Cherringham--The Curse of Mabb's Farm (8 page)

Then: “Yep. Place hummed, it did. And as soon as Ray left, it started going straight down the tubes.”

Jack looked around at the three of them. “And Ray?”

“Left a note,” Pete said. “A bit about ‘time to move on’ … so he did.”

“Police weren’t curious?”

Pete shook his head. “No sign of foul play. Man’s free to do what he wanted. There were rumours of a woman somewhere, Australia I think. And the note said that Charlie could keep an eye on the place until … or ‘if’ he came back.”

“Strange,” Jack said.

“Why’s that?” Pete said.

“Ray must have known Charlie would screw it all up. And yet—”

Jack paused. The men had nothing to say about that.

And that’s because,
Jack thought,
it
is
strange. Foul play or no foul play, there’s something odd there.

“And the Curse?” Jack asked.

“If stupidity is a curse,” Phil said.

But Tom nodded. “Tell you what though, there’s something not right about that place, that’s for sure. Always got a bad feeling, especially when I was on the hill, away from the farmhouse. You could feel it.”

Score another believer for Team Curse,
Jack thought.

“All bollocks to me,” Pete said. “Man simply shouldn’t be running a farm.”

Jack noticed that with more questions, more chatter about Charlie, that Phil Nailor had grown quiet.

Could be something.

Or not.

Jack was about to order another beer, maybe a round for very helpful table.

When his phone buzzed.

Sarah.

“
Hi, glad you called, I was thinking—”

But Sarah’s voice on the other end stopped him cold.

“Jack — something’s happened.”

“The kids, you … all right?”

“Yes.” The shrill tone hadn’t faded. “But can you come to mine quickly? You’ve got to see this …”

“Be right there.”

Jack looked at the men.

“Gotta run. Thanks for the company.”

And the men nodded as Jack raced out of The Ploughman’s.

Sarah was at the door waiting for Jack.

She looked scared, her voice hushed.

“Thanks for coming so soon. Kids haven’t seen it. Has me spooked, I tell you—”

“Hang on — what does?”

Sarah looked left and right, as if checking whether Chloe or Daniel were within earshot.

“Come and see …”

She led Jack to the back door that opened onto the small garden.

“It’s weird, Jack,” Sarah said before pushing open the door.

At first, all Jack could tell was that the rain seemed to be going sideways. It had turned that nasty. Worse, a steady breeze made the bushes and trees bend one way, then the other before — in a sudden lull — snapping back into place.

Like hurricane weather,
Jack thought.

And yet we’re not exactly on the tip of Cape Cod.

Both he and Sarah now getting splattered by the rain.

“Want me to get you a waterproof?”

Jack shook his head.

“What am I looking at?”

Again Sarah looked away, checking on the children. Whatever it was, it was something she didn’t want them seeing.

Then she just pointed. “That!”

And Jack looked out to the garden, only scant light from the kitchen windows, then … he spotted something standing in the middle of the grass.

At first it was hard to say what it could be. But then—

“It’s—”

He turned to Sarah.

She finished his sentence.

“It’s part of the Wicker Man. Right. A charred arm, looks like, with that claw-like hand. Stuck in the ground.”

“God. Someone put it there.”

“
The Curse
…” Sarah said, a half-hearted attempt at humour.

Jack quickly turned to her to make sure she didn’t mean to be taken seriously. An uneasy smile confirmed that fact.

Still …

“Why would someone stick that in my garden?” she asked.

Jack shook his head. He had grown fond of Sarah, really fond of her, her kids.

And he didn’t like this at all.

“I don’t know,” he said.

He didn’t want to make her any more concerned, but right now he was most definitely alarmed.

“Jack, there’s something else. I haven’t gone out there. But it’s holding something in its hand. I can’t make it out. But there’s definitely something.”

Impossible to see from here. A lump, something dark clutched in the burned-black wicker hand.

“Only one way to find out,” he said. “Got a couple of brollies?”

Sarah nodded, and walked back into the house, while Jack shut the door and waited, thinking, more than anything else, worrying.

Stepping outside, the wind began ripping at the umbrellas. Even with the dome of each umbrella facing directly into the wind, it seemed like the struts would soon give way.

“Nasty night,” he said.

Pointing out the obvious.

They got soaked even as they walked the few steps to the stump of the Wicker Man.

A quick look, then inside, Jack thought.

A line reverberated.

‘
T’isn’t a night fit for man and beast.’

As they reached the arm, that line seemed more than apt.

Sarah remained standing, letting Jack bend over to look at the thing in the Wicker Man’s brambly hand.

“It’s a bird,’ Jack said. “Hard to say what it is, it’s small though, a raven maybe? Or one of those magpies.” He took a breath, knowing that both of them had to be thinking the same thing.

Who had put the arm there, and who had gone to the trouble of placing a dead bird in its grasp?

Creepy
didn’t quite capture it.

“Let’s go back inside,” Sarah said over the rat-a-tat of the rain on the umbrellas.

They sat at the kitchen table. Sarah had grabbed two towels so they could dry off. Daniel and Chloe surfaced but they were used to Mum and her detective friend, so no awkward questions were asked.

Later Sarah would go out, when the rain eased, dispose of the thing.

She had brought out a half-full bottle of Glenmorangie, and two tumblers.

“Ice?” she said, “Water? Sorry, I don’t have the fixings for a martini. Promise to rectify that.”

Jack smiled as she poured him a couple of fingers. Having him here made things feel a lot better, though she was still rattled: someone had invaded her space and marked it with a sinister message.

“Hey, I’d have to be some kind of idiot to complain about a drop of one very fine single-malt. This — neat — will do fine.”

She smiled and poured herself half as much.

“So what do you make of that?”

She knew him well enough by now to know that, when he was quiet, it was because he was mulling things over. He still radiated strength and concern, but he was silent, like he’d gone somewhere dark and deep.

He took another sip.

“Guess you’d have to say, it’s a kind of warning.”

“To me? Why warn me? What have I done?”

Jack smiled as if he had heard similar protestations before — which she knew he most certainly had.

“Okay, look at it this way, Sarah. We know that there is no Curse. Someone is terrifying that poor couple, for reasons unknown, and now you’re trying to help them work out what’s going on.”

Sarah nodded.

“In fact, I probably have the other arm waiting on my boat somewhere. Though Riley would do a good job of chasing off anyone with that idea. Reminds me —
you
should get a dog.”

“That’s exactly what the kids say. I’ve got enough to do, thank you very much.”

He grinned at that. “Man and woman’s best friend. And if you plan on sticking with our amateur detective work, it could be useful to have one. Nothing like loud barks from a really large dog to scare people away.”

“I’ll consider it. So that out there, it’s a warning? And the bird?”

“I was hoping you could tell me that. Does it have some significance, a dead raven, the Wicker Man … or is it just more mixed up mumbo-jumbo?”

“I don’t know but either way, the message is clear.”

“I agree. ‘Stay out of this.’ Which, I can guess—”

“—I’m not going to do.”

“Now how did I know that’s exactly what you’d say?”

He told her about his pub chat and she described her not-too-friendly encounter with Charlie.

“Maybe this means we’re onto something?”

“Not sure about that. We have Tamara testifying to the work of evil forces, and of course Tom Hodge and Phil Nailor both would have it in for Charlie.”

“And there is the odd fact that neither Charlie or Caitlin seem to want any real help at all.”

“Right. And yet Charlie really is scared. I’ve seen fear — and that man has it.”

“It doesn’t make sense …”

Jack didn’t respond to that. More deep thoughts churning.

He squinted with one eye. “Mind if I have a wee bit more. Can smell and taste the peat. Great stuff.”

“Be my guest. Just remember you’re driving through that mess out there.”

“Never forget that. You are right — there is something awfully wrong about all this. But there’s this other thing, the brother, Ray.”

“His disappearance? Just seems like he left, leaving Charlie in charge—”

“Bingo. That’s
it
. I can see a dozen reasons for his leaving. I mean, I vanished from my world and washed up here. But Ray, the good, capable farmer, leaving the place to his incompetent brother? That, I don’t get.”

Then Sarah had a thought. She knew they were a team, and she also knew there were things in her world that Jack didn’t understand, things that could be useful.

“Let me do some digging around about Ray Fox. Maybe check bank records, land titles, all that stuff—”

Jack grinned. “You mean hack around?”

She smiled back. Jack wasn’t above bending the rules to do what had to be done.

“Let me worry about the niceties. See what I can find. Might be the ‘missing Ray’ is nothing—”

Jack killed his second pour.

“—Or something. Great idea. And one more thing?”

“Hmm?”

“Whoever did that outside isn’t playing around, Sarah. And I am beginning to formulate a plan.”

“Plan?”

“More of a trap. Can we meet tomorrow morning, at the mystical Tamara’s shop? I’ll set it up. Say ten-thirty?” Then: “I mean, of course, half past ten.”

“Details?”

“Patience, Watson. All will be revealed in the morning. We’ll need the help of the all-knowing, most mystical Tamara.”

“Really? That massage must have made some impression.”

“Don’t knock it,” he said with a smile. “Did wonders.”

“Meanwhile — I’ll do some hunting on the net. I can’t wait to hear what you’re cooking up.”

“Me either, actually.” He stood up. “Say goodnight to Daniel and Chloe for me.”

Then Jack left, and Sarah realised that the house now felt safer simply by his having come over.

And when the rain abated, and she finally went outside, she’d see that — before leaving — he had walked around to the back and had disposed of the wicker arm and the dead raven for her.

Sarah looked at the screen on her MacBook Air, shook her head, and then muttered, “Too wrong.”

Grace — sitting at a desk across form her — looked up.

“Wrong? What’s ‘wrong’, Sarah?”

She looked up. She trusted Grace implicitly, thought of her as much a confidante as Jack. She could — and would — tell either of them anything.

But hacking into the local bank was not an activity she could share with her assistant.

“Hmm? Oh nothing — just a software glitch.”

She looked back at her screen. It had taken just a few minutes to slip through the first line of Greenwood Bank’s security. Far too easy — even for an amateur like her …

“How are you getting on?” she said to Grace. “You okay sorting the graphics for the hotel spa weekend?”

“I’m onto it. But did you know that they’re planning a Murder Mystery Evening for the weekend, dinner and everything?”

Sarah laughed at that. “Sounds like fun.”

“I thought I might go, though can’t see Jeremy sitting through that …”

Jeremy, Grace’s boyfriend, was a quiet young man who liked his football.

They seemed to get on well…

“Well, if he says no, count me in,” she said, hitting Enter.

And then, after a few navigational tricks, and using the various paths and backdoors that every site has, Sarah was in the main database for the bank.

Sarah leaned close.

Still felt wrong,
she thought.
Doing it for the right reasons or not.

From here, she couldn’t actually move any funds.
God!
Even this local bank would have sufficient monitoring systems in place to detect that.

But basic, raw information about accounts?

That was a different matter entirely. She could see what any clerk could access after just being hired and a week’s training.

She entered ‘Ray Fox’ into the search bar.

Two accounts popped up, one savings, the other current. Both open to view.

She picked the current account and saw that it had been inactive for the last eighteen months.

Substantial funds in there, which would seem to argue that he eventually planned to come back. And no one — like his brother for example — seemed to be trying to claim those funds.

So far, nothing suspicious. Or useful.

She thought of the Murder Mystery Weekend that Grace had mentioned. Might be fun, once the leaves had begun to fall.
See how the pros really solve crime!

Then she thought she’d check the last transactions before Ray departed. A few bank card purchases. Bills paid. A routine transfer from savings to current account and—

Then — just three weeks before all activity ceased — a big transfer.

Three thousand pounds to Cauldwell & Co, the local estate agents.

She was tempted to share the discovery with Grace, but since this was all illegal, best she give her PA as much ‘plausible deniability’ as possible.

She looked up.

“Grace — I’m meeting Jack in an hour, but I’ve got to dash somewhere beforehand. Back by lunch, swear to God, to dig in with you.”