Chapter 7 - Ida Bentley

The two of them, Irene and Andrew, have their heads down, busily theorising and notetaking around the round table of the bookstore, their empty cups left to the side. The morning sun is burning off the dense mist of the night, leaving the cobbles outside shining slightly. 

Several streets away, in the kitchen of a well-kept townhouse, a young woman with brown, wavy, shoulder-length hair, thick green cardigan and long black pencil skirt, covered by a plain black apron, is scrubbing the remnants of what appears to be last night's dinner from some crockery. She has an air of concern and confusion about her, one eyebrow slightly raised and her face scrunched up like she can’t figure something out.

The house seems empty, no other sounds can be heard apart from the scrubbing and periodic grunt of exertion as she applies a bit of elbow grease to her cleaning. It's a modest kitchen, dark green wall tiles, a tiled black and white floor,  a small wooden table and chairs tucked in a corner to create a breakfast nook. 

A few minutes later, after she is done washing and drying her hands, she unties the apron, leaving it folded over one of the chairs and leaves the room.

Ida strides across the house and through the hall, picking up an envelope that was left on a side table, finally stopping to sit in a lounge chair, a wide comfortable sofa-chair of soft duck-egg blue fabric. The envelope has previously been opened, torn open hurriedly from what the exterior looks like.
Her eyes scan over the contents thoroughly, and again.

“Out of town? Andrew? Bloody nonsense.” She blurts out loud, throwing the letter off to the side and quickly striding from the room, grabbing a coat on the way out the front door. The letter, the part that can be read whilst it is half folded and hanging off the table, reads:

“I’ve left town for a few days to clear my mind. My office is locked up and I will send another letter when I’m planning on returning. No need to wo-”.

-

The outer door of the office is closed, with a sign hanging just inside saying as much. Ida stands out front with her coat wrapped tightly around her and a deeply furrowed brow causing her to look furious. She starts rapping her knuckles against the door, except after the third blow, it moves slightly inward, the door unlatching.

“Thought as much.” She mutters to herself, stepping inside and shutting the door behind her. “Andrew I know you’re here, “out of town” my foot.” Stamping up the narrow stairs, she turns to the closed office door and attempts to peer through the clouded window. 

Nothing but pitch darkness. She fumbles in a pocket of her coat for a moment, pulling out a long brass key and sliding it into the lock. The door opens slowly inward, the creaking of the hinge echoing down the hall and bouncing off the walls.

“Andrew?” She repeats, less confident this time, fumbling in her pocket again before pulling out a small box of matches. Strrrrkt. The sound of a match striking the strip, and a small flame births in the inky darkness. 

She turns to light a small lantern hung by the door, its warm glow steadily bringing the room into detail. It’s tidy, much tidier than when Ida had cleaned it up before, in fact it is simply missing a large amount of the boxes of paper and books that were stacked up in here previously. The only real clutter that remains is a few scraps of paper on the desk, but no sign of Andrew at all. Ida lets out a long sigh and turns to leave before she stops, moving back to the desk and picking up one of the pieces of paper that was left there to read it. 

“Ninety-three Butcher’s Street? And William wasn’t working in medicine?” She seems to be mulling it over for a moment, before she sets the letter down and picks up another piece of paper. This one seems to have some kind of a burn in the centre.

-

Several hours have passed, with Irene and Andrew tirelessly writing down everything they’ve learned, taking a few breaks to get up,  fetch water and stretch their legs. 

“What do you think the tapping noise is?” Andrew queries, taking a small sip of his water and leaning against the window frame just behind the table.

“Well if we’re right in that whatever seems to be taking control of these people is something you can see, maybe the tapping noise is trying to get your attention to look at it? Like bait in a trap?”

“Or misdirection entirely, getting you to look somewhere else other than where the danger is?”

“I’m not sure. It still feels like we are missing something.”

The two of them stop for a moment to think. The sound of a soft rain starting outside fills the room as it begins hitting the windows.

“What about the officer? He just stopped and stared at the floor whilst letting out those unearthly groans.” Irene starts again, her brow furrowing with a finger half-raised in the air like she had more to say, before stopping.

“That’s true, he was facing toward us before he suddenly lurched over, I was in too much of a hurry to really check any other details. But he definitely stands out.”

“I just wish I could have seen what happened slightly closer, surely the key to what it is we need to avoid is in that interaction.”

Andrew seems to lose focus for a moment, simply staring into the candle in the centre of the table, Irene continuing to talk quietly. The flame flickers softly, dancing against some unseen breeze, casting its hazy reflection off the pewter cup nearby.

“What if it’s light?” He mutters quietly.

“Sorry? I didn’t catch that Andrew.”

“It’s called the “Burning Stolen Light” right? The thing that is supposedly being worshipped.” Still staring at the flickering flame. “So what if it’s light? Specifically light being reflected off of something? Light being stolen when it’s reflected.”

“You think-” Irene starts.

“Hold on, think about it, the parents in the basement were staring at the mirror in the room, but more specifically the light that was coming off of it. The officer in the street had dropped his lantern on the floor, the wet floor. What if the lantern light reflected off a puddle and that's how he got caught?”

“Oh my god. All the broken things in the basement, it's everything in the house that was casting reflections. That must be it!”

“Don’t get too excited Irene. It still doesn’t all add up, because if it was just casting light into a reflection everyone would be caught already.”

“You’re right, there must be another factor involved, something that would make the reflections have some kind of effect on people.” Irene stops for a moment, looking perplexed but determined. “At least it means we can plan ahead of our next excursion.”

“Yes but have you thought about what that entails? If we want to go looking again, the safest way to do it would be in the dark.”

“And there is no way of knowing if those people can see in the dark or not.” She shivers at the thought, dragging her fingers through her hair anxiously.

“There is one thing that is a blessing in disguise.”

“And what is that?”

“At least we would be able to hear them creaking as they move.”

Shuddering, Irene begins busying herself by pulling together a small pile of notes, signing them in the corners of each page with a small but distinct “W” and then stuffing them into an empty envelope.

“Irene?” Andrew leans forward, trying to figure out what it is she’s doing.

“Bear with me a moment, someone needs to get this information to the Estate so they can try and contain it and prevent it spreading, and they won’t believe it if it’s from me.”

“So you’re forging Williams initials. If it works, it works I suppose.” He finally sits back into his chair. “But what do we do next?”

“Perhaps we should start exploring the possibility of-”

Her words are suddenly cut off by the thud of a heavy impact on the door behind Andrew. And again, until pretty quickly it's obvious that someone is slamming their fist into the door over and over.

“ANDREW! If you’re in there, please help me!” A woman’s voice shouts over the intermittent slamming, cracking heavily as if she’d been screaming for the last hour.

Before Irene can stop him, Andrew is at the door and swings it wide. A gust of rain-laden wind sweeps in at an angle, catching him in the eyes. He blinks once, stunned.

Standing in the rain, long skirt, short brown hair and a thick smear of something dark and crimson down the front of her cardigan. She has what seems to be fingernail scratches running from her right temple down, around the eye, to her jawline. It’s Ida.

“Andrew, I didn't know what to do. I went to your office to find you and I found this letter and then-” She starts sobbing, clearly having been holding it back for some time. Without a word, Andrew sweeps his arm around her and brings her inside. 

-

Nearly an hour later, and Ida is finally starting to settle, her sobbing subsiding and words becoming steadily more legible.

“Ok Ida, I need you to explain again please, and Irene could you please bring Ida over a tea?”

“Of course, one moment.”

“I went over to your office, thinking that you would be there and just wanted to be left alone - which you know I can’t stand for you to do.” She swallows deeply and continues. “Except you weren’t there and all I could find was some pieces of paper on your desk, and one of them was a letter from Irene who told you to go here and so I thought I would be able to find you here.”

“Right but what happened between you reading the letter and ending up here looking like this?”

“Well I decided to pop back home for a minute to get dinner ready for David. For when he got back home from visiting his family. Except when I arrived, the door was already unlocked and his boots were by the entrance.” She takes a deep, unsteady breath. “When I called for him, he didn’t respond. So I went looking, I was going to ask if he could sort himself out for dinner. I searched all over the house until I found him in our bedroom, he was sitting on the bed facing my dresser, still not responding.”

“Take a minute, have a drink of tea and then tell us more. Sorry to be meeting for the second time under such circumstances.” Irene hands over the tea carefully, placing a hand on Ida’s shoulder comfortingly before stepping back.

“He attacked me. He crawled at me backward over the bed, for god's sake. I could hear how much pain moving like that was causing him. He was groaning like it was agony and yet he kept trying to grab at my face. His fingers were bent backwards and his nails caught my skin before I pulled away. In a panic I just thrust forward with the first thing I could grab.” Tears start to well in her eyes again, brimming over her lids, the words stumbling out with little break. 

“I stabbed him, Andrew. I had grabbed a knitting needle from the top of the drawers by the door and jabbed in straight into his side. He didn’t stop so I did it three more times before he started to slow down enough that I could run. That’s all I did, then I ran away in a panic all the way here. I didn’t even stop to check if he was alright.”

Andrew rubs his eyes, perhaps the sight of his younger sister so visibly upset causing watering of his own. He looks up at Irene helplessly.

“I don’t know what to do. It’s pretty clear what’s happened but I don’t think I can be the one to explain it to her.” 

“It’s perfectly fine Andrew, I’ll handle it, just be with her and hold her hand.”