Cold Blood by Jane Heafield (great books to read txt) 📕

‘Possible. But didn’t you just say you wanted partiers at the boathouse? There were some sods early this morning.’

‘I’ll take what I can get.’

Anders was happy to show him. They entered the cottage. The showroom was downstairs, all four walls papered with life-size trees to make you think you were lost in the woods. Upstairs were the living quarters: a kitchen, bathroom, bed-sitting room. Here, amongst games consoles, a giant curved TV, pinball machine and treadmill, was a desk with the CCTV control panel.

This was state-of-the-art, not the clunky box used at the Red Lion. Playback was done by either picking a time and date, because the digital storage went back weeks, or by rewinding time with a dial. Digital also meant no quality loss at increased speed, and it didn’t have trick mode, so Liam would miss no frames. The camera covered the forecourt and the slice of road visible in the gap in the shrubbery.

Also unlike at the Lion, this owner refused to leave Liam alone with his gadget. Anders created a racket on the pinball machine as Liam found the recording for Sunday night, when the film crew had left Lampton. He spun the dial to speed up time. Out here nothing happened, and that didn’t alter for hours. The timestamp whizzed, but nothing else moved. The first blip, a long time coming, was a light washing across the forecourt as Anders’ Audi turned in and the man got out, all taking place within half a second in fast-forward.

A real-time hour later, a small van turned into the grounds. Obviously not the CaraHome, but Bennet played the video in real time in hope of a clue. As promised, there was audio. Really good audio. The microphone not only caught the noise of the van’s engine, but also registered the slap of its driver’s door closing after the driver got out. Bennet even heard it over the damn pinball machine. Anders approached the guy, said ‘Hello, you look like a water-feature man to me.’ So, just a customer. Bennet spun the dial again.

This little portion of the universe remained inert thereafter. The light sluiced rapidly from the sky, and the picture turned black. Then green, as night vision kicked in. Wow. Bennet almost jumped out of his skin when something flashed on the screen at about 1am. Monday morning. The CaraHome?

But when he rewound, real time, three motorbikes zipped past backwards, trailing their headlight beams like comets’ tails.

‘Joyriders,’ Anders said from the pinball machine. ‘Little shits wake me up all the time. Should hear how loud they are out here in the middle of the night. You’ll see when you get to early this morning.’

The sun came up with cartoon speed. Bennet spun through Monday. The sky got bright and then dark again, but the picture otherwise didn’t change. By the time night fell and the world turned green again, Liam was buzzing with frustration. He had hoped that the CaraHome had indeed taken the service road to the roundabout, and somehow avoided being snared by the camera there, perhaps because it tailgated a truck or… whatever. But Anders’ camera wouldn’t have missed it.

Bennet was sure he was wasting time, but he continued to watch the video. Tuesday was more of the same nothingness. The only break was when a pair of girls in a small car turned into the forecourt. Customers. They snapped a few photos of each other standing by large garden ornaments, but bought nothing and were gone twenty minutes later. Anders’ Audi was definitely going to have to go back.

Tuesday night became Wednesday morning. It was just after 2am on-screen when Anders stopped playing his pinball machine and said, ‘About here’s where you want to press play. If you want to hear the Stanton Beast.’

Bennet slowed the video to twice real time, and dropped the fast-forward altogether when he saw a green-lit Anders come out of his home. It was obvious why. The microphones caught the faraway crack of wood, and the roar of a throaty engine. The sounds were barely there, which added to the eeriness.

‘I came out because I wondered if the road was being fixed,’ Anders said, leaning over Bennet’s shoulder to watch the screen. ‘The supermarket people, they re-tarmacked early so their suits could ride on down to see the site for the new store. But some people reckon they were planning to start building on the sly, get some momentum going while this thing got argued in court. I was ready to start shouting, what with them doing that stuff at that time of the morning. But then I wondered if some people were pretending to be the Beast, you know?’

If the noise had been a flash, there and gone, anyone might have guessed at a car crashing into the woods. But the sinister sounds continued, a steady mix of throaty growl and crack of wood, reminiscent of the sound effects in horror movies. The faint noise certainly sounded intentional.

‘I didn’t want to get involved if some gang of yobbos was larking about,’ Anders said. ‘Vicious bastards these days, carrying knives and all. So don’t think I’m a wimp for not rushing down there.’

The Anders on screen went back into his building. The mega microphone even caught the sound of bolts being slammed into place as the man who wasn’t a wimp fortified his stronghold. A floodlight came on, lighting up the garden and shutting off the camera’s night vision. The strange noises continued.

But it got no louder or fainter, so whatever it was didn’t move closer or further away from the camera. No vehicle went past. There were no lights out there in the woods.

‘Where did the noise come from?’ he asked Anders.

‘Down to the left. Not close, but I couldn’t tell how far. But I figured it was at the boathouse. Yobbos mess about there all the time.’

The boathouse. Anders was the second man to state