The Empty Grave (Lockwood & Co. #5)(7)

‘This is great,’ it said. ‘The best seat in the house. With luck I can watch Lockwood trip over his own feet again. So, fill me in. What do you want me to do?’

I took a deep breath. ‘Scour the rest of the stairs for snares, levers, wires, flip-stones, ghost-traps, and anything else that might threaten us. You see something, you let it rip. Otherwise keep silent. Not another word. Agreed?’

‘OK.’

‘Then let’s g—’

‘STOP!’ The skull’s scream was even louder than before.

I cursed. ‘What now?’

‘Hey, relax. Just doing my job. There’s a trap on the next step, I think you’ll find.’

And sure enough, when I stabbed my torch on, I could see a thin wire stretched across the step below us, just at ankle height.

‘Tripwire,’ George breathed.

‘Yes, and maybe something more than that.’ Lockwood indicated where the wire disappeared into a small groove cut into the wall. He lifted his candle; one of the stones above was larger than the rest, and seemed less well embedded too. ‘Think this might’ve dropped on our heads after we’d tripped and fallen?’ he asked. ‘It’s possible.’

Holly swallowed audibly. ‘Tell you what, let’s not find out.’

One after the other we stepped down over the wire. The evident but unknown malice of the trap sent a chill through all of us. Lockwood wiped perspiration from his brow.

‘We owe the skull for that, at least,’ he said. ‘Let’s keep on. It can’t be far now.’

We continued down the slowly curving stairs. The skull remained silent. There were no more dangers to be seen. At last our questing candlelight bent and folded against the carved stones of a wide, almost semicircular archway. The stairs stopped just short of the arch, ending at a paved expanse of floor.

No one spoke. We were all on high alert. We used our psychic senses, probing ahead of us into the dark. Nothing was seen or heard. I ran my fingers over the walls too, in case Touch might pick up something, but the stone was blank. Our thermometers showed a temperature of seven degrees: chilly, but not exceptional. It gave no cause for concern.

That didn’t mean we were putting our rapiers away. Lockwood and I set down our candles and switched on our torches. With weapons at the ready, we walked slowly beneath the arch into a large stone room.

The burial chamber of Marissa Fittes was a high, domed space, with an oval outline that echoed the shape of the mausoleum far above. Our torch beams crossed and re-crossed it, picking out the same curved walls of closely fitting blocks, the same clean flagged floor. There were no doors, no niches, no alcoves to be seen. But in the middle of the vault …

Our beams speared inwards to meet at the central point. This was a raised rectangular plinth of smooth grey stone, a few feet high, with bunches of dried lavender propped against it. It had the word FITTES inscribed along the side.

On top of the plinth, glinting coldly in our torchlight, was a silver coffin.

The coffin had been covered with a magnificent silver drape emblazoned with the famous Fittes symbol – a rampant unicorn.

‘Don’t want to rush to any conclusions,’ Lockwood murmured, ‘but I think we might be there.’

George too spoke in a whisper; it was not a place for noise. ‘That’s the special coffin in which she supposedly lay in state. Three days in Westminster Abbey, with mourners filing by. Then they brought her here.’

‘If she is here,’ I said. I was Listening again. No, it was OK. Everything was still.

‘That’s what we’ve come to find out.’ Lockwood walked purposefully across the vault. In the briskness of his movements he was allaying our unspoken fears. ‘Won’t take five minutes, then we’re gone. Do it like we practised. Chains at the ready.’

Time and again, in the peace and comfort of 35 Portland Row, we’d gone through this part of the operation. We’d known it was the crunch point, when fear might make us forget essential things. So we’d rehearsed on a sofa in our living room, circling it with iron chains, looping their ends carefully, sowing salt and iron filings on the floor, setting up lavender candles at regular distances all the way round. Good protective measures, carried out swiftly and well. In moments we had the plinth surrounded in this manner, sealing in the coffin – and whatever it contained.

We stood ready, just outside the chains.

‘All right,’ Lockwood said. ‘Now for the coffin. George?’

‘As predicted, it’s a Wilson and Edgar special edition, lead-lined, silver casing, double clasps. Should have a counterweighted hinge, so it opens to the touch.’ George spoke calmly, but there was sweat running down the side of his face. This was not a normal tomb, and all of us were clammy with nerves. Holly’s face had blanched; Kipps looked as if he was trying to chew off his own bottom lip. Even the skull at my shoulder had gone quiet, the green glow dulled almost to nothing.

Lockwood took a deep breath. ‘OK, so this is my job.’ He looked around at us. ‘Old Marissa started everything – the agencies, the fight against the Problem. That’s her legacy, which everyone takes for granted. But we know something else is going on. And part of the answer lies inside.’

‘Move fast,’ I told him.

He smiled at me. ‘Always.’

George and Kipps held their candles ready. Holly and I unclipped magnesium flares.