Hell Pit Page 15

  “What’s so funny?” he asked.

  “You look so serious sometimes,” she said. “It’s as if you’re carrying the weight of the world on your shoulders.”

  “Perhaps I am,” McGrath replied. He glanced at his watch, and changed the subject. “I’m not trying to get rid of you, but isn’t it time you were getting back?”

  “I have the rest of the day off to get ready for the trip,” she told him. “However, you could always do the chivalrous thing, and drive me home. I begged a lift to the site with a colleague this morning, so I’m without a car.”

  “I have a better idea,” McGrath said spontaneously. “Do you like Chardonnay?”

  “I love Chardonnay.”

  “I happen to have some at my place,” McGrath said standing from his seat.

  2.

  They chatted comfortably as they drank, and when the bottle was finished, McGrath took Kate gently by the hand, and led her into the bedroom, where they passed the remainder of the afternoon in each other’s arms.

  McGrath proved a considerate lover, reassuring Kate with compliments and sensuous touches, understanding the importance of foreplay, succeeding in bolstering her confidence, arousing her effortlessly. Kate responded passionately, secure in the belief that here was a man whom she could trust, and devote herself to without fear of rejection, or disappointment. When the lovemaking was over they held each other close.

  While McGrath quietly snoozed, Kate remained wakeful, curious to know more about the man beside her. She had so many questions for McGrath, yet was afraid to ask them for fear of alienating him. She raised herself up onto an elbow and studied the rugged contours of his face, wondering. It was then that he opened his eyes, and smiled up at her.

  “Penny for them,” he said.

  Kate opened her mouth to speak but was unable to vocalise the questions she was so desperate to ask. As if reading her thoughts, McGrath began to talk freely about himself, and in doing so, gradually disclosed the information she sought, by first describing his childhood and teenage years, before confiding in her about his failed marriage and his secret past life, when he had served in the Special Air Services.

  He told her because it felt right. When he finished Kate was silent for a long time. “It’s quite a story,” she said finally. “I never imagined—.” She stopped, unable to decide what it was she wanted to say. She had just made love to a man trained to kill, a man who in all probability had done exactly that. She had some difficulty grasping the concept.

  “Now who’s bearing the weight of the world,” McGrath asked intuitively. “So: what about you. Would you care to tell me your dark secrets?”

  “Oh, I’m afraid I’m very boring by comparison,” she replied self consciously, but McGrath refused to be thrown.

  “Let’s start with your career then. What made you want to be an archaeologist?”

  Kate seemed to relax a little and lapsed into thought, before finally saying, “One of my uncles was a history teacher. He was also an enthusiastic amateur archaeologist. I accompanied him to the occasional archaeological dig when I was a child. I loved the sense of excitement and expectation a dig inspired. And the fact so many people were prepared to give up their free time to mess around in the earth for hours on end. It got me curious. For people to want to do that, suggested to me that it must be a worthwhile pursuit.”

  Out in the hall the phone rang. McGrath left the room to answer it, closing the door to afford himself extra privacy. It was the police officer to whom he had reported the matter of the crypt. He announced himself as PC Draper from Northwalk Constabulary.

  “Glad I caught you in sir,” he said with forced politeness. “You reported having come up on the venue of a possible paedophile ring. I am just phoning to tell you that one of our men was sent down there to investigate.”

  There was a pause.

  “And?”

  “He found the crypt. But it was empty.”

  “That’s impossible,” McGrath said careful to keep his voice low, unwilling to involve Kate in the sordid episode.

  “The bed, literature, the toys you mentioned, none of it was there,” Draper said simply.

  “But it has to be,” McGrath argued. “I didn’t imagine it.”

  “I’m only telling you what our man told us,” Draper said. “The crypt was empty. May I ask how you came across it in the first place, sir?”

  McGrath told him.

  “We questioned the priest of St Anthony’s, to see if he could shed any light on the mystery. He was profoundly shocked by what we told him. To the best of his knowledge, the crypt is disused, and always has been.”

  McGrath recalled the figure he’d glimpsed in the wood. Might it have been the priest: surely not. But why would the Father lie about the fact nothing was in the crypt, when plainly it wasn’t the case, unless of course he had something to hide?

  CHAPTER TWENTY FIVE

  The young mother had left her baby unattended for just a few minutes. She had left it in its brand new stroller outside the corner shop just off Scott Street, not far from St Anthony’s Church. She had nipped into the shop on a sudden impulse to buy a packet of cigarettes, even though she had abstained from smoking these past eleven months since discovering she was pregnant, continuing to abstain since the baby’s birth. The addiction had finally beaten her. It was this addiction, and subsequent momentary lapse in paternal care, that led to the premature death of her young child who, according to eyewitnesses, was dragged from its stroller, and carried away by a squat powerfully built dog.

  The child’s remains were later discovered on wasteland near to the scene of its abduction. The police launched a concentrated search for the killer dog issuing orders for those involved to take no chances, and to shoot on sight. Two armed officers eventually tracked down the animal, cornering it in a disused warehouse. Both men were fully trained in armed combat, and were expert marksmen. The last radio communication from them assured those listening that they had the situation under control, and would communicate again when the task of eliminating the threat posed by the dog was completed. The call never came. Sometime later, the two officers were found dead; their bodies mutilated beyond recognition.

  Two days later, a dog fitting the description of that responsible for the recent spate of killings was seen entering a schoolyard in Bethnal Green. Three children were badly mauled in the ensuing attack. The teacher who fought off the crazed animal by striking it repeatedly about the head using a fire axe, claimed that, despite sustaining severe head injuries, it failed to suffer any blood loss. The animal was later spotted on a back street not far from St Anthony’s Church.

  CHAPTER TWENTY SIX

  CHISWICK, LONDON

  Bill and Elsie Shepherd were woken by a sudden loud bang from downstairs, followed by the splintering of broken glass: Bill sat bolt upright in bed. “I think we’ve got burglars Els,” he said, reaching across and fumbling for the bedside light. Beside him his wife of almost fifty years blinked against the sudden brightness, and stifled a yawn.

  “What are you going to do, Bill?” she asked, hauling her heavy frame up to a sitting position. Bill shushed her, listening for more noises, but the house was silent.

  “Perhaps we imagined it,” Elsie said hopefully.

  “And pigs might fly,” Bill returned. “It sounded as if the bleeding house was about to be demolished. And why the hell isn’t Charlie barking?”

  With a decisive sweep of his arm Bill threw back the blankets and got stiffly to his feet. Just then there was a loud crash, as something downstairs fell and smashed.

  “Christ,” he hissed miserably, “I don’t bloody need this at my age.” He crossed the room to the bedroom door, and put an ear against the wood, listening.

  “What do you hear Bill?” Elsie asked from bed.

  “Will you be quiet woman,” he replied sharply. “I think someone’s out there.”

  “We should have had a blinking phone put in this room,” Elsie complained. �
��As things are, if we have got burglars, we’re trapped.”

  Bill ignored the comment and searched the room for a weapon with which to arm himself. His gaze fell on Elsie’s walking stick, propped up in one corner. The stick was made of solid mahogany with a heavy brass handle. Deciding it was better than nothing, he grabbed it and bravely pulled open the door.

  Seconds later he was lying dead with his skull cracked open. On the other side of the room his wife screamed hysterically as his killer crossed the threshold. In one livid hand the figure carried the mangled remains of Charlie. In the other it held a blood soaked axe.

  CHAPTER TWENTY SEVEN

  The weather was cold and bleak, the heater in the old Rover pathetically ineffective as Chrichton drove Kate away from the capital. Kate did her best not to shiver. The conversation between the two centred on archaeology, with Chrichton doing most of the talking, while Kate gazed through the passenger window, pondering the similarities between what had happened following the excavation of the French burial pit, and the one in Northwalk. The media had made the connection, and played on it heavily in an attempt to portray St Anthony’s burial pit as a haunted place, infested by malevolent spirits. One paper had even hired a group of psychics to visit the grave. They were refused access by the archaeologists, but it didn’t stop them filing a report to the newspaper confirming that the site was indeed haunted.

  Over lunch in a service station, the two of them discussed the manuscripts they were to examine in the West Country. “The most promising one is locked away in an annex room at the back of an old chapel,” said Chrichton as he munched on an egg and watercress sandwich. “The other is in a museum, though it isn’t on public display as it isn’t deemed important enough. The curator of the museum doubts the manuscript in his possession will help us much, but says we are welcome to take a look if we so wish.”

  “You said they’re written in a hybrid language comprising of Celtic symbols and Egyptian hieroglyphics,” Kate said.

  “That’s correct,” Chrichton answered.

  Kate suddenly wasn’t sure if she would be of much help on the assignment. While she had a rudimentary knowledge of those languages Chrichton was the expert, being fluent in both. He had played a major part in unravelling the mystery behind a series of clay prisms discovered in a cave outside Thebes, Egypt in the late nineties. The prisms had provided valuable information relating to a place called Armana where it was thought Tutankhamun’s parents had created a sun-worshipping city that was directly opposed to the accepted form of moon worship, an indulgence that caused them to be labelled heretics.

  Investigating the authenticity of manuscripts such as the ones they were to examine could be a drawn out, uncertain process. It was not an exact science by any means. In the past, even experts had made mistakes. One had only to look at the fiasco of the Hitler Diaries to know that. If however, either related directly to the unearthed burial pit at Northwalk, in archaeological terms they would have hit the jackpot.

  “Our host is a Father Rinaldi,” Chrichton said when they were back on the road. “I came into contact with him through a mutual friend who is chief archivist at a museum in Bristol. My friend originally came across the manuscript in Father Rinaldi’s possession some time ago. When the burial site was discovered, he remembered it, and got in touch with me on the off chance it might be of some use. Have you visited this part of the world before?”

  “Once, a long time ago,” Kate said.

  The memory of that visit was still fresh in her mind, and still painful in light of what followed. It had been with her ex-fiancé before his infidelity ruined their relationship. They’d stayed in the market town of Evesham before travelling on to Woodstock where they visited Blenheim Palace. That was in the past, however. Chrichton interrupted her thoughts, offering to show her around over the weekend.

  “It’ll be fun,” he said. “We can take a trip out into the country: maybe indulge in a bite to eat at one of the pubs there.” Sensing Kate harboured reservations, he quickly went on, “It’ll give us a chance to get to know each other better on a personal level. What do you say Kate. Is it a date?” He grinned, and glanced at her hopefully.

  Kate politely declined, saying she had other plans. She had in fact invited McGrath over. He would be staying at a hotel just outside Broadway. She hoped to spend the weekend there with him. When she told Chrichton he appeared to take the news well. As a result she hoped a new understanding could be born between them.

  As they reached the outskirts of Oxford, Chrichton said, “The second manuscript is in Bristol. If the first doesn’t pan out we’ll have to spend time there, working on that one. The process might take us into the second week.”

  Half an hour later they passed through an idyllic country village whose buildings were constructed of attractive Cotswold stone. They continued on cross-country. Thunder heads loomed as they arrived at their destination, a place called Linden, which turned out to be an enchanting village comprising terraced cottages, a few shops, a post office and a pub called The King’s Head. The pub stood opposite a green that was bordered by four or five thatched cottages. A small church was nearby boasting a rectory constructed of the same striking yellow stone that appeared to be the village hallmark. They drove along a narrow drive before parking outside the rectory.

  Father Rinaldi was a charming elderly man with downy white hair and twinkling eyes, whose boyish grin took years off his age. He greeted his two guests as if they were old friends, plying them with tea and biscuits, before showing them to their separate rooms at the top of the big old house, which he proudly announced was one of the oldest properties in the area. Once they were settled in he gave them a guided tour of the church grounds, talking incessantly as he went, and repeatedly apologising for the fact.

  “Old age has turned me into something of a chatterbox I’m afraid” he said disarmingly. “I feel I have so much left to say, and so little time in which to say it. I would like to show you around the district at some stage. I have a couple of hours free tomorrow if that would be convenient?”

  “It would be lovely,” Kate said automatically, although Chrichton seemed less than enthusiastic.

  Rinaldi led them back to the house where he informed his housekeeper of their arrival. Chrichton though was impatient to see the manuscript. The priest, obliging to the last, took him and Kate into the chapel where it was kept, leaving them alone to view it whilst giving a gentle reminder that dinner would be served shortly. The manuscript was a thick, time worn document, its many pages torn and tattered. In places the ink was so badly faded the words were almost illegible.

  Over dinner, Rinaldi entertained them with tales of his life overseas, where he had spent many years working as a missionary after completing seminary at Vatican City. His present parish, he said, was where he’d received his calling years before, whilst a student at the local Catholic boys school.

  Following dinner Chrichton returned to the manuscript, leaving Kate alone with the priest. Father Rinaldi was keen to know why Kate had entered the field of archaeology. She gave the same reasons she had given McGrath, citing curiosity as a prime motivator.

  “I feel the same way about my reasons for entering the Church,” he concurred. “I was called, but it was ultimately curiosity that tempted me into its vast and glorious sanctum for I felt there was so much to learn.”

  Kate was comforted by his candour. For a while they discussed the burial pit, although Kate sensed the priest was uncomfortable with the subject, possibly due to the sinister events associated with the unearthing of the mass grave.

  Chrichton failed to show for the rest of the evening. Kate apologised for his absence.

  “Your friend is very dedicated,” the Father said diplomatically. “He obviously considers the manuscript extremely important. We will have plenty of time to get acquainted over the coming week, no doubt.”

  The stresses and strains of the day had caught up with Kate. She bid the Father goodnight, and climbed the
wide creaking stairs to her room, glad to be on her own at last. From her bedroom window she could see the chapel, in which Chricthon worked on the manuscript, and from which shone one solitary light.

  Deciding to leave him to it, she slipped out of her clothes and climbed into the old wooden four-poster bed, relishing the feel of the crisply laundered sheets against her bare skin, wishing McGrath was lying beside her.

  CHAPTER TWENTY EIGHT

  It was 4.30 in the afternoon and Angie McGowan was exhausted from another gruelling day working on the excavation site. She looked forward to getting home to her one bedroom flat, stripping off and climbing into a nice hot tub. Having studied archaeology at the local university for the past two years, the thrill of obtaining real work experience on the present dig at St Anthony’s was matched only by the intense thrill of making love to her Jamaican boyfriend, Errol.

  She climbed the metal ladder to the top of the pit and negotiated the muddy terrain to the temporary staff room, where she collected her belongings. Stepping outside again, she cursed the lousy weather, knowing she had a long walk ahead of her through several acres of parkland, before she reached her rented flat. She was reconciled to walking a lot in the future, her old bomb of a car having finally given up the ghost yesterday, spluttering its last breath, leaving her stranded on a duel carriageway, where she and the stationary vehicle were nearly steamrollered by an articulated lorry. The garage estimated it would cost three hundred quid to put it right, and that was just for labour.

  She walked through the church gates and crossed the road, momentarily distracted, at the same time inviting the wrath of an angry motorist forced to swerve to avoid hitting her. She stared indifferently as he sped away; her mind focused on the dig, and the disconcerting rumours suggesting the burial pit was cursed, turning perfectly normal people into homicidal maniacs. She had overheard two men talking the other day, discussing the fact that they had begun hearing voices, which others before them, the papers said, claimed to have heard prior to committing bloody murder. Strangely, neither man had been seen since. Angie admitted privately that the situation made her nervous, but the experience she was gaining was invaluable, and besides, she needed the money.