Last Rites (23 page)

‘Because I know Sarah,’ he answered. ‘I know how gentle she is, how kind she is, of the promises she has made to us, her brothers and sisters in her coven. The Sarah I know wouldn't do what the police think she might have done.’

He stood up and started to move towards the door.

‘What are you going to do for Sarah?’ I asked.

‘We are going to have our ceremony tomorrow. It is
Samhain and we are going to celebrate. But we will worship for Sarah. If we have faith, it might turn out justly.’

I shook Olwen's hand as he went, and as the door closed I turned to Laura. ‘What do you think?’

‘I don't know,’ Laura replied, ‘except for one thing: that if Olwen is right, and Sarah isn't a murderer, then we don't have long to check it out.’

Sarah opened her eyes and took a deep breath. Her body felt weak, worn down by the lack of food, and her fatigue was making her see things, like the walls moving, just pulsing in time with the heartbeats. But she had gained some strength from thinking of those things she was trying to get back to: her parents, the children she taught, her friends. She tried to listen past the noise coming from the speakers, but it was too loud. All she could do was hope that she wasn't interrupted.

She slipped the blanket from her shoulders and stood up, her knees creaking. She stepped over the line of the circle and went to the door. She pressed her ear against it, but the heartbeats were still too loud.

Sarah looked down at the floor. It was dirt, just the same as it was in the rest of the room, but it was compacted hard from footfall. She took one of the springs in her hand and scraped at the floor. It made a groove. She scraped again, this time harder, and the groove turned into a small furrow. She knew her plan: if she could dig a hole deep enough, she might be able
to get under the door. She had no idea what was on the other side, but at least it gave her a chance, some hope.

She threw herself to the floor and tried to peer under the door. The gap was tight, but she thought she could get through. Sarah started to dig at the floor harder, and then as the compacted soil began to break up, she used her hands and tried to scoop the dirt from around the door. But it was still tightly packed, and she felt her jagged, broken nails bend back painfully when she scraped.

But still she dug, scraping quickly, loosening the soil until she could pile it up next to her feet. And the hole was getting deeper all the time.

She mopped her brow. It was hard work and she hadn't eaten or drunk much over the previous few days, but she knew she had to keep going. She couldn't think about what would happen to her if she was caught, so she knew that this was her only chance.

An hour passed, maybe more, and Sarah had a hole. It looked deep, and she threw her head and shoulders into it, but it still wasn't wide enough. She had to scrape into the other side so that she had an exit. She could see under though. Steps went upwards. What happened when she got up there was something she wouldn't have long to work out.

She resumed her digging, made the hole creep further into the room as her fingers turned bloody, when the spring caught on something.

Sarah stopped and looked into the hole. There was something white, like a twig, snagged in the hook on
the bedspring. She scraped around it so that she could see whether it was an obstacle. The twig got longer, its texture like smooth ivory.

Sarah yelped and scuttled backwards. She sat against the wall, looking into the hole, her hand over her mouth. It was a bone, she could tell that now, clean white in contrast to the dark soil around it.

She returned to the hole, nervous now, and dug around the bone, smoothed the soil away from it, treated it with respect. It wasn't an animal bone, she could tell that, some long-forgotten memory of school biology creeping back. It looked like a forearm. She brushed it clean, and when she saw the elbow joint she knew it was human.

Sarah was crying now, her panic rising. People had been buried here. She wasn't the first.

She began to dig further along the arm, to get the hand free, firstly freeing the soil around the wrist, and then the hand itself. She was careful as the fingers were exposed, long white spindles.

Then she saw something on one of the fingers, like a black metal band. She swallowed, felt her stomach lurch. She guessed what it was, but she had to be sure. Her hands were shaking as she cleaned off the dirt with her spit, but when she had finished she went down on her haunches and began to sob.

She looked at the ceiling, wailing, ‘No, no, no, no.’ And then, through her tears, she looked at her own hand. There, on the third finger of her right hand, was the same black band, the same emblem. A screaming face, silver on black.

Sarah couldn't dig any more. She couldn't crawl over the grave of the ones who had been before. Instead, she started to scrape at the soil around the body.

My fingers drummed nervously against my knee. I had spent most of the night thinking about what Olwen had said, how Sarah was a victim, not a murderer, and how she wasn't the only victim, and I had ended up being convinced. The internet had thrown up old newspaper reports and tribute websites set up by friends of the other victims, keeping my printer busy, and a visit to the archives in the library had filled in some of the gaps. Now it was time to see what the police thought.

I didn't expect a good reaction, but I was doing what I thought was right. What happened after that was in someone else's hands.

I was in the reception area of Blackley police station, alone, nothing for company but hard plastic seats and dog-eared posters on the wall, some of them hanging loose from a corner or two. I had a bag of news clippings by my feet.

I rubbed my eyes. I wondered whether I was doing too much, if I had crossed the line from chasing the story to chasing the girl. But then I thought of the letters, and Olwen, and the Facebook entry. Sarah could die
today, and that would always be on my mind if I didn't do what I could.

I patted my bag, filled with pieces of forgotten history and the family trees. I chewed on the skin around my nails, so that my fingers were feathered by the time Karl Carson appeared in front of me. There was someone else with him. A quieter man, more measured than the ones who had taken me to the moors.

‘Ah, it's the Witchfinder General,’ said Carson sarcastically.

‘Isn't that your job?’ I replied, and I saw a flicker of a smile on the other man's face.

‘You know how to make yourself conspicuous, Garrett,’ said Carson, walking over to me, trying to intimidate me. His colleague behind him was more watchful, and I could feel him assessing me. They seemed like opposites. Fire and ice. The classic team of good cop, bad cop.

‘I can just go,’ I said, and then I held up the bag. ‘Or you can stop puffing your chest out and I can tell you what I know. The story won't take long to write, so if you want to wait for the front-page edition, you can.’

Carson ground his teeth as I stood there for a few seconds, just waiting out the silence, the bag in my hand. It was obvious he was used to being in charge. He took a few deep breaths through his nose, his cheeks just flashing red, before he said, ‘So you've been talking to tree-huggers and inbreds around Pendle Hill. It's tourist stuff, nothing more. Witch shops, walking trails, crap like that. Why should I be interested?’

‘Because there's a connection,’ I said.

Carson looked at his companion, just a raise of the eyebrows, a doubtful look, before he asked, ‘With what?’

‘With Sarah Goode.’

Carson stepped closer. ‘What proof have you got?’

‘Are you prepared to think about Sarah as anything other than a murder suspect?’ I asked, still holding up the bag.

‘In a murder investigation, you have to play the percentages,’ he replied.

‘And maybe sometimes you have to get creative,’ I said. ‘Like, why does a young woman from a normal family murder a casual boyfriend? And what if Sarah is in danger?’ Before Carson could respond, I added, ‘Sarah Goode is a descendant of a Pendle witch, and she is a member of a witches' coven. Members of that coven have been killed over the last ten years, and I think Sarah might be the latest.’

Carson and his colleague looked at each other, surprised.

‘A coven?’ asked Carson incredulously. And then he started to laugh. ‘I'll tell you something, Mr Garrett: every instance of witchcraft I have come across in my police career is nothing much more than middle-aged men trying to persuade young women to take off their clothes. Sometimes the girls are too young, and so we get involved.’

‘I bet you've come across a few vicars who have caused you concern too.’

Carson took some deep breaths, and then said quietly, ‘This is all very convenient.’

‘What do you mean?’

‘Your job is to clear Sarah,’ he said angrily. ‘You were brought into this by Sam Nixon, her wannabe lawyer. No one knows about her involvement in witchcraft, and then Sam Nixon sets you after her, and suddenly it's all talk of covens and old murders.’

‘Why would I want to make something up?’

‘Because you hope it will give her a defence,’ Carson snapped. ‘Maybe Sarah does have a family link, and maybe she does go to some kind of coven. But that means nothing. It's kids' stuff. Hocus pocus, fun in the woods, everyone's at it this time of year. Now that she is in trouble, she is making herself out to be some crazy old witch to get some kind of diminished responsibility defence. Avoids a life sentence,’ and then he stared at me, ‘and perhaps she even has some lawyer telling her how to sound, because he has sent a reporter to follow the trail she has set.’

‘You forget that for me this is just a story,’ I responded. ‘Think about the other options.’

‘What like?’

‘We know that the witch thing isn't a coincidence, the letters tell us that. And we know the letters are from Sarah.’

Carson glowered at me. ‘Those don't get printed. Understand?’ The question was brisk.

‘But they make one hell of a story, don't you think?’

Carson pointed angrily towards the door from which he had just come. ‘In there, now, Mr Garrett,’ he growled at me. ‘I think we need to talk.’

Sarah didn't move as the noise of the heartbeat stopped and footsteps sounded on the other side of the door. She sat back against the wall and waited for him to enter.

The door opened slowly, as always, rumbling on its runner. As he stepped in, he stopped, his head tilted downwards, towards the hole Sarah had dug during the night.

He lifted his head and looked over towards Sarah, who stared back at him defiantly. Her fear had gone, because she knew where it was going to end. There was no escape, she knew that now, and with the certainty of her end came strength.

His head tilted back towards the hole. Two skeletons exposed, the bones bright, both with the same ring on one hand. When he seemed to look back at Sarah, just his head moving, she held up the springs in her hand, the hooked ends sharpened by the digging.

‘I've been busy,’ she said, spitting the words out, her hands digging into the springs.

He didn't answer. He let the silence grow.

Sarah swallowed. She had expected a response.

‘No way out?’ she asked eventually.

He shook his head slowly, his body still.

‘How many more?’ she asked.

‘Just enough,’ was the reply.

‘Why are you doing this?’ Sarah asked, gesturing around her. ‘Why are you holding me like this? I've done nothing to you. Neither had they.’

He moved forward quickly and grabbed a handful of Sarah's hair. He pulled her head to the floor and knelt down beside her. Sarah screamed in pain. His hand strained as he pulled her hair tighter. Sarah's hands flailed at his hood, trying to break free, crying out.

He put his head to her ear and whispered, ‘We've spoken about this before. We're not so different.’

Sarah froze. She remembered the last time she had stood up to him.

‘But what did they do to you?’ she hissed through gritted teeth.

He laughed at that. ‘No, it's what I did to them that interests you,’ and then he held up his hand. ‘Enough. No more kindness,’ and then he let go of her hair before walking quickly out of the room.

Sarah put her head to the floor and closed her eyes. She stayed like that for a while, just feeling the coldness of the ground against her head, when she heard something. She looked up and saw the other one, the younger one, the hood looser around his head. He was holding another bag.

‘One more letter,’ he said.

Sarah shook her head. ‘No.’

He stepped forward. ‘Now's not the time to be a heroine,’ he said.

‘But what if I don't?’

He pointed towards the hole in the ground. ‘And then there were three,’ he said, laughing.

Sarah looked down, thought for a few seconds, and then she held out her hand. He put the pen and paper into her hand, along with some pre-prepared script.

She looked at what he was asking her to write, and then at him. Her mouth was open. ‘I can't.’

He nodded. ‘You will.’

Sarah looked at the hole again, the view blurring as her eyes filled with tears. She wiped her eyes and started to write, copying what he had brought in. When she had finished, she put her head on her arms and started to sob.

She didn't notice when he left the room. She didn't know how long she had been on her own, but when she looked up again, she knew that she was living out the last day of her life.

I was pushed towards a small room with a view onto the street outside, the walls once painted bright white but now yellowed by nicotine. I guessed that it was the room where the police took statements, nothing worse than that. As I put my bag of clippings onto the table, Carson burst in after me, the door smacking against the wall, his colleague just behind him.

‘You will print nothing about those letters,’ he said.

‘I'll write whatever makes the story interesting,’ I replied. ‘And if you know that the letters are from the witch trials, why are you being so dismissive about the witch connections?’

‘Sit down, Mr Garrett,’ Carson barked.

‘No, I won't sit down,’ I snapped back. ‘I've come here with information. If you already know it, I'll leave. If you don't, then maybe it will help you to know that Sarah will die today.’

‘We know about the Facebook entry,’ he said sarcastically.

‘There's more than that,’ I replied.

Carson opened his mouth to speak, and then he closed it again. His colleague stepped forward.

‘I'm Sergeant Joe Kinsella,’ he said, and he smiled politely. ‘Please tell us what you know.’

His voice was more measured, and I saw curiosity in his eyes.

I looked at Carson and saw that he was still angry, but I noticed how Joe Kinsella had an effect on him, that the quieter man kept him in check.

‘Okay,’ I said, ‘maybe you're right: perhaps Sarah did kill Luke in a lover's rage. His death might have sent her over the edge, made her crazy.’ I tapped my head with my finger. ‘Maybe she has gone, unravelled.’

Carson didn't respond.

‘Or maybe Sarah was already crazy,’ I said. ‘Perhaps she developed some obsession with witchcraft, and in her madness she killed Luke. Perhaps the letters are a manifestation of that. If you are right, that she killed Luke, then she is a dangerous woman, even to herself, and must be caught.’

Carson nodded with mock-graciousness, but then said, ‘And I know reason number three. She killed her boyfriend, decided she needed a defence, so she goes to see her crooked defence lawyer, and he tells her to act crazy. She sends some well-researched letters and waits for a sympathetic jury. She will eventually appear on chat shows as the woman who killed and stayed free.’

‘You're too cynical,’ I said, trying to retrieve the initiative, ‘because that wasn't the final possibility. There is a more obvious one.’

‘Which is?’

‘What if the witchcraft obsession is someone else's? What if Sarah is the victim of that obsession? Think about it. She comes from a stable background, she's close to her family, and there are no known mental problems.’

‘Apart from the fact that she is in a witches' coven,’ said Carson, ‘which doesn't sound like ordinary-girl stuff.’

‘But messing around in the woods with salt and candles does not make her a psychotic knife-woman,’ I countered. ‘So could killing Luke have sent her over the edge? Well, I'm no criminologist, but I can guess one thing: young women do not kill casual boyfriends without a very good reason, and they were not so close that an argument would send Sarah into a blind rage.’

‘So go on,’ he said, ‘inspire me.’

I ignored his sarcasm. ‘If it isn't fraud or madness,’ I said, ‘there is only one option left.’ I raised my eyebrows. ‘That someone else is responsible for Luke's death.’ I paused. ‘It is the witch connection that ties Sarah into all this. And if that is the case, then Sarah is in great danger.’

Carson glared at me for a few seconds, and then he started to laugh, except that it was filled with hostility, meant to belittle me. He walked to the door and held it open.

‘Goodbye, Mr Garrett. Perhaps you should call in on your girlfriend. She'll be spending her career filling out lost dog reports pretty soon.’

I swung the bag onto the desk. ‘If it's just coincidence, there's been a lot of bad luck in Sarah's coven,’ I said sarcastically, and nodded towards the bag, the contents
spilling onto the table. ‘Missing persons, murders and suicides, scattered around the Pendle area, and sometimes further afield. All different, but linked if you look at them the right way.’

Carson looked at the bag, and then back at me. Kinsella stepped forward and began to pull the papers onto the table.

‘Linked how?’ asked Kinsella.

‘They were all descendants of Pendle witches,’ I said, ‘and they were all members of the same coven.’

Carson spluttered a laugh, but when he realised that Joe Kinsella wasn't joining in, he stepped forward and pushed hard on my shoulder.

‘You'd better sit down,’ he said, and he was scowling as his colleague closed the door.