Doctor Who_ Wolfsbane - Jac Rayner [7]
And Rose Perry. Another one on 28th November.‟
All in all, they found twelve graves. There were seven more for the 28th of November. William Hodges. Thomas Charnock. John Abbot. Stephen Bennett. Amos Wetherham.
Edward Usher. Caleb Johnstone. All of these men were aged between thirty and sixty. And there were a couple of other places where the earth looked newly dug, too, but which had no headstones - other graves? Other deaths?
There were flowers on Rose Perry‟s grave, a tied posy of hedgerow blooms complete with roots.
None of the other new graves had flowers. Had anyone mourned? Was there anyone left to mourn? Twelve deaths -
or more - in two days.
„We have to find out what happened,‟ she murmured.
When she looked up, the Doctor was already half way back to the gate. „Where are you going?‟ she called.
„We have to find out what happened!‟ his call echoed back.
Sarah took another look at Rose Perry‟s grave, another look at Harry‟s. She hurried over to the edge of the churchyard, where wild roses clambered through the hedge, and tore a handful away, not feeling the prick of the thorns in her numbed fingers. She placed them as carefully as her icy hands would allow just below the stone that told of Harry beneath. A drop of her blood joined them. Then she hurried to catch up with the Doctor, forcing herself not to look back.
But if she had looked, she would have seen a fine thread of root slithering out of a rose-stem where the blood had hit it.
Harry‟s head touched the pillow and immediately sprang up again. There had in actual fact been three or four hours between the one act and the other, but he was scarcely aware of them. But for the faded winter sunlight creeping through the gap between the heavy velvet curtains, he would have thought it mere seconds since he‟d fallen asleep. He lay his head back down and shut his eyes again. There was a swish as of curtains being pulled open, and Harry forced himself to surface once more. This is what had awoken him. A spotty girl of about fifteen was in the room with him, and now he could scent the hot morning tea that had been placed by his bedside. He struggled to sit up, realised he was bare-chested, and feeling embarrassed and conspicuous, tried to lie half back down and subtly pull the covers over himself.
The girl took not the slightest bit of notice. „Morning, sir,‟
she said with a slight bob, heading back for the door.
„Er...‟ Harry began. The girl stopped and peered enquiringly at him over her shoulder. „Thank you for the tea,‟ he continued, hopelessly. She smiled and turned back to the door. „Er...‟ Harry said again, desperate not to lose his only source of information but having no clue whatsoever what to ask her. „Er... I‟m Harry. Harry Sullivan.‟
„Yes, sir?‟ she said, turning back to him yet again.
Surely it wasn‟t human to be so uninterested in a man who had turned up in the middle of the night just after one of the houseguests had been murdered? Or was this the legendary sang froid of the good servant?
„Will there be anything else, sir?‟
Harry‟s nerve failed him. „No. Er, no, thank you.‟
He lay back on the pillow for a few moments after the door had closed. He had no real interest in drinking the tea. And whereas on the one hand he desperately wanted a bit more shut-eye, on the other, rather more urgent hand, he needed to know a bit more about this peculiar situation in which he had found himself.
He swung his legs sleepily over the side, and with an effort pulled himself upright. His clothes had been folded neatly over a chair, the mud had been brushed from his trouser legs, and there was a jug of warmish water by the side of a bowl, a cake of brown soap, a badger-hair brush and a cut-throat razor. Harry eyed the last with some apprehension, being rather more used to the safety variety. However, not wishing to create a bad first impression with whoever he might meet here, he hung a towel around his neck and set to with vigour, brain whirring all the while. Servants and badger-brushes added up to the England