The Wild Hunt- A Solstice Ghost Story

To say I had a misspent youth might be a bit of an understatement. I was in a word ‘wild’. Whilst in my early twenties I engaged in what modern psycho-babble would describe as risk taking behaviour, then I would have described it as having a bloody good time. Thankfully I am older and hopefully wiser now and can look back on those days with a sense of relief that I survived, as some did not. I lived a transient life through the late 80’s and early 90’s, sometimes squatting, sometimes in the back of some old van and more oft than not in a sleeping bag under the night sky. I wandered far and wide with my guitar in hand and pack on my back.

I was lucky enough in those days to meet some very colourful characters, some sound and some a bit shady round the edges. Pete and Ralph were two such types, Pete was sound enough, but Ralph could be a bit of a handful when he had a drink on him, which was every day from mid-morning onwards. I lived in a squat with them both in the summer of 1989 and we all went busking in Brighton’s North Lanes every day. In a way it was those days of excess that got me off the drugs that I was starting to take more and more. Pete and Ralph’s appetite for getting off of their heads was insatiable, and I guess by trying to keep up with them I made myself so sick, that it turned me off of drugs for life. Perhaps it was the amount that I was drinking then, it just didn't leave room for anything else. Towards the end of the summer the squat was evicted and I headed my way (up to London) and they headed theirs (off to another squat in Bristol).

I stayed with an old friend of the families in London and they helped me to straighten out and get myself back on track for a while. I got a temporary job working in a warehouse and managed to save up a good chunk of money to rent a flat. Everything was going well, and then fate, as it has a habit of doing, intervened.

Four days before Christmas I said my farewells to my saviour and caught a bus to Brighton. I had arranged to stay with a mate while I looked for a flat or bedsit to rent. As I left the train station I heard a horn beep.

“Hey Rob” a voice called “Geezer!”

I turned to see a head all dreadlocks and piercings, sticking out of the sliding side door of a van that looked like it had picked up laundry from Queen Victoria, it was so old.

“Bloody hell Brian, mate how are you?!” I said, pleased to see my old mate.

“Alright bud, alright” said Brian grinning away with an obvious buzz on.

“Just heading out to the stones, for the solstice you going?” he said noting the guitar and rucksack slung on my back.

The rest as they say is history, I never did rent a flat in Brighton, the money was all gone, by the time I got back from Stonehenge, but  life as they say is all about learning. I can’t really say I had a good time at that year’s winter solstice festival, I don’t really remember much of it, only two things, one it was bloody freezing and two I saw Pete and Ralph and it was them that took my money. To cut a long story short Pete and Ralph had a sure fire money maker, buy some hash and sell it on for a profit. Only one problem though, they didn’t have any money to finance the deal. That is until I came along with my nest egg, saved up for a deposit and one month’s rent on a bedsit. Don’t get the wrong idea, I didn’t just hand it over, I wasn’t that naive, but they wore me down, they knew me to well. To top it off they both touched the centre stone of Stonehenge on the morning of the Solstice and swore by the old gods that I would be paid in full with interest by the end of the day. If not may the judgements of the gods fall down upon them. I know it sounds stupid, but it was this that convinced me, it was the sheer presence of the place, you could feel the ancient powers all around, you had to respect them. Well I did anyway. As for Pete and Ralph they headed off to do the deal full of promises and smiles never to return. There were perhaps three or four hundred at the festival in a scattering of trucks, vans and tents. Well somewhere in that lot they went to ground, or perhaps they just ran for it. Either way I had been scammed.

It is important to learn from past mistakes as you negotiate your way through life, but it is equally important to forget those mistakes to. Otherwise they will tie you up in knots and trip you up, if you dwell too much on them you will never take any risks again, they will disable you. And so I forgot about Pete and Ralph, quite frankly I was embarrassed that I had been such a fool. So I just got on with it. I went back to London with my tail between my legs and the family friend proved just what a good friend they were. I got myself together within two years and ended up beginning a degree in Social Work and living in South London.

It was on the 20^th of December 1991, the day before the Solstice when I ran into Pete, he was busking at a tube station, and if it hadn't been for his singing and the song he was playing, I would not have recognised him. He was a shadow of his former self, as thin as a rake and his dreads shaved off.  As I saw him I felt torn as to what I should do. A part of me just wanted to grab him and demand my money back, but looking at him I was overwhelmed with sadness at seeing how far he had fallen. I lowered my eyes and rushed past with the flowing crowd. But as I neared the platform I heard approaching footsteps rushing toward me and Pete’s voice calling.

“Rob, Rob, it’s me Pete” he touched my shoulder and I swung around, the anger resurfacing for a second until I looked into his sunken eyes.

“Hi Pete” I said not knowing what to add.

“Take it” pleaded Pete, thrusting the small hat with all his busking money into my hands.

“Please, take it all, it’s all I have, please” again he pressed the hat upon me.

“Shove it mate, I don’t want your money” if he thought a few coppers could make up for the way he had cheated me he had another thing coming.

“I’m sorry, I’m so sorry” he said tears welling up “we blew it, got stoned and blew it” he broke down and began to cry. My heart went out to him this man who had once been my friend, my anger and shame at being conned all left me and I was flooded with empathy for this fellow tortured soul.

“its ok mate, it’s ok” I said softly “come on let’s get a cup of tea, you hungry?”

“No, no” he said shaking his head “I have to be at the church long before midnight”

“Oh ok” I said maybe he’s got religion I thought, stranger things have happened.

“Do you forgive me?” he asked pleadingly “Maybe if you do they won’t come?, do you, do you” As he stood there his chest heaving and the tears flowing I thought he must have some kind of mental illness, he had fallen apart since I had last seen him.

“I forgive you” I smiled “come on I’ll walk to the church with you” as we walked we talked and he told me the story of what had happened to him and Ralph and I knew then that his mind had snapped, to many drugs I thought. What follows is an account of what he told me. It sounds ridiculous but as he talked he seemed almost bewitched by the story he told me and the words beguiled us both as we lost all sense of time.

According to Pete they had always planned to pay me back, they went to a bar in someone’s truck to do the deal, but the seller of the hash never turned up. The money just ran out of their hands drink after drink, snort after snort and by the time they got themselves together again it was gone, drunk away and stuffed up their noses. The next day they ran, knowing that I would be well pissed off. They avoided Brighton for a bit until they had heard that I was up in London and not planning on going back there. The next winter they moved to an old abandoned cottage in the Sussex countryside, on the North Downs. It was there that they planned on spending the winter Solstice, with a pile of fire wood and a pile of drink.

They sat in the old cottage with the fire roaring as the night of the 20th became the night of the 21st the winter solstice. Ralph beat his drum and Pete sang along and played his mandolin, by the light of the fire. They were both so caught up in the music that they never really even noticed the other voices and drums joining, until the cacophony of hellish voices shocked them back into the present. They stopped playing mouth open wide, but the other worldly drums and voices played on until a mighty horn blew and a single bass drum beat three times. Then silence; only their heavy panicked breathing and the crackling of wood on the fire breaking the stillness of the night.

“COME” boomed the voice of a man, animalistic in tone and texture, as he spoke they jumped to their feet in shock.

“COME” a voice that must be obeyed “THE WILD HUNT AWAITS”

“We don’t want no trouble mister” quaked Ralph “were not going to stay here, well go in the morning”

“SILENCE OATH BREAKER, YOUR JUDGEMENT AWAITS”

As if in a dream they stumbled to the broken down front door of the cottage and out into the night. Before the cottage was a field with a ring of trees in the middle of it and there under the trees lay a sight that caused their bowels to open and empty. Within the circle were a dozen or so riders mounted upon a variety of beasts, stags, bears, horses and giant wolves. The riders were all dressed in animal furs and green robes and upon the heads were hats made from the skins and horns of all form of feral beast, mankind amongst them. They held axes and spears in their hands and some brandished torches that burned with a ghostly green fire.

“OH WOE TO YE! WHO DARE SWEAR AN OATH ON THE HOLY ALTAR! UPON THE HOLY DAY! AND BREAK IT SO” their leader chanted, a terrible bearded brute, and more bear than man.

“WHAT SAY YOU NOW?”

“Please sir” quaked Ralph, the fear causing his voice to break and squeak as he spoke, adding a sense of the ridiculous to the macabre scene unfolding on that fateful night “please, we did not Know, we meant no offence”

“BUT OFFENDED WE ARE MORTAL!” the words violent and loud knocked Ralph and Pete to the ground as they clung to their aching eardrums.

“Please Sir forgive us” said Pete, staring at the ground in front of him.

“FORGIVE?” said the head of the hunt, seeming to ponder the question for a moment or two “FORGIVE?” and then after a few moments,  they heard a sound that left Pete and Ralphs hearts with no hope, no memories of a world that was good, were a man could make amends for the wrongs of his life. A sound that sent them both to a place beyond fear. Quietly at first came the sound of the huntsmen’s laughter, like a contagion that would wipe out an ancient race within a day, the laughter began to spread through the assembled ranks of the wild hunt. Rising in volume, in discord, until Ralph and Pete could stand it no longer and began to wail like the lost souls they now knew themselves to be.

“NO, NO WE DO NOT FORGIVE, THAT IS FOR THE OTHER GOD AND ALL HIS ILK” the huntsman sneered down at them from the lofty heights of his saddle, a terrible judge to behold “NO WE SEEK JUSTICE, NO MORE, NO LESS”

“FOR FIVE YEARS WE HUNT, EACH YEAR UPON THIS EVE IF THEN YOU STILL LIVE, FREE YOU WILL BE” He drew a large horn, shorn from some mythical beast long since dead and raised it to his lips “BARRRROOOOOMMMMM” the sound exploded into the night, causing all those asleep in their beds to stir fearful in their slumbers and fear that something untoward stalks the night outside.

“BUT IF CAUGHT  THEN DOOMED YOU WILL BE. TO RIDE IN THE YEARLY HUNT FOR EVERMORE” hearing  those words Pete raised his head and saw in those terrible faces before him the once hunted men and women, who sought not only justice, but revenge for the terrible fate which had befallen them.

“LET THE HUNT BEGIN” with that the cries of the hunters and hunted alike filled the night, causing foxes to burrow deeper into their hills, squirrels to peer from their treetop nests in fright, and bats to wish for the dawn to come as they flew into their kith and kin, all direction lost from their flight that night.

Of what happened as he was hunted that solstice night Pete was not certain, he managed to gain sanctuary in a churchyard an hour before dawn, and hid, bleeding from the cuts of a thousand unseen thorns, within the hollow trunk of an ancient Yew. Cowering there as  the hunt charged the boundaries of the hallowed ground in fury, until dawn drove them from the land for another year .

Pete never saw Ralph again. For a while they ran from the hunt together, but were separated by the treacherous dark of the winter night’s sky. Of his capture he was certain. He seemed to lose the ability to talk.,as he began to describe the sounds that he had heard when Ralph had been  caught by the hunt, far off across the fields and woodlands of the downs. It was as if his brain was closing down parts of his consciousness, in order to protect him, from the horror of those sounds. A horror that awaited him also, if he were to be caught by the hunt.

The next day Pete had headed out of the countryside and fled for the urban sprawl of London, hoping to gain protection from the wild within the concrete jungle. There he had remained, nearly an entire year. He now knew the location of every churchyard in London, and every route by which he could flee to these sanctuaries, from the terrible unforgiving gods of old. As his story neared its end it was like a spell had been lifted from us and looking at my watch I realised that we had both been walking and talking for over three hours.

“Wow it’s nearly twelve!” I exclaimed.

“What!” shrieked Pete staring at me fearful eyed. Looking around I realised that I didn't even know the street I was on, or how we had got there.

“Good bye, I am sorry” he said in almost a whisper, turning from me he began to run down the road towards the Iron gates of a park.

“Pete wait, wait for me” I called after him. I followed him as fast as I could, but the Rock and Roll lifestyle had taken its toll and I was soon gasping for breath. As I reached the gates of the park, I saw his silhouette against the orange street lamp glow of the city beyond. He was near the crest of a hill and heading for a small churchyard which surrounded a tiny chapel. The clock in the church tower began to strike the hour, but the sound of the bell seemed to distort into something hellish and discordant. I froze in place unable to move, transfixed by something prime-evil, beyond terror. Neither could I force my head to turn away as from out of the dark places of the park the hunt appeared,  horns blowing and riders howling. They blocked the ground between Pete and the churchyard, forcing him to change his frantic course and disappear from view onto the far side of the hill. The wild hunt like a forest fire of terrible green flames flowed over the hill after him. As the last rider disappeared from view, they turned and gave me the briefest of looks. The sound of the hunts pursuit of Pete faded away into the wild night of a city, which before then had felt like home to me. Although I can’t quiet remember it I am sure I heard Pete’s capture shortly afterwards, but some part of me protects me from the memory of it. One memory I cannot escape though, a memory that will haunt me until the day I die, perhaps beyond. The memory of the last rider looking back at me. A face twisted and misshapen like a plant in barren soil, trying to grow toward the light.  A face of one I had now forgiven, but not forgotten. A face of one damned to ride for eternity, within the ranks of the wild hunt. A face of an old friend, a man once. A man who was known as Ralph.

'Years Gone By' -A Christmas Ghost Story

The story that I am going to tell you is true, it happened at Christmas, 10 years ago. In those days I had just qualified as a Doctor and was working long hours at a casualty unit in South London. It was a stressful time, my mother was dying and I was to be the last surviving member of my family as my Father and Brother were killed in a car crash the year before. One good thing that came out of those times though was the fact that I met Jayne, my now wife. She was a music student then and used to busk at my local tube station. I still claim that I put the best part of six months wages, into her violin case, before she even looked at me. But look at me she did and as our relationship bloomed it was decided it was time for me to meet her parents.

Jayne came from a remote part of the North Yorkshire moors, a place called Scarfell Pass. Her family had farmed sheep there for as long as could be remembered, and her parents and two brothers tried to make the best of an increasingly difficult way of life. Jayne went home every Christmas and I was cordially invited. Due to my heavy workload though I couldn’t leave before the morning of the 24^th.Whereas Jayne finished her semester the week before and wanted to spend some time with her family. Therefore it was decided that she would travel up by train to York where her father would meet her and I would drive up on Christmas Eve, in the old jalopy that I pretended was a car.

After a stressful night in the emergency room, dealing with drunks and their victims I headed for the carpark and slept in my car for two hours before hitting the road north. Ten hours had passed by the time I had finally managed to shake the rat race and the last of light pollution. It was pitch black as I headed out onto the moors. I knew from the directions that Jayne had given me that I had less than 10 miles to go, when the snow began to fall. Well fall would be an under estimation, tear down out of the sky with upmost malice would be nearer the mark. A city boy like me was unused to conditions like these, the road soon disappeared from view, and I could only guess where it was from where I thought the verges were. My luck didn’t hold for long though, I ran the car off the road and got the front wheel stuck in a ditch.

No amount of cursing, pushing, ranting or crying would get that devil of a car out of the ditch and I was well and truly stuck. What’s more my phone had no reception, so I couldn’t summon help. At least I had spoken to Jayne half an hour before so she knew I wasn’t too far away. I was weighing up my chances of walking to her family’s farm in the blizzard that had engulfed me, when as quickly as it had started the snow stopped, and to my amazement I saw the lights of a house less than a few hundred feet away in a small valley to the left of the road. Perhaps they have a phone I thought and better still a tractor that could pull me out of the ditch. I grabbed a torch from my emergency bag in the boot and found a small track running down to the house and a rundown farm yard.

I stomped through the snow to the front door of the house and knocked loudly on the wooden door. I could hear people moving on the other side of the door and whispered voices but no one answered.

“Hello is there any one there” I called knocking again. Still nothing.

“Please, if I could use your phone, I have had an accident and need some help” I added making things seem perhaps a bit more serious than they were. With that I heard the shuffle of feet from behind the door and I opened just enough for a thin worried looking woman of about thirty or so to peer out.

“What is it ye want, are ye injured lad?”

“No, but my car is stuck in the ditch, up there on the road, can I use your phone?” I asked pleadingly.

“I, ye can, but be quick” she said opening the door and beckoning me in; as I entered she gazed out in the night in fearful apprehension, before shutting the door with a slam.

“Through here lad, phone is over there” she gestured to a small hall table with an old fashioned plastic phone with a round dialler on it. As I headed towards it I passed the kitchen door and saw two children, one girl and one boy, both about 10 or so ‘twins I thought’.

“Brian, go to front window and keep an eye out for him” the woman said to the boy and he nodded and went to the window facing out to the yard.

“Is everything alright?” I asked.

“Yes, yes, but please be quick, my husband is due home and he doesn’t like strangers” she was almost pleading with me, and I knew that my presence was making her uncomfortable.

I dialled Jayne’s mobile on the almost antique phone, but all I got was the continued hum of the dial tone. Strange, perhaps her mobile was down to, what with the weather and the remoteness of the location. I fished out a piece of paper from my pocket that had the phone number for Jayne’s folk’s farm scribbled on it In my spidery scrawl. The number began to ring and a woman answered.

“Hello Mrs Patterson” I said

“Aye, how can I help ye?”

“It’s Derek calling can I speak to Jayne”

“Derek, Derek who, we don’t know any Derek”

“Derek Reynolds, Jayne’s boyfriend” I replied a little exasperated at this stage.

“Jayne’s boyfriend, what’s this, some kind of joke or somat”

“No, no it’s me Derek!” I said beginning to feel panicked.

“Nuff of that lad, get off line or I’ll call police!” she warned hanging up the phone on me.

“Well I never” I sighed under my breath, had Jayne neglected to tell her parents about me and if so why. Perhaps I was in for a very awkward Christmas. Well I was stuck now I didn’t know what to do.

“You finished mister?” The woman asked hovering by the kitchen door.

“Yes, yes, I guess I’ll have to head back to my car and try and flag down some help”

“I’m sorry, I can’t help you any mo…” her words turned to a low moan or even a whimper as the boy came running into the hall “he’s coming” he hissed. A cars headlight’s flooded into the kitchen through the front windows. A door slammed and a heavy body fell into the front door.

“Open the door now I say” a drunken voice boomed.

The woman opened the door and a brute of a man burst into the hallway, he was so large he seemed to drive the light from the house, with his presence.

“And who is this?”

“He’s had an accident and needs to use the phone” pleaded the woman.

“Has he now?” said the brute staring me down. “Get out, we don’t like strangers here” he scowled.

“I meant no offence” I said heading for the door. His only reply was to push me out and slam the door after me. I lost my footing in the snow and went sprawling. From inside the house his voice boomed and I could hear things being thrown around and the children wailing. I had to act and fast. I turned and tried to enter through the front door, but it was locked. Then I heard a sound which sent shivers down my spine. WHOOSH. The sound of something very flammable, like petrol, catching fire. I looked into the kitchen through the front windows and saw the room sheathed in flames. I charged the door again hoping to burst it open. Instead I bounce painfully back into the snow. As I lay there the door opened and the man stood, shotgun in hand, silhouetted in the open doorway, with all the flames of hell behind him. The children wailed as they tried to revive their mother who lay unconscious in the hall floor.

“Run stranger” he whispered “RUN!!” He shouldered the gun and let off one barrel. The window screen of the car in the yard exploded into a thousand shards, as did my courage. I am ashamed to say I ran, I ran like I had never run before. I left those children and their mother in the hands of that devil. I tore up to the road and saw to my relief that a car was coming, as it approached my car in the ditch it flashed it’s lights.

“Help help” I shouted running towards them and waving my arms in the air. The car a Land Rover flashed its lights again and came to a halt. The passenger door opened and I heard Jayne’s voice call out “Derek, thank god we found you”

“Jayne, Jayne quick the fire, have you got your phone?”

“What fire?” she said looking at me puzzled.

“The house there” I said turning to point. But to my utter surprise there were no flames, no lights, just darkness. I stood there shocked and disbelieving for a moment and then fell to my knees, my legs refusing to work anymore. Strong arms grabbed me and guided me to the car. I later found out it was Peter, Jayne’s older brother.

“No no” I whispered “we have to help them”

“Who?” said Jayne concerned.

“The people in the house, over there”

Jayne and her brother exchanged a worried and puzzled glance.

“No one has lived here for at least twenty years, by my reckoning” said Peter.

“No no there’s a family, and the fathers drunk and he’s going to kill them” I blurted the panic giving me the frantic tones of a mad man.

“Ok, we had better have a look” said Peter, exchanging another glance with Jayne. We walked back towards the house, but no house was there, only some derelict farm buildings, the roofs long since gone.

“But I, I…?” How could this be?

“Come on love” said Jayne soothingly “I think you may have banged your head when you went into the ditch, back there”

“Yes, yes I think you could be right”. We left my car suck in the ditch, with a note in the window screen saying no one was hurt or lost on the moors and headed back to Jayne’s family farm. There after the hello’s and formal introductions, I was given a large brandy and ordered to bed by Jaynes mother, a woman not to be argued with.

Christmas morning dawned bright and clear, and the snow filled panorama of the north Yorkshire moors was truly something to behold. I sat with Jayne and her family around their kitchen table eating possibly the best breakfast I have ever eaten, homemade sausages, bacon, black pudding and potato cakes, the breakfast of kings. Talk turned, as it was bound to, of the events of the night before. I expressed to all my embarrassment, as I was now certain that I must have suffered some kind of concussion when my car slid off the road. As I began to explain to all present how concussion can affect the behaviour I was cut short by Jayne’s mother.

“There was a house and there was a fire”

“What?” I blurted.

“There was a house and there was a fire” she repeated.

“oh”

“But they didn’t all die” she said taking my hand “he did, he was drunk you see and he tried to kill his family, but a stranger was in the house, a man who had had an accident on the road” as I went ashen pale, she squeezed my hand and smiled “he saved them”.

She got up and went to the kitchen dresser, she opened a drawer and brought out a bundle of photos, from it she produced a photo of a woman and two teenage children, one boy, one girl.

“My best friend in school Esther Peters” she said handing me the photo “in Canada, in 1986, two years after her husband died trying to kill her and the children”. She reached up to one of the Christmas cards on the dresser.

“Here’s the card she sent me this year” she smiled at me “something’s just are, something’s don’t need to be explained”

“Amen to that mother!” said Jayne’s father leaping to his feet “Now who’s for a bloody good walk!”

I have been lucky to know Jaynes family for the last ten years and what happened that night has never been spoken of since, as if something fragile could be broken, if it was unwrapped again and shown the light of day. We spent a delightful Christmas together. Upon returning from rescuing my car we ate possibly the largest Turkey that ever roamed the earth. I was able to switch off from the pressures of work and relax for a while. My phone lay silent for perhaps the longest time that I owned it, mainly due to the fact that I could not get a signal. As evening wore on I decided that I should ring my mum to see how she was getting on. As Jayne passed me her mobile it began to ring.

“Go on answer it” she laughed as I went to hand it back to her.

“ Hello Mr Reynolds, Derek Reynolds” said a woman with what sounded like an American accent.

“Yes speaking”

“Hello Mr Reynolds I am calling from Petershill hospice….”

“Yes is everything ok”

“YOU NEED TO LEAVE TONIGHT” the phone went dead.

“Hello, hello” the line was dead.

“What is it?” asked Jayne.

“My mum I think she doesn’t have long”

“I’m coming with you” she replied

“Thank you”

Like a whirlwind we gathered our things and with rushed farewells we fled into the night. The roads were still snow covered, but I was able to follow the tracks of other cars and so find my way through the night. As we neared the place where I had come off the road however a new blizzard sprang out of nowhere. This time though I decided to stop rather than end up in the ditch for a second time. After five minutes of white out, like the night before the blizzard stopped as quickly as it had started. And there before me, before us both were the lights of a house, the house.

“Please tell me you can see that too?” I said turning to see the amazement in Jaynes face.

“I… I….I mean what the?”

There are moments in a person’s life when there is uncertainty, they are many, and they plague us all. But sometimes there are rare, rare moments where there is nothing but certainty, if we are lucky to have known this even once in our lives we can say we have lived. I have lived. A clarity of thought descended on me as  I opened the glove compartment taking out the note pad and scribbling a quick note. I tore the note from the pad and stuffed it into my pocket.

“Stay here Jayne, it’s meant to be me” it looked at her straight in the eyes, and saw for a brief second that she knew, and I loved her for it, still do.

I got out of the car and opened the boot pulling out the wheel wrench and stuffing it under my coat, and into the waist band of my trousers. I grabbed my torch and headed for the house. As before I banged and pleaded until the door was opened. This time though I only rang Jaynes parent’s home. A woman answered a younger version of a woman I now knew.

“Hello Mrs Patterson” I said.

“Aye, how can I help ye”

“You don’t know me” I whispered “You must get help for your friend Esther Peters, she needs you tonight!” I slammed the phone down and turned to face Esther.

“You finished mister?” she said.

“Your husband is going to kill you tonight” I said, the words leaving me brutal and blunt. She gasped all spirit disappearing like the wind from a balloon, the writing was on the wall, she knew what was coming, had hoped, pretended it would never happen. But from the mouth of a stranger the truth had snuck up and cornered her and could no longer be denied.

“ Save my children” she gasped as the boy ran into the hall.

 “He’s coming” he hissed. A car’s headlights flooded into the kitchen through the front windows. A door slammed and a heavy body fell into the front door.

“Go out the back” I whispered “go to your friend Mary’s house, Mary Patterson, she will meet you on the road”.

“Open the door now I say” a drunken voice boomed.

“ Take this” I whispered taking the note from my pocket and handing it to Esther “ Do what it says or I cannot save you” She looked on doubtful, beaten down.

 “Trust me” something passed between us, I don’t know what or how, but we both knew what had to be done. She took her children and left by the back door.as I drew the wheel wrench from my waistband as I opened the door with a jolt. With wrench in hand I stepped to the side as the brute lost his footing and sprawled onto the hallway floor…..

As I and Jayne drove away into the night, a woman stood reading a piece of paper by in the light of a burning house:

Ring 00717764432 9.p.m Greenwich meantime on 25th December 2004

Talk to Mr Reynolds say you are calling from Petershill hospice

Tell him he must leave that night.

Only then can I save you and your children!