Phil Rickman - The Cold Calling

‘Listen, I don’t even know what authority you have to say that.’ No way was she going to identity herself, pour it all out to some superior being from the planet Arrogant. ‘I’d prefer to hear it from Professor Falconer.’

‘I speak for him.’

‘And you are?’

‘Magda. I run this place. Now look, I don’t have time for this. We have a course next week, a dozen people, we’re mega-busy, so please get back in your car-’

‘I never heard of you. I believe my editor spoke to someone called Ersula Underhill.’

Magda blinked. ‘That makes no sense. Ersula’s ancient history.’

The words pushed a cold skewer into Grayle, who was just imagining Ersula, in a white lab-coat, messing with tapes and stuff and taking no shit whatsoever from this woman.

‘Anyway,’ Magda said, ‘Ersula Underhill wasn’t authorized to arrange for journalists or anybody else to come here.’

‘You say she’s gone? Like, where?’ Grayle noticed that, in the Portakabin behind her, the giant flute had ceased. She watched Magda’s eyes.

‘Look.’ Magda had her hands aggressively on her hips. ‘What is this?’

‘Could I please speak with Professor Falconer?’

‘No. Go away.’

‘Well, actually …’ a man’s voice said, and Grayle, half expecting this, turned towards the door of the Portakabin.

He was lean and he wore leather cowboy boots, his greying hair pulled back into a ponytail. He had an easy smile. He carried two small cassette tapes. She remembered his face from the front of the videotape package Duncan Murphy had given her in Oxford.

Magda shrugged, expressionless, and walked away towards the house without giving Grayle another glance.

‘And which publication do you write for?’ Roger Falconer said lightly.

Grayle suddenly started feeling nervous as hell.

The atmosphere had settled around Cindy the second he was inside. Dark little hall, smell of damp. An acute tang of despair in the chaos its occupant called a study.

It enclosed Marcus Bacton like a fog. His hair was lank, the purplish bags under his eyes blown up by his glasses. He looked like a man in need of help, but it was never wise to suggest this to anyone. Always better to turn it the other way round.

‘Come for your help, I have, Mr Bacton.’

Marcus Bacton grunted. ‘Better sit down then.’ He tossed two telephone directories from the sofa and about a dozen pieces of paper flew out. ‘Fuck it,’ he said, but he seemed too weary to pick them up.

The dark-haired young man came into the study. He must be over twenty years younger than Bacton. Somehow, he looked even less healthy. His face was pale and blotched, his eyes clouded. This made no sense to Cindy; Phenomenologist editorials had been full of references to the wonderful healing ambience.

‘I have to say, Lewis,’ Marcus Bacton said, ‘I’m totally nonplussed. Are you actually telling me you’ve come all this way to talk about this bloody serial-killer nonsense?’

Cindy saw the younger man stiffen, his eyes still.

‘Er, this is my, er, nephew. Maid-’

‘Wilson,’ the young man said. ‘Bobby Wilson.’

‘How are you, Bobby? Yes, I’m afraid I have come to talk about this serial killer nonsense.’

Bobby leaned against a wall, his arms folded. ‘You see?’ Marcus Bacton said to him. Bobby didn’t look at him.

‘What does he mean?’ Cindy said.

Bobby sighed. ‘He had a letter from one of his readers who suffers from fairies in the greenhouse. That’s not you, is it?’

Cindy was furious but contained it. ‘No, lovely,’ he said. ‘That’s not me.’

He paused. Marcus scowled at Bobby.

‘I’m the one who wants to know who killed his housekeeper,’ Cindy said.

Corn-haired, apple-cheeked Adrian pushed the play button and the big noise wafted out of wall-mounted speakers. This close, it didn’t sound so much like a flute as the sound you made when you blew down a seashell or maybe across the open top of a wine bottle.

‘Adrian and various students spent three weeks inside Neolithic underground chambers recording this stuff,’ Roger Falconer said. ‘Different times of day, different weather conditions. Quite impressive, isn’t it?’

‘What does it mean?’ Grayle wondered.

‘Quite significant, actually.’ Falconer wore a frayed denim shirt. Nestling in his greying chest hair was what looked like a flint arrowhead on a leather thong. His smile wanted to eat you up. ‘It supports the theory that what we know as burial chambers served other purposes, perhaps initiatory. Yes?’

‘Mmm.’ Grayle nodded. Coming on like a journalist, as this now seemed acceptable. ‘The Native Americans had something similar, right? The Hopi?’

‘Exactly. Not so apparent now as it probably was when they were built, but the suggestion is that these subterranean cells were constructed as much for auditory as visual effect. To provide a sensory experience for the person inside.’

‘To condition their consciousness,’ Adrian said, his voice brisk with enthusiasm and private schooling. ‘To make them accessible to Higher Influences.’

‘Yes, well,’ said Falconer. ‘For Adrian, I’m afraid, it’s only the beginning.’

‘Oh gosh, yes.’ Adrian stopped the machine and exchanged cassettes. ‘If you listen to this, you’ll hear … hold on, I’ll wind back about ten seconds … now listen very carefully.’

Adrian pushed the button and stood aside from the machine, like a stage magician, looking, at the same time, too rough-hewn and honest for that line of work.

‘OK?’

‘Sure.’ Grayle was feeling more relaxed and quite interested. After the cool, edgy reception from Magda, the whole atmosphere had changed, Roger and Adrian both up-front, friendly, charming.

‘There,’ Adrian said. ‘Did you hear it?’

‘Huh?’ The Portakabin was divided into white-partitioned sections. It looked cool and modern, charts on the walls.

‘OK, I’ll run it again. In fact I’ll turn it up a little, if your ears can stand it. You have to realize, of course, that all this is hugely amplified anyway, although we’ve managed to filter out much of the hiss.’

The hoarse, hollow whistling came rushing out of both the speakers like a gathering storm.

‘Now,’ Adrian said. ‘There it goes. Hear it? Sort of like atcha-ka, atcha-ka . ‘

‘Probably a bird,’ said Falconer.

‘Roger, it was at night . ‘

‘Hedgehog, then.’

Adrian didn’t look deflated. His face glowed with excitement.

‘What do you think it is?’ Grayle asked him.

‘Well, I think … I believe … we’re listening to a chant. Possibly the remains of a chant. Of course, it’s obviously deteriorated over thousands of years.’

Falconer smiled indulgently at Adrian and shook his head.

‘Hold on,’ Grayle said. ‘You’re saying this is … like a prehistoric voice?’

‘Stone records sound,’ Adrian said. ‘It’s infused with magnetism. Stone records voices and images too, and one day I’m going to prove it.’

Roger laughed and clapped him on the shoulder. ‘If only you could, old chap. Be enormously illuminating, because we really have no idea what kind of language these Neolithic people employed. You see, Grayle, that’s what the University of the Earth’s really all about. While I’m not convinced, not by a very long way, that there’s anything to this EVP …’

‘Electronic Voice Phenomena,’ Adrian explained.

‘… we’re giving Adrian a chance to experiment under scientific conditions. And we’re letting interested members of the public share in that experience, which makes for a rather exciting, memorable holiday for them and helps fund our continuing research. Science should never be rarefied or elitist.’