The Empty Grave (Lockwood & Co. #5)(79)
‘Yup,’ said George. ‘Watch out: here they come again.’
One of Winkman’s men had peeped out fleetingly at the bottom of the staircase, then darted across into the library. A moment later the barrel of a gun appeared round the corner. Three shots were fired. We ducked back as plaster fell from holes in the ceiling above our heads. At the same moment a swift, athletic shape took the opportunity to bound halfway up the stairs. A familiar voice came calling. ‘Oh, Lockwood …’ it said. ‘Where are you?’
Lockwood spoke quickly. ‘I’m going to buy us some time. The rest of you get into Jessica’s room, put on the cloaks. You too, Lucy.’ Even without looking, he knew that I would disobey him. He drew his sword, stepped over to the top of the stairs.
They opened the bedroom door behind me; at once a psychic tumult beat against my mind. I heard the shrieks of ghosts inside the circle. For an instant I remembered the skull, shut in a cupboard down in the kitchen. I shook the thought away. The others were slipping into the room, Kipps supporting the slowly moving George. But I hung back, watching as Sir Rupert Gale clambered into view. Aside from a peppering of magnesium salt, he had entirely evaded my flare downstairs. He wore his usual green tweed suit and a cerise shirt; his face was eager and smiling.
Lockwood waited at the top, his hair down over his eyes, his rapier ready. He was trying to look relaxed, but I could see that he was breathing hard.
‘Anthony John Lockwood!’ Sir Rupert said. ‘Do you realize you’ve managed to put Winkman and four of his men out of action so far? Shockingly unfriendly, I call it. Where’s your hospitality?’
Lockwood wiped his lick of hair aside. ‘Come up,’ he said, ‘and I’ll give you a little more.’
Sir Rupert chuckled. ‘You know,’ he said, ‘for months I’ve been wondering where this encounter would take place. I must say I had high hopes. On some castle battlements, perhaps. Or in a palace garden …’ As he spoke, he jumped forward. He ducked under Lockwood’s first blow, and met the second with an easy twist of his rapier. ‘But this mean little staircase?’ he said. ‘In this cramped and dreary squat? It’s a trifle disappointing.’
Lockwood cocked his head to one side. He struck out again, parried, guarded his legs against repeated side-cuts and low jabs. ‘Are you insulting my house?’
Sir Rupert’s eyes twinkled. ‘Well … the dreadful sofas, those ethnic cushions, that ineradicable smell of toast … It’s all so frightfully homely. It’s just I’d hoped for a more glamorous location, that’s all.’
He moved up another step. Lockwood edged back from the lip of the stairs. Their arms were moving too fast to see now; the swords blurred and moved, melding in the air. The clash of blades became a continuous burr, a wall of sound. A thin red line appeared on Sir Rupert’s cheek; one of Lockwood’s hands was suddenly bleeding.
‘I’m sorry to hear that Portland Row disappoints you,’ Lockwood said. He flashed his gaze towards me, where I stood at the door to the room. I gave a signal to show him that the others were ready, to urge him to come on. ‘And you’re right about the furniture,’ he added. ‘It is shabby. Sadly, the floor coverings aren’t much better.’
He sprang to the side, bent down and pulled sharply on the carpet at the top of the stairs. George had loosened it earlier, so that nothing held it tight to the steps. The whole thing came free, wrenched upwards in a tight diagonal. Sir Rupert’s boots were pulled from under him; he was thrown backwards. With a cry he vanished down the stairs, over and over, rolling head over heels. There was a complicated series of bumps as he disappeared from view.
A moment later Lockwood was ushering me through the door into the bedroom. We slammed it shut and thrust the bolts home. The cold power of the gate behind us thrummed against our skin. Ghosts screamed out our names.
Lockwood turned to look at us all. He brushed his hair back with his wounded hand, leaving a trace of blood on his face. ‘Well,’ he said, smiling, ‘that settles it. Now we’ve got to go through.’
20
It would be nice to say that locking ourselves behind a good strong door gave us a brief sense of respite, but that wasn’t really true. Yes, a house full of murderers was bad. Sadly, being shut in a small room with a spirit-gate didn’t have much to recommend it, either.
The good news was that our construction of the gate had worked a treat. Everything had gone according to plan. Our super-strong iron circle had held firm, and was fully withstanding the spectral energies now raging inside it. With the coming of darkness, as Lockwood had predicted, the ghosts had emerged from their Sources. Unable to escape the circle, they whirled furiously round and round, radiating hideous cold and psychic dread. My body shrank from the force of it. My head rang with their cries.
There were so many spirits trapped there, so many squeezed into such a tight space, that it was impossible to make them out clearly. The column of air above the circle was thick with their movement: with faint shadows writhing and plunging, figures of billowing black smoke flowing in and out of existence; screaming faces pressed against the invisible barrier that penned them in. The light in the column was hazy and faint. You couldn’t see the bed clearly, you couldn’t see the objects on the floor, you couldn’t see the far side of the room. As for the chain we’d suspended across the circle between the posts, ice shimmered on its links as it disappeared into the haze. The ghosts kept clear of it, loathing its iron. That chain was our way through.