Something Wicked This Way Comes Read online

  I could have been one of them. A few decades earlier and I would have ended up in an orphanage, possibly even this one. I thought back to the ways rage and grief had torn through me at that age. Yes, I would have been sentenced to the lash and the barn like the Armstrong boys and their friends.

  Except, of course, every child in the photos of Vainguard House was white, or close enough to pass. What had happened to boys like me back then? There must have been some black orphans in port cities at the time. I knew that much. What orphanage had taken them? Where would I have been sent?

  I was pretty sure it wouldn’t have been any better than Vainguard.

  No, not just Vainguard. It was Eilbeck House, Blacklynefoot. It was an Eilbeck home where this had happened. Whatever might have happened to me back then, in this day and age I was an Eilbeck kid, always would be. And that made it all the worse.

  I closed my eyes, tried to let the thought go, and returned to my seat to wait for the chime that would signal the start of my video conference.

  AN HOUR later, my head was throbbing, and all the eminent faces on my screen looked worse than I felt. We’d gone over and over the evidence and drawn few conclusions beyond the agreement that something terrible had happened. Right now, Dame Eileen, the Chief Executive, was laying out a plan of action. She was trying to be brisk, but her voice wasn’t entirely steady.

  “…hand over to the police, but discreetly, of course. Leon, is there anything at the site which might be considered further evidence?”

  “I’m still sorting through Armstrong’s papers,” I said. “I do have something that makes me more than a little uneasy.”

  She dropped her face into her hand for a moment. “Go on.”

  “Armstrong kept track of every child who died or disappeared in the region since 1944. He kept an album. Newspaper clippings, mostly, but some other documentation. I have it here in front of me.”

  Felix leaned forward. “Leon, my dear, does that mean—?”

  “Yes,” I said, trying to glare him to silence. I didn’t want to dredge up personal ghosts in front of the trustees. “I don’t think it’s anything suspicious—all of the deaths are accidental causes, but it’s a little creepy.”

  Dame Eileen sighed. “To be safe, let’s pass that to the police as well. I’d like you to leave the rest of the papers untouched until we have their go-ahead. We are going to fall over ourselves to cooperate, ladies and gentlemen. Leon, I’d like you to stay in the area and offer them your full assistance, but stop working in Vainguard entirely. In the meantime, let’s see if we can track down any surviving Vainguard orphans. Some of them might remember this and I don’t want any surprise lawsuits coming out of the woodwork.”

  “From an initial glance at the records, a lot of them were sent to Canada after the war,” said Hardeep Singh, our chief PR officer.

  “Shit,” Dame Eileen muttered. “That’s another can of worms. I thought Eilbeck’s had refused to partake in that.”

  I said, thinking out loud, “Maybe it was just the Vainguard kids.”

  “Keep going,” she snapped.

  “Look, the coroner’s report absolves them of any blame, but the local policeman clearly believed the staff at Vainguard were lying, and the place closed as soon as we were far enough past the war that people might have had enough breathing space to start asking questions. Then the records get hidden in our archives—and look what’s missing from them. No statements from the surviving kids or the members of staff directly involved.”

  “You’re thinking cover-up?”

  Singh said, “Don’t say those words!”

  I held up my hands. “I wouldn’t go so far. Maybe it was just that nobody outside the orphanage wanted to look too closely, and the staff involved took advantage of that. We’ve all done child advocacy. You know how people are inclined to believe adults they trust over children, especially children with troubled backgrounds—and that’s today. Back then….”

  Dame Eileen sighed. “I’d put money on it you were right. Shit.” I’d only ever met her at formal functions before. I had no idea she knew how to swear.

  “We need to control the narrative on this,” Singh said. “The people on this loop are it. No one else gets read in until we talk to our lawyers. We can’t let this destroy us.”

  There was a general murmur of agreement, but I thought of the little fair-haired boy in the album. Francis and his friends deserved justice too. “But we make it right, yes? The Armstrongs and the others, they deserve—”

  Dame Eileen’s voice was firm, but not unkind. “Today’s children come first, Leon.”

  I persisted. “Martyn Armstrong kept this secret all his life. Don’t you think that maybe he left us this place because he wanted the truth to finally come out? Is there no way we can respect that too? He spent his entire life in mourning. Don’t we owe him something?”

  None of them met my gaze. Then Felix said, far less jovial than I’d ever heard him, “If Martyn had wanted this known, he had ample opportunities to tell someone. He and I had been corresponding for years, and he never let a hint slip. I’m not so sure he did want the truth to come out. Let’s not rush any decisions.”

  I bit my tongue. I was the least important cog in this particular machine. If I was being wise, I wouldn’t make enemies of the people whose goodwill I would need for the rest of my career at Becky’s.

  But Becky’s was the smiling modern face of the same Eilbeck’s homes that had made Ronald Parfitt stand up in class with his soiled sheets around his neck, that had forced his sister to kneel through the night in a chapel that gave me—a grown man—nightmares, that had caned Martyn Armstrong twenty times a day for two weeks straight for insolence, that had tied a ten year boy’s hands to his bedstead for turning on his side in his sleep.

  For the first time since I had fetched up on Felix’s doorstep as a terrified thirteen-year-old, I was ashamed to be an Eilbeck child.

  The trustees were still talking, but I looked away from the screen, so they wouldn’t see the tears burning in my eyes.

  Niall was standing in the doorway, his arms folded and his face grim.

  Chapter Nineteen

  HE MET my gaze without moving. I swallowed hard. He didn’t say anything.

  On screen, the trustees were wrapping up the discussion. I dragged my attention back to them, mouthed the platitudes they expected, and watched as they flickered out of sight one by one until only Felix remained.

  “Leon,” he said, sounding genuinely distressed.

  I clicked his window closed, too and set my status to offline. I didn’t want to talk to him, not now.

  Niall was still standing there, watching me. I clenched my fists against the table and asked, “How much did you hear?”

  “Most of it.”

  “I’m not supposed to tell you anything,” I said, feeling helpless. “I’m supposed to—” I choked on it. I was supposed to be loyal, and it had never been hard before.

  “I’m not asking you to.”

  I closed my eyes and spat out, “You should.”

  He crossed over to me, each step clear against the wooden floorboards. His hand dropped on the back of my neck, and I let out my breath. He said, “You work out what feels like betrayal to you, but bear in mind I heard enough to put together most of the story.”

  “I know.”

  “And I reckon you know me well enough now to know I’m not going to go blabbing to the press about something that happened seventy years ago.”

  “We won’t keep it secret forever. We just need to work out how to—there are children out there today who trust us. We need to find a way to tell the truth without hurting them.”

  He stroked the bottom edge of my hair, so softly and carefully I wanted to cry again. “Not just children, I’m thinking.”

  Oh dammit, who was I fooling? My eyes were full of tears again. I hadn’t cried like this when I was a kid and had good reason to, but all the skill at holding them back I’d built then see
med to have melted away. I stood up, turning my face away from him, and clicked the files open again. “There. Look. Read it so you know.”

  He pulled me close first, lips brushing my forehead. Then he settled in the chair and began to read.

  I couldn’t bear to watch his face, so I went over to the window and stared out at the hills again. The sun was high now, and the shadows were retreating into the woods, but facing north still meant the sun couldn’t reach these windows.

  Behind me, Niall said, “Well, she’s a stone-cold bitch.”

  I laughed, though it hitched a little. “Yeah.”

  “I’m not going to like this discipline register, am I?”

  “It’s the worst bit.”

  He read it in silence. Then he walked over to me. “Turn around.”

  I did, bracing myself as I met his gaze. He looked devastated. Well, he was a parent, and my organisation had done this to kids the same age as his lost Katie. Would he hold me responsible?

  He wrapped his arms around me and buried his face against my neck.

  Oh.

  With a sigh of relief, I lifted my own arms and hugged him back tightly.

  It didn’t make it all go away—nothing was going to bring back those boys from the dead or undo the cruelty that had been inflicted upon them. But it helped, more than anything else could have.

  When he finally let me go, Niall said gruffly, “That’s it. You’ve had your orders, and this place is enough to make anyone depressed. Grab your stuff. We’ve got lunch plans.”

  “Have we?” I asked, amusement pricking through my gloom. “Bit high-handed there, mate.”

  “You mind?” By his tone, he didn’t think so.

  “Depends on what these plans are.”

  “Thought I’d chuck together some ham sandwiches and we could go and eat them up on Kirk Rig in the sunshine.”

  “Oh God, yes,” I said instantly.

  He chuckled. “If that’s what sarnies gets me, I’m looking forward to getting you naked later.”

  I knew he was doing it deliberately to distract us both, but it still made me smile. “Why, Mr Forster, I do believe you’re a flirt under that grim exterior.”

  “You’d better believe it,” he said and leaned in to kiss me.

  It was only a quick kiss, but I almost felt the old house draw its breath in with outrage.

  Niall helped me pack up, and it was odd to realise how little impact I had made in the days I had spent working here. Everything of mine could be shoved into my backpack. I hesitated when he started for the door.

  “The album,” I said, not sure how to phrase this. “I’ve been told to give it to the police, just in case.”

  He snorted his opinion of that.

  “Yeah, but they may start digging into it. Do you want me to take the article about Katie out first?”

  He stared at me, looking so startled I feared I had misstepped. Then he said, “No. No, don’t.” Very softly, he added, “But thank you for asking.”

  “It seemed right,” I said and took the hand he offered me.

  We bolted the back door and headed out into the barmkin. I paused, looking up at the empty outer window frames, tried to imagine shattered glass spearing down from them. Standing there, I realised how dark it would have been—a winter’s night with every window in the village blacked out. They wouldn’t have had any warning before the glass sliced through them.

  I shuddered, and Niall squeezed my hand hard. “You do the main door, and I’ll lock the chapel. Don’t think about it.”

  It was good to get outside into the warmth of the summer’s day. Leaving Vainguard lifted a weight off my shoulders. I didn’t know how long I would be relieved for, but I hoped it would take the police days to okay my return.

  Niall headed down to the lodge while I closed the bungalow. I chucked my mug and other bits and pieces into the back of my car, then hesitated. Vainguard was still brooding behind me, but it wasn’t that which drew me this time. I made my way carefully across the overgrown cobbles to the barn. I paused in the doorway. Had it always been this dark and bleak, or was that the result of decades of neglect? Or did something linger in these stones—some echo of the misery of the children who had been forced to sleep here in the depths of winter?

  I shook my head, trying to dismiss the fancy, but I couldn’t, not quite. This whole place had felt threatening to me even before I knew the truth, but now it seemed worse than ever. I wanted to go home, back to Eilbeck House’s cosy brick-and-tile old manor house, to my little flat under the eaves and the light breezes that tumbled off the Downs. I was sick of Vainguard.

  But for the time being, there was Niall, who was the one thing I would miss when I went home. Turning my back on Vainguard, I hurried down the drive to where he was waiting for me.

  HE DROVE us over the border and along a maze of increasingly narrow lanes until we were bumping up an unmade track. At last he stopped, backing into the space before a gate. “We have to walk from here.”

  It was very quiet. Somewhere a stream was trickling through the soft moorland. Low stone walls flanked the path, and behind them sheep were spread across the boggy grass, occasionally raising their heads to stare at us. Beyond them were only the green folds of the hills—I could see no hint of any houses.

  The trail was a steep incline a slightly darker green than the surrounding fields. As we climbed it became obvious why, as the land on either side slowly transformed from grazing land to pure bog—bright grass cobwebbed with tiny streams, clumps of peat and purple heather swelling up in soft waves.

  “I’ve got to be at the local riding school at three,” Niall said apologetically as we scrambled up the trail. “But that gives us a couple of hours. Thought you might like this. It’s not on the tourist track, but it probably ought to be. No one seems to know about it.”

  “Now you’ve got me curious.”

  “Don’t have any hidden bits of history down south?”

  “We’ve got the remains of a plague village behind the local church which isn’t marked on the maps as anything more than an earthwork.”

  He shivered. “This isn’t as morbid.”

  “Glad to hear it. I’ve had enough of morbid for one day.”

  The track ended at another wall, this one with protruding steps built into its sides. We swung over it and onto a narrower trail through the heather. The soil flexed and sunk a little below every step but did not give way. In front of us, the ground rose up again in another bank of ling and fern.

  And then I saw it. That bank was too even to be natural. In front of us, curving round the crest of the hill, was an old hill fort.

  “Careful,” Niall warned. “The ditch is boggy. You have to follow the trail or you’ll be in it to your waist.”

  I followed his advice, and soon we scrambled up a narrow crease in the heather and onto the crown of the bank. The top and interior of the ring were cropped low enough to walk around. A few sheep were lying in the shady heart of it.

  The sun was hot, but a breeze caught at us up here, and I breathed in deeply, letting it blow my troubles away as I gazed out at the views—green and purple hills rolling away until they turned blue with distance. There was no sign of any other human. We could have been the only men left in the world.

  Niall took my hand again as if it was the most natural thing in the world, and I swallowed down a pang of sadness. Thinking of home had made me realise I really didn’t want to make a permanent home of Vainguard, not even if the shadow of scandal vanished enough to make it feasible. But much as I missed home, there was no Niall there—no one who would barge so effortlessly through my loneliness.

  Well, I would make myself go out and look again. There must be someone out there for me.

  Niall turned to smile at me, and that vague thought dissipated under the force of his presence. Right now, I didn’t want some amorphous future lover. I wanted Niall, with all his passion and grumpy kindness.

  “Can you see the buzzard?” he
asked.

  I squinted in the direction he was pointing but couldn’t spot it. He shifted close behind me, his hands falling to my hips, and moved me a little. “There. Hovering straight ahead of us.”

  I could spot it now, but it was hard to focus on it when he was pressed warmly against my back.

  “Sit up here long enough,” he murmured into my ear, “and you’ll start to see more—we get merlins and peregrines, as well as the little birds in the heather. Thought I might have seen a hen harrier once, but it was only for a second, and I couldn’t be sure.”

  I knew nothing about birds, but his obvious delight in them made me wish I did.

  The bird hanging in the sky before us suddenly dropped, plummeting towards some prey that was hidden from us.

  “There he goes,” Niall said admiringly. “Big bastard, isn’t he? You’d be amazed the number of daft tourists who spot one like him and come back babbling that they’ve seen a proper eagle.”

  “I might have made the same mistake,” I admitted quietly. “An eagle’s bigger, though, isn’t it?”

  “Much. Once you’ve seen one of them, you wouldn’t make the mistake.”

  “You have.”

  “Aye. Climbing in Skye and saw a golden eagle. Most beautiful thing I’d ever seen, but it scared the life out of me too. You see pictures and focus on their flying, not the way they hunt, but up close…?” He shook his head. “Beautiful but terrifying.”

  “I’d still like to see one,” I said, though I’d never thought of it until now. I leaned back in his arms and watched the buzzard climb to its watchful place in the sky. “This is lovely. Thank you.”

  “Don’t thank me until you’ve tried the sandwiches,” he said practically. “I’m no chef.”

  “Do you need to be for sandwiches?”

  He laughed and led me on around the banks of the fort. On the other side, the hill fell away in steep heathery wrinkles, with moss-softened boulders rising out of the purple sea. In a few places, the flowers parted to reveal thin trickling streams.