The Gateway - Chapter X: Graveyard In Shadow

Despite having visited it so many times before the gateway felt very unfamiliar tonight. I think it was because it was shrouded in a blanket of darkness and I was used to being witness to a gateway, which was surrounded by sunlight and twittering birds.
‘Tonight fills you will apprehension doesn’t it John?’ the soldier asked.
‘Well yes, the graveyard is a rather particular place to meet – how do you know that anyway?’ I quizzed.
‘I’m part of your subconscious, I know what you know… and more.’ He answered creepily.
‘Do you know then, given you know so much, what Susan intends me to assist her with tonight.’
‘Well if you do wish to know, you will simply have to find out. I will give you a vague answer though, to heighten your curiosity, after all curiosity is what killed the cat as they say,’ he laughed to himself, ‘tonight Susan wants you to help her… bury the past.’ He gave a hideous smile.

I awoke a little shaken. What on earth did he mean – curiosity killed the cat, was he referring to Felicity’s curiosity toward the house on Dark Moor. But Susan wouldn’t harm her little sister anyway – would she? What did he mean by bury the past? I glanced at my wristwatch. It was twenty to midnight. I pulled on some warm clothes and sneaked downstairs taking the key with me for when I returned. I did assume I would be returning after all.

The cold air nipped at my skin, which did help wake me up but to the detriment of the agreeability of the journey to the graveyard. Fortifying my beliefs concerning the lack of luck I am fortune of, rain started to lash down. I could not help but think lightning was sure to follow shortly.

Thankfully it did not and I arrived at the graveyard, as I took another look at my watch, at five past midnight. Susan was nowhere to be seen. I sat down at a bench, which had been dedicated to the first reverend of the church. Matthew Orange apparently was his name. I surveyed the graveyard. A blossom tree had partly covered some of the graves in its flower, the rest were cast in shadow. I had always thought blossom trees were strange, most trees produced fruit, apples, pears and such but the blossom tree produced a flower. Numerous crosses mimicking the one Jesus died on exuded gloominess and depression. Some of the graves were imprisoned by hordes of ivy, which had wrapped itself around their stone bodies covering the names of the long-forgotten dead. I wondered if all undertakers turned slightly mad or clinically depressed after a period of time. The weathervane spun round on its perch, unable to make up its mind to as which direction the wind was assaulting it from. A ghostly white hand rested on my shoulder and turning round I saw a hooded figure grasping a scythe.
‘I have come for you child, I have come to take you into the next world.’ It rasped in a terrifying voice. I fell off the bench and screamed. Tears ran down my face furiously and I raised my arms to attempt to block the blow, which would surely follow. I shook violently, my face a painting of anguish. The figure lowered its hood.
‘Jesus, John, you’re a superstitious one aren’t you.’ Susan smaned finding my consuming fear hilarious.
‘Very bloody funny!’ I exclaimed, brushing the dirt off my clothes as I got to my feet. ‘What are you doing with that thing?’ I said pointing to the scythe, which upon closer and more careful inspection was, in fact, a sickle.
Susan smiled. ‘Curiosity killed the cat John. You’ll have to wait and see.’
I froze, was Susan the soldier who guarded the gateway?
‘What do you mean curiosity killed the cat?’ I asked.
‘It’s just a saying John. Don’t tell me you’ve never heard of it before. Goodness, what is this country coming to?’ Susan walked towards the gate of the graveyard and looked behind her to see me rooted to the spot.
‘What are you waiting for? You look like you’ve seen a ghost! That grim reaper thing was just a joke; now do make haste for goodness sake.’
I blinked and turned to catch up with her. I forced out a question that I had been meaning to ask ever since she had told me to meet her here.
‘Are you going to kill me Susan?’ I squeezed out.
Susan looked at me with an incredulous look, which shortly turned into hysterical laughter.
‘Pray, John, tell me why I would do such a thing? You really do have an overactive imagination.’
‘Well, I thought… You know because I let Felicity follow me… You were sort of angry…’ I trailed off.
‘I’m not going to kill you for it for God’s sake. You’re going to help me tonight – that is your punishment.’
I noticed we were heading to Dark Moor.
‘Are we going to see Mary?’
‘Yes’
‘Why do you have that scythe,’ I studied her suspiciously, Mary was a huge instability to our freedom and now Felicity knew where the house was and was sure to try and explore it at some date. Silencing Mary was an infallible method of stopping anyone finding out what we had done.
‘John, you must understand I have to take certain measures to protect you and myself. I am doing this for you as well.’
‘I’m not sure I want to be part of your scheming and sinful conduct anymore.’
‘You have no choice! If we don’t work together we will both be hung. We need each other now John! I can’t do this without you! If Felicity discovers Mary I will have to take my own sisters life to guarantee our freedom and that will lead to more lies and more complications and we will be eventually trapped like a fly in the web of sin we have spun and so we will face eternal darkness.’ Susan pleaded desperately. I started to weep, unsure of what to do, my natural instincts versus my morals. I wish I could be brave like Beowulf in the stories my grandfather used to tell me, but I was weak, bound to Susan by sin, by reliance and by a darkness that was slowly consuming more and more of my soul, if such a thing exists.
‘Can’t we find Mary another place to live?’ I said hopefully.
Susan clapped her hands together.
‘I say, what a marvellous idea, and pray, John, where exactly do you propose we can find such a dwelling which is located near a river and Blackberry, for, if it had slipped your mind, I provide Mary with that rather important component of keeping oneself healthy called food?’ Susan answered cuttingly.
‘I was just saying…’
‘Well don’t!’

We carried on in silence, the pressure and stress of keeping everything together was getting to Susan. Within twenty minuets or so we came to the house. Susan put her finger to her lips to make sure I was quiet and proceeded into the house, making not a sound when she opened the front door. The door, I noticed as I followed her thither, had no lock or any sort of mechanism to stop intruders entering. In hindsight we should really have brought Mary one from the Blackberry tool shop when she first moved in. The house was shrouded in darkness; clearly Mary had gone to bed. The moonlight creeping through the cracks in the boarded up windows gave the candles silhouettes, making them look like little soldiers standing to attention. There was an eeriness to the house at night, not to mention a biting coldness due to an overall lack of insulation and of course the temperature outside, which gave my heart a reason to pump blood round my body at what seemed like an alarming rate.
‘Watch the holes in the stairs,’ Susan whispered as we ascended to the first floor. I watched carefully where I put my feet. I felt around with my left foot for a step whilst my right foot was firmly on the step before it, just in case my left foot went through the wood. My heart skipped a beat with every creak the stairs made, or at least I thought it was that which made my heart thump; it could well have been the sweet perfume Susan was wearing. We made it to the top of the stairs where Susan signalled to Mary’s room. We crept to the door and Susan opened it carefully. I could see the lump in the duvet where Mary lay.
‘Mary,’ Susan said sharply, ‘it is time.’
Mary shot up into a sitting position with a speed that caused me to take a step backward.
‘Susan?’ Mary called.
‘Yes, Felicity knows of the house, she will be sure to explore it soon.’
‘It is time to set our plan in motion then?’
‘Yes,’ I saw Susan smile darkly as she said this, ‘it is time for Blackberry to witness what we have planned for half a year now.’
‘What are you talking about?’ I asked confused, as relieved as I was Susan did not seem to want to kill Mary; I had no idea what they were speaking of. Perhaps this was a trap set by the two of them, perhaps I would be killed, and perhaps they had set me up to take the fall for Geoffrey’s death. Then we heard a noise that struck cold panic into each of our hearts. The door downstairs opened and the floorboards creaked under the feet of whoever was downstairs. Then a voice sounded out in the silence.
‘Are you sure Felicity? This had better not be one of your childish jokes.’
I looked at Susan.
‘Peter and Felicity!’ she whispered.
‘Yes, now do be quiet, I have no idea who or what lives here.’ Felicity’s harsh voice answered.
Susan grabbed Mary’s hand.
‘Is there anywhere we can hide?’
Mary looked pensive for a moment.
‘I have a better idea, follow me.’
The three of us ascended another set of stairs and Mary led us into a room of the second floor.
‘There’s a dumb waiter somewhere here, wait a second,’ she took out a candle from her jacket and a box of matches and lit the candle. ‘Here, look.’
‘What’s your point, we can hardly fit in that can we?’ Susan asked incredulously. Mary picked up a rock from the floor.
‘The dumbwaiter goes from the kitchen on the ground floor up to this room and every floor above it. I keep this rock here in case anyone comes. We can throw the rock down and they will hear it and search the kitchen. We can hide then, it will give us more time.’
Susan nodded. Mary threw the rock and we listened to the loud clang it made when it hit the floor, Mary had put a saucepan at the bottom to create more noise.
Mary and I moved towards the door as we heard a shout from below.
‘What was that?’
Susan put her hand up for us to wait. We listened in silence for voices below, which came up through the dumbwaiter.
‘There must be someone in this kitchen, search the pantry Peter.’ Felicity demanded.
The candlelight danced on Susan’s face, making her smile dreadfully sinister. She leaned over the dumbwaiter and in a rasping whisper hissed:
‘Get out of my house!’
Susan’s voice echoed down the dumbwaiter, giving it more gravity and adding more forcefulness also.
‘Jesus! What was that!’ Peter sounded tearful.
‘I don’t bloody know, do I?’ Even Felicity had lost the confidence and cruelty to her voice.
‘Get out!’
‘Oh God, its coming from this room! Lets go Felicity, its haunted. Let Susan and that John boy come here if they want, the ghost will get them.’ Peters voice was shrill and terrified.
‘Shut up! Don’t be silly, such things don’t exist.’ Felicity said, though she didn’t sound convinced herself.
‘It’s not working!’ Mary said desperately.
‘Where is the uniform?’ Susan asked quickly.
‘The attic, why?’ Mary then realised and a slow smile spread across her face. Susan returned one and shot up the stairs, taking the candle with her, with a lightness and deftness of foot that can only come with ballet training.
Five minuets later I heard footsteps coming down the stairs. I looked at Susan when she emerged in the doorway and was paralysed with fear. I was staring at the soldier of my dreams. A white hooded top covered the torso whilst the face and hands were covered in bandages. Susan’s greens eyes glowed in the fire of the candle.
‘Where did you get… that uniform?’ I croaked.
‘Mary made it, what do you think she’s been doing for months? Twiddling her thumbs?’ I couldn’t answer; it was too bizarre to contemplate. Were my dreams an actual vision of the future?
‘Anyway,’ said Susan, ‘while you stand there gawping like a fish I am going to scare the spines out of those two twits downstairs.’ She gave a rasping laugh and marched down the stairs, with the sickle in her hands, making sure Felicity and Peter would hear her.
‘You like my uniform?’ Mary asked sensing I had been put a little of guard.
‘Yes, its great,’ I gave an awkward smile, ‘where did you get the material?’
‘Susan brought for me, and lots of thread obviously, I had to hand stitch it; she couldn’t get me a spinning wheel.’
Voices came from below. Peter and Felicity had heard Susan’s slow march down the stairs and were investigating, though Peter did so rather unwillingly.
‘Get out of my house!’ Susan shouted.
Two screams pregnant with a pure, abject and desperate terror rang out in the night. No words followed, just the sound of clumsy feet making their way, with much haste I might add, to the door and out into the cold of the night.

A few minuets later we heard Susan running up the stairs, her eyes glowed with ecstasy and a sort of cold cruelty. She unwrapped the bandages around her head and her smile added to the certainty I had as to how pleased she was with herself.
‘What a pair those two are, honestly they could be the stars of a comedic double act!’ Susan laughed breathlessly. Mary giggled and I, despite my uncomfortable disposition with being so close to uniform which had haunted me for so long, couldn’t suppress a triumphant chuckle also.
‘Now Mary, I don’t suppose, in your time here, you’ve found any secret passageways in this old mansion have you?’ Susan asked, a smile still present.
Mary shook her head.
‘Honestly no, you would have thought so in a house like this; though I still get lost sometimes.’
‘We need to find a secret room for you to hide in, just in case some other fool like Felicity stumbles upon this place and becomes curious.’ Susan looked thoughtful for a moment before adding, ‘say, are there any old wardrobes in this ruin?’
‘There’s one on the fourth floor, and a double bed also; I think it was the old master bedroom. The beds one of those with four posts that run up to the ceiling and red velvet curtains that hang around the outside which can be drawn when one goes to sleep; its simply brilliant!’ Mary smiled dreamily. ‘I sleep there most nights.’
‘Good, John can buy a sledgehammer tomorrow; we’ll knock through the wall behind it and make a secret room for you to hide in. Is there a room behind it?’ Susan asked.
‘Yes, it’s an average size, used to be a nursery judging by the wallpaper. We’ll have to block up the original entrance though. We could probably put something in front of the door; that would be easier.’
‘Alright Mary, keep the uniform under your bed and that way if Felicity comes again you can scare her off once more and you won’t have to run upstairs. Why were you sleeping in the dumbwaiter room tonight anyway?’
‘So I could haul food up if I got hungry, there was some cheese and bread in the pot I dropped the rock on. Hopefully Felicity and Peter didn’t notice that, or they might have suspected something alive was living here as well as the “ghost”.’ Mary gave a wry smile.
Susan embraced Mary as a farewell gesture.
‘We’re going now, but we’ll be back round at mid-afternoon tomorrow. How many uniforms have you made to date by the way?’
‘Roughly thirty I’d say; about five a month.’ Mary answered.
Susan held up her hand and waved goodbye and I also gave Mary a farewell hug. I felt rather grown up being with two fifteen year old girls, and having seen Peter run off scared, even though he is a year older than I am.

With that Susan and myself departed, leaving me, when I had got back home and into bed, wondering what the soldier uniforms were to be used for, and what the soldier of my dreams would say on our next, imminent, re-acquaintance.