CHAPTER 11

There was a rush of questions from the Rayboulds and Bill Ainsley, and Jerry had the heady pleasure of providing information.

“As I see it, there’s three distinct elements in the situation. First, there’s the legend. The tale of the Brindleys being carried into Hag Hole. Mr. Raybould, is that all you know of the Brindleys? Have you heard anything else?”

“I told you all as I ’eard. There’s Mrs. Starkie, who’s over ninety, as knows all about the tales—she says Lord Titus went out with all of ’is relatives and they danced themselves right into the ’Ole—the lot gone, just like that! Every last one on ’em, father, son—”

“—and Grandfather Brindley with the beast’s foot,” said Jerry. “He’d have a club foot, or maybe he was born with six toes or webbed feet. There’d be a reason for the detail—there’s always truth somewhere. And that’s all?”

“Devil took ’em!”

“Old wives’ tale,” said Mrs. Raybould, without conviction. “Hc goes boozing and comes back talking a load of rubbish.”

“You said it was all rubbish too,” Bill Ainsley said.

“So I did,” said Jerry. “But I hadn’t seen what Brenda was up to. Not then. She’s the second strand. Bill, doesn’t it strike you that she’s always around when there’s some nasty business?”

Bill shrugged. “She’s just a slag.”

“She’s all of that!” Mrs. Raybould snorted. “And you encouraging her!”

“Let’s keep calm, shall we?” ordered Jerry. “Now, Mr. Raybould, what do you make of that coalscuttle? It came from the cellars, you say?”

“Aye. When we were clearing out the rubble, it were dug up. It’s been lying around years. I only brought it up this summer.”

“And Brenda likes it—she’s always stroking it,” said Jerry. “Don’t you see, something about the engravings has something to do with the other thing?”

“What other thing?” asked Bill.

“Why, Lord Titus and his club foot!” Jerry said. “And now things start to happen again, just when Brenda’s here! There’s always been the Walpurgisnacht element—the bomber coming down, the Boy Scouts getting lost, the lieutenant losing his way. Always on May Day Eve!”

“And you saw the bodies down there,” said Bill Ainsley. He pointed towards the cellar. “You reckon Brenda’s been in the tunnel?”

“No,” said Jerry. “But we know she wants to.”

“How?”

Jerry realised that he hadn’t told Bill Ainsley of Brenda’s excursion with Sam Raybould. Mrs. Raybould was stonily silent, so it was left to her husband to explain.

“She saw the cellar,” said Raybould. “I sent her to get coal.”

“Coal!” spat Mrs. Raybould. “It wasn’t coal she was after!”

“Oh,” Bill said. It was clear that he understood.

“While you were out at lorry,” Raybould added.

“So she went down,” said Bill Ainsley. “You reckon she’s after something?”

“I’m glad I don’t know,” said Jerry seriously. “The three things go together: this eighteenth-century Satanist, Lord Titus Brindley; Brenda and what she’s up to; and those poor creatures who ended up in Hag Hole.”

“So what do you make of it all?” asked Bill.

“Nothing!” said Mrs. Raybould. “Just a parcel of silly lasses! No one goes down there! Not till the thaw comes!”

“I couldn’t agree more,” said Jerry. “The safest thing we can do is to stay together until all this is over, and keep well away from the cellar.”

“You must have your own notion of what it’s all about,” persisted Bill.

“I’d be guessing,” said Jerry. “Id want some evidence before committing myself.” His fingers shook as he picked up the old volume. “This is evidence.”

“It’s only an old book,” said Mrs. Raybould.

“It’s more,” said Jerry, slitting through the rotting leather, so that the corroded hasp fell away. “It’s some sort of journal.”

With growing excitement, he turned to the flyleaf. The paper was damp, but it had not yet begun to pulp. The writing was neat, large and elaborate, an educated man’s copperplate hand; the ink had run, but not much.

“‘Alfred Douglas Davenant,” Jerry read aloud. “‘Gentleman and Antiquarist.’ It’s his journal! Antiquarist!” he said impatiently, looking up to see the bewilderment of the others. “That’s the nineteenth century term for archaeologist and historian! And a confounded nuisance they were! They broke into barrows and destroyed important things—they were only treasure-seekers really! Usually country squires who’d read a bit about the finding of Pompeii and hoped for a few bits of gold, or a statue for the garden!”

“Gold?” said Raybould.

“What does it say?” asked Bill Ainsley.

“Don’t interrupt,” said Jerry abstractedly. “It’s not easy. The damp’s blurred the ink right through—but it’s certainly a diary. See!” He found unmarked pages and turned the mouldly pages back. “‘The Twenty-Eighth Day of April, 1827’—that’s the most recent entry. He turned more pages back. “Here, see!” Jerry said, pointing to the stained page he had read from. “Look—‘so I duly paid the woman for her trouble and set off to inquire into this bizarre tale, and in truth I must confess that I was in need of some diversion in consequence of the melancholia which had afflicted me since the death of my beloved Louisa…’ Louisa? His wife, I suppose. Can’t he get to the point! Here! It’s mentioned! ‘…it seems that there is a great Pit in the side of the mountain so that mine ancient informant’s story in this regard has all the appearances of accuracy. How will the rest of the wonders she has told me, and which she so earnestly believes in, I am fully convinced, hold good once I betake myself inside this extraordinary manifestation of Nature?’ It’s Hag Hole! It must be! Bill, I’ll have to read back a few pages!”

He settled down to read the old-fashioned script, tracing the events recorded in the diary. Raybould muttered complaints from time to time, mostly about the schoolgirls. He wandered off quite soon, but Jerry did not notice him leave. At length, as Jerry remained silent, Bill Ainsley became bored and he too left the kitchen. But Mrs. Raybould stayed. She made fresh tea for the little white poodle; Jerry accepted a cup as well with no more than a grunt of acknowledgement. He felt his head bursting with amazed pride as be read on and found the information that would make a coherent whole of the slender clues and half-truths he had heard. Alfred Douglas Davenant had been more than a gentleman-forager. He had been a meticulous scholar who had tracked down the source of the legend of Hag Hole!

Jerry looked up:

“My God, it’s all here, Mrs. Raybould! Do you know what you’ve been living over for the past twenty years?”

She administered to Sukie, not looking at him. “It’s best left to them as is paid for it!”

Jerry looked down again, fingering the flowing script with the devotion of a scholar.

“Jerry!” called Bill Ainsley from the passage. “Jerry, lad, for God’s sake!”

He stumbled in, face ashen. Whatever had occurred had been enough to shake him out of his dull acceptance of life. But Jerry had his own news:

“I’ve discovered the connection between the Castle and Hag Hole, Bill! It was the Brindleys!”

“Jerry, I’ve seen them!” Bill Ainsley gasped. “She’s in it—I’d have wrung her neck if I’d dared, but I couldn’t go near her!” He shuddered with revulsion. “Lad, I’d not dare go near any of them now!”

Jerry frowned. “Is there some tea for him, Mrs. Raybould?”

“Why, what’s he seen?”

Jerry took the teapot, for Mrs. Raybould still nursed a grudge against the amorous driver.

“Christ!” Bill said. “It’s tonight! It’s to be tonight! What time is it?”

“A quarter, past ten,” said Mrs. Raybould. “Mind that tea. Sukie-darling wants another saucer.”

“What were they doing, Bill?” Jerry asked.

Bill gasped for breath. Mrs. Raybould poured milk into his tea and pushed it at him. When he had drunk deeply, he said:

“I couldn’t believe it, Jerry. They’re all undressed in there—Brenda and every last one of them! And she’s had something boiling up on the fire in that coalscuttle, and it stinks something cruel! Some sort of fat or grease, but there’s another smell, I don’t know what it’ll be—”

“I can guess!” said Jerry. “My God, Alfred Douglas knew what he was about!”

“She was throwing bits of grass or roots—and dried berries—from her bag into the scuttle, and they were all moaning together, as if they’d gone mad! I was going to ask them what they were up to, but I thought I’d better not, them being undressed. And I wanted to laugh at first, till I saw what they were making!”

“Making?” said Mrs. Raybould. “Them lasses?”

“Yes! Christ, I couldn’t believe it! Jerry, you know the blonde lass?”

“Julie—she was carrying a wool teddy bear.”

“They’d torn the head off, and they were stitching it up! They’d sewn the face up—and there’s horns and a beard on it, and they’d got it fastened to some broken chair legs—”

“My chairs!” said Mrs. Raybould. She got to her feet.

“No!” said Jerry, “if you value your sanity—or your soul—don’t go! We can’t stop them, no one can. All we can do is keep ourselves out of danger! Look what happened to everyone who went near the cavern on Walpurgisnacht! No, Mrs. Raybould!”

She sat down as both he and Bill put a hand on her shoulders.

“Why?” she said, thoroughly frightened. “What’s going on?”

Sukie stopped drinking tea and cringed beside her, whimpering with fear.

“She’s every right to be frightened,” said Jerry. “If Bill’s seen what I think he’s seen, then the girls are beyond human help at the moment.”

“Why?” said Mrs. Raybould.

“They’re preparing for the Grand Sabbat! What Bill saw just now was the ritual goat’s mask, and the chair legs he saw will be for the mock-altar.

“Mock-altar,” said Bill Ainsley. “What for?”

“The Black Mass,” said Jerry grimly. He pointed to the old journal. “It was the ceremony used in devil-worship. Davenant records some of the practices used in black magic.”

“But what are they up to?” Mrs. Raybould said. “I know they were on about the cellar and you said—”

She stopped.

“The Brindleys,” said Jerry, recognising that she too now accepted the truth. “It all hangs together now. Walpurgisnacht is the night when the Brindleys can use their power. And my God how they’ve used it!”

“Then what’s that stuff they’re boiling up?” asked Bill.

“Had they got their first-aid tins out?”

“Aye, but—”

“Grease,” said Jerry. “They’ll rub themselves with it. Alfred Douglas has something about it.” He opened the ancient journal. “Listen: ‘I have it on good authority that the Brindleys resorted to all the potions available to less enlightened times, and that they were not averse to the use of Aconitum and even Belladonna in order to bring on those delirious frenzies which, so they believed, made them able to enter into a fitting state for communion with their Master’…”

“But what’s it all for?” Bill said. “What’s this got to do with the Brindleys? And what’s in that, anyway?” he said, pointing to the journal.

“I’ll explain—briefly! Sam was right about the Brindleys; the local legend is true. They were the local aristocracy about two hundred years ago, and they were black magicians—Satanists, though they’d call themselves Followers of the Old Religion, I expect. Anyway, they must have had some sort of Sabbat—that’s what the legend meant when it declared that they’d gone into Hag Hole. They would have gone there, because it’s a peculiarly suitable place for religious ceremonies that have to be secret. It’s underground, and if Alfred Douglas is any guide, it’s got a most appropriate meeting-chamber! With me?”

“Just about,” said Bill.

“Sukie-darling eat her Doggy Delight,” Mrs. Raybould encouraged. She had cut herself off once more.

“So they went down into Hag Hole—all the Brindleys. There’d be enough for a coven—thirteen, probably, with grandfather Lord Titus as the Magister—the boss-witch. They’d be calling Satan down, perhaps to ask for favours, possibly just to keep on good terms with him. The whole family would be in it—nephews, sons, grandsons.”

Bill growled. “Are we in any danger?”

“Probably more than we realise! If we can keep together till after midnight, though, we should be all right. There’s a thaw on the way, so we’ll be able to get away early tomorrow. Tonight’s the difficulty.”

“Aye, but hold on a minute, Jerry,” Bill frowned. “These Brindleys—they went down Hag Hole. Then what?”

“Then nothing! Bill, they’re still there! Listen: ‘Being of a curious disposition, and having nothing of moment to detain me at my Manchester home, I determined on finding out the history of this singular key. The letter which had come with it, and which was almost indecipherable, due to the effects of long storage in damp conditions, was quite mysterious. It purported to be a missive from a lady’s maid, and the effect of the letter was to proffer an apology for abstracting the key from the lady’s desk at some time in the past, when the writer had been in the employ of the lady in question. So, a veritable mystery! Here I had a key for which there was no door, and a letter addressed to a lady whose name I did not know’…” Jerry stopped, eyes gleaming. “The old boy was brilliant—”

“Old boy? Him with this?” said Bill, indicating the satchel and the journal.

“Yes! He says he was old, he’d lost his wife, and he’d come across a mystery! I don’t know why he pegged out down in the cavern—perhaps he had a heart attack, but anyway that doesn’t matter now. What does matter is that we know what happened to the Brindleys!”

“What did happen, then?”

“Why, man, they went down to hold their Sabbat and they stayed down there! The door I found leads to some sort of underground chamber where they’d held their meetings! ‘They’d made a passage-way from the cellars to Hag Hole! They’d go through the cellars down there,” said Jerry, indicating the corridor that led to the cellar door. “Down they went through the passage-way we saw! Then they’d unlock the door they’d set into the entrance to the cavern. I suppose some of the servants would get a whiff of what was happening, then the story would come out in a garbled form, with enough of substance in it for the legend to begin to grow!”

“And this Davenant got on to the story?”

“It’s here!” said Jerry, pointing to the journal. “He bought an old bureau that came from Derbyshire, and there was a letter—and a key in a secret drawer. Then he traced the letter to the High Peak and he started asking about local legends. Eventually, he heard about the Brindleys—”

“And they’re down there!” Bill exclaimed.

“Yes. And there’s a key to the door I told you about! The one they tried to cut their way through those Boy Scouts! The one with teeth marks!”

“There’s a keyhole?”

“Yes! That’s what the key’s all about! It’s my guess that they went to hold their Sabbat over two hundred years ago, and that they were accidentally locked into the cavern!” An unpleasant thought struck him. “Or maybe it wasn’t an accident.”

“Someone—”

“Might have locked them in. Yes!”

“Christ!” whispered Bill. “Then what’s all that about?”

He and Jerry looked towards the corridor. They could hear the sound of women’s voices, not girlish high-pitched educated noises, but a low and mysterious crooning; the menace was there again, just as it had been the night before. There was a wildness about the sound that caused Jerry’s scalp and beard an uncomfortable, cold itching sensation.

“You know, don’t you?” said Jerry.

“The Brindleys?”

“Yes. Walpurgisnacht, Bill. The night of Power. They’ll try to get the Brindleys out. That’s the reason for it all. Bill, we can do nothing but stay together. And hope.”

“Try to get them out!”

“Yes. The coalscuttle is the old cauldron used by the Brindley Coven. The Power has gone into the girls.”

“A cauldron? That’s a cooking pot—”

“Yes. Brenda’s brewing up some sort of ointment to get them into a trance! Oh, you can find the stuff easily enough! Berries and roots—deadly nightshade, Bill! She’d have it in her duffel bag!”

“Brenda? Brenda!”

“She’s their leader!”

“Yes, but how did she—”

“I don’t know!” Jerry snapped. “All I do know is that they’ll make for the cellar!”

Mrs. Raybould talked in low tones to Sukie.

“They’ll want the key Alfred Douglas Davenent came across in the bureau he bought,” said Jerry

“This key!” Bill’s eyes gleamed. He was curious and afraid. “He’d have it with him?”

“Of course. He was a brave man. He’d have wanted to find out what lay behind the door.”

Jerry saw the direction of Bill’s intent look. He too found himself staring at the rotting leather satchel.

Mrs. Raybould looked up:

“Sam took it.”

Both men stared at the gaunt woman.

“I talked about treasure hunters! He let me go down! He must have heard something about the cavern! I said something about gold!”

Mrs. Raybould stroked Sukie:

“He never had much sense, Sam Raybould.”

The low moaning and crooning from the dining room suddenly built up into a burst of noise; Sukie put her thin neck back and howled mournfully. Then she bit Mrs. Raybould in the chin and fled.

“Sukie!” screamed the woman. “Sukie-darling!”

The noise from the dining room ceased, and Mrs. Raybould came back.

“Sukie’s in with them,” she said in a scared voice.

“We’ve more to worry about, Mrs. Raybould!” Bill growled. “What about your Sam?”

Another sound floated down the corridor as someone opened the door to the dining room: it was the voice of the adenoidal Manchester announcer:

“And now, a special request for the twelve girls high up there in the lonesome High Peak! For the dozen beauties from Langdene Academy up in the transport café on Devil’s Peak, a little number called ‘That Old Black Magic’. Ha-ha-ha!”

There was an echoing bray of laughter from Brenda, a mocking and menacing flood of noise. Jerry felt his bones turn to water. It was like being on Toller Edge again. There was need for action, but he had no confidence.

“What about Sam?” said Bill.