The Wood

Three

PC Jock Houliston chewed on the stem of his large bent pipe. He attempted to relight the wedge of soggy tobacco, gave it up as a bad job and stared disdainfully at the large-scale OS map which adorned the wall of his office. Suddenly life had ceased to be a pleasant run-in to retirement. He could have done without all this, Jesus Christ he could!

He was overweight and had an unhealthy ruddy complexion, a host of burst cheek veins giving it a purplish appearance. Balding, with rotund features, he prided himself in being the typical jovial policeman, the last of a dying species. Next year the inhabitants of Droy would have to put up with some young upstart from the town, who would be eager to show his authority in his first posting. That would be an end to the after-hours drinking sessions in the Dun Cow most nights. Which was one reason why Jock had decided to leave the area altogether. Let them remember him along with 'the good old days'. With a low sigh he turned back to face the sharp-featured CID man whose eyesight was apparently good enough for him to study the map from where he stood on the other side of the desk.

Detective-Sergeant Jim Fillery was small and insignificant at first glance. In the street you would pass him by, not even giving him a second glance, which was a considerable advantage where a plain-clothes policeman was concerned. Short fair hair, the only distinctive feature about him was his eyes, pale blue chips of ice that gave you some insight into the man behind them. Vicious, a man not to be trifled with. Three years ago he had undergone a special enquiry; during an interrogation a prisoner charged with indecent assault on a seven-year-old child had seemingly fallen and cracked his skull on the wall of the interview room. There followed the usual public outcry against 'police brutality'.

But the Committee's findings had been that the prisoner had slipped and fallen during a struggle with Fillery, and that the policeman was in no way to blame. Six months later the injured man had died suddenly of a brain haemorrhage and there was a further storm of protest, the dead man's family demanding that the original enquiry be re-opened. But they had lost their appeal and Fillery's reputation was established. The hard man of the Force — but one day he would overstep the mark.

'We know for certain Foster's in this area.' Fillery had a quiet voice but you listened extra hard because he wasn't the type of man to take kindly to constant requests to repeat what he had said. 'That Mini by the wood is the one that was stolen in Stoke-on-Trent. I'm pretty certain that we won't find this Embleton girl alive although the Super would slay me for saying that. It beats me, though, what's happened to Dark. Maybe Foster has jumped him in the wood, killed him, although sex-killers generally do not assault anybody except their chosen victims. Anyway, we'll find out today, I've no doubt, when we draw Droy Wood. The media are billing it as one of the most intensive manhunts of the decade.'

'It'll need to be.' Resentment in Houliston's voice. 'Droy Wood is the nearest thing you'll find approaching the Everglades in this country!'

'We'll sort it out.' the CID man snapped. 'Every available police officer from a twenty-mile radius, a whole company of army rookies who are damned glad to have something useful to do, plus some of the best tracker dogs in the Force. We'll find the girl and Dark, and if Foster's in there he won't get away this time, I can assure you!'

There was a personal bitterness in Fillery's tone now. He remembered his last encounter with James Foster, that rainy November day when he had arrested him on a rape charge, two devastating physical blows delivered with such expertise to the abdomen that they had not left a single mark. Just another of thousands of sex perverts who ought to be castrated, a clear-cut case that should have put Foster away for a few years. Instead, that weak-minded judge had given him a suspended sentence with a recommendation for psychiatric treatment. The stupid senile old fucker! The next time Foster had killed, and now it looked like he had killed again. Fillery was going on that manhunt personally, he had a score to settle with James Foster; he wanted to be the one to find him crouching naked under a bush. Pleading for mercy which wouldn't be given; just ten seconds alone with him. 'There's a thick mist come in off the coast.'

Houliston's expression was stoic. 'And in Droy Wood that's bad.' 'I've heard all this crap about what happens when the mist covers Droy Wood,' the detective laughed harshly.

The only thing it'll do will be to make our task that bit harder. But we'll thrash that wood out, every bloody reed and bush. If he's there, we'll get him, make no mistake about that.'

Jock Houliston nodded. Vehicles had been arriving since shortly after daybreak, police cars and vans, army transport trucks, and, of course, the usual following of sightseers, ghouls who hoped to catch a glimpse of the sexually mutilated body. In many ways they were worse than the killer because their motives were the same, perverted lust, voyeuristic vultures preying on the carnage.

Suddenly Droy was in the eyes of the whole country. The mist had come in overnight, had not melted with the dawn, a low-lying mass of white vapour that seemed to stop once it reached the coastal road. Eerie, even a casual bystander could not miss the implication; its task was to cover Droy Wood, protect the evil that lurked there. Cold and clammy, it had a damp cloying smell, the reek of rotting vegetation, a continual process that spanned centuries and would go on until the end of time. Vehicles were parked along the road which bordered the wood. The Mini and the Conservancy Land Rover were still there, cordoned off with orange tape. Later they would be moved.

A uniformed police superintendent was talking to a bunch of young soldiers, frequently pointing with his baton across to where the big wood lay screened by the fog. Everybody must keep in sight of the next man in the line, a dog every fifty yards. A couple of insignificant police marksmen just in case. In all probability they wouldn't be needed. Every eventuality was catered for. Police on the flanks with more Alsatians in case Foster made a run for it, which was a strong possibility. Search every reed-bed, every bush, take your time.

Jock Houliston pulled on his Wellington boots, did not like this one little bit. These boys did not understand what they were up against; it was impossible trying to tell them. They scorned the rumours because they did not understand. Jock had been a lad attending Droy school that time the German parachuted down. He remembered the search, listened to his father's own version of it. The Jerry was in there, no matter what anybody might say, and they would have found him if the mist had not rolled in. Just like it had today.

The search wasn't just a futile task, it was a dangerous one. Jock had spent some considerable time going through the missing-persons file. Somebody went missing somewhere every day, often folks who had a good reason for disappearing, just wanted to lose their identity and start a new life elsewhere. But the policeman had a very strong belief that a number of those in this area had found their way into Droy Wood. Some of the bogs were dangerous, they could suck you down without a trace and all that was left was your name on the missing-persons file for perpetuity. He joined the line, moved a few yards further up so that he could see the outline of the next man down, a young soldier. The constable's mouth was dry, he could taste the decay in the atmosphere; coughed and spat. On his right was Roy Bean, the Droy Estate's gamekeeper.

Somebody blew a whistle and they were off, slow measured strides, their footsteps muffled in the thick fog. A sort of movie sound-effect for water buffalo tramping restlessly around a water-hole.

Houliston checked his watch. 8.25. It was going to be a long day. Voices, shouting all the time, searchers keeping in touch with one another. Frequent stops. Once somebody blundered into a mire, had to be pulled out. A glimpse of a fleeting shape ahead of them, but the dogs did not seem to find a scent. They were quiet, almost subdued, unwilling to venture far ahead. You sensed the general atmosphere of reluctance. Of fear, too. Jock knew that they had to come upon the old house soon. He had seen it once before, many years ago, but had never been inside. He recalled his father's story of that day they searched it for the Boche.

'You wouldn't have gone in there on your own, lad,' old Mac Houliston had sucked his lips as though he didn't want to relate the story but thought he ought to in case his son might venture there sometime on some idiotic schoolboy prank. There's nothing there except decay and filth and a rusty old iron bedstead, but all the time you got the feeling that there was somebody watching you. Spooky. We checked all the rooms then got out as quick as we could. I reckon there has to be a cellar but nobody wanted to hang around looking for it. If there is, then the Jerry could well have been hiding down there. He might even still be there now, just a skeleton propped up in the corner where he fell asleep. '

And that was one of the things worrying Jock Houliston today. That old ruin, if it still stood, it would have to be searched thoroughly, the cellar investigated.

There's the house.' The man closest to him had moved in and the constable saw that it was Roy Bean, the Droy gamekeeper. Angular features with protruding top teeth, yellowed with nicotine, hardly served to enhance his unfortunate looks. His left eye was set a shade lower than the right, his nose too small. Houliston had once heard a summer tourist remark rather tactlessly 'I suppose that's the fucking village idiot.' Yet the young keeper always wore moleskin breeks tucked into polished gaiters, seemed to take a pride in the once-traditional dress of his profession. His own status symbol, his father's and grandfather's before him, and if people were too ignorant to notice the

'uniform' of an honoured profession then that was just too bad.

'Aye.' Jock pushed his peaked cap on to the back of his bald head. 'The Droy House, what's left of it, at any rate.'

Even the swirling fog could not hide the dereliction. The rafters had conceded finally to the perseverance of an army of woodworm and had collapsed, showering the slates down inside, smashing most of the upper storey, splintering it right down to ground-floor level. A heap of debris; soon the remnants of the outer walls would crumble and that would be the end of the once-splendid home of the Droy family.

Others were converging on the clearing now, whistles being blown to halt the advancing line of searchers whilst the ruined building was investigated. Houliston groaned to himself as he spied Fillery. The CID man would make a meal of this lot; they could be here for hours.

'You come inside with me, constable,' the detective motioned to Houliston.

'You wait here, keeper. I expect you know this place well, better than most of us here, but we'll call you if we need you.' We don't like civilian involvement unless it's absolutely unavoidable.

'No, sir, I never come here.' Bean's tone was one of uncertainty, reluctance.

'We don't shoot the wood any more. It ain't safe.'

Too many bogs, eh,' Fillery cut in quickly. He didn't want this yokel to begin retelling the Droy legends. They were concerned with facts not rumours today.

'You follow me, constable, and we'll take a look inside. We'll have to tread carefully, we don't want the whole lot collapsing on top of us.'

Somehow the girders still held the doorway open, the door itself long gone, a dark dusty square remaining. Threatening, defiant; almost an 'abandon hope all ye who enter here', Houliston thought. But Fillery was moving forward with a cautious eagerness, peering inside, producing a torch and swinging its beam on the interior. 'Let's go inside,' he said.

The torchlight revealed walls covered with moss and lichen, condensation which streamed down the stonework and dripped steadily into puddles on the floor. Houliston swallowed; the sound reminded him of a radio play he used to listen to as a youngster, propping his bedroom door open at night so that he could hear the wireless in the living room downstairs. A headless body in an empty house, the steady drip-drip of blood from the landing to hallway. Ugh!

'Look!' Houliston jumped visibly as Fillery spoke, saw the CID man drop to his knees. 'Now that is very interesting!'

The other checked the instinctive 'what?' The detective force invariably adopted a superior attitude over the uniformed branch, a kind of Holmes and Watson relationship; surely you see what I see.

Jock Houliston leaned forward, peered intently at the floor. He saw slate chips and fragments, a mound of thick moss — and clearly imprinted on the latter was a naked human footprint. He felt his flesh go cold, start to creep, glanced back towards the doorway. Outside he could hear Roy Bean talking to some of the soldiers. Outside — it seemed a million miles away right now.

'It's fresh, too,' Fillery breathed, 'see how the impression has squelched right down into the spongy moss which hasn't sprung back into place yet. A matter of hours ago, I'd say. Look, there's another. and another. Going right on into the hallway!' PC Houliston didn't want to follow his companion. Somebody was in here, there was no doubt about that. Fine, they were hunting a fugitive and that aspect did not worry him; if only it had been anywhere else except Droy House! The old stories came flooding back. Tales recounted by his father of how a few generations ago the Droys were the cruel landowners of these lands, how they assisted the Customs' officers in the apprehension of smugglers coming ashore on this deserted stretch of coast beyond the wood. Prisoners were taken, brought back here, some terrible tortures inflicted upon them. The villagers heard the screams in the dead of night and neither the smugglers nor their contraband were heard of again. Stories, fables. Fiction. You could tell yourself that any other place except here.

'Let's see where they go to.' Fillery's voice echoed in the confined space as he moved forward, his torchbeam scanning every patch of shadow. Houiiston followed; he didn't have any other choice. Oh God, why couldn't all this have waited another year?

'That must be the cellar.' Suddenly the white beam was focused on what looked like an open trap door in the corner of the hallway. Even Jock Houliston did not need the sharp-eyed detective to show him the piles of rubble that had been cleared from it; more moss, more footmarks. going right on down into the bowels of Droy House. 'Whoever it is, they're down there, all right!'

Whispering now, the detective alert, his hand in the pocket of his raincoat. He was armed, he would shoot if he had to.

Descending a step at a time, shining the torch on ahead of him, leaving no niche in the ancient stonework unexplored. There was no debris down here, the cellar having been protected from structural collapse, just bare wet walls and an overpowering stench of damp staleness. And so very cold. You sensed the evil.

Houiiston moved closer to the detective, didn't want to be left alone in this awful blackness. He prepared himself for the gruesome sight of the murdered girl; she just had to be down here. Maybe Dark, too. And Foster. The place was bigger than you would have thought, like ancient catacombs stretching on and on, the dripping roof supported by stone pillars. All manner of frightening thoughts same to plague the Droy policeman; suppose the roof collapsed with the vibrations of their movements, trapped them alive down here. Catalepsy. Childhood bogies emerging from the cupboard. You do believe in spooks. Can't you hear them whispering in the darkness, touching you with their cold clammy fingers?

'Christ on a bike!' Detective-Sergeant Fillery pulled up so suddenly that Houiiston cannoned into him, clutched at him to save himself from falling. They both stared, words were superfluous. In the torchlight they saw that they had reached the end wall of the cellar, built in a kind of bow, maybe eight feet high, some fifteen feet across.

And there fastened to the stonework was a series of rusted manacles, five or six pairs of them with matching leg irons a couple of feet from the floor beneath them. You saw in your mind the pain-wracked bodies of centuries ago, broken limbs threatening to jerk out of their sockets; heard their cries of torment. Oh Jesus, you wanted to slap your hands over your ears to try and shut out the pitiful wails, the screams of women and children. You smelled death, the stench would never leave this place, the evil here would never die.

'Well. there's nobody here.' Houliston uttered the words, a hint that they should be leaving. Something inside you told you to run, get the hell out. But the sharp-eyed Fillery had spotted something else. He was on his knees again, poking on the floor with a forefinger and holding it up to his nose, gingerly giving it a lick with his tongue. Then he straightened up, turned back to his uniformed colleague.

'Blood,' he spoke in a whisper, 'fresh blood!'

'Oh Lord.' Houliston recoiled a pace.

'And more footprints.' The detective's features were pale in the reflected glow from the torch. 'All of 'em coming in here, stopping at this infernal wall. but none going back out!'

'That's. impossible!'

'Yes, if you look at it realistically, but it could be a trick though Christ alone knows what anybody would get out of setting up a thing like this. Undoubtedly this is an old torture chamber going back to the early eighteenth century. Not that that is going to figure in any way in our problem.' Somehow the detective's voice did not ring true. He, too, was scared beneath the bluff facade he had created.

'Well, there's definitely nobody in the house,' Fillery told the waiting group as they emerged into the foggy clearing. The ground floor and the cellar are empty and the upper storey has completely fallen through. Let's continue with the search outside.'

PC Houliston checked his watch. 11.30. God, they must have been in that place almost an hour. In spite of this foul stinking mist it was a relief to be outside.

The line fanned out again, waited for the whistle to blow to send them forward again. If anything the fog was thicker, creating weird unearthly shapes out of the twisted marsh trees, boughs that became arms making threatening gestures at these intruders; the boles demonic faces screwed up in hate and fury. This is still the land of the old Droys, begone from it whilst you are still unharmed!

Roy Bean whistled tunelessly through his buck teeth, a habit of his when he experienced a sense of inferiority. He almost always whistled on shooting days when he was surrounded by the visiting gentry with their Range Rovers and Purdey or Boss guns. Deep down he hated them, hated his own role which was to serve. Sometimes when this obsession really got the better of him he would take his.22 rifle, fitted with a silencer, up to the feeding points in the woods and pick off a few handsome cock pheasants as they pecked the grain he had thrown down for them. Rader, the butcher in town, would always give him a few quid for birds on the side. It could cost the gamekeeper his job if he was found out, but he told himself that the risk was outweighed by the satisfaction of nicking half-a-dozen brace of the Agent's birds. It got him one up on the bastards and made him smarter than them. Old Houliston had had a fright, the keeper could tell from just looking at him, the way his ruddiness had paled, his hands shaking slightly as he fidgeted with his stick. Those two had seen something in there they didn't like. But no way was Roy Bean going to go back to the old house to find out. No, sir!

He wished he could have carried his gun today. Damn it, he had every right to because Droy Wood was officially part of his game preserves. But that officious Superintendent had made him leave it behind in the van. 'Any guns, gamekeeper, will be carried by police marksmen only.' Yes, sir. Fuck you. The going was harder now, the reed-beds denser, the ground softer. Roy Bean used his long ash stick to prod the area in front of him, trying to find the firmer patches. This fog was getting thicker, too; you couldn't see the man on your right or left any longer, and the line could not close up anymore or they would not be able to cover the terrain systematically. At least that Superintendent had not objected to him bringing Muffin, the springer spaniel, along. Roy didn't feel right going anywhere without a dog on the estate. A day in rough cover like this would do her good, cool her ardour. She never walked, always ran; never stopped searching for a scent. If any of the missing people were in here Muffin would find them, long before those snarling police dogs did. Nevertheless, with the fog coming down like this he would have felt a lot easier with a gun under his arm. Christ, he only hoped that they had drawn it ail before dark.

The liver and white springer had gone on ahead, probably on a rabbit scent. Roy whistled urgently. Hell, he didn't want her getting lost in here. No response, but he could hear her thrashing and splashing about in the rushes up ahead. He whistled again.

Suddenly the spaniel bitch stopped, a second or two of silence and then she gave a cry, a yelp. Whimpering, yelping again.

'Muffin!' Roy Bean stepped forward, felt himself sink into a patch of quagmire, the mud viciously sucking at him as though it sought to pull him down below the surface. 'Fucking hell!'

Fear, anger, and even as he floundered, caught hold of a silver birch seedling, he saw the spaniel coming back. Her ears were flat on her head, her tail curled between her legs, running, whining and whimpering. Fleeing!

'You stupid fucking bitch!' If his feet had not been so firmly embedded in the mud, Roy Bean would have kicked out at her. She ran up to him, came up close behind him. 'Stupid bugger, you'll knock me back in there. You'll. '

His anger tailed off as he glimpsed a movement in the fog ahead of him, a shape materialising out of the swirling grey vapour. A man. At first he thought it was one of the search party, a soldier or policeman, perhaps, who had heard his struggles in the bog and come to investigate. But no, [he silhouette was wrong, the strange ill-fitting coat, the triangular-shaped hat with long matted hair falling from beneath it like a cartoonist's impression of a living scarecrow. And for a second, maybe two, Roy Bean was afforded a glimpse of the face and he almost screamed. Coarse features, partially bearded as though mange had taken its toll, sunken sockets that were eyeless yet saw; the mouth open in a snarl of anger displaying a double row of broken blackened teeth.

And then it was gone, as suddenly as it had come, fading back into the fog as though it had never been. A trick of the half-light, the fog? Roy Bean would have settled for that explanation, told himself over and over again that it was an illusion, had it not been for the spaniel cringing and whimpering up against him.

He knew only too well that whatever that thing was it existed. Dusk was beginning to merge with the thickening fog as the searchers finally emerged from the village end of Droy Wood, weary, mud-splattered soldiers and policemen, physically and mentally exhausted, the tracker dogs staying close to their masters. Nobody spoke, merely glanced dejectedly at one another, clustering together, waiting for the Superintendent to come across and dismiss them.

Three missing people: a conservation officer, an attractive naked girl and a crazed sex-killer were not in Droy Wood.

But everybody sensed that something was.