Their captive was right about the coffee though. The squad was soon packed into the small living area cabin of the cruiser, taking advantage of the brew, the heat, and respite from carrying their packs, which they had left lying on the viewing deck at the back of the boat.
“I still haven’t got your name, or what you’re doing here,” Banks said once they were settled.
“Ah, the easy ones to start with,” the older man said, taking out a pipe and stoking it with rough black tobacco. “My name is Alexander Seton; you can call me Sandy. As for what I’m doing here, I’m after the same thing as you I suspect. I’m after Nessie.”
Banks almost laughed. He’d expected Wiggins to be first to be told of the colonel’s threat of the brig. He could hardly use the same threat against their captor.
“I don’t think the monster, if it exists, spends its time rummaging around in the ruins of old burned-out houses,” Banks replied.
Seton’s grin widened as he replied.
“It might… if it was born there.”
- 5 -
Banks’ gut was shouting now and he knew he didn’t really want to hear the man’s story. But ‘roving brief’ meant listening to any intel, however ludicrous. Besides, he had good coffee, and he was warm, two things that didn’t apply out on the road.
“Tell me,” he said.
“It’s a longish tale, and I have a dry throat. Will you lads join me?”
He took a bottle of single malt down from a cupboard and five small glasses.
“We’re on duty, sir,” Hynd said, but Banks waved him down with a smile.
“It wouldn’t be the first time we’ve had a dram when we shouldn’t, and one’s not going to hurt anybody, so hush, Sarge, and let the man pour.”
It was more expensive stuff than Banks was used to, honey and wood smoke in the mouth, and a fire in the gut, and he had to resist the temptation to dive head first into it. He lit a cigarette, raised the glass to their host, and waved for the man to continue.
When the older man spoke, it was in the tone of a man who knew how to tell a story, and had one that needed to be told.
“The current house, what remains of it, was built in the mid-18th century as a hunting lodge for the Fraser family. Before that, there was a church on the spot dating from the Reformation, with a wee cemetery and a yard where they hanged cattle rustlers and murderers on a gibbet. Before the church was there, the ground had a series of burial mounds going back well before Christianity, before the Romans, into the depths of prehistory, the rumor among the local populace being that all those who were ever buried here were cursed folk, abandoned by God. In all that time, so the stories go, this particular patch of ground has always had a dark reputation.”
“More auld wives tales and fairy stories,” Wiggins said. “Cally will be in his element.”
Seton smiled.
“I’m rather fond of auld wives myself,” he said. “And I’m partial to fairy tales, as there is usually a kernel of truth to be found in even the most unusual of them.”
“Sounds like you’re a bit of a scholar, wee man,” McCally said.
“At one time, I was indeed a scholar, but in science rather than anything less mundane. Today, however, I am, and have been for many years, before all of you were born I’d guess, a student of what you might call the esoteric.”
“Come on now, if this is more of yon occult shite, I’m going out on deck for a fag,” Wiggins said.
“More?” Seton said, and raised an eyebrow.
“You tell your story, and maybe we’ll tell you one of ours,” Banks said. “You were telling us about the house? What were you doing there? And how does a monster fit in?”
“I’ll get to that,” Seton said, pouring himself another drink before continuing.
“You may have heard of Aleister Crowley, the so-called ‘Great Beast’ and ritual magician? Now is not the time to discuss the man’s supposed Satanism or his demerits as a human being. But one thing at least is true of him; he was a great student, indeed master, of the history and practice of the lost magical arts. He bought the house here in 1899, and you can be sure he knew of its history before doing so.”
“I knew it. More occult shite,” Wiggins said.
Seton stopped the private from leaving by the simple expedient of pouring them all another drink. Banks didn’t complain; there wasn’t enough in the bottle for any of them to get drunk and, besides, he was starting to get intrigued by Seton’s story.
“Crowley was interested in all manner of ancient practices,” Seton continued, “not least of which was the alchemical path to perfection and how it might be obtained. It is no surprise that there are reports from the early part of the last century of animals, and household pets, disappearing in this area. I believe the man was using them for his experiments. Again, I will not bore you with the detail of the full range of magical practices that he carried out, but they were many and diverse. Household servants told the folk down in Foyers of a small menagerie being kept in a shed at the rear of the property, and of animals being changed and turned into chimeras, monsters if you like.”
“Pish,” Wiggins said. “A load of auld pish.”
“That’s as maybe,” Seton said. “However, I could show you documentation, letters, sworn statements and journals and such, that go a long way to backing up my assertions. The papers tell that Crowley at least had some control over the beasts when he was present here. But he was often away on business. One night while he was in Edinburgh, at least one of the animals escaped, and the housekeeper, and two small children, were found dead in the doorway in the morning.”
“That’s the story I read,” Hynd said. “It was a big scandal back in the day.”
“That it was,” Seton continued. “But as I said, it is not Crowley’s reputation that concerns us here, but what became of his experiments. For only a few years later, the first modern stories of a monster in the loch started to appear, the first to make the papers being a report in the Inverness Courier on the second of May 1933. One thing to note is that there was no mention of any reptilian features, none of the ‘extinct dinosaur’ theories that emerged later, after the famous, now proven fake ‘Surgeons’ photograph. Indeed, one of the more credible early sightings speaks of a very large otter-like beast rather than anything resembling a dinosaur. It ate a cow in front of some ladies out for a quiet Sunday drive in the 1940s.”
Banks jerked at the mention of the otter, for suddenly pieces were starting to fall into place. To cover it, he spoke up.
“That still doesn’t explain what you were doing up at the house tonight,” he said.
“Doesn’t it?” Seton said. “I thought it did. I was, of course, looking for something, anything, that might tell me by what magical rites Crowley managed to control the beasts. I heard about the attack on the village and thought I might be able to do something to help.”
“We’ve seen firsthand what this thing can do, mister,” Wiggins said. “I don’t think it gives a fuck about your mumbo-jumbo.”
“Nevertheless, what kind of man would I be if I didn’t at least try?”
“You sound like you know a bit about the history of the monster here,” Banks said.
“I know a bit about a great many things,” Seton said, laughing, “But yes, I’ve done a lot of study in the area.”
“So what do you think it is?”
“I think it’s probably as much a result of science gone wrong as of magic, although Crowley definitely used magic to control it. And I think it’s likely to be more like the giant otter I mentioned earlier than anything else, an aquatic predator, mostly hiding in dark places, wary of man but now, somehow, emboldened. And I also believe that the burning of the house might have been a trigger, of sorts. Perhaps it saw the house as a symbol of control, perhaps the house itself contained some magic that kept the creature at bay.