Authors: Helen Phifer
‘Hi, I’m Annie. Is this your first day?’
He nodded, then jumped up and held out his even sweatier palm.
‘Morning, I’m George and yes it is.’
She shook his hand. ‘Don’t worry about it. You will be fine. It’s a good job you didn’t start yesterday. Have you heard about the severed head my colleague Jake found?’
His face turned white.
‘Oops sorry, I guess you hadn’t. Don’t worry. Things like that don’t happen very often around here.’
She didn’t add that this was unless he had to work with her, and then it might be a whole different ballgame. She’d terrified the poor guy enough in the space of two minutes. He’d be making a quick exit and never coming back if she told him how in the last two years she had been stalked by a serial killer who had abducted her and tried to kill her down in the cellar of an abandoned mansion, which had once belonged to none other than Jack the Ripper. Thankfully she had overcome Henry Smith to live to tell another tale.
Then there was her run-in with a nine-year-old ghost called Sophie and the evil Shadow Man who wouldn’t let her go to the light because he collected souls. Annie had fought him with the help of her now good friend Father John, and together they had managed to banish him to the darkness for good and set Sophie free. Last but by no means least was her run-in with Betsy Baker, the woman who, in 1732, had lived in Apple Tree Cottage, which was now Annie’s home. Betsy had poisoned her mother, then set her sights on the most eligible widower in town, killing his children and parents so she could have him and his house all to herself. Betsy had made Annie’s life hell when she and Will started renovating the cottage, giving Annie terrible nightmares and almost killing her in a car crash. Annie had been in a coma and watched the tragedy of Betsy Baker unfold while she was unconscious. Betsy had been hanged for her crimes by a group of angry villagers and buried in her own front garden in an unconsecrated grave.
Jake had helped Annie to dig her up and, enlisting the services of Father John, they had moved her skeleton to the safety of his church in Bowness where he’d dug a grave and finally given her a proper burial. Yes, it was probably best not to share this information with him so freely.
Cathy walked in and smiled at Annie as if she was about to eat her, which didn’t bode well for either her or George.
‘Morning, PC Ashworth. You drew the short straw. You’re answering any jobs that come in while your lovely colleagues conduct the inquiries regarding that poor bugger’s head we found yesterday. And you, George, I’m afraid drew an even shorter straw by having to work with our Annie here. She’s a walking disaster so I’m relying on you to keep her on the straight and narrow.’
He vigorously nodded his head. ‘I can try, ma’am.’
‘Rule one, George: none of this ma’am bullshit. It makes me sound like I’m your great-aunt. Call me Cathy unless you’ve really screwed up and need to crawl. Annie, I don’t want you getting involved in our severed head case unless it’s life or death. The last thing I want is to be getting indigestion worrying about where you are every hour. Just keep clear of it. Jake was in full agreement and said he’s happy to do your share of the door knocking, and we’ve brought in every PCSO from Barrow and Ulverston anyway so there are plenty of staff to do what needs to be done.’
Annie knew better than to argue with Cathy and she was quite relieved. She hated endless door knocking and leaflet delivering. Cathy threw the van keys at her.
‘Take George and give him the rundown on the area. Show him the best places to get some dinner and a brew.’
‘Yes, boss.’
Cathy grinned at them. ‘And if you both manage to keep out of mischief I’ll be one very happy woman. I’m on my way to see what the troops are up to, so play nice.’
Annie sat down behind the desk opposite George. ‘Let me just log on to my computer and see what’s been going on in the world of Bowness since I finished work last night – in case there are any jobs that need following up on – and then we’ll go out on mobile patrol.’
Annie’s radio began to ring.
‘Oh and can you bring me back some dinner? I ate my packed lunch before I’d had chance to log on to the computer this morning. Cheers.’
‘Yes, boss.’
George was smiling at her. ‘She seems okay then for a big boss.’
‘Yes, she is as long as you’re behaving…no, she is. She’s great and has been brilliant with me since I moved up here.’
She stopped herself again from giving him the rundown on her life. She didn’t know the man at all so until she did the less said the better. Her radio crackled and the voice on the other end called her number.
‘Can you attend Beckett House on Windermere Road, please. It’s a grade two. Elderly woman reporting the man who came to unblock her drains has come to some harm. She thinks he has disappeared in her cellar and may have come to some harm down there. She can’t go down to see if he’s okay because she’s not good on her legs.’
‘Roger, I’m on my way. Can you show me in seven zero and I also have…’ – she tilted her head to read the epaulettes on his shoulders – ‘…I also have 7993 with me.’
She stood up and George followed her as she strode outside to the van.
‘What’s a grade two again?’
‘It means it’s important but not as important as a grade one, which is an emergency response. There’s two-hour time limit on getting to the job.’
‘Oh, so no blue lights and sirens this time?’
‘No, sorry. Not this time. Anyway be thankful – it’s not very good driving through the twisty back roads around here at top speed, and it’s dangerous.’
‘Yes, it must be. I just wondered what it was like, you know.’
She did know. When she first joined she’d loved it when Jake had been her tutor and would answer emergency calls, then drive like a maniac to get to the job first so they could deal with it. It was an adrenaline rush like no other, but as the years passed she began to realise that most of the jobs were the same people with the same problems, which weren’t really that much of an emergency. The excitement had slowly passed and the dread of being stuck in custody all night with the same idiots took its place.
She decided that George wasn’t so bad and she would do her best not to give him a hard time.
She turned into the overgrown drive at Beckett House. She had been here to do inquiries when there was a missing man a few months back and all the sheds and outhouses had to be searched. The grey slate house, with its huge black and white painted windows and doors, would have been lovely in its day and George began to mumble about how the other half lived. The elderly woman who lived there was waiting for them on the front step and she looked distraught. Annie jumped out of the van.
‘Hello, Miss Beckett, what’s the problem?’
‘Hello, dear, I’m afraid I have some very bad news and it’s entirely my fault. I should have stopped him from going down there on his own. I knew all along it was a very bad idea.’
Annie gently took hold of her arm to guide her back inside and George followed behind. The old woman led them to the kitchen, which smelt of home-made shortbread and stewed tea.
‘Why don’t you sit down, Miss Beckett, and I’ll make us a fresh pot of tea, then you can tell me all about it?’
‘Would you, dear, or would you rather go and search the cellar first? Although I think it’s far too late for him.’
George was looking at Annie, inquiring whether Miss Beckett was as mad as a box of frogs or just delusional, and she shook her head.
‘I need you to tell me from the beginning what’s happened. This is George. It’s his first day as a special constable and he’s going to make the tea, aren’t you, George?’
‘Yes, yes, of course I will.’
He picked the still-warm teapot up from the centre of the table and tipped the contents into the sink. He then began making a fresh pot.
‘There was a terrible smell and I knew it was coming from the cellar. It’s been around for a few days but this morning it was really bad and I couldn’t stand it so I looked in the phonebook and rang the number from the first plumber’s advert that I saw. They sent two men out and that was all right because it has to be two, you see. You’re much safer in a pair. But they couldn’t see what the blockage was and they didn’t have the right tools. Well, they left and one of those Irish men… What’s the word you use for them now instead of gypsies?’
‘Travellers.’
‘Yes, I’m positive he was one of them. Well, he knocked on my door ten minutes later and, you know, he looked a bit of a rogue and had forced his way inside before I knew it, but he didn’t threaten me. Well, he offered to sort the drains out for me and I was desperate, you have to understand. The smell was horrific.’
Annie smiled at the woman who looked so frail that a strong wind would blow her over.
‘You’re doing really well, Miss Beckett. What happened then?’
‘Well, he went into the cellar but the lights had gone out. I told him he shouldn’t but he laughed and told me that he wasn’t afraid of the dark. I gave him a torch, then I came back in here and it was then that I heard the music, the old music of the wind-up jack-in-the-box that belonged to my brother, Joe. I just knew something bad had happened. I shouted to him but the only thing I heard was a muffled scream and it sounded like it was a long way away.’
George was standing behind the woman rolling his eyes and Annie actually wanted to tell him to grow up, but she didn’t. The poor woman obviously thought something had happened; she may have dementia, for all she knew, or she might be telling the truth.
‘Did you notice if this man had a car or a van? Maybe he decided to leave and didn’t tell you?’
‘No, he didn’t have any vehicle that I could see. He walked up the drive. I know because I watched him from the kitchen window.’
‘Well, in that case I think the best thing to do would be for George and I to go down into your cellar and have a look around, and then we’ll search the rest of your house from top to bottom, if that’s okay with you?’
‘That would be wonderful, thank you.’
George placed the teapot back down on the table and waited for Annie’s instructions.
‘Right, do you want to show us where the cellar is so we can give it a quick check?’
‘I don’t know if I should let a young thing like you go down there. It’s such a dangerous place; it always has been.’
There was something in the woman’s eyes that looked straight through Annie’s and said quite clearly, ‘I’m not talking rubbish; this is all true.’ And Annie knew then that she believed her. She nodded her head.
‘It’s okay. I promise I understand. I’ve dealt with a lot of things that were slightly unusual the last couple of years and I know how to look after myself because I’ve had to. Anyway, I have George here to help, so please don’t worry about me.’
They followed her along the corridor to where the cellar door was situated and Annie felt her stomach do a full-length flip. The hairs on the back of her neck and arms stood on end and she felt a cold chill run through her bones. Martha stared at her.
‘You feel it, don’t you? You know it’s not right. It’s never been right since the day this house was built. I’ve been stuck here my whole life waiting for my brother, Joe, to come back and making sure that whatever it is that lives down there can’t get out.’
Annie looked at the number of bolts and padlocks on the heavy wooden door and wanted to slide them all back in place, lock the cellar up tight and leave Beckett House right now. But she couldn’t leave this poor old woman to deal with whatever it was hiding down there on her own. She wished that Jake was here. Even though he hated anything like this, just his sheer size and muscles always made her feel a whole lot better. George, who was looking bemused, was an inch shorter than her with a bit of a paunch, and didn’t instil the same sense of security. She wondered if she should ask for Jake to come and back her up because, technically, she was on her own and this man she couldn’t find might be up in the bedrooms right now, stealing the family heirlooms.
Annie pulled her thick, black leather gloves from her pocket and slid them on; then she took the torch from her body armour and pressed the button to switch it on. George fumbled to get his out of the loop he’d tied it to so that he wouldn’t lose it, but he managed to get it out and did the same. She said a quick prayer for whoever might be listening to protect them both from evil, and then she worked loose the bolts that were still fastened. Pulling the door back, she reached for the light-pull and tugged it. Watery light filled the cellar steps and she noticed the old woman, who was shaking, let out a small sigh and relax her shoulders. Taking this as a good sign she shouted, ‘Hello, it’s the police. Is there anyone down there?’
They were greeted by silence. Annie nodded for George to follow her. He didn’t look quite so bemused now. She shouted again and again but beyond the underlying feeling that something bad had happened down there, there was nothing. When she got to the bottom she stood on the last step and shone her torch around, even though there was a light on, because it didn’t reach the dark corners. She knew what horrors could lurk in dark corners because she’d seen them for herself. The vast cellar looked empty. There were boxes and shelves filled to the brim with all sorts of stuff but they were all pushed against a wall and there was nowhere for this man to be hiding.
She bent down and, with one gloved hand, picked up the torch that had been abandoned on the floor and switched it off. There was a smell underneath the damp and she tried to place it, but she couldn’t. Although every sense was on heightened alert, she didn’t feel as if there was anything in here right now. But it definitely felt as if something
had
been here. It had left an echo of itself. She stepped down and began heading to the very far corner where the big, iron drain cover was pushed to one side. So someone had been down here, because she was pretty sure Martha Beckett wouldn’t have been able to lift it. There was also a big damp patch next to it, along with an assortment of tools that looked older than she did.
She walked across to the hole, wondering if the man had fallen into it and hurt himself. As her shadow blocked out the light and she stood over it a sense of dread settled over her. It was so strong she felt her own knees go weak. There was movement at the bottom of it and she forced herself to shine the torch down to see what it was that was scaring her so much. Whatever it was moved fast as the light filled the hole. If she’d blinked she would have missed it. George, who had followed her, was standing behind her peering over her shoulder.