To the Devil - a Diva! (30 page)

      
One of those Travel Lodges

             
Somewhere near the Lake District

On the motorway, Friday

My Dear Effie, You'll never guess.

Actually, that's very true. You never WOULD guess what's been going on, and why I've ran away and disappeared. I expect you might be quite shocked. But didn't we say our lives had gone too small and quiet? Didn't we say we lacked excitement?

I know you won't approve. In fact, if I told you everything I'm quite certain you wouldn't. You always WERE a bit more proper than me. So I won't tell you the whole story. Just in case you're tempted to take this letter to the police. I know they'll be after us. We've seen the front of the tabloids. How Karla and Lance are supposed to have vanished, and everyone thought at first they'd done a moonlight flit together. Well, as if!

But then the police found the signs of struggle in Lance's flat and the blood-stained knife and all that shocking, Agatha Christie-style stuff.

And, I admit, Effie, all of that IS a bit melodramatic, and I'm sorry for any upset that's caused you since the
weekend. But there wasn't time to warn you. We all had to vanish, pronto.

We had to get rid of the body. Karla's body.

See? You've got me confessing allsorts – in writing! – and this was only meant to be a note to ask you to forward some clean underwear, my passport and some Steradent in a Jiffy envelope.

You see, I think we're going to be on the run for a little while yet. All hell has broken loose.

You wouldn't believe half of it, Effie, because it involves black magic and what Lance calls the necromantic powers of the Brethren who had Karla under their wicked spell
… all her life!

What we are doing is attempting to find a way back. A way back from those dark and magical woods that me and Karla strayed into, all those many years ago.

It's why we're up in the wilds again. Me and Lance and Colin. Oh, if you could only see the two of them together, Effie. They seem so suited. It seems that adventures and adversity have really brought them together. Lance seems like part of our little family now.

Anyway – we've got Karla with us.

In powder form.

This is the really shocking bit, Effie – so just hang onto your hat.

You remember how evil she was becoming on Monday night. Well, after you'd gone she got worse and worse and I was getting more and more worked up. And we were all convinced – quite correctly, it
turns out – that she was under Satan or somebody's influence.

And when I stabbed her (All right! There's my confession! It's true! But don't condemn me out of hand! No one condemns Van Helsing, do they? He stabs Dracula and the evil's over and the credits roll up dead quick – and we never see Van Helsing dealing with the consequences do we? No, the story's finished. Good has triumphed, hasn't it?)

So … when I stabbed her, up in Lance's patio garden – well, blow me down if she doesn't go and explode in a great big puff of black coal dust!

We stood staring for a moment and then,
quick-thinking
Lance ran off for a dust pan and shovel and Colin found some Tupperware under the kitchen sink.

Only her handbag was left of her. Inside we found her mobile phone. Lit up with a message in old Gothic letters:

Daughter? Are U there? Have U succeeded with Randall?

Lance texted them back. He is with us now, masters.

And, almost immediately, the phone went
bleep-bleep
and:

Then bring him 2 Kendal. 4 the ceremony. Bring him 2 the dark, dark woods.

Lance had gone right pale by then. ‘I'm going,' he said. ‘And I'm taking Karla to them.'

‘I'm coming with you,' Colin said. Lovely moment then – when they smiled at each other. Bonded in
unholy peril! Well, I was buggered if I was going to be left out.

So off we went.

And last night we bore Karla's remains into the dark, dark woods. Into the heart of my own private darkness. And we found the Brethren up to their daemonic malarkey and we took the granulated Karla to them.

It all got a bit confusing from them on – but rest assured, Effie, the three of us managed to get away safely in the end. There was quite a lot of noise and shouting, and a bit of a punch-up, but we're safe. For now. We delivered Karla to them and then we pelted for it.

So we're hiding out in this motel thing. Now I think on, you probably can't send me my pants and sundries in the post, because I don't think we're going to be in one place long enough to have an address. We're fugitives! As Lance says, the Brethren can be quite nasty and we've gone and poked a very pointy stick straight in Beelzebub's eye.

And there's the other thing, as well. The fact that they took those ashes in the Tupperware container and the way that the robed grand master with the golden peacock mask tossed them into the sacrificial pyre.

Well, Lance and Colin and me – we stood there staring for a second or two – along with all the other revelling Brethren. And, just before we high-tailed it out of there – we saw her again! In the flames, Effie! All young once more and vigorous! Shrieking out for revenge!

They have brought her back to life!

Don't fret too much, though. These things have a habit of sorting themselves out. And, with Colin and Lance to look after me, I don't even feel all that scared. Not even with all the screaming hordes of hell and the resurrected Karla Sorenson at my back. I'd better sign off now, Effie, because we're off to have a bite to eat in the Little Chef now, and then it'll be time to get on the road again.

So … don't expect to see us any time soon.

With much love from your old friend,

Sally.

 

 

Allison & Busby Limited
13 Charlotte Mews
London W1T 4EJ
www.allisonandbusby.com

Copyright © 2004 by P
AUL
M
AGRS

The moral right of the author has been asserted.

Trade paperback in Great Britain in 2004. Published in paperback in 2011.
This ebook edition first published in 2011.

All characters and events in this publication other than those clearly in the public domain are fictitious and any resemblance to actual persons, living or dead, is purely coincidental.

All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced, stored in a retrieval system, or transmitted, in any form or by any means without the prior written permission of the publisher, nor be otherwise circulated in any form of binding or cover other than that in which it is published and without a similar condition being imposed on the subsequent buyer.

A CIP catalogue record for this book is available from the British Library.

ISBN 978–0–7490–4069–7