“I should have known better.
“I knew all the old stories, you see. I knew all about the ghosts and the strange happenings. Heard them from my old dad, who heard them from his dad, and so on. . So many stories, and all with the same point if you took the trouble to listen. That the King’s Arms was an unquiet place and always has been. But I thought they were stories, something to give the inn character and pull in the tourists. Tourists love a good ghost story. Money in the bank, as they say. And at first, everything was fine. .
“But, slowly at first, then more and more, I started to see things. Hear things. Experience things. . Things I knew from my time in the Institute were well out of the ordinary. And well out of my league. Worse still, my customers started to see them, too.”
“What sort of things are we talking about, Adrian?” JC said carefully.
“Not traditional ghosts, like in the stories,” said Brook. “Nasty things. Unquiet spirits. Dangerous presences. So I called up my old contacts at the Institute and told them I needed a field team here, to investigate. And a damned good one! I’ve never seen anything like this, Mr. Chance. . You’ve got to Do Something! Put the ghosts to rest or drive them out, or. . something!”
“So you can get your customers back?” said Melody.
“Because,” said Brook, “Something bad is coming. I can feel it.”
JC looked at Happy, who nodded slowly. “He might be right, JC. This inn gave me the creeps from out in the car park. Inside, it’s like standing in a slaughter-house, listening to the man with the hammer creeping up on you.”
He looked slowly around the empty bar. JC could see in Happy’s face that he was Seeing something. He moved in close beside the telepath.
“What is it, Happy?” he murmured. “What do you See? The face of the monster?”
“It’s not a presence,” said Happy, frowning. “Not as such. I’m not picking up any individual ghosts, or poltergeist activity, no real feeling of supernatural manifestations at all. . but this whole place feels bad. Not only the bar, the whole damned building. Steeped and soaked in psychic nastiness, going back. . centuries. Embedded in the stone and brick and wood. Like Chimera House, only worse. Much worse. Something spectacularly bad happened here, long and long ago. And I think it’s still happening. Calling the dead to it like moths to a flame.”
“There was nothing like that in the briefing files,” said Melody. “But they were. . pretty basic. Maybe I should get my kit out of my suitcase. See if I can turn up some solid evidence. .”
Happy was so disturbed he didn’t respond to her open dig at all. He was scowling now, turning his head back and forth in a troubled sort of way.
“Something’s here, JC. I mean right here, in the bar, with us. Watching. Listening. Making its plans against us.”
“Where?” said JC, looking quickly about him.
“Everywhere,” Happy said sadly.
“You’re not really going to wait till tomorrow, to make a start, are you?” said Brook, anxiously.
“Not after what our marvellous mutant telepath just said, no,” said JC. “But I do think we could all use a break before we get stuck in. A few minutes alone, to get our heads together, get our second psychic wind. . Do you have rooms prepared for us?”
“Of course, of course,” said Brook. “I dusted and aired them out as soon as I knew for sure you were coming. No-one’s stayed in them for years, you understand. I never even go up there at night, these days. I have a room, in town. . But I’ll stay here as long as you’re here. So let me show you to your rooms, so you can. . freshen up, and settle in.”
“Yes,” said JC. “And then we’ll come back down, and you can fill us in on all the details you’re holding back from us.”
Happy turned his head abruptly to look at Brook. “You didn’t just happen to come back to your old home-town, to retire. You didn’t just happen to buy this pub. Something important to you happened here. You have unfinished business, with the King’s Arms. .”
“Get out of my head!” said Brook.
“I don’t need to read your thoughts,” said Happy. “Simple deduction. Nice of you to confirm it, though. What did bring you back here, after all these years?”
“Like you said,” muttered Brook, looking away. “Something bad happened here. And it’s still happening.”
He walked over to the back of the main bar and opened a concealed door, uncovering a narrow staircase. “Your rooms are this way.”
JC took Happy by the arm and got him moving. They all gathered up their suitcases and followed Brook up a set of thinly carpeted wooden steps. The wallpapered walls were so close on both sides there was only room to go up single file. The lights were all off, upstairs. Brook stopped at the top and switched on the landing lights. He looked quickly about him, as though expecting something to happen; but nothing did. He seemed as much disappointed as relieved. He stepped quickly back, out of the way, to allow the others to join him on the landing. More dully wallpapered walls, distinctly old-fashioned, and more very thin carpeting. And rather more shadows than JC was comfortable with. Brook pointed out their three rooms, close to the top of the stairs. He slapped three large metal keys into JC’s hand, then hurried back down the stairs to the relative safety of the main bar.
JC looked at the three keys on his palm. Large, heavy, old-fashioned things. Melody hauled her heavy suitcase up the last few steps and bent over it, breathing hard. While she was preoccupied, JC looked at Happy.
“Your face is flushed, and you’re sweating. Have you taken something?”
“Not everything about me is down to the pills,” said Happy. “I don’t always need them.”
“Why do you need them now?” said JC. “What started you off again?”
“You want the straight answer?” said Happy. “Because I ran out of reasons not to.”
JC wanted to say more, but there was a cold finality in Happy’s voice that stopped him. So he moved over to join Melody.
“You have to talk to Happy,” he said quietly. “He’s in a bad way. He’ll listen to you, where he won’t listen to me.”
“He got himself into this situation; he can get himself out,” said Melody.
“Harsh, Mel,” said JC. “It’s not that simple, and you know it.”
“Of course I know it!” said Melody. She looked right at him for the first time; and she looked horribly tired and worn-out. “You can’t help someone who doesn’t want to be helped, JC. He doesn’t need you, or me, or the job. He needs his pills. I thought I could change that, give him something else he could depend on. But I couldn’t. He’s on his own now. Because that’s the way he wants it.”
“But why does he want that?” said JC.
“I don’t know!” said Melody.
She stuck out her hand for the key to her room. JC gave her the key to Number Seven, and she stomped over to the door, dragging her suitcase along behind, rucking up the thin carpet. She unlocked the door, went inside, and slammed the door shut behind her. JC turned back to Happy, who suddenly threw his arms around JC and held him tight. JC held on to him, not knowing what else to do.
“I’m lost, JC,” said Happy, his face pressed into JC’s shoulder. “I don’t know what to do! It’s like I’m drowning, and I’m going down for the third time. .”
He let go of JC abruptly and stood back. He held out a hand for his key, and JC gave him the key to Number Eight. Next door to Melody. Happy took his suitcase, unlocked the door, and went inside, shutting the door quietly behind him. JC looked at Happy’s closed door, then at Melody’s. The only thing he knew for sure was that you should never reveal your weaknesses, out in the field. Because the opposition will always take advantage. . He walked over to his room, Number Nine, then turned abruptly to look back down the length of the landing. All the other doors were closed, everything was perfectly still. Outside, he could hear the wind rising and the rain battering against the single window at the far end.