In a voice that shook, Declan said, ‘Colm? Where are you?’
‘Over by the old fireplace, trying to get this press out from the wall. Why?’
Declan said, ‘Something’s standing next to me. And it’s grasping my hand.’ He recoiled, snatching his hand free and nursing it as if it had been bitten. Colm’s voice, still on the other side of the tower said, ‘Declan? What’s wrong?’
‘There’s something in here with us,’ said Declan, and as he spoke, the darkness slithered, and shadows reared up on the walls – grotesque shadows that might easily be figures on prancing horses, figures wielding spears, figures that wore crowns and mitres . . . There was the glint of crimson – like slanted eyes peering down from the walls, and Declan shrank back, flinging up a hand in instinctive defence. A face came swooping out of the darkness and peered down at him – a dreadful carved face, the red eyes slitted and malevolent, the lips stretched in a hungry smile.
At the top of his voice, he yelled, ‘Get thee gone from me, Satan!’ and there was a dry chuckle, like ancient, skinless bones being rubbed together.
Then the door burst open and the Kilglenn villagers erupted into the tower. Cold moonlight, eerily mingled with leaping torch flames, came jaggedly through the darkness. The shadows with their glinting red eyes vanished, and the villagers seized Colm and half-carried, half-dragged him out on to the cliff side.
But Declan saw that the crimson light shone from the eyes of the men and women he had known since he was born.
There was nothing either Declan or Colm could do.
The villagers thrust the torches in the ground, and held Colm down.
‘Murderer,’ they chanted. ‘Mesmer Murderer. We know who you are.’
‘Murderers have to be branded,’ cried several more. ‘The mark of Cain. As it was in the beginning, so it shall be now.’
‘Brand the murderer, brand him.’
‘Set the mark upon him.’
Branding irons, thought Declan, horror engulfing him. They’ve brought branding irons, and they’re heating them in the torch flames. The newspaper stories about the Mesmer Murderer with Colm’s photographs must have reached them – they know what he did. And they’re going to burn him. I’ve got to stop them, he thought, but as he started forward, two more of the men grabbed him and held him back.
‘See what we do to murderers,’ said one of them.
‘We’ll do it to you as well, if you try to stop us,’ said another.
Declan said, ‘You can’t do this. Please. You’re not sane – you’re being used – can’t you tell that! Can’t you feel it?’ He searched frantically for words. What had Colm said it felt like? ‘Something’s slid beneath your skin,’ cried Declan. ‘It’s clawed its way along your hands and fingers and into your brain . . . Can’t you feel that it has?’
But they threw him away from them, sending him sprawling on the wet ground, and turned back to Colm. Through the panic and fear, Declan had time to think that in the light of the flaring torches, these people bore no resemblance to the villagers he had known. He looked about him, frantically trying to see a way of saving Colm.
But it was already too late. The villagers of Kilglenn, filled with bloodlust, were holding down Colm’s arms and legs. The glowing branding irons – two of them – were raised into the night sky. Then they were brought down on to Colm’s face.
TWENTY-SEVEN
For Declan the worst part was not Colm screaming in agony; it was the dreadful stench of burning flesh – the stench they had both smelled on this hillside not very long ago.
A thin rain had started to fall, cooling the irons, and as the glow of their heat faded, the hatred and malevolence of the villagers seemed to fade. They stepped back from Colm, seeming unsure of themselves – almost seeming unaware of where they were. Some of the women started crying. In twos and threes, avoiding each others’ eyes, they made their way back down the cliff path.
Somehow Declan got Colm as far as the shack, partly carrying and partly dragging him. Colm was moaning and struggling, but once inside the cottage he seemed to become calmer. Declan laid him on the battered sofa, and faced, with horror and dismay, the task of tending to Colm’s burns. The branding irons had burned away almost the whole of one side of his face, searing into his cheekbone all down to the jaw.
‘Eyes both intact though,’ said Colm, in a thready voice. ‘At least I’ll see Death when he approaches.’
‘You’re not going to die,’ said Declan angrily.
‘Declan, they’ve burned half my face off! Why would I want to live?’
‘It’s not so very bad,’ said Declan. He was not sure how burns should be treated, but he tore strips from his shirt and soaked them in the cold rain, then laid them over the burned flesh. But Colm was still twisting and turning as if trying to escape the pain and Declan was dreadfully aware that Colm’s hands were icily cold. Could you actually die from the shock and pain of a bad burn? Please don’t let him die, he thought, and stood up with decision. ‘I’m going to get help from the village.’
‘No one will come.’
‘My mother would. My father, too.’ But even as he said it, Declan was wondering if he could ask it of them. Neither of his parents had been among the torchlit group, but they would not want to be seen by the villagers as aiding a killer. And how would they feel towards Declan himself, after he had run away without warning, leaving only a note?
In miserable indecision, he built up a fire in the shack’s little hearth, and drew a rug over Colm. In one of the cupboards he found half a bottle of whiskey, which he handed to Colm hoping it might dull the pain. Colm drank most of it, then relapsed into an uneasy sleep, and Declan sat on, wanting to get help, knowing there was no help to be had.