Lockwood & Co: The Screaming Staircase

12

The following day dawned bright and clear. Pale November sunshine flowed through the kitchen window and extended cheerily over the usual breakfast clutter. Cornflake packets glowed, bowls and glasses sparkled; every scattered crumb and blob of jam was picked out perfectly in the morning light. The air was warm, and heavy with the scent of good strong tea, of toast, fried eggs and bacon.

I wasn’t enjoying myself at all.

‘Why, Lucy?’ Lockwood demanded. ‘I just don’t understand! You know an agent has to report any artefact she finds. Particularly one so intimately connected with a Visitor. They must be properly contained.’

‘I know that.’

‘They’ve got to be put in iron or silver-glass until they can be studied or destroyed.’

‘I know.’

‘But you just shoved it in your pocket, and didn’t tell me or George!’

‘Yes. I said I’m sorry! I’ve never done that sort of thing before.’

‘So why did you do it now?’

I took a deep breath. My head was lowered; for some minutes, while my reprimand proceeded, I’d been grimly doodling on the thinking cloth. It was a picture of a girl; a thin girl wearing an old-style summer dress. Her hair whipped around her head, and her eyes were vast and blank. I pressed the pen down hard, probably scoring the table below.

‘I don’t know,’ I muttered. ‘It all happened so fast. Maybe it was because of the fire – maybe I just wanted to save something of her, so she wouldn’t be completely lost . . .’ I sketched a big black sunflower in the middle of the dress. ‘In all honesty I hardly remember taking it at all. And afterwards . . . I just forgot.’

‘Better not mention this to Barnes,’ George remarked. ‘He’d be livid if he knew you’d absent-mindedly carried a dangerous Visitor around London without precautions. It’d give him yet another reason to close this agency down.’

Out of the corner of my eye I watched him complacently spread another dollop of lemon curd on his toasted bun. Oh, he was in fine fettle that morning, George, chipper as a ferret. I reckoned he was enjoying my discomfort big time.

‘You forgot?’ Lockwood said. ‘That’s it? That’s your excuse?’

Defiance flared; I raised my head, brushed my hair back. ‘Yeah,’ I said, ‘and if you want to know why, for starters I was probably too preoccupied with being in hospital, and after that too busy worrying about you. But actually, if you think about it, I didn’t have any reason to believe it was dangerous. Did I? Because we’d just sealed the Source.’

‘No!’ Lockwood jabbed a finger of his good hand on the tablecloth. ‘That’s just it! We thought we had, but we hadn’t! We hadn’t sealed the Source, Lucy, because obviously the Source is there.’

He indicated the small silver-glass box, which sat quietly between the butter and the teapot. It glittered in the sunshine; inside, the golden necklace could just be seen.

‘But how can it be the Source?’ I cried. ‘It should’ve been her bones.’

He shook his head pityingly. ‘It only seemed that way because her ghost vanished the moment you covered her body with the silver net. But obviously you’d covered the necklace too, in the self-same action, which was more than enough to seal it up. Then, when you pinched the necklace—’

I glared at him. ‘I didn’t pinch it.’

‘– you put it straight into your coat pocket, which was stuffed full of iron filings and packets of salt, and other agency bits and pieces that were more than enough to keep the Visitor constrained for the remainder of the night. The following day, though, you slung your coat down on your chair and the necklace fell out. Then it lay hidden in the pile of clothes until darkness, when the ghost was able to return.’

‘The only puzzler is why it wasn’t as fast or powerful as the previous night,’ George said. ‘From what you say it was almost sluggish when you first escaped from the room.’

‘Most likely some of the iron and salt fell out of your coat with the necklace,’ Lockwood said. ‘They’d have been enough to keep the ghost weak, and stop it sustaining its presence very long. That’s probably why it couldn’t follow you downstairs, and wasn’t able to re-materialize swiftly when we came back up.’

‘Luckily for us,’ George said. He shivered, took a consoling bite of toasted bun.

I held up my hands to silence them. ‘Yes, yes. I understand all that. But that’s not what I’m saying. What I mean is, the Source is whatever the Visitor is most attached to, isn’t it? It’s what it holds most dear. So surely it really ought to have been her bones.’ I reached out, picked up the glass case by its cord and turned it in my fingers, so that the pendant and spool of chain inside slid softly to and fro. ‘But instead it turns out to be this. This necklace is more significant to the spirit of Annabel Ward than her own bodily remains . . . Isn’t that a little odd?’

‘No different from that motorbike rider we had one time,’ George pointed out.

‘True, but—’

‘I hope you’re not trying to change the subject, Lucy,’ Lockwood said in a cold voice. ‘I’m in the middle of ticking you off here.’

I set the case down. ‘I know.’

‘I’m not finished, either. Not by a long chalk. I’ve a whole heap more to say.’ There was a protracted pause. Lockwood gazed sternly at me, then out of the window. Finally he gave an exasperated cry. ‘Unfortunately I’ve lost my train of thought. The point is: don’t do it again. I’m disappointed in you. When you joined the company I told you I wasn’t fussed if you kept stuff hidden about your past. That’s still true. But keeping secrets about things that happen now is different. We’re a team and we’ve got to work that way.’

I nodded. I stared at the tablecloth. My face felt cold and hot at the same time.

‘You can forget wondering about this necklace too,’ Lockwood said. ‘I’m taking it to the Fittes furnaces in Clerkenwell today to get it incinerated. Goodbye Source. Goodbye Annabel Ward. Good riddance to the whole affair.’ He scowled petulantly into his mug. ‘And now my tea’s gone cold.’

The events of the night certainly hadn’t helped matters, but Lockwood’s mood was poor for other reasons too. His ghost-touched hand was troubling him. Barnes’s bad tidings weighed heavily on his mind. Worst of all, the public fallout from our Sheen Road disaster had begun. To his horror, the fire had made The Times that morning. In the Problem Pages, where prominent hauntings were covered daily, an article entitled INDEPENDENT AGENCIES: MORE CONTROL NEEDED? described how an investigation carried out by Lockwood & Co. (‘an independent outfit run by juveniles’) had resulted in a dangerous, destructive blaze. It was clearly implied that Lockwood had lost control. At the end of the piece a spokeswoman for the giant Fittes Agency was quoted. She recommended ‘adult supervision’ for nearly all psychical investigations.

The repercussions of this article had been quick and definite. At 8.05 a.m. there’d been a phone call to the office, cancelling one of our ongoing cases. A second call followed at nine. We fully expected several more.

The chances of raising £60,000 within a month seemed remote, to say the least.

Our meal tailed off into frosty silence. Lockwood sat across the table from me, nursing his cold tea, flexing his injured fingers. Life was returning to them, but they still had a bluish look. George shuffled about the kitchen, gathering plates and bunging them in the sink.

I turned the glass case over and over in my hand.

Lockwood’s anger was justified, and that made me miserable. The strange thing was – though I knew I’d been in the wrong, both in taking the necklace and forgetting all about it – I couldn’t wholly regret what I’d done. That night in Sheen Road I’d heard the voice of a murdered girl. I’d seen her too – both as she’d once been, and as the wretched, shrivelled object she’d become. And despite the fear and fury of the haunting, despite the terrible malignancy of the vengeful ghost, I couldn’t quite throw those memories aside.

With the body turned to ashes, this necklace was all that remained: of Annabel Ward, of her life and death, of her whole unknown story.

And we were going to bung that in the fires too.

It didn’t seem right to me.

I lifted the case closer to my eyes, staring through the glass. ‘Lockwood,’ I said, ‘can I get the necklace out?’

He sighed. ‘I suppose. It’s daytime. It’s safe enough for now.’

It was certainly true that Annabel Ward’s ghost was not going to spring forth from the pendant during the day. But it was linked to her, whether she was somehow contained within it, or simply using it as a conduit from the other side. So I couldn’t help feeling a frisson of anxiety as I flicked aside the slender iron bolt and eased the silver-glass open.

There it was: looking scarcely more sinister than the jam spoons and butter knives that littered the sunlit table. A delicate piece of jewellery on a delicate golden chain. I took it out of the case, flinching a little at its chill touch on my skin, and studied it properly for the first time.

The chain was formed of twisted loops of gold, mostly clean and bright, except in a couple of spots where something black had clogged between the links. The pendant itself was roughly oval, about the dimensions of a walnut. Thanks to George’s galumphing boot, it had a slightly squashed look. At one time the exterior must have been lovely. It had been lined with dozens of flakes of mother-of-pearl – pinkish-white and glittering, and neatly embedded in a mesh of gold. But many of the pieces had fallen out and, as with the chain, the surface was tarnished in places with ominous black flecks. Worst of all (and again thanks probably to George), the entire oval had been ruptured down one side. I could see a clear split along a seam.

More interesting than all that, however, was a slightly raised heart-shaped symbol halfway down the pendant at the front. Here, a faint and spidery pattern marked the gold.

‘Oh!’ I said. ‘There’s an inscription on it.’

I held it up so it caught the light, and ran my finger over the letters. As I did so, I caught a sudden sound of voices – a man and woman talking, then the woman’s laughter, high and shrill.

I blinked; the sensation faded. I gazed at the object in my hand. My curiosity had infected the others. Despite himself, Lockwood had got up and moved round the table. George had left off the dishes and, flourishing a tea towel, was peering over my shoulder from the other side.

Four words. We gazed at them in silence for a time.

Tormentum meum

laetitia mea

It didn’t make much sense to me.

‘Tormentum . . .’ George said at last. ‘That sounds cheerful.’

‘Latin,’ Lockwood said. ‘Haven’t we got a Latin dictionary somewhere?’

‘It’s from the man who gave her the necklace,’ I said. ‘The one she loved . . .’ The echo of the two voices still resounded in my mind.

‘How d’you know it’s a bloke?’ George put in. ‘It could have been a female friend. Could’ve been her mum.’

‘No way,’ I said. ‘Look at the symbol. Besides, you wear these things so you can have your loved one’s message next to your heart.’

‘Like you know anything about that,’ George said.

‘Like you do either.’

‘Let’s have a look at it,’ Lockwood said. He perched on the chair next to mine and took the necklace from my hand. He held it close, brow furrowing.

‘Latin phrases, a loved one’s gift, a long-lost girl . . .’ George flipped his damp tea towel over his shoulder and headed for the sink. ‘Bit of an exotic mystery . . .’

‘Isn’t it?’ Lockwood said. ‘Isn’t it, though?’ We looked at him. His eyes were shining; he’d sat up suddenly. The gloom that had enveloped him all morning had suddenly dispersed like white clouds on the wind. ‘George,’ he went on, ‘do you remember that famous case that Tendy’s had, a year or two back? The one with the two entangled skeletons?’

‘The Wailing Tree affair? Of course. They got an award for it.’

‘Yes, and masses of publicity. And the reason for that was they figured out who the Visitors were, didn’t they? They found a diamond tiepin on one of the skeletons and traced it back to the jeweller who made it, and that told them that the owner—’

‘– was young Lord Ardley,’ I said, ‘who’d gone missing back in the nineteenth century. Everyone thought he’d run off overseas. But there he was, buried in the family garden, where his younger brother must’ve put him, in order to inherit the estate.’ There was a pause; I looked at them. ‘Why so surprised? I read issues of True Hauntings too.’

‘Fair enough,’ Lockwood said. ‘And you’re spot on. The point is, it was a great story, and by solving that old mystery Tendy’s did very well. They became a much more prominent agency off the back of it; they’re fourth biggest in London now. So I’m just wondering . . .’ He trailed off, gazing at the locket in his hand.

‘Whether Annabel Ward might do the same for us?’ George said. ‘Lockwood, you know how many Visitors there are in London? Across the country? It’s a plague. People don’t care about the stories behind them. They just want them gone.’

‘You say that, but good cases make big headlines,’ Lockwood said. ‘And this one could be good. Think about it. A glamorous girl, brutally slain and lost for decades, two tragic lovers, a small but enterprising agency uncovering the truth behind the killing . . .’ He grinned at us. ‘Yes . . . if we play it right, we might make a splash with this. We could turn our fortunes round after all. But we’ll need to get moving. George – that Latin dictionary is on the first-floor landing, I think. Fancy fetching it down? Thanks! And Lucy,’ he continued, as George padded away, ‘maybe there’s something you can help with too.’

I gazed at him. His transformation from the grumpy, woebegone figure of a few minutes previously was utterly complete. His movements were quick and light, his injuries forgotten; his dark eyes sparkled as he looked into mine. In that instant it was as if nothing in the world fascinated him as much as me.

‘Tell me something,’ he said. ‘I almost don’t want to ask this, given our experiences these last two days, but when you held the locket just now, I don’t suppose you . . . felt anything, did you?’

I nodded slowly. ‘If you mean a psychic residue, yes I did. Voices, laughter . . . Not much. I wasn’t trying.’

‘And do you think,’ Lockwood said, smiling, ‘if you did try . . .?’

‘You want me to see what sensations I can get?’

‘Yes! Isn’t it a great idea? You might pick up something vital; a clue that we can use.’

I looked away, embarrassed by the intensity of his gaze. ‘Sure, maybe . . . I don’t know.’

‘If anyone can do it, you can, Luce. You’re brilliant at this. Give it a go.’

Moments before, he’d been promising to incinerate the locket. Now it was the key to all our troubles. Moments before, he’d been giving me a rollocking; now I was the apple of his eye. This was the way it was with Lockwood. His shifts were sometimes so sudden that they took your breath away, but his energy and enthusiasm were always impossible to resist. I could hear George thumping eagerly around upstairs; and I too felt a sudden unbidden thrill – excitement at the prospect of uncovering the ghost-girl’s story; hope at the thought of maybe helping save the agency somehow.

Despite myself, of course, I also couldn’t help being flattered by Lockwood’s words of praise.

I sighed heavily. ‘I could try,’ I said, ‘but I can’t promise anything. You know that with Touch it’s normally just emotions and sounds you get, not concrete facts. So if—’

‘Great! Well done.’ He pushed the pendant along the table towards me. ‘Can I help in any way? Would you like me to make you a cup of tea?’

‘No. Just shut up and let me concentrate.’

I didn’t pick it up at first. This wasn’t, after all, something to do lightly. I’d already had ample evidence of the ghost-girl’s wrath and hatred. I knew her fate had not been a pleasant one. So I took my time. I sat looking at the pendant and the coil of chain, and tried to rid my mind of thoughts as best I could. I set aside all the rushing, garbled feelings of the day-to-day.

At last I took it in my hand. The cool of the metal sank through me.

I waited for any echoes that might come.

And very soon they did come, same as before. First a man and woman talking; the woman’s high-pitched laughter, the man’s voice joining her as one. Then a sensation of fierce joy, of passion shared; I felt the elation of the girl, her feverish delight. A great bulb of happiness spread out to fill my world . . . The laughter changed, became hysterical in tone. The man’s voice grew harsher, the sound twisted. I felt a cold, sharp jolt of fear . . . And then at once the joy was back, and all was well, well, well . . . Until the next reversal, until contentment curdled, and the voices rose once more in anger, and I was sick with jealousy and rage . . . And so it went on, back and forth, back and forth, the mood-swings flashing past, like I was on that merry-go-round in Hexham as a kid, the one time my mother let me go, and I was full of joy and terror mixed together, and knew I couldn’t get off no matter how I tried. And all at once came sudden silence, and a cold voice talking in my ear, and a final blaze of fury that ascended to a desperate shriek of pain – a shriek I realized was my own.

I opened my eyes. Lockwood was supporting me in the chair. The door burst open; George pelted into the room.

‘What the hell’s going on?’ he cried. ‘Can’t I leave you two alone for a minute?’

‘Lucy,’ Lockwood said. His face was white. ‘I’m so sorry. I should never have asked you to do that. What happened? Are you OK?’

‘I don’t know . . .’ I pushed him away and, in the same motion, dropped the pendant on the kitchen table. It rocked there briefly, glittering. ‘I shouldn’t have done that,’ I said. ‘It’s too strong. It’s completely bound up with her spirit and her memories. I felt I was her for a moment, and that wasn’t nice at all. Her anger is terrible.’

I sat quiet for a moment in the sunny kitchen, letting the sensations peel away from me like fading fragments of a dream. The others waited.

‘There’s one thing I can tell you,’ I went on at last. ‘Maybe it’s what you were after, Lockwood, and maybe it isn’t, but it’s something I do now know for certain. It came through in the emotions loud and clear.’ I took a deep breath, looked up at them.

‘Yes?’ Lockwood said.

‘The man who gave her this necklace? He’s the one who killed her too.’