Last Rites (4 page)

When the tips of his fingers touched the gleaming wetness he gasped.

It wasn’t water, that much he’d been right about. It was slime.

Like the thick secretion of some enormous snail. But this was darker and more noxious. It was more like liquid excrement.

He snatched his hand away, wiping the muck off on his trousers with a mixture of disgust and revulsion. However, as his initial feelings passed, his mind began to fill with other thoughts and one in particular struck him and refused to be banished.

Where had the slime come from? What had left it behind?

He swallowed hard, determined to press on but feeling light-headed because of the vile stench that seemed to be seeping into the very pores of his skin.

From somewhere, and at first he wasn’t sure whether it was behind or ahead of him, he heard a sound. A splashing sound, as if someone was moving quickly through water. The sound echoed inside the tunnel for a moment then died away and the man flicked off the torch momentarily, standing in the pitch black, trying to pinpoint the direction of the noise.

When it came again he realised that it was coming from behind him and he now knew for sure what he had feared for some time.

He wasn’t alone inside the tunnels.

7

Walston, Buckinghamshire

Anne Bailey switched off the engine of the car and sat motionless behind the steering wheel. She exhaled wearily, the noise still reverberating in her ears. A broken exhaust, her husband had told her. He was sure that there was a hole in it. In some pipe that he’d mentioned but that she couldn’t remember the name of. It was ‘blowing’ he’d said. All Anne knew was that the bloody thing had to be fixed and quickly. Not only did it make the vehicle unbearably noisy to drive but, she understood, it also made it dangerous. Carbon monoxide fumes seeping into the car, something like that, she recalled.

As she hauled herself out of the car she knew that the exhaust would have to be fixed, but where the money to carry out the repairs was going to come from, she had no idea. A couple of hundred, her husband had said. He’d also told her that he knew someone who might be able to fix it for half that price but Anne wasn’t too sure about that. She wanted it fixed properly, by a mechanic in a garage. However, if the work was going to cost two hundred pounds or more then perhaps this acquaintance of her husband’s was the only answer. A hundred was bad enough but they’d have to find it from somewhere. Either that or she’d have to give up the car and she didn’t fancy doing that with the amount of walking she had to do in a day. Perhaps, Anne thought, she could clean the house of the man who was offering to help. She already cleaned eight houses in the town so another one wouldn’t be a problem. She didn’t enjoy cleaning (apart from having a sly look through the drawers and wardrobes of her employers when she was cleaning their bedrooms) but she had no choice. She couldn’t work in a supermarket or shop because she couldn’t master the electronic tills. Besides, at her age, very few people were interested in her limited skills. She’d never picked things up very quickly even as a girl and now, at sixty-eight, it was even more taxing for her. She had to earn money some way and there was very little that she could do other than domestic work. She had to supplement her husband’s meagre pension somehow. It was all they could do to pay the rent every month and he was no use. What could he do? Anything too strenuous and he’d be dead.Three heart attacks in the last four years had almost killed him as it was. So, Anne cleaned because she had to. Her customers were nice people and they all paid her cash in hand which helped. No problems about declaring to the tax man. All apart from a woman who worked at an accountant’s. She paid by cheque. Naturally, Anne thought irritably.

Even the vicar paid her in cash, she mused as she crossed the small car park towards the gate that led to the churchyard. Beyond it, the church poked its spire towards the overcast sky, threatening to tear open the low hanging clouds.

St Jude’s was one of the oldest churches in Walston. At least six hundred years old as far as Anne was aware. Not like these new places of worship that reminded her more of observatories than houses of God. There were two like it in the town. Both with large glass domes where their steeples should have been. Anne hated the look of them. She hated their newness. Just like she hated most things that were modern. To Anne they implied change and she didn’t care much for change either. She preferred more traditional things and that included churches. St Jude’s with its tower and spire, its ivy-covered walls and its stained-glass windows was how she remembered the churches in her youth.

She felt a strong breeze blow across the churchyard and she pulled up the collar of her coat as she walked. Anne paused to pick up a sweet wrapper that was stuck among some weeds at the side of the path. She muttered something under her breath and stuffed the paper into one of her pockets. Fancy dropping litter in a graveyard, she tutted to herself, how disrespectful. Probably some young child. The offspring of one of the many teenage mothers that lived in Walston, she assumed. No respect. None from the parents and none from the children.That was the world now as far as Anne was concerned. No one had any respect any more.

She continued along the stone path around the church, turning to her right to reach the main door of the old building.

What was left of the cat was nailed to the wooden partition.

All four of its legs had been splayed, a long metal spike driven through each paw so that the cat was spreadeagled against the metal-braced door of the church. Anne shot out a hand to steady herself, her head spinning as she gazed at the butchered remains. She realised in an instant that the cat had been skinned. It took a second longer for her to notice that both its eyes had been torn from their sockets. She opened her mouth to scream but no sound would come.There were some spots of congealed blood on the door and also on the stone flags beneath. There were some ants busying themselves around the rust-coloured spatters.

Anne staggered backwards, preparing to turn away. She knew she had to get help. Get the vicar. Call the police. Call someone. However, as she readied herself to head back along the pathway, she noticed that the door of the church was slightly open. Perhaps the vicar was already inside, perhaps he’d seen what had happened. She had to check. Had to go inside the church. She had to pass the door with the crucified cat nailed to it.

In spite of herself, Anne took a step forward.

8

North London

Natalie Mason placed the bunch of grapes and two apples in the plastic bowl on the bedside cabinet. She picked one of the grapes and popped it into her mouth.

‘That’s traditional, isn’t it?’ Mason said, taking a grape for himself. ‘Bringing fruit for the sick.’

‘The hospital rang me yesterday and told me you were out of the coma,’ Natalie informed him.

‘But you didn’t want to come until today?’

‘Don’t start, Peter,’ she breathed. ‘I got here as soon as I could.’

‘Other stuff to do?’ he asked, a trace of sarcasm in his tone. ‘More important things?’

‘I’d been here four times before but you were still unconscious. I didn’t know if you were going to slip back into a coma again.’

‘So you didn’t want to waste your time?’

She stood up and shook her head.

‘If you’re going to be like this then I might as well go,’ she told him.

‘No, no,’ he urged. ‘I’m sorry. Sit down.’

Natalie hesitated a moment then did as he asked. She crossed one leg over the other and Mason ran an approving gaze over the slender limbs, encased in skin-tight denim. Her short leather jacket was open to reveal the lilac blouse beneath. She wore a silver crucifix around her neck that hung tantalisingly between her breasts. Her freshly washed light brown hair bore blonde streaks and her make-up, as ever, was sparingly but immaculately applied.

‘You look great,’ he told her by way of a peace offering.

‘You look like shit,’ she said, flatly.

‘That’s one of the things I always loved about you, Nat.Your honesty.’ He took another grape. ‘I look better than I did when they brought me in.’

‘I know, I saw you when you were hooked up to all the machines,’ she sighed. ‘Have they told you when you can leave?’

‘The end of the week if I’m lucky.’

‘Are you going back to your flat?’

‘Unless you want me to move back in with you.’

She smiled and shook her head.

‘I’m concerned about you, Pete,’ she grinned. ‘But not
that
concerned.’ She took another grape and popped it into her mouth. ‘I don’t think that would be wise, do you?’

‘You’re probably right. You usually are.’

‘If you give me a key to your place I can go and fetch some clean clothes for you.’

‘Thanks. I appreciate that.’

There was a long silence and she moved her chair a little closer to his bed.

‘Do you know who attacked you?’ she asked, quietly.

‘I didn’t get a clear view but I’m pretty sure,’ he told her.

‘Why did they do it, Pete?’ she wanted to know.

‘Because that’s all they know,’ Mason snapped.‘Because they’re scum. Because most of the kids in that fucking school are little bastards. Because the school itself is a shit hole.’

‘But they tried to kill you. What the hell made them do that?’

‘I’d put two of them on detention that day.’

‘And that’s it? That was their motive? They tried to kill you because you put two of them on detention?’

‘That’s all kids like that need,’ he sighed. ‘Them and three of their mates must have followed me.’

‘Have the police spoken to you yet? I’d have thought they’d have been here as soon as you regained consciousness.’

Mason shook his head.

‘Two months ago another teacher, a supply teacher, was stabbed three times in class and the little bastard who did it got six months in borstal. Nobody gives a shit any more, Nat. So, once the court case is over I just want to get out of here and get away.’

‘Away where?’

‘Anywhere. Out of London. I’ll move. Get a job in another part of the country. There’s nothing to keep me here, is there?’ He looked pointedly at Natalie.

She reached out and touched his hand lightly.

‘Not even me?’ she asked, smiling thinly.

‘The reasons we separated haven’t changed.
We
haven’t changed.’ He gripped her hand and held it. ‘I wish we had.’

Natalie nodded almost imperceptibly, her eyes focusing on a large purplish-coloured bruise on his right forearm. She thought how much pain he must have been in. How close to death he’d actually come. She looked at his face, her own features now expressionless once again.

‘I put flowers on Chloe’s grave yesterday,’ she finally said, softly.

Mason nodded.

‘When was the last time you went there, Pete?’ she continued.

‘I can’t remember,’ he told her dismissively, easing his grip on her hand.

‘Why not? Was it that long ago?’

‘I visit when I can.’ He shrugged.

‘I don’t like going there either, Pete. It brings back memories for me as well, you know, but I focus on the memories of when she was alive, when she was happy. Before she was ill.’

‘Good for you,’ he said, trying to hide the edge to his voice but failing.

‘I still do it,’ Natalie breathed. ‘I do it because she was our daughter and I loved her.’

‘I loved her too,’ Mason snapped. ‘Visiting her grave more often doesn’t give you the monopoly on grief, Natalie.’ He swallowed hard. ‘I can’t bear to stand by that grave and think about her. I never could, you know that. That doesn’t make me any less of a man. It doesn’t mean I didn’t care about Chloe when she was alive but all I see when I stand next to that grave is her lying on that fucking bed in the hospital waiting to die. I can’t see her running about playing. I can’t see her smile. All I see is how she suffered at the end.’

‘Running away from the pain isn’t going to stop it, Pete.’

‘It’s my way of dealing with it.’

‘That’s your way of dealing with everything. You’d rather run or hide from problems.’

‘Did you come here to see how I was or to lecture me about my lack of moral fibre? Or were you just worried that if I died, you’d have two graves to put flowers on instead of one?’

‘Fuck you, Pete,’ Natalie hissed, getting to her feet.

Mason thought about trying to stop her but decided against it. He watched as she walked across to the door.

‘Let me know when you decide to move out of London,’ she muttered. ‘I’ll come and wave you off.’

Mason held her gaze for a moment then she pushed the door and stepped through into the corridor beyond. He heard her footsteps receding away in the stillness.

‘Shit,’ he murmured, under his breath.

Inside the room, it was quiet once again.

9

Walston, Buckinghamshire

Anne Bailey’s footsteps echoed on the cold stone floor of the church as she inched her way inside, careful not to brush against the bloodied carcass of the flayed cat. She was breathing quickly and heavily, her heart thumping a little too hard in her chest. Anne leaned against the nearest pew and tried to slow her breathing.

If only she had her mobile with her, she thought. She could have called the police from outside the church but she rarely carried the phone. Her daughter had bought it for her for her last birthday and Anne had protested at the time. What need did she have for a machine that could text? When would she ever do that? How often would she actually use the phone? It was all she could do to press the tiny digits with her swollen fingertips. Now, however, she would have given anything to have had the device in the pocket of her coat.

For a second she thought about calling out the vicar’s name. If he was inside the church then he would come running. But another thought struck her.What if whoever had done this to the cat was still close by? Might they come running too? She turned and looked around her. There were so many dark corners inside the church. So many places where someone could hide. They might even be watching her now. Anne felt her chest tightening even more.