Witch Hunt

Chapter Forty-Three




I had to make a considerable effort to focus on the road as I drove back to Ashbolten; the storm was moving on, but the rain was coming down hard and visibility was still very poor. Even so, I couldn’t help wondering what the hell was going on. Not just with Cutt, but what had Mum been doing at Treetops? And why had she left me a pointer on my real birth certificate? That continued to perplex me. Dan suggested that Rebecca had contacted Mum. Had Rebecca led Mum there? To show her her story?

When I pulled up outside the pub the rain had eased. The lights in the village were out. A tentative moon popped out from a break in the clouds and coated everything briefly in a wet silvery sheen. I was lifting my stuff out of the boot when something made me look towards the village green. It was a small patch of grass with a duck pond, currently empty of fowl, and something white was floating on the surface. From a distance it looked like a large white plastic bag. I took a couple of steps closer. It was larger than that. In fact, it looked more like a pillowcase packed with meat. Or the back of a body. No. That was silly. My imagination had been fired up and was obviously going into overdrive. I turned back to the car, but I couldn’t let it go. Damn, I thought and threw my stuff back into the boot. Two minutes, that would be all it would take to make sure some poor sod hadn’t trundled out of the pub and into the water. It was a terrible night for it and no one else was about.

I locked the car, put my keys in my pocket and jogged towards the pond. It wasn’t very wide, only four metres or so, but God knows how deep it was. As I reached the edge I peered at the lump. It was floating about three foot out, and yes, it did look rather human within its soggy white cloth casing. Several times I looked around for a stick, finding one eventually in the pond, and stretched out to poke and hook it to me. Just out of my reach, I leant dangerously over the edge. Hearing footsteps behind me, I turned slightly, bringing my chin over to my shoulder but keeping my eyes on the floating thing, and yelled ‘There’s something here. Can you help?’ I was only able to catch a glimpse of a man looming when, with one quick move, he shoved me on the back. I put my hands out to grab something, but wasn’t quick enough and toppled forwards and into the pond.

The shock of the freezing water squeezed all the air out of my lungs. I flailed about underneath the surface, touching roots and reeds. Something caught around my foot. I struggled against it, with increasing terror, trying to lift my face to the surface. Only everything was black. Where was the surface? The sky? The moon?

Something had wrapped itself around my lower left leg and try as I might, I couldn’t kick free its hold. My hands were twitching and jerking as I tried to seize hold of a root or something to climb upwards. Whatever had hold of my foot tugged me down into the depths of the pond. Breath escaped from my lungs in a thin stream, brain and heart galloping in an echoing yet muted drumbeat that resonated out of me and into the dark water.

I panicked. Opening my mouth, I tried to scream, and liquid rushed in and began to fill me up, its cold infecting every part of me.

My sense of self and of struggle began to diminish. I could feel my body giving up the fight, my lungs preparing to accept the water. Then, suddenly, there was another form in the blackness – a pale ghost-white face, dark hair floating in feathery tendrils about her.

Rebecca loosened the grip of the thing around my foot and moved me. Before I reached the surface I saw bubbles stream from her mouth. Through the grimy water I heard the words ‘Not yet. Go.’ And then I was rushed upwards.

Breaking the surface of the pond I clambered to the side. Water still clogged my throat. I drew air into my lungs swiftly.

How I managed to pull myself out, I’ll never know. The wind was screaming through the village as I uncurled at the side of the pond. I gasped greedily, trying to get the cold air into my lungs – aware that across the green, a black car was speeding into the night.