Buried Slaughter (9 page)

David laughed. “Strange, right? Both hired at the last minute and for a large sum of cash. Both end up headless and stuffed between a bunch of old bones. But there’s something else I’ve got for you. Something very interesting.”

Brian closed his eyes. He could hear Hannah shuffling through the newspapers in the kitchen. “Look, David‌—‌you should be telling this to the police, not me. I can’t help you with this. I can’t‌—‌”

“We’ve got a location on Harold Harvey. An address.”

Brian froze. “You…‌An address? What…‌Where?”

David Wallson was silent for another few moments.

“David? What are you talking about? Hello?”

“Do you believe in ghost stories, Brian?” David asked.

“Ghost stories? What do you mean?”

“I’m about a minute away from your place. Meet me outside. You’re going to want to see this.”

The phone cut out to complete silence. Brian stood staring at the screen, the words of David Wallson running through his mind. Harold Harvey was responsible for hiring Brabiner’s archeological group. He was involved in shady last-minute deals with both of the massacred teams.

And then Wallson had said something about an address, before descending into supernatural ramblings.

“Who was that, Brian?”

Brian looked over his shoulder. Hannah was by the door. She had that look in her eye. The same look in her eye when he’d come in with news of his suspension last night. Disappointment. Curiosity.

“Hannah,” Brian said, as he stuffed the phone back into his pocket. “There’s something I need to do. Somewhere I need to go.” He kissed her on the cheek and made a dash for the front door.

Before Hannah could respond, Brian was already at the bottom of the driveway.

Chapter Nine

“This better be good,” Brian said.

David Wallson held his pint to his face and grinned. It was the first time that Brian had noticed the slightly chipped tooth Wallson had, as he rested it on the edge of the glass and poured some lager down his throat.

“I’m serious,” Brian said. He lowered his voice slightly when he realised that a family a few tables down were looking at him. The log fire in the lounge area of the Grey Goose pub crackled on, autumn fast descending into winter. The walls were lined with paintings of medieval battlefields, symbols of national pride. There was a gentle hum of life about the place; an atmosphere predominantly led by a generation older than him. That was the beauty of country pubs‌—‌fewer young bastards, more old wankers. Worked fine for Brian.

As the skinny, dark-haired bartender wiped the surface of the bar, David Wallson downed the last of his pint and leaned across the table to Brian. “Like I keep on saying, it’ll be worth it.”

“So worth it that you had to drag me out to a bloody country pub to tell me? So worth it that you couldn’t just tell me in the car? So worth it that you had to pretend you had the fucking location of Harold Harvey?”

David smiled again. He held eye contact with Brian before reaching into the pocket of his brown leather coat. “Harold Harvey. You did good finding that name. And we found a little out about him, too. As I said, we found out he hired Brabiner and his team to do the dig on Longridge Fell.” He slapped down a signed receipt onto the table and pushed it over to Brian. “Notice anything peculiar about that?”

Brian glanced over the receipt. It was handwritten and signed by John Brabiner. The amount of payment was what caught Brian’s eyes the most, though. £160,120. A hell of a lot of money for one job.

“Yeah, a fair bit of cash, right?” David Wallson said, as if reading Brian’s mind. “A very…‌specific amount of cash.” He placed another receipt onto the table and pushed it up to Brian. It was almost identical to the Brabiner receipt, only this one had different handwriting and was signed by Ian Davidson‌—‌or Mr. Davidson as he preferred. “The same amount. £160,120. Does that mean anything to you?”

Brian held the receipts up and squinted at them both. “Should it?”

“Perhaps if you studied your local history, four of those numbers would.”

“What are you trying to say? Just spit it out, for fuck’s sake. I don’t have all‌—‌”

“All right, all right,” David Wallson said. He snatched another, larger wad of papers out of his seemingly never-ending pocket and tossed them over to Brian. “You can sit there and read those while I have a pint or I can give you the shorter, more entertaining version.”

Brian turned the page, which was filled with writing and what looked like ancient images and diagrams. He was hardly in a mood for reading though. His head was aching, probably due to the flat Coke that he’d been served. Always hated flat Coke. Reminded him of his times of desperation. “Just tell me what this is all about. What the significance of all this is. And how the hell you got your information.”

David picked up his glass but placed it back down, realising it was empty. He eyed up the bartender and nodded at him, but to no avail. “Impossible to get some quality service in this place. Anyway, yeah. Flick to page three and it might make more sense.”

“Now, now,” Brian said, opening up the papers. “This isn’t a copy of your newspaper you’ve given me, is it? We all know how downright sleazy your page threes are.”

David rolled his eyes. “That’s just fun stuff. This is serious. Much more serious.”

When Brian turned to page three, his headache intensified.

They were close-up images of the new killing site on Longridge Fell. The first thing he noticed were the decapitated heads, the glassy eyes staring up in fear at something. Blood had oozed out of their heads like sand from an egg timer and clotted in the mud below.

But even more intriguing were the bones that circled the heads in the exact same pattern they had at Pendle Hill.

“Three heads, then feet, shin bones, thigh bones, arms. Looks familiar?”

Brian closed the documents and offered them back to David Wallson. “I figured it must’ve been the same guy who did this. Clearly we’ve got a serial killer nutter on our hands. Somebody who likes to collect old bones and mix them with new stuff, I dunno.”

David took the documents back and leafed through the pages. The gentle mutter of conversation continued in the background. Locals who gathered around the bar peered in their direction with angry red eyes. “That’s a possibility. And I believe that’s an area your old detective friends Marlow and Molfer are running with at the police. Add in the fact that an anonymous, untraceable caller notified police of the Longridge killings and, well, it sure does seem that way. But, as always, we’re one step ahead of the investigation.”

David plonked the papers back in front of Brian like they were some kind of unwanted hot potato. Brian stared at the diagrams on the paper. There were lists of years. Dates from the seventeenth century onwards. Patterns, strange languages that he couldn’t for the life of him understand. “What’s this? And what does it have to do with the investigation?”

A creepy smile tugged at the corners of David’s mouth. “You know those bones are from way in the past. You were the first to see it, for God’s sake. And I think you’d be a fool to believe they were just some ‘old bones’ that a serial killer decided to play around with. Look at the image in the top right. Recognise that pattern?”

Brian squinted at the top of the page. The image was of a smiling face, surrounded by arms, legs, feet. A cartoonish, almost comical drawing, but he couldn’t deny the similarities to the very real murder scene. “But I don’t understand. Are you implying our killer had a fascination with seventeenth-century art?”

David laughed and shook his head. “No, no. This isn’t seventeenth-century art. These are real-life diagrams from those believed to be the Pendle witches.”

Brian couldn’t help but smile. He rubbed his eyes and shook his head. “I’m sorry. I’m sorry. But are you saying now that our killer is a witch? An old witch come back from the dead to haunt the world? Just listen to yourself.”

David shrugged. He pulled the documents back once again. “Well, I thought it might take a few things to convince you. But think back to that sum of money. £160,120. Think about it.”

“I’m thinking. And it still seems like a crazy amount of money. Enough for a serial killer to lure a group to a certain location to get whatever kind of messed-up kick he desires.”

“In 1612, twelve people were massacred in the lovely scenic Lancashire fields, suspected of witchcraft. They were dragged from one end of Lancashire to the other, they had rocks thrown at them, the women were fucked up the ass time after time, and still they were made to walk, all because of some superstitious locals.”

“I heard the story once,” Brian said. “But I still don’t see what‌—‌”

“£160,120. 1612. Coincidence?”

The link between the sum of money and the year caught Brian off guard slightly. He really hadn’t caught on to it, but it still didn’t mean it was anything more than coincidence. “I still think you’re clutching at straws a little. I’ve no doubt your paper wants to run some zany resurrected witches story, but I’m just not interested in being a part of your superstitious bullshit.”

David Wallson sighed. He flicked through the papers one final time, before stuffing them back into his Tardis-like inside pocket. “That’s a shame. It really is. I thought you could help us out and vice versa. Really thought we had a good deal.”

Brian zipped his coat and stood to his feet. He nodded at David and made for the door of the pub as the log fireplace crackled into even more life, the heat radiating off it way too intense for late October. “Good luck, David. I’ll keep an eye out for your story in the paper.” He grabbed the rusty brass handle of the pub door and partly opened it, the chilly air from outside a refreshing change to the overbearing heat inside.

“It is a pity,” David shouted, “because I really have found the location of Harold Harvey. No bullshit.”

Brian stopped. He looked back at David, who was still sat in the same position. Some other locals in the pub muttered to one another and pointed in Brian and David’s directions. One of them‌—‌a bald man with a crinkly forehead and bloodshot eyes‌—‌looked awfully familiar. “Bullshit. Where? You tell me.”

David didn’t respond. He just sat there with that smug grin on his face, well aware that it would tick Brian off.

Brian stormed back in David’s direction, almost knocking a pint glass from a table on his way. “I asked you a very serious question. Where is he?”

David looked up at Brian and pointed out of the leaded window, which was slightly condensed with sweat and hot breath. “He’s buried in that churchyard across the street.”

Brian’s stomach sank as he stared out of the window. “But he can’t be dead. When did he die? He‌—‌”

“Harold Harvey was the man responsible for the murder of those twelve witches in 1612. He was murdered six years later at the age of 60. Are you sure you don’t believe in witches anymore, Brian?”

Chapter Ten

The churchyard was completely vacant, and looked like it had been for months until Brian and David showed up. Brown, crusty flowers had curled over and died, gasping through lack of water and nourishment. Headstones were splattered with bird shit and painted with graffiti. In the corner of the churchyard, a lone rabbit chewed on the head of a bunch of memorial roses.

“So we’ve got a man called Harold Harvey who murdered a bunch of witches in the 1600s. We’ve got a payment of money with the date of the witch murders. And we’ve got a ritualistic bunch of murders that just about match the crazy diagrams of those witches all those years back. I think you can safely agree this isn’t just a coincidence now, can’t you?”

Brian stared at the headstone. It was old and cracked at the sides. The markings on it were barely readable, but the name was ever-so-prominent.
Harold Harvey. 1558‌—‌1618.
No message. No notes on family or how likeable a guy he was. Nothing.

David Wallson pulled a pack of chewing gum out of his pocket and held it out to Brian, who shook his head in refusal. David popped one in his mouth and chewed anyway, as the wind picked up and battered the trees that surrounded the churchyard. “I know what you’re thinking. ‘Why do I always get so attached to the complicated shit?’”

Brian shook his head. His cheeks were burning. He knew there was nothing he could technically do about what he had discovered other than inform the police. And yet he just couldn’t let it all go. He knew too much. He was in too deep. “What now? What little bullshit activity do you want me to carry out for you now?”

David grinned. Minty breath emanated from his mouth and covered Brian’s face. “I guess we’re at square one, aren’t we? The real Harold Harvey is dead. Somebody is using his name as an alias for one reason or another.”

Brian turned back to the headstone and peered at it.
Harold Harvey.
“These witch tales. The Pendle Hill and Longridge Fell stories. They’re pretty common knowledge, right?”

“Local folklore,” David said. “Half the little inbred towns around here probably hear it as their first stories on their mother’s laps. A way to stop them heading into the woods.”

“The woods?”

David pointed at the triptych of hills in the distance. There was a large tree-filled area in between each. “That’s where all these apparent witches used to go up to do their…‌well, their witchy shit.”

“‘Witchy shit’?”

“Y’know. Animal sacrifices. Eating babies. The standard witchy activities.”

Shrugging, Brian headed further away from Harold Harvey’s headstone and to the concrete wall that lined the churchyard. He rested on it and stared out at the hills. “If our killer wanted to remain anonymous, then why would he choose the name of a commonly known witch slayer as his alias?”

“Oh, now what’s this? First, it’s
our
killer, and now you’re going all superstitious on me. This is good, Brian. I feel privileged.” He punched Brian on his arm and winked as he too rested on the concrete wall and looked at the scenery. “Perhaps it’s somebody who’s obsessed. Somebody who doesn’t like witches and, I dunno. Maybe the Brabiner and the Davidson groups stepped on this guy’s witchy land or something.”