Heathen/Nemesis

Seventy-Five

Second floor.

The top storey had yielded nothing. Outside, the rain which had been falling when they entered the building seemed to have eased. Night had invaded the heavens, closing around the waxworks like a black fist as impenetrable as the umbra that seemed to fill every inch of the museum. The exhibits were small islands of light within a sea of shadows.

Donna paused at the bottom of the flight of steps and looked to her right and left.

To her right was a gallery featuring GREAT EVENTS IN WORLD HISTORY; to her left, THE ENTERTAINMENT WORLD.

‘Do you want to check one side and I’ll check the other?’ she asked Julie.

‘No. I’m staying with you,’ the younger woman said, horrified at the thought of being alone in one of these darkened rooms. Donna gripped her hand briefly to reassure her, but the gesture did little to ease Julie’s fear. Donna, too, felt the hairs on the back of her neck rise as they moved into the right-hand gallery.

A mock-up of the front benches of the House of Commons displayed a dozen of the country’s most important politicians. Behind them were older, more famous ones. Gladstone, Disraeli and Lloyd George all stood in judgement, silent and unmoving as the two women passed by.

The next exhibit showed Napoleon’s final trip to St Helena. He was in a cabin on board the ship with several figures standing around him.

There were books on the desk at which the effigy of the Emperor sat.

Donna wasted no time checking them out.

Julie, meantime, took a couple of paces across the gallery towards a group of world leaders, past and present, gathered around a desk.

She shivered as she felt so many sightless eyes boring into her.

A board creaked beneath her feet and she sucked in a startled breath.

Adolf Hitler stood, arms folded, beside Benito Mussolini. Stalin and Trotsky stood to their left.

Julie could see bookshelves behind them.

The Grimoire could be there.

‘Donna,’ she whispered.

No reply.

She looked round to where her sister was searching through the other books.

‘Donna,’ Julie repeated.

There was no sign of the older woman.

Julie felt as if someone had suddenly pumped her full of ice water.

‘Oh, Jesus,’ she murmured, fearing she was alone. ‘Donna.’ She raised her voice slightly.

There was a chipboard wall between the exhibits and Julie turned and moved towards it.

She could hear sounds on the other side.

The breath was stuck in her throat and her mouth felt dry.

It was if someone had filled it with sand. In the deafening silence inside the gallery she could hear her heart thumping madly against her ribs.

‘Donna,’ she said again, the word sounding thunderous in the solitude.

Close by a floorboard creaked.

Julie swallowed hard.

‘It’s not here.’

Donna stuck her head out from behind the chipboard wall.

Julie just managed to stifle a scream. She raised a hand to her forehead and let out a breath which seemed to empty her lungs.

‘For Christ’s sake,’ she murmured.

Donna saw the exhibit her sister had been looking at and crossed to it. She looked up at the books on the shelves and reached for the closest.

She flipped it open.

Blank paper.

So was the next.

And the next.

Every book on the shelf was a volume of blank sheets.

Donna sighed wearily and prepared to continue the search.

Julie suddenly grabbed her arm.

‘Listen,’ she whispered, her eyes bulging in their sockets.

‘What . . .’

‘Just listen.’

They stood as motionless as the wax figures surrounding them, ears alert for the slightest sound, eyes roving around the darkened gallery for any trace of movement.

Donna heard it too.

The unmistakable creaking of floorboards.

Someone was on the floor above them.

‘It must be Paxton,’ Donna said quietly.

‘He was below us,’ Julie protested.

‘He said that we could pass each other without knowing. Perhaps he went up to double check, in case we missed something.’

The footsteps receded.

The two women remained motionless, gazing up at the ceiling as if to trace the source and direction of the footsteps.

There was one more protesting creak, then silence.

‘I’m sorry,’ said Julie none too convincingly. ‘This place . . .’ She allowed the sentence to trail off.

Donna squeezed her hand and nodded.

They paused a moment longer, then moved further down the gallery, inspecting each exhibit, checking any books which could be the hidden Grimoire. Finally satisfied that these tableaux held no secrets, they turned round and headed back towards the gallery marked THE ENTERTAINMENT WORLD.

At the top of the stairs between the two galleries Donna paused and peered into the thick shadows, listening for movement from either above or below. She heard nothing. She wondered if she should call out to Paxton, just to find out where he was. She decided against it and walked through the archway to be confronted by the figure of Elvis Presley.

Julie followed, past the cast of Dallas, glancing at figures of Rod Stewart, Tina Turner and Madonna.

So many eyes watching them.

These exhibits were mostly just single figures, not set out in any kind of tableau, but isolated in their stage clothes with just a name plate for company.

Kate Bush stood defiantly before them, her hair frozen in an imaginary breeze, curling in the air like the deadly locks of a Gorgon.

Bob Hope was leaning on a golf club.

Frank Sinatra was holding a microphone.

Donna moved quickly through the gallery.

‘There’s nothing in here,’ she said. ‘Let’s try the next floor. Perhaps Paxton’s found something.’

‘He would have called, wouldn’t he?’ Julie enquired.

‘Perhaps we didn’t hear him.’

At the top of the stairs just beyond the archway at the exit from the gallery stood figures of Michael Jackson and Stevie Wonder.

The former of the two was in a glass case.

Donna moved close to it, peering in at the finely sculpted features, momentarily distracted by the sheer artistry of the effigy.

She and Julie moved nearer to the glass.

Julie touched it.

The figure turned and looked at them.