He stubbed out his cigarette and walked back to his cottage to brew some fresh coffee and make a sandwich.
Seated at the battered pine table he listened to the coffee machine performing its magic. It was the only sound in the house. He lived alone, and always had. There were plenty of women he shared his life with from time to time but none that stayed around long enough to move in. None that he wanted to open up to, with whom to share his innermost thoughts. Given his psychic ability he knew that if he ever did find someone to share his life with they would have to be special.
He poured out the coffee. There had been a woman, once, one that might have been special. He had let her go. She was married and he didn’t want any relationship they might have to end with pain. That was what he told himself.
Back at the garden table he bit into his toasted cheese and tomato sandwich. The research about ley lines had a point. He was agonizing over Sian. He was looking for links between the house they had investigated and recent similar occurrences.
Ley lines were one part of the possible link but what he had been pondering was what similarities there might be between the actual places. He had his files on the other chair. The house he was familiar with was the most recent, and not one he needed any notes to recall. The others were spaced out a few months apart. One was a small factory outlet in an industrial park; another was a multistory car park; and then there was a small retreat that consisted of a number of terraced houses knocked through into one dwelling.
There was no instantly recognizable link, so Carter went back to the first file and started again. What did the factory do? Did it make things, assemble things, what? After wading through reams of paper Carter found the answer: religious artifacts. Okay, that was a start. How did that link to the car park? There was no obvious clue in its purpose so he looked at the location on a map. It was in a residential area, houses all around, a row of local shops, and a church.
The next file was the ordinary house from a few days ago. Again there was nothing about the house itself to provide any clues. The location was as ordinary as the house; nothing there seemed liable to produce a link. The Flemings were ordinary in every way so far as he could tell; hardworking, clean living, even churchgoers. He checked again, though he knew the answer. Sian was a regular churchgoer as well, a strict Catholic girl.
With mounting anticipation Carter pulled over the last file: the retreat. The file indicated it had originally been a row of terraced houses built for the workers at a mill that produced cotton at the turn of the twentieth century. In the 1990s it had been cleverly converted into a single dwelling, long and narrow though it was organized to accommodate up to fifteen priests. The retreat was a house for Jesuit priests to stay in and meditate.
CHAPTER NINE
Michael Bennett reached the top of the incline and stopped running. A stitch was creasing his side, and his legs felt like lead. The run yesterday morning had exhausted him and he had very little left. The plan to drive the Land Rover to the jetty had foundered at the first hurdle. Three of them had tried to get it to start and all had failed. The engine wasn’t even turning over. Going by foot was the only option. And now it was late in the day and the light was beginning to leach from the sky. Another couple of hours and it would be dark, and that would be a disaster. He had to find the jetty in daylight; he’d have no chance come nightfall.
Leaning forward to catch his breath he looked about him and groaned. He’d climbed the hill in the hope it would give him a view across the island, but now he was at the top he realized it wasn’t high enough — nowhere near high enough. He took the compass from the side pocket of his backpack, flipped open its waterproof cap and held it out in front of him.
That couldn’t be right!
The compass needle was swinging backwards and forwards, unable to decide which way was north. Slowly it started to spin in lazy revolutions, which confounded him further.
It was hours since he’d left the others and set off, and he was no closer to finding the jetty and the boat. He didn’t want to let them down. As he’d left the Manse he’d looked at their faces and seen a host of emotions painted on them, ranging from derision to hope, from hope to abject terror. The women, Sheila and Casey, seemed to have a kind of blind faith in him, believing that he would somehow find a way back to safety. He remembered Scart’s words on the boat on the crossing over. Group Leader. That was a joke. Before coming to this godforsaken island he had never actually led anything in his entire life. And with that arbitrary decision had come a responsibility, and the fact that he didn’t want such an onus on him was neither here nor there.
He moved his weight to the left, intending to carry on — what other course was left to him? — but as his foot came down it hit a half-buried, moss-covered rock and twisted over on itself. The pain lanced up his leg as far as his groin; white-hot, excruciating. He cried out and crashed to the ground, lying there panting from his exertions, humiliated by his ineptitude and very frightened.
He thought he could hear movement through the trees and undergrowth behind him, and he could imagine a pursuer closing the gap between them. When he looked back he could see nothing, no sign of anyone or anything. But the panic had taken hold of him now, and with a groan of resignation he made himself stand.
The pain, when he put weight on his twisted ankle, brought tears to his eyes. Oh God, if only he’d listened to his wife. Diane had told him bluntly — and quite cruelly — that this management exercise was beyond his physical capabilities. ‘Michael, you’re forty-eight; too old and too out of condition for a week gallivanting around some remote Scottish island.’ And he’d argued with her, trying to make her see that he had no option. If he wanted to survive against the junior managers, the young Turks, the predators regarding his senior position with hungry eyes, then he had to compete with them on equal terms. Only, where were they now? Cowering in the shadows of the Manse, sending him out to seek help from…from God knew where. The island was deserted. The only hope left to him was to reach the jetty and the launch that had brought them across from the mainland. With any luck he’d be able to get the radio working and be able to summon help. And then he wouldn’t have to test his seafaring skills on the choppy waters of the North Sea.
He limped on, keeping an eye on the fading light. Five minutes later it started to rain; a thin sleety drizzle that blew into his eyes.
This was hopeless. He’d never find the jetty now.
And then he saw it; not more than four hundred yards away. The boat was still there, tied to one of the stanchions, rising and falling on the swell. His heart leapt and he started at a hobbling run, trying to ignore the pain from his injured ankle that knifed up his leg with each stride, until the separate shafts of agony converged, becoming one long, scintillating scream.
He was so focused on the speck of hope in the distance that he didn’t notice the gully. Only when his foot hit empty air and he found himself pitching forward did he realize he’d made a terrible mistake. The ground fell away and he rolled and bumped down the incline, sharp stones and clumps of thistles raking his skin, drawing blood, creating new hotspots of pain on his already pain-wracked body. As he rolled to the bottom of the gully the deep undergrowth of bracken and heather swallowed him.
Shaken and disoriented he tried to push himself upright, but a new pain surged through him. It was ten times worse than anything he had experienced so far, and so intense he blacked out for a few seconds. When he came to and shook his head to clear his thoughts he realized with numb surprise that he’d broken his leg.