Phil Rickman - The man in the moss

'And the blackmailer? Stand up, John Peveril Stanage?'

'This is the one man whose name is never mentioned in Bridelow. The one writer whose books you will never see on the paperback rack in Milly's Post Office.'

'You were outside when I told them about that stuff with the bones in Scotland?'

Cathy went on nodding. She looked very young. Still had on her damp dufflecoat and a college scarf wound under her chin. 'Mungo, I can't tell you how sorry I am about Moira. I sincerely blame myself. I should never have let her drive away in that state.'

He felt his eyes narrow. 'State?'

'I think I must have been the last person to see her alive. She was very down, I'm afraid. She'd picked up a bug of some kind. And she was upset over the burglary – someone broke in here and stole some things from her. Including this… famous comb. Which she kept in a secret pocket in her guitar case.'

'They stole the case?'

'Just the comb. Seemed silly. 'I'm afraid I didn't really believe her about that, at first.'

'Shit.' Macbeth clenched his fists. 'How would this sonofabitch know precisely where she kept the comb?'

'Mungo…' Cathy hesitated. 'She told me she'd only shown one person where she kept that comb.'

'Wasn't me.'

'No,' said Cathy. 'It was Matt Castle.'

'The ubiquitous Matt Castle. What was her relationship with this guy?'

'She was in his band. And that was all. She was always very insistent about him never touching her.'

'Yeah, but I bet he wanted to.*

'I know he wanted to. He was crazy about her. Men tend to… Oh, gosh, I'm sorry.'

'The irony of it,' said Macbeth, 'is I never got to touch her either.'

'But I doubt,' Cathy said, not without compassion, 'if you're of quite such an obsessive temperament.'

'Something hurts, is all. Maybe it's self-pity. I, uh, thought she was gonna change my life.'

'Maybe she has.'

'You mind if we get off this subject? Tell me about Castle.'

'Yes.' Cathy sat on the arm of what must have been her father's wing-backed fireside chair. 'Matt's son, Dic, reckons his father's lust… unrequited lust… for Moira, just got progressively worse with age. Eventually developing into almost a… perversion? About women with long, dark hair.'

Macbeth was seized, for the first time, by the reality of something more potentially soul-damaging than either grief or anger.

He said, 'That woman in the room across there…'

'Yes,' Cathy said calmly. 'I noticed that too.' This was more like it. This was much more like Hell.

'Christ, I feel just awful.'

Pain in the head, behind the eyes. A growling pain. Put me back. Put me back into the nice, warm shit.

'You've got to come with me,' the Devil urges.

Hot coals roaring and crackling all around. The inside of a furnace, but without the pretty colours. A black furnace with one cold, flashing, piercing flame.

'Piss off, leave me alone.'

'Look, I haven't got much time.' Stabbing her through the eyes with his needle of light.

'You've got all the time there is, pal, all the time there ever was and all the time there's ever gonny be. That no' enough for you?'

'Please. For Christ's sake.'

'Listen, will you get rid of the damn light?'

'Sorry. I forgot you'd been in the pitch dark so long. I'll put it under my jacket, that any better?'

'Yeah. You're OK, Satan, you know that?'

'Try and sit up.'

'Get your fucking hands off me!'

'Listen to me, you have to get moving.'

'Who is this?'

'It's me. Dic. Dic Castle.'

Light on his face. Dark red hair, Matt's jawline, Matt's stubborn lips.

She coughed. It made her head ache. She said, all she could think of to say, 'Was it you? Was it you who took my comb?'

'No,' he said. 'No I didn't. I know who did.'

'Who?' Her back hurt as she sat up. Like it mattered now.

'Bloke called Shaw Horridge. But that's not important right now.'

'No.' The name didn't seem to mean anything to her.

'Look, Dic, I don't want to seem stupid, but what are you doing here? What am I doing here? And where in Christ's name is here?'

Maybe they were both dead. Maybe he'd been sent to offer her a cup of tea.

'It's a storage building, back of the brewery.'

'Brewery?'

'Bridelow Brewery. You have to come now, Moira. Please. I'm supposed to have gone for a pee, that's all. They're going to start wondering where I've got to, and then we could be in a lot of trouble.'

She stood up. There was mist to struggle through, thick grey mist. A monster rose over her and opened its jaws.

Bridelow. Bridelow Black.

Her hands fiddled with her clothes. Sweater. Jeans. She seemed to be fully clothed. She felt naked and raw.

'Thought I was fucking dead. Dic, why am I no' dead?'

'They've had you on drugs.'

'Sure as hell wasn't speed, was it?'

'I don't know. I really don't know much about drugs.'

'Bridelow Brewery,' she said. 'Why's that scare me? Bridelow Brewery. Bridelow Black.

On her feet now, panting, leaning against something, maybe a wall, maybe a door. He'd put out his light. They were just a couple of voices. 'Bridelow Black,' she breathed. 'Ran me off the road. Ran me over a damn precipice.'

'No precipice. There was a fiat area over the wall next to the road. Then a slow drop after that. There was a lot of mist. They took you out…'

'Fat guy with a half-grown moustache.'

'Yeah. Name's Dean-something. Calls himself Asmodeus, after some biblical demon. Looks like a dickhead, but he isn't.'

'He hit me. Also, some big bastard in a dog-collar hit me. Everybody hits me.'

'Can you walk?'

'Three of them in the lorry. They were dragging me away. Who the hell are these people?'

'They all work at the brewery. Gannons fired the local men, brought in these people. Occult-followers from Sheffield and Manchester. Small-time, no-hope urban Satanists. You can practically pick them up on street corners. Doesn't really care any more who he brings in, any low-life shit'll do.'

'Who's this?'

'Stanage.'

'Sorry, my head's, like, somewhere else. I'm not following this. Who's…'

'Can you walk!'

'Guess I can. Question is, do I want to?'

Then walk out of here. Do it now. You walk out of here in a straight line until you get to the road. No, look, I'll come with you as far as the entrance, OK, then I've got to get back or I'm dead. I'll give you the lamp, but don't use it till you're out of sight of the brewery. Go to the Rectory. You remember where the Rectory is?'

'Rectory. Yeah. Near the church.'

'You remember Cath?'

'Dic,' she said, 'what's that noise? I was thinking it was the hot coals.'

'Coals?'

'Never mind.'

'It's just the rain, Moira. The rain on the roof. It's raining heavily, been like this for hours. You're going to get wet, can't be helped. OK, I'm opening the door. You see anybody… anybody… run the other way. Tell Cath… are you taking this in?'

'Doing ma best, Dic.'

'Tell her they're going to put out the light. In the church. The beacon.'

'Who's "they"?'

'Moira, listen, they've got my dad propped up in there. And his clothes. And the pipes. And me. And… you. Please, just go!'

' What did you just say?' A shuddering creak and he pushed her out, and it was like somebody had thrust her head down the toilet and flushed it.

She gasped.

'Come on.' He took her arm. She could make out the shapes of trees and a sprinkling of small lights among the branches.

'Not that way.'

'What's that tower?'

'Part of the brewery. Can't you go any faster? I'm sorry. They catch you, I'm telling you, they'll kill you.'

She'd stopped. She was shaking. Somebody was pouring bucketfuls of water directly into her brain. She clapped her hands to her head.