Authors: Nick Gifford
He was on the bottom step when there was a loud knock at the front door.
He swung it open. There was a tall, dark-haired man on the doorstep, standing with his hands at his sides. Behind him were two more men. Matt recognised one of them as the Detective Sergeant who had come out to Crooked Elms that afternoon. The other man was a uniformed policeman.
The first man held out an ID card. “Detective Inspector Stead, Bathside Police,” he said.
What more could they want, Matt wondered? He had answered all their questions this afternoon. He had thought it was all sorted out.
The man was still talking.
“... to talk to Vincent Smith. Is he here?”
Matt glanced over his shoulder. Carol and Mike had appeared in the living room doorway. “Just missed him,” said Mike. He pointed out towards the street: there was a space where Vince’s Ford Escort had been parked earlier. “What is it? What’s going on?”
“Where did he go?” asked Stead. “It’s important that we find him quickly. We have reason to believe he is a danger to the public.”
“What do you mean?” demanded Mike. “What are you talking about?” He guided Carol out into the hallway, shutting the living room door behind them.
Stead looked at each of them in turn, before resting his eyes on Mike once again. “The Reverend David Walters died in Bathside General Hospital about half an hour ago,” he said carefully. “He died from a blood clot resulting from the assault he suffered at your father-in-law’s house in Crooked Elms. He regained consciousness briefly this evening and he was able to make a statement to one of my officers.
“Mr Smith, we want to talk to your son about the murder of the Reverend Walters. We want to talk to him very urgently indeed.”
17 Growing Apart
He didn’t want to go to sleep.
He lay on his camp bed, staring at the shadows on the ceiling. Maybe if he had managed to go for his run things would be easier. If he had run on that beach, and reassured himself that it was just a beach – if he had been able to draw the line between his experiences in Alternity and the real world – maybe now his head wouldn’t fill with dark memories every time his eyes closed.
Some time later, he heard a car pull up in the street outside. He rolled onto his side and squinted at his alarm clock. It was just after midnight.
He climbed quietly out of his bed and slipped across the landing to a small window that looked out over the street. Vince’s red escort was there, in its usual place.
The front door of the house opened and instantly a mutter of voices rose up the stairs. Mike must have been waiting for Vince to return.
Two floors up, Matt only caught snatches of their angry exchange.
“You must be joking, man!” Vince cried at one point. Then, after more indistinct muttering: “No way, man. They’ve got nothing on
me
. You must be out of your mind if you think...”
The front door opened, then slammed. From his vantage point, Matt watched Vince stride across to his car and get in. The engine started, the lights flared, and seconds later he was out of sight.
Matt returned to his camp bed and lay with his hands behind his head, staring up at the dark ceiling.
He doubted Vince would be back now: he would probably be driving away as fast as his old Escort would take him. It probably wouldn’t be long before the police picked him up.
It made the situation a bit simpler for Matt, at least. It gave him some breathing space.
He turned over and closed his eyes. He hadn’t slept for a whole week, he supposed. He couldn’t put it off any longer.
~
He was getting the hang of Kirsty’s racing game. He could see how easy it was to get hooked on this kind of thing.
The two of them sat side by side on the living room floor, alone while Carol and Tina worked in the kitchen.
He felt remarkably well today. He didn’t know if he had dreamed in the night: if he had, then no traces had lingered when he woke. The recent past was beginning to find some kind of perspective already. It was over, a set of experiences he had found his way through. Things seemed so much better in the daylight.
He returned the controls to Kirsty. She was still far better than him, and she never missed an opportunity to patronise him about it. “Getting better,” she said now. “At this rate you’ll be able to dump the L plates in a week or two.”
He grinned and leaned back against the sofa.
At the sound of the door he looked up.
Tina was glaring down at the two of them. “Kirsty,” she hissed. “I thought you wanted to help me with the bread.”
Kirsty smiled cheekily at her older sister. “Me and Matt were just racing,” she said. “You never play me at this one, but Matt will. He likes it.”
Tina’s face coloured. “Kirsty!” she snapped. “I’ve
told
you. Now come through with me at once.”
Kirsty turned back to the television, ignoring her sister.
Tina came into the room and stood in her way. She bent over and grabbed her by the arms.
“Hey!” Kirsty squealed.
Tina’s knuckles had whitened where she gripped her sister.
Matt had seen enough. “Go steady,” he said quietly. “You’re hurting her.”
Tina stared at him, easing her grip a fraction. “What has it got to do with
you
?” she demanded.
She was nearly crying, he saw. The situation was out of her control. Matt was reminded of his escape from Alternity, when Kirsty had smashed a vase over her sister’s head.
She never leaves me alone for long
, she had said then.
Tina didn’t know how to leave her sister alone, he realised. For years now, Tina had established her role as Kirsty’s protector yet now Kirsty was growing up, becoming independent. Tina didn’t know how to handle it. She didn’t know how to let go.
He had been so intent on Tina that he hadn’t noticed the effect this confrontation was having on Kirsty. Abruptly, she burst into tears. She shook Tina’s hands away from her arms and scrambled to her feet.
“Just leave me alone!” she cried. “Stop it. Can’t you see he’s okay now? He’s changed. It’s all okay... can’t you see?”
With that, Kirsty turned and fled from the room.
Tina stood dumbly, staring after her sister. Then she, too, burst into tears.
Matt looked away as she stood there, crying. Feeling awkward, he picked up the discarded handset and quit the game.
Finally, he pushed himself to his feet. “She’ll be okay,” he said softly. Again, he pictured the vase smashing over Tina’s head. He shrugged awkwardly, trying to blank out the image. “Things could be worse, after all,” he added.
And pretty soon they were.
~
“Kirsty?” Carol had just poked her head around the door. “Matt, have you seen Kirsty? She wanted to see the bread coming out of the oven.”
Matt looked up from his book. “I think she went to her room,” he said.
A couple of minutes later Carol came back, looking puzzled. “She’s not there,” she said. “Tina’s up there. She’s been crying. She won’t say why. Do you know what’s been going on?”
How much should he say? “They had an argument over the computer game,” he said, half-truthfully. “About half an hour ago.”
Just then, Tina appeared behind her mother. Her face was pale, her eyes reddened from crying.
“Mum?” she said. “What is it? Where is she?”
They exchanged worried looks.
Matt stood. “She’s probably in the garden,” he said. “It’s a nice morning.”
The garden was deserted, apart from next door’s Siamese, lying in a patch of sunlight, licking its paws.
They searched the house next, but she wasn’t to be found.
“It’s not like Kirsty to do something like this,” said Carol, for the third time. “It’s just not like her!”
It wasn’t like Tina and Kirsty to argue, Matt thought, but they had.
“Right,” he said, trying to take control of the situation. “She can’t have gone far. She probably just wanted to be alone. She’ll be back soon.”
“We have to look for her,” said Carol quickly. “She’s too young to be out like this. We have to find her. Just wait until I get my hands on her...”
Out in the street, they paused. Carol looked all around. “The roads... oh my god, the roads!”
“She’ll be okay,” said Matt. “Why don’t you have a look around here – there are lots of places she could be.” Lots of alleyways and side streets. There was any number of routes she might have taken if she had decided to head into town for some reason.
“Tina,” he continued. “Let’s go down to the front. She’s probably at that ice cream stall by the beach huts. Did she have any money with her?”
They reached Bay Road and looked carefully in both directions. No sign of Kirsty. They crossed to the war memorial and looked down the left fork of the road, where it became Coastguards’ Parade. There were more people in that direction, but none that looked like Kirsty.
“Come on,” said Matt, stepping into the road.
Tina started to cry again. “It’s my fault,” she said. “It’s all my fault.”
Matt shook his head. “She’s just growing up,” he said. “You have to learn to give her a bit more space, that’s all. It’s no big deal, is it? Come on. The sooner we find her, the sooner you can patch it up, okay?”
Tina removed her glasses so she could rub at her eyes with the sleeve of her sweatshirt. Then she replaced them and followed him across the road.
They stopped at the railing, above where the grassy cliff tumbled gently down to the Promenade. It was cooler today than it had been recently, and the holidaymakers were more sparsely distributed: a few lazing on the grass, more strolling or chasing along the wide concrete Prom or playing on the beach.
There was a small knot of people around the ice cream stall.
“Do you want to stick together, or should we split up?” asked Matt.
Tina straightened and said, “We’ll split up. It’ll be quicker then.”
He left her walking along the top level in the direction of Eastquay. As he zigzagged down the paths to the Promenade, he kept surveying the crowd but there was no sign of Kirsty. He tried to remember what she had been wearing: jeans, a pink flowery tee-shirt, trainers.
He approached the stall from the side, jumping the queue.
“Excuse me,” he said, trying to catch the attention of the young shaven-headed man who was squirting soft ice cream alternately into two cones. “Hey, excuse me!”
The man looked up.
“I’m looking for a girl.”
“Aren’t we all, mate? Only got ice creams here, though.”
“No, no... My cousin. Seven years old, mid-brown hair tied back. Glasses, jeans, pink tee-shirt. She’s gone off somewhere. Her mum’s worried.”
The man shook his head. Matt turned to the people standing in the queue, but they were all looking blank, shaking their heads.
Matt backed away, turned, searched the crowd again.
For an instant, he thought he had spotted her: a small girl, brown hair, pink top. But she turned, called out to somebody, and he saw that he was mistaken.
He searched for about quarter of an hour, stopping people every so often to ask if they had seen her. They all looked blank, concerned. No one had seen her. He decided to turn back and see if Tina had been any luckier.
Just then, he spotted an old man leaning against the concrete wall that separated the Promenade from this part of Coastguards’ Parade. He was watching the people as they passed, his eyes following them, studying them. Matt had seen him down here before, and put him down as some lonely old pensioner up from London for some sea air.
“Excuse me,” said Matt, approaching him. At first he had been self-conscious about approaching strangers, but now he barely gave it a thought. “Have you seen a small girl? My cousin’s gone missing and her mum’s worried. Seven years old, glasses, mid-brown hair, jeans, pink tee-shirt.”
The man shook his head.
But then he hesitated. “You sure about the tee-shirt?” he said. “I saw a kid like that about twenty minutes ago. Only she was wearing a black jacket, not a tee-shirt.”
Kirsty had a black jacket. “She could have had the jacket over the tee-shirt,” said Matt.
The man nodded. “Suppose she could, couldn’t she?”
“Where was she?”
The old man waved a hand towards the road. “Over there. I noticed her because she was crying. Poor kid.” Then he straightened and smiled.
“Looks like you’re wasting your efforts, though. She’s already been found. I thought something like this had happened: I figured she’d been lost in the crowds and then she was found. Car stopped and she went over to it. Guy in the car was giving her a good telling off, he was.”
“What happened?” asked Matt. “Where is she now?”
“Got in the car, didn’t she?” Suddenly, the old man looked concerned. “It was a red Escort – that sound like the right car to you?”
Matt nodded. “Yes,” he said grimly. “That sounds like the right car, all right.”
18 Opening the Way
“Hey! Come back!”
He hadn’t planned it. It just happened. A man in shorts and vest, crouching to unchain his bicycle from the ornate iron lamp-post. He had extracted the chain from the bike’s back wheel and turned to put it in his bag and, without hesitating, Matt had swung his leg over the saddle and pedalled away as fast as he could.
He glanced back and saw the man sprinting after him, purple-faced with fury.
Matt pedalled harder. He didn’t have time to stop and explain. He had been stupid to think Vince would just run away. What had Gramps said? People like Vince are drawn to the Way – it calls to them. Vince had seen the Way open, he had felt its power. Matt should have known he would try something like this! He had to get there as soon as possible. He had to get to Crooked Elms.
A short time later, he spotted Tina, walking along by the wall, searching the crowds for her sister. He jumped the bike up onto the pavement and cut a line through a swathe of startled pedestrians.
She looked up, surprised by the sight of him approaching on the stolen bike, then suddenly scared when she saw the grim look on his face.
“I know where she is!” he shouted. “I’m going to get her back.”
When he glanced back, he saw the angry owner of the bicycle shouting at Tina, his cousin backing away from the man, frightened and confused.
He lowered his head and pedalled as hard as he could, dropping a couple of gears to climb the steadily rising road away from the Bay.
~
He was hopelessly out of condition – if only he had kept up his football training through the summer! By the time he reached the first houses of Crooked Elms, he felt sick with exhaustion.
He came to the crossroads and swung right across the path of an oncoming van. Its horn blared at him but he didn’t care. He was nearly there.
He approached the house and for an instant he thought he had got it wrong. Then he saw Vince’s red car pulled up at the far side of the U-shaped drive. He swung his leg over the saddle and jumped from the bike, leaving it to crash, uncontrolled into the hedge.
The house loomed over him. He closed his eyes and its presence lingered menacingly.
They were down there, he knew.
He just hoped he wasn’t too late.
The front door was closed. Locked. He went to each of the front windows in turn and peered inside, but there was no sign of Kirsty or Vince. He went round to the side of the house. There was still a dark patch of blood on the ground where the vicar had been dumped.
He came to the back door and reached into his pocket for the key he had taken last time he was here. He slid it into the lock and it turned easily. Softly, he pushed the door open and went inside.
He listened, but there was nothing.
He knew they were here: he could feel it in his gut. He could feel the heat, the mental buzz. He could feel the disturbed energy coursing through the house.
He went through to the hallway. The door to the basement was closed, but it hid nothing from Matt.
He pulled it open and stepped inside.
The single bulb lit the basement. He looked down the steps and saw Kirsty lying in a corner with blood smeared across her white face – at first he thought she might be dead, but then she moved an arm, and gave a little sob. Vince was standing in the shadows, his arms spread wide.
“Come
on
, you little cow! All you’ve got to do is say the words. Make it happen, Kirsty. Open it up!”
“No.” Matt didn’t raise his voice, he just spoke in a normal tone, but it was enough.
Vince swivelled at the waist and stared up at him. Then he started to smile.
“Let her go, Vince,” said Matt. “She’s only a kid, for Christ’s sake.”
“I can’t, Matt. You know I can’t. This is my destiny, Matt. This is what I’ve lived for. It’s in my head – I can feel it. It just needs to be set free! This is my chance to be in control, my chance to
be
somebody. We could be like kings, Matt. We could be like gods! You’ve tasted the power, Matt. You know what it’s like. You’re an outsider, just like me. You know I can’t lose out now.” He grinned widely, madness in his eyes. “It’s gone too far for me to just let go.”
The Reverend Harold Allbright must have been like Vince: an outsider drawn to the power of Alternity. Obsessed by it. Corrupted by it. Until he had been defeated by Gramps.
Matt nodded slowly, aware of Kirsty’s terrified eyes fixed on him. “I know that,” he said. “I know what it’s like.” Then he pointed at Kirsty. “But why the kid? Let her go, Vince. Let her go and I’ll open the Way. I can do it. You know I can do it.”
Vince studied him carefully. Then he nodded. “Okay, then. Do it. But the girl stays here.”
Matt shrugged. “She doesn’t matter,” he said, coming down the stairs. “She’s only a kid.”
With each step, his feet became increasingly heavier.
Never the doors of the righteous be breached
, he recited, over and over in his mind, fighting the feeling, mastering it. He was in control. He could feel the power and he was in control.
He stopped close to Vince and met his look.
“Open it, Matt,” said Vince. “Open it and keep it open, so the powers can break through. I want it. I want to use it.”
Matt nodded.
“Never the shield of our minds be breached,” he said, mixing up the words, scattering them at random, letting them come out in whatever order they chose.
“Shine shadow, where light had concealed!
“Protect us from evil, protect us from fear.”
All the time, his eyes never left Vince’s excited face.
“Shine shadow, where light had concealed!”
The air started to shimmer, blurring and distorting the pattern of bricks on the basement wall.
“Never the shadow, where light had concealed.”
He started to smile as he recited the words. The shimmering disc was taking form in the air. Just as before, the Way was opening up about two metres in front of Matt.
Just behind Vince.
“Shine shadow, where light had concealed.”
He could feel it reaching out towards him, calling him.
He stepped forward and pushed Vince squarely in the chest.
Vince’s mouth fell open in surprise and he staggered backwards.
Not far enough! Matt stepped forward and before his cousin could steady himself he pushed him again.
The shimmering disc rushed towards him, wrapping itself around Vince, swallowing him up.
In that fraction of a second, Matt had time to see the look of sheer rage that crossed Vince’s features as he realised he had been tricked.
And then he had time to realise that Vince had grabbed him by the wrist and was pulling him with him, through the Way.
The shimmering disc wrapped itself around both of them, and Matt felt a sudden wave of heat and nausea swamping him, and then there was only blackness.