Chalk Dust & Broomsticks, Chapter 36

Is Nick Blunt being haunted in his dreams? Is the Ka of Alex Simmons making herself known

Nick Blunt was experiencing some very disturbing dreams. He dreaded going to bed. As soon as he lay down, with his wife Gina beside him, the fear started. He closed his eyes, and the black wall appeared, drawing him in like an inevitable conclusion.

Each time he travelled through that wall, he was accompanied by a strip of light. The light which he felt was a she, spoke to him in his mind, soothing him yet pulling him further into the unknown truth. Night after night, in his dreams, he travelled deeper. He was heading towards a dark room, where he smelt blood, that metallic smell. The fear was ever increasing, and he would withdraw, waking in a sweat, determined never to sleep again.

During the day, his nerves were ragged. He knew it was only a matter of time before the police interviewed him again. He was, after all, their prime suspect in the case of the missing Alex, but so far, the only crime was a missing person. The very thought of Alex being a "body" was too much for Nick to bear.

He dialled his doctor's surgery, navigating the automated menu.

"Hello," said an impatient voice. "Can I help you?"

"Yes, please. I want to make an appointment to see Dr. Wilson as soon as possible. I've been having erm..."

The voice cut in: "Is it urgent? Only Dr. Wilson is fully booked for today and tomorrow. You could come on Thursday at 4:30 p.m.?"

"Thank you," said Nick, relieved. He gave his name and birthdate..

Just as he replaced the receiver, the phone rang. It was Inspector Stanhope.

"Hello, Mr. Blunt. How are you?"

Nick felt the skin on his neck prickle. "Not too bad, Inspector. What can I do for you?"

"Can you come to the school on Thursday afternoon? I have some more questions I want to ask you. Shall we say 4:30 p.m.? Will that suit you?"

Nick frowned. "Well, I already have an appointment at 4:30 p.m., Inspector. Can we make it earlier?"

There was a short pause. "O.k., we'll make it 3 p.m. Please come to the small room adjoining the library on the junior side."

Just then came a shrill voice from upstairs: "Nick, Nick, come quickly. I don't feel well. I need you."

It was Gina, calling from the bedroom. Nick ran upstairs, two at a time. Her pregnancy was past the dangerous stage, but she was supposed to keep calm. It hadn't escaped her notice that the Inspector and P.C. Knight had been interviewing people at the school, trying to find Althea's assailant and information on the missing Alex.

When Nick entered the bedroom, he saw Gina looking flushed and agitated, her blonde hair wet with perspiration.

"I feel dizzy, Nick. Every time I stand up, I feel so weird. I just need to lie down again. I'm frightened."

Forgetting his own fears for the moment, Nick helped his wife feel reassured and immediately rang the midwife, asking her to come and check on Gina as soon as possible.

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The Warning In The Tea Leaves
Shirley smiled, looking at the swirling leaves in her garden. Only a few weeks ago, the garden had been full of buzzing bees. So peaceful, she thought, yet at any moment the bees could swarm and cause mayhem. So it was in life, peaceful one moment and pandemonium the next.

Mrs. Catchpole paid a visit. Shirley invited her into the garden where they sat on a rustic bench under the apple tree.

"Inspector Stanhope is spending a lot of time in the school just now," Mrs. Catchpole fretted. "It doesn’t do the school’s reputation much good. Has he asked you any questions yet?"

"No," said Shirley, "but I expect he will soon." Shirley was wondering how she would answer the questions posed by the inspector and decided that the best thing was to be as evasive as possible. It wasn’t for her to solve the mysteries. That was the inspector’s job.

Mrs. Catchpole, adjusting her sunhat, admitted she was seeing the inspector tomorrow. "I don’t think I can shed any light on Alex’s disappearance or Althea’s attack. I know that Nick thought a lot of Alex, her work I mean," she added, hastily.

"Do you think something could have happened to Alex?" Asked Mrs. Catchpole, sipping her tea.

“I don’t think they will find a body,” said Shirley, but they have spent quite a bit of time searching around the school for clues to her whereabouts.

Shirley stirred the tea in the pot. “I’ll read your tea leaves for you, if you wish,” she offered, with a cheeky smile.

Bast, Shirley’s huge black cat, leaped onto Mrs. Catchpole’s lap, laddering her best stockings before taking its leave.

“Too bad!” said Shirley, her eyes twinkling. “Now, the tea leaves. Drink up and I will begin.”

Mrs. Catchpole drank the tea. Shirley looked at the tea leaves at the bottom of the cup and then up at the Chairperson of the Governors.

“There is a warning here,” she said. “Two heads, joined as one, but each facing in a different direction. Does that mean anything to you, Mrs. Catchpole? There are some bubbles in the leaves, too. That could be an indication of something which has remained hidden but is now about to come to the surface. Do you understand?”

The Veil is Thin
That evening, Inspector Stanhope sat in church with his wife, Ann, who was happy to have finally convinced her skeptical husband to attend a service with a spiritualist medium. Ann had her late father’s book on her lap, hoping he would "get in touch."

The Inspector, however, viewed the whole proceedings as a waste of time. He decided to use the opportunity to try and untangle the threads of his unsolved case. He closed his eyes, thinking about the missing Alex Simmons.

The compère introduced Mrs. Mary Sanderson, the Medium, who took her seat on the podium in a long, midnight blue gown.

"We are all friends here," Mary said. "Put your faith in the Lord and let's see if we can make some connections... All you have to do is sit back, relax and let the evening flow."

Inspector Stanhope was aware of a pungent smell, spicy, "a bit like curry or a fruity couscous dish from North Africa." He looked around but couldn't find the source.

"Can you smell anything, dear?" he asked his wife.

"Yes, actually I can," she replied. "I can smell roses. They were my father's favourite flowers."

Well, isn't that interesting, he thought. I smell curry, she smells roses.

Mary Sanderson broke into their thoughts, her voice carrying across the auditorium.

“Does anyone here know a George? I have someone here called George.”

Mary’s eyes scanned the audience. At first no-one answered, but then a lady, near the back, put her hand up.

The Inspector saw a middle-aged lady on the left-hand side of the theatre lift her hand in the air. Mary invited her to go up to the platform and join her there. As the lady was walking up the steps, Mary Clutched her chest, indicating that George had suffered a sudden demise as a result of an intense pain in his chest.

“George wants you to know,” she gasped, “that you should go out more. You’re to have fun. He says he’ll wait for you on the other side and you’re not to worry anymore. He says that when you join him, you will be able to go rock-pooling again, like you did before.”

A look of recognition lightened the lady’s face and with relief, she turned to the audience and explained that her husband had always encouraged her to get out more and that they used to go rock-pooling every year whilst on their holidays.

A wave of calm suffused the audience at this point. They began to relax and the Inspector wondered if this was a set-up, a deliberate plant, designed to get the audience to be more receptive and open to the spirits. He dismissed the thought. ‘stop being so skeptical,’ he told himself.

Whilst Mary droned on, he cogitated on the case of the missing Alex. He had made some progress with the investigations, but where was it leading him? He had a missing person – not so unusual these days; many people went ‘absent without leave’ to avoid their responsibilities. Perhaps this had happened to Alex? He began to answer his own questions. ‘Not likely in this case, because Alex had prospects. She was doing well at her job; in fact she stood to gain promotion at the Education Office. Was somebody jealous of her prospects?’ He started counting suspects …’maybe I should interview some of her colleagues at work. I’ve already spoken to her immediate boss, Nick Blunt. He is desperate to find her, but he can’t find any link. He has received several calls from her mobile phone, but before he can answer, the caller has hung up. Then there is the question of her missing car, last seen outside the school in the Christmas holidays. He asked the Headteacher about that, but she had no answers.

The Inspector considered kidnap, but there had been no calls for a ransom. He considered abduction, but again it seemed unlikely. Alex moved in fairly close circles and didn’t travel far afield. She was a professional woman, dedicated to her job, with a very close relationship with Althea and Nick Blunt. ‘there is something not quite right in this case,’ he thought. ‘there is something that doesn’t fit. I might have to start all over again in my trail and see if I have missed a vital clue.

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Alex Makes Her Move

The Ka of Alex Simmons was in the church. She was sitting above the podium, in her guise as a strip of light, looking into the audience. She was trying to get into the action down below but felt giddy from the many swirling spirits. She decided to remain still and concentrate on her power.

She looked at the Inspector, deep in thought with his eyes closed. She desperately needed to tell him that she had been murdered, condemned to float around in this spirit state until justice was done.

Alex forced her memories into his mind, showing him the dark truth. She needed him to know her body had been struck, then dragged to the boiler house and left on the cold, stone floor.

Worse was to come. As the Inspector sat, eyes closed, the Ka imprinted her final, traumatic memories onto his mind: A large knife and a sawing sound. She made him remember the smell of her blood and the sight of her limbs as one after the other they were severed from her torso. She remembered... she remembered...

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