Chapter 21: The Scene of the Crime
I took my phone from my ear. What was happening? Was I going mad? Where was I? Was I in London at all?
I stared into the distance, trying to make out the dirty grey line of the Thames. I could discern nothing to make me question my own sanity, so what was going on? Had Morgan got to Eddy’s mind as well as my mother’s? I narrowed my eyes, Eddy had expressed no fear of that himself and I had assumed he had a different category of mental strength to Mum. But maybe we had both underestimated Morgan.
Eddy’s voice squeaked from the phone. I put it back to my ear. “Eddy, there’s something seriously wrong here. I think your mind is being played with. I think she got to you as well.”
“What do you mean?”
“I mean...” I slowed my voice down, as if speaking to a child. “I mean, I’m in London and I never left. You imagined it.”
Yet again a long pause. “You didn’t come back late last night, then get on the first train this morning?”
I frowned. “God, no. That would be exhausting.”
“Well, yeah. That’s what I thought, but...” His voice warmed with relief. “So we really didn’t do it? I must have been even drunker than I thought. I could have sworn...”
“Eddy,” I interrupted him with a sudden brainwave. “Maybe, maybe somebody spiked your drink. That could make you have weird dreams.”
“You’re right. The Orkney Lot. John Owen was talking about how Camelot are cheats and I shouldn’t be the head. Maybe they wanted to get me in trouble. They could say I was on drugs or something.”
“There you are.” My vision of him and me in the bathroom made sense now. I must have somehow connected to his fantasy, or whatever it was. “So, you dreamed, or hallucinated about me?” A smile lurked around my lips and coloured my voice.
“Yeah, I guess.” He still sounded doubtful. “I’m glad we’ve got that sorted though. I’m at school, would it be okay if I phoned you back later?”
“Alright, and Eddy, be careful. There might still be some of whatever drug it was in your system. Don’t...” I tried to think of appropriate advice. “Don’t go near busy roads.”
A smiled warmed his voice. “Okay Maddie. Bye.”
I shut my phone off and grinned as I put it down. Okay, somebody had tried to drug him, but still, he had hallucinated about me. That had to mean he really liked me.
I picked the sketch pad up and moved on to the nearer, old fashioned tower blocks. A clock chimed somewhere and I considered making another cup of tea.
In the kitchen I realised what had been causing my restlessness and went back to retrieve my phone. I reread Sarah’s message: “U R so rock and roll! Hope the trip went ok! xxx”
Rock and roll. What could I have done that was rock and roll? I decided to speak to Sarah, and planned my wording carefully, so it could be interpreted a few ways, without me sounding like a crazy person.
“Hey Sarah.”
“Oh Hi Maddie, oh how are you, you poor thing? You must be so tired. I’m sorry I’ve really got no time to talk, I should be in maths like five minutes ago.”
“Okay, I was just going to ask about last night...”
“Of course, wasn’t the party amazing?”
“Well I suppose...”
“What do you mean you suppose? I thought you were having a brilliant time. You seemed to be. You said you didn’t like parties, you little liar. You’re a party animal I should have known. What time did you stay till, in the end? Did you sleep at all anywhere?”
I crunched my eyes tightly shut, trying to work out what had happened. The hallucination theory was obviously off. Impossible to think Eddy and Sarah both had their drinks spiked and both dreamed they had seen me at the party.
“Maddie? Are you still there?”
I cleared my throat. “Yeah, sorry Sarah, I just realised I got to go. See you soon yeah?”
“Oh my gosh, yes, and when you do you’re going to tell me all about-”
I cut her off. For somebody with no time to talk she had a lot to say.
I didn’t want to think about what had happened at the Hechters’ mansion the night before. I blocked it out of my mind. I knew that if I thought about it I would just curl up in a ball on the floor and cry and puke until Dora and Tom came home. And I couldn’t imagine anything they could do to make me stop.
So I got dressed, packed my bag, wrote them a hurried note and left their apartment. I had to get back to Somerset. Everything going on there was too weird and dangerous, and I had to be near enough to help Mum if she needed it. Eddy seemed so capable and in charge, but now I realised he was way out of his depth. I couldn’t trust him to look after himself, let alone Mum.
The tube rumbled through north London and I watched the other passengers out of the corner of my eye. I remembered when I used to ride the tube all the time and I was just like them. A perfectly normal girl, with perfectly normal problems. I should never have left London. Now I was a crazy lady of a non-existent lake and a thousand year old witch was sending my mother insane and doing heaven knows what to the boy I loved. I blinked and blocked my mind to the thought.
Standing on the bustling concourse of Paddington Station I called Eddy and told him I was coming back. As I knew he would, he tried to persuade me not to return, but I stayed clipped and certain in my determination.
The train to the West Country had just arrived from Bristol, and under my seat I found a copy of the Western Daily Press. I concentrated hard on every detail of its small town news, reading about Christmas dinners, late night shopping, and the competition for most imaginative seasonal window display. I focused on the stories of ordinary people, with normal lives. Half way through the newspaper I found an article that made me pause and narrow my eyes. I read it twice, then sat back and looked out the window.
The archaeologists digging up the tomb of the Byzantine knight had reported a theft from their excavation. In the morning, two days previously, they had arrived at their site to continue cataloguing the contents of the great stone coffin, only to find it completely empty. They had already removed some small pieces of gold and silver jewellery and a tarnished sword. All that remained was armour and the skeleton inside it, but both had gone. The archaeologists were helping police with their enquiries, but suspected a professional theft commissioned by a collector somewhere.
I shivered, and hoped I didn’t know better.
In Weston Eddy met me at the station. “Maddie.” He half raised his arms, as if to give me a hug, but I shot him down with a glare. “Um, are you okay?”
“To be honest Eddy, no.”
“What’s wrong?”
I half turned away from him. “Eddy, we need to go somewhere and talk.”
“What about?”
“You’ll see.”
I led him down an avenue of guest houses and old people’s homes, and we stopped at the first cafe we came to: ‘The Coffee Pot.’
Inside, the smell of grease and instant coffee assailed my nostrils. A warm fug filled the cafe and steamed up the windows. We sat down beside a wall paneled with wood effect plastic and ordered tea.
“So.” Eddy had had time to prepare his face. He had a politician’s uncanny ability to present surface calm and confidence. “What is it?” He spread his ravaged hands.
“Eddy. Something horrible has happened. I’ve learned how to use water to see other places, where water is. I can use water networks like, like closed circuit TV.” My gaze roamed the table surface as I spoke. “I saw what happened in your bathroom last night. I thought it was my imagination, but somebody looking like me was really at the party. Sarah spoke to her.”
“Morgan.” All colour left Eddy’s face. “She made herself look like you.” Muscles jumped in his jaw and for a moment I again saw the expression of a much older man. “Oh heaven help us now, because no one else can.” His voice knotted harshly and seemed edged with grief.
“What do you mean?” My anger and sadness at him, an
d how that creature had beaten me to his youth and intimacy, everything seemed overshadowed by his mountainous emotion.
He jabbed a finger at me. “All your laughing at fate. Your grand boasts about free will, and talent. This is what I get. This, all over again.”
My jaw dropped. “Again?”
Eddy sneered at me. “Off course again. I thought you had read your myths and legends? The first time this happened I was older. But it went down more or less the same. She seduces me into starting off a process that’s going to lead to my downfall.” He stood up and his frail chair clattered to the floor. “One thing will be different this time. This time I won’t make the same mistake. I won’t let the boy live. There’s not going to be a second Mordred to ruin me.”
I dug my nails into the palms of my hands to try and keep myself from fainting. “You’re going to kill your own child?”