The House of Lost Souls - F. G. Cottam [144]
‘You know what I think, Malcolm? And this is only my supposition, mind. But I’ve a sneaky suspicion your beast is hurt. It killed Nick Mason, right enough. And in time you and Mr Greb will be all the stronger for possession of the magic Nick’s father endowed him with. And that’s just as you foresaw and planned it. But he was altogether tougher and more resourceful than you thought he’d be, was Nick. And right now, Harry Greb is feeling badly from the fight. He’s taken a standing count, so he has. It’s my belief he’ll be in need of a rest before he comes for me. To my mind, for the present only, it’s down to the two of us.’
There was a slouching sound from above, as if in contradiction of what Seaton had just said. And Covey smiled and glimmered. But the sound had betrayed itself in Seaton’s mind with lack of appetite. Mr Greb would recover. The beast would gather itself. But it hadn’t quite done so yet. Covey took a toothpick from a barbed display of them on the tabletop. And Seaton remembered the magic the man’s father had contrived in the bar in Portsmouth to break the back of a belligerent sailor.
‘I want the bag in your lap. It doesn’t belong to you. You’ve stolen what it contains. Return it and you will leave here healthy and sane. Give it to me.’
‘Ah, Malcolm. Why don’t you go and fuck yourself.’
The thing above them, gathering obvious strength, murmured and shifted.
Covey bit the toothpick he’d been playing with and Seaton felt pain blister and grind through him. And the bag soughed in his lap. And he knew, finally, that he would fight with the persistence with which his dead and valiant friend had fought to give the boy the burial he deserved.
‘Why me, Covey?’
Covey shrugged. ‘Give me the bag.’
And the thing above them found its feet and began to shift down the stairs.
The bag rippled in Seaton’s lap. Covey took the toothpick from between his teeth and held it out towards a candle flame. Seaton’s clothing was soaked. Lascalles’ old missal was pulp in his jacket pocket. There was a hiss of steam from his sodden cuffs and the heat through him was bright, burning agony.
‘Give me the bag.’
‘Never.’
Behind him, Seaton heard the beast burst into the room on a draught that extinguished the candles and pitched them into darkness. It howled and the bag rippled in his lap. Covey cursed and the beast panted and stank at Seaton’s back with fury. He heard Covey’s fingers scrabbling on the tabletop, for a knife? For Wheatley’s revolver? Behind him, he sensed Mr Greb gathering, poised for attack.
Matches. Covey was searching for matches.
Seaton laughed out loud. He had remembered something. He had remembered something vital he had probably been schooled by the man opposite him to forget. ‘I’ll give you light,’ he said.
And Malcolm Covey screamed.
Seaton put both hands over the bag. He felt the nap of velvet over its sad, small protrusions. He closed his eyes and the darkness behind his lids was cleaved by brightness. ‘I’ll make you safe, Peter, so I will,’ he said.
He held the beast back with a part of his mind in the way he now remembered he had done it before. He’d used a great amount of his power, then, instinctive and untried. It had been a moment so cataclysmic that the forest itself had been stunned to silence and its birds had shed their feathers on the wing. The Irish myth of running water hadn’t stopped Mr Greb. He had done it. And vanity had caused the collapse in him that followed. Not content with felling the beast, he had approached it where it lay. And he had looked it in the face. That was a mistake he would not repeat.
It was behind him now, mewling, manacled by a single, ironbound thought. And Covey was scraping matches against the side of a box in a bid to repeat his spiteful trick of a moment ago. But none of them would ignite, because Seaton wouldn’t allow it. Wheatley’s gun was on the table, sure enough. But Covey would find he couldn’t pick it up. Seaton’s mind had welded it where it lay. Covey was crying. He was sobbing, fumbling with the matchbox, dropping matches