The Girl Beyond Forever by Adam Loxwood

Author:Adam Loxwood [Loxwood, Adam]
Language: eng
Format: epub
Publisher: Pendulum Books
Published: 2023-11-30T16:00:00+00:00

CHAPTER 47

My phone was ringing. I was splayed on the old Chesterfield in the Great Room at the Royal Inn on the Park. Papers from Mather’s box folder were spread all over the place, along with a selection of journals and files I’d brought back from the storage locker at 4.00 am. A half-empty bottle of rum lay at the end of the sofa, an accomplice in crimes perpetrated against my pounding head. I touched it gingerly as I answered the phone.

‘Schaefer.’

‘Where are you?’ It was Sarah, and the sound of her angry voice sparked a memory: it was Sunday. The third Sunday of the month. I checked the time and realised I was late. It was almost 11.00 am.

‘I’ll be there,’ I replied.

‘He can’t take much more of this,’ Sarah began, but I cut her off.

‘I said I’ll be there.’

I got to my feet, put on my jacket and left the room as fast as I could.

It took me twenty-five frantic minutes to get to London Bridge and my train south was ten minutes late departing. By the time it got moving I wasn’t sure whether my churning stomach was the result of the previous night’s drinking or the nervous guilt at letting my son down.

There was nothing I could do to fix things on the train, so I tried to unpick what I’d read the previous night after I’d returned from the lockup. The trawl through my journals proved fruitless. I’d never encountered anything about an Edward Lomas or the Totus. My reading just reminded me how little progress I’d made. Leads that went nowhere, suspects who knew nothing, prospects withering on the vine. My written account of the past few years gave me the feeling that I was moving in ever-decreasing circles. Shark Eyes had given me the only truly promising lead in recent memory, and I had no intention of letting Edward Lomas slip through my fingers.

Mather’s box file had yielded little in the early hours. After scouring my journals, I read translated pages from Excommunicare, an arcane manuscript created by the Sacred Congregation of The Holy Office of the Inquisition in 1588. The text was aimed at inquisitors and had been written with the purpose of codifying the process of identifying and outing heretics. Much of it dealt with the processes that could be used to extract confessions from wayward individuals. The text also dealt with the punishments that would appropriately chastise the heretic and show the Church’s resolve in dealing with devilry. I was shocked to read about such torture and murder carried out in the name of what was supposed to be an omnipotent God. Why did an all-powerful being need the protection of violent men?

Among the sanctified violence, I had found a passage on Il Totus. It commanded any inquisitor who discovered a member of Il Totus to refer the case to a higher authority and send the accused heretic to Rome for judgement. I wondered why this organisation had been singled out for special treatment.

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