Simon Green - Spirits from Beyond

“Have you ever considered having the inn exorcised?” JC said to Brook.

“It’s been tried!” said Brook. “Three times in the last forty years, to my certain knowledge. Every time the town gets a new priest, and they hear the stories, they can’t wait to take on the infamous King’s Arms. Things go quiet for a while, then they start up again. I think. . it’s because what’s here, whatever it is that’s here, is older than the Church.”

The crowd had nothing to say about that. Judging by their faces, it wasn’t anything they wanted to talk about.

“Whatever’s here,” said Cootes, looking challengingly at the three Ghost Finders, “it’s best not to upset it.”

“Hell with that!” JC said immediately. He glared around the bar and raised a dramatic voice. “To whomever or whatever troubles this place, hear my words! Be advised! This place, and these people, are under my protection and that of the Carnacki Institute! Behave yourself or else.”

He looked around him, but there was no response. Everyone in the crowd was very still. They looked tense, braced for. . something. But nothing happened. They could all hear the wind outside and the rain dashing against the windows; but that was all. JC sat down again and gave the crowd his best reassuring grin.

“You have to stand up for yourself. Ghosts should know their place. You’ve told me the old traditional stories. Now tell me things you’ve seen and heard for yourselves. Don’t be afraid. I’m here to listen, and to help.”

“Sometimes,” said Jasmine, quietly, “sometimes, at night, if you’re the last to leave here. . You look back, and the pub isn’t as it should be. There are lights on, in the upper rooms, where nobody goes. And you can see shadows, human shapes, standing before the lit windows, looking out. Or moving slowly back and forth, like people coming and going. Except they’re not people.”

“I never turn the upstairs lights on,” said Brook. “Never anyone staying there. .”

“I know,” said Jasmine, helplessly. She looked at her hands, clasped tightly together in her lap. She looked like she wanted to cry.

“Sometimes,” said the old farmer Troughton, “there’s a large oak tree standing in the field outside. Only mostly there isn’t.”

“And sometimes,” said Brook, “when I’m in here on my own, I can feel someone following me around. Standing behind me. I never see or hear anything, but I know. Sometimes I hear footsteps upstairs, but when I go up and look, there’s never anyone there. And I try not to look in any of the bar’s mirrors because sometimes when I look I see someone standing behind me, in the reflection.”

The crowd was looking very unhappy now. Shifting in their seats, looking at each other for support and comfort. It was one thing to tell stories out of the past; no-one wanted to contemplate their moving into the present.

“Well, Brook,” JC said loudly, “I hope you won’t be putting any of us in the room where the servant maid hanged herself.”

And it all went very quiet. The crowd looked at each other. Finally, Troughton cleared his throat.

“You’re not thinking of actually staying the night here, in the King’s Arms? Are you? No-one ever stays the night here.”

“Why not?” said Happy.

“Because the charges here are terrible!” said Cootes.

There was an outburst of laughter at that; but the mood had changed. People were shifting uncomfortably and glancing at their watches, looking around for their coats and belongings. And then Jasmine jumped to her feet and pointed at a window with a quivering hand. Her face was shocked white, her eyes stretched wide. Everyone looked at her.

“What’s the matter with you, girl?” said Troughton.

“There was a face!” Jasmine said shrilly. “At the window!”

Everyone was on their feet at once, looking where she pointed; but there was no face to be seen at any of the windows, only the dark of the night, and rain running down the leaded glass. But the damage had been done. There was an awful lot of ostentatiously looking at watches, and saying Is that the time? I really must be going. People hurried to pull on their coats and headed for the door. Got to be going before the storm gets too bad. Or the road gets flooded. Have to make an early start in the morning. . JC raised his voice, trying to reach them, to calm them down, but they were already pushing and shoving at each other as they ran for the door, streaming past JC and Happy and Melody as though they weren’t even there. The bar emptied in a few moments, the last few actually fighting each other in their need to get through the only exit. And then the main bar was empty, apart from the three Ghost Finders, and Brook, behind his counter.

“And still drinking time left on the clock,” said Brook, shrugging resignedly. “You’ve lost me some profits there. But I have to say, I’m surprised they stayed this long. Given that it’s dark out.”

JC looked at him steadily. “Why did you call for us, Adrian? What’s really going on here?”

“I used to work for the Carnacki Institute before I retired,” said Brook. “Though never as a field agent, like you. No, me and my crew, we would turn up long after you were gone, to clean up. Remove the bodies, clear up the mess you left behind, and do whatever was necessary, or practical, to remove the psychic stains from the environment. Not glamorous work, perhaps, but necessary. We all did our best, to prevent nightmares. Anyway, I put in my years, stuck it out as long as I could, then I took early retirement. I’d had enough. I came back here, to my old home-town, and bought this pub. Something to keep me busy, in my twilight years. A chance for a little peace and quiet, at last.

“I should have known better.

“I knew all the old stories, you see. I knew all about the ghosts and the strange happenings. Heard them from my old dad, who heard them from his dad, and so on. . So many stories, and all with the same point if you took the trouble to listen. That the King’s Arms was an unquiet place and always has been. But I thought they were stories, something to give the inn character and pull in the tourists. Tourists love a good ghost story. Money in the bank, as they say. And at first, everything was fine. .

“But, slowly at first, then more and more, I started to see things. Hear things. Experience things. . Things I knew from my time in the Institute were well out of the ordinary. And well out of my league. Worse still, my customers started to see them, too.”

“What sort of things are we talking about, Adrian?” JC said carefully.

“Not traditional ghosts, like in the stories,” said Brook. “Nasty things. Unquiet spirits. Dangerous presences. So I called up my old contacts at the Institute and told them I needed a field team here, to investigate. And a damned good one! I’ve never seen anything like this, Mr. Chance. . You’ve got to Do Something! Put the ghosts to rest or drive them out, or. . something!”

“So you can get your customers back?” said Melody.

“Because,” said Brook, “Something bad is coming. I can feel it.”

JC looked at Happy, who nodded slowly. “He might be right, JC. This inn gave me the creeps from out in the car park. Inside, it’s like standing in a slaughter-house, listening to the man with the hammer creeping up on you.”

He looked slowly around the empty bar. JC could see in Happy’s face that he was Seeing something. He moved in close beside the telepath.

“What is it, Happy?” he murmured. “What do you See? The face of the monster?”

“It’s not a presence,” said Happy, frowning. “Not as such. I’m not picking up any individual ghosts, or poltergeist activity, no real feeling of supernatural manifestations at all. . but this whole place feels bad . Not only the bar, the whole damned building. Steeped and soaked in psychic nastiness, going back. . centuries. Embedded in the stone and brick and wood. Like Chimera House, only worse. Much worse. Something spectacularly bad happened here, long and long ago. And I think it’s still happening. Calling the dead to it like moths to a flame.”