A Cry From Beyond (8 page)

“That’s a
pity.” I said, meaning it. She glanced up at me and smiled. We
walked the rest of the way in virtual silence. Somewhere along the
way we lost sight of Lennon. The next time we saw him he was on the
patch of land between the cottage and the old chapel, digging
frantically. I commanded him to stop but he ignored me. I shrugged
and left him to it, and led Michelle inside the house. While I
stoked up the potbelly Michelle disappeared upstairs saying she had
to pack up her belongings. Once the fire was going, I called out to
her to see if she was hungry, but failed to receive a reply. I
tried again without success. Why the hell wasn’t she answering?
With thoughts of the missing Mary-Louise running through my head, I
hurriedly left the room heading for the stairs.

Any
concerns I had for Michelle’s safety were quickly dispelled
however. She had decided to surprise me by making herself
comfortable on the bed in the master bedroom—my bedroom rather than
the guest room—wearing nothing but a friendly smile. I quickly
undressed and joined her.

Our
lovemaking felt good, as always. It might have felt better still
was I not so preoccupied with the disappearance of Mary-Louise.
Sandy was convinced her kidnapper intended to kill her. I hoped
that for all our sakes it really was just a bad dream or
hallucination he’d experienced, rather than the real thing,
otherwise we were all in trouble, and no one more so than poor
Mary-Louise herself. I pondered my own dream. Was it possible Sandy
and I had dreamt about the same man, (man or fiend?) If so, what
did it mean?

That
evening Michelle caught the train back to London as planned. I
missed her badly, yet found myself thinking more about the
mysterious blonde. Doing so made me feel guilty, as if I was being
unfaithful. I was obsessed, it seemed. The blonde had come to haunt
me. Why had she attended the party, I repeatedly wondered, alone
and knowing no one? Had she really mislaid her daughter? And who
the hell was she anyway?

Once
again: so many darned questions.

CHAPTER FIVE

Following
the party, I shut myself away to concentrate on song writing. I had
a deadline after all. By the end of the week however, I was in
desperate need of social contact so I got in touch with David to
invite him and Jenny over for drinks. Jenny couldn’t make it: she
was away visiting her mother. David on the other hand was
keen

“I’ll see
if the others are free,” he suggested, referring to H and the
gang.

“Good
idea,” I said. “And tell ‘em to bring their instruments. We can
have a sing song if they feel up to it.”

He rang
back within the hour.

“It’s all
arranged. See you in a while, matey.”

Later
that day a battered Ford transit van came to a grinding halt on the
driveway. It contained David, Irish, Terry, Rick and H. They’d come
armed with a collection of musical instruments and a dangerous
amount of booze. I led them into the kitchen and set about
organising drinks, while Lennon did his own version of meet n
greet. With everyone was served, I led them upstairs to the attic
room.

“Cold as
fuck up here,” H commented upon entering.

“I’ll
switch on the heater,” I said and went and did so.

I
allocated musical instruments to those who could play—or rather,
claimed they could play—(Irish was not one of them and elected to
observe from the sidelines), and cranked up the volume on the PA.
Following a quick tune up we let rip with a couple of old Zeppelin
numbers. Rick surprised me by turning out to be a competent
harmonica player: having brought along his own Hohner Blues Harp,
promising tongue in cheek to update to a Chrometta 12 if we hit the
big time. With his help we managed a half decent rendition of “When
the Levee Break’s”. David, who fancied himself on bass, managed to
keep a steady rhythm going, while H did his own thing on a set of
bongos. Meantime, Terry strummed along using an old Ashton student
acoustic that carried a sticker with the proclamation: My other
guitar is a Gibson.

The booze
flowed freely. Before too long we were all in high spirits. The odd
reefer made an appearance down the line. As the light outside began
to fade, and the birds screeched their eerie presence to the early
evening, I decided to test the gangs reaction to my new material. I
played two numbers I intended submitting to Mike in demo form,
prior to them being handed over to the record company. One was a
folksy ballad titled, “Since the Dawn of Time,” while the other was
a catchy little tune called, “Am I the one?”

Everyone
listened politely and complemented me afterwards. Rick prophesied
the songs would guarantee me a successful comeback, which was good
to hear, although I did suspect he was being slightly over
optimistic. I knew better than to expect two miserable songs, no
matter how good, would guarantee a lasting comeback. In my
experience the music business is fickle with zero guarantees.
“Talent and hard work doesn’t necessarily equal success,” Mike once
told me. Cynical as it sounded, it happened to be true: an awful
lot depended on sheer luck, knowing the right people, and being in
the right place at the right time.

The
conversation briefly turned to other topics, before, inevitably,
the disappearance of Mary-Louise cropped up. The mention of her
name created tension and unease, the effect of which was sobering.
Irish had his own theory to explain away her vanishing act,
claiming she’d been kidnapped by the greasers who caused trouble at
the party.

“It’s
just the kind of thing those bastards would do,” he maintained. “I
know them from old. They’re arseholes with no morals. They wouldn’t
have a problem taking a girl against her will to satisfy their own
twisted needs. If she refused to play ball, she might’ve found
herself in danger.”

“You
think those two men could’ve harmed her?” Rick asked
incredulously.

“Look
what they went and did to one other,” Irish pointed out. “They’re
rough as they come, and don’t play by the rules.”

“What
about her boyfriend,” David said.

“What
about him?” I asked.

“We don’t
know for certain that he wasn’t responsible, do we?”

“He
seemed pretty genuine when he was talking to us,” I
said.

“He and
Mary-Louise might’ve argued,” David persisted, “causing him to
overreact. It does happen.”

“Don’t
think so, somehow,” H said.

“Mark my
words, the gree-bows are behind it,” Irish maintained.

No one
passed comment. There was no point. Irish was adamant. Besides, no
one was able to disprove or better his theory.

Terry,
who’d been unusually quiet, suddenly announced that he felt unwell.
“Bad cider most probably,” he said before visiting the
bathroom.

“I heard
a strange thing the night the chick went missing,” Rick said while
he was gone, “I overheard someone say that it had started again.
What did they mean, I wonder?”

“Have no
idea,” said Irish.

David
spoke. “I think I know. When I was a kid, there was a spate of
disappearances round here. A number of girls went missing. I don’t
think they were ever found.”

“The
bogeyman returns,” Rick commented.

“Let’s
hope not,” David said. He vacated his seat and wandered over to the
window which overlooked the road and the derelict cottage on the
other side. With his back to us he lit a cigarette.

“If Irish
is right, and she was abducted,” he said, “She might have got taken
across the road.”

We
considered the implication of his words, knowing that that kind of
thing happened all too often: abductions, rape, murder, heaven
forbid. You had only to read the newspapers, or watch television to
know that occasionally an innocent situation can turn into a
nightmarish one. H disagreed, however.

“What I
don’t understand is how she could’ve been kidnapped right under
everyone’s nose. There must’ve been thirty plus people at the party
at any given time. Someone would’ve seen or heard something,
surely?”

“Not if
she went willingly,” I pointed out. “If she got friendly with some
other guy at the party, and was desperate to be alone with him;
what better, more convenient and discreet place could there be,
than the derelict house across the road. If of course you weren’t
that fussed about where you got your kicks. And say that having
gone there, she came to her senses and was overcome by guilt for
two timing her boyfriend, and tried to walk away, only her new
found Romeo had other ideas and turned nasty.”

“It’s
possible,” David agreed, but H was sceptical.

“What
girl in her right mind would seek a romantic interlude in a rat
infested derelict house?” he asked.

“Lust
combined with alcohol can make a person do some pretty reckless
things,” I pointed out.

Terry
returned from the bathroom, looking pale and unhappy.

“How are
you feeling mate,” Rick asked him.

“Like
shit,” he said dropping down into his seat. “Just thrown up. Got
really bad stomach ache.” He stared at his glass of cider as if it
contained poison.

“Can’t
take your drink, that’s all,” said Irish before knocking back the
remainder of his own drink, as if to prove a point. Wiping a hand
across his mouth, he announced in thick Irish brogue, “Gentlemen, I
tink we owe it to ourselves, and to Mary-Louise, to take a look
across the road.” With that, he stood up. “Come on: what are you
all waiting for?” he asked when the rest of us
hesitated.

“Let’s
get it over with,” H said uneasily and left his seat.

“At least
it’ll put our minds at ease,” I said, whilst hoping our efforts
would prove fruitless. I joined David at the window.

“Are you
okay?” he asked me confidentially.

“It’s not
a good situation to be involved in is it,” I said.

“She’ll
turn up John.”

“Let’s
hope so.”

I peered
thoughtfully through the glass. The sight of the derelict cottage
standing on the other side of the road made me think about the kid
who once lived there, fated to be mown down by a truck, and about
the whole visionary episode I’d experienced on the day I arrived at
High Bank.

“John?”

I pulled
myself back to the present to find David observing me.

“You look
like you’ve seen a ghost,” he said.

I managed
to force a smile. “I’m okay.” We turned to face the others. H
stared morosely at the floor while Rick and Irish looked at us
expectantly. As for Terry, he announced he was going to lie down
for a while.

“Use the
guest room,” I instructed. “It’s on the right as you hit the lower
landing.”

“Well,” I
said to the others once he’d gone, “are we all game?”

Everyone
nodded.

Irish
said, “Let’s do it.”

We left
the attic room and descended the two flights of creaking stairs
into the dimly lit hall. In silence we struggled into our topcoats
knowing it would be freezing cold outside. I grabbed the torch out
of the kitchen, and in dismal silence we left the house heading for
the derelict crofter’s cottage, leaving Terry behind with
Lennon.

There was
no moon that night, making it as dark as hell. One solitary car
passed by as we reached the roadside. We watched it disappear
around the bend as if we thought its presence was somehow
significant. Then we crossed the deserted road. Pausing briefly on
the other side, I turned to the others and said, “I’ll ask the
question again: are we all up for this?”

“I don’t
see we have any choice,” Rick said.

David was
reflective. “I agree. If there’s the remotest chance she’s in there
we have a duty to investigate.”

“Then
what the fuck are we waiting for?” It was Irish.

We looked
towards the dark uninviting derelict shell that was once a
crofter’s cottage, home to a family fated to losing their son in a
terrible road accident, and then we trudged up the weed infested
path to the front door. Only there was no front door. As some point
in time it’d been ripped from its hinges, and now lay flat against
the ground, alongside the security grille that had protected it,
making access a simple affair. The downstairs windows were boarded
while those on the upper level were left unprotected: the glass
panes broken and jagged edged.

We
wandered inside to be greeted by thick depressing darkness, and an
atmosphere that reeked of neglect and decay. I played the torch’s
yellow tinged beam along a dirty wooden floor, and badly damaged
plaster and lathe walls. The room was small and cramped. It was
also entirely empty. I tried to imagine what it was like as a home
but it was difficult. The passing of time combined with dereliction
had reduced this house to a characterless husk. It reminded me
morbidly of a forgotten grave. Quite suddenly, and for no apparent
reason, I spun, directing the torchlight at the open door way, and
to my amazement saw a number of large birds congregating on the
path outside. David saw them too. We glanced at each other,
mystified by their unannounced appearance, and then, as suddenly as
they’d arrived, they departed, flying off into the night en
masse.