CHAPTER 7

Sydney and Preston stepped out of the car at 22 Wailset Lane and stared at the boarded up bread factory. Sydney ’s hands curled into fists. The little maggot was going to die.

            “Oh dear,” Preston mused, beside her. “He lied to us?”

Sydney shot him a dangerous look. “You think?”

“I don’t understand this at all.” Preston tsked. “Are we even sure that Cawvers took Nigel? How do you know it wasn’t one of those other blokes that are always after you?”

“I know it was Cawvers.”

“But can you be sure? I mean, I don’t mean to doubt your instincts at all of this, certainly you’ve been doing it much longer than I and I am, after all, just a tag along, but it just doesn’t seem conceivable that a woman with such a longstanding reputation at the Academy could be some psychopath who’s one wish is to steal away my brother. After all, Sydney , he’s hardly someone to get obsessed over and…”

Sydney grabbed Preston by the front of his shirt and yanked him forward so their faces were only inches apart. “Do you know what I find inconceivable, Preston ? The very idea you are arguing with me about this when your own flesh and blood brother is in the hands of a woman like Cawvers.”

“I…I….”

“And what I also don’t appreciate is you trying to debase a man who is not only my best friend and partner, but who has more courage, more skill and a hell of a lot more tact in his little finger than you have in your pathetic, scrawny-assed body.”

Preston’s eyes widened. “I…I don’t see the need for insults, Sydney .”

Her hand tightened on his shirt, cutting off some of the oxygen to his throat. “Be lucky my rebuke is verbal or you’d be in several different pieces by now, Preston .” She released him so suddenly that he almost fell over.

He rubbed his throat and eyed her, confused, then her words started to sink in and he lowered his eyes, ashamed. “I am worried about him, Syd,” he admitted, quietly. “I…I don’t want to think he’s with a monster or what she might be doing to him.” He sighed and dropped down on a bus stop bench in front of the factory. “I know I sometimes seem overbearing and…and that I don’t care for him, but I do. He is still my brother.”

Sydney’s anger evaporated as she listened to the misery in his voice. “I know you do, Preston .”

He ran his hands through his hair and then cupped them over his nose and mouth in contemplation. He lowered them and looked up at Sydney . “I didn’t know, you know, that he was having such a hard time at his school. Truly I didn’t. I...I would have done something if I had known, but he…well, Nigel never really talked to me much.” He sighed. “I can’t blame him for that, really. I was an arse sometimes, always looking for ways that I could be better than him.”

Sydney settled next to him on the bench. “Why do you do that, Preston ? Why do you feel you have to be better?”

“Because he is so damn good at everything! Our parents were so enormously proud of everything he did. Oh, did you hear, Nigel has memorized the entire Encyclopaedia section of the library. Or, listen to our precious Nigel recite the entire line of the English monarchy.”

Sydney almost smiled at the pettiness in Preston ’s voice as he mimicked what she assumed was supposed to be his mother’s voice. “So, you were jealous of him because he was smart?”

“No, well, yes, but it wasn’t just that he was smart. Everything comes so easy to him. School, music…” He grimaced. “Girls. I have to work bloody hard to even get a girl interested, Nigel just has to walk down the street with his nose stuck in a book and the birds bloody well flock to him like he’s the Prince of England.”

Sydney couldn’t deny the charge, she’d witnessed the effect Nigel had on women first hand, and he was so often oblivious to it, or at least pretended to be.

Preston lowered his eyes. “Even Amanda didn’t want me. She was after Nigel and what he could do for her.” He looked at Sydney . “I even stole away his dream job and what happens, he ends up working for you, the most beautiful and enchanting woman of the century.” He shook his head. “It isn’t fair.”

Sydney considered how many times she’d heard Nigel utter those same sentiments about Preston . She squeezed his shoulder. “Let me ask you something. Would you rather he be hideously unattractive and have the mentality of a ten year old?”

“No! Of course not. I don’t wish him anything of the kind.”

“Then why do you begrudge him for what he is?” She smiled and caught his chin so he would look at her. “ Preston , you’re smart, you’re funny and charming, and you’re very attractive. I’m very lucky to know two such amazing men and to have them both as my friends.”

Preston smiled shyly. “Thank you for that, Sydney .” He paused. “I supposed I could try to be more forgiving of Nigel’s accomplishments.”

“That would be very brotherly of you.”

“As I am feeling so fraternal, may I ask you a question, Syd?”

“Sure.”

“How long have you been in love with my brother?”

Sydney gaped at him and felt her hand drop from his shoulder. Before she could answer, her cell phone rang. She rose and quickly pulled it out of her pocket. She flipped it open with more eagerness than necessary and saw that it was Karen calling. “Tell me you have something for me.”

“You were asking about Julia Cawvers, right?”

            “Yes,” Sydney agreed as she climbed back into the car and waved for Preston to do the same. “What did you find out?”

            “Well, the only residence I could find for her is at the academy, but I did get a blip of something when I typed in her name in the British Archive Newspapers.”

            “What is it?”

            “Well, I don’t know if it is the same woman, but there was an article from twenty-five years ago of a Juliana Cawther who was a teacher at a school in Ireland where several young boys went missing.”

            “Missing?” Sydney demanded. “Define missing.”

            “Well, from what the article says, this Juliana Cawther was questioned about the disappearances, like all the teachers were, but the police seemed to focus their investigation on her.”
            “Why?”

            “It doesn’t say, but the police dropped their case against her when her own son disappeared within a few months of the others. No charges were officially laid, but it was apparently a big media circus and everyone seemed to think that Juliana killed the boys and her son. There just wasn’t any proof of it.”

            “She could have changed her name to rid herself of the stigma from the accusations,” Sydney agreed. “But it could also be a coincidence. Two women with similar names who happened to be teachers.”

            “That’s what I thought, until I pulled up the article and there is a picture of the boy who disappeared.” Karen paused. “I can fax it to Nigel’s laptop.”

            “Do it, we’ll be back at the hotel in a few minutes.” Something nagged Sydney in the back of her mind, something about the name Juliana. “Karen, do me a favour and do a search for Juliana in our archives.”

            “Uh…okay, although it’s liable to pull up several hundred names.”

            “Focus on the ones from the British Isles,” Sydney suggested as she heard Karen’s fingers flying over the keyboard of her computer. “The name is very familiar, but I can’t place it.”

            “I was right, there are a lot of Juliana’s,” Karen muttered. “Can you narrow it down for me?”

            “Search early eighteenth century.”        

“There was a woman named Juliana L’Mosque who was accused of witchcraft in the early eighteenth century, but she disappeared from her cell before she could be brought to trial.” Karen paused. “But that was over a hundred years ago, Syd. It can’t be the same person.”

“L’Mosque,” Sydney repeated as Preston pulled into their hotel. She was out of the car before he had the engine switched off. “That doesn’t sound…oh Shit. Karen, do a search on 1814 Hornsby Lane , London .”

“Okay.” A moment of silence as the computer worked. “ Hornsby Academy ? Isn’t that Nigel’s school?”

“Look for what it was before it became a boarding school.” Sydney hurried through the lobby and into the elevator, barely allowing time for Preston to join her.

“Hang on,” Karen requested. “This will take a minute.”

Sydney entered her hotel room and quickly moved to power up Nigel’s laptop and set up the small portable fax. “Anything?” she demanded as the machine beeped to say it was receiving.

            In the late 1800’s the address was the estate of a Lord Greymur, one daughter, no sons to leave the estate too, so it was auctioned to the church and became a monastery, but it was burned to the ground by a mysterious fire in 1912, only part of it remained.”

            “The towers.” Sydney muttered as she recalled the dorms that Nigel had stated were his as a young child. She had noticed that the building was set apart from the others, painted to look similar, but built onto an existing structure, the remains of Greymur castle. This was getting worse and worse. “Karen, what was the name of the daughter Greymur left behind?”

            There was a long silence and then, when Karen spoke, fear had crept into her voice. “Juliana. She married a baron named Alvin L’Mosque, but he died a year later of Apoplexy. She was later tried for his death, citing witchcraft was the cause.”

            Sydney didn’t reply. She was staring at the picture that had just rolled out of the fax. “Sweet God.”

            “What?” Karen asked, concerned. “What is it?”

            “I just got the fax.”

            “Yeah, scary, isn’t it?” Karen agreed, grimly.

            Sydney stared at the photo of a young man, probably nine or ten, with brown hair and sad eyes. If she didn’t know any better, she would swear it was a very young Nigel Bailey staring back at her.

IIIIIIIIIIIIIIII

            The crying had started again. Gentle, mournful sobs that echoed through the halls and drifted into his room. Nigel pulled the covers over his head and shivered, telling himself it was the wind, or the pipes of the school, or his own wicked imagination.

            “Sprits do not exist,” he told himself, his voice small and trembling with fear. “There are no such things as ghosts, or spirits or demons.”

            The sobbing seemed to increase to a wail and Nigel closed his eyes against it. “Stop,” he moaned, frightened. “Please God, make it stop.”

            Finally, it stopped and the room was enveloped in silence. It took him several minutes before he could pull the sheets away from his head and peer around in the darkness.

 Moonlight filtered through his dormitory window and set the room in a ghostly, iridescent glow. His roommate Johnny Stiles was still asleep in the bed opposite Nigel’s, half his covers kicked off, one arm hanging over the side. Nigel could see the light under his closed door from the hallway and watched a shadow move across it. His eyes flew to the door handle and he watched it turn, slowly.

Something compelled him to fly out of the bed and rip open the door. “Who’s there?” he demanded, but found the corridor empty. He peered down both sides and saw nothing, but then noticed a shadow off to the left.

“Right,” he decided as he hurried back to his small desk, pulled a torch from the drawer and then reached Johnny’s cricket bat. “Enough is enough.” Someone had to be playing tricks on him, probably those blokes Ford and Roberts, they were always at him for one thing or another. Well, he’d reached his limit and when he caught them he’d show them what it was to face an angry Nigel Bailey.

 He slowly started down the corridor, the hardwood floors felt cold against his bare feet. “Who’s there?” he whispered, his voice cracking more from fear than the fact that he would soon reach puberty.

His heart stopped as he turned the corner and stared down another long, lonely corridor, lit only by a handful of wall lamps that were dimmed for the evening. What was he doing, out of his room this time of the night? Why didn’t he just go back to bed? If he was caught out of his room at this hour he would be severely punished.

He really didn’t want another trip to the Headmistress’ office. He had already felt the sting of her punishment once this year, because he had given a candy bar to a student who was being punished for setting a smoke bomb in the science lab and had been put on rations of only dry bread, ham and water for his meal while he was confined to his room, allowed only to leave for classes.

However, if it was Fords and Roberts, they would be laughing at his fear. His fingers curled around the bat determined, he’d get them for playing games with him. He pushed on down the corridor. He could hear the crying again, only this time it didn’t sound so ghostly, it sounded like a child, a real child like him. “If that’s you, Ford, you’d best stop it this instant!”

 When the sobbing continued he moved closer, his curiosity winning over his fear and he found himself at the end of the corridor staring a door he knew led to the towers. They had all been told that the towers were dangerous and there were of course rumours, that they were haunted. No one could ever get past the heavy, ancient locks of the door; there was only the one key to fit the keyhole under the latch.

He reached for the ancient door handle and was startled when it opened. He stepped back, frightened. Why wasn’t it locked? It was always locked!

Again, curiosity won him over as he heard the crying again. Perhaps one of the boys had gone up there and gotten hurt? The Headmistress was always warning them that it was dangerous and she gave the same speech to all first year students to stay away. Some boys chose not to listen.

He switched on his torch, hefted the cricket bat and slowly climbed the winding stone steps. “Hello?” he whispered. “Is there someone up here?” The crying suddenly stopped and he froze in a moment of fear.

“Here!” a young voice cried. “Please! Help me! I’m here!”

Nigel ran up the remaining steps and found another door at the top. “Are you in there?” he called.

There was a pounding on the door. “Yes! Please! Let me out! Hurry!”

Nigel set down the weapon and pulled at the door, but it wouldn’t open. “I can’t budge it. I think it’s locked. Can you push it from your side?”

“I can’t! I can’t get out! Hurry, you have to hurry, before…” The distinct echoing sound of footsteps coming up the stairs frightened them both into silence.

Nigel looked around, there was no where for him to hide, just stone walls on either side. “Let me in!” he hissed pulling at the door.

“Let me out!” the other boy cried.

The glow of Nigel’s torch dimmed as a shadow fell over him. He spun around and screamed.

Nigel bolted up from the bed, his heart racing, his throat dry and his entire body soaked with sweat. It took him a few minutes to realize that he was still in the room without a window. He swung his feet to the floor and cradled his head.

Where on Earth had that dream come from? Was that a memory of his past or just his fears igniting his dream state? He rose suddenly. He had to get out of here. He didn’t know why, aside from Cawvers being a madwoman, but there was something very wrong with her. He had to escape.

He went to the door and pulled on it, but it wouldn’t budge. He pounded on it. “Open this door! Help! Anyone, please help me! Let me out!” He shivered as he remembered the voice in his dream, the little boy crying for help. But had that been real?

He had no recollection of that night, he didn’t ever remember going into the towers when he was a child, surely he would have remembered hearing a child cry for help? It was a dream, but the dream was mirroring his reality and it was scaring the hell out of him.

He was suddenly filled with an unreasonable feeling of panic. He went to the window, threw open the curtains and stared at the brick wall. He searched desperately for a weakness in the wall but found none, the bricks were solid. He walked over to the chair and broke off one of the legs. Perhaps he could dig around them. Sometimes it was just a matter of finding a loose brick and if the mortar was old he should be able to get through it with the wood.

He went to work on the wall, remembering the techniques that Sydney had taught him, all that he had learned about finding a way out of an enclosure. He hurried into the bathroom and soaked one of the towels in hot water, then set it against the bricks, pressing it against the ancient calking that held the bricks together.

Slowly the wall started to soften and Nigel used the table leg to dig around one of the bricks in the middle, where the area was the softest.

Sydney would find him soon, he was sure of it, he just had to stall until she got here and it would be better if he knew where here was.  Slowly the brick started to loosen until he could scrape at it with his nails. Finally, he managed to pull a brick out and a small beam of daylight filtered in. Nigel could smell fresh air as he put his eyes to the hole and tried to see out, only there was nothing to see but the setting sun.

He went to work on another brick, then another. His chair leg was whittling down against the hard surface of the bricks. Finally he managed to get two more bricks out and he could almost see something outside. It looked like water.

He managed to pull out a forth brick and his view increased. His eyes widened as he stared in disbelief. “Oh my God!” He could see the pond that boarded the grounds of Hornsby Academy . He was in the towers!

He dropped the brick and stepped back from the wall, stunned. The remains of his dream came back to him and as it did, the cold hand of reality crawled up his back. It hadn’t been a dream! He remembered waking up and hearing a boy in the tower. He remembered trying to get him out, but then some one came and…and…

He shook his head trying to force the rest to come to him but he couldn’t. It must have been Cawvers that had found him, perhaps incapacitated him and he had gotten such a fright that his memory had blocked it out. That had to be why he was so afraid of the dorms after that, why he had the unexplained fear of her.

His eyes widened as he remembered the dream of waking up to find her bending over his bed. She wasn’t watching him sleep, she was putting him back to bed because he had found that boy in the tower! He’d felt his eyes on her everywhere he went after that, she was always watching him.

He grabbed up the chair leg and started hacking at the wall. He had to get out! He had to let someone know he was up here. He didn’t know whatever became of that boy who had been crying, never even knew the boy’s name, he only knew that he had to get out and away from Cawvers.

“You’ve been a very bad boy, while I was away.”

Nigel spun around and saw Cawvers standing in the doorway. “I know what you’ve done!” he croaked as he hid his wooden tool behind his back. “I know where I am now and you can’t keep me here.”

Cawvers smiled, calmly as the door closed behind her and she set the tray of food on the desk. “What is it you think I’ve done?”

“The boy. I remember the boy you locked up here in the towers all those years ago. What did you do to the boy?” What had she done to him that Nigel had blocked out the very memory all this time?

“You were dreaming, Nathan.”

Nigel blinked at the name she used. “My name is Nigel.”

“It’s alright, my darling. We don’t have to pretend anymore.” Cawver picked up a small bowl and smiled. “Chocolate pudding, it’s you’re favourite.”

“I don’t want your bloody pudding.”

There was the slightest flicker of hurt in her eyes, a look that Nigel had not expected, then he watched her set the pudding down and offer him the glass of milk.

“Are you thirsty then? You must be after all that hard work with the bricks.”

Nigel stared at her stunned. “Why are you keeping me here?”

“You belong here, with me. This is your home.”

“Why do you think that?”

“Oh, Nathan.” Cawver took a step towards him and frowned when he backed up against the wall, keeping the chair leg hidden behind his back. “I’m sorry I had to punish you before, but you wouldn’t listen.” She held out her hands. “Look, I’ve put the cane away. I won’t ever hit you with it again. I’m sorry.”

“Why do you keep calling me Nathan? My name is Nigel. Nigel Bailey.”

Cawver’s face darkened for a moment, then returned to calm again. “I know you had to live with them for awhile so you’ve come to think of them as your real family, but they weren’t, Nathan. I’m your family, I’m your mother.”

“You’re a lunatic!” Nigel exclaimed, alarmed. “My mother was Elizabeth Bailey!”

“No!” she snapped and then her features softened again and she moved to caress his cheek, startled when Nigel flinched away. “They made you run away then, and I am sorry for it. I am sure you were traumatized and that is why you don’t remember.” She stepped back and patted the bed. “Come, sit down and I’ll explain it to you.”

Nigel remained where he was and watched her warily.

She sighed and smoothed out the skirt of her long black dress. “I hurt you before. I didn’t mean to, but you had been very bad. Then they came and took you away. I looked for you for so very long, years and years. You were my baby, so of course I had to find you.” She smiled, wistfully. “And then, one day, you walked into my office and I knew it was you right away. We had to pretend of course, and let everyone think you belonged to the Baileys, but we knew the truth, didn’t we?”

Nigel stared at her. “The truth?”

“That you were my Nathan. They changed your name and tried to hide you from me for so many years, but how could they know I would be here when they brought you?” She rose and smiled. “I waited for you, my sweet boy. For so long I’ve waited for you and I’ve had to make such sacrifices for you, but I managed it and here you are. All my work, all my patience paid off.”

“ Miss. Cawvers…”

“Oh, call me Mama, darling. I’ve waited so long to hear you say it.”

“You…you’re not my mother. I…I don’t know why you think you are, but you…you’re confused.”

“No!” she snapped and once again her face changed to one Nigel was more used to, the sneering, rage of a monster. “You are my son! I found you and I won’t let them take you away again!”

“Them?”

“Do you think I don’t know it was the judge and his little minions that stole you away from me?” she hissed. “I had nothing to do with the death of those boys, they were insignificant insects but they tried to insist that I had hurt them.” She lunged forward and caught him around the shoulders, pushing him into the wall. “They blamed me for them and they blamed me for his death as well, but I did not do it!”
            “Do…do what?”

“I did not kill the baron! I did not murder him!”

Nigel was speechless. The woman was completely delusional. “I want to leave. You can’t keep me here…”

She released him suddenly and returned to the food, her mood changed once more. “You’ll remember in time, and then it will be as it was before.” She turned around to pick up the milk. “You’ll feel better after you have your milk.”

Before she could turn back, Nigel swung the chair leg across her head and watched her fold like a papier-mâché doll, the milk in her hand dropping with her and spilling across the floor.

He tossed aside the table leg and reached for the set of keys at her waist. He ripped them off and went to the door. The woman was mad and he had to get out of here.

The door opened easily, once he found the right key and he stepped out onto the stone steps that were now horribly familiar. He paused a moment and glanced back at the woman crumpled on the floor. He experienced a moment of sympathy for her, then hurried down the stairs.

He was startled to hear her on the steps behind him and was shocked the blow hadn’t rendered her unconscious longer. He threw open the door at the bottom of the stairs and ran straight into the arms of Joseph Reardon. “Oh thank God!” he exclaimed. “Professor, the headmistress….She’s gone round the bend, you have to help me…”

Reardon nodded grimly. “It’s all right, Bailey. I’ll handle everything.”

There was no time for Nigel to react before he felt several volts of electricity surge through his body. He crumpled to the floor, his gaze settling on Cawver’s black shoes. Witch’s shoes he thought, incoherently as the world faded to black.

Continue to chapter 8