Lockwood & Co.: The Screaming Staircase

Carey shortly after three, and the estate itself by four. Only their difficulty in opening the park gates (Bert Starkins, thinking they were phantoms risen from his cabbage patch, had shot at them from his window with a blunderbuss-load of iron filings) prevented them from arriving at the hall prior to five a.m. Even so, they were two full hours earlier than Lockwood had requested, and just in time to block Percy Grebe’s escape.
    They didn’t turn up a moment too soon for me.
    It wasn’t ghost-touch or anything, but my close exposure to Annie Ward’s final manifestation had left me badly dazed. The chill had cut to my bones, and my right hand – where I’d held the locket – was frost-burned on the palm. Coming on top of everything else we’d experienced in the house through the long hours of the night, it was all I could do to stay upright. Those first chaotic minutes after DEPRAC’s arrival I remember only as a blur.
    Things soon started getting better, though. A Fittes medic gave me an adrenalin shot to pep me up. Another bandaged my injured hand. A kindly DEPRAC officer did the best thing of all and made me a decent cup of tea. Even Barnes, passing by my sofa in the midst of barking orders all around, patted me on the shoulder and asked if I was well. I was fine, thanks for asking, but quite content to let someone else take charge.
    Of course, events didn’t stop just because I was side-lined. There was still plenty going on. The first thing that happened was that the chauffeur, Percy Grebe, was taken into custody. He’d not seen the gruesome details of Fairfax’s fate, but he’d sensed enough to be left in a state of abject terror. That terror made him talkative. Almost before he was hustled to his feet, he’d begun to spill the beans.
    The next thing was that a crowd of agents, armed to the teeth with rapiers, flares and salt bombs, and swivellingsupersized torches zealously all around, advanced slowly out across the Hall. The key word here is slowly . They were mostly Fittes operatives, with some from Tendy and a few from Grimble, and all went with extreme caution, taking psychic readings every step of the way. The dark reputation of Combe Carey hung heavy over them, as it did their adult supervisors dawdling at the door. Lockwood and George stood cheerily by as they began to secure the area, painstakingly passing orders back and forth, and jumping at every scrape and shadow.
    Their first stop, naturally, was the library, and here, by whirling torchlight, Fairfax’s body was located. He lay face-down on the rug in the centre of the room, with his eyes wide open and his arms outstretched as if in supplication. The medics had the adrenalin needles ready, but they didn’t try to use them. It was already much too late. Fairfax had suffered first-degree ghost-touch, and it had left him swollen, blue and dead. Immediate readings were carried out in the vicinity of the locket and all around the room, but everything came up negative. The spirit of Annie Ward – having been reunited with her killer – was nowhere to be found.
    After this, at Barnes’s command, the operatives spread out across the Hall, routing out Fairfax’s servants in the East Wing, and checking the substance of our story in the West. Lockwood and George oversaw their progress to the door of the Red Room, which was discovered to be locked. The key,at Lockwood’s suggestion, was found in Fairfax’s pocket; the room itself, when a crack team tiptoed in, was empty, quiet and cold.
    Much to George’s delight, among the Fittes agents commandeered by Barnes that night was none other than our old friend Quill Kipps, together with his sidekicks, the blonde-flick girl and the boy with the tousled thatch. George took great pleasure in standing close as Barnes issued them with orders, occasionally chipping in with suggestions of his own.
    ‘Just through that secret passage you’ll find the famous staircase,’ he said. ‘I think we cleared it of screaming shadows, but perhaps Kipps should go ahead and check. At the bottom is the well room where the massacre of the monks took place. Maybe his team should take a peek there too. No? They seem reluctant. Well, if that’s too scary, there’s a Grey Haze in the downstairs toilet they might be able to cope with.’
    In fact, any remaining danger was soon past. The first dawn rays broke through the windows of the Long Gallery and stretched warm and golden across the floor.
    In keeping with