'They're trying so hard,' said Lili as she gazed in wonder around the vast room. 'But there's something preventing them.' She gave a shiver. 'There's another entity here, but it won't come forward. Not yet.'
The psychic stared down at the spinning top whose colours were beginning to blend, to become murky, and then to become a white blur. A humming sound came from it that was neither musical nor harsh, but which ascended to a steady thrum. And the whisperings now sounded like the soft flurry of distant birds on the wing.
But then a voice, a real voice, a man's voice, interrupted everything, even though it was just a murmuring coming from the landing above.
The spinning top began to wobble as it slowed down and its humming grew deeper in tone. Colours appeared on its tin surface once again and the dancing figures started to become clearer. Suddenly, the toy lurched, faltered, then fell onto its side to roll away in an arc, coming to a stop behind Eve. The whisperings ceased.
Lili inclined her head, searching for the source of the new voices. Loren came into view from a doorway along the landing, followed by a tall man, and it was his voice they could hear. The girl kept looking round at the man, as if taking in every word he said.
The couple paused and through the balcony's railings, Lili saw Loren pull open a cupboard door. The man's voice was strong and clear enough to be understood from below.
'We'll come back to it after I've had a word with your mother about the attic. I shouldn't like anything to be disturbed up there now I've set up.'
'That's Gordon Pyke,' Eve told Lili. 'He's the investigator.' Then, as if she had only just noticed: 'Lili, what happened to those sounds? The whisperings.'
The psychic continued to look up at the two people on the landing, who were now making their way to the stairs.
'Lili?''
The psychic dropped her eyes to find Eve staring at her. 'They've gone. Something disturbed them. I think they were frightened away.'
'It was the children, wasn't it? The orphans who drowned in this place all those years ago.'
'Yes. Yes, I believe—I'm sure—it was.'
Pyke and Loren were descending the stairs and Lili saw that the man, who had a small goatee beard, was very tall. Something—an intuition—seemed to click in her mind as she watched him, but the thought hadn't yet made itself apparent. Pyke had left something at the top of the stairs; it was a large suitcase.
Leaving the stairs, the so-called 'ghost-hunter' walked round the puddles with Loren. 'You appear to have been flooded,' he remarked needlessly as he looked around the hall. He craned his neck to peer up at the ceiling. 'Don't worry, I'll find its root cause and then we'll be able to stop it happening again.'
Something about the man was bothering Lili as he and Loren came towards them. As Pyke approached, she gazed intently into his eyes.
The sensing hit her like a physical blow, almost taking her breath away.
Oh my God! she thought. Then, urgently and aloud: 'It's him, Eve! He was the boy in the photograph. The one you called Maurice Stafford.'
68: OBSTRUCTION
Gabe brought the Range Rover to a sliding halt, the bonnet nodding at the leafy fallen tree one foot away.
Hell! This can't be happening!
Travelling too fast, he had almost smashed into the obstacle that sprawled across the country lane, seeing it only just in time to slam on the brakes. He thanked the Lord for quick reactions and EBA—Emergency Brake Assist. Electronic traction control had helped also, preventing the vehicle from going into a skid.
The Range Rover's full-beam headlights lit up the blockage and Gabe quickly surveyed it. Lightning stammered and illuminated the scene even more and from where he was sitting he could see that the toppled tree filled the full width of the lane, its branches having crushed the tall hedges on the right, its split trunk creating a solid barrier on his left. Gabe slumped back in his seat in momentary despair and uttered a sound that fully formed would have been a curse. Thunder roared.
Without further hesitation, he pushed open the driver's door and stepped out into the storm. His eyes narrowed against the driving rain as he pulled up the collar of his reefer jacket and tucked one lapel beneath the other to protect his neck. Closing the door with a thud, he moved towards the high barrier of branches, the vehicle's head-lights helping him assess the damage ahead. He walked to both sides of the lane and found no way round the obstruction. At least, not in the Range Rover.
He was about to climb the grass verge where the shattered tree stump still smouldered, the fire caused by the lightning strike extinguished by the wind-blown rain, when he was distracted by a single light approaching down the lane behind him. As the light drew closer it shone directly into his eyes, dazzling them so he was forced to raise a hand in front of his face.
The voice fought to be heard over the storm. 'Mr Caleigh? Is that you?'
Gabe blinked and was able to make out a dark figure behind the torchbeam as it was lowered a little.
He raised his own voice. 'Who's there?'
The torch was dropped even further so that its beam pointed at the ground. By the reflected glare of the Range Rover's headlights he recognized the approaching figure. The man with the torch wore a storm coat with the hood up over a flat cap.
'Percy? That you?'
'Yers, Mr Caleigh,' came the shouted response. 'It's Percy Judd. Had an accident, has yer?'
Gabe could barely comprehend the old gardener's words over the noise of the gale and pounding rain, but he caught the name all right. He waited for Percy Judd to get closer before speaking again.
'What the hell you doing out on a night like this, Percy?'
The gardener leaned close to Gabe's ear.
'Goin' to the same place as you, Mr Caleigh. Makin' my way to Crickley Hall.'
Gabe jerked his head away in surprise. 'Right now? Why?'
Percy seemed reluctant to explain. He could hardly tell his employer that it was the incessant whining and then howling of a dog had brought him out of his home this stormy night. That and his own very real sense of unease. 'Worried about the weather, sir,' he only half lied, again talking directly into Gabe's ear. 'It's flood weather, Mr Caleigh, jus' like las' time, them who remembers tell me.'
'I thought it couldn't happen again.'
'Nothin' can stop the waters pourin' off the moors, not when it's been rainin' fer weeks an' the storm's this fierce. It's the build-up, y'see. All the precautions can only limit the damage, can't stop the floodin' itself.'
Great, Gabe thought to himself. Something else to worry about.
'I tried phonin' the house,' Percy went on, 'but the lines must be down. Couldn't get nothin', jus' a dead line.'
As lightning flashed again, Gabe pointed at the fallen elm. He waited for the thunder to roll away before attempting to speak to the old man again. Percy stood there unbowed by the wind and rain, his back straight, rainwater dribbling from the peak of his flat cap which protruded from the hood.
'Road's blocked all the way across,' Gabe told him. 'Can't get round it in the car.'
Percy quickly appraised the situation. 'Then we'll have to walk round it, sir. Not too far to Crickley Hall from here; we'll make it all right.'
'You still wanna' go there? You don't have to, you know—I can take care of things myself.' He was only thinking of the old man's stamina. It was still a long way to Crickley Hall no matter what Percy said.
'No, I wants to go with yer. Set my mind at rest, like.' He seemed resolute.