Chapter 42: 41: The Last Cursed One

“Are you sure this is the right address?” Bill asked.

I looked around the tiny living room. The walls were covered with the muddiest, least convincing watercolour paintings you’ve ever seen. Mum’s efforts looked like fine art in comparison. Apart from these desperate, scrabbling attempts to recover her creativity and magical essence, the sparse bungalow was as threadbare as the house in High Wycombe. Dust and cigarette ash were strewn everywhere. The rooms were an unkempt mess, the kitchen a breeding ground for superbugs.

“This is the place,” I said.

We’d broken in after ringing the doorbell had produced no result. Bill had entered first, pistol drawn, clearing the rooms one by one. For a few tense moments, d thought we were too late and there’d be a dead body. That wasn’t the case, though. Marian, whose cover name was Emma Smith, was not at home.

“Terrific,” Bill muttered. “Now what?”

“Local shops, perhaps? Maybe the pub if there’s one nearby?”

“What if she’s on holiday or something?” Dee asked.

“Then we’ve got a big problem.” I grimaced.

I was trying not to panic, but this wasn’t going according to plan. We stepped back outside, scanned the cul-de-sac. Of the seven or eight nearby bungalows, three of them had lights on, including the one next door. I knocked on the neighbour’s door and was greeted by a suspicious, pinch-faced older gentleman.

“Hello,” I said with the most charming smile I could muster. “I’m looking for my aunt, Emma, but she isn’t home. Do you know where she is by any chance?”

The pinch-faced man sized me up down his nose. Adjusted his thick glasses. Sniffed loudly.

“She’ll be at The Oak, no doubt.”

“The Oak?”

The man sniffed again, indicating his total contempt at my lack of local knowledge with nothing more than his sinuses.

“You want to go back onto Salisbury Road, right and right again. Can’t miss it. Proper English pub. Traditional place. She’s there most nights. Not that the miserable cow ever has any fun.”

And with that, he closed the door.

“Charmed, I’m sure,” I muttered.

I relayed the information to Dee and Bill. Told Bill to monitor the house, told Dee to head back to the limo and let Jess know what was going on, and then left in search of The Oak. It didn’t take me long to find it: a three storey, traditional English country inn, complete with Tudor style black beams between the white plaster front.

I ducked inside and was greeted by a rowdy group of women on a hen do. Squeezing through the celebrations, trying to be inconspicuous, I scanned the rest of the pub. I had one photo of Marian/Emma to go on, but I didn’t need it. As soon as I spotted her, it was obvious who she was. What she was. To me, at any rate.

She was sitting alone at a table with a pint of dark ale in front of her, a few sips taken from it. Her clothes were outdated and worn. A pool of misery surrounded her. The partying women could sense it and steered clear of the lone woman and her palpable gloom. Marian paid no attention to what was going on around her. A misty film covered her eyes, obscuring everything except her own dark thoughts.

I sat beside her. Explained who I was, using the ‘I’m with Section 13’ line. Called her by her real name, the one no-one would have used for seventy years. Told her she was in danger and that she needed to come with me. She barely registered my words. Only a faint nod indicated she’d heard me.

“We need to go. Please. You’re in danger here. So are my friends.”

Marian’s filmy eyes flickered towards me. She reached out a hand, lifted her pint, took a sip.

“Did you know alcohol doesn’t affect someone with my condition?” she said. “I can barely even taste the ale. I can barely taste anything at all. Not for seventy years now.”

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Mental alarm bells were ringing loud and clear. Precious seconds were ticking by. We didn’t have time for this.

“We need to leave, Marian,” I said gently. “Please trust me on this. Someone is coming for you. He wants to kill you, to reverse what you did in the forties.”

“It was bound to happen,” Marian replied.

Unlike Paul, she didn’t look afraid. Instead she seemed resigned to her fate.

“We can protect you. We can stop this from happening.”

Marian nodded as if she had finally comprehended. She took another slow sip of her ale. Rolled the liquid around her mouth before swallowing. Sighed.

“Even with danger just around the corner, there’s still no taste,” she said sadly.

She got up, and I led her through the crowd of raucous women. They parted for us as we cut through them, not wanting their fun to be tainted by Marian’s grim aura. Once we were outside, the revelry continued behind us as if we hadn’t been there at all.

Instead of walking towards the limo, Marian insisted on taking the shortcut back to her bungalow.

“This way,” I urged her, trying to guide her toward safety.

“I need to pick up some things first,” Marian said. “That’s what you do when you go somewhere else, isn’t it? You take things with you. Like a toothbrush. Clothes. I haven’t been anywhere else in such a long time, I forget.”

The fear that we were about to be caught was so intense I wanted to scream at her. She seemed determined to drag this out. Rather than waste more precious minutes arguing, I hurried her back to the bungalow.

“This her?” Bill asked.

I nodded. Jess and Dee were standing outside the house. Great.

“Jess, the limo?”

“I thought you might need help to look for Marian,” Jess said.

I groaned in exasperation. Nothing was going the way it was supposed to. Marian complained about the broken door, wondering if ‘them kids’ had broken in again. She didn’t know why they bothered unless they wanted to steal her watercolours. Had I seen her watercolours? She wondered.

My heart was beating faster with every passing second. How long had this all taken so far? Half an hour? An hour? More?

I hurried Marian along the corridor into her messy bedroom. She packed some clothes into a battered, antique suitcase that hadn’t been used since World War Two. I’d managed to get her to the front door when she remembered her toothbrush and returned inside to find it.

The sound of a speeding car engine in the distance got louder. I saw a flash of headlights as it turned onto our street. The hairs on the back of my neck stood up. A silver-grey series 5 BMW Saloon tore up the dead end road. It sped past us and mounted the pavement so it could spin around without reversing. Tyres screeched on tarmac. The headlights caught Marian’s front door as it came to a sudden stop. The driver's door opened. So did the passenger doors. Three figures got out.

This time, Mr Stabby hadn’t come alone.

“He’s here,” I said, clenching my fists

“Oh dear,” Marian said from the bathroom, “I’ve run out of mouthwash.”

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