“Well,” Lee managed conversationally, after some time, “Mr Pascoe can see her because he’s mad, or halfway there, anyway. And I can see her because I’m a clairvoyant. But how the bloody hell are we going to explain you?”
“I don’t know.” Gideon’s mouth had dried out. He’d sat down unthinkingly on the edge of the Pascoe’s marital bed, and there he remained, unable at present to coordinate a move. “Er... hello, Granny Ragwen.”
She was sitting cross-legged atop the wardrobe, wedged lithely into the tiny space. She was wearing a cloak covered with tiny suns, moons and stars, which didn’t look embroidered. Were they little mirrors, skilfully sewn on? As Gideon stared, a comet shot across the fabric, leaving a glimmering trail. Her witch’s hat, tip bent backwards, was perched atop what looked like a fresh blue rinse and perm.
“Hello, Sergeant,” she said politely. “How’s your mother, that true lady of Dark?”
Gideon forbade his voice to shake. “She... She’s fine, thank you.”
“And that little girl of yours, the one who can lift the weight of the whole world?”
I wouldn’t mind that so much, but she’s also learned to lift cars. “She’s fine, too. Forgive me, Mrs Ragwen, but the last time I saw you was at the Penzance Montol. You’ve been listed as a missing person since then, and I’m afraid your daughter Madge thinks you’re dead.”
“Yes, yes.” The old lady nodded vigorously, almost dislodging her hat. “We agreed it was best for her to think that, so she could inherit the house and what little I had to give her. But you and I have met since then, Sergeant—out by the burning church, on the night when the solstice gate swung wide.”
A tense silence fell in the room. Lee broke it at length, an edge in his voice Gideon had never heard before. “Maybe that was just a dream, Mrs Ragwen. Not everyone remembers their dreams.”
“He doesn’t remem-... Oh.” She turned an amused, horrified glance on Lee, eyebrows rising. “Well, an interesting life you must be having of it, little seer!”
Gideon barely registered this exchange. Once the impossible had happened, all he could do was deal with it—and, as ever, his job came first. He was willing to bet that Mabel hadn’t invited this creature over the threshold, or opened a window to let her fly in on her bloody broomstick. “Do you mind if I ask what you’re doing here, Mrs Ragwen? You’re scaring the life out of poor Mr Pascoe.”
“Who? Oh, old Nat? I’m not really here for him. I’ve got something for your other half—I knew he’d be along soon enough.” She reached behind her. Mabel Pascoe hadn’t seemed the type to allow stray clothing to get stuffed behind wardrobes and forgotten, but nevertheless a scarf appeared, unfolding like a long blue snake as she tugged. “There we are,” she said in satisfaction, jerked the end free and tossed the scarf down to Lee.
He caught it on reflex. Pascoe moaned and tried to grab for it. Immediately Lee put it into his hands. “What are you up to? I’m not taking anything from an old man.”
“He won’t mind. Ask him.”
“He can’t answer.”
“Of course he can. Ask him in your way.”
The everyday lights had come back into Lee’s eyes. Gideon saw no return of the silver as he shifted on the bedside chair. All he did was lean forward to rest his elbows on his knees. His attention filled the room like the scent of warm bread. After a moment, Pascoe gave a grunt and pushed the scarf back to him. Then he raised one hand, stiffly extended an index finger and pointed at the door. “There,” Lee said. “He’s had enough of our company for now. Yours too, I’m sure, Granny...”
He fell silent. After a moment, Gideon followed the direction of his gaze. “Do I really want to know,” Gideon asked slowly, “if you think she’s gone too?”
Lee got up. He crossed the room to the wardrobe, stood on his toes and passed one hand back and forth in the air above it, like an ordinary mortal who had to test things by feel. “What’s more interesting to me is that you could see her in the first place.”
“Well—that’s happened before. I’ve piggybacked off your gifts, seen things I shouldn’t have.”
“You weren’t piggybacking. I need to get out of here, Gid. Mabel’s got the central heating on full blast.”
“She’s afraid social services are gonna descend on her and take Nat into care.”
“Yeah, I know. It’s a pain, isn’t it—you settle down to dislike someone, and they turn out to have legitimate reasons for what they do. Some of it, anyway.”
“There’s more to it, isn’t there?”
“Yes. Something in the wind, in the air. Coming up out of the earth. I don’t want to disgrace you, but I think I’m gonna faint.”
“Oh. Oh, no, you’re not.” Gideon strode over to him. He took hold of him by the waist, leaned down so Lee could get an arm over the back of his neck. Maybe he ought to let him faint in comfort here, amongst the faded-chintz bedspreads and handwoven rugs, but the wind and the earth would be better guardians to him than the walls of Mrs Pascoe’s sorrow-laden house. Glancing to see that the old man was more or less back in his bed again, he half-lifted Lee over to the door and pulled it open.
Mabel Pascoe was waiting in a wickerwork chair on the landing outside. She was pallid with anxiety, hands clenched in her lap. She jumped up at the sight of him. “Can I go in now?”
“Yes, of course.” He wanted to offer her a word of comfort, but he was far from sure that any such words were in order. And he didn’t have time: Lee’s breath was scraping raggedly in his throat, his hold becoming urgent. “Nate fine, but you should probably get your doctor out to have another look at him soon. We need to go now, I’m afraid.”
She clearly didn’t care. She darted past him with astonishing speed for her years, dodged into the bedroom and slammed the door behind her. Gideon took a quick look at the stairs. They were nice and wide, unusual in an ancient place like this. He ducked down, carefully knocked Lee’s knees out from under him and hoisted him into his arms. “Got you.”
“For God’s sake, Gid! Put me down.”
“You’re honestly easier to handle like this.” He set out down the staircase, watching out for newel posts and rucked carpet. “Anyway, you weigh nothing. Are you all right?”
“I weigh plenty. It’s you.”
“What?”
“Never mind. If you’re gonna lug me around like a swooning maiden, get on with it. And don’t let the farmhands see.”
He needn’t have worried. The yard was vacant when they emerged from the house, only the stillness of a summer noontide holding sway. Here on the old land, work started early, and there would often be this kind of hiatus between eleven and twelve—a feeling of not-quite-siesta, something deeper and more serious, as if the earth itself had fallen into an unbreathing faint. The pause between heartbeats, between something ended and not yet begun... “I feel like the tide’s on the turn,” Gideon said, setting his lovely armload down on a turf bank on the far side of the yard, where the bulk of the police truck would shield them from curious eyes. “Do you feel better now?”
“Much. If you want to know about the tide, you should look at that fancy watch of yours.”
“I’ve just barely learned how to tell the time on it.” Nevertheless Gideon sat down on the bank beside Lee and gave the gleaming, multi-dialled face an admiring glance. “Probably easier to stand on the wall and look over... Which hilltop would it be? That one over there?”
“Yes, the one beyond the Spinner stone. You can use it as a marker. That’s what I did.”
Gideon looked him over. He had some colour back in his cheeks, and there was no trace of the silver. Still... “When did you do that, then, love?”
He hadn’t let go of the scarf. He’d looped it round one wrist so he could hang on to Gideon on the way downstairs, and now it was back in his hands. “When did I do what?”
“Use the stone as a marker, you said.”
“Did I?”
“Do you know what? I’m taking you home, Mystic Meg.”
Lee yawned and stretched. “You can’t. My car’s here, for one thing, and for another I’d like to have a look at the little cove just down the road. A lady emailed me a couple of weeks back. She’s got a cottage down there, and she says she sometimes hears strange noises, like somebody sobbing and crying out.”
“Probably cows. Or the waves forcing air up through blow holes in the cliffs.”
“Probably. It’s a man’s voice, though, and she only ever hears it during the day. Wailing banshees at night are ten a penny around here, you see.”
“I see. I’ll give you a lift, then.”
“Okay, but then you’d better get back to catching villains. I really am all right. I’ll walk back, or...” He shielded his eyes and let his head rest for a moment on Gideon’s shoulder, looking into the limitless blue yonder of the Cornish summer sky. “Or Granny Ragwen can give me a ride on her broom.”
***
Quarter of a mile away from the Pascoe farm, Gideon’s mobile rang. Despite his protestations, Lee had already lapsed into worn-out sleep in the passenger seat, so Gideon pulled the Land Rover into a gateway to answer. He grabbed the buzzing set before it could wake him. “Hi, Jenny,” he said, pushing open the door and easing out. He’d chosen a stunning spot: here, the daisy-starred turf gave way to granite outcrops, and these in their turn plunged down and away to the sapphire of Stranger’s Cove. He’d been right about the tide. The sloping beach had been exposed all the way to the kelp line, but now long tongues of foam were thrusting their way up the sand. “Does Lawrence reckon I’ve had long enough to roam about the fields?”
“Never mind her. What about me? Such a beautiful day, and here I am stuck behind my desk, digging up the mud for you.”
She sounded entirely happy with her dirty work. Gideon grinned. “Anything good?”
“Not at first. No trace on our systems of anyone called Alice Rawle. So instead of putting police resources to improper use, I gave a mate of my dad’s a ring. He’s a sergeant over in Camelford, and...”
“And they cover Bowithick and the north edge of the moor. I’m not sure you’re clear of improper use yet.”
“Not at all. He owes me a favour, and this wasn’t a police matter. He’d just joined up, though, and there was a lot of gossip in the squad rooms.”
“Gideon?”
He turned. Lee was leaning across the handbrake, eyes full of questions. “Got Jenny Spargo on the line,” Gideon told him, reaching in to ruffle his hair. “Mind if I put this on speaker, Jen? Lee’s here, and this is a bit of a family affair.”
“Go ahead. Afternoon, Lee. Well, the school’s legit, as you know, but you’ve got to ask yourself how someone like David Rawle affords to run it.”
Lee pulled himself closer to the phone. “There wasn’t much to it when I was there—just the house and the grounds.”
“Not anymore. It’s state-of-the-art classrooms, dozens of them. You can see it from the road, but you can’t get any closer than you could to Hawke Lake. When my sergeant went over for a plain-clothes nosey—lost-tourist routine, you know—he didn’t get further than the gates.”
“I guess that’s normal enough these days,” Gideon said. “Were they locked?”
“Locked and guarded. And my contact thinks the guard was packin’.”
“Packin’?” Gideon echoed, trying to work out the implications of an armed guard at the gates of a lonely moorland school. “You’re watching too much TV, Jen. Okay. What was the water-cooler gossip about back then?”
“Alice Rawle. She left her father’s school while it was still just the house and grounds, and went to university at Cambridge. The weird thing is that she apparently got head-hunted directly from there by some hush-hush military group. Nobody knows why, because she wasn’t all that bright. But she never came home.”
Gideon’s heart lurched coldly. “Was there an investigation?”
“No. According to David Rawle, she stayed in touch and she was fine. That’s the end of the story, as far as my friend up in Camelford knows. But there is one thing more. You asked me to run a check on Rawle and his wife, didn’t you?”
“That’s right. They run the school together, and—”
“You don’t have to explain, Gid. In fact, the less you tell me, the better. My sergeant’s mum was a good friend of hers. She was terribly worried about David, although she’d never say why, and it was her decision for them both to retire. But there is no Mrs Rawle, not anymore. She died in Spain last year.”
Gideon put a hand on frame of the door. He held Lee’s gaze steadily. “Shit,” he said at length, too faintly for Jenny Spargo to hear.
“Gid? Are you still there?”
“Yeah. Er, yes. I am.”
“Are you at the beach, you layabout? I can hear waves.”
“No, it’s just static. I’ll be back in soon. Thank you, Jenny—I owe you one.”
“Another one. I’ll add it to the pile.”
He hung up. Still he didn’t break eye contact with Lee. Neither of them needed to speak. Gideon picked the number for Tamsyn’s nursery school out of his phone’s speed-dial list. He hit the button and waited, barely breathing, for the admin line to pick up. He was grateful when Headmistress Prynne herself gave her usual dry and challenging hello. “Miss Prynne? It’s Gideon, Tamsyn’s dad.”
Her voice just barely warmed, though she knew and liked him well. She was a good guardian dragon, the best of gatekeepers. “Good afternoon. Is everything all right?”
“Yes. Yes, fine, only... could you make sure that no-one else but Lee picks Tamsie up today? And I know how much care you take of all the kids, but could you and her teachers keep a close eye on her until then?”
“That should have gone without saying, Gideon.”
“Yes, I know, but—”
“We do know your situation. We do understand.”
There was something weirdly gentle in the click her phone made as she ended the call. Gideon’s was still on speaker. “I think,” Lee said softly, after another wave-washed silence had elapsed, “that for all its faults and its gossip, our kid is growing up in the right place.”
“I do, too.”
“I must’ve been off my head to think otherwise, even for a minute.”
“You just wanted the best for her. What do you want to do now?”
“Can you drop me back off at the Pascoes’? I’ll grab my car and go home.”
“Tamsie won’t get out for a couple of hours yet.”
“No, I know. But you asked what I wanted, and what I want is to be waiting by the kerb outside the school gates.”
Gideon swung back behind the wheel. He waited for Lee to join him from the passenger side. But Lee had come to a halt in front of the Rover. He was staring at the footpath sign, a lichen-furred fingerpost that marked out the coastal path in one direction, and in the other... “Stranger’s Cove,” he called, over the rush of wind and water that forever carved their songs out of this land. Through the windscreen he looked blurred to Gideon, ready to fade. “This is the place.”
“I’ve always pronounced that to rhyme with hanger.”
“That’s the right way. A farmer called Stranger used to own the land. Clem doesn’t know that, though. He only saw the sign. And he was such a stranger, you know? The loneliest man in the world.”
There was salt spray on the windshield. That was all. Lee was alive and present, his expression only one of mild surprise when Gideon scrambled out of the car and took him by the shoulders. “What’s the matter, big man?”
“I think you’re seeing ghosts.”
“Well, it’s just this scarf. I’m a contact medium sometimes, as you know. Objects like this can form bridges.”
“Then burn the damn bridge. I don’t like this, love. Let it go.”
“I would, only...” He backed away before Gideon could pull the scarf out of his hands. “Only this is the place. He’s been bringing me here, step by step, using the currents of our ordinary events, the decisions we made. I have to let him use me.”
“Bugger that for a lark,” Gideon said grimly. A new conviction stirred in him, bright and pure. “I could scare him off you with one growl.”
“I know you could, my Beast. But don’t. Just help me. Help both of us.”
“How do I do that?”
“I don’t know yet. It was such a long time, such a long journey, and we’re not used to being helped. We’re starting to look dirty and ragged, and no-one wants us in their towns.”
“Listen to me. There is no we here. There’s Clem Atherton, and there’s Lee Tyack-Frayne, my husband. Don’t you forget that.”
“We’ll try not to.” Once more evading Gideon’s outstretched hand, Lee stepped into the road. “This is where it all began to end. We realised it here, when we saw the signpost—that we’d always be strangers, that we’d never find a home or a resting place or anyone to love us again. And we were too sick and weary to go on.”
“Oh, my God, Lee. Get back into the car and let me take you home.”
“No. No home, no...” Lee paused, rubbing his eyes. “No cars, either, or hardly any at all on the roads, not back then. I walked down here between the hedgerows of flowers, the campions and the tricorn leeks and all the others Michael taught me the names for, and here I had my first glimpse of the sea.”
Gideon didn’t ask who Michael was. He didn’t dare. The pronoun shift from we to I meant the transfer was complete, that whatever had been content for a while to share space inside Lee had now taken over. And a growl wouldn’t do the trick anymore: would possibly make both spirits jump out of Lee’s embattled skin. What a screwed-up thing for Gideon to have said, anyway! A growl, for God’s sake... But then Lee had answered as if the threat had made perfect sense to him. I know you could, my Beast. Lee called Gideon beast on half a dozen daily occasions. Sexy beast, when Gid had got a new close-fitting shirt and was modelling it for Lee’s admiration. When dinner wasn’t happening fast enough and Gideon was under his feet in the kitchen: Out of my way, hungry beast. And, oh, in the bedroom, Lee’s sweet moan when the moon was full and everything was ripe and right for Gid to be inside him—ah, you bloody great beast, you!
No time to think about it now. “Clem Atherton,” Gideon said sternly. “Is that you?”
“How do you know my name?”
“Leave the questions to me, please, sir. I’m a police officer.”
A faint grin—not Lee’s—lit the pain-gaunt face. “I can tell. The uniforms haven’t changed that much.”
“You’ve come to the wrong place, Mr Atherton.”
“Oh, God, please don’t move me on. Not yet. My chest hurts. Everyone says it’s my heart, and they’re right, I suppose. But I’d be fine if I hadn’t lost Michael. Oh, Mike!”
Lee folded down onto his knees. A cry tore from him, his own voice eerily braiding into and through the invader’s, breaking up into wild sobs. Before Gideon could move—to do what, he didn’t know—a door slammed, such a domestic sound in this new wildness that he whipped round anxiously to find the source. A cottage, so well blended with the granite cliffs that he hadn’t seen it until now, tucked into a corner of Stranger’s fields... A woman was running full-pelt towards the gate, her movements hampered in a way Gid recognised: bare feet hurriedly thrust into wellingtons that needed socks to make them fit. She was dragging a red-faced man in her wake. “Listen,” she yelled. “I told you I was hearing something. Hurry up, Stanley—it’s coming from just up here.”
She reached the gate. Her bulkier companion failed to stop in time and collided with it hard enough to make it jounce on its hinges. “Esther,” he managed when he could. “For heaven’s sake. It’s not a ghost, or whatever it was you were worried about—it’s just this poor man. There’s been an accident.”
Gideon moved to block their view of Lee. He loved the British public. They could be mean drunks, standoffish, way too inclined to think that their islander status granted them superiority. But at every road crash he’d ever attended, there they were: switching off engines, applying such first aid as they knew, offering flasks and travelling rugs. They liked nothing better than a disaster, and a chance to prove they had hearts. He was willing to bet that Esther and Stanley here would carry Lee off on a door, lay him on their sofa and ply him with sweet tea at a moment’s notice. “It’s all right,” he said. “It isn’t an accident. Nobody’s hurt.”
“See, Esther? The police are already in attendance.”
“Yes, but... that’s Lee Tyack, Stan. The psychic I emailed to ask him if he could investigate the noises. That’s him. Is he all right, officer? What’s he doing?”
“Investigating,” Gideon said shortly. He loved them, the public, but he, Lee and Clem Atherton needed them out of the way. “I’m afraid a very dark, er... ley line runs up this track, ma’am.”
Her eyes widened. “A ley line?”
“Nonsense,” Stanley expostulated, sharply as a sneeze. “Rubbish!”
“Be quiet, Stan. You don’t understand anything about this kind of thing.”
“Oh, and you do, I suppose?”
“I do. I watch all Mr Tyack’s shows. Will it be very dangerous, officer?”
Well, if she’d asked... “Extremely,” Gideon said solemnly. He ignored a snorting chuckle from the kneeling figure beside him: Lee, no doubt, hopefully getting the upper hand. “When Mr Tyack becomes a link between the positive end of the line and the negative, there could be a tremendous discharge of energy.”
“Oh, he’s very ethical. He’d never want to expose us to that.”
“Too right, ma’am. So if you wouldn’t mind...”
“Of course not. Come away, Stanley! Don’t stand there gawping.”
She hauled the poor man away as enthusiastically as she’d brought him. Gideon was almost disappointed. He’d said move along, now many a time in his career, and even had recourse to nothing to see here. One day he’d get a chance to ask if the punters surrounding him didn’t have no homes to go to. His mind was skidding wildly over the ice of this situation, joys and sorrows vying for a hold. Why was there so much sunshine and love in the air, when Lee was in the grip of an alien spirit? He should have been scared out of his mind.
Instead he crouched in front of the struggling man. “Come on, Clem,” he said gently. “Lee and I are your friends here. Tell us what’s wrong, and let us help.”
But it was Lee who looked back into his face. “He’s letting me speak to you. Please listen, because I won’t be able to hold him back for long. He’d got as far as here, and then his pain and loneliness got the better of him, and he fell down in the road and wept. He wants you to know that it was the first time he’d given in, that he’d suffered like a man until then.”
“Suffered like a... Why does he think I’d want him to do that?”
“He sees how big and strong you are. He thinks it’s what you’d expect. Times were different then.”
“All right. Tell him I understand. What does he want?”
“For you to see. He was kneeling where I am. And he looked up and saw the top of the Spinner stone at Pascoe’s Farm, there.” Lee raised one shaking hand. Following the direction he indicated, Gideon too picked out the gleaming head of the monolith. “It was such a hot day, just like this one. The heat-haze was making the stone dance, and it seemed to beckon to him, so he got up and started walking. He’d have died here all alone, otherwise.”
“But he didn’t? He didn’t die alone after all?”
A tremulous smile shed radiance over Lee’s face, bright enough to put the noonday sun to shame. “No. Oh, no. He wants you to see. He wants the minister to see, and the woman who carries out justice in this land. It’s all playing out just as it happened then, and you all have to see.”
“Sweetheart, you know I’ll move any mountain I can for you. Are you sure you can’t shift this guy’s hold on you, though? Your eyes haven’t changed.”
“My... My what?”
“Your eyes. They go silver when you’re having a vision, and...”
“Do they?”
“My God—didn’t you know?”
“Never did it in front of a mirror, I suppose.” A shudder ran through him, and he pressed both hands hard to the tarmac, lowering his head. “Clem wants you to see, and Ezekiel, and DI Lawrence, and until they do, he’s taken my vision. I’m blind.”
“Oh, fuck.” Gideon took gentle hold of his chin. He lifted his face to the light, noting with cold fear how his pupils remained darkly dilated. Lee’s latest scan at Trelowarren hospital had come back clear, and Gideon sometimes stupidly allowed himself to think that this meant they were safe for the year to come. “Lee, you have to shake this off. It’s too much for you.”
Lee jolted away from him. He surged to his feet. “Did you not hear me?” he demanded. “Fetch Zeke. Fetch Lawrence. Do it now!”
Lee could roar, too. He made the air around him reverberate. What had he said to Gideon the night before—that he could take him, if ever it came to a stand-up fight? Gideon believed it. The freedom and security of that took the edge off the terror of seeing his wide gaze focussed on the wrong place. “All right,” he whispered, and instantly Lee corrected himself, homing in on the sound. “I’ll get them for you, I promise. Just hold on.”