‘He left me there to die,’ said Dr Ramsay. I was watching the ceiling. The edge of the hole where the long thin strip had collapsed was licking and curling with tongues of flame and the brown bloom above us was darkening to black and blistering all over. ‘I thought it was one of his jokes. I actually climbed in and let him close the thing!’
‘Well, you’re out now,’ I said, wishing he would shut up and let me listen for Alec.
‘It started as a tease! He’s such a joker himself. I was only teasing.’
‘I know,’ I said. ‘Alec!’ I turned back to the doctor. ‘Get ready to breathe in and duck. It wasn’t seemly behaviour for a professional man, though, was it, Dr Ramsay?’ For I had worked it out as soon as I saw him there. The gentleman who wrote to say a woman died of fright at the Moffat Hydro. It was Dr Ramsay. ‘You thought if he had the nerve to dream up a story like that he deserved a bit of ribbing, eh?’ I said. ‘So you wrote to the magazine. And then when the mediums began to arrive you went to the library, didn’t you, and asked what ghosts you could tell tales of in Moffat and have them believed. You let some of Tot’s friends in on the joke, didn’t you? And persuaded them to spread your stories for you.’
‘It was only a tease,’ he said again. ‘And he was ready to kill me!’
‘I think, my dear doctor,’ I said, ‘that he was going to kill you because the story of Mrs Addie was crumbling and he didn’t want you to tell the police that he… what shall we say?… bribed you to sign the certificate?’
‘Not bribery,’ said the doctor. ‘He was going to write off my losings.’
At last, I remembered the other mention of a respectable man. Hugh had said that Tot’s casino attracted them. That was who I had seen slipping into the Hydro by the smoking-room door. He was on his way to the poker table or roulette wheel, where he would not have to pay his debts, at least not at twenty shillings to the pound.
‘And I wouldn’t have done it if there was a mark of violence on her,’ the doctor said. ‘She died of natural causes. She must have. Heart failure was the truth after all.’
‘She died as you were going to,’ I said. ‘Only without the fire to make it quick for her. Now, duck under! Alec, please! Alec, hurry!’
There was a huge creak and as I took in an enormous breath and let myself sink, I saw the ceiling above us give way and let a ball of yellow fire, ragged with grey and orange fringes all around, come rolling down towards us and then I was under the cold water and the silence filled my ears. I had lost Dr Ramsay. I felt for where he should be, but there was only the swish of empty water there and I knew that I would be able to hold my breath much longer if I kept from moving. So I crouched down as low as I could with my eyes shut and prayed and prayed, until my chest was searing with pain and my head was pounding.
When I could not hold on another second, I pushed off the bottom and came up through the warming water, letting my lungs empty and then filling them again as soon as my mouth broke the surface. It was hot and bright, filled with the sound of breaking timber and shattering glass, a nightmare place. I dragged in another breath, looking all around for Alec or Dr Ramsay, but the surface of the water was blocked with sizzling debris and I could see nothing. I closed my eyes, gulped as much air as I could and went under again.
I counted to two hundred before I felt myself begin to swoon and pushed upwards the second time. Up in the air, the nightmare was worse than ever. The ceiling was gone and a black chasm with fire at its edges rose above me. All around, pyres of broken timber and plaster were crackling like bonfires and belching smoke up into the air. Someone was screaming with pain nearby.
‘Alec!’ I tried to call out, but my voice was no more than a ragged whisper. ‘Oh, Alec.’ I looked up and saw a shard of floor beam coming straight down towards me like a burning arrow. I dragged in a breath and sank again.
It was warm all the way to the bottom this time, and I felt sluggish and heavy in my clothes and shoes. Odd objects bumped against me, but when I reached out my hand it was pieces of plaster, turning to mud in the wet, and I pushed them away.
I knew that my lungs gave in more quickly this third time. It seemed hardly a moment before I was rising again and when I got to the surface I lay back weak and panting, before I dared open my eyes.
The fire in the resting room was still crackling and leaping, but in here the flames were mere flickers and the smoke had cleared. I lifted my arms and let them float on the surface of the water, then shrieked as someone clutched my hand.
‘Dan!’ I turned and there was Alec, surging towards me through the debris in the pool. His face was shining red, his lips blistered, but he was alive and he was smiling at me. ‘She wasn’t there,’ he said. ‘I couldn’t get to you for all the burning rubbish but I’ve been shouting and shouting.’
‘I was under the water,’ I said. ‘Holding my breath.’
‘What a good idea,’ Alec said, touching his lips and wincing. ‘I’m going to look like a toffee apple tomorrow.’
‘Where’s Dr Ramsay?’ I said. Alec nodded to a spot behind me but then tightened his grip on my arm.
‘Don’t look,’ he said. ‘He tried to get out and a piece of the ceiling fell on him.’
‘I told him to hold his breath and duck!’ I said. ‘Is he dead?’
Alec raised his eyebrows and then winced again as his wrinkling forehead stung.
‘He’s very very dead,’ he said. ‘Please don’t look, darling. Now, I reckon since we’re soaking wet, if we go the way we came we’ve got a fair chance of getting out of here. What do you say? We can always come back if it gets sticky.’
I shook my head, feeling the rat’s tails of my hair lashing back and forth. With every gulping breath I was taking in more of the sulphurous burning stink.
‘I’m never coming back to this bloody place ever again,’ I said and began wading to the edge of the pool to haul myself out. ‘I understand now why fire and brimstone are such an effective threat, I can tell you.’
We sizzled a bit in some of the corridors on our way to the outside and the floor felt hot through my shoes now and then, but we met no serious harm and when we emerged and came reeling out onto the lawns, we might not have looked as beleaguered as we felt for the crowd gathered there ignored us absolutely. They were all looking upwards to exactly the same spot on the first floor, some with their hands clasped over their mouths and some with their hands clasped for praying. I cast my gaze to where they were facing and saw Alec, from the corner of my eye, do the same.
Framed in one of the windows, a figure stood with a bundle of papers in its arms. The papers were on fire but she – it was a woman; it was Dr Laidlaw – threw them out anyway.
‘Stamp on them!’ she said. ‘Don’t use the hose. My work! My life’s work!’
‘Never mind your life’s work,’ shouted one of the firemen. ‘Save your life, you silly lassie. Jump and I’ll catch you.’
She bent and picked up another armful of paper folders and notebooks, casting them out of the window and then screaming as she saw them start to burn while they fell. Her hair was on fire now and one sleeve of her dress too, and yet no one turned away. We simply stood there, horrified, watching.
‘Jump and I’ll catch you!’ called the fireman again. Three of his colleagues came, running heavily in their boots and helmets, and the four of them stretched a tarpaulin sheet under the window.
‘Jump, Dr Laidlaw,’ someone else cried.
‘Do what your father would tell you!’ It was Mrs Cronin, standing wringing her hands, gazing up in horror.
‘Dorothea, for God’s sake!’ It was Alec’s anguished voice beside me.