Ritual (10 page)

Gypo did not move. He felt the bruises exploding their hand-grenades inside his muscles. After a debate as to which leg was the least useless, he lugged himself to his feet and swayed against a lime tree.

‘Are you all right, Gypo?’ enquired the conqueror.

‘Oh, just lovely!’ replied the conquered. And battalions of hate began to march in his blood stream. ‘I’ll cripple you for this, Anna! I won’t kill you! You wouldn’t notice that! It would be too much like a climax! But paralysis is different! Very different!’

He hugged his wounds towards the wood. The torturers began to manipulate his bruises with surprising efficiency. In one day he had really had a celebration!

Anna closed her window, wondering where Gypo had found the ladder. She remembered being followed on her return from the wood. Poor old Gypo! She leant against the thin plaster wall, adjoining David’s bedroom. Tonight she would like subtlety. Already the animal heat of three quarters of an hour ago had disappeared from her mind to her navel. It was as if, centuries ago in a blood time, she had been rutted by the Minotaur. But now she wanted human release. Something involving soul. At least that.

David listened with his groin. Nothing moved in her room. He felt himself drawn towards the wall. He refused to be magnetised. He knew her hot body demanded through the stale mortar. He knew.

Still with her hips hard against the wall, she removed the first layer of her skin. Her sweater. She loosed her breasts. She allowed them to settle like silk cushions on her ribs. Her body excited her. She had developed her enjoyment of her own sensuality to an infinite degree. The black bra slithered down the sea-green wallpaper. Then pressing her buttocks against the cold wall, she slid off petticoat, and skirt, allowing them to foam a soft range of hills round her ankles. She did not wear stockings.

She amused herself, knowing David was stroking the wall. She savoured erotics for their own sake. Anna believed in everything for its own sake.

David slid his hands over his side of the wall, lingering where the subtle incline of her navel would be.

She turned towards him. The honey was prepared. You only need a big spoon, she thought. Then she mapped her body, from mountain to citadel, on the blank page of the wall.

As he plied his fingers like brush strokes on the imaginary canvas of her limbs, she made the correct seductive noises. But he could not hear.

‘Inspector David Hanlin, please inspect Anna’s handling—of this delicate situation!’ And she laughed, self satisfied at the blatancy of her power, and curved her way to bed. Beckoning.

If David had had the ability to climb directly through the wall and mount her, he would have done so. But owing to the circumstances, he didn’t. He just stood with a bubble of saliva between the O of his lips. Very disappointed. He knew she was snaking naked into her summer sheets. The blackbird hair spread like two sleepy wings on the pillow with her face framed between.

Now she was slowly drawing the hand-washed sheets over her relaxed knees, up the incline of her thighs. Then the vessel of loose honey was covered by the white cloth. With all the time of a cooling summer midnight, she eased the sheet down the shadowed hollow of her waist before climbing her breasts. Microscopic strands of material irritated her steeples and the church of her body ached to chime.

The left breast was fractionally larger than its sister. It was Anna’s favourite. She flexed it towards the wall.

With disgust, David found he was licking a faded dancer off the wallpaper. The dancer was painted yellow and purple. That is, before the licking began. He wiped his tongue on a stale handkerchief. The handkerchief was now yellow and purple. He knew, with the sheet cutting her breasts in half, he knew she was laughing.

A hand searched out the button of her table-lamp, and pressed. Off with electric—on with the moonlight. Blotched silver dappled her breasts and wove icicles in the waterfall of her hair. She purred hungry in the moonlight. Won’t he ever come? Hasn’t he the guts? Surely the waves of my body would lave him lovely. Surely.

She whispered his name over and over. But he did not come. The hushed tempo of her breathing mounted. Once again the gaunt image of the oak tree thrashed its branches in her mind. Once again she was dancing the earth dance of Midsummer.

She concentrated the thrust of her mind with the thrust of her loins. She thrashed her body hard into the mattress. The quiet pain excited itself to storm. But still the honey would not break from the honeycomb. Yes no yes and yes the pain knotted itself like a glass ribbon in her entrails. It passed into the sea. And then as the sun persuades the snow into water, and then the honey surged through the blood honeycomb and the butterflies gorged themselves. Her breathing slithered through ecstasy slowly to dream.

The Inspector had forced himself to open his bedroom door and listen. The landing was pitch and silent. He ached to rest in her. To let the whole ridiculous night turn summer in her. Carefully placing his feet, he edged along the wall to her door. With a slippered click, he opened the door and stepped in.

‘Anna! Anna!’ he called, persuasively soft.

No answer. He hunched his head over her pillow. She was asleep. The experiment in self-satisfaction was over. And the snowfall of sleep rested on her shoulders and hair. He did not wake her. Even if he had, he knew, as always, it was a walk too late. Frustration opened and closed his hands on a lance of moonlight and the desire teased and remained. Desire was a permanent fixture. It pleased itself when it applied the thorns. And now was as good a time as any for the cruel prick.

10

On returning to his room, he tried to sleep. But his subconscious was in revolt so sleep would not let him forget. He continued to chamfer the blade of his paper-knife. The white wood glistened like Sheffield steel under the scoop of the chisel. And the hours were in no hurry. As darkness is the principle of the Universe when all the suns are dead, he was constantly reminded that darkness would last forever. He began to feel his brain was a beech nut, continually being sucked dry.

Four o’clock.

Half past four.

He lay on the bed. He got up. He paced the room. Backwards and forwards. Forwards and backwards. Like a traffic policeman. But his only traffic was the stars.

Half past five.

The first wet perfumes of dawn bled in his nostrils. The stars were beetroot-purple. Then they gave in the good-morning wind and made way for a sky of bluebells.

Six o’clock.

Quietly he left the breathing in the house and let himself into the street. He put on his sunglasses anticipating the dawn. The raw sun was spreading its wound over the sky. The houses and cobblestones reflected the salmon fire. Everything was tinged with flesh. The street radiated rose to bronze to yellow as the sun took over England. No clouds. No wind. Only sun in the pure ether.

Suddenly the rhythms of summer blossomed in his body and he ran down the main street with dawn in his head. He skirted quickly through the woods. The birds’ wind section went berserk. But he had not time to conduct. The sea was pulling him. A sting of salt tanged his nostrils. He didn’t take his usual route. This time he branched to the left. This was the quickest way to the waves.

Then he felt the familiar blow lamps on his shoulder blades. It must be Gypo. Though I’m not sure. I’ve learnt not to be sure of anything.

Kicking his way through blackberries, he noticed a bat’s wing pinned to an oak tree. The morning was getting off to its usual start. Hanlin smiled to himself. The blow lamps continued to probe his shoulder blades.

I must admit he’s humorous if nothing else. Funny man!

When he eventually clattered out of the wood, he saw a large house surrounded by high walls. It was only some six hundred yards from the beach. He levered himself into the fork of a tree to see it better and looked behind him to see if he was still being followed. He wasn’t.

It was Cready’s Manor House. Not very attractive. A hotch-potch of late Tudor, pink chimneys and ornate Victorian windows and doors. The walls were a recent acquisition. They had a chalky newness. He could see the back of the house clearly. All the curtains were drawn. There was a large summer-house at the bottom of the lawned garden, hemmed in by trees. He felt they were covering more than primroses. Snagging a couple of threads in his jacket, he achieved ground again and sauntered down to the beach.

The sea was a roar of green crystal. The sun licked the sea. Shells cracked under his feet. It was good. Murder does not exist at dawn. It belongs to the vampire hour, to spilt ink at sunset. Now murder and Anna’s nipples surged unheard in the undercurve of the wave.

He took off his all-night shoes and socks and allowed the freezing water to shudder his feet. His nerve ends tingled. It was very good. Sitting down, he cleaned the sand from between his toes. Then with an impatient finger and thumb, he picked off a three month corn from his left little toe. He rolled the dead skin between his fingers.

That’s all that’s thrust in the grave, then! Eleven and a half stone of human corn. My God, morbidity’s arrived. We’re in for a nice day. He played a quick ducks and drakes with a discus shell, and watched it leap-frog the waves. He leaned back to throw a third shell when a hairless hand caught his wrist. David lifted his head back in the sun to see who had cast the first dice of the morning.

Bull-horned moustaches jabbed towards him. It was one of the head settlers. Lawrence Cready, great minor actor, retired. With the Squire’s family manor behind his name as his only official distinction.

‘Don’t waste your energy on throwing shells, my dear sir! Save it for spreading marmalade on toast. Join me for breakfast.’

Ah, thought Hanlin, the settlers are about to show their hand. Or at least, inform me which game we’re playing. And, maybe if I’m lucky, the rules.

‘With pleasure, Mr. Cready.’

David levered himself to his feet. The two men walked towards the Manor.

‘I—er—er—understand you acquired the Manor from the reluctant Squire, Mr. Cready.’

‘True! True! Unfortunate but advantageous. Having misspent a lifetime in theatre, one learns to seize the opportunities at hand. As an actor, one is given them so rarely, and then, as I did, one misuses them—or they misuse you. Either way, there’s an overdraft. Squire Francis Fenn comes from a boggy family!’ He roared with laughter at his verbal mishap. David looked very serious.

‘Yes, well, Inspector, I know it is a bad Elizabethan joke, but I always feel that bad Elizabethan is better than good Modern. At least, there’s entrails behind it. And imagery. Always important when you’re avoiding reality.’

‘You were telling me, Mr. Cready, about how you came to own those chimney pots above us.’

Cready opened the wrought-iron gate.

‘Yes, well, Sebastian Fenn, the Squire’s progenitor, left such a wreath of debts after his death, that his son had to sell the Manor to the highest bidder. Me!’

‘So the blackmail inference is untrue?’

‘Blackmail? My dear Inspector, on what grounds could I blackmail him?’

‘Perhaps he was involved in some Satanic Rites, Mr. Cready. Child murder. The odd rape. Sodomy. And I’m sure, Mr. Cready, with your talent, you’ve dug up the personal histories of the monied members of this village. And now perhaps you are holding them to ransom for their sexual and sadistic misdemeanours. Perhaps.’

‘I feel you’re having a brain storm, Inspector. Sodomy? Murder? Incest?’

‘I’m sorry, Mr. Cready, I forgot incest. I understand it’s as common as fish and chips in back-water villages. Though, I must admit I haven’t seen a fish and chip shop yet! But I can smell incest!’

‘Why, does it smell any different to the other kinds of fornication? Oh, Inspector, are you suggesting that I run some kind of University for debauchery and then blackmail all my members? Forgive the sexual analogy. But really! Admittedly, I could blackmail the Squire over something!’

‘Oh, I can imagine!’

‘Can you, Inspector?’ He led David into his tiled hallway. ‘Hm, I could threaten to report him to the Royal Music Society for his abominable flute playing!’

‘Ah, you have noticed. I would not have thought you would have noticed such
minor
evil.’

‘Evil, Inspector? This is Boy’s Own stuff, really!’

‘Yes, you’re right, it is, Cready! That’s exactly what it is! What you villagers are doing is sickening comic horror stuff! Diseased children’s games! Murdering little girls for example!’

‘But she wasn’t sexually interfered with, was she? Surely, they would have found that out at the inquest. I think, Inspector, you would like it to be murder so you could destroy us. Our happiness revolts you. That’s what I think, Inspector.’

Half of David’s mind acknowledged that he had no proof it was murder. And yet he knew. His instinct rarely failed him. Even when it did, it usually opened other doors to corruption.

David removed his sunglasses. Cready led him past two large rooms to the breakfast room. The sun sneaked through the coloured glass. A bright-dew lawn could be seen squared off by the window panes. In the centre of this Victorian room a round table was set for two.

‘I knew you’d come, see, Inspector. I knew you couldn’t resist. There’s some very frenetic water flowing under your bridge. You’re too instinctive and imaginative by half. You probe an impulse like a lover rather than a policeman. I don’t entirely trust you, do I? No, I don’t.’

Cready pressed a small bell beside his place-setting. A manservant, thirtyish, good-looking in the Hollywood format, smoothed into the room. Cready eyed him openly with. relish. It was as if the marmalade and toast had made an entrance.

‘Could we have toast and marmalade, please, Martin? And coffee? Black! Yes, and cream.’

Martin smiled. He was all gums, pink gums. His teeth were like a four year old’s, very tiny and eager to bite anything. Absolutely anything. Martin left the room. David sat opposite Cready. Cready stood up and also left the room. David began to draw a bat in the dust on his plate. Strange, the cutlery’s not clean, he thought. Then he realised the table setting had been arranged the night before.

Cready returned.

‘We won’t wait for breakfast here. It’s nearly seven o’clock now. The children will be here soon. Too late for breakfast. Martin will follow us into my Museum and feed us toast and marmalade—personally. It’s very exciting.’

Another nutter, thought David. The village is entirely composed of nutters! I could have done with some breakfast. But hand-fed by a poor man’s Gregory Peck is a little disillusioning!

Cready led him through a labyrinth of tiled corridors, up a flight of stairs, and along another tiled intestine. Finally they reached a large black Gothic door. It was marked ‘Museum’.

I suppose he keeps corpses in here for amateur necrophilia. Or maybe he’s an expert on body perfume. Whatever it is—I know it won’t be healthy. Still, that’s what I’m paid for.

Having spent three minutes selecting the correct Yale key, Cready let David into the room. Once inside the Museum, David quickly scrutinised the contents. Black silk drapes, funereally folded, hung on the black walls. The midnight room had only one window. It was about three feet high and a foot wide in the shape of a Gothic arch. The design of the glass was interesting. A triumphant portrait of Lucifer, with his taloned foot on the nape of Christ’s neck. The symbolism was not subtle.

There were purple shelves on the walls filled with purple books. The sign of the Zodiac and the Pentacle were balanced either side of the window. A black velvet-covered table was placed directly in front of the window, suggesting a portable altar. On top of it, jet candles reared their horns to salute Cready’s moustaches. Two swords with giant silver swastikas were placed next to the candles.

‘This, as you have probably gathered, my dear Inspector, is my Witchcraft Museum.’

‘So you’re a dabbler, are you? You’ve twisted your nasty little mind into the occult, have you?’

‘Not so little, Mr. Hanlin, not so little!’

‘Look, Cready...’

‘Don’t get excited, old man!’ As Cready said this, he removed a tissue from his back trouser pocket and proceeded to polish the swords. ‘I anticipate your questions before you ask them. One of my small talents. Now I want you to get this straight, there is nothing in this room that is real. Unfortunately. Even this sword is electrically plated. The drapes are second best silk. The stained glass very cheap. Even my books on the subject are standard. Mind you, I have tried to get originals—I mean, the banned ones but even the pornographic book shops in Soho are of no assistance. They have all the smut, the perversions, and flagellations, etc., but very little of the actual Craft. No, please don’t interrupt. So reluctantly I must admit I’ve only progressed ostentatiously with my hobby. I wanted to show you this room because I can feel the throb of what you’re thinking—and it’s not very nice, is it? In fact, it’s very nasty. You think that witchcraft is rife in this village, don’t you?’

‘I know it is!’

‘Please, don’t interrupt. I would never have invited you had I known you were such a compulsive talker. As I was saying, you believe that witchcraft is rife in this village, don’t you?’

‘I…’

‘Now, don’t reply. Well, all I can say is that I wish it were rife, and then perhaps my knowledge and interest would develop. But I can assure you that this village is as dead as a staked vampire. Especially after sunset. Though to be honest, if the Old Religion possessed this village, I probably would be too frightened to be anything but a warlock voyeur. If such a person exists. No, Inspector, it’s a dead art here. Of course, in more advanced places, like East Anglia and Scotland and Ireland, things are more excitingly black and hopeful!’

‘Cready, I don’t like calling people liars—especially when I have no proof—but...’

‘Well, don’t then! It is libellous.’

‘But in your case, Cready, I would stake my position that you are as murky as they come. And they come murky!’ Having pronounced his considered opinion, David lifted a heavy volume from the book shelf and wafted his way through.

‘Of course you can read my books,’ Cready retorted. ‘Especially if you don’t ask my permission. Would you care to throw the odd volume through the stained glass! Or perhaps...’

‘This looks genuine enough to me. “Detailed Studies Of Advanced Magic”. “How To Spiral The Mind Over The Abyss”. “The Complete Satanic Rites”. You certainly can’t find this one at the Charing Cross Road. Cready, I suspect you’re a full initiate of the occult. I should think murder is hardly complex enough for you.’

There was a knock on the door. Martin entered with a tray of coffee, toast and marmalade. David thrust the book back on to the shelf, selected a piece of toast, marmaladed it, and munched it.