‘Books,’ Callum repeated, as evenly as he could. ‘I’m guessing these would be the books on that hidden shelf up there, then? The ones you’re so precious about, you threw my friend out of the house when she went near them? Passed from one generation to the next. So they should be mine.’
If Gran was surprised to learn that he knew about the secret library, she didn’t show it.
‘I’m sorry, Callum,’ she said again, with that same weary air of defeat. ‘I was wrong.’
‘Wrong? No kidding!’ Callum yelled. ‘You’ve tried to hide me, but that monster – whatever it is – still found me, didn’t it? It stood on the patio, grinning at me last night. It chased me halfway around the school today. It knows I’m here. All it has to do is wait!’
Now Callum was on his feet, too. He faced his grandmother. ‘You didn’t want to trigger my powers? I’m being blown off the map by them, and I don’t know anything about them! What is this thing that’s after me? What does it want? What does it do – besides rip out people’s eyes? Why does it do that? How can it be stopped? Are you hiding that from me as well?’
‘No, Callum, I’m not. I don’t know how to stop it.’
‘At least tell me what it is! You say you’ve been trying to protect me all my life – now’s your chance to really do it. Tell me!’
‘Callum, I don’t know what it is.’ Gran’s voice was so despairing that Callum knew she was telling the truth. ‘But I’ll tell you what. We don’t need to stay here. If the Shadowing is beginning, we can leave. We -’
Gran broke off, clapping a hand to her mouth. Callum stared at her. A horrible twisting sensation in his stomach told him that they had reached the deepest secret of all.
‘What’s the Shadowing, Gran?’
‘It’s nothing,’ replied Gran, hastily. ‘But I’m serious, Callum. We can pack a couple of rucksacks in ten minutes. We’ve still got time to catch a train to Manchester tonight. We could be in the Lake District in a couple of hours. We can lie low for the weekend and make plans. Figure out our next move. I’ve got a friend from school who lives in Scotland -’
‘Gran. Gran!’ Callum interrupted. ‘This isn’t helpful. What do you mean “if the Shadowing is beginning”?’
‘Don’t ask me, Callum.’ Gran’s voice was desperate. ‘I can’t tell you.’
‘You have to!’
‘Callum, I can’t!’ snapped Gran. ‘It’s too dangerous. I know this is hard, but you just have to trust me.’
Callum shook his head. Maybe Gran could keep him safe, and maybe she couldn’t. Either way, he was fed up with being lied to.
‘If you won’t give me answers, I’ll have to get them some other way.’
Yanking open the door, Callum stormed out of the cottage. He stomped up the path to the front gate, shoulders hunched and head down, gritting his teeth as he tensed himself for the harrowing walk through Marlock Wood.
‘Callum, come back!’ Gran called after him in desperation. ‘It’s not safe!’
Callum didn’t answer.
He set off up the road into the dark.
Chapter 20
Halfway through Marlock Wood, Callum began to run. His heels hit the road with dull thumps. He was running the race of his nightmare again, driven by dread, not knowing where he’d end up. But in the nightmare, his surroundings had been unfamiliar. Now he knew where he was. Now he was awake. He didn’t know if he was running towards the menace of his evil dream or away from it, but he knew it was real.
He ran out of the wood and through the tidy, empty streets of the housing estate, cars and garden walls lit faintly orange by the street lights. When he reached Marlock High Street at the top of the hill, Callum paused. He had lost all sense of time waiting in the police station, and he had no idea how late it was now. The high street, usually quite lively on a Friday night as its pubs and restaurants began their weekend rush, was deserted by the living. Maybe news of Ed’s murder had spread and was keeping people off the streets. Only the fluttering, pale ghosts came and went along the pavements. Callum ignored them. It seemed strange that these harmless shades had once seemed so frightening. Compared to what was hunting him now, they were no danger.
Panting a little as he looked around, Callum saw the sign that pointed towards the train station. The yellow-brick house by the station, Melissa had said. That was where she lived – the only place he might find the answers he needed. He hoped it wasn’t too late to make an unexpected visit. At the station approach he glanced up at the dial on the nineteenth-century clock tower and was surprised to see that it wasn’t yet nine o’clock.
Melissa’s house was small and smart, with a brass plate on the door that said ‘Old Stationmaster’s Cottage’. Callum waited until he was breathing normally before he rang the bell.
Melissa answered the door herself. She opened her mouth to exclaim aloud, then clapped both hands over it before any sound came out. For a moment Callum thought she was going to hug him, and he stepped back warily. But she managed to restrain herself. Instead, she grabbed his arm with one hand and hauled him inside, holding a finger to her lips with the other hand to warn Callum not to say anything. Then she called out over her shoulder, ‘It’s one of my friends from school, Mum. Everybody’s so upset about what happened today. Can I make him a cup of tea?’
‘Right-o,’ called a woman’s voice from the front room. ‘Come in and have a chat then, if you like. Best to talk about it.’
‘Thanks, Mum.’
‘And try not to make a mess, Melissa.’
Melissa screwed up her face and led Callum to the kitchen.
Her house seemed enormous to him. It wasn’t really much more than a cottage itself, but the ceilings were higher and it was three times as wide as the Nether Marlock alms houses. The kitchen had been extended with a modern glassed-in area to make room for an ageing sofa and large pine table stacked with magazines and newspapers.
‘I’m so glad to see you,’ Melissa said with honest warmth, briskly clicking the switch on the electric kettle and banging down two mugs on the crowded table. ‘But look, I’m not going to take you in to talk to my mum. Everyone in town’s gone hysterical over this murder and she’s not too happy about me being called as a witness. What happened? Did they prove your alibi?’
Callum nodded.
‘Yes!’ Melissa crowed, slapping one palm down on the tabletop hard enough to make the mugs jump. ‘I’m so pleased! So does that mean you’re free?’
‘Depends on your definition of freedom,’ Callum said, leaning his elbows on the table and burying his face in his hands. After a moment he ran his fingers through his hair – it was tangled as a bird’s nest after this evening’s carry-on. He looked up at Melissa. ‘I think I know what’s happening,’ he said.
Over mugs of stewed tea that neither of them could drink, Callum told Melissa everything that had happened over the past week. He left out nothing, not even the details of his dream, his meeting with Jacob, or the fights with his grandmother. Even Melissa, who had been so eager to believe that Callum was a chime child, looked overwhelmed by the undeniable connection of the faceless monster with Ed’s murder – and with Callum himself.
She bit her lip, then stood up, went to the back door, and looked out into the night.
‘Come on,’ she said, and beckoned. ‘The best thing you can do – the only thing you can do – is to find this Jacob. OK, you don’t know what he is, but he’s obviously not the one who’s killing kids. You said yourself he’s a ghost, not a monster like this other thing. Maybe he knows what’s going on. He might have answers.’