The lines of police tape had been torn away. Light gleamed in a razor-thin line beneath the door.
Lockwood held a finger to his lips. He’d been silent and grim-faced throughout the journey, scarcely uttering a word.
Which is more than I could say for my other companion.
‘You’ll be too late,’ a voice hissed in my ear. ‘Cubbins won’t have been able to resist taking a look. Peeped, choked, dead already: that’s my prediction.’
‘You’d better hope not,’ I breathed. ‘Or you know what we’ll do to you.’
Somewhere in the rucksack I carried, I felt the indignant hum of churning plasm.
Since leaving the house, the ghost in the jar had kept up a whispered commentary, alternating wildly between threats, pleas and expressions of false condolence. It was agitated, in other words; my threat to abandon it had left it deeply unsettled. Which didn’t make it any less irritating. I’d have gladly hurled it into a bush, but we didn’t have that option. The ghost knew Bickerstaff. The ghost knew the secrets of the mirror. We might have need of its help right now.
Lockwood glared at me for quiet; he reached for the great metal door handle. I readied myself, squinted in preparation for the transition from dark to light. With a sudden fluid movement, he turned it, pushed. The door squealed; brightness flooded our eyes. We both stepped in.
The interior of the chapel was much as when we’d last seen it on the morning after the theft: the desks of Mr Saunders and Mr Joplin strewn with papers; the gas heaters; the great black catafalque on its metal plate; the pulpit, the altar and its long, shiny rail. All was silent, all was still. There was no one to be found.
I listened for the telltale buzzing of the bone glass, heard nothing.
Lockwood touched the nearest heater. ‘Warm,’ he said. ‘Not hot. He’s been here tonight, but not for a while.’
I was looking at a familiar twisted shape in the near corner, swept aside amid piles of dirty salt and filings. ‘The iron coffin’s still here – look. But Bickerstaff’s body is gone.’
‘My master is near,’ the ghost whispered suddenly. ‘I feel his presence.’
‘Where?’ I demanded. ‘How do we get to him?’
‘How can I tell? It’s so hard in this jar. If you let me out, I’ll sense far more.’
‘Not a chance.’
Lockwood strode across to the wooden door behind the altar rail; he pushed and pulled, but the door remained firm. ‘The padlock’s off,’ he said, ‘and the bolts are open. Someone’s locked it from the inside.’
‘Are we sure he’ll be in the catacombs?’ I said. ‘It’s not the sort of place I’d go.’
‘But that’s just it!’ Lockwood jumped back; he was staring wildly around the room. ‘Remember those illustrations in the Bickerstaff papers? The catacombs are exactly the sort of place where idiots like Joplin do hang out. It’s a place to find stuff – it gives the right grisly ambience. And, crucially, it’s private. You’re not going to be disturbed down there.’ He cursed. ‘Ah, this is a nightmare! How can we get in?’
‘Blind as bats,’ the ghost said. ‘Always looking, never seeing. Even if it’s standing straight ahead of you.’
I gave a snarl, thumping my fist into the side of the rucksack. ‘Quiet, you, or I swear I’ll—’ Then I stopped dead, staring at the big black marble plinth in the middle of the room. The catafalque. The Victorian device for lowering coffins into the catacombs below. I gasped. ‘The catafalque! Didn’t Saunders say it was still working?’
Lockwood slapped his palm against his head. ‘Yes! He did! Of course! Hurry, Luce! Look everywhere! Cupboards, corners, over by the altar . . . There must be a mechanism!’
‘Oh, you think?’ the skull scoffed. ‘Honestly, this is pathetic. It’s like teaching cats to read.’
We rushed back and forth around the chapel, peering into every likely nook and shadow, but the walls were bare, and we could see no lever or button.
‘We’re missing something,’ Lockwood muttered. He turned on his heels, frowning. ‘It must be close.’
‘So we look again! Hurry!’ I opened a small vestry cupboard, threw aside piles of mouldy hymn books and service sheets. No lever there.
‘Hopeless,’ the skull whispered. ‘I bet a five-year-old could figure this out.’
‘Shut up.’
‘We’ve got to find it, Lucy. Heaven knows what Joplin’s doing.’ Lockwood was tracing the far side of the wall, scanning high and low. ‘Ah, we’ve been so dumb! He’s been right in front of us the whole time, and we didn’t give him a moment’s thought. He’s been poking his nose into the case since before we opened the coffin. Barnes even told us that someone at the excavation site must have tipped off the relic-men about the mirror – otherwise they’d never have turned up so fast. Joplin was one of the few people who could have done that, but we never suspected him.’
‘There wasn’t any reason to,’ I protested. ‘Remember how upset he was about the theft? I don’t think he was acting.’
‘No, I don’t either. But it never occurred to us that Joplin might have been genuinely upset, and yet still be guilty. You know what I think happened? He got Jack Carver to steal the mirror – just as Carver had stolen lots of stuff for him before. Saunders said there had been many thefts at his excavations over the years. That was all Joplin, pinching things he fancied. But this time, Carver double-crossed him. He realized the value of the mirror, and took it off to Winkman, who paid him well. Joplin was furious.’
‘Right,’ I said. I was racing along the wall – bare, white, without anywhere to hide a crack or cobweb, let alone a switch of any kind. ‘So furious he stabbed the relic-man with his fancy dagger.’
‘Exactly. Ordinarily, I bet Joplin would be too wimpy to hurt a fly. But if the skull’s correct – if Joplin has been affected by the ghost of Edmund Bickerstaff, and is being driven mad . . .’
‘Yes,’ the skull whispered. ‘That’s what the master does. He takes the weak and feeble-minded and bends them to his will. Like this, for example. Lucy – I order you! Smash my glass prison and set me free! Set me freeeee!’
‘Get lost,’ I said. ‘Lockwood – so do you really think that Joplin went after Carver?’
He was over in the far corner of the chapel, moving fast, speaking faster. ‘He did, and caught up with him when he was on his way to see us. They argued. When Carver revealed he’d sold the glass, Joplin went berserk. He stabbed Carver, who broke free and managed to get to us. Joplin, of course, would have thought he’d lost the glass for ever. How wrong he was. Ever since then we’ve been searching for it, and kindly keeping him informed. And now George has actually brought him the glass, and Joplin’s got his heart’s desire, while we – we can’t find our stupid way down!’
With a cry of frustration Lockwood kicked the wall with a boot. We’d gone round the entire room without success. He was right. We were stymied; there was no way down.
‘What about outside?’ I said. ‘There might be another entrance in the grounds.’
‘I suppose, though how we’ll find it in time, I don’t know. All right,’ Lockwood said. ‘We’ll look. Come on.’