Adam Nevill - Banquet for the Damned

'Beth's mother? She's here again?' Arthur says, his voice a whisper.

'No. But a lad called Walter Slater did not show up for his flight to Greece, and his mother has heard nothing from him in a week. A Mrs Skidmore wants to know what has happened to her daughter, Maria, and the parents of Rick Leech have asked me if their only son is in trouble again. I'm not so worried about him, he has discipline problems. But the others were all good students, who stayed over the summer to finish their work.'

Arthur's face turns ashen. 'So many,' he murmurs. Then he raises his voice. It becomes shrill. 'Why did you wait to tell me?'

'What could I say? I have no idea where they are. Two of them disappeared overnight and left their doors open. We cannot keep an eye on every student.'

'Eliot. He is responsible.'

'They were not divinity students. To my knowledge he may have had no contact with any of them. And you know what young people are like, Arthur. They just take off. They don't always think. My own sons are the same. I am sure there is an innocent explanation, and that this is nothing more than coincidence. But if they are connected to Beth, or Eliot, we shall have to be prepared, old man.'

Arthur sits down, heavily. His eyes flash to the walls and then the ceiling and his small hands are unable to find a resting place. 'The friends of the missing students. They must have been told something?'

Harry shakes his head. 'Nothing. But, Arthur, listen carefully. We cannot afford a panic. I need you to keep your head over this. We are in the clear.'

'But the arm, Harry.'

'That is a matter for the police. We genuinely know nothing about it. We'd be laughed out of our jobs and this town if we even mentioned Eliot's little ceremony. I brought Eliot to this town, and we decided against any mention of his escapade in May. If news of his midnight shenanigans gets out we're ruined. Think of the university's reputation. Think of the papers too. They'd wallow in it. Witchcraft in St Andrews? So, if questioned, you do not speak of it.'

Arthur closes his eyes and bows his head. Harry gazes out the window behind his chair. 'When term starts it will all blow over. Of that I am sure. Eliot will be gone, and the missing students will show up and everything will return to the way it was. We have no reason to believe otherwise. What I am asking for, what I am insisting upon, is discretion. If you should be questioned, you say nothing about the night in May. Nothing. It's sink or swim time, Arthur. And as our present connection to him is tenuous at best, we'd best observe public relations.' Harry exhales with an air of satisfaction. A little colour returns to his cheeks.

Arthur stands up. 'Sorry, Harry. I can't agree. What if the students don't come back? And if they do, what if they come back like Beth? Brainwashed. We can't ignore this. If that Dante chap wasn't here maybe I'd give it a go, and carry on turning a blind eye. But I can't. It's gone too far.'

Harry turns swiftly, but speaks slowly. 'Have you taken leave of your senses?'

'Harry, no one blames you for bringing Eliot to St Andrews. He was a friend and you helped him. But we both made a terrible error of judgement before the summer. We should have notified the authorities the moment he mixed a student up in his madness. The young man, Dante, has threatened to go to the police unless we provide answers. And quickly.' He pauses, and then raises his chin, defiant. 'I made him a promise. I'm going to see him tonight. He has a right to know about May.'

Harry closes his eyes. 'Jesus wept. Sit down, Arthur.'

'No. His friend has disappeared and he's desperate. You didn't see his face. He means it. What's more, he seems convinced Eliot's behind it. If inquiries are made, he'll point the finger at us. We made the mistake of trying to warn him at the Orientation.'

Arthur sees the telltale signs of strain reappear on his friend's face. He wonders if Harry would dare to threaten him. 'And what precisely will it achieve?' Harry asks. 'You explain to this Dante character that we saw something in Eliot's cottage. Shortly followed by the suicide of one research student while the other began to jabber in Latin. You are the Hebdomidar of this university, for Christ's sake. Do you have any idea how absurd you will sound?'

'Sorry, Harry, my mind's made up. He can help us.'

'How?'

'He wants to find Eliot. I believe he wants to force a confrontation about the whereabouts of his friend. And something Dante said to me at the Orientation, about Banquet for the Damned , struck a chord. He's not a sceptic like you and I. This Dante is far more receptive to Eliot's ravings.'

'I still don't follow.'

'He believes, Harry. If he thought it was a murder or kidnapping, he'd have been to the police already. But he hasn't. Why? Because he believes. He believes Eliot has done something incredible. Something so fantastic the authorities would laugh at his story. We both saw something in that cellar in May. We don't know what and decided it best not to speculate. Or maybe, over time, our minds have told us we never saw what we thought we saw. I don't know anymore. But it's time to recruit an ally who doesn't question the situation. Someone young and angry enough to probe. To push Eliot and to find out what really was achieved back then. So I say we go to Dante this evening, and we tell him about Eliot's ceremony and what we saw. And we tell him what we know of Eliot's most recent work. Remember the paper he delivered at Cambridge about the psychic energy trapped in this town? He was laughed off the stage. He disgraced himself. But what if he was telling the truth, or at least what he thought was the truth? That he had actually communed with something here. Something that wanted to come back. If Eliot and Beth believe it, who knows what they're capable of? But let Dante do the work. And if there is a connection between Eliot's experiments and the students, he might uncover something about the missing ones.'

After a moment of silence, as Harry looks down at his hands, he says, 'You are sure he will go along with this?'

'Yes. And the information need never have come from us. But it's time to know, Harry. Time to really know what Eliot has done.'

Harry says nothing, but nods his head in reluctant assent.

'What is it, dear?' Marcia asks, poised by the filing cabinet in Arthur's office; tall, her glamour subtle but not faded. 'You look worried. More than usual.' The handsome face is turned to him, smiling, full of sympathy, the eyebrows raised in concern. Arthur pushes a set of crisp papers to the side of his desk and sighs. 'Few things on my mind,' he says, sulky in the way that always seizes her attention and softens her voice.

'Can I get you a coffee?'

'No thanks. I have to get off. I have someone to see.'

She turns her body around. Whispers escape from inside her tweed suit. His ears are attuned to them. 'You can talk to me, Arthur.' His name is spoken, so softly.

Looking up, his vision blurs, then clears, and focuses on her face, broad enough to carry the lines, to spread the mouth, painted a dark red. Her perfume wells around his desk. 'Are you going somewhere?' he asks.

'No,' she says quickly; her eyes are smiling, surprise in them now.

'You look good. The theatre, I thought,' he stumbles, not at ease, the flirting awkward when they are alone and not before an audience.

'I thought I'd treat myself —' the cabinet drawer shuts with a whirr and then a click '— a little celebration. I've finished the collection.'

'Oh, you have. Good. Good,' Arthur says, relaxing, and feeling a little foolish. Her painting of course. She's dressed for dinner in celebration of finishing the seascapes. Very good from what he's seen. Her oils. One hung behind his desk. A picture of the pier. The perspective is right, the scene captured well; you know where you are, looking across the East Sands to the west with the cathedral on the hill. But there is something mournful about the picture. Are the colours too flat? Too brown and grey. Perhaps the light was poor at the time she painted it. When she presented it to him on his birthday, just after Christmas, the sombre tone surprised him. He never associated her with those colours.