Sabrina & The Secret of The Severn Sea Read online

  If Sabrina’s proud-hearted celebration of her name sat well with her evident haughtiness, it did not spell complete happiness, thought Luke, but filled her eyes with a certain cold insouciance.

  Once more she very much gave him to believe that she would have his approval especially. He felt flattered.

  Ellie stood over her son and gently smoothed his fair hair.

  ‘What do you think, Randal? Should mummy get married in a spooky old castle, or what?’

  Randal’s almond eyes grew wider.

  ‘I should say so.’

  ‘Next time you come you must meet Freya and Varg, my two Elkhounds,’ said Sabrina at once.

  ‘Those are funny names.’

  ‘I suppose.’

  ‘Why did you call them that?’

  ‘Well, I named Freya after myself.’

  Luke interrupted.

  ‘But Freya isn’t your name.’

  ‘No, but in Scandinavia where my dogs come from Freya means noble woman.’

  ‘And Varg?’

  ‘That’s an old Norse word for wolf.’

  *

  Thus did Sabrina offer everyone her heartfelt aid which, within the not too distant future, led Luke to place his absolute trust in her with such strange results.

  30

  Luke crossed the bridge that spanned the moat, ready to exit the castle.

  Suddenly a shout penetrated the cackles and caws that came from the rooks in the trees above him.

  ‘Reverend Luke Lyons? Can I have a brief word, please?’

  Sure enough, a young woman approached him with a loud click of her boots.

  ‘I know who you are. You’re Eva Greene. You ambushed me in the tearooms in Berkeley.’

  It struck him as odd that once more she should single him out for her special attention.

  ‘Have you started to look for the hidden treasure yet, reverend? You have, haven’t you?’

  ‘You spying on me, or what?’

  ‘I told you, I intend to write your life story.’

  ‘Doesn’t mean I’m interested.’

  ‘Doesn’t mean you have a choice.’

  She was even ruder than he remembered. No older than he was, she hid much of her face behind her very large, black C-thru sunglasses.

  Equally black crosses hung from her ears.

  The crooked smile on her lips was excessively self-assertive and determined, like most investigative journalists.

  A black notebook and pencil rested between her fingers, on one of which she wore a coffin ring.

  ‘You really ought to know better, Ms Greene. Who says there is any treasure, anyway?’

  ‘Your mother, Jess Kennedy, spoke about it on TV. Are you two in league?’

  ‘Goodbye, Ms Greene.’

  ‘What’s the hurry?’

  ‘I must drive my sister and nephew back to their farm.’

  ‘But what if I can help you?’

  ‘I very much doubt that.’

  ‘At least let me give you something,’ said Eva, hurriedly handing him a large brown envelope from her pocket.

  ‘What is it?’

  ‘Believe me, you need to see this.’

  ‘Busy day, Ms Greene. Busy day.’

  ‘Call me. My number is on the back.’

  *

  ‘Good grief, Luke, who was that awful woman?’ said Ellie, with a laugh. ‘Doesn’t she know how difficult it is to take anyone seriously when they dress like an undertaker while at work?’

  ‘Quite difficult?’

  ‘You got that right.’

  ‘She’s a damned hack who wants to write my life story or some such rubbish. You know the sort of thing: Gangster Priest Returns Home.’

  ‘We should read what she gave you.’

  He passed her the envelope to open.

  ‘It looks like the front page of today’s Echo,’ said Ellie.

  With that, Luke climbed into the Land Rover and started its engine.

  Ellie and Randal followed suit.

  ‘What does it say?’ he asked as he drove the short distance to Floodgates Farm.

  Ellie cleared her throat.

  ‘ Police confirm that the remains of a severed foot have been found inside a steel-capped leather boot that washed up in the River Severn. Due to the hermetic seal caused by the leather, some fatty acids have been converted to soap by a process of saponification. A toe or two have been preserved. Police think the mud might continue to throw up more bones .’

  ‘They don’t suggest whose it might be, then?’

  ‘ Forensic tests will follow. The gruesome find was made by a woman walking her two dogs along the river near Severn House Farm, half way between the redundant power stations of Oldbury and Berkeley. It’s a vintage oxblood, steel toecap type from the 1970s or early ’80s with a sole plate to guard against punctures from below. It did have laces but they have all been eaten by the fishes .’

  ‘What does a boot have to do with me?’

  ‘If you want to know that you shouldn’t have told Ms Greene to bugger off quite so quickly.’

  ‘Ignore her. Clearly she likes to make a big fuss about nothing.’

  As they approached the farmyard’s gate, Ellie shot him a different look altogether.

  ‘How’s it going with grandma? What did Gwendolen say to you?’

  ‘She thinks we mean to rob her blind.’

  ‘I feel so much happier now that you’re here to help sort it all out, that we can all pull together from now on.’

  ‘I suppose.’

  Luke sat tight in his Land Rover.

  ‘You coming in or what?’ said Ellie. ‘I have beans on toast.’

  ‘Next time.’

  ‘Do please bring your dirty clothes. They can go in the washing machine, if you like?’

  ‘You’ll do my smalls?’

  ‘No, brother, but you can.’

  ‘In prison I once had all mine done for me.’

  ‘Spoken like a man.’

  ‘Freedom was a high price to pay for my weekly wash, I have to admit.’

  He waited for Ellie and Randal to go through the yard’s heavy metal gate, then went to restart the Land Rover’s engine.

  Seconds later there was a tap on his window.

  It was his sister again.

  He wound down the dirty glass.

  ‘What is it?’

  ‘You lost this when you took that tumble in the castle.’

  In Ellie’s hand was a gold pocket watch.

  ‘I never even missed it.’

  ‘Sorry, my fault. I put it in my bag. Forgot all about it until now.’

  ‘Fact is, I’m certain it belonged to our grandfather.’

  ‘Wow Luke, really? What on earth makes you say that?’

  ‘Ian Grey gave it to me.’

  ‘After all these years? How come?’

  ‘He said he found it on the riverbank in 1981 which is strange in itself.’

  ‘I should say. Did you know that there is something hidden inside its fob?’

  ‘Not the fob, no.’

  ‘It split apart when you hit the floor.’

  ‘Show me.’

  Ellie slid her nail into the rim of the decorative seahorse. Sprang it apart. Sure enough, a lock of hair curled neatly inside.

  ‘Whose is it, Luke? It can’t be grandma’s. Gwendolen never had black hair.’

  ‘The hair must, I think, belong to this woman.’

  He took the watch from her and showed her the tiny photograph lodged in the back of its cover.

  ‘Who is she?’ said Ellie, marvelling.

  ‘There’s a message written on the back that says To Sean with love from O.’

  ‘Whoever she is – or was – she’s quite a beauty.’

  ‘Don’t you see, Ellie, a find like this could change everything.’

  ‘Sorry Luke, but I disagree. So what if our grandfather was a dark horse? What does it matter?’

  ‘It could matter a great deal.’

 
; ‘Sean Lyons drowned on the night the railway bridge came down,’ Ellie protested, in a deeply earnest voice for which he was least prepared. ‘Must I tell you not to muddy the issue?’

  ‘Here’s what I admit. Ian Grey desperately wanted to unburden himself to me. He was doing some private detective work, during which he uncovered something unsavoury about our grandfather. He was going to enlist my help, I’m sure of it. Since when he’s disappeared off the face of the Earth.’

  ‘Disappeared? How come?’

  ‘Ian was due to meet me at the tin tabernacle. Instead he left me a note warning me to stay away. Someone frightened him off? If so, who doesn’t want what to resurface?’

  ‘Fact is, brother, you’ve got some crazy notion into your head. Even if our grandfather was still alive today, he’d be 97.’

  ‘And if we can’t rule it out?’

  ‘It’s simple. We end up in very deep water.’

  ‘Someone has to know why this watch isn’t lying in a submerged grave along with its owner.’

  ‘Wrong. You should resist the siren call of the river.’

  *

  Sasha lay along the top edge of her seat and peered through the Land Rover’s back window as they drove down narrow, twisting lanes back to the vicarage.

  For some reason she kept watch on the road as it uncoiled behind them, Luke noticed.

  Her sense of being followed would not go away?

  Then came a feeling no less strange and faint than the one he had experienced when he heard about the death of King Edward II in the King’s Gallery. Most of all it felt both virtual and visceral, as if occurring in another time and world but to nobody else but him. Somehow Sabrina’s voice had been hypnotic and dangerous.

  It still was.

  Suddenly he looked in his mirror again, ready to hit the brake.

  But it was all right.

  That old red Mercedes had taken another turning.

  *

  The moment he arrived at Hill House, Luke rushed to prise apart the pocket watch’s seahorse fob like a stubborn clam. He scooped out its lock of jet black hair. Watched it uncoil twice round his finger.

  He was sure that it belonged to O in the photograph.

  Did she have her hair cut and styled specially for her studio picture but saved a curl for her lover’s token?

  He quickly closed the seahorse again and with it its secret.

  31

  It was Day Seven of his cabbage soup diet.

  Today he could consume as much unsweetened fruit juice, brown rice and vegetables as he wished, Jorge told himself happily on his last day in hell.

  Seconds later, Sasha deposited a dead rabbit at his feet on the vicarage’s cold stone floor.

  He stood up too quickly and wobbled, whereupon there floated into his covetous mind a most tantalising vision. That was the trouble with dieting, it could leave you slightly light-headed, weak and even impair your concentration.

  He was licking his lips at the thought of rabbit pie.

  Instead, the sound of canine teeth cracking bone filled the kitchen, accompanied by loud growls whenever he tried to go too near.

  ‘Unbelievable. You’ve no idea how that gets on my nerves.’

  Upstairs was no better.

  The perpetual darkness of its cluttered corridor caused him to proceed cautiously, a caution reinforced by the ominous silhouette of the ship’s figurehead outside its shut door.

  He had already gone over the house with a fine toothcomb in the hope that something would shed light on Luke’s disappearance, but still there remained this one last room that he dared not try.

  However long the red-haired sentinel had been removed from the ocean, nothing could diminish her ability to appeal to him with some sort of plea, although nothing audible passed her lips.

  Her eyes flashed a silvery sea-green glint between her eyelids by way of attention. Such irises were two unclouded vaults of heaven or lapis lazuli.

  It confused him, then, to confess in what way a lump of sculpted wood deserved his fear.

  Then he saw it. The hitherto forbidden door stood ajar beside her.

  ‘Sam Rooke again?’ said Jorge with feeling.

  Sasha caught up with him. She pawed at black wooden panels with irrepressible bravado and bloody claws.

  He followed her in to his father’s claustrophobic office.

  The tall cupboard, on top of which Rev. Thomas Winter had once kept his cane, was still there but not the offending item.

  Gone, too, was the chair over which he had been told to bend to receive his punishments.

  The room now looked more like a cabin since, laid out on its immense table, there were all sorts of charts that related to sea and sailing.

  That the so-called gardener had been poking about in here behind his back, he could be absolutely certain.

  A large painting had been unhooked from its pale patch on the wall and left propped against the room’s dark oak desk, ready for the next bonfire. Sailing ships worked to windward in this faded but still fine Victorian picture which was a depiction of the Severn Railway Bridge in all its glory.

  He turned it over and a cardboard train ticket had been tucked into a wooden slat of the frame on its back. It turned out to be a pass for a reporter from the Dean Forest Guardian newspaper, permitting him to ride on the first train over the bridge on the 17th October 1879.

  The picture was as old as the structure.

  If there were so many things to burn there had to be a reason, he conjectured and turned back to the desk.

  Someone had been writing copious notes in a large leather bound ledger.

  ‘The way I see it, Luke, old friend, you were engaged in some very thorough work shortly before you disappeared.’

  Jorge turned a page in the book and his eyes fixed on an entry dated March 23, 1951. The Egyptian registered ship Ramses II was bound for Sharpness loaded with thousands of tons of maize from Russia when she ran aground on Lydney Sand. She was a total loss.

  A neat annotation in pencil stated that the wreck could still be seen occasionally above the mud at low tide.

  A second entry had been circled in blue as if it deserved special attention. On 16th February 1961 the BP Explorer was heading for Sharpness from Swansea when, inexplicably, she turned over in the water. She was seen the next day floating upside down through the wreckage of the Severn Railway Bridge. Five men drowned.

  Since the wrecks were all in the Severn estuary but years apart, it had to be locality, not time, that was especially significant.

  The list ran to dozens of wrecks.

  Jorge turned his eyes briefly to the half open door and fancied that its guardian had turned her eyes slightly his way.

  Surely she had just heard him sigh very deeply?

  ‘Whatever induced you, Luke old friend, to act on your desire, fear or circumstance, there can be no doubt that you were in the middle of investigating some link between the drowned and the living.’

  A room this full of books, maps, charts and nautical relics amounted to a vast accumulation of conclusive and corroborated evidence.

  ‘You were seeking to establish how the river works, weren’t you?’ Jorge said aloud, fingering binnacles and sextants. ‘You were learning the secret of the Severn Sea for a purpose, to see where things washed up? Why was that, I wonder?’

  He gazed at a large chart of the estuary all the way to the Atlantic and saw that crosses had been marked along its bank upstream and downstream of the site of the missing railway bridge.

  They could have been crosses on some pirate’s treasure map or the places at which bodies, boats or wreckage regularly came ashore as far north as Purton and as far south as Oldbury-On-Severn.

  In another drawer lay a newspaper cutting from October 1960: Missing Boat Found In River.

  He read on: ‘Sean Lyons (41) was seen to set sail in his dinghy on the night of 25th October to rescue survivors after the tanker barges Wastdale H and Arkendale H collided in heavy fog and br
ought two spans of the railway bridge crashing down. He was last observed launching his boat at high water from marshy land at Purton. Yesterday his upturned dinghy was discovered at Frampton-on-Severn. Police believe it highly likely that he has been buried in mud or washed out to sea by the tide. People are saying he died a hero.’

  A gold pocket watch lay in the drawer’s left hand corner, Jorge discovered. It weighed heavily in the palm of his hand and began to tick as soon as he wound it.

  With it was something else.

  ‘What the hell, Luke? What were you intending to do with a gun?’

  It was then that a few lines from Revelation formed involuntarily on his lips: And the sea gave up the dead which were in it, and death and Hades gave up the dead which were in them, and they were judged, everyone of them according to their deeds.

  32

  ‘First Molly tries to jump the wall. Now this. I literally don’t know what to make of it,’ said Ellie, grasping a heavy steel mallet firmly in both hands.

  They were standing before a gap in a hedge that bordered one side of the paddock on Floodgates Farm.

  Luke frowned.

  ‘It’s not as if there was any thunder or lightning…’

  ‘What can I say? I woke up at midnight. Heard her galloping round her field like a mad thing.’

  ‘…I know, because I sat up until 3 a.m. doing my jigsaw.’

  He offered up a sharpened stake to the hole that he had just dug in the ground.

  ‘Thank God the cut on her front leg isn’t too bad. This ointment will at least keep off the flies.’

  ‘Lucky you know what to do.’

  Ellie retied her red scarf on her head.

  ‘Good of you to help me with the fence, Luke. I really appreciate it. Jeremy never wants to waste time on my ‘pet’ at the best of times.’

  ‘Too bad.’

  ‘You don’t like him, do you?’

  So saying, Luke slipped a metal rammer over the top of the post and held on to the cylinder’s two steel handles. He shut his eyes as he let Ellie take first swing at it with the mallet.

  His arms juddered horribly with the violent shock of each blow while the stake sank inch by inch into the stony ground. By striking metal, not wood, they saw to it that they did not split the post apart down the middle.