Josh nodded his head towards the caravan. ‘He’s been living in there.’
His grip tightened on Amber’s upper arm when she felt her knees sag. Within her vision, the grass, stone walls, a distant copse of trees in the field’s corners, and the blue, cloudless sky all shifted around her, swooped slightly, and then settled. She clutched Josh’s arms until the strength returned to her legs. ‘Here? You sure?’ Her voice was little more than a whisper.
Josh nodded.
They stood side by side in a sloping field used for grazing sheep. A cold wind crawled over the northern wall, picked up and batted Amber’s hair about. Towards the southern edge of the pasture a collection of grubby sheep chewed the thick, dark grass that grew close to the stone wall separating the bottom of the field from another beyond. The herd was aware of their presence but not alarmed.
Partially covered by an unruly hedgerow, in the northwestern corner of the field, a small, heavily discoloured, orange and white caravan slouched into a corner. From a distance, Amber could see that the edges of the visible panels were water damaged and part sprung from the frame. The exterior surface of every panel was long rusted, green with mildew and stained brown at the corners.
As they approached she saw that one tyre was flat and the short drawbar that projected from the chassis flaked rust. Three dirty windows at the front of the caravan were visible, and another two at the side. Around each window condensation obscured most of the shadowy interior, and the black rubber seals around the glass panes were crumbling. Through two of the windows at the front, purple bedding had been squashed against the filthy glass, as if stuffed there to block out the light or prevent anyone from seeing inside.
Amber had met Josh at Pit Wood and followed his car to the field; the caravan was within two miles of her farmhouse. She and Josh had embraced swiftly in greeting, and Josh had cupped the back of her head to whisper, ‘Sorry, kid. I’m so sorry. You were right.’
She had never wanted to be right, and said, ‘Don’t be. Please.’ Though Amber had stopped short of explaining that Fergal had been outside her house, stood on the patio and staring into the living room the night before, because she had begun to believe that Fergal had not been present on her property in any form or manner that Josh would ever accept or understand. But how could he be alive? She’d shot through the window at where he had been standing. And he had also moved with an impossible rapidity from the lawn in the night. She had seen him below, and then he had vanished.
‘Come on. I’ll explain when we get there,’ Josh had said, as he released Amber from the bear hug. ‘The police will have to be notified soon. And before the news breaks we’ll need to get you stowed somewhere safe. If I am right about this, it’ll make headlines. Not the kind you’ll want on your bloody doorstep either.’
They’d parked their cars, bumper to bumper, in the inlet by the road-facing gate of the field containing the caravan. Before they left the cars, Josh asked Amber to give him the gun. He let her keep the pepper spray and winked as he said, ‘He’s not here, so you won’t need that. But if you do, remember to point it towards the enemy.’ Josh helped Amber climb over the gate, and led her inside the northern wall and across the grass to the stained and derelict caravan. Only part of its roof was visible from the lane that bordered the field, and only then if you were looking hard for something; otherwise, the vehicle was invisible unless its spectators were inside the field. A good place to hide. A good place to wait.
Josh sighed. ‘Caravan belongs to the farmer. Seasonal labourers once used it, but not for a few years. Our man stayed there for a while until the farmer realized he had a squatter. He thinks Fergal broke in sometime during the winter.’
Amber turned to Josh in surprise and confusion. Josh rolled his eyes and nodded. ‘I have no idea how he knew you were coming here either. But he knew you were coming to Devon, and near Grammarcombe Wood specifically, so he installed himself in this old caravan months before you came back to settle down. To await your arrival.’
Josh blinked rapidly, clearly perturbed by the implications of his discovery. ‘I just don’t get it. How could he have known? The master builder, the head designer, the architect – they didn’t recognize you. Your appearance had changed too much when you met them. And that was what, nearly a year ago? Nine months, right? But even if one of the contractors recognized you, then how did Fergal Donegal hear about it? I just don’t understand. How did one of the contractors get the information to Fergal? Not to mention why they would tell him. A third party? A go between? Maybe. It’s unlikely the information was passed on in any other way. Unless…’
Amber touched his hand. ‘Josh.’
‘Your barrister, your agent, I need to talk to them both. See if they’ve been hacked. Though who would Fergal Donegal know who could do that?’
‘Josh … Josh.’
He broke from his reverie and looked at her.
‘That’s not how he found me.’
Josh sighed, then opened his mouth to cut her off before she mentioned what he feared.
‘Please, Josh. Listen. He didn’t need to be told I was coming here. She knew.’
‘She? Amber, I’d rather you didn’t go there—’
‘I saw them. Last night.’
Josh looked at her as if she was a stranger that had come up to him in a crowd.
‘He’s been outside the house for days. Fergal. Getting closer. He wanted to show himself to me. Torment me. Drive me out of my mind with fear. That’s how they controlled us at number eighty-two. And he was carrying her last night so that he could show her to me.’ Introduce me, she nearly said, but the thought of actual contact was too hideous to contemplate. She dropped her voice and said to herself, ‘He was her black oxen. That drew her wagon hither.’
Josh frowned. For a few seconds he was unable to speak. ‘You saw him. Him. Fergal. Last night. You never—’
‘It probably wouldn’t have made any bloody difference who I called. I don’t think anyone would have seen him. No one but me.’
‘Amber, now look—’
‘Josh. He was there, standing on the patio, and as real as you are right now. It was no illusion. And he was holding her. Her. His Black Maggie. I fired at him. Broke the window. But there was no one outside.’
Josh swallowed. In his eyes she could see bafflement and the usual concern, a belief that she was delusional, perhaps insane. But mixed in with his shock was an anxiety that she might even be right.
‘Come on. Let me show you inside,’ Josh said, to break the silence that settled thickly between them.
Amber didn’t follow.
Josh paused. ‘You’re safe. It’s OK. He’s long gone.’
Now it was her turn to have doubts. ‘How can you be sure he was here?’
Josh sighed and looked at the sky. ‘After we met, last time, well, I came back. And stuck around while you were in Plymouth. You seemed pretty convinced he was here. I couldn’t see how that was possible, but you were so bloody frightened. And I felt I owed you some peace of mind. So I came back and made a few enquiries. Random ones, really. And a few things turned up…’ Josh paused to squint and stare into the distance.
‘What? For fuck’s sake, what turned up?’
‘Break-ins, three bloody breaks-in. At your farmhouse. When it was still a building project. The builders should have reported it to you, but never did, because nothing was taken.’
‘I don’t understand.’
‘Someone broke into the building – your farmhouse – when it was a construction site. So I checked with the local fuzz about any similar cases round here. And there were a few. Maybe not connected, but all occurring at the same time. Food. Someone had been stealing food. Sheets had been pinched from washing lines. Nothing valuable. Some stuff from sheds. No money, no white goods. Basic stuff from gardens, from the back of shops. Milk off doorsteps. Like someone was scratching out an existence round here. Nothing major, nothing too obvious, nothing serious to attract much attention. So I made some calls and visited a few of the people who’d reported the thefts. And I found an eye witness. Someone saw Fergal. The guy who owns this field saw the bastard, which led me down here. I caught up with the farmer a few fields that way’ – Josh nodded to the west – ‘as he started work this morning. So I checked the caravan out and called you.’
‘Saw him? He actually saw him?’
‘His description matched. He disturbed Fergal right here, one evening after Christmas. And he watched the bugger run away from this,’ Josh stabbed a forefinger at the caravan. ‘Didn’t go after him because he said there was something not right about the guy. Said he was black with dirt, filthy. Worse than any tramp he’d ever seen. Reminded him of a coal miner, or some escaped convict from a film. Couldn’t believe his eyes when this lanky figure just streaked out of the caravan and legged it. But he did see his face, or what was left of it on one side.’ Josh shook his head in disbelief. ‘Same height, nearly seven foot. Gangly, face all messed up.’ He paused to wince. ‘Was pretty sure he only had one eye too. But he was alive, Amber. The prick was still alive and down here around the same time you signed the contract on that farmhouse.’
Josh nodded at the caravan. ‘The farmer showed me inside this morning. Lucky for us, he hadn’t got round to clearing the place out. Couldn’t face it. He just padlocked it after Fergal took off. Keeps meaning to have it hauled away as scrap. Fergal never came back once he’d been rumbled. He’s pretty sure about that. Come on.’ Josh walked quickly to the caravan. ‘It’s still unlocked. I told the farmer I’d call him when we were done. But I didn’t tell him a murderer on the run had been kipping in his field last winter.’
Amber felt as if a slow-acting drug was taking effect on her body and mind as Josh explained how he’d made the connection between Fergal and the caravan. Now she felt breathless and almost too weak to follow her protector through the long dewy grass. ‘God. Oh, God,’ was all she could manage by way of a response, as she walked in a daze up to the dented and stained door.
In her vague and formless thoughts, some kind of resolution, some answer, was trying to suggest itself to her, but her notions and ideas and guesses still made no sense. If he had been here, then maybe he was alive, and still hiding out locally, close to her home. But that didn’t explain why she had been unable to see him that morning after she discharged the weapon. Or the couple of times she had seen him outside, at the back of the house. It was like he’d just disappeared on each occassion. ‘I don’t understand,’ she said to herself more than Josh.
‘Makes two of us,’ he said over his shoulder, and then opened the caravan door.
‘Careful, Josh, don’t,’ Amber said, when he poked his head and shoulders inside the murk. Josh’s hands supported his weight on the outside of the door, and he used the strength in his arms to haul his head away moments later, one forearm immediately under his nose.
Amber shrieked. ‘What? Josh, what?’
‘The smell. Not the kind you get used to. We can’t go inside anyway. It’s evidence, or will be very soon. But you can see enough from the doorway. You can see how that pig lived in there.’
‘I … I don’t want to.’ She felt sick, and was sure she could smell the sebaceous, oily stench of Fergal’s clothes around her in the field, like a malevolent spirit released from its tomb; the same bestial spoor she had withered before in the dim sinuses of Edgehill Road.
‘Been treating his face with something. Couldn’t have healed properly. Those bandages look nasty. Milk’s gone off too. Toilet’s backed up. He literally lived in garbage. It’s all over the floor. Knee deep. Bet the bastard never opened a window either…’ Josh’s commentary on what he could see inside the dismal pall of the caravan’s interior, muffled by the arm across his mouth, increased Amber’s nausea.
Josh turned away from the door, wincing. ‘Police will have to go through it. Poor sods.’
‘Is there … is there a box? A wooden box?’
‘Box?’
‘Like a cabinet. Can you see? With a curtain across the front? Can you see?’
Josh shook his head. ‘Just rubbish. Rot. Stained bedding. Like a landfill. I’ll tell the police to look for it. This is the box from number eighty-two?’
Amber nodded. She liked them dirty. Like Bennet. Like Fergal. Hadn’t Knacker said that? Deranged and subservient, depraved and sadistic, filthy; their flesh as corrupt as their minds, as spoiled as she was. Black Maggie.
Amber cast her eyes around the field, at the very grass, looking for disturbed earth. ‘Has anyone gone missing, Josh?’
‘Missing? Here?’
‘Girls.’
His eyes saddened as he fully understood the question. ‘No. Nothing like that.’
‘Not yet. We have to find her and the bastard that carried her down here.’
Josh frowned, unsure how to react. Amber didn’t care what he thought of her or her crazy ideas. She’d taken her lead from Josh for too long, as well as the police, legal firms, representatives of traditional authority and order, purveyors of reason. And they had failed; failed to protect and hide her. Because they had failed to see, and to understand what she had been telling them for years. And Fergal had been here, and he had brought the Black Maggie to Amber’s door, to resume the cycle of terror and torture and rape in service of the thing that once inhabited a house in Birmingham.
She had believed herself tainted three years before on the dirty linoleum of an abandoned kitchen; the connection between her and old Black Mag must have been exploited by some invisible, intangible, remote means that made no sense to anyone but her. It had known she had come to Devon, or maybe known she would come to Devon. And then her actual presence, when she had arrived to buy the house, had drawn it to a specific location. Maybe those old Friends of Light and the Bennets had also understood how such an influence upon the living was possible, before it was too late for them too. Amber Hare-was-Stephanie Booth was the foothold in new territory. Death became Black Mag; murder, sacrifice. And how high the corn would grow when maidens were laid beneath the green, green grass … But if Fergal had been near her home, with the box, all along … then maybe the resumption of her activity, her purpose, was largely dependent upon her physical presence. The Maggie had to be brought here, transported, carried to Devon. Which would make her range limited. Maybe she could sense Amber when close, could invade her senses, her mind, her sleep, at a psychic level undetectable to others. Maybe …
Amber lost her footing, her balance, and took several steps backwards to stay on her feet. ‘Jesus. Oh, Jesus Christ!’ She clutched her head from the impact of a sudden terrible idea inside her mind.
‘What? What is it?’ Josh moved across to her, held her elbows. ‘What is it, kid?’
Amber closed her eyes. Worried she might faint from the abrupt and horrible arrival of her most recent revelation, she drew one deep breath after another to steady herself. ‘I’m OK, Josh. I’m all right. Cars. Back to the cars. Now!’
‘Of course. Let me lock up.’
Josh walked off to seal the outlaw’s den with a padlock. Amber ran for her car, wiping at the tears on her pale cheeks.
Josh caught up with her by the gate. ‘I know this is hard…’
‘You got some more time for me, mate? Today?’
He nodded. ‘What did you have in mind?’
Amber inhaled deeply to ease the constriction squeezing her chest. ‘I think I know where they are.’