Curse of the Stag’s Eye (Haunted Hearts)

17. Chapter 17

Chapter 17

R hys pointed with a trembling hand. I slowly turned to my left. With hands grasping the balcony rail, fog swirling heavily about him, stood a man in a navy-coloured overcoat and flat cap. An older man with bushy eyebrows and long, grey sideburns.

Nikesh waved to him, a reflex.

The man — his clean-shaven face hollow and damp, mouth drawn open, eyes bloodshot — turned towards us. The air turned to soup around us, thick and ripe with pipe tobacco.

My blood turned to slush. My legs buckled and I hooked my arm around the railing. Nikesh yelled. The lamp turned, flashing us in weak light, and the man vanished, swallowed by the mist in the blink of an eye. I stood there for God knows how long, staring at the empty gallery.

The colour had drained from Rhys’ complexion and he stood motionless.

Dawn bolted for the door. “Nah, mate, no way. I’m not having it. I’m not having it.”

Nikesh clambered through the hatch, into the lamp room. “Babes, wait for me, oh my Christ!”

Before they reached the cage door, a whooshing, clanging noise shot down through the tower, echoing and echoing, rippling and rippling, racing away from us, down, down, down, until it climaxed in a deafening, metallic knelling that rattled our very bones, quickly followed by chains falling, falling, falling, clattering and coiling at the bottom of the shaft.

Fearing the gallery would collapse at any moment, I hurried into the lamp room and slammed the hatch closed behind me.

“The weight,” Rhys said. “The lead weight’s fallen.”

We raced down to the service room to find the weight hanging securely, just as it had been. It hadn’t budged. Not one inch.

Dawn and Nikesh didn’t wait, they rushed down the staircase.

Rhys’ voice cracked. “Did you see his face?”

I had never seen a more sorrowful expression in all my life. “I saw the man you hired to scare me.” Why did I say that? I marched down the staircase. “Another friend from the Trust, was he?” Why couldn’t I stop myself from saying those things?

“What?” Rhys followed me, pointing to the window. “Friend? What are you on about?”

Despite what I said, I found myself darting down the steps, as fast as my legs could carry me, and into the sitting room where I found Nikesh comforting Dawn.

I lay my shaking hands on the cold, curved wall. “It wasn’t real.” I knew it was, though. I knew it was. It was as if my mouth and my mind were battling each other for dominance. My mouth was winning, as usual.

“Then where did he go?” Rhys was a little out of breath. “Jumped over the gallery railings, did he? A little ninety-something-foot drop — that’s no big deal, is it? For a practical joke? It was him, mun! Baines! The keeper who died!” The warmth had returned to Rhys’ skin, and he all but hopped about.

“It bloody was him, wasn’t it!” Nikesh tottered over to Rhys and they danced with giddiness, like kids on Christmas morning. “Oh my Christ, I’ve seen one! I’ve seen a ghost!” He set his hand on his muscular chest. “Oh my Christ, I’ve seen a ghost. An actual ghost. Christ.” His face dropped and he plonked onto the little bed, next to Dawn.

Rhys sat on the rug, legs crossed. He took a notepad from his jacket and furiously scratched some words on it by lantern light. He said he wanted to get everything down while it was fresh.

“Why didn’t I run?” I asked. “A normal person would run. Or scream. Or do… something. Take a photo, maybe? I just stood there.”

“That’s all part of it,” he said, still writing. “I told you that there needs to be a certain mood for a ghost to appear. An almost trance-like state. That’s you meeting them halfway. They do the rest. We were all in a heightened state up there. Afraid, or flooded with adrenaline, or whatever.

“You’re not quite in your right mind when you see a ghost, the very presence of one does something to the human brain. Or the soul, maybe. I can’t explain it but I’ve felt it often enough. Everyone thinks that they’d know how they’d react if they saw a ghost but they don’t. It’s like stepping into another world, just for a moment. All normal rules are relaxed.” He frowned as he wrote, his pen sliding quickly over the white paper.

“Wouldn’t a Dictaphone be better? Or a camera? Even your phone…”

He laughed a little. “Ghosts don't get along with digital media. If they did, don’t you think we’d be drowning in evidence? Every Instagram feed would be chockablock with phantoms. We’d have teens doing TikTok dance routines with spectres. Spirits affect electric charges. It’s why I wear a wind-up watch. You've heard of batteries being drained in their presence, haven’t you? You’ve got your phone on you, yes? Check the battery. Go on.”

I unlocked my screen. “Eight per cent. I charged it before I left the B&B this evening.”

“If you really must try to photograph a ghost, then traditional film cameras work best but even then the exposure times needed in low light make them all but useless. I don't even try to record them anymore. I had a Dictaphone but I couldn't afford to keep buying batteries for it and those rechargeable ones are worse than useless. I mostly make handwritten notes now. I learned shorthand and everything.”

He finished his note making and clambered back to his feet. He brushed the dust from his legs and bum. “Are you okay?”

“What? Yes, I’m fine. I’m fine.” I felt bad for how I’d shouted at him but it hadn’t affected him whatsoever.

He reached out and took my hand. “Listen. It’s okay if you’re not.”

I wanted there to be another explanation. I wanted Rhys to say he’d hypnotised me, to say he’d been waving his lantern around all the time, wiggling his fingers, and doing some Derren Brown illusion on me. He hadn’t been, of course. If he could do that he’d be on the telly and not here with us. Not here with me. Standing right in front of me. Holding my hand. I wanted to say something but as he spoke, I realised I could see his breath. The air had turned chillier still. The hairs on my neck stood on end.

“Not again.” Dawn sat on the bed, rocking back and forth.

“Listen.” Rhys had his thick finger on his lips again. “Footsteps. Not my doing this time, I swear.”

Again the rhythmic thud of boot on stone, descending. We all crept out onto the bitter cold staircase and with hands on the olive green railing, we made our way down to the door of the first bedroom. There the man, Baines — the keeper — sat at his desk, fountain pen in hand. I could clearly see his bushy sideburns, a sour expression on his face, the cracked skin on his fingers, the inky loops of his cursive. A gull squawked outside the window.

Nikesh gasped, Dawn squeaked, Rhys squealed, and in a heartbeat, the keeper was on his feet, facing us. His face grew thinner and thinner, his mouth open, his eyes rolled back in his head, turning pure white. He screamed a soul-wrenching, heart-cracking scream, so loud I covered my ears as a wave of abject misery washed over me, a wave of sorrow, a wave of pure, agonising loss . And then he was gone. No flash of light, no slow fading away. Simply there one moment and gone the next.

Rhys turned to face me, breathing heavily and wide-eyed. “You’re not going to tell me I faked that and all, butt.”