The Lamplighters (20 page)

High up in the trees, a vivid green form rose up from a branch. It spread itself wide and embraced the gentle crosswind, gliding into an expanse of blue. Moments later, it was followed by its twin. The beautiful green birds soared high then weaved in and out of each other’s flight path, lovers and nest-fellows entwined in an invisible trajectory above the dense foliage.

Far below, Marla and Jessie sweated and struggled on. Marla paused and rotated her shoulders in a circular shrugging motion, giving herself a moment’s blessed reprieve from the clammy patch of sweat forming between the backpack and her spine. She cursed as Jessie, a few steps ahead, pushed past a branch that swung back and almost took her eye out.
All fun and games ’til someone loses an eye,
Marla thought darkly. Oblivious to the swinging branch, Jessie pushed on and Marla had no choice to but to follow. She had no idea how long they’d been marching like this, like conscripts plucked from the city and thrust into the jungles of some far flung conflict they had no desire to fight. Cursing under her breath as she almost lost her footing in some brambles for the umpteenth time, Marla found herself missing the city. London. She pictured herself in her bed-sit, filling out the personality test again. The person who’d done that seemed distant to her now, even after just a short time on the island. She wondered if she’d have been so eager to sign her name on the dotted line if she’d known what she’d put herself in line for. Exploding boats, scrambling through tunnels listening to conspiracy theories from a whacked out American hippy chick and, worst of all, leaving poor injured Pietro behind. Not only that, but with only an apparently senile lighthouse keeper to tend his wounds. It didn’t seem decent, or fair. If her legs didn’t hurt so much she’d probably laugh, or cry, or both.

Just then, she noticed a dark form lying in the foliage just inches from her feet. She stopped to take a look, peering down at the shape to make out what it was.

The bird lay flat on its back, one eye completely closed—the other open. A tiny fly skated across the black ice surface of the eyeball. Both the bird’s wings were tightly closed around its brown body like formal dress—a tailcoat of funereal finery. There it lay, looking to Marla like it was sleeping. Before she knew what she was doing, she’d crouched down and was gently cradling it in her cupped hands. She lifted it from the leaves and studied it more closely—she could see no sign of trauma. Most of all, she felt surprise at its lightness, its fragility in her hands. She placed it back into its shroud of leaves. There was nothing she could do for the bird now. It looked as though it had simply fallen out of the sky, and Marla found this unfathomably sad. Even the skies around this godforsaken island, it seemed, were filled with death. Inescapable.

Then a shadow fell over her, and she looked up to see Jessie, clearly displeased at having to retrace her steps. As Jessie grumpily hauled her to her feet and dragged her on, Marla’s ears were filled with the sound of her own breath, a heavy sound like that of a dog panting on a hot day.

“Quiet,” Jessie hissed, her voice loaded with warning.

“Okay…” Marla said, panting, “I’ll gasp…for air…as quietly as…I bloody well can.”

Jessie scowled, doing her best not to begin an argument. Instead she pushed on ahead and then, seeing something, reached out and parted the web of branches that lay ahead of them. Marla could now see the source of Jessie’s sudden caution, a massive sprawling structure with rows of glinting windows. The Big House.

“We made it. Now all we have to do is get inside,” Jessie whispered. “And get a shift on, girl, there isn’t much time.”

Marla didn’t need a second invitation, her clammy skin aching to fold into the cool shadows of the house. As they crept closer to the structure she found it taking what was left of her breath away. It was
huge
, really massive, and much larger than the London town houses near the park where she used to walk—and those were vast. They pushed on through the barrier of dense undergrowth encircling the house, great leaves brushing them while the roots concealed beneath conspired to trip them up as trespassers.

Something crunched beneath Marla’s foot, and she looked down to see another dead bird. This one had decomposed so much that it was merely a skeleton sheathed in scraggy feathers.

“Gross.”

Marla lifted her foot and took a couple of steps away from the bird.

Scrunch.

Jessie had halted in her tracks and turned back again, her annoyed look turning to wide-eyed horror as she drew near enough to see what Marla had blundered into.

The carcasses of dead birds lined the forest floor beneath Marla’s feet in a messy spiral that spread out over some ten feet in diameter. At the center of the spiral of little corpses stood the stump of a tree. Its wood was blackened, as though the thing had burned down alive and every inch of it was riddled with writhing maggots. More dead birds covered the ragged surface of the tree stump, their ruination apparently the source of the colony of maggots that had taken root there. It was as though a tree full of birds had perished along with it, struck down by lightning or a death curse. Looking down at the little burst balloon of a bird’s stomach, Marla saw disgusting, fat worms the color of blood writhing there. She tried not to shriek, biting her fist in revulsion. She stepped back and moved towards Jessie, hearing that dreadful scrunching sound with every step, tiny skulls imploding beneath her feet.

“So many birds. What on earth could do that?”

Jessie’s question hung futile in the air. Marla did not want to linger for fear of discovering the answer.

They reached the House. Emerging from the dense green, out into the shade of gigantic wild palms, Marla felt as though she’d stumbled onto a ludicrous stage set in the middle of an amphitheater. The creepers and palms surrounding it added to the effect, looking like huge ropes and pulleys with their leaves and branches forming an umbrella of curtains and living scenery. Looking back the way they’d traveled, she could now see the curvature of the land surrounding the house. It banked gradually upwards in all directions forming a bowl-like crater around the building, which sat castle-like at its center. From this vantage point, the house had the aspect of a great meteorite that had crash-landed just meters from where she was standing and eroded over decades. The building was much older than the others she’d seen on the island so far, eschewing the millionaire’s white stucco and double-fronted windows for more traditional materials. Old gray stone, weathered to an almost turquoise hue, made up the bulk of the structure with old timbers framing each dark window. Exquisitely crafted eaves supported the slate roof. Each length of timber had the undulating curves of driftwood and was carved with subtle designs evoking waves, night skies and the surrounding forest. As Marla studied them her eye delighted at the discovery of hidden details—a branch carved here, a driftwood parakeet perching there.

The snap of a branch and the spell was broken. Marla looked around for the source of the sound, and found Jessie standing dead still a few feet away from her and gazing into the treeline nervously.

“We have to get inside right now.”

Then another sound, this time from behind them, coming from the house. This noise was different, man-made, like grinding gears and cogs of some ancient fairground ride. Turning to look, Marla could now see great metal shutters coming down slowly over every window frame—and in front of the door.

“Run Marla…”

Jessie’s voice was so laden with fear that Marla quickly broke into a run for the door. There’d be time for explanations later. Looking over her shoulder to make sure Jessie was following, Marla saw the source of her fear. Black clad figures were crashing through the undergrowth, heading straight for them.

Marla ran into the solid wooden door with a thud and wrenched at the exquisitely carved handle with both sweaty hands. The grinding metal shutter continued its steady descent above her. Marla’s teeth ground together in time with the mechanism as she gripped and wrenched the handle as tight as she could and shouldered the door with all her might.

Nothing. The door just wouldn’t budge.

Then Jessie was on her and together they repeated the action, two frantic little human battering rams shoving against the door for all they were worth.

The door gave, flinging itself wide open with a sharp crack as the two surprised interlopers tumbled inside onto the floor.

“Godammit!” cursed Jessie. The impact had taken the door off one of its hinges.

Wriggling to her feet, Marla crouched, peering out through the remaining gap at their pursuers as the shutter continued to descend. Fowler’s men were almost at the house, with weapons at the ready. One of the men, realizing he was now in range, skidded to a halt and aimed his weapon at the gap where Marla and Jessie stood crouching.

There was only one thing to do. Jessie got to the shutter a fraction of a second before Marla, pulling down on it with all her remaining strength. Marla helped her, wincing at the loud squealing protests of the shutter as they aided its descent. The man fired his weapon and a small cluster of wires exploded from its tip—a taser gun. Just then, Jessie applied her foot to the metal lip at the bottom of the shutter, forcing it down. Something snapped inside the mechanism and Marla was lucky not to lose a couple of fingers as the shutter crashed into place, sealing them off from the outside world. The taser projectiles rattled off the metal shutter like hailstones, followed by a thud and several muffled voices.

Jessie rushed over to a wall-mounted box and flipped the cover open. She peered inside at what looked like a complex home security alarm. An array of tiny LED lights danced, reflected in her gleeful eyes.

“The lockdown worked. You check all the window shutters on this floor, make sure they are secure.”

“Secure? How do you mean? Aren’t they secure?”

“Just make sure there’s no debris stopping the shutters from closing properly.”

“Debris?”

“Like dead birds. Stuff like that.”

“Dead birds?” Marla shuddered.

“Look, just check the damn windows okay? I’ll check the back door and upstairs.”

Jessie turned and quickly headed toward the rear of the house. Marla nodded, then counted her fingers, to make sure they were all still really there. Now for the windows. She’d feel reassured to know they were all sealed tight. Maybe Jessie had set her the task to achieve just that. Whatever, she didn’t have to be so damn bossy about it. As she began to check off the windows one by one, Marla heard a scream rip through the dust and stillness of the house.

Jessie.

Chapter Twenty-Four

Vincent tried hard to blink himself awake through the heavy red fog clouding his eyes. He listened to Fowler grunting an instruction to his men and seconds later felt the bitter kiss of cold water hitting his face. The empty bucket made a hollow metallic clang as one of Fowler’s boys set it down on the floor. It sounded like a boxing ring bell.
Round Five and the old guy has had the fight knocked out of him, they oughtta put a stop to it now, that’s a pretty bad cut over the old timer’s eye, looks like he’s popped a lip too by the amount of blood on him.
Vincent’s eyes rolled back and his body tried desperately to fall off the chair, but to no avail. Tied up as he was, he’d have to take whatever Fowler and his cronies had in store for him next.
Ding ding, gotta come out fighting, the roar of the fight fans, then blackness.

Running out of cruel ways to punish the old man was not an outcome Fowler could have predicted in a million years. But here he was, drenched in salt sweat, knuckles raw and bloody and still the old fucker was tongue-tied. Maybe he really had lost it after all the years up here alone, retreated into some dark cove within his thick skull unable, or simply unwilling, to come out and face the music. Fowler upturned the empty bucket, placed it rim side down and used it as a seat. Looking up at the bleeding old man, he shuffled forward as if at some routine progress meeting. Close enough to whisper, he spoke clearly and softly, pausing only to wipe a small fleck of crimson from his lapel.

“You’ve been out, old man. We know this, and you know this. Our cameras have seen you, skulking around the island in your oilskins. We can’t have cameras everywhere though. You know that too, don’t you?”

Vincent’s leathery skin gathered itself around the meat of his eyes and mouth and he half-coughed, half-cackled as he tried to speak. Some nonsense about his “child”. Fowler was growing ever more impatient.

“Where’s Anders? Where’s the German girl? We know she visited you here, at this lighthouse. Brought you books.”

Fowler recalled the day he filed his report with the Consortium about the missing girl. Accompanying the report were his concerns about the sightings of a man walking the island at night. All efforts to intercept the unauthorized intruder had been fruitless. The mystery man knew the island like the back of his hand—that much was certain. Fowler could only conclude it was the lighthouse keeper who was prowling the island after dark. It was a fair assumption he had something to do with the missing girl but he’d need authorization from The Consortium to carry out a full investigation. When this authorization was denied him, he’d followed his ensuing orders to the letter of course; keep it hush-hush, forbid his men to mention the matter on or off the island, and induct the new recruit, Miss Neuborn. He knew The Consortium Inc. had to protect its interests and he was in no position to contradict its ruling. So he went on, he knew his place. But now Anders was missing. His best fucking guy. Looking into the old man’s eyes, Fowler was at absolute breaking point. His blood boiling, he stood up and poured vitriolic words like hot oil into the man’s face.

“No more, you old fucker, d’you hear me!? No more, no more! You must think I’m a blind man. Walking around this island like you damn well own the place…”

Fowler glanced at Pietro’s corpse, laying contorted like roadkill on the cot bed. Vague excitement throbbed in his crotch as he replayed the image of the boy twitching beneath the pillow while Vincent pushed down on him, hard.