Her mother stood up and ran to the cellar and her husband and Davey.
James was down there scratching his head in disbelief. Between all three of them they pulled out every box, case and trunk to search inside them. James looked at the old wooden crate he’d brought in here one evening before he, Eleanor and the children had moved in. It looked as if the lid had been ripped off and put back on. A ball of fear lodged in the base of his spine and he had to force his feet to move towards it. Had someone been down here and taken the thing from inside it? Perhaps Joe had caught them stealing it and they’d taken him as well.
Another thought crossed his mind and he tried to block it out, but he couldn’t. He had an uneasy feeling about the empty crate, which should have contained the supposed, magnificent, one and only captured Windigo in the whole world, and now didn’t. He tried to think who knew about it and when the last time was that he had looked at the packing crate, but he couldn’t remember. James knew it was a long time ago. He’d moved it in under the cover of darkness with help from Archie, one of his most trusted workers, and he’d sworn him to secrecy.
If Eleanor had known he’d brought that thing into their home she would have been beside herself. It terrified her. She’d made him promise that he wouldn’t bring it anywhere near their house, but it was worth a lot of money and he didn’t want to leave it lying around the amusement park until the building that was going to house it was finished. It wasn’t alive. It was dead. At least it looked as if it was dead. In fact, he didn’t even believe that it was real. He had no idea who had made it, or how, but it was a very good piece and one of its kind. So why could he not shake the uneasy feeling that the monster’s disappearance had something to do with his son who was now missing?
He thought back to the night he had first set eyes on the creature, as he’d walked down the cobbled street and, for the second time in ten minutes, asked himself what he was doing. Why did the man who had the piece he wanted to add to the display of his sideshow of freaks and monsters want to meet in a dark back alley in Piccadilly? He knew he should have sent one of his employees but he needed to see the thing for himself, to see if it was real or at least looked realistic, because the asking price had been a lot of money and this wasn’t exactly one hundred per cent above board. There were no shipping papers from America. where it was from, to go with the skeleton. In fact there were no papers at all. This was a strictly take a look and pay cash on the spot deal.
He stopped and looked at the blackened door in front of him. This must be the one. As he lifted his hand to knock it opened a crack. The smell of stale ale and something that had gone off escaped, making him take a step back. ‘Who is it?’
‘Mr Beckett.’
There was some shuffling and fumbling and then the door opened wide enough for him to step through. For a moment he contemplated turning around and walking away. For all he knew he was about to get beaten and left for dead.
‘I thought you were. I can tell by your fancy clothes and the sound of your shoes on the stones outside that you’re not one of us.’
James, who had never looked down on anyone in his life, even though he had been brought up the son of a businessman, thanked God that he wasn’t one of them – whoever they may be.
‘Come in before someone sees you.’
He forced himself to step inside the dark hallway and tried not to flinch as the man slammed the door behind him.
‘So you are looking for something special for your fairground, are you? Something the likes of which the world has never seen?’
‘I am. That’s very true but I don’t know if you can show me anything that I want. I’m afraid I might have made a mistake coming here.’
The man smiled, showing a mouthful of rotten teeth.
‘Oh you’ll want what I have, all right. It’s been kept in the dark, underground, for five years, waiting for the right buyer to come along.’
The man led James along the narrow corridor into a room that was brightly lit by many candles. Inside it was an assortment of boxes and crates of all shapes and sizes. He continued walking to the back of the room until he reached one that was almost seven feet tall and looked more like a coffin than a crate.
‘Tell me, Mr Beckett, do you believe in those Red Indian folk tales at all? A man of your stature must like to read. Do you have any interests in the Algonquin tribes?’
James shook his head. ‘Not specifically – I have read a lot about the history of the Indians but nothing that I can recall about that specific tribe.’
‘Have you ever heard of the thing I’m going to show you? Apparently it’s bad luck to speak its name. It came over from North America with my great-uncle who went out there and became a bit obsessed with their way of life. He spent many years with a certain tribe and this was the parting gift he brought back.’
James could feel his heart begin to race. He was scared yet at the same time morbidly fascinated to see what was in the box. He felt his knuckles flex. He needed to see inside that crate. There was no way – no matter how much he disliked the dirty, smelly man standing in front of him – that he could leave now.
‘They say that they don’t exist but my uncle knew they did. A shaman told him all about them. He said they would sit around the campfire telling tales of horror and cannibalism. These things dwell in caves and like the dark. The tribesmen had a name for it; they called it the “evil that devours”.’
‘Well, that’s all very well and good, but if I’m to buy this thing from you I need to see it, please, so that I can make all the necessary arrangements to ship it back to the fairground.’
The man studied James then nodded. ‘Very well. I’m fed up of taking care of it. I’ll be glad to see the back of it.’
He stepped forward and began to unlock the padlocks keeping the case secure. James had never felt a greater fear yet he stepped towards the crate, eager to see whatever it was inside. Finally the man pulled the lid back and it swung open, revealing the most revolting thing James had ever seen. His instinct was to back away at the smell of burning flesh that emanated from the box and he cupped a hand over his mouth.
‘The only way to kill them is to burn them and that doesn’t always work.’
He said it matter of factly, like it was no more difficult than swatting a fly.
James stared at the thing in the crate. It looked like nothing he’d ever come across. It had a gaunt, skeletal body that was covered in some kind of grey skin. The head was larger than the average man’s, although a similar shape, but it was the teeth that made his breath catch. They were long, sharp and pointed and would look more at home on a sabre-toothed tiger. James looked at the man, who shrugged.
‘It’s an ugly bugger, all right.’
It was then that James looked down to the thing’s hands. Only they weren’t hands – instead of fingers there were long, sharp, black claws. The man stepped forward. After slamming the door shut, he began to padlock it once more.
‘Sorry, that’s about as long as I can stand to look at that thing. It scares me.’
So many thoughts were running through James’s head that he had difficulty processing them all into the right order. The one that was at the forefront was the one that kept screaming at him that he simply had to have that thing, no matter what the cost. Even if it turned out to be a complete fake it would draw the crowds from miles around to the amusement park. The crowds would flock to see it. This was the thing he had been waiting for. It could turn the park’s fortunes around for good.
‘I’ll take it.’
Those three words echoed in his mind. And where was it now? It had been the only thing from his freak show to survive the great fire that burnt down the fairground in 1919. It had been relatively unscathed apart from the blackened and cracked glass that surrounded it. He had stayed all night fighting the fire and by the morning