He sat up, shivering. He had never been all that keen on sex. The few times he had tried it, it had left him and his partner unsatisfied and let down and the last time he had failed entirely. He did not try again, but now he was desperate. He reached down to rub himself miserably.
Well, that’s not going to get us very far, is it. We need to go out and find someone.
Almost without realising what he was doing he was reaching for his clothes, opening his door and creeping along the landing. He paused, listening. He could hear April snoring. Quietly he tiptoed downstairs, opened the front door and stepped out into the ice-cold night.
The streets were deserted. He found the young woman, paralytically drunk, weaving about on the pavement three streets away. She didn’t fight him as he dragged her up into someone’s driveway, tore off her clothes and slammed her against a tree.
Good. That’s good. You see, you can do it. The voice was panting exultantly. Now, don’t hurt her. You don’t want a murder charge hanging over you. That’s what did for me. Give the lady back her clothes.
Somewhere a clock was chiming as he made his way back to the front door. He let himself in quietly. April was still snoring. Silently he climbed up to his bedroom and dropped on the bed. He slept at once.
In the morning he assumed it had all been a dream.
‘You’re looking very pleased with yourself.’ April was sitting at the kitchen table when he went downstairs. Her laptop was open in front of her. ‘Here. Take a look at this.’ She pushed it towards him.
He sat down opposite her and tried to focus. He was looking at a small castle. An ancient building, anyway, with several storeys, narrow windows and a moss-covered slate roof with a little turret. It stood against a background of cloud-swept hills. He scrolled down to the caption:
One of the ancient seats of a southern branch of the Douglas family, at present occupied by current laird, biographer and historian, Malcolm Douglas.
Timothy looked up at April triumphantly. ‘Bingo!’
‘As you say.’ She sat back smugly. ‘If that is where she is. Trouble is, we don’t have a car.’
‘That’s my department, I think. What would madam like this time? A Bentley? A Roller? A Ferrari perhaps?’
She reached over and punched his shoulder. ‘Anything that goes. We aren’t going to keep it for more than one journey.’
He did a double take. ‘What do you mean?’
‘Well, we aren’t going to hang around, are we. The police patrol up and down the road every few hours here, I’ve been watching. Whatever we do, it’ll have to be quick, then we’re on our way out of here, for good.’
68
Thomas smelt burning as soon as the shouts of the servants woke him. He leapt out of bed grabbing his dressing gown and opened the door. ‘The stables,’ Roberts shouted as he ran past him. The place was in uproar, all the servants awake now, Fanny and Margaret, wrapped in shawls, hurrying towards the front door, the dogs barking, one of the maids screaming hysterically.
Thomas ran outside and stood still for a moment in horror, seeing the flames licking out of the stable block. ‘The horses!’ he shouted. As the menservants streamed across the lawns to help he saw one of the grooms leading Ebony away from the building, then another with one of the carriage horses. There was a crash as a roof fell in in a fountain of sparks that seemed to reach the sky, then the sound of a horse screaming. Thomas grabbed a bucket and joined the chain of men pouring water on the flames but there was nothing they could do. It was dawn before the fire was out. Men had come from all over Hampstead and from the Kenwood estate to help. Exhausted, they gathered on the lawn as the morning light allowed them to view the scene. One end of the stables had gone completely. Two carriage horses had died and they had found Invincible on the floor of his loosebox at the end of the building. He was covered in blood. ‘His throat was cut, sir.’ The head groom had tears in his eyes as he and Thomas stood looking down at the little horse.
It was a moment before Thomas could speak. ‘The fire was deliberate then?’
The man nodded. ‘I fear so. I don’t understand. Who would do such a thing?’
Fanny had come up behind them. ‘Oh, Tom!’ She began to cry. She was still coughing from the smoke, exhausted, like them all. ‘Oh no.’ Behind them a crowd had gathered, looking down at the body of the pony.
They could find no clues as to who had done it. Thomas knew though. Somehow Andrew Farquhar was behind this atrocity. No bolts and locks or night watchmen could keep them safe from him. He had given away the obeah woman’s doll and the horses had paid the price.
By six o clock that evening Timothy and April were back at Number 26 having left the stolen car almost where Timothy had found it. The nearly full tank of petrol had put him in a good mood that morning; the realisation that the Tower House was an impregnable fortress depressed him totally. No one appeared to be at home. There was a muddy Land Rover parked in front of the house, but it didn’t look as if it would go very far and the old outbuildings that might have served as garages were deserted; the woodland was forbidding, as were the surrounding shadowy hills. After a cursory tour of the place from the shelter of the trees, they climbed back in the car, disgruntled. ‘If she’s there, she’s safe, from you at least,’ April said dismissively as they set off towards Edinburgh. ‘Forget her, Tim. She’s not worth it. There will always be others.’
‘Others?’ He ground the gears and swore. He’d be lucky if the engine lasted till they got back to civilisation.
‘Other people to scam. Other houses. Other hoards of jewellery.’
He did not reply. His teeth gritted, he set the reluctant car at another of the interminable lonely hills. What a place to live!
‘Other fascinating women,’ she added with a snide smile.
He didn’t bother to answer.
The voice waited until late that night when April was asleep, before pestering him again.
Don’t tell me you didn’t enjoy it. A woman in your power. The excitement, the passion, the raw smell of her, the screams. Do it again now. We’ll find someone easily.
He sat on the edge of his bed, rocking backwards and forwards, feeling the urge building somewhere deep in the pit of his stomach. He looked at his watch. Eleven. It was too soon. There would be too many people about.
He hadn’t given yesterday’s young woman much thought at all. At first he had thought it was a dream but then he had begun to wonder. The voice had convinced him. She was probably too drunk to remember what had happened, it said. He hadn’t hurt her, or done anything a dozen men hadn’t done to her before. And this time he would be better at it, he would prolong the glorious rush of excitement and exultation. The voice in his head, whoever, whatever, it was, was an experienced teacher.
Come on. What are you waiting for?
The voice was getting impatient; desperate.
He found this girl on her own doorstep, fumbling to get her key into the lock. She was trying to juggle her handbag with a tote full of books, a student then, with clean shiny hair and stylish wedged shoes and pretty clothes. He didn’t give himself time to think. Creeping up behind her he had his hand over her mouth and dragged her into the bushes in seconds. This girl fought. She fought tooth and nail, but he overpowered her in the end, panting in triumph as he forced himself into her. The exultant cry he let out as he fell away, exhausted, was not his own voice. He dragged himself to his feet and ran for it, leaving her lying on the ground. He didn’t wait to see if she was all right. He didn’t give her another thought.
* * *
SERIAL RAPIST STRIKES AGAIN
It was headline news.
Timothy had slept late; when he went downstairs April had been out to buy food and a newspaper. She pushed it towards him without a word.
DNA testing on the first victim confirms a link to a violent attack on celebrity chef, Finlay Macdermott, in Cramond. Police report that another vicious attack on a student as she returned to her digs in Bruntsfield
last night was almost certainly by the same man. The girl, nineteen, is recovering in hospital this morning, being comforted by her parents and her boyfriend. Police warned that this man’s violence is escalating. They are telling people to lock their doors and advising women not to walk in the streets alone at night until he is caught.
‘Perhaps you would like to explain?’ April’s ice-cold voice cut through his thoughts as he pushed the paper away.
‘What do you mean?’ He looked up and held her gaze.
It had all been a dream. When he woke this morning he knew it was a dream.
‘What do you think I mean? Where did you get those scratches?’ There was one across his face, another on his wrist. He had stared at them in the mirror this morning and wondered how he got them.
‘I don’t know,’ he said. His bewilderment was real.
The voice was silent.
Malcolm had seen the movement in the trees from the window the day before, as he had gone down to the kitchen to make coffee.
‘Ruth!’ he called up the stairs. ‘Come and see this.’
They had watched April and Timothy scouting round the house, saw Timothy run across the open ground to try the front door, and saw him immediately scurry back to where his sister waited in the trees. ‘So, we can assume they are tracking us through the bloody social media,’ Malcolm said thoughtfully. ‘I wonder if there is something we can put out there to throw them off the scent. Fight them in their own swamp.’
Ruth gave a reluctant smile. ‘I thought I was safe here.’
‘You are safe here.’ He put his arms round her. ‘Look, they’re heading back towards the road. Ring the police. I want to see where they’re going.’
Making her lock herself in, he followed them soundlessly back towards their car, saw Timothy hot-wiring the engine, watched April climb in with a final look over her shoulder. He waited till they had driven out of sight before he went back indoors.
The police had not come round until the following morning. Their faces were grave. ‘Unfortunately we missed them yesterday. He returned the car to the same car park he stole it from and no one spotted them.’ Jack Jordan pursed his lips. ‘We didn’t join the dots. Vehicle theft is not a priority these days but this man is. His violence is becoming more and more marked. Two rapes in two days, the second far more vicious than the first. We have to catch him.’
‘I can’t believe Timothy’s a rapist,’ Ruth shuddered. ‘He is a nasty, creepy little man, but it just doesn’t sound like him. He’s greedy and he’s a swindler, but rape?’
‘There’s no mistake,’ Jordan confirmed. ‘At least, not in the first case. We don’t have results yet from the second, but from the victim’s description it’s the same man. He wasn’t masked. He made no attempt to hide his face.’
When the police had gone, she brought her books downstairs to be near Mal while he chopped onions. They were taking turns at cooking their meals.
‘I can’t believe Tim has turned into a vicious rapist.’
‘I can.’ Malcolm pursed his lips. On the stove behind them the onions sweated gently in a heavy pan. ‘He’s repressed, he’s a failure. No woman would ever find him attractive. What has he to lose?’
‘I’ve always wondered if his sister is the brains behind their schemes,’ Ruth said thoughtfully. ‘And she could be the one behind the tweets.’ She paused. ‘But this violence just doesn’t seem like him. Unless. You don’t think …’ she hesitated. ‘Tim was in the Old Mill House when we summoned Farquhar. Is it possible …?’ She paused again.
‘That Farquhar possessed him?’ Malcolm finished the sentence for her. ‘If I’m honest, I’ve been wondering about that. We summoned Farquhar and we were protected, I made sure of that, but Timothy is without boundaries. He’s weak and who knows what suppressed lusts the man has.’ He paced slowly across the floor and back. ‘Possession is the stuff of horror movies, but it can and does happen. Even if that theory’s true, though, there’s no way of proving it or doing anything about it until he’s caught, and then it would be a matter for police psychiatrists.’
Ruth shuddered. ‘You don’t think the Bradfords have gone back to the Old Mill House?’
‘Not if they know what’s good for them. I gather Lachy and his brother are a formidable team. And the policeman said they’re making regular patrols past Number 26 in case he goes there.’
‘When I think of all the nights I spent under the same roof as him!’
‘Don’t think about it. They’re going to catch him very soon and when they do they’ll throw away the key. You’ll never have to worry about him again.’
‘And meanwhile, what do I do? Stay here?’
‘Rapunzel, at the top of her tower.’ He came over, drew her to him gently and kissed the top of her head. ‘It means you’re safe. And perhaps we’ll find a Lachy of our own for backup. If it comes to it, it would be interesting to find out how quickly the laird can raise an army to defend his lady.’
‘Am I your lady?’ She felt a warm glow pushing away her unease.
‘Oh yes.’
‘An army sounds impressive.’
‘Well, we’ll have to see about that. It may consist of a team of old codgers from the pub, but they are a loyal bunch round here. They adored my mother and though I’m not so good at baking for the WI I think they would be there for me if I called.’
‘And they wouldn’t mind your new reputation for being a sorcerer?’
He laughed. ‘It was from my mother I inherited the gift.’
‘I’m glad you think of it as a gift still, and not a curse.’ She put her arms round his neck. ‘And, for the record, I feel safer here than I have felt anywhere for a long time.’
Thomas
The sennachie taught me once how to create a secure space. I only half listened at the time but I remembered now, at Evergreen Hill, visualising the ring of light around the garden, the trees, the lawns, the stables where already the builders were at work, the coach house and the house itself. This place would be inviolate.
But I couldn’t do it at Lincoln’s Inn. Too many strangers came and went in the house there who needed to be made welcome and it was there that I heard the voice again, laughing, always laughing. ‘You miss the pony then? Did I make your children cry?’ And when, frozen with horror, I looked around, there was nothing to see but shadows, movements at the corner of my eye and that voice in the distance, that mocking laugh.
One place he never came was the country church I had discovered once by accident. I would ride there alone, or with a groom who would wait with the horses outside and I would sit quietly in the front pew. It was there I learned to contact my ancestors and speak in prayer to God. The sennachie had told me my teacher would come and in this dusty little church with its murky stained glass and its shadows and its cobwebs I found the ability to pray. Perhaps that was what he had meant.
Davy and his American wife, Caddy, presented us with our first grandson, named Thomas in my honour, and then, only a few months later, Frances and Samuel produced their first son, another Thomas. It should have been a time of joy but both times Farquhar came to torment me, reminding me that through my fault, or so he claimed, he had no children. It was then he made his most chilling threat of all. That he would pursue my children and my grandchildren, and their descendants, for generations to come.
Then he tried to kill me.
As I walked along Pall Mall towards Carlton House to a meeting with the Prince of Wales, a hand at my back pushed me violently in front of a coach and four as it trotted swiftly down the road. I stumbled and managed to find my feet in time as the driver reined in the horses, swearing. I knew who had done it. No living being had been near me, at least not near enough to push me. I stood there, at the edge of the road, as the crowds parted to walk past me, the incident forgotten immediately by those who had witnessed it. People were being knocked down in the road all the time; some were lucky and lived to tell the tale, others were maimed or killed; they were pic
ked up and taken away and a bucket of sand was thrown down to absorb the blood. I had been lucky. This time.
Only minutes later as the doors to Carlton House opened I was swept into the noisy, jovial presence chamber to greet my friends and tell them about my recent trip to France. I had taken the opportunity while the courts weren’t sitting to visit Paris to meet the first consul, Napoleon Bonaparte. I did not trust the man and did not like him. Later I learned that the feeling had been mutual. I told the story as a joke to make Prinny and Charles Fox laugh. It was no longer a joke when my suspicions were proved right and Napoleon declared himself emperor and openly prepared for war.
69
With the threat of invasion by France, regiments of militia were set up all over the country. Two in London were made up of lawyers and Thomas, as a former soldier, found himself colonel of the Temple Corps. When he told the king his troops were all lawyers, the king replied drily that they ought, in that case, be called the Devil’s Own. The name stuck.
It was hard to concentrate on his cases when, beside the threat of war, personal news of loss and despair came thick and fast. Letters from Edinburgh told of the death of his brother Harry’s wife, then in October their sister Anne died. He was stunned. He had grown used to consulting her on all manner of problems, regarding her advice as a rock upon which he could lean. The eldest of them all, she was so like their mother in many ways he found it hard to grasp the fact that she had gone.
‘She will go on watching over you, my darling,’ Fanny reassured him. She took his hand and gave it a gentle squeeze. ‘You above all people must know that.’
‘Unless her faith precludes her from returning.’ He pulled off his jacket and threw it down, walking across to the fireplace. ‘She quoted the book of Deuteronomy at me once, saying that to talk to spirits was an abomination. She’s hardly likely to return to speak to me and risk putting my soul in jeopardy as well as her own.’