The Casebook of Newbury & Hobbes (26 page)

Newbury turned the envelope over in his hands. His heart skipped a beat. The letter was unopened. How long had it sat there, hidden inside that dusty old book, waiting to be discovered? The postmark was smudged and unreadable.

Trembling, Newbury closed the book and placed it on the floor beside his chair. He took the cigarette from between his lips and flicked what remained of it into the fire. Then, settling back, he ran his finger along the inside of the envelope and carefully extracted the letter within.

There were two pages, each of them covered in the same scratchy, looping handwriting. He swallowed, his mouth dry. How could he have ignored a letter from Templeton? He supposed that, at the time, it had been nothing unusual, a note written in haste between meetings. Something, perhaps, that Templeton would have dashed off quickly to impart some information or other, soon forgotten as the pair of them moved on to the next investigation, the next adventure. Now, though, it was like receiving a letter from beyond the grave, a communication lost in time.

Newbury exhaled, realising that he’d been holding his breath. With a sigh, he smoothed the first page and began to read:

August, 1897

My dearest Sir Maurice,

Knowing you as I do, I don’t expect you shall bother to read this letter when it lands upon your doormat. Indeed, it is my full and firm belief that it will end up heaped amongst the similarly discarded notes on the drawing room carpet at Cleveland Avenue, never to be seen again. (I am often amazed by your ability to disregard your missives in such blatant fashion. I’m sure it must drive your unlucky correspondents to distraction.)

Nevertheless, I felt it necessary to impart a few words, despite this anticipated outcome. Think of this largely, then, as a cathartic exercise on my own part. There are things that need to be said—things that I need to say—and in my present condition, I wonder if perhaps I will have no other opportunity to say them.

And who knows! Rather than discard the unopened envelope, you might fortuitously tuck it inside one of your dusty old tomes to serve as a bookmark, and then happen upon it one day unexpectedly, years from now. I hope then that its contents will prove entirely irrelevant, and if I’m still about in the land of the living, we can share a drink and laugh over it, marvelling at my youthful temerity.

Newbury sighed and gave a hearty chuckle; Templeton had known him so well. He smiled at the fond memory, although he also felt a twinge of deep regret as he considered that last sentiment. How he would dearly love to be able to share such a moment with his old friend. To sit and laugh over a drink at his club. If only things had been different. If only...

He read on:

The view from my convalescent bed here in Richmond is not so bad: the rolling hills of Yorkshire in the distance, a picturesque little town, a castle. I’ve known worse, and the people seem cheerful enough. Perhaps we should both venture a little further afield from time to time; London can be an oppressive sort of place, and I wouldn’t want our little episode by the sea to put you off.

(Ah, a slight accident. Please excuse the rather unsightly smear of cigarette ash towards the bottom of the page. The nurses here are, for some God-awful reason, opposed to the old Guinea Golds, and thus I’m sneaking a quick smoke as I scrawl this note on the veranda, unbeknownst to the matron.)

Newbury grinned. This was very much like the Templeton Black he remembered.

I am, I’m told, lucky to be alive. Although the doctor (a handsome devil if ever I saw one) has explained there is little he can do to relieve my symptoms. And so my convalescence has become a waiting game as the infection runs its course. One way or another, the doctor believes it will be over within the week. I cling on to that thought. It represents blessed relief, whatever might become of me.

The fever itself comes and goes. Some days it is almost too much to bear, and I feel as if I am close to combusting from within, as if there’s a fiery inferno inside my chest and the pressure is mounting all the time, seeking a way out. In those moments I long for unconsciousness, but it rarely comes.

When the fever is not raging the days drag by with little to hold my interest, and although there are periods of severe discomfort, it is the nights I dread.

I fear I’m suffering from the most awful night terrors. Ridiculous for a man of my age, I know, but I’m assured they are simply a result of the infection, fever-dreams caused by the invading parasites.

In them, we’re back at Maltby-by-the-Sea, and I can taste the fresh, salty air on my lips. The place is near-deserted, just as I remember it, but nevertheless I have the overwhelming sense of being observed. Whatever I do, wherever we go, there’s a pervading feeling of being watched. Something malign is hounding us, and yet despite this sinister understanding, we go blithely wandering about the place, as if searching for trouble.

(I have come to understand that this, of course, is exactly what we do. It is our modus operandi, our reason for being. We attract trouble like magnets attract iron filings, and we revel in it.)

The townsfolk act as if there is nothing untoward to concern them, offering hollow smiles as they turn us away, ignoring our questions. Yet all the while, terrible plans are afoot. Evil things are brewing. Night falls, and we take refuge at The Angel Hotel.

That’s when the strangers come lurching from the salty spray, trailing seaweed and foul-smelling water as they seek us out, coming to drag us to our doom beneath the waves. We struggle as we’re pulled from our beds, but there are too many of them and they smother us, carrying us back to the beach, where the townsfolk are arrayed to watch, grinning and staring.

I thrash as I’m dragged into the water, try to call out, but the shock of the icy embrace is too much and the water floods my lungs. I panic as I try to breathe, try to push myself towards the surface, but they hold me down, and soon the light begins to dim.

This, I know, is their revenge. They have come for us because of what happened, because we know their secret, and because they cannot allow us to live.

It is then that I wake, gasping for breath.

Newbury sat back in his chair, memories stirring. This letter, then, had been written during the aftermath of that very investigation, following their return from Maltby-by-the-Sea. They’d been called north to investigate a spate of missing people in the little seaside town on the east coast. The townsfolk had proved largely obstructive and unhelpful, even when another of their number—a young woman called Florence Partington who had recently moved to the town from Darlington—had disappeared from under their noses.

Black had maintained all along that something untoward was going on, and that the townsfolk were either too afraid to discuss it, or complicit. Despite this, the two of them had been unable to uncover a shred of evidence, other than a series of unusual footprints in the wet sand and a torn shred of a woman’s nightgown in the churchyard.

This had gone on for some days, with people’s attitudes towards Newbury and Black growing increasingly hostile. It was made abundantly clear to them both that they were not welcome in the town. Nevertheless, neither of them could shake the feeling that there was something obvious they were missing, that the strange behaviour of the town’s inhabitants and the pervading undercurrent of tension were connected with the unexplained disappearances.

Newbury had finally brought the matter to a head, when—to his horror—he had discovered the truth about the locals: that they were not, in fact, locals at all. They were
things
that had come out of the sea, shambling creatures from beneath the waves that had cast a glamour upon the town, taking on the appearance of normal people, acting out normal lives. To what end had never been made clear, but one thing was certain—any outsiders who came to settle in Maltby, any real people, were swiftly despatched, dragged out to sea in the night to be silenced.

Newbury had broken the spell and revealed the strangers for what they really were: monstrous humanoids with bloated white flesh, jagged teeth and glossy black eyes, trailing seaweed and salt water in their wake. They were impersonators, living a lie, and they had to be stopped.

These things, these
strangers
, had turned on Newbury and Black, and Black had almost become another of their victims, manhandled to the bay and forced beneath the dark and shifting waters. Newbury had come to his aid, however, fighting the beasts off with a cattle prod and effecting their escape.

Cold, wet and bedraggled, they had fled the town and taken shelter in a derelict barn for the night.

When they returned to Maltby the following day, accompanied by a small force of policemen, the town had been deserted. The entire populace had seemingly returned to the water during the night, leaving Maltby as a ghost town, eerily abandoned.

It was then that Black had collapsed and been rushed to a doctor in the neighbouring town, sporting a terrible fever and a hideous rash that began to emerge in blotchy patches all over his body. The doctor had managed to stabilise him, reducing the fever, but the rash, it seemed, was the result of an infection caused by Black’s exposure to an unusual algae during his brief foray into the sea. There was no obvious treatment other than to manage the fever, and so Black had been sent to Richmond to recuperate, and for a while the doctors had been uncertain as to whether or not he’d survive.

Newbury recalled the anxiety of those weeks, the horrible uncertainty over whether his dear friend would live or die. At the time, Black had seemed his usual, flippant self, taking it all in his stride, joking and laughing on the few occasions Newbury managed to head north to pay him a visit. Newbury had always wondered how Black had been able to remain in such high spirits during such a trying time. Clearly, though, there were things that had preyed on his mind, things he’d needed to put in writing because he’d felt unable to say them out loud.

Newbury turned the sheet of notepaper over and continued to read.

Anyway, enough of that. You do not need to hear talk of such things. The business in Maltby is over and done with now, and my dreams are naught but silly fictions. You need not trouble yourself with them. Although I must add that I find it ironic that the strangers who did their best to finish me off might inadvertently have succeeded, despite your best efforts to haul me from their fishy embrace; the infection continues to spread. Rest assured, though, that I will continue to fight it, and with any luck I’ll be fit and by your side again in a few weeks, ready for another adventure.

And so we come to the crux of my letter. I worry now that my words will seem steeped in melodrama, that you’ll consider my concerns boyish and unfounded. Yet I will state them here regardless, because I must: I fear for you, Maurice.

I fear you are treading a path that will lead towards not only your unhappiness, but your detriment in every respect. Your obsession with the hermetic arts grows almost daily, it seems, and your recent engagement in its practices has left me deeply concerned for your well-being.

Understand that I have no doubt regarding your intentions. The results of your endeavours, too, cannot be disputed—the ritual you performed in Maltby, for example, served to unveil the strangers for who they truly were, to save lives. Yet I saw the toll it took on you, saw how much of yourself you had to sacrifice in order to dispel their glamour. (Not to mention the unspeakable mess you made of your hotel room when you eviscerated that peacock.)

I cannot help but think back to Old Mab, the witch we encountered in the woods, the woman who had given herself up to the trees. She had lost herself in the darkness. You said then that you understood the temptations she had faced, that she had allowed herself to be gradually eroded by her desire to help others, to wield forces she did not fully understand.

My fear is that you walk that very same path, and that you, too, will lose your way. I say this now because I see that you are balanced upon a precipice, and that there is still time for you to step away.

I ask only that you consider my words, as my dear friend and confidant. If I am to die here in Richmond, I would do so knowing that I have warned you of what I consider to be the greatest danger you face. All the strangers from the sea, wood witches, ice spirits, clockwork golems and other villainous creatures we have faced are as nothing when compared to this.

I am tired now, and the nurses will be along soon to berate me for spending too long on the veranda in the cold. Forgive me if I seem maudlin, but I urge you to heed my words. There will be choices to be made, and for your own sake, I hope you make them well.

I hope that we shall meet again, Sir Maurice.

Your friend,

Templeton Black

Newbury allowed the pages to slip from his fingers. They fluttered to the floor. There was a hollow sensation in the pit of his stomach, a gnawing sense of emptiness and regret. Tears came then, in floods, and Newbury cupped his face in his hands, his body wracking as he shook with emotion.

Would things have been different if he’d bothered to read the letter all those years ago? Would he have made different choices? Perhaps he might have prevented the dreadful events that followed? How could he ever know?

Black had pulled through, of course. He had shaken off the infection and returned to London, and nothing more had been heard of the strangers who had once come from the sea. Together, he and Black had shared many more adventures, before that fateful day at Fairview House, before his friend was cruelly snatched away from him by the machinations of a madman. Yet Black had never mentioned the letter, had never aired his concerns again, not even when Newbury had involved him in matters pertaining to the occult, to his fascination with the hermetic arts and rituals. And now it was too late. Far too late.