The Ghost Tree by Barbara Erskine
April paused thoughtfully at that. Then she smiled. She knew from more recent entries just how serious a writer Malcolm was. As far as she could tell, he had never mentioned his interest in the supernatural in public since. It would be enormous fun to bring it up again and, the perfect touch this, make him think that Ruth had done it. Almost certainly it would seriously piss him off.
By the time she had drunk two coffees and a tea from the box of sachets on the little tray she had found in the drawer with a kettle, she even knew his address. She smiled in triumph. ‘Got you, Ruth bloody Dunbar!’ she crowed.
It didn’t take long to set up new Facebook and Twitter accounts in a name which would mean nothing to anyone but those involved: RuthieD. She smiled as she tapped away in the small silent room. Nothing cruel, nothing libellous, not yet, just hints, seeds sown in the night.
A certain serious historian is said to be obtaining his research through spirit mediums. Whoa! Watch this space to find out who. #Malcolm Douglas
Better check your history books. Ever wondered where biographers get their information? Do they dream it? Or do they interview the dead?
Famous Edinburgh author turns out to be secret psychic. You can get your home exorcised by him for free #Malcolm Douglas
Now she had started to think of suitable tweets she couldn’t stop.
She switched off her laptop and sat back with a smile.
Next morning, she switched on her laptop again. It took only seconds to find RuthieD. She stared at the screen, then slowly she began to smile. Perfect. His name was already out there. Not exactly a Twitterstorm, but one or two trolls were starting to sharpen their pens and other people were expressing their shock and disappointment. Give it another few hours and the papers would pick up the story. He had hardly been discreet, even if it was ten years ago. ‘Screw you, Mr Douglas,’ she muttered. ‘And then screw you, Ruth.’
As she made her way later towards Princes Street and the crowds of people looking into the shop windows or standing staring up at the great castle on its rock, she felt one of them at last. She was no longer a woman on the run, she was a person in her own right, and free. And she was on a mission.
61
Timothy couldn’t hear anything from where he was hiding in the smallest bedroom on the landing. At the beginning, Ruth and Malcolm’s voices had been clear. They were in the hall at the foot of the stairs, then they had walked into the sitting room and closed the door behind them. He heard the murmur of their words every now and again, but then he lost the thread of what they were saying. They were talking to someone else, someone called Andrew. He held his breath. All the more reason to be careful. He didn’t want to be confronted by three of them.
He crept out of the room and looked down the stairs at the sitting room door. It was closed. He could faintly smell a scented candle. It was incensey, exotic. He screwed up his face, afraid he was going to sneeze. Pulling off his shoes, he tiptoed down the stairs and over to the door and listened. They were silent, then he heard Ruth’s voice quite clearly. He hadn’t heard a word from Andrew yet. He turned away. He couldn’t risk being caught. He ran in his socks across the hall and back up the stairs, pausing halfway with a catch in his breath as a step creaked under his weight, then on up towards the attic. He would stay up there until they had gone.
He was wishing already he had stopped in the kitchen to grab some food. He was desperately hungry but best be safe. He could eat all he wanted once they had gone.
There were three bedrooms in the attic. He pulled a blanket off one of the beds and wrapped it round his shoulders, then he lay down against the pillows, prepared to wait. In seconds he was asleep.
Fin could hear nothing. When he had woken from his faint he was tied hand and foot, blindfolded, and there was something stuffed into his mouth, almost choking him. He groaned and received a kick in the shin. ‘Shut up you fool or I’ll kill you.’ Timothy grabbed him under the arms and began dragging him backwards across the floor. He felt himself being bumped down a couple of steps and suddenly it was very cold. They were outside. He could feel the rain soaking into his clothes, then they were out of the rain again and Timothy was propping him up against the wall in a sitting position. He knew exactly where they were. In the outhouse, outside the kitchen door. ‘Now listen.’ Timothy’s mouth was close to his ear. ‘If I hear a sound from you, I will come in and stick this knife between your ribs, is that clear?’
Fin felt himself nodding vigorously. He heard the door bang and the key turn in the lock outside, then all was silent but for the sound of the rain on the broken slates. He waited several seconds then he began to wriggle. His wrists were agony, lashed behind his back, his shoulders twisted and aching, his feet tied so tightly they were going numb. He couldn’t stop himself groaning. He was crying now too, hot tears running down his face from under whatever was tied round his head. The only part of himself he could move was his neck. He rubbed his head against the wall, which was cold stone and rough, and almost at once he felt the bindings round his eyes and mouth loosen. He wriggled to get a better purchase and within a few minutes he had managed to spit out the gag, retching, then the blindfold slipped down off his eyes onto his shoulders. It was his own scarf from the coat hooks in the hall. Encouraged, he began to work on his feet. They were tied with orange string. He could feel it loosening. It hadn’t been knotted properly and had somehow caught in the hem of his trousers. Another couple of hefty kicks and his legs were free. He was calming down now, his brain beginning to function rationally.
Timothy had panicked, that much was obvious. He hadn’t expected Fin to be there; the man was evidently quite mad. He thought hard. Where were Ruth and Mal? Dear God, had they walked in on Timothy? Were they all right? He began to struggle even more frantically.
Fin was not the most athletic of men and his bulk made it difficult to manoeuvre, but he was determined somehow to get to his feet, albeit with his hands still lashed behind him. He knew the one thing in his favour was that the shed he was locked in was so old and rotten that one good kick would smash the door off its hinges. Once he was outside, he could head for the drive where, if he kept to the bushes, he could escape unseen. He wriggled some more, harder this time, trying to get his feet under him. It was raining harder now. A trickle had found its way through the roof and was running down his neck.
Please God, let him get free before Timothy came back. He tried to move his feet and gasped with pain as one of his legs seized with cramp. He took a deep breath and made another attempt and this time he managed to get his feet under him. On levering himself upright, he found his head wedged under the damp rotten beams. His face was covered in spiders’ webs as he took a step forward and threw himself against the door. His prediction had been right. One shove and the doorpost splintered and wrenched free and the whole frame fell out onto the path, followed by him. He sprawled full length in the rain, but he was free. He managed to scramble to his feet and ran, his arms still bound behind him.
It was almost dark. It had been lunchtime when Timothy had attacked him; it must now be late afternoon; the stormy sky made it darker still but a streak of light between the clouds showed him a car outside the front door. It was Malcolm’s. So they were here. His overwhelming relief was followed by a stab of panic. Supposing Ruth and Mal had been attacked by Timothy?
Shivering violently, he forced himself deeper into the shrubbery, and tried to work out what to do.
‘Andrew?’
They had been here for a long time. First Ruth, then Malcolm had been talking patiently to the hovering shadow, as if to a recalcitrant child, trying to coax him to respond, but to no avail. After his first few responses he had remained silent and now the figure was fading until they couldn’t see him any more. The room felt empty.
‘He’s gone,’ Ruth whispered.
Malcolm glanced at his watch. ‘We ought to go too. We promised Fin we would be out of here before he came back.’ He looked round the room. ‘Nothing of him left,
‘I’ll ring him later and thank him.’ She followed him into the hall. ‘Shall I go and check round the house? Make sure everything’s all right?’
He shook his head. ‘I’m sure it’s fine. Farquhar’s gone. He’s not going to stay when there’s no one here.’ He reached to turn off the lights behind them.
‘Do you think he’s gone for good?’ she asked.
‘Sadly not. I was hoping for more of a confrontation.’
She shuddered. ‘That was enough confrontation for me.’
‘You faced him off at the beginning. That was the main thing. You didn’t let him terrorise you and he didn’t or couldn’t find enough strength to hang around. It proves to me he feeds off your fear. We’re on the right track.’
They were heading for the front door. Ruth set the alarm and they let themselves out into the cold. The rain had finally blown away towards the west. They climbed into the car and it was as Malcolm started the engine and turned on the headlights that he let out a cry of alarm. There was a figure staggering towards them across the lawn.
‘Oh my God! It’s Fin! What’s wrong with him?’ Ruth scrabbled with the door handle.
‘Drive! Drive away quickly!’ Fin was sobbing so hard he could barely speak. ‘Lock the doors. It’s Bradford – he has a knife.’ He was crying as they pushed him onto the back seat. Malcolm glanced round the wind-swept garden then dived into the car to find the Stanley knife he kept on the shelf under the steering wheel. It took only moments to saw through the twine and cut Fin’s hands free. Ruth grabbed one of the dog blankets from the back to tuck round him, before climbing in beside him, gently trying to rub some life back into his arms as Malcolm accelerated out of the drive.
They rang the police from the main road and waited there under a street light until the patrol cars arrived. One drew up immediately behind them, the other swept round the corner down the lane towards the house.
‘Your alarm has been activated, so we were already on our way.’ One of the policemen climbed into the front passenger seat beside Malcolm. He turned so he could talk to Fin and Ruth in the back.
‘I set it just now as we left,’ Ruth said.
‘He must have still been in there,’ Malcolm said, ‘and let himself out as soon as we drove away. Oh, Ruth! And you nearly went upstairs alone!’
The house was empty, though the police found at once where Timothy had spent the afternoon. The discarded blanket and the crumpled bed were clear to see.
Fin refused to go to hospital, and was too distressed to be interviewed. It was agreed the police would come to the Tower House next morning to take a full statement and at last they were able to drive away.
‘I don’t think I will ever feel safe in that house again,’ Fin was sobbing. His teeth were chattering.
‘Shall I pick up the dogs on the way past?’ Malcolm called back over his shoulder as they neared home. ‘I can leave them if you like, till tomorrow.’
‘No. Fetch them. I think we’d all feel happier and safer with them there,’ Ruth replied. She was holding tightly onto Fin’s hand. It was warmer now, but it was still trembling.
When Malcolm opened the rear door, the two dogs leapt into the four-by-four with huge enthusiasm, overwhelming them with yaps of joy and the smell of excited dog. Ruth was right. They all felt better for their company.
With Fin warm and bathed, wrapped in a huge woollen dressing gown, courtesy of Mal’s late father, and ensconced in front of the fire in the sitting room, a large glass of whisky in his hands, he reached for his phone and found all the missed calls from Max, wondering where he was. Max was there in an hour with a bag of hot food, wine, more whisky and two large dog treats.
It was only much later, as they all sat round the fire again, the horrors of the day behind them, that Max reached for his tablet. ‘Sorry, folks. One of the joys of being an agent: always on duty.’ He began to scroll down his emails and after a few moments he looked up. His face was white.
62
Timothy had been waiting on the top landing when Mal and Ruth came out of the sitting room. He leaned over the bannister to look down the stairwell and heard Ruth suggest she look round the house. He tensed. He could see her shadow as she moved across the hall. He smiled. If she did, he could creep up behind her, put his hand over her mouth and she would be in his power. It had been so easy to overcome Finlay. The man had collapsed at his feet. He hadn’t decided yet what to do with him. Whatever it was, it would be a delicious moment. How April would have loved it. To have her idol at her feet. But then, he reflected, perhaps she wouldn’t. It would have spoiled her image of him as a shiny, cheery chap always surrounded by lovely food and pretty pots of herbs when in fact he had shown himself to be a stupid, scared, fat man who had probably wet himself by now. He sneered at the thought. He was almost disappointed when he heard Mal tell Ruth not to bother going upstairs.
He sat down to wait as they put on their coats and opened the front door, then he stood up and ran down the first flight of stairs. He could still smell the candle they had used downstairs.
Unable to resist making a detour into Ruth’s bedroom, he opened the door to find all her personal stuff had gone since he had last been there. The bed had been made, the bedspread pulled over it smoothly. On the bedside table was a little old-fashioned travelling clock and an almost empty box of tissues. He was about to move on when he spotted, half-hidden by the box, a set of keys. He stared at them for a second then grabbed them. These had to be the keys to Number 26. In her rush to pack and move out, she had overlooked them. He felt an enormous leap of excitement as he shoved them into his pocket. He was almost home.
Timothy was heading for the door when he heard a voice close behind him.
That’s her bed. If you can’t have her, don’t you want to lie down there; pleasure yourself?
He spun round, shocked. ‘Who’s that? What do you want?’ The room was empty but he could sense the presence of someone near him, feel him, smell him. He felt his skin crawl. His hands grew clammy as he backed towards the door.
You and I could get along.
The presence was nearer now, overpoweringly close, but he couldn’t see anyone there. He took another step back. ‘Go away!’ He put up his hands to ward off the voice.
Alike as two peas in a pod, you and I. I think we’ll suit nicely.
There were hands on him now, feeling him, clutching at his biceps and then dropping to grab his crotch.
Timothy let out a howl of rage and fled out onto the landing and down the stairs, taking the last three steps in one leap. He ran for the front door and somehow managed to drag it open. As he flung himself down the steps he heard the alarm go off, wailing deafeningly behind him.
The four-by-four had gone. There was no one there. He ran as fast as his legs could carry him for the drive and then on up the lane, careless of who might see him, stumbling in the dark, splashing through puddles. At the main road he pushed through a gap in a hedge and across someone’s garden, into some kind of copse. There, he collapsed, gasping for breath, unable to run another step.
As he huddled onto the ground, his head cradled in his arms, he heard the sound of ugly laughter ringing in his ears. Whoever, whatever, had touched him in the Old Mill House had come with him.
Malcolm was studying Max’s tablet. He was silent, intently scrutinising it, then he handed it back without a word.
‘What?’ Ruth said anxiously. ‘What’s happened?’
‘Show her,’ Malcolm said.
Max leaned forward and handed it to her. She looked at the line of tweets and the colour drained from her face. ‘Oh, Malcolm! RuthieD. That’s not me. You do know, that’s not me!’
It was Fin’s turn to hold out his hand and she passed it on to him. He glanced at it then he looked at them all in turn. ‘Of course it’s not you,’ he said. ‘But it’s someone who knows you. It’s Harriet.’
&nb
‘If it is her, it’s my fault,’ Malcolm said. ‘I didn’t realise how hurt she still was.’
Ruth was chewing her lip miserably and he leaned towards her. ‘Don’t look so upset. None of this is your doing.’
‘Oh but it is!’ she flashed back at him. ‘Me and my big mouth. If only I hadn’t told her. I never dreamed—’ She rubbed her face again. ‘You told me not to tell anyone.’
‘Need this necessarily be bad?’ Fin put in. He glanced from Malcolm to Max. ‘Isn’t all publicity good publicity, if you handle it right?’
Max nodded slowly. ‘I think you’re right. There is no point in trying to stuff the cat back in the bag. All the history snobs are having far too much fun to let this drop.’ It wasn’t the original tweets that were so bad, it was the vicious enthusiasm with which other people had piled in with their scornful ridicule. ‘I think we should maintain a dignified silence for a while, then Malcolm can put out a suitably amused response.’
‘Amused?’ Malcolm raised an eyebrow.
Max nodded again. ‘The reviews from your esteemed colleagues over the years, Mal, are evidence enough that your work is sound. If those same people jump on the bandwagon to diss you, they are going to be admitting that they have made huge mistakes in judging your books; that they couldn’t spot hokum when they saw it. Admit your interest in the paranormal, ask why it should prove so amusing to RuthieD’ – he shook his head at the name – ‘who obviously doesn’t realise it’s a serious subject with a chair at the university. Then wish her well.’
Malcolm smiled uneasily. ‘So, we leave it for a while and let the hordes claw me to pieces?’
‘They are condemning themselves, no one else. Max is right. That’s a good call,’ Fin said.