The Magus of Hay(115)

‘Quite a way in,’ Robin said. ‘I guess an archaeologist would want to take a small trowel to it and about two weeks sifting the dirt, but…’

He lifted the spade.

‘… the hell with that.’

A square of reddening sky lit the upstairs room, where a rug had been rolled back and a pile of rubble made a pyramid on the boarded floor. Merrily peered into a hole in the back of the fireplace that became a shaft.

‘How do you know it’s not just part of the wall that’s been repaired at some time?’

‘No mortar,’ Kapoor said. ‘And we’ve found two modern bricks on end, like pillars to take the weight, make a space. I’m trying not to dislodge them.’

Robin propped his stick against the wall.

‘Can I do something? Getting kinda antsy here.’

‘Nah, mate. You been pushing it enough.’

‘In fact,’ Gwyn Arthur said, ‘if I can ask a favour, Robin… there is something you could do. Would there be any way we might find out if the Order of the Sun in Shadow does still exist? I suspect you have contacts on the… occult fringe.’

‘Conceivable the Pagan Federation would have them on a list, even if it was only a blacklist. There’s also a guy of my acquaintance, up in Manchester, who knows everybody ever swished a wand. You want me to call him?’

‘If you can do it without explaining why.’

‘Gwyn, with all respect, I wouldn’t know why. A swastika in the chimney, a hole in the wall, a guy who died from bad smack… interesting and a tad disturbing… for us. But I’m sensing you’re on a different path here.’

You could understand his perplexity, his need for a handle on this.

‘Three missing persons,’ Gwyn Arthur said. ‘I have to do what I can. Humour me, Robin. Now I’m no longer in the modern, bureaucratized police, I am allowed to follow my feelings with impunity.’

Betty had beckoned Merrily down to one of those kitchens which needed a mini-fridge and a micro-oven. It had no window and must, for many years, have served no wider purpose than making tea during working hours.

‘Are you… really planning to live here, Betty?’

‘Until we’re making enough money to rent somewhere better and turn all this into shop, I suppose we are.’

‘Things are that bad?’

‘Have been.’ Betty plugged in the kettle. ‘For most of a year, Robin could hardly walk at all. Couldn’t sit to paint, couldn’t stand to paint. Very depressed. Then he – we – had the idea of moving to Hay and starting a bookshop. Thinking we could flog our magnificent collection of pagan, magic and earth-mysteries books to kickstart it.’

‘Good idea. Maybe not the best time to do it, mind.’

‘No. But we’ve happened upon this place, right under the castle and Robin’s all lit up. The castle, wow! Suddenly, the old Robin’s back. Love of ruins – castles, abbeys, cromlechs, everything they don’t have in America. Even their negative aspects he sees as inspirational. Just moods. Merrily, all I want is to make it work for him. What would you have done?’

‘Gone along with it, I suppose. We do, don’t we?’ She looked around the cell-like kitchen. ‘How long have you felt something was wrong here?’

‘You felt it?’



‘Betty, I don’t profess to feel anything. I just do received wisdom.’

‘I don’t believe that. And when what I’m getting is plain evil I don’t want to mess around. I mean, I don’t want you to feel compromised or—’

‘Plain evil?’

‘Got it the first time I came in. Wasn’t the smell of a putrefying body, nothing so obvious. Not even that damp sensation of human misery, which is the most common thing you pick up in a run-down house. It was active, bad energy. Aggressive. Sort of thing dowsers pick up sometimes. So half of me’s saying, get out, don’t touch this dump. But how can I say that to Robin?’

‘Did you say anything to him?’

‘Hinted there was a slight problem. Would’ve been stupid to say nothing. But I said, whatever it is we can handle it. We can fix it. And sure, there are some things I can fix. Or convince myself I’ve fixed, which is pretty much the same thing. In the world I was a part of.’

‘OK… what’s actually happened?’

‘Not much. First time I walk in here, I don’t like the feel of it, particularly upstairs. Well, big deal. And Robin spending last night here and it’s not a very good night – lights coming on, which could be loose wiring or something. And then we find out that a junkie snuffed it on the premises – well, so what? Hardly Amityville, is it? Nobody’s ever seen Brace walking past in the night with a spectral syringe in his arm. And yet…’