He put down his pint glass but did not let go. He stared at his hand, at the fingers wrapped around the glass. “Tell me, Brendan. What do you remember from that night? The night we… went missing.” He did not look up. He didn’t want to look into his friend’s eyes.
Missing… and they still were, all of them, when it came right down it.
Brendan sighed. Then he spoke. “I remember us making the den in the trees, and then I saw something. Somebody. A man in a mask… like a bird’s face, or something.”
“Captain Clickety?” said Simon, finally raising his eyes.
Brendan nodded. “Yes.” He exhaled loudly. “Remember, it was something Marty told us. Back in the seventies, a couple of kids — twins — who lived in the Needle were tormented by a poltergeist. They called him Captain Clickety, because they kept hearing a clicking sound, like castanets. I’ve read about it since… most of the rumours are false. Nobody seems to want to talk about it these days, but one of the twins died of a heart attack. At least that’s what the records say. Natural causes, anyway. Probably shock-related.”
Brendan leaned forward in his chair, his chest almost touching the top of the table. His face was sombre, his eyes narrow. “Captain Clickety,” he whispered in a singsong voice.
Simon felt cold. The old rhyme had chilled him, bringing back snippets of memory, torn and tattered visions, like a shredded sheet: the inside of the Needle, all dark and damp and empty; a figure moving through the darkness, rustling in the low-hanging branches of trees; a girl, her skin shedding light as she came towards them, smiling… movement, like huge wings, curling around her back and shoulders.
Brendan spoke again, as if he had not broken off from his account: “I remember the platform falling, cutting my arm — I still have the scar." He glanced down, at his arm. “And we went back that night, sneaked out of our houses, and met up there, to guard the den. What a bunch of babies — acting like cowboys.” He smiled, despite the solemnity of his tone. “We saw someone again — possibly the same figure — and we decided to follow him, to spy on him. It was just a game, a bit of fun… that was all. A fucking kids’ game.” His eyes were shining with tears. “Then… then… we were in there, inside the Needle, and we were so fucking scared. We were terrified.”
Simon reached out and grabbed Brendan’s hand, clutching it. He didn’t care who saw them; he didn’t give a damn what it looked like. “But how did we get in there? That’s what I can’t remember. I didn’t even see the figure, although it was my idea to follow him. I don’t remember how the hell we got inside that place.”
Brendan looked deep into his eyes. “Me neither.”
Simon pulled his hand away, suddenly embarrassed by the contact. He glanced around the room, but nobody was taking any notice of their exchange. In The Dropped Penny, nobody eavesdropped on your conversation; nobody gave a damn about your business, whatever it was.
Brendan took a large swallow of his beer. He licked his lips.
“I went in there earlier,” said Simon. “I went in there again, by myself this time. That’s when I got mugged, as I came back out. They were waiting for me. But while I was in there, something happened. I saw things, things that shouldn’t have been there.”
Brendan pressed his lips together.
“I saw twigs, skinny little branches coming out of the walls and moving around like snakes, like they were trying to grow. They wrapped around my wrists, trying to bind me, like we were before. I heard a clicking sound, up on the higher levels. Clicking, like the sounds I remember from twenty years ago.” He had run out of steam, losing the rush that had forced the words out of him in a torrent. “I think I did. I’m not sure of anything anymore. I have these dreams… strange dreams.”
“I do, too,” said Brendan. “Nightmares, but they always seem so real at the time. It doesn’t even feel like I’m dreaming. Feels like… like real life, but flipped over, messed about with, shaken up into weird forms.”
Simon nodded. “That’s it. That’s exactly it.”
Brendan slammed one hand down onto the table, not too hard, but enough to make a loud, hollow sound. “You’re right. We have to find Marty.”
Simon listened to his old friend. For the first time, he seemed to be truly on board, to be taking all of this seriously.
“We need to find him and ask him if he’s been dreaming like this too. If he feels like something’s reaching for him, trying to pull him back, towards the past.”
Simon’s blood was racing through his veins. His skin felt hot. He was no longer cold: he was burning. “Is that how you feel?”
Brendan nodded. “Aye.”
“So do I, mate. So do I…”
Brendan closed his eyes and began to speak.
“Stop it,” said Simon. “Just cut that shit out, right now. You’re acting like a fucking child. We need to focus, we have to keep a grip on the situation.”
“What situation is that, then?” Brendan picked up his glass, but it was empty. He placed it gently back on the table. “How exactly do you describe what’s happening to us, if in fact there is anything happening to us and we’re not just going mad? Or always were mad, ever since some bastard locked us up in the Needle and abused us for a weekend.”
“A weekend that felt like an hour,” said Simon. “Remember that little fact? I do. When we came out of there, it seemed like we’d only been inside for an hour, but it had been two days. Two whole fucking days. I still don’t have that time back — do you?”
Brendan shook his head. “Okay, yes. I do remember that. It’s the thing that scares me most about the whole thing, those lost days. Where did it go? I mean, what the hell did we do for all that time? What did he do to us?”
“And who, or what, is he?” Simon pushed away from the table, suddenly uncomfortable within the walls of the old pub. “Let’s get out of here. The quicker we find out where Marty might be, the better for us all. Having that tough bastard with us will make everything seem a bit less oppressive.”
“Yeah, okay.” Brendan stood, pushing back his chair. “Let’s go. We have an appointment to keep with an old lady and a pot of tea. She might even have cake.” He smiled, and it almost reached his eyes.
Almost.
CHAPTER NINETEEN
MARTY SAT ON his sofa with the blinds closed. The noise of the city — the busy quayside traffic, the lunchtime crowds surging towards pubs and cafes for their salads and panini and plates of antipasto — dimmed to nothing but background noise.
The television was on, tuned to a twenty-four-hour news channel, but he had the sound turned right down. A woman with shiny blonde hair and impressive bone structure mouthed banalities that he had no desire to hear. He stared at her face, at her flawless skin, and imagined it peeling back to show the bone beneath. For some reason, that made him smile.
Marty was stretched out, with his legs trailing on the floor, and he was wearing only a pair of baggy gym shorts. His torso was bare. He was sweating; his skin glistened, as if he had been sprayed with water. In one hand he held a whisky bottle, and in the other he had the acorn. He was rubbing the surface of the nut with his fingers, polishing it, making it shine. It was a reflexive action, something to use up his nervous energy.