Читать книгу Bloody Right - Georgia Evans - Страница 14

It was well and truly dark when Paul Schmidt walked up the curving drive of Wharton Lacey and approached the tradesman’s entrance. He was not feeling well-disposed to the world around him. The “lift” that Weiss had arranged for him was in a farm lorry smelling of pigs. The old codger driving it, a shriveled specimen of humanity scarcely worth biting, refused point-blank to take Schmidt up the winding drive. “I was told to drop you here,” he insisted as he pulled up at the gates. “That’s what I was paid for. I’m not going up to the house.”

Schmidt shoved aside the temptation to rip out the man’s throat for his impertinence. Unfortunately that might draw too much attention to his arrival, and anonymity was a necessary precaution. He cursed the old fool and set off walking.

And walking. The first sight of the house, as he reached a bend in the drive, was favorable. He might just arrange to keep it as his headquarters when the time came. He ran on in the dark, heading for the back door as he’d been directed.

If he hadn’t been a Vampire, he’d never have found it. The night was pitch dark and the drive bordered with shrubs, but he found his way around the house, pausing by a window to overhear a boring conversation about the quality of wartime cheese. Foolish mortals, death was about to rain on them and they worried about cheese!

He made his way around the side of the house and knocked on the kitchen door.

It opened a crack and a man’s voice asked, “Who is it?”

“Paul Smith,” Schmidt replied. “I’m the replacement gardener. Miss Aubin is expecting me.”

“Come on in then.” The door was opened just enough to let Schmidt slip in sideways. “Miss Aubin!” the man called as he led the way down a tiled passage and into a vast, warm kitchen.

And there, standing by the scrubbed table in the middle of the room, was their suborned ally.

“You got here alright then,” she said, looking up from rolling out pastry.

Obviously, since he was standing a few meters from her. Stupid cow! “Yes, I’m here, and with my things.” He indicated the cheap, cardboard suitcase Weiss had insisted he use.

“I don’t suppose you need to eat, do you?” she asked.

He was tempted to say yes, he needed fresh warm blood, but it was a little too early to break his cover. Once his job was done there would be time enough to feast. “Not right now, no.”

“Jacob, here, will show you your room.”

The man led him back out of the door and across the courtyard and opened the door to a stable block. He paused to light a hurricane lamp.

“Up there.” He indicated a flight of uncarpeted stairs. “You’ll need the lamp. There’s a row of rooms, used to be for the stable lads, when we had them. Miss Aubin had the one at this end cleaned out and the bed done up for you. It’s the biggest and the roof there doesn’t leak. You can come into the scullery to wash. There’s a tap out in the yard, but water will be warm in the scullery.” He handed the lamp to Schmidt. “Anything you need?”

Plenty, but it could wait. “No, I have what I need.”

“Good. See you in the morning. Servants’ breakfast is at six. Gets it out of the way before the family eat. ’Night then.” Without another word the man walked back to the house, leaving Schmidt holding the flickering lantern.

Damn and double damn! He was to sleep with the horses! One day someone was going to regret treating Paul Schmidt this way. Meanwhile he’d bide his time, and out here he’d be conveniently unobserved. There were two horses below if hunger became too bothersome and he could even set up his radio if he felt so inclined. How would these fools of Britishers know what he was doing?

As long as he didn’t hanker for creature comforts, it was close to perfect.

Gryffyth Pendragon looked across the table at Gloria. She smiled—well, it was almost a smile. Nervous grimace might be more accurate. “I’m a Shifter,” she said. “I don’t become a Dragon like you and your father.” Of course, she wouldn’t. She was English. “At full moon and sometimes in between, I turn into a fox.”

“Saved my bacon twice,” Andrew said, giving her a smile. And some smile it was. He almost devoured her with his eyes. Gryffyth understood the feeling. If only Mary were here too. “She raised the alarm back in September when the first one tried to sabotage my plant, and then last month when we ran into the second one.”

“You helped, Andrew. You had the stakes.”

“You ripped its throat and heart out.”

“You killed it, just like that?” Gryffyth asked. Seemed odd to be talking about ripping out throats and hearts, sitting at the same kitchen table where he used to do jigsaw puzzles with Alice’s younger brothers when it was too wet to play outside.

“It would have killed me. Tried to kill Andrew. You’ve been in battle, Gryffyth. So have we.”

Pretty to the point, that. Still seemed beyond reason that little Nurse Prewitt would take on a Vampire and dispatch it to wherever Vampires went. But then if she’d faced it as a vulpine Shifter, that made all the difference. “Yes. I’ve been in battle and seems I’ve come home to another one.”

“The war is everywhere, son,” Dad replied. “You never get away from it.”

Except he hadn’t faced Vampires in Norway. At least to his knowledge. “What about the rest of you?” he asked.

“I’m Pixie,” Mrs. Burrows said, going on and ignoring Gryffyth’s dropped jaw. “A Devon Pixie. So is Alice. Not a fact we broadcast any more than you do your Other nature, but there you are.”

“What about you?” Gryffyth asked Andrew.

“Me?” The man gave a shrug and a grin. “I’m a human hanger-on. Got caught up in all this through Gloria.”

“Me too,” Peter Watson added. “I got involved via Alice. Nothing special about me. I’m a conscientious objector, actually.”

Interesting. And he didn’t sound ashamed of it.

“No false modesty, now, Peter,” Gryffyth’s dad said. “We all know the truth, apart from Gryffyth here.” He looked sideways at his son. “There’s two lads cutting up and growing to be men up in London because Peter got them out when they were trapped in the cellar when the vicarage got bombed.”

Interesting, and obviously embarrassing to Peter. “I didn’t do it alone,” he said.

“No, lad, you didn’t. But you did it, and we all know why my part of it had to be kept under wraps.” Definitely a story here. He’d have a few questions when they got home, but meanwhile…

“Let me get this straight.” Saying it aloud might help sort things out. “Dad and I are not the only Others in the village: we have two Pixies and a Shifter. Anyone else?”

“There’s another,” Mrs. Burrows said, “who has refused to join us.”

“We managed without him, Gran,” Alice said.

“That’s not the point. He has skills and gifts. But is unwilling to help.”

Reminded Gryffyth of the time she’d scolded him and Alice’s brother, Michael, for climbing on the roof of the garage to pick fruit off the high branches of the apple tree.

“There was another, too,” Alice said. “Mother Longhurst.”

Gryffyth stared at her. “The old witch?”

Alice nodded. “I used to scoff at her and her magic and herbs but she really helped. She knew more than any of us about Vampires.”

“Won’t she still help us?” She had been a solitary, independent old biddy, but…

“She’s dead,” Alice said. “Died in rather odd circumstances.”

“Killed?”

“Who knows. I think the circumstances were odd. The police who found her, and the medical officer who did the death certificate, don’t.”

He’d like to get the whole story about that too. “So it’s us,” he said, “against Vampires. How many of them and what are they doing?”

“As for how many,” Alice said, “we don’t know for sure. We’ve dispatched two, another Gran and I saw. I found him injured, but he disappeared. Seems Gryffyth encountered another.”

“Or maybe the same one,” Peter suggested. “Alice knows what that first one looked like.”

“I saw him too,” Dad added. “Helped get him into the surgery from the car. He was in a bad way. Or appeared to be. He could barely stand and had a nasty wound in his side.”

“But,” Peter added, his voice grim, “by the time the ambulance arrived, a couple of hours later, he’d disappeared.”

“After killing Alice’s dog,” Mrs. Burrows said.

“And no one saw him again?” Gryffyth asked. It was only a very tenuous thread of understanding, but he was slowly coming to grips with this.

“Until this afternoon,” Alice said. She went on to explain the events of the afternoon in Guildford.

“Tall, blond, and youthful,” Gryffyth said, almost to himself. “And you think he’s come back?”

“If he has, there’s three of us will recognize him on sight,” Mrs. Burrows said.

“The one I saw wasn’t as tall as I am and dark haired. Didn’t get a feel for age, but he was strong. Not as strong as I am. Thank heaven.”

“Then there’s two we have to worry about,” Andrew said. “Blimey, are they never going to stop?”

“Where are they coming from might be a better question,” Peter said, and nodded across the table at Gryffyth. “We ought to tell you the story from the beginning.”

“Or as much as we know,” Alice said, with a smile at her husband. “Go on.”

“Me? Alright then. The rest of you interrupt if I miss something. First thing was, as the sergeant said, Alice finds this injured person, brings him back and he disappears. Next one appears in the village, claiming to be a nephew of a villager. (Who, incidentally, was arrested as a German spy a little while later.) There’s an odd incident up at Andrew’s munitions camp. Guards collapse. A couple of days later, Gloria raises the alarm again and the place is found to be ringed with explosives. We get help from Old Mother Longhurst. She gave Alice a magic knife and told us what to do to get rid of him. It worked.” He gave a shudder as if the memory wasn’t one to be revisited more than absolutely necessary.

In the pause, Andrew took up the story. “The second one came and set up as a baker. Until…well, to cut it short, we twigged him. He tried some nasty tricks with Alice.” Gryffyth noticed Peter squeezing Alice’s hand. “The long and short of it is Gloria did him in.”

“Alright,” Gryffyth asked, “aren’t Vampires supposed to be immortal?”

“But not indestructible,” Alice said. “A magic druid knife and mistletoe work best, with stakes as backup.” She shrugged. “It’s not easy.”

He’d worked that much out for himself. “Where do they come from and why Brytewood?”

That earned him a good minute’s silence. “At a guess,” Mrs. Burrows said, getting up to fetch the teapot and refill everyone’s cup, “they come from the Jerries. Who else would want to sabotage an essential munitions camp?”

Very good point. Gryffyth took another tart from the plate Andrew handed him. Mrs. Burrows’s cooking was the utter best. Even in these times. “So, you think this thing that went for me is another Vampire?”

“Seems like it, son.” He stared at his father. This was really too much.

“So what now?”

“Now we all finish our tea and go home, I think,” said Mrs. Burrows. “It’s getting late, and we all need a good night’s sleep if we have to deal with Vampires in the morning.”

“I thought they couldn’t come out in daylight?” Gryffyth said.

“That’s a myth,” Dad replied. “Made up by the talkies. This lot seem to wander about as they darn well please.”

No one contradicted him. “Anything else I need to know?” Crikey! He’d thought Norway was tough. Seems there was trouble as bad lurking in the Surrey hills. “Have these Vampires killed, apart from your dog, Alice?” He remembered old Susie, who used to race across the fields with them.

The silence and nods answered that one.

“Now then.” Mrs. Burrows stood up. “That’s enough for one night. It’s late. Gryffyth knows what’s going on here. What we all have to do now is keep our eyes and ears open.”

Gryffyth felt frankly lost as Alice dropped them at the gate and he hobbled up to the front door.

“You alright, son?” Dad asked. “No harm felt from the attack?”

“I think I did more harm to him…it.”

“Maybe you did, son, but nothing seems to stop them for good.”

“Except Alice and Gloria.”

“Yes. Good girls they are. Strong in magic, both of them.”

“Pity we don’t have more on our side.”

Dad opened the door. “There’s another, son.”

“The person Mrs. Burrows mentioned?”

“Not him,” Dad replied, taking off his coat and giving Gryffyth a hand with his. “That’s Whorleigh, a self-serving, no-use creature if ever there was one. There’s someone else, son.” He gave a smile. “You’ve met ’em and you’ll work out who it is by the time we need ’em. They’ll help us beat the Boches.”

“What in heaven does that mean, Dad?”

“Think about it. Want a mug of cocoa before we turn in?”

Cocoa? How could Dad talk about Vampires, German spies, undiscovered Others and cocoa at the same time? And come to that, what was it with Whorleigh, the grocer?

And he’d thought it would be quiet, maybe even a bit dull back home. Shows what he knew.

As he undressed and got into his pajamas, Gryffyth wondered briefly who this mysterious, not Whorleigh, Other was. But what he really wondered was what Mary was doing. Undressing too, he hoped. He liked the thought of Mary with her clothes off. If her whole body was as smooth and warm as her breasts under his fingers…

He’d better watch it or he’d never be able to sleep on his stomach.