The Rain-Soaked Bride Page 9

  Involuntarily, the real Toby put a hand to his cheek, feeling it dry against the tips of his fingers. The Toby in the reflection didn’t move.

  The real Toby watched, keeping the torch at an angle so the reflection of its light didn’t whiteout the image in the mirror.

  The rain continued to fall and, slowly, behind the Mirror Toby, the door of one of the cubicles began to open.

  Toby glanced over his shoulder, reassuring himself that the corresponding door on his side of the mirror remained still.

  Then he looked back. From within the shadows of the cubicle in the mirror, a woman appeared. She was dressed entirely in white, a plain, silk dress that hung over a body that was too thin and angular to possess much in the way of flesh. Her face was hidden by her hair, long and black, plastered flat by the falling rain. He squinted at it, trying to catch a sense of it between the long, wet strands, but there was nothing.

  The woman moved out of the cubicle. There was no sign of her feet, the white dress reaching the floor and dragging across the wet tiles.

  She came closer and closer to the Mirror Toby who continued to stare ahead, oblivious it would seem, to what was creeping up behind him.

  The whispering through the speakers became louder but still Toby couldn’t break the noise down into words. They were as hidden and unintelligible as the woman beneath the hair and dress.

  She slowly reached forward, the sleeve of her dress falling back to finally offer a glimpse of what lay beneath. It was nothing but corruption, and the fingers, if they could even be called that any more, left a little of themselves behind as they touched the Mirror Toby’s cheek.

  Then the room was flooded with light and his reflection was once more his own, dry, confused, and staring at nothing but himself.

  c) Beaconsfield Services, M40

  Of all the responses Toby’s experience could have enlisted from Shining, glee was the least expected.

  ‘Wonderful!’ shouted the old man, clapping his hands in barely restrained enthusiasm.

  ‘So glad you think so,’ Toby replied, taking a sip of his coffee and wishing it contained alcohol.

  ‘Honestly,’ said Shining, ‘we couldn’t hope for better. I remember a loathsome mission in Poland during the 1970s …’

  ‘Oh dear Lord,’ sighed April. ‘Mr Nostalgia’s off …’

  ‘It was miserable,’ Shining continued, ignoring her. ‘I knew there was a double in their local section but nobody would believe me. I ended up being chased through Warsaw by a rabid bear.’

  ‘Sounds charming,’ said Toby, entirely uncertain as to his superior’s point.

  ‘It was an interesting evening,’ Shining admitted, ‘I ended up killing the poor thing in Saxon Garden, using a cyanide pill and a noose made from my braces. The point, though, was that the powers that be couldn’t accuse me of seeing shadows any longer. If someone was willing to kill me, I must be on to something. I exposed the double in the end. Ran him over with a tram, actually …’

  ‘Stop now,’ said April, ‘you’re spoiling my breakfast. We get the point.’

  ‘I’m glad to be able to prove that we’re involved in something life-threatening,’ said Toby, ‘though I would hope that the three dead bodies we’ve already had to contend with went some way towards that.’

  ‘True,’ agreed Shining, ‘but at least we know that we have the culprit worried.’

  ‘Them and me both,’ Toby replied.

  ‘And,’ Shining continued, ‘we also have a bit more to go on. You saw the curse spirit!’ He pulled out a small notebook and began hunting through it. ‘You should call Cassandra and give her the extra details.’

  ‘Oh God, do I have to?’

  ‘Shush now, she’s a lovely girl.’ Shining handed the notebook over, tapping at a phone number. ‘Remember you’re Terry.’

  ‘How could I forget?’ Toby sighed and looked around for the nearest payphone. Being without their mobiles was already proving irritating.

  ‘Do you have plenty of change, darling?’ April asked, ferreting in her handbag. ‘I can lend you some, if you like. As long as you’ll sign a chit for it, I need the fifty pees for the meter.’

  ‘You must be the last person in London who still keeps the lights on by shoving coins at the situation,’ her brother sighed. ‘I thought they were phasing them out?’

  ‘I hold the line.’

  She dropped a stack of coins on the table and Toby grabbed a couple of them. ‘Can I leave you to handle the paperwork?’ he asked Shining, strolling off in search of a phone.

  d) Flat 4, Thompson Lane, Ealing Common

  When the phone rang, Cassandra Grace was occupied in an attempt to master what her Tai Chi instructor assured her was ‘White Crane Spreads Wings’. In her experience, the crane’s wings were somewhat ill-balanced and she was extricating herself from the cushions of the sofa as the call came through.

  ‘Cassandra Grace,’ she said, still trying to circumnavigate a set of pernicious scatter cushions, ‘theatrical wunderkind and future Hollywood star?’

  ‘Hi Cassandra,’ said Toby. ‘It’s Terry.’

  ‘Terry? Do I know a Terry? I don’t think I do, I’m sure I would remember a Terry.’

  ‘We met yesterday, I was with Christopher.’

  ‘Christopher?’

  ‘We had lunch,’ Toby sighed. ‘You were looking into a curse for us.’

  ‘Oh yes!’ Cassandra replied. ‘That Terry. Are you asking me out for dinner? I bet you lay awake all night thinking about me, didn’t you. Well, I say “thinking”, I really mean—’

  ‘No,’ Toby interrupted, desperate to stop the flow of the conversation. ‘I was calling to give you a little more information about it. I’ve seen something. A woman.’

  ‘The bitch, you’re mine!’

  ‘Please, Cassandra …’

  ‘Oh, all right.’ She sat down on the sofa, immediately finding it a hard and uncomfortable place now she had scattered the cushions all over the flat. ‘Tell me all about it.’

  Toby did so.

  ‘It sounds brilliant!’ Cassandra replied, once he’d finished describing what the woman had looked like. ‘Well, brilliant in that way that you really wouldn’t want it to happen to you but it’s great when it happens to someone else.’

  ‘Glad you enjoyed it. Might it help?’

  ‘Bound to. Though I’m terribly worried about you now. Are you sure you don’t need me to come up there and stay with you? Just in case?’

  ‘Would it help?’

  ‘It would take your mind off things.’

  ‘You’re fine, thank you.’

  ‘Are you sure you haven’t been cursed?’

  There was silence for a moment. ‘Well, I’m not dead.’

  ‘Yes, there is that. Given the others, you would have probably been found half-flushed down a toilet. Or with your mouth stuck around the vent of a hot-air dryer. Or drowned in a sink.’

  ‘I’m going now, my change is running out. We’ll have to call you later, we haven’t got our phones.’

  ‘Shame, I could have sexted you all day!’

  ‘Bye now.’

  He hung up and Cassandra went for a run around the flat to work off a little of her excitement.

  e) Beaconsfield Services, M40

  Toby found Shining and April in the shop. Shining was looking impatiently at his watch while April rifled her way through the newspapers.

  ‘Look!’ she announced, holding up the front page of a tabloid, ‘that lovely medium-chappie has got in trouble for shagging an occasional table in front of Cheryl Cole.’

  ‘The things people get up to these days,’ her brother replied, glancing at the photo where a shamed Belgrade tried to hide his face from the snapping cameras of the gutter press. ‘If you don’t mind, we need to be going.’

  ‘All right, all right,’ she snapped. ‘Shame, though. I liked him. He had wonderfully amusing hair. Sticking up all over the place. Perhaps it was haunted.’

  She dumped
the newspaper back on the rack.

  ‘Any luck?’ Shining asked Toby as they walked back out to the parked car.

  ‘She was as excited as you were. But then, as far as I can tell she always is excited. She’s looking into it some more. I said we’d call her later.’

  ‘Excellent. I’m sure you’ve helped narrow it down.’

  ‘Glad to be of service,’ Toby scratched at his cheek, recalling the sight of those dead fingers touching him there.

  CHAPTER SEVEN: THE HOUSE

  a) Lufford Hall, Alcester, Warwickshire

  After leaving the motorway, they circumnavigated Stratford-upon-Avon and the small village of Alcester, driving out onto quiet, open roads surrounded by winter fields.

  ‘I’m breathing so much fresh air,’ April commented, ‘I suspect I shall get the bends.’

  ‘Just work through it, dear,’ said Shining, ‘it’ll add years to your life.’

  ‘A wonderful thought,’ said Toby, ducking as she reached forward from the back seat and tried to punch him.

  The gatehouse of Lufford Hall appeared on their right and Shining pulled in. ‘Do try and act like grown-ups,’ he said. ‘It would be awfully embarrassing to be refused entry.’

  ‘There isn’t a building in the land that would dare keep me out,’ muttered his sister.

  To the left of the large, wrought-iron gate, was a small office. Toby could see the flicker of several TV screens, monitoring security cameras, he assumed.

  Either side of the gatehouse, a high, pale, stone wall surrounded the grounds of the Hall. At the top, Toby noted a thin wire framework that was no doubt alarmed.

  Two cameras looked down on them from either side of the gate, one fixed, one moving, panning up and down the road.

  ‘It looks secure enough,’ he said.

  ‘I’ve yet to meet a curse spirit that gives two hoots about barbed wire,’ said Shining.

  The door to the gatehouse opened and a young man walked over to the car. He was wearing a dark blue uniform, a privately contracted security firm, Toby reckoned. They always farmed the grunt-work out to the private sector these days.

  Shining unwound his window. ‘August Shining,’ he said, ‘Toby Greene and April Shining.’

  ‘Hello, dear,’ said his sister, giving the guard a wave from the back seat.

  He ignored her. ‘Have you been issued with passes yet, sir?’ he asked Shining.

  ‘Obviously not,’ said April, ‘otherwise we’d be showing them to you, wouldn’t we?’

  He glanced at her, an unfriendly look in his eyes. Private security firms were always inflexible when it came to dealing with people, Toby thought. Too many slapped wrists and public dressing-downs. They could have had the Prime Minister in the back and this lad would still be wanting to see paperwork. Irritating but reassuring all the same.

  ‘I’ll have to talk to the house, sir,’ he said. ‘Please stay in the vehicle.’

  He returned to the guardhouse, leaving April to mutter angrily to herself in the back. ‘Why do jobsworths always say “vehicle” when they mean car?’ she wondered.

  ‘He’s just doing his job,’ Shining replied. ‘I’d rather he was officious than negligent, wouldn’t you?’

  She chose not to reply to that, just settled back in the seat for a sulk.

  After a few minutes, the young man returned.

  ‘Sorry to keep you, sir,’ he said. ‘Just be a couple of minutes more, someone’s coming down to meet you.’

  ‘Should have brought a tent,’ April muttered.

  Eventually, a black car drew to a halt on the other side of the gate. The passenger door opened and Bill Fratfield climbed out. He peered through the gate at Shining and Toby, gave them a distracted wave then leaned back into the car. He spoke to the driver, shut the door and moved over to the guardhouse, the car returning up the drive without him. He reappeared, exiting through the guardhouse and walking up to their car.

  ‘Sorry about this,’ he said. ‘Someone screwed up with the passes. Pain in the arse.’

  Toby wondered if Section 37 had been forgotten. He wouldn’t have been surprised.

  ‘No problem,’ said Shining. ‘As we were just saying, better a delay than lax security.’

  ‘Quite,’ Fratfield agreed. ‘I’ll ride up to the house with you, if that’s OK. I’ll give you the guided tour.’ He glanced at April in the back seat. ‘You must be Mrs Shining.’

  ‘“Miss”, dear, still sexually available, unencumbered by any current husbands.’ She opened the door and scooted over to give him space. ‘Hop in.’

  ‘Thank you,’ Fratfield replied, looking, Toby thought, like a man who was about to walk in front of a firing squad.

  ‘I confess,’ he said as he brushed discarded boiled sweet wrappers away from the safety-belt socket so he could strap himself in, ‘I was surprised when we were told you would be joining the party. Not your sort of thing, I would imagine.’

  ‘Oh shush now, darling, I’m not just tagging along for the free dinners, you know.’

  Toby smiled. He had certainly assumed that had been her main motivation.

  ‘I don’t want you thinking I’m my brother’s keeper,’ she continued. ‘This isn’t a family outing.’ She patted Fratfield on the thigh. ‘People always get confused when I turn up. I imagine they forget I’m influential enough to have you all shot let alone fired.’ She grinned at him. ‘But don’t let me intimidate you, my lovely little secret service man, you were going to give us the private tour, I believe?’

  August gritted his teeth, pulled the car through the opening gate and onto the drive.

  ‘Yes,’ said Fratfield, ‘well, I’m sure you’ll be a great asset.’

  The drive ascended upwards before cresting and dropping back down, presenting them with a wide view of the house and grounds beyond. It was a large, two-storeyed building split into three sections. The central section was slightly receded, a triangular roof-piece topping off an impressive four-columned portico. From there, steps divided off to either side and descended to the large gravel forecourt. In front of the Hall, the garden was laid to lawn with a central fountain.

  ‘Lufford Hall,’ said Fratfield. ‘Jacobean, though the inside is so baroque it makes your hair stand on end. Like most of these old piles, it’s spent a good number of years as an albatross around the neck of the fading aristocrats saddled with it. Military hospital during the Second World War, government property thereafter.’

  He reached between the front seats and pointed to the left of the main building. ‘Extensive stables to the one side, mainly office space now, though they keep a few horses to entertain the foreign dignitaries. You know what these places are like once we get hold of them, half office block, half bauble to dangle in front of diplomatic visitors.

  ‘The gardens are mainly landscaped lawns, though there’s a rather ragged box maze to the right and a sculpture park, of all bloody things, to the rear. I think they let tourists potter around it in the summer.’

  ‘Got to pay its keep,’ said Shining.

  ‘Madness, isn’t it? But nobody can keep the fires burning in a barn like this without a good chunk of funding. I think we get something from the arts council for letting the local college use some of the facilities. Though, obviously, that’s off for the next few days. No visitors allowed.

  ‘Behind the house, the grounds rise up towards woodland. That’s the most vulnerable area, frankly, we’ve got the rest well eyeballed. Still, even if someone did get over the wall and through the trees, they’d have to cross an open rear terrace that we have tabs on. The wall’s wired too.’

  ‘I noticed that,’ admitted Toby. ‘Movement sensors?’

  ‘Dotted around the perimeter,’ Fratfield replied with a nod. ‘Recent additions. We decided to take advantage of the extra day afforded us by Sir James’s death to throw some extra bells and whistles around the place. Hopefully we’ve got the place tight now.’

  Shining pulled up in front of the Hall.

&n
bsp; ‘You can park at the stables,’ said Fratfield pointing towards the left. We’re trying to keep the main entrance clear.’

  ‘No problem,’ said Shining, driving the car around and parking next to an army jeep. He nodded towards it. ‘We’ve got uniforms on top of the private boys?’ he asked.

  ‘Actually, that belongs to one of the kitchen staff. King decided it would look better without a load of khaki about the place.’

  ‘I don’t imagine they would have been very useful anyway,’ said Shining as he climbed out. ‘If the threat is as supernatural as it seems, a rifle bullet isn’t going to slow it down much.’

  ‘Yes,’ Fratfield laughed. ‘Well, we have to take all things into account.’

  ‘I sense the awkward sound of a cynic,’ said April, getting out of the car after Fratfield.

  ‘Well,’ he admitted, ‘I don’t know anything about the subject. It all seems a bit bizarre to me but, and this is the important thing, your files tell a different story. I can keep an open mind.’

  ‘Then you’ll never get anywhere in the Service,’ she said, ‘but good for you anyway.’

  ‘Leave your bags,’ Fratfield said. ‘We’ll have them sent up to your room shortly.’

  ‘Once you’ve had security give them a once-over?’ asked Toby.

  ‘Naturally.’ Fratfield shrugged. ‘I’m afraid it’s all belt and braces here for the foreseeable. I take it you haven’t got any phones on you?’

  ‘No,’ Shining assured him, ‘or laptops, tablets, anything along those lines. We’re positive Luddites.’

  ‘Good job. Come inside and I’ll introduce you to whoever’s about.’

  b) Lufford Hall, Alcester, Warwickshire

  The entrance hall was big enough to play sport in, thought Toby as they stepped inside, though doing so was bound to result in the destruction of something cripplingly expensive. The floor was laid in large black and white tiles running at a diagonal across the room. Entering was like walking across a mammoth chessboard. The ceiling and walls were, as Fratfield had promised, covered in baroque plastering, the details picked out by concealed lighting. A twin set of staircases held the room as if in a pincer, running up either side of the hall and meeting in the middle. Looking up, Toby felt almost dizzy as his focus was lost amongst the glittering shards of a giant chandelier.