The Revelation Room (The Ben Whittle Investigation Series Book 1) (14 page)

‘Where is he?’ Ebb demanded. ‘I sent him to get a blowtorch,
not build one.’

The Sons and Daughters of Salvation stood in line. No one
offered an answer. Ebb turned to Bubba who was still standing beside the cross.
‘Guard him.’

Bubba nodded and looked at the ground.

Ebb strode out of the barn like a sergeant major in pursuit
of a missing recruit. By the time he reached the farmhouse, he was gasping for
breath. He walked around the side of the farmhouse to the back door and stepped
on a thistle. He yelped and hobbled into the kitchen. As soon as the
inaugurations were done and dusted, Benjamin could help Bubba to tidy up the
garden.

He stood in the middle of the kitchen and called Tweezer’s
name. Tweezer didn’t respond. Something moved in the corner of his eye. A
shadow by the Welsh dresser. Ebb spun around to face it, his heart thudding in
his chest. He took a deep breath and tried to calm his nerves. Where in God’s
name was that idiot Tweezer? The house was quiet. Too damned quiet. Calm before
the storm quiet.

‘Tweezer?’

The silence in the house crept under Ebb’s skin. He walked
through the kitchen and into the hallway, keeping an eye out for unannounced
guests. It wasn’t unknown for Jesus to appear to him in a vision when he was
least expecting it. Once, the great man Himself had appeared from the spout of
a teapot and told Ebb to kill Brother Gerald. Told him in no uncertain terms to
“castrate the traitor and subject him to death by a thousand cuts”.

A mahogany grandfather clock at the end of the hallway read
a quarter to ten. He watched the pendulum swing from side to side. Its steady
tick sounded like a death-knell in the silence.

Ebb checked the lounge and then called up the stairs.
‘Tweezer?’

A floorboard creaked, making Ebb jump. ‘Tweezer? Are you up
there?’

If Tweezer was, he wasn’t saying.

‘You’d better have a damn good reason for going AWOL.’

No response. Where the hell was he? He walked up the stairs
and checked the Brothers’ Room and the Sisters’ Room. Both empty, save a few
flies and the lingering smell of dope. How many times did he have to tell Marcus
not to smoke that stuff inside the house? It was tantamount to mocking the
Lord. Words would fly, make no mistake.

He walked along the landing and took a peek in the bathroom.
Empty. He made a mental note to tell Sister Emily to pay close attention to the
soap scum around the rim of the tub. It was no good showing the damned thing a
bottle of Flash and hoping it would self-clean.

Ebb looked up a second flight of stairs to where his
quarters were situated. His haven. His space. His oasis. Tweezer wouldn’t dare
go up there without permission. Not if he valued his life. Ebb wiped
perspiration from his eyes. The hairs on the back of his neck were standing on
end.

Ebb cleared his throat. ‘Tweezer? Are you up there?’

‘Help me,’ a muffled voice called back.

At first, Ebb assumed his mother was playing tricks on him
again. She could be a real joker sometimes. She was about as funny as a fart at
the dinner table, but it didn’t seem to deter her.

Ebb held onto the handrail for support. ‘Who’s there?’

‘It’s me. Maddie. Help me.’

Ebb walked up the stairs, mindful that his mother might
still try to fool him. You needed to keep all the bulbs burning bright where
that one was concerned. He reached the small patch of landing outside his
living quarters and stood outside the door, wheezing and wishing his heart
would settle down to a normal rhythm. ‘Madeline?’

‘Help me.’

Ebb’s blood froze. His heart plummeted into his stomach. The
front door was open. And he’d closed it. He’d not bothered to lock it, because
everyone had been in the barn with him except for Marcus who was on watch duty
up the tower.

‘Madeline? What’s happened?’

‘Tweezer tried to rape me,’ Maddie called.

‘Rape you?’ Ebb said, his mind a kaleidoscope of scenarios.
This had to be a trick. Satan playing games with him. ‘Tweezer?’

‘He’s unconscious on the floor.’

Ebb laughed. A small nervous laugh that sounded somewhere
between a sob and a giggle. ‘And I’m Peter Pan.’

‘It’s the truth. I kicked him in the face and knocked him
out.’

Ebb shoved the door back against the wall and stepped into
the lounge. There was a fifty-inch flat-screen TV secured to one wall. He
peered at the blank screen. His mother had once interrupted the evening news to
announce that Ebb was on the FBI’s top ten most wanted list. She’d even been
wearing her trademark pink wig and sunglasses.

Ebb ripped the crucifix from his neck and held it out before
him. He walked through the lounge on legs barely able to support his weight. He
stopped in the bedroom doorway and peered inside. Madeline was still manacled
to the bed. Her face looked strained, but that was to be expected with Satan
controlling her.

‘Help me,’ Maddie pleaded.

Ebb ignored her pitiful appearance. Appearances could be
deceptive. Vigilance was the key to survival. He took a couple of steps towards
the bed and addressed Madeline. ‘What have you done?’

‘I haven’t done anything,’ Maddie shouted. ‘He attacked me.’

‘Who attacked you?’

Maddie nodded towards the blind side of the bed. ‘That
bastard.’

Ebb ignored the profanity. He walked around the foot of the
bed and stared at Tweezer’s naked body. Tattoos scarred every inch of his skin.
Serpents. The scales of justice. Gangland graffiti. In Ebb’s opinion, Tweezer’s
body looked like a billboard advertisement for Hell.

 ‘Is he still unconscious?’

Ebb glanced at Maddie. ‘You must have lured him here.’

‘Me? How the hell could I do that? He attacked me.’

Ebb grappled with the truth. ‘He wouldn’t betray me.’

‘He tried to rape me.’

Ebb clutched the cross in both hands and thrust it out
before him. ‘I’m not listening to your filthy lies and excuses.’

‘Who do you think untied my robe?’

‘I have no doubt in my mind that Brother Tweezer untied your
robe. And I have no doubt in my mind that you coerced him into doing so.’

‘How in God’s name am I supposed to have coerced him into
doing anything?’

Ebb snorted. ‘Because you’re a seductress. A temptress. A
vampire.’

Maddie twisted her head to one side. The cuffs rattled against
the head rail. ‘What do you think I did? Send him a love note?’

Ebb eyed her warily. She was far more powerful than he’d
imagined. ‘Don’t take me for a fool. You must have seduced him with telepathic
messages.’

Tweezer groaned on the floor. Ebb thrust the cross at him.
‘Get up and get dressed.’

Tweezer raised his head. ‘Where am I?’

Tweezer’s disorientation lent further proof to the fact that
he’d been controlled by external forces. ‘Get up. Right now.’

‘You’re sick,’ Maddie said.

Ebb raised his eyebrows. ‘Do you want to shame the shovel?’

‘I don’t have a clue what you’re talking about.’
      

Ebb didn’t like the look lurking in those beguiling green
eyes. They were full of malice. Only time would tell whether she was beyond
salvation.

Tweezer groaned. ‘What happened?’

‘You’ve been compromised, Pixie-pea. Get up and get dressed
before your hideous body makes me sick.’

‘Please undo my hands,’ Maddie pleaded.

Ebb pointed the cross at her. ‘Not while this court’s in
session, sister. What do you take me for: the fool on the hill?’

‘I’m begging you. Please.’

Ebb ignored her and walked over to an oak dressing table. He
took a hatpin from one of the drawers. He held it up in front of Maddie. ‘My
mother’s. She liked hats. And wigs. And men.’

Maddie pushed back against the head rail.

‘Don’t fret. The pin’s not for you. It’s for Sleeping Beauty
over there.’

Ebb walked over to where Tweezer fumbled about on all fours.
He bent over and jabbed the hatpin into the sole of the man’s left foot. Deep.
Almost right through to the other side.

Tweezer screamed and bucked like a steer introduced to a
rodeo.

Ebb pulled the pin out. Blood oozed from the wound. ‘Get up!
It’s time for the rabbit hole.’

Tweezer looked over his shoulder at Ebb. One eye was closed,
the surrounding skin swollen and purple. His mouth and goatee beard were
streaked red.

Ebb put the hatpin in the pocket of his robe. ‘You’re not
looking too good, my friend.’

Tweezer gawked at him. His mouth opened and closed as if it
had been disconnected from his brain. Ebb resisted an urge to kick Tweezer’s
backside. ‘How could you be tempted by Satan so easily?’

‘I wasn’t— ’

‘You’ve made a nasty mess all over my floor. It’s a good job
that the oak is sealed.’

‘I’m sorry, Father.’

Ebb watched a bubble of snot and blood burst from the end of
his nose and splatter on his top lip. ‘You’re supposed to be my number two. My
main man.’

‘I’m sorry, Father.’

Ebb snorted. ‘Do you think sorry makes it all right?’

‘No, Father.’

‘Get up.’

Tweezer scrambled to his feet. Blood dripped from his nose
and ran into his beard. He picked up his robe and put it on, fastening it
around the middle with the yellow sash.

Ebb noticed Tweezer’s hands were shaking. Perhaps he was
still under the influence of the seductress. ‘Go to the bathroom and clean
yourself up.’

‘I’m sorry, Fa—’

Ebb waved the cross at him. ‘Satan has tempted you, brother.
Compromised you. Save your apologies for the Lord Jesus Christ Himself. I’ve
got better things to do than listen to the excuses of a savage sinner.’

Tweezer wiped his nose with the back of his hand. His good
eye swivelled in its socket, coming to rest on Maddie. ‘She—’

Ebb waved him away. ‘Go.’

Tweezer hobbled out of Ebb’s quarters, his injured foot
leaving tiny spots of blood on the oak floor. Ebb stroked his head and studied
Maddie. ‘I suppose you think you’re clever?’

‘I just want to go home.’

Ebb laughed. A small throaty laugh that sounded as if it had
been fashioned in a witch’s cauldron. ‘You’re a slippery customer, all right.
Slippery as an eel in oil. But I’m on to you. As Jesus Christ is my witness,
I’m on to you.’

‘I didn’t do anything.’

Ebb pursed his lips. ‘How did you do it? How did you seduce
him?’

Maddie looked away.

Ebb took a deep breath. ‘It’s going to be a long night,
Madeline. But I will purge your body of Satan if it’s the last thing I do.’

Ebb escorted the prisoner down into
the kitchen. Twice the prisoner had tried pleading his innocence, but Ebb had
learned long ago that the truth was best extracted by time and torture. You
could set your clock by that.

Tweezer looked at Ebb with his good eye and tried to smile.
‘Would you like a brew, Father?’

Ebb took a deep breath and tried to summon patience. Tweezer
was in denial. That was as plain as Sister Emily’s face. Ebb stroked his chin.
‘A brew?’

‘Yes, Father.’

‘What kind of brew? A Hebrew?’

Tweezer snorted laughter. A mistake. His nose bled again.

‘You disgust me, Brother Tweezer.’

Tweezer wiped his nose. ‘Sorry, Father.’

‘You have betrayed me.’

‘She tempted me, Father.’

‘I know she bloody well tempted you, you fool. I don’t need
you to tell me she’s a nest of vipers.’

Tweezer bowed his head. Blood bubbled from his nose. ‘I’m
sorry, Father.’

Tweezer’s eyes put Ebb in mind of a wounded animal. ‘The
girl has just arrived. What do you expect her to be? Pure?’

‘No, I—’

‘She has all the sins of the free world inside her.’

Tweezer nodded and plucked a flake of dried blood from his
beard. ‘She might be a witch, Father.’

Ebb squinted at Tweezer as if he’d just challenged him to a
dual at dawn. ‘A witch?’

‘Yes, Father. I think we might have to drown her.’

‘You do, do you?’

‘Yes, Father. It’s the only way to rid her body of the evil
inside her.’

Ebb smiled. ‘Perhaps we ought to put you both down the
wishing well in the garden. What do you think about that?’

Tweezer clamped his mouth shut and focused all his attention
on his dripping nose.

‘The girl’s not a witch. She needs purging, nothing more
than that.’

‘She’s dangerous, Father.’

Ebb ignored him. ‘But you’re a different kettle of mackerel,
aren’t you?’

‘I didn’t do—’

Ebb slapped the table. ‘Save your tongue. If you tell me one
more time that the girl lured you to the bedroom, I shall render your mouth
incapable of speech. Is that clear to your ears?’

Tweezer nodded. ‘Yes, Father.’

‘You are supposed to be my right-hand man. What do you
suppose that means?’

‘I carry out your instructions, Father. I help you to keep
order.’

‘What else?’

‘I serve the Lord?’

Ebb fought an impulse to bang Tweezer’s head on the table.
‘You’re meant to set an example to the group. Do you think attempting to rape
an uninitiated member is setting a good example?’

‘No, Father.’

‘I trusted you.’

‘You can still trust me, Father.’

Ebb shook his head. ‘Not anymore. You have proven yourself
to be weak. Weak and open to attack. I fear Satan has attached himself to you.’

‘No, Father. No, he’s—’

Ebb held up a hand. ‘Stop babbling. The weak always deny the
truth, even when it’s perched on their shoulders like a parrot.’

‘Satan’s inside the girl, Father.’

Ebb crossed his arms. ‘I truly believed that we’d purged all
traces of Satan from you when we tied you to a tractor and hauled your sinful
body back and forth across the North Field during your inauguration.’

‘You did, Father.’

‘I remember nursing you back to health and being certain
that there was no trace of that weasel left inside you.’

‘There wasn’t, Father. I swear.’

‘Bled from every pore into God’s sweet earth. But I still
see him standing before me, large as life and twice as brazen.’

‘No, Father.’

Ebb held up a hand. ‘You can no longer be trusted, Brother
Tweezer.’

‘I can. I swear on my life.’

Ebb walked over to the Welsh dresser and took a set of keys from
a drawer. He selected a large silver key and walked to a door at the far end of
the kitchen.

‘What are you doing?’

‘You’re going down the rabbit hole, Brother Tweezer.’

Tweezer gawked at the door with his good eye. ‘Please,
Father. There’s no need to put me down there.’

Ebb unlocked the door and opened it wide. ‘You get settled
in. I’ve got urgent business to attend to.’

‘Please, Father.’

‘Stop wittering and get down there.’

Tweezer limped past Ebb and peered into the basement.
‘Please, Father. I don’t like being locked in. I get claustrophobic.’

‘Do you want to shame the shovel?’

‘No, Father. It’s just—’

Ebb walked up behind Tweezer and shoved him in the back.
Tweezer rolled down the stone steps in a tangle of twisted limbs. His skull hit
the concrete floor at the bottom with a sickening thud. He hollered like a baby
torn from its mother’s breast. Ebb considered it quite an unseemly racket for a
man who boasted gangland murder in his portfolio.

Tweezer crawled a few feet and then collapsed between the
neat rows of cannabis plants.

Ebb slammed the door and locked it. Some people proved to be
downright babies when the chips were down.  

All the king’s horses, and all the king’s men, couldn’t
put Humpty together again.

Ebb jumped back at the sound of his mother’s voice. It
seemed to be coming from the teapot. For one terrible moment, he thought the
thing was sporting a pink tea-cosy. He rubbed his eyes. No cosies. Not even
pink ones.

He shuffled out of the kitchen and went back to the barn. He
was exhausted. It was all he could do to put one foot in front of the other.
The Lord had seen fit to overload his schedule, which was fine by him, just as
long as He didn’t expect Ebb to perform miracles when dealing with Satan.
   

Bubba was still guarding the cross. Good old dependable
Bubba. The big guy hadn’t shown one stick of dissent since the night Ebb had
cut out his tongue. In fact, Bubba had even shown a level of understanding
concerning the need to remove his tongue after witnessing Cyril’s execution. As
far as Ebb was concerned, Bubba was too good a worker to dispense with, but too
much of a liability to leave with the ability to tell tales.

‘Is everything all right, Bubba?’

Bubba nodded. His lips flatlined.

Ebb noticed a strange black aura around the big guy. Like a
shadow with fuzzy edges. ‘Are you sure you’re okay?’

Bubba shuffled and grunted.

Ebb stared in disbelief as the aura broke ranks with Bubba’s
body and hovered in front of the cross.

‘Are you okay, Father?’ Sister Alice asked.

Ebb looked at her. There was a nasty buzzing noise in the
back of his head, reminiscent of the time one of his ‘uncles’ had hit him with
a shovel when he was a child.

Sister Alice broke ranks and walked towards him. ‘Father?’

Ebb closed his eyes. The ground swayed beneath his feet.

Sister Alice reached out and took his arm. ‘You look… tired,
Father.’

Ebb tried to smile. Tried to reassure her. He liked Sister
Alice. She would be spared when the bunnies burned. ‘I am tired, Sister.’

‘Would you like to rest, Father?’

Ebb tried to open his eyes, but the lids were too heavy. It
was as if someone had placed pennies on them after death. ‘There’s much work to
do, Sister.’

‘That’s why you need to rest, Father. You need to be
strong.’

Ebb ground his teeth as the buzzing in his head escalated.
‘Satan is among us now. I can smell his foul breath on the wind.’

‘We shall fight him, Father,’ Sister Alice promised.

Ebb forced his eyes open. Satan was blocking his thoughts.
‘Be careful.’

‘We shall be vigilant, Father.’

Ebb’s eyes rolled back in his head. ‘It’s time to put the
bunnies to bed.’

‘The bunnies?’

Ebb fell to the floor. He twitched and jerked like a man in
the midst of an exorcism.