A Cry From Beyond (24 page)

“Let the
party commence,” I said, slipping out of the room into the
hall.

Madam Lee
was dressed from head to toe in black. A shawl was draped over her
head. She might have been attending a wake. Standing behind her was
the irrepressible Coogan. I invited them in out of the rain and
thanked Madam Lee for coming. She appeared not to hear me, her
attention focused on her surroundings and more particularly the
cellar door.

“Where
does that lead,” she asked, nodding to it.

I told
her and glanced over at Coogan, who looked like he already wanted
to leave.

“This
way,” I said, motioning for him and Madam Lee to follow, but he
refused to budge, saying he would prefer to wait outside in the
hall, until the séance was over.

“Very
well,” I said. I looked at Madam Lee who removed the shawl from her
head, allowing it to fall around her shoulders.

“Follow
me if you will,” I said.

Coogan,
who had barely taken his eyes off me since entering the cottage,
continued to observe me closely. He distrusted my motives for
asking Madam Lee along because he distrusted anyone who was not of
Romany stock.

I
introduced the clairvoyant to the others. Everyone reacted
politely, albeit a little edgily. David offered his cigarettes
around, while Jenny guided Madam Lee over to a comfortable armchair
in one corner of the room and asked if she would care for a
drink.

“There’s
beer, wine or spirits or perhaps you would prefer a soft drink,”
she said. Madam Lee chose tap water. While Jenny was in the kitchen
getting it, I topped up David’s glass of wine and got H, Rick and
myself beers.

H
commented that it was getting chilly. He was right. Despite stoking
the potbelly, the temperature in the room had dipped
noticeably.

“We need
more logs for the fire,” David said.

I went
outside to the log shed, taking the back way, as I didn’t want
contact with Coogan if I could avoid it. When I returned to the
front room, the others were gathered together in readiness for the
séance, drinking and saying little. Madam Lee sat in one corner,
talking quietly to Jenny, who hung on her every word. Jenny really
did believe in the clairvoyant’s psychic abilities and treated her
with a certain amount of reverence. H and Rick discussed sport,
while David sat on his own staring blankly through the window. I
went to the table and cleared my throat.

“Shall we
get started then?” I said looking at each of them in turn, allowing
my gaze to settle finally on Madam Lee. She looked incredibly wan
and frail. She shivered imperceptibly.

“Are you
cold?” I asked.

She
ignored the question and got to her feet. “We should begin. Please,
would someone draw the curtains?”

H quickly
obliged.

“Thank
you,” she said.

I
motioned to the table. “Shall we?”

Just
then, the room was illuminated by a spectacular bolt of lightning.
Then the lights failed, plunging the room into semi-darkness. Gasps
of surprise echoed roundabout. A split second later, thunder boomed
almost directly overhead.

“I hate
thunder and lightning,” Jenny moaned into the gloom. “I once knew
someone who was killed by lightning. It was terrible. She was
walking home from school across a field when she got struck. She
died instantly.”

“Don’t,”
David cautioned, “you’ll upset yourself.”

Jenny
smiled weakly. “You’re right.”

I looked
at David, wondering.

“The girl
in question was Jenny’s cousin,” he said quietly.

Lightning
flashed and thunder boomed for a second time.

Rick
swore out loud. H warned him about his language. He
apologised.

The
living room door opened. Coogan looked in, inquiring after Madam
Lee’s wellbeing.

“I’m
fine,” she said. “Now leave us.”

He
disappeared back into the hall, closing the door behind him. I made
to follow, my intention being to fetch a torch and candles from the
kitchen, but then the power returned and the lights flashed back
on. Rick let out a huge sigh of relief.

“I
thought your phobia was rats?” H remarked.

“I’ve got
a list,” he admitted. “The dark comes in at number two.”

We took
our seats and waited for Madam Lee to speak. But then the lights
failed again. Rick cursed under his breath and got balled out by H
a second time.

I urged
Madam Lee to continue regardless. In a hushed voice she instructed
us to join hands and to close our eyes. One by one we obliged and
then waited. She said nothing for a few moments. Her breathing grew
deeper and slower. As she did this, the chill in the room seemed to
intensify. Moreover, I got the distinct impression that someone
else had suddenly joined us. The feeling grew so strong I was
compelled to sneak a crafty look around, but saw no one. I felt
Jenny’s hand tighten around mine as if she sought reassurance.
Perhaps she too sensed an additional presence?

Madam Lee
broke the silence.

“I can
hear you moving around,” she said in a low tentative voice, “but I
cannot see you. Tell me where you are?”

Her
question was greeted by a deep, oppressive silence.

She
repeated the question only to receive the same negative response. I
half expected one of the others, H or Rick, to break the circle,
unable to suspend their disbelief any longer, even denounce the
sitting as a charade, but they remained silent and cooperative. Did
they also feel the presence of another? By now whatever it was felt
uncomfortably close. Having said that, another quick glance around
told another story entirely.

“Talk to
me,” Madam Lee commanded suddenly. This time I felt a disturbing
shift in the atmosphere. A definite threat seemed to hang in the
air. Beside me Jenny gave a slight moan, while David gripped my
other hand tight enough to make it ache. I wanted to open my eyes,
wanted to break the circle, but to my horror found I was unable to
move a single solitary muscle in my body. I was, to all intents and
purposes, paralysed. As were the others, I realised, for the threat
that had suddenly invaded the room was overwhelming and utterly
debilitating.

“Speak to
us,” Madam Lee demanded. “Reveal yourself!” But there was only
silence and a terrible sense that something was wrong, that an
event was imminent, one that would have awful ramifications for us
all.

“Are you
afraid,” asked the clairvoyant. Her tone was mocking. It was as if
she was trying to provoke a reaction. The temperature dropped still
further. “Your name,” she said firmly, “give me your
name!”

In
another part of the house a door suddenly slammed violently shut.
Someone—I think it was Jenny—cried out in shocked surprise. I
struggled to open my eyes, but it was impossible. They may as well
have been sealed shut. And then it happened.

Violent
gusts of wind rose up within the room; so violent in fact, my chair
was rocked backwards to the point where it very nearly toppled.
There were cries of surprise and incomprehension—and abject fear.
Through the ensuing chaos, David and Jenny kept a vice like grip on
my hands as if afraid to let go, as if they were convinced their
lives depended upon maintaining contact. Strength in numbers, Jenny
had said.

The wind
grew stronger still, until it howled with rage. I could hear
objects being knocked over, falling to the floor and breaking on
impact. Chaos ensued, whilst everyone sat immobilised, unable to
see or to even speak. For brief moments absolute terror reigned.
I’m convinced we all felt as if we were caught in some kind of
violent vortex. The unearthly wind howled. Objects were hurled with
terrible force about the room. We were trapped in a terrifying
spiritual storm that all but ripped the clothing from our bodies
and dislodged us bodily from our chairs. It seemed never
ending.

And then,
without warning, Madam Lee screamed, and that scream had power
enough to engulf the unnatural wind, momentarily taming it and
bringing it to heal. We heard rather than saw the clairvoyant crash
to the floor. At that point the monstrous wind began to abate,
inexplicably losing its force, its unnatural ferocity. At long last
I managed to open my eyes to a room once again bathed in light,
fully expecting to see absolute devastation. Instead, incredibly,
everything was as it was prior to the lights failing and the séance
commencing.

Except
for Madam Lee, who’d been thrown bodily from her seat and lay
sprawled across the floor, fighting for breath.

“Quick,
we have to help her,” David urged, rising from his seat, but Jenny
beat him to it.

“Leave
her to me,” she said kneeling beside the old woman, gently taking
hold of her hand. Words of comfort were administered, until
finally, Madam Lee’s rapid breathing slowed and some of the colour
returned to her otherwise pallid face. As her condition improved,
the oppressive atmosphere that had dominated the room gradually
receded.

It was a
full minute before the clairvoyant was able to open her eyes.
Before that happened however, she spoke, briefly, in the same low
voice she’d adopted throughout the séance, although on this
occasion her words were barely audible.

“If you
really are who you claim to be,” she began, “Where is your birth
place?”

A brief
silence ensued, in which she frowned deeply as if receiving a
secret message. When she spoke again it was to ask a further
question, directed to the same unknown source. In a tremulous
voice, she said, “And who might your father be?”

There was
another short silence. And then, quite suddenly, she gave a cry of
genuine alarm. Jenny, who remained at her side, advised her to
relax, to take long deep breaths. It seemed to do the trick, for
her breathing gradually returned to normal. At long last she
managed to open her eyes, taking a moment to focus on her
surroundings and then, with help from Jenny and me, she struggled
to her feet and retook her seat at the table. We gathered round,
all of us wondering what kind of disturbing insight she’d just
gained.

Jenny,
sitting next to her, said, “Who was it Madam Lee, who did you speak
to?”

The
clairvoyant looked at each of us in turn, as if unsure whether to
divulge the information she’d received. Finally, evidently
struggling to control her emotions, she said, “Coogan. I made
contact with Coogan.”

2.

We stared
at one another in stunned disbelief. And then, one by one, we
looked across the room to the door that led out into the hall, all
except Madam Lee. She had no need to. She already knew what lay on
the other side of that door, while we could only guess.

“Are you
saying he is dead?” It was Jenny. Her voice trembled. Her face was
ashen.

Madam
Lee’s silence spoke volumes. H was the first to leave his seat. I
quickly followed suit, as did Rick, while David and Jenny remained
with the clairvoyant, in a comforting role.

H opened
the door and stepped out into the hall, while Rick and I brought up
the rear. We, all three of us, shuddered involuntarily.

“It’s
cold as fuck out here,” H said without exaggeration. Stepping into
that hall was, I imagined, like stepping into an industrial
freezer. Our breaths grew vaporous. We shivered collectively. As
for Coogan, he was nowhere to be seen. RIck checked outside, while
H and I searched the upstairs of the house, before doing likewise
down in the cellar, where it was still colder.

And
where, unbelievably, hundreds of sexton beetles swarmed like giant
ants. They were everywhere. We took perverted delight in crushing
them under foot. Those that crawled along the far wall— the only
wall occupied by the insects—we brushed away using a broom we found
by the cellar steps. As they fell to the floor they too were
despatched underfoot. The activity, loathsome though it was, at
least allowed us to vent some of our anger and
frustration.

“You’d
better consider getting the pest control guys back,” H remarked
following our little act of genocide.

“Not a
word to the others,” I said.

We
arrived back in the hall just as Rick returned from his impromptu
search of the grounds. He looked frozen to death, despite wearing
appropriate winter clothing.

“Any
sign?” I asked.

He shook
his head in defeat. H slumped against the wall,
demoralised.

“I really
can’t believe this has happened,” Rick said as he pulled off his
beanie and stuffed it into his coat pocket.

“None of
us can,” I said, watching numbly as he removed his Parka and hung
it up on a coat hook. It seemed that Coogan had gone the same way
as the others, inexplicably vanishing off the face of the earth.
And yet it seemed improbable—more than that—impossible that a man
such as he, could’ve been over powered and abducted without leaving
any sign of a struggle. Reluctantly, we reported our findings back
to the others and then made the decision to mount a more in depth
search of the grounds, not that we held out much hope of ever
finding Coogan. He too had fallen foul of High Bank Cottage, it
seemed, and had joined “the lost ones”.