The torch was lying several feet away, its thin beam pointed at the wall opposite, revealing only a strip of torn wallpaper. He could just make out the shape of the black bag he'd also dropped lying close by.
In a crouch, his senses still not recovered from the onslaught they had received, Halloran moved forward and grabbed both items, then scrambled backwards so that he leaned against the wall once more. He broadened the light beam to take in a bigger area.
The floor was littered with rubbish and filth, a threadbare carpet, corners curled covering a minimal section of bare boards. The walls were stained, the faded paper hanging in tatters; to one side were cupboards, the wood cracked and dull. A small table and chair were to his left, a few paces away, on the table-top a plate on which remains of a meal had furred green. I-C° noticed that the ceiling light socket had no bulb, the ceiling itself bulging in places, and pockmarked with dark fungi. Mustiness from that fungi contributed to the room's pungency; the rest was a mixture of urine, stale faeces, and sweetness.
The wide beam lingered around the room's single window, whose curtains were rendered grey by dust.
A high-backed armchair faced the window. Wiry stuffing, like internal organs, spilled from holes in its upholstery. He knew that it was from here that the lodge-keeper watched the estate's gates. But Halloran could not see if the chair was occupied. Several seconds went by before he determined to find out.
He edged past the doorway, keeping to the wall, moving to a position from where he could shine the beam directly into the chair. Shadows shifted also, stirred by the changing light. The angle improved as he drew closer, yet somehow he was reluctant to discover who sat there, his mind scarcely coping with the hallucinations it had already been bombarded with; he knew, though, that he could not leave the room without confronting the lodge-keeper.
He reached the corner, his shoulder brushing mould and dust from the mildewed wall, and raised the torch so that it shone directly into the seat. Both relief and disappointment swept through him when he found it empty.
But a faint disturbance was coming from elsewhere in the room. A sighing of air. A breathing.
Halloran slowly swung the beam into the furthest corner, from where the sound came, the light passing an iron fireplace, this one too filled with hardened ashes, before coming to rest on a misshapen bundle of rags lying on the floor.
As he watched, the bundle began to move.
37 JOURNEY AROUND THE LAKE
There were five of them in all, lying low in the undergrowth, faces pressed into the earth as the car lights drew near. Only one of the men looked up when the brightest moment had passed, and he waited until the rear lights had become pinpoints in the distance before speaking.
'That was it, all right. The Granada, Ten minutes at least 'tit the other one comes along.' Next to him, the man named Danny grunted. 'Across the road, quick as you like, and as little noise as possible. There might just be a foot patrol inside the grounds.' They rose as one, brushing through the foliage and around trees, sprinting across tarmac to reach the wire fence on the other side of the road. They were trained mere, and one immediately turned his back and rested against the mesh, cupping his hands between his thighs as a stirrup. He hoisted his companions over, then threw the two rifles left lying in the grass to them. The weapons were deftly caught and he scrambled over after them The group melted into the shadows of the trees, then regrouped when they were well out of sight from the road.
The leader whispered loud enough for there all to hear. 'Round the lake, boys, an' no talking am the way. we'll )Seep to its edge in case there's an alarm set-up an the woods. Eyes sharp, lads, an' single file.
Make your mothers proud.' He went forward, the others following down a slope that red to the water's edge. They crept along the shoreline until the moo n, emerged from clouds like an all-encompassing searchlight, the: group dropped to the ground. They crawled back into the under growth and waited to find out if they had been observed. Their leader eventually gave the order and they rose as one to move silently through the trees.
'Look out,' one exclaimed.
The others stopped, crouching low, hands reaching for weapons. Hammers clicked on revolvers.
'What was it?' the leader demanded when there was no movement nor sounds for several seconds.
'I saw something ahead,' the subordinate replied. 'A shape.'
'What the hell are you talking about? Was it man or dog?'
'Neither,' came the nervous response. 'Just a shape. I swear it disappeared in front of me.'
'You're going soft in the head, McGuire. Let's get the job done.' They moved off again, but soon it was the leader himself who brought them to a halt. His scalp prickled as he watched the wavery mist that drifted in and out of the trees a few yards away. A cry close by distracted him.
One of his men had raised his Armalite and was about to fire.
'No,' he hissed urgently, grabbing for the barrel. 'What the hell are you playing at?'
'Jesus, God, I saw them there.' He pointed into the grass a short distance away. 'A goddamn nest of
'em. Snakes. They just faded away.' The leader shook his head in disgust. His men were behaving like old folk, frightened of their own shadows. He returned his attention to the spot where the mist had curled through the trees almost like arms reaching towards them. No mist now. God Almighty, he was as bad as the others.
'Danny, will you look over there.'
'Keep it down,' he growled, but turned to where the man was pointing. Through the woods he could see the lake. The water was choppy, stirred by a breeze that grew stronger by the moment, the moonlight tossed by undulations. But it was the far bank to which his man was directing him. There was movement there, a flowing stream that had nothing to do with water.
'What is it?' someone whispered.
'Can't you tell?' said the leader. 'It's dogs, man.'
'Coming for us?' He could feel his men's panic.
'Not at all. They'd be across the water at a sniff of us. No, they're on their way somewhere else, an'
thank God for that.' He watched the tiny, ghostly forms skirt around the lake, their low bodies catching the light so that in parts they looked silver. Clouds consumed the moon once more and he could follow their journey no longer.
He frowned, wondering where they were heading for with such haste.
38 THE KEEPER
The breathing became louder, a hissing that each time ended in a thick, muciferous sigh.
It faded again, became almost a whisper, and Halloran strained to listen. The heaped bundle of rags was still, having moved only once.
His own breathing was unsteady and Halloran realised that never before had he felt such debilitating trepidation, for a peculiar virulence seemed to poison the very air in the room. His inclination was to flee, to bolt through that doorway and get out into the night where the breeze was pure. But the curiosity that had led him to this place had become something more: an obsession, perhaps even a quest. Revelations from his own life had spun before him here, things that were bad, his worst sins recreated, and there had to be a reason why. He felt shame, a guilt he had always suppressed rising inside; yet it was his fascination that was stronger. It was that which prevented him from taking flight, for it prevailed over the fear, subjugated the exposed guilt.
Halloran tentatively made his way towards the tangled rags.
He saw the edges of a thin mattress, dried stains overlapping its sides, spreading where fluid had once seeped into the wood of the floor. The mound on top could have been anythingblankets, piled clothing, assorted pieces of material. That there was someone beneath, there was no doubt, for the whispered breathing came from here and the jumbled covering quivered slightly with the exhalation. Halloran leaned forward and gripped the rags. He pulled them away.