Phil Rickman - Crybbe

For Fay, there would be no secret pleasure any more in editing tape in the office at night, within the circle of Anglepoise light, a soft glow from the Revox level-meters, and all the rest into shadow.

For none of what dwelt beyond the light could now be assumed to be simply shadow. Once these things had started happening to your mind, you couldn't trust anything any more.

That evening, she and the Canon watched television in what used to be Grace's dining-room at the rear of the house and was now their own sitting-room. Two bars of the electric fire were on – never guess it was summer, would you?

Arnold lay next to Alex on Grace's enormous chintzy sofa. The dog did not howl, not once, although Fay saw him stiffen with the distant toll of the curfew. He'd be sleeping upstairs again tonight.

She watched Alex watching TV and sent him mind-messages. We have to talk, Dad. We can't go on here. There's nothing left. There never was anything, you ought to realize that now.

Alex carried on placidly watching some dismal old black and white weepie on Channel Four.

Fay said, at one point, 'Dad?'

'Mmmm?'

Alex kept his eyes on the screen, where Stewart Granger was at a crucial point in his wooing of Jean Simmons.

'Dad, would you…' Fay gave up, 'care for some tea? Or cocoa?'

'Cocoa. Wonderful. You know, at one time, people used to say I had more than a passing resemblance to old Granger.'

'Really?' Fay couldn't see it herself.

'Came in quite useful once or twice.'

'I bet it did.'

Fay got up to make the cocoa, feeling more pale and wan than Jean Simmons looked in black and white. In one day she'd hung up on Guy, betrayed Rachel, demolished relations with Goff before she'd even met him. And caught herself about to give a blow job to a microphone in the privacy of the Crybbe Unattended Studio.

What I need, she thought, is to plug myself into a ley-line, and she smiled to herself – a despairing kind of smile – at the absurdity of it all.

The box files wouldn't all fit in the boot of the Mini. Three had to be wedged on the back seat, with the doctor's bag.

But the ledger, the dowsing journal of Henry Kettle, was on the passenger seat where Powys could see it, Henry's letter on top.

Just past the Kington roundabout he gave in, pulled into the side of the road and, in the thinning light, he opened the letter.

Dear Joe,

I'm doing this now, while I feel the way I do. If it all sorts itself out you'll probably never read this letter. None of it will make much sense to you at first and if it never does make any sense it means my fears will be groundless.

What it comes down to is I've been working out at Crybbe for a chap called Max Goff who's bought Crybbe Court.

The nature of the job is dowsing some old alignments where the stones and such have all gone years ago, and it's been giving me the shivers, quite honestly, that whole place.

Don't get me wrong, there's nothing psychic or any of that old rubbish, but it's not right and as far as I can work out it's a long-term kind of thing. I intend to keep an eye on the situation in the weeks and months and, God willing, the years ahead and keep on revising my notes, but I'm not getting any younger and you could go any time at my age and I feel as how I ought to inform somebody. You have had some daft ideas in your time but you're a good boy basically and the only person I can think of who I can trust not to dismiss this out of hand as an old fool's rumblings.

God knows, I'm not infallible and I could be wrong and

I don't even know as yet the nature of what's up in Crybbe, only I get the feeling it's long-term, and I'd like to think there was somebody who could keep an eye on what that Goff's up to.

Now my daughter, we've grown apart, no kidding myself any more. She's out in Canada and she's VERY WELL

OFF. So I've written to my solicitor in Hereford informing him that as well as all the papers my house is to be left to you. Consider it as a token of my confidence.

Yours sincerely,

H. Kettle

(Henry)

'God almighty,' Powys said.

He could see lights coming on in Kington, through the trees on the other side of the road, darkening hills. Somewhere, on the other side of the hills, Crybbe.

Leaving him the house was ridiculous. He'd probably have changed his mind by now, anyway.

But the letter was dated 19 June.

Only two days before Henry's death.

Powys opened the ledger at the last completed page. It also was dated 19 June.

Quite a successful day. Located three more old stones.

One of them would be eleven feet above the ground, which would make it quite rare for the Crybbe area, the nearest one as high as that being down near Crickhowell. I have been over this twice to make sure. It is very peculiar that there should have been so many big stones in such a small area. I tried to date this big one, but all I could come up with was

1593 when it was destroyed. It seemed certain to me that this was done quite deliberately, the whole thing taken out and broken up. This was all quite systematic, like the burning down of monasteries during the Reformation.

What intrigues me is how this Goff could have obtained the information about there having been stones here when even

I had never heard of them. Sometimes I feel quite excited by all this, it is undoubtedly the most remarkable discovery of prehistoric remains in this country for many years, even if the archaeologists will never accept it. At other times, however,

I do get quite a bad feeling that something here is not right, although I cannot put my finger on it. I have always disliked the Tump for some reason. Some places are naturally negative, although perhaps 'natural' is not the word I want. The Welsh border is a very funny place, but I am sure there is a good scientific explanation.

The last entry. Neatly dated and a line drawn under it. Two days later Henry Kettle was lying dead in his car under Crybbe Tump.

It was dark when Powys got back to Hereford. He lugged the box files up the stairs to his little flat above Trackways and left them in the middle of the floor, unopened. It would take months to explore that lot.

Bui he was committed now.

He went down to the shop and put on the lights. From his photograph, Alfred Watkins frowned down on the counter, Powys could see why: Annie had put the box of 'healing' crystals on display.

He wrote out a note and left it wedged under the crystals box.

Dear Annie,

Please hold fort until whenever. I'll call you. Don't light too many joss-sticks.

Feeling a need to explain, he added,

Gone to Crybbe.

P.S. Don't get the wrong idea. It might be old, but it's not golden.

When he put out the lights in the shop, he noticed the answering machine winking red.

A woman's low, resonant voice.

'J. M. Powys, this is Rachel Wade at Crybbe Court. I wanted to remind you about Friday. I'd be grateful if you could call back on Crybbe 689, which is the Cock Hotel or 563, our new office at Crybbe Court. Leave a message if I'm not around. Things are a little chaotic at present, but we'd very much like to hear from you. If you can't make it on Friday, we could arrange another day. Just please call me.'

'I'll be there,' Powys said to the machine. 'OK?'

He went upstairs to bed and couldn't sleep. He'd seen Henry barely half a dozen times in the past ten years. If the old guy really had left him his house to underline his feelings about Crybbe then they had to be more than passing fears.

'What have you dumped on me, Henry?" he kept asking the ceiling. And when he fell asleep he dreamt about the Bottle Stone.

The following day was overcast, the sky straining with rain that never seemed to fall. After breakfast, Jimmy Preece, gnarled old Mayor of Crybbe, went to see his son.