Lockwood & Co.: The Whispering Skull

It took us till midnight to dig the thing out. One of us stood guard, taking readings, while the others laboured with the tools. Every ten minutes we swapped round. We used the spades and picks that had been discarded on the path to cut away the mud from metal, deepen the pit at its centre, and slowly expose the object’s lid and sides.

We rarely spoke. Silence enfolded us like a shroud; we heard nothing but the skrrt, skrrt, skrrt of the tools in the earth. All was still. Occasionally we scattered salt and iron up and down the centre of the pit to keep supernatural forces at bay. It seemed to work. It was two degrees colder in the pit than on the path beyond, but the temperature remained steady. The buzzing noise I’d heard had gone.

Albert Joplin, for whom the mysterious burial exerted a powerful fascination, remained with us for a while, flitting back and forth among the gravestones in a state of high excitement. Finally, as the night darkened and the coffin rose clear of the earth, even he grew cautious; he remembered something important he had to do back at the chapel, and departed. We were alone.

Skrrt, skrrt, skrrt.

At last we finished. The object stood exposed. Lockwood lit another storm lantern and placed it in the mud near the centre of the pit. We stood a short way off, gazing at what we’d found.

An iron box about six feet in length, two feet wide and just over a foot deep.

Not any old box, in other words. As Lockwood had said – an iron coffin.

The sides were still partially caked with soil, grey and sticky-looking. Where the gunge had come away, the surface of the box showed through. Rust bloomed on it like flowers of coral, the colour of dried blood.

Once, presumably, its sides had been clean and straight, but the pressing earth and weight of years had contorted the box so that its vertical edges were skewed, and the top sagged in the middle. I’ve seen lead coffins from the Roman burials they find under the City with the exact same squashed look. One corner of the lid was so warped it had risen away from the side completely, revealing a narrow wedge of darkness.

‘Remind me never to get buried in an iron coffin,’ George said. ‘It gets so tatty.’

‘And it’s no longer doing its job either,’ Lockwood added. ‘Whatever’s inside is finding its way out through that little gap. Are you all right, Lucy?’

I was swaying where I stood. No, I didn’t feel great. My head pounded; I felt nauseous. The buzzing noise was back. I had the sensation of invisible insects running up and down my skin. It was a powerful miasma – that feeling of deep discomfort you often get when a Visitor is near. Powerful, despite all that iron.

‘I’m fine,’ I said briskly. ‘So. Who’s opening it?’

This was the big question. Good agency practice, as set out in the Fittes Manual, dictates that only one person is directly in the line of fire when ‘sealed chambers’ (i.e. tombs, coffins or secret rooms) are opened up. The others stand to the side, weapons at the ready. Rotating this duty fairly is second only to the biscuit rule in terms of importance. It’s a regular point of contention.

‘Not me.’ Lockwood tapped the sewn-up claw-marks on his coat front. ‘I did Mrs Barrett.’

‘Well, I did that trapdoor in Melmoth House. George?’

‘I did that secret room at the Savoy Hotel,’ George said. ‘You remember – the one with the ancient plague mark on the door. Ooh, that was eerie.’

‘No, it wasn’t. It wasn’t haunted or secret. It was a laundry room filled with pants.’

‘I didn’t know that when I went in, did I?’ George protested. ‘Tell you what, we’ll toss for it.’ He rummaged deep in his trousers, produced a dirty-looking coin. ‘What do you think, Luce? Heads or tails?’

‘I think—’

‘Heads? Interesting choice. Let’s see.’ There was a blur of movement, too fast for the eye to follow. ‘Ah, it’s tails. Unlucky, Luce. Here’s the crowbar.’

Lockwood grinned. ‘Nice try, George, but you’re doing it. Let’s fetch the tools and seals.’

Breathing a sigh of relief, I led the way to the duffel bags. George followed with ill grace. Soon the silver seals, the knives and crowbars, and all the rest of our equipment were in position beside the coffin.

‘This won’t be too tricky,’ Lockwood said. ‘Look – the lid’s hinged on this side. Opposite that, we’ve two latches – here and here – but one’s already snapped. There’s just the one by you, Lucy, still corroded shut. Quick bit of nifty crowbar-work from George, and we’re home free.’ He looked at us. ‘Any questions?’

‘Yes,’ George said. ‘Several. Where will you be standing? How far away? What weapons will you use to protect me when something horrible comes surging out?’

‘Lucy and I have everything covered. Now—’

‘Also, if I don’t make it back home, I’ve made a will. I’ll tell you where to find it. Under my bed in the far corner, behind the box of tissues.’

‘Please God it won’t come to that. Now, if you’re ready—’

‘Is that some kind of inscription on the lid?’ I said. Now we’d come to the point, I was really alert, all my senses firing. ‘See that bit of scratching there?’

Lockwood shook his head. ‘Can’t tell under all this mud, and I’m not going to start wiping it off now. Come on, let’s get this done.’

In fact, the lid of the coffin proved harder to force than Lockwood had anticipated. Quite apart from the corroded latch, the bloom of rust across the surface had bonded the top to the sides in several places, and it took twenty minutes of laborious chipping with pocket knives and chisels before the hinges were loosened and the lid freed.

‘Right . . .’ Lockwood was taking a final reading. ‘It’s looking good. Temperature’s still holding firm and the miasma isn’t any worse. Whatever’s in there is keeping surprisingly quiet. Well, there’s no time like the present. Lucy – let’s take our positions.’

He and I went to opposite ends of the coffin. I held our largest, strongest silver chain-net, four feet in diameter. I unfolded it, and let it hang ready in my hands. Lockwood unclasped his rapier and held it with an angled Western grip, ready for a quick attack.

‘George,’ he said, ‘it’s over to you.’

George nodded. He closed his eyes and composed himself. Then took up the crowbar. He flexed his fingers, rolled his shoulders and did something with his neck that made it click. He approached the coffin, bent close, set the end of the crowbar into the crack between the broken clamps. He widened his stance and waggled his bottom like a golfer about to take a swing. He took a deep breath – and pressed down on the bar. Nothing happened. He pressed again. No, the lid was twisted; perhaps its contortions had jammed it shut. George pressed down again.

With a clang, the lid shot up; George’s end of the bar shot down. George jerked backwards, lost his balance and landed heavily on his backside in the mud, with his glasses slightly askew. He sat himself up, stared stupidly down into the coffin.

And screamed.

‘Torch, Lucy!’ Lockwood had dived forward, shielding George with the blade of his rapier. But nothing had come out. No Visitor, no apparition. The gleam of the lanterns shone on the inside of the lid, and also on something in the coffin – something reflecting a darkly glittering light.

The torch was in my hand. I shone it full into the interior, on what was lying there.

If you’re easily icked-out, you might want to skip the next two paragraphs, because the body staring back at me wasn’t just bones, but a great deal more. That was the first surprise: there was much that hadn’t decayed away. Ever left a banana under a sofa and forgotten about it? Then you’ll know that it soon goes black, then black and gooey, then black and shrunk right down. This guy, entombed in iron, was like a banana midway between the second stage and the third. Torchlight glimmered on the dried and blackened skin, stretched tight above the cheekbones. In places it had cracked. There was a neat hole in the centre of his forehead, around which the skin had entirely peeled away.

Long hanks of white hair, colourless as glass, hung beside the head. The eye sockets were empty. Dried lips had shrunk back, revealing gums and teeth.

He wore the remnants of a purple cloak or cape, and beneath it an old-style black suit, stiff high collar, black Victorian cravat. His hands (bony, these) cradled something shrouded in tattered white cloth. Whether because of the angle of the burial, or because of the movement of the earth in the long years since, the object had slid from beneath the cloth, and was peeping out between the skeletal fingers. It was a piece of glass, perhaps the width of a human head, with an irregularly shaped rim. It was quite black with dirt and mould, and yet the glass still glinted – and the glinting caught my eye.

Look! Look . . .

What was that voice?

‘Lucy! Seal it up!’

Of course. It was Lockwood shouting.

With that I cast the silver chain-net, and the contents of the coffin were blotted out.

‘So what did you see, George?’ Lockwood asked.

We were standing on the path now, drinking tea and eating sandwiches, which some of Saunders’s team had brought. A decent crowd had gathered – Saunders, Joplin, several workmen and the night-watch kids – some because the fun was over, others possibly in delayed response to George’s scream. They all hung about the gravestones, staring at the pit, a safe distance from the chains. We’d shut the coffin lid; just a corner of the chain-net could be seen.

‘I mean, I know Bickerstaff looked bad,’ Lockwood went on, ‘but, let’s face it, we’ve seen nastier. Remember Putney Vale?’

George had been very subdued for the past few minutes. He had barely spoken, and there was an odd expression on his face. His eyes showed numb distress, but they also held a yearning, far-off look; he kept gazing back towards the pit as if he thought he had left something there. It worried me. It reminded me a little of ghost-lock, where the victim’s willpower is drained by an aggressive spirit; but we had sealed the Source with silver, and there was no ghost present now. Still, George seemed to be improving. The food was fast reviving him. He shook his head at Lockwood. ‘It wasn’t the body,’ he said slowly. ‘I’ve seen worse things in our fridge. It was the mirror that he held.’

‘You thought it was a mirror, then?’ I said. When I closed my eyes, I still saw that piece of glass, glinting, flashing, darker than dark.

‘I don’t know what it was. But my eyes were drawn to it. I saw in it . . . I don’t know what I saw. It was all black, basically, but there was something in that blackness, and it was awful. It made me scream – I felt like someone was sucking my insides out through my chest.’ George shuddered. ‘But at the same time, it was fascinating too – I couldn’t take my eyes away. I just wanted to gaze at it, even though it was doing me harm.’ He gave a long, heartfelt sigh. ‘I’d probably still be staring at it now, if Lucy hadn’t covered it with the net.’

‘Good job you’re not, by the sounds of it,’ Lockwood said. He too had been watching George closely. ‘Funny sort of mirror. No wonder they kept it in an iron coffin.’

‘Did they know about the properties of iron in Bickerstaff’s time?’ I asked. It was only with the start of the Problem, fifty years before, that mass production of ghost-proof materials made of iron and silver had begun. And this burial dated from a generation or two earlier than that.

‘Most people didn’t,’ Lockwood said. ‘But silver, salt and iron have always been used against ghosts, and evil spirits in general. So it can’t be a coincidence that we’ve got iron here.’ He lowered his voice. ‘Either of you notice anything odd about Dr Bickerstaff himself, incidentally?’

‘Aside from the general mummified-corpse angle, you mean?’ I said.

‘That’s just it. According to Joplin’s newspaper, Bickerstaff was eaten by rats, wasn’t he? That fellow was all in one piece. And did you see the hole in his—’ He broke off as Saunders and Joplin approached. The excavator had been barking orders at the night-watch kids, while the archivist lingered by the iron chains, staring at the coffin. Both had big smiles for us; there was a round of back-slapping and congratulations.

‘Excellent work, Mr Lockwood!’ Saunders cried. ‘Very efficiently done. Perhaps we can get on with our proper business here, now all that nonsense is over.’ He took a swig from a steaming mug of coffee. ‘People are saying old Bickerstaff held a crystal or some such . . . Something from one of his weird rituals, maybe. But you’ve covered it with your net of course.’

Lockwood laughed. ‘You’ll want to keep that net in position, believe me. There’s certainly some kind of powerful Source in there. We’ll need to contact DEPRAC straight away, so they can arrange for safe disposal.’

‘First thing tomorrow!’ Saunders said. ‘Right now we need to get on with ordinary business. We’ve lost half a night’s work already. Well, I suppose you’ll want me to sign papers for the work done, Mr Lockwood. Come back to the office, and we’ll get that sorted for you.’

‘Can we move the coffin into the chapel tonight?’ Joplin asked. ‘I don’t like leaving it out here. There’s the danger of thieves and relic-men . . . you know.’

Lockwood frowned. ‘Well, be sure to keep the net in position. Replace the chains round it when it’s moved, and don’t let anyone go near.’

Lockwood and Saunders departed. George leaned against a box-tomb and began an animated conversation with Joplin. I busied myself gathering our equipment, taking my time. It was early yet, not even midnight; definitely a better evening than the previous one. Strange, though. A very strange burial, and impossible to fathom. George had seen something, but there’d been no tangible ghost at all. Yet anything that could create so much psychic disturbance despite all that iron was formidable indeed.

‘Miss?’

It was the workman named Norris, the biggest and brawniest of the excavators. His skin was leathery. Whitish stubble extended up to the buzz-cut on his scalp. The tattoo on his neck was a wakeful skull with extended wings. ‘Excuse me, miss,’ he said. ‘Did I hear correctly? No one’s to go near the coffin?’

‘Yes, that’s right.’

‘Better stop your friend, then. Look at him go.’

I turned. George and Joplin had crossed the iron chains. They’d approached the coffin. They were talking excitedly, Joplin bunching his papers tighter under his arm.

‘George!’ I called. ‘What on earth are you—?’

Then I realized.

The lid. The inscription.

Still chattering blithely, George and Joplin stooped beside the coffin, and began chipping mud away from the lid. George had his penknife; he raised the lid slightly to aid his work. The silver net beneath was dislodged. It slipped to one side.

Norris said something to me, but I didn’t hear him, because at that moment I’d become aware that a third figure was standing alongside Joplin and George.

It was still, silent, very tall and thin, and only partially substantial. The iron coffin passed straight through one corner of its long grey robe. Glistening swirls of plasm, short and stubby like the feelers of anemones, flexed and curled outwards from the base of the apparition – but there were no arms or legs, just the plunging robe. Its head, swathed in a long, curled hood, could not be seen. Except for two details: a pale sharp chin, dull white as fish-bones, and an open mouth of jagged teeth.

I opened my own mouth and – in the heartbeat that it took to shout a warning – heard a voice speak in my mind.

‘Look! Look!’

‘George . . .’

‘I give you your heart’s desire –’

‘George!’

Because he wasn’t moving, and neither was Joplin, though the figure was directly in their view. Both of them were still half bent, frozen in the act of brushing the mud off the coffin. Their eyes were wide and staring, their faces transfixed.

‘Look . . .’

The voice was deep and lulling – yet also coldly repellent. It muddled my senses; I longed to obey it, but was desperate to defy it too.

I forced myself to move.

And the figure also moved. It rose up, a great grey column, faint against the stars.

Behind me, someone shouted. No time. I drew my sword.

The shape loomed over George and Joplin. All at once they seemed to snap out of their trance; their heads jerked up, they started back. I heard George cry out. Joplin dropped his papers. The figure hung there, frozen for an instant. I knew what it would do. I knew it would suddenly arch down, drop like a falling jet of water. It would engulf them. It would consume them both.

I was too far away. Stupid . . . The rapier was useless.

No time to change: no time to reach for anything in my belt. The rapier –

The shape dropped down – the open mouth, the teeth descending in an arc.

I threw the sword; it spun like a wheel against the sky.

Joplin, tripping over his own feet in his panic, knocked George to the side. George, retreating, fumbling in his belt for some defence, lost his balance, began to fall—

‘I give you your heart’s desire –’

The sword passed directly between George and Joplin, just above their heads. The silver-coated blade sliced point-first through the cowled face.

The figure vanished. The voice in my head cut off. A psychic impact-wave sped out from the centre of the circle and knocked me off my feet. Lockwood, hair flying, coat flapping, ran past me down into the pit. He skidded to a halt beside the chains and scanned the scene with glittering eyes. But it was OK. George was OK. Joplin was OK. The coffin was quiet. The summer stars were shining overhead.

The Visitor had gone.