Darkness Demands Part 37

"Right, and her mother made her."

"And this is to do with some letter that Mrs. Bloom received? Did she say-"

"Dad. Her mother made her go-she wanted Miranda to stop seeing me."

"But did Miranda say that?"

"It doesn't take a genius to figure it. All this about some f.u.c.king letter arriving in the f.u.c.king dead of night is a c.r.a.ppy excuse to get Miranda away from Skelbrooke."

Paul seethed with anger. John could see it in the way his son walked, fists clenched. He followed Paul through the back door.

Val sat under the tree while Elizabeth still played ball beside the stream. The heat was incredible.

"Paul. Did Miranda tell you what was in the letter?"

"No, Dad." He turned and glared right into John's eyes. "Don't you get it? There probably isn't even a f.u.c.king stupid letter."

"John, I'm sorry you're angry. This has got to be a s.h.i.tty-"

"You're d.a.m.n right it's s.h.i.tty. But all you can do is bang on about it, Dad. What's in the letter, Paul? What does it say? Did it come in a purple envelope, Paul?"

"Paul-"

"Paul, Paul, Paul." His son mimicked him cruelly, squinting his eyes. "I'm a famous writer, Paul. I want to scoop out your brains and put them in my s.h.i.tty book, Paul." His voice rose to a yell. "Just leave me alone, Dad! It's none of your business. Got that? None of your friggin' business!"

Elizabeth looked round startled by the shout. The ball she'd been bouncing clipped the edge of the racquet and shot across the lawn. She saw it would roll into the stream. Obviously mindful she'd already lost a ball that way, she raced after it as fast as she could, her bare feet blurring at an incredible speed as she ran downhill to reach the ball before the water carried it under the house.

Val realized what would happen next. John did, too. "Leave it, Elizabeth. I'll get ita Elizabeth!"

In the Necropolis hill something dark was grinning there. John saw it in his mind's eye as he watched with horror as his daughter tried to stop suddenly at the water's edge. She was too fast now. On bare feet she skidded across the gra.s.s. With a burst of spray she hit the water.

In seconds the stream carried her down to the house. Even though it hadn't rained for days the flow of water was still remorseless.

Crying out, thrashing her arms and legs* she tried to stand. And she would have been able to stand easily with the water coming barely to her waist if the current hadn't been so strong-so uncannily strong.

"You b.a.s.t.a.r.d." The words escaped John's lips; directed at whatever lurked beneath the Necropolis, but it was Paul who turned round with an expression of shocked amazement.

"It's not my fault," Paul retorted. "She slipped!"

The look on his son's face as he glared back contained nothing less than hatred.

By now Elizabeth had been carried to within twenty yards of where the water disappeared with a rumble into the stone throat that ran beneath the house.

"Dada" she cried. "Dad, I can't get out!"

John ran toward the stream. Paul was closer. With an athletic leap Paul jumped into the stream between Elizabeth and the tunnel entrance.

Now all he had to do was stand there and catch her. The width of the stream was no more than five feet. In theory it would be hard for her to slip by his long arms.

But then there was another factor in this.

An ancient driving power that made demands. That had the power to punish anyone that refused those demands.

And it's all your fault, John Newton.

Dispelling the irrational accusation from his mind, he ran forward, aiming to catch Elizabeth if she was swept past John. With her hair matted across her face he saw her try to swim, her T-shirt inflating around her in a soggy ma.s.s. At that moment she cannoned into Paul. He slipped backwards, but still managed to grab her sopping T-shirt with one hand while reaching out to steady himself against the bank with the other. Muscles stood out like cable in his arm as he raised his sister from the water. Then twisted round to hand her over to John. By this time Val had reached them and together they lifted Elizabeth out onto dry ground.

Paul saw that his sister was shaken by the fall. He gave her a rea.s.suring smile. "That was a close one, Lizzer." He grinned. "At least you won't have to wash behind your ears tonight."

The second Elizabeth was out of his hands his center of gravity shifted, his feet seemed to slide forward from under him and he fell flat on his back into the stream with a tremendous splash that doused both banks.

Here, the water was no deeper. But by the time Paul tried to stand the current had carried him to where the stream bed had been floored with stone slabs the size of gravestones. The stones were bright green with weed, and the water was fast but shallow, no deeper than a foot or so.

"Paul, stand up," Val shouted. She'd noticed he was being carried toward the maw of the tunnel. Beyond that was the dark throat of the millrace.

"Paul, stand up!" Elizabeth echoed her mother's cry. "Stand up!"

He tried but the weed was slippier than gla.s.s. At one point he even sat bolt upright, yet still the force of the current carried him across the slabs.

John watched. A cold dread of the inevitable flooded his stomach.

When Paul tried to roll himself to one side of the stream the water seemed to bulge upward to push him back to its center.

John raced for the mouth of the tunnel. Rather than compound problems by running into the water himself, he realized the best option lay in reaching down to Paul from the side of the stream, then grab him as he pa.s.sed. The only place he could be sure of reaching him was the very mouth of the tunnel. There, the banks had been enclosed in stone block-work, so at least the sides wouldn't crumble beneath him as he reached out to his son.

John reached the mouth of the millrace. Behind him both Val and Elizabeth were shouting to Paul to hang onto a branch or simply get to his feet. But the current was swifter here as banks narrowed, forcing the water to flow faster so it would power the mill.

John leaned over the stream, hearing the echo of water as it vanished under the house. There in utter darkness it dashed itself against stone pillars and raced downward under arches to G.o.d knows where before surging out the other side. If Paul should be swept under therea "Paul!" he yelled, holding out his hand. "Get my arm!"

Water, accelerated by the narrowing channel, swept Paul faster. Even so, Paul raised an arm, his eyes locked on John's, and John saw an implicit trust there he hadn't seen since his son had been a little boy.

There was no problem in gripping Paul's arm.

The problem was the speed his one hundred and sixty-pound son was travelling. John felt himself spun round then dragged toward the lip of stone that projected from the edge of the tunnel. The jutting stonework rammed into his chest just below his armpit.

He'd braced himself for a jolt. But he hadn't braced himself against the blast of white-hot agony that raced through his body. He'd never known pain like it. The fist of stone felt as if it had crunched right through his rib cage. Pain radiated outward across his chest and down his arm.

Grunting, he held onto his son's lean forearm. In turn, Paul's fingers closed round John's wrist to grimly hang on. John looked down. With the exception of one arm the millrace tunnel had swallowed Paul's entire body. Dimly he was aware of Val running forward to help. But there wasn't enough s.p.a.ce on the bank here for her to grip Paul. All she could do was put her arms round John's chest and pull.

He cried out in agony the instant she tugged.

"John? What's wrong?"

"Nothing," he shouted over the water's roar. "Just keep pulling. We need to get him outa the force of the water will tear him to pieces under there."

Biting down, he tried to blot out the pain. The pain wouldn't quit. He must have cracked his ribs. It felt like hot iron nails were being hammered into the upper-part of his chest. When he tried to tug Paul back the pain traveled deeper into his arm. He nearly vomited at the intensity of it.

"Keep pulling," he gasped. "Keep pulling."

Then something seemed to reach up from under the house. He felt a tremendous tug on his arm.

When he looked down at the hand that had held his son's wrist nothing but water lay in its grip now.

CHAPTER 34.

"Paul's gone."

"What?"

He looked up at Val as the sound of the water drummed in his ear. For a second he didn't even realize he was the one who'd spoken the words. "Paul's gone," he repeated. As John straightened pain shot through his chest. Breathing in, he winced. A good two or three ribs must have snapped from the force of the blow. But he couldn't let that stop him now.

"We've got to get him out," he said. "There's all kind of debris down there. If it traps him underwatera"

Val ran around the house. He followed. Ghost faced, Elizabeth tried to keep up. It was the dog who reached the other side of the house first. He stood on the banks of the stream and howled a banshee howl.

He and Val reached the outlet together. John stared down, willing his son to reappear, sputtering, sodden, but ready to make a joke of it all.

They waited five seconds, ten seconds. Twenty. Thirty.

Paul didn't appear.

"Oh, dear G.o.d," John breathed. "He's trapped."

"Will Paul be all right, Dad?" Elizabeth's eyes glittered on the outfall of water that emerged in a viscous core as if squeezed from a tube. "I wish I could change places with him. I'm smaller. I'd be all righta Dad?"

"Val! Wait here in case he comes througha you might have to help him out if he's hurt."

For a moment John considered tearing round to the back of the house then following his son into the roaring darkness. But G.o.d only knew what old timber posts, branches, tangles of barbed wire already lay in the millrace like animal traps. Getting himself trapped wouldn't help Paul one bit. Instead, he ran to the living room, threw himself on his knees, and looked down through the observation gla.s.s into the dark pit of the millrace. All he could see were flecks of white foam amongst the swirl and twist of deep shadows. He scrambled across the floor to switch on the millrace lights. A second later he was back at the gla.s.s, leaning forward on both hands, staring down into the now dazzling splash of light that illuminated the observation chamber. He grimaced as the pain from his busted ribs ricocheted through his entire being.

Gritting his teeth, he stared down. This chamber was an access to the millrace in years gone by. But now the gla.s.s was well and truly bolted down. Could he break it?

Not a hope in h.e.l.l. The previous owner said the toughened gla.s.s could bear the weight of elephants. d.a.m.n. He stared down at flecks of green weed slithering by.

What condition was his son in down there? What if he couldn't keep his head above the surface? What if the water had smashed him against stone columns like a pinball? There must something he could doa Good G.o.d. Just a few feet below him a figure appeared.

A man that had lain dead for years, swathed mummy-like in green weed, yet still possessing two living eyes that burned up with a terrible fire at him. A hand erupted from the foam. Fingertips slashed at the gla.s.s.

Then John knew. "Paul!"

Sheer water pressure must have squeezed his son through the narrower sections of the pa.s.sage, coating him in waterweed. Now there Paul was: alive-very much alive!-yet trapped in that stone gut. Down there the water must feel cold as ice. The thunder of its pa.s.sage and that utter grave-like darkness must have disorientated him. But still he'd looked up and recognized his father.

John saw the mouth open. Paul was shouting, only the gla.s.s blocked all sound. In rage John struck the observation window with his fist. His eyes locked onto the terror filled eyes of his son. For a second Paul struggled against the rush of water, but it was as if dark forces gripped his legs and drew him slowly-as slowly as a funeral pace-from this chamber into the next section of tunnel.

Paul looked up in panic. Water cascaded over his face and those two burning eyes. Constantly, green weed swirled round and over him. Then his waist was drawn into the tunnel, and then his chest vanished. In a gulp his head had gone, too. John saw two hands clutch above the foam, fingers stretching out, as if Paul hoped that even then someone would reach down to pull him to safety.

Then they, too, were gone.

Once more John ran to the front of the house where Val waited with Elizabeth. The dog had plunged into the stream to stand looking into the outflow.

"He's stuck down there," John shouted.

"John! Where are you goinga John?"

He ran back round the house, then followed the stream up to the lake. At first the torrent had driven Paul to the house where the tunnel greedily swallowed him. But now the flow of water wasn't powerful enough to force him through the stone bore beneath the house. If he became lodged underwater in the tunnel, then he'd drown before the water pressure drove him through to the other side and freedom.

Gasping for breath, John reached the sluice gate. For weeks now he'd been working axle grease into the rusted cogs and winding shaft, trying to free the locked mechanism without any success. Now he saw the only way to save his son was to literally flush him through the tunnel and out the other side.

Seizing the steel wheel in both hands he began to turn.

Instantly agony seared his side. His broken ribs must have champed like b.l.o.o.d.y jaws against one another. Yelling in pain, he heaved at the wheel, straining to turn the thing.

For a moment nothing.

Then, with a scream that echoed his own, the wheel turned. Trying to blot out the pain in his ribs, he forced the wheel round-then round again. Jerkily the sluice gate began to lift. Water ran faster into the channel. The stream turned black with churned silt. Then, slowly, it began to rise.

Sweating, panting, groaning with a pain that threatened to overwhelm his sanity, he turned the wheel again and again, faster and faster. The ancient mechanism squealed. But it moved. The f.u.c.king thing moved!

Howling with a savage exultation, he forced the sluice gate open as far as it would go. Then he turned back to see a tidal wave rush down along the channel. It hit the tunnel mouth with so much force it sent a splash bursting high enough to wet the bedroom windows. For a second the waters rose as they hit some blockage beneath the house. Backing up, they spilled over the bank, threatening to form a lake across the lawn.

Then, abruptly, the blockage had gone, allowing water to flow freely into the tunnel.

Shakily now, as if the strength had bled from him, he returned to the outflow on the farside of the house where Val and Elizabeth waited.

Water gushed out with enough force to push the dog back to the bank.

But there was no Paul.

"He can't be far from this end of the tunnel now," John panted. "The water pressure should have pushed him through."

Val bent down to look at the green core of water as it vented from the side of the house. Maybe a good yard thick, it appeared solid enough to slice with a knife.

"I can see him!" she cried. Then she forced her arm into the water. "I can feel his head." She shot John an agonized look. "He's underwater. He won't be able to breathe."

Forcing her arm deeper, she felt for the trapped body.

"He's lodged against something," she shouted. "I'm going to try and turn him."

Then, against the force of the water, she drove her arm deeper, until her shoulder reached the lip of the tunnel. Now water gushed up over her face. She couldn't breathe herself, yet she held herself there, working at her son's shoulder, trying to turn him round inside the narrow pa.s.sageway.

The sun, like some great watchful eye, glared down. John found himself slipping into a weird detached state of mind. For a moment, it seemed, he left his soaking and battered body to gaze down at three figures standing beside the water that tumbled from beneath a three hundred-year-old house. A black dog shivered on the bank.