miss Piggy.

‘Case, Prissy?’

‘Don’t be coy, big boy,’ she purred. ‘You think there’s something going on, too, don’t you? Ken, Sophie and Willoughby, I mean. You’re on to something.’

He got as close to her as he dared while still being out of tongue range. ‘As a matter of fact, I think I am …’

‘Tell me,’ she’d grabbed his lapel with a lightning thrust born of years on the piste.

‘I can’t,’ he said, gently releasing her fingers. ‘Not yet. Tell you what. Do you think White Surrey would hang on the back?’

‘What?’

‘The bike.’

‘Sure,’ she said, jumping out to secure it for him. ‘Your place or mine? Willoughby’s out.’

‘The Barlichway,’ he replied, hauling the cold metal into position behind the Shogun. In response to her puzzled expression he said, ‘Prissy. There is something going on – you’re right. There’s something I need to check on.’

‘On that disgusting council estate?’

‘The same,’ Maxwell nodded, feeling as he always did around horsy-setters like Prissy, a little to the Left of Lenin. ‘Will you take me? I suspect the roads will be rather treacherous.’

‘Of course,’ she said, feeling his muscles under his coat, ‘By the way, seen much of Jacquie C. lately?’ She smiled, licking her lips. ‘Because, you see, if you’re not,’ and she waited until he’d fixed the straps on the bike before taking his hand and plunging it into her blouse. Her nipple was hard, like an acorn, which was hardly surprising bearing in mind the ambient temperature of Maxwell’s fingers.

The Head of Sixth Form laughed. ‘Prissy, please,’ he said. ‘Accepting a lift from you like this, I feel enough of a tit as it is.’

The journey was spent in silence, Prissy’s face a mask of fury in the green light of the dashboard. As they reached the High Street, Maxwell began a running commentary of Smalltalk but he may as well have been talking to Harpo Marx. The Shogun screamed to a halt on the edge of the Barlichway as Pussy slammed its gears into reverse.

‘This is as far as I go,’ she said.

Maxwell was glad to hear it. He leaned across. ‘You know, Prissy,’ he said, ‘if you didn’t try so damned hard, I could get quite fond of you.’

She turned to look at him. ‘Fuck you,’ she snarled and as he stepped down from the Shogun she screamed away into the night, White Surrey still firmly strapped to her back.

‘A bike, a bike,’ muttered Maxwell into the Barlichway night, ‘my kingdom for a bike,’ and he trudged, hands in pockets and nose in collar, along the road to the Rat.

Gentrification had not reached this far into the abyss. The Rat was a concrete watering-hole in a concrete desert, the badly painted rodent crouching on its haunches on a piece of Edam – or was it Gruyere? The pub’s paintwork was peeling badly and its windows, crisp with the night frost and driven snow, looked dark and dead.

Maxwell tapped on a side door, but it wasn’t Bess the landlord’s daughter who answered, but the landlord himself.

‘We’re closed, mate. Blimey, it’s been snowing.’

Here was an intellectual, Maxwell realized. ‘Barney about?’ he asked.

‘Barney who?’

‘Barney Butler.’ Maxwell’s crisp fiver spoke more eloquently than a hundred surnames.

The landlord checked right and left, though whether for a police patrol car or a snowplough, Maxwell never knew. All he knew was that the crisp fiver vanished from his grip in less time than it took to say ‘Come in.’

‘Mr Maxwell,’ Barney was lounging in a corner of the snug, an old mate sprawled unconscious on the table next to him.

‘Evening, Barney. One for the road?’

‘We’re closed, mate,’ the landlord reminded him.

‘Fuck off, Yardley,’ Barney shouted. ‘I’ll have a Smith’s and my ol’ teacher’ll have … ?’

‘A Southern Comfort please, Yardley. And a small one for yourself.’

Yardley surlied his way around the bar. ‘If the filth arrive, you got this ten minutes ago, right?’

‘I getcha,’ grunted Maxwell as one of Harry Enfield’s characters and prodded the snoring lump lying face down across Barney’s table.

‘That’s Bull,’ Barney said. ‘His wife left him today. He’s a bit upset.’

‘Yes,’ nodded Maxwell, dropping his tweed hat onto Bull’s head. ‘I can see he is. Ever read any Conan Doyle, Barney?’ he asked his man, suddenly unable to remember whether Barney could read at all.

‘Who?’

‘Sherlock Holmes.’

‘Nah,’ Barney drew heavily on a wizened rollup. ‘I seen the films, though.’

‘Ah,’ Maxwell beamed. ‘Dear old Basil and even dearer old Nigel Bruce. So you know what a Baker Street irregular is then?’

‘No,’ Barney looked blank. ‘An occasional shit?’

Rather than give his man time to suggest any more possibilities, Maxwell said, ‘People employed by the world’s greatest detective to watch the streets, finger the undesirables, that sort of thing.’

‘Don’t think I follow,’ Barney muttered.

Maxwell dug into the inside pocket of his coat. ‘Seen this bloke before?’ he asked.

Barney tried to focus on the photograph. He’d had a few. ‘No,’ he said. ‘Should I?’

Maxwell dug deeper and found his wallet. ‘Here’s a brand spanking new twenty spot, Barney, keep you in ciggies for a day or two. There’s another thirty if you spot this man.’

Barney looked at the photograph again, the dark wavy hair, the limp grin. ‘Who is he?’

‘That doesn’t matter.’ Bull stirred and muttered from his position of oblivion on the table. ‘If you see this guy on the Barlichway, I want you to follow him. No contact. Just eyeballing. Watch where he goes, what he does. This bloke,’ he pulled out a second photograph, ‘might be with him.’

‘Fair enough, Mr Maxwell.’

Yardley arrived with the drinks tray.

‘And Barney,’ Maxwell tapped the side of his nose, ‘this is our little secret, okay?’ And as Yardley stood there, looking down at them in a puzzled sort of way, Maxwell and Barney looked up at him and chorused, ‘Yeah?’

Martin Stone slammed the door of his Peugeot. It sounded oddly muffled in the night. He wasn’t a poetic man, but he paused briefly as he reached his front door and looked at the pavement, a powdery Cartland pink under the street light. The heaviness of the snow-clouds had gone and the stars were sharp as diamonds overhead, so close you could reach out and touch them.

He put his key in the lock and went into the darkened hall. There was no sound, other than the soft padding of the old spaniel that snuffled out to meet him. Deaf or gaga or too old to care, the animal had not barked at his master’s footfalls in the drive or the sound of the lock’s rattle. He sniffed and whined as Stone patted him briefly.

‘What’s the matter, boy? Everybody gone to bed and left you?’ He went into the kitchen, switching on lights as he went. He looked in the huge chest freezer, toying with an Indian. Then he looked in the fridge, throwing his coat onto a chair. He pulled out a carton of milk, then thought twice. ‘Ah, stuff it,’ he said and mechanically put it back, checking that the back door was locked and the central heating set right. He clicked off the light and climbed the stairs.

There was a glow from the nursery and he popped his head round the door. Janey’s cot was empty, the little half moon mobile twirling above it glowing luminous in the dim light. His eldest little bundle of joy was with his mother in Littlehampton. He wondered briefly how much grief she was giving her. Little Sam’s cot was empty too. Alex had obviously put the baby in with her. He nipped into the bathroom, too tired to wash or clean his teeth. Another bitch of a day. He looked in the mirror before deciding on a pee. That business with Jacquie Carpenter had rattled him. He’d thought he was all right with Jacquie; that she was no threat to him. But now he wasn’t so sure. Now he’d have to watch his back.

He switched off the light and fumbled into his own room. The second cot in there was empty and more importantly, so was the bed. He reached the lamp and its light flooded the room. No one had slept here recently. The bed was made and cold. There was no indentation on the pillow. Alex’s photo smiled at him from the bookcase.

‘Oh, Jesus, no,’ he whispered. ‘Not again.’

12a

‘Good Morning, Count,’ Maxwell drifted through from the kitchen, still wearing his dressing-gown. ‘Yes, I know,’ he could read the feline’s astonished whisker movement a hundred yards away, ‘it’s only half past six and your master is already upright, adopting that unnatural position to which your lot could never hope to aspire. But don’t get me on the iniquities of evolution or we’ll be here all day.’

Metternich had no intention of talking evolution or anything else philosophical. He intended to lick his armpits and that’s precisely what he did.

‘The village,’ Maxwell had a pad of file paper open on the coffee table and a pen in his hand. ‘Not the place where they imprisoned poor old Patrick McGoohan in the good old days of television, but Wetherton. The Saxon scholar in you, Count, realizes the derivation of the place name – the ton or settlement of Wether, some local Wessex warlord, I suspect.’

Metternich slurped loudly on some clump of fur – ‘Hunnermuhorkpork.’

‘But, to more pressing matters. Here,’ he sketched as he spoke, ‘is the church. Here, the school. If I remember aright, the hostelry is over this way. There’s a post office, I think. Cluster of houses. A green, with or without maypole … and that’s it. That’s all I can remember. Population? Yes, good question, Count. Two less with the rapid departure of the rector and the headmistress; although, strictly speaking, Ms Thorn didn’t live in Wetherton. So, where do we start?’ Maxwell tapped his teeth with his Biro. ‘Indeed. Mrs Spooner.’