The Revelation Room (The Ben Whittle Investigation Series Book 1) by Mark Tilbury

Author:Mark Tilbury
Language: eng
Format: mobi, epub
Published: 2015-05-03T23:00:00+00:00

Chapter twenty-one

Ebb escorted the prisoner down into the kitchen. Twice the prisoner had tried pleading his innocence, but Ebb had learned long ago that the truth was best extracted by time and torture. You could set your clock by that.

Tweezer looked at Ebb with his good eye and tried to smile. ‘Would you like a brew, Father?’

Ebb took a deep breath and tried to summon patience. Tweezer was in denial. That was as plain as Sister Emily’s face. Ebb stroked his chin. ‘A brew?’

‘Yes, Father.’

‘What kind of brew? A Hebrew?’

Tweezer snorted laughter. A mistake. His nose bled again.

‘You disgust me, Brother Tweezer.’

Tweezer wiped his nose. ‘Sorry, Father.’

‘You have betrayed me.’

‘She tempted me, Father.’

‘I know she bloody well tempted you, you fool. I don’t need you to tell me she’s a nest of vipers.’

Tweezer bowed his head. Blood bubbled from his nose. ‘I’m sorry, Father.’

Tweezer’s eyes put Ebb in mind of a wounded animal. ‘The girl has just arrived. What do you expect her to be? Pure?’

‘No, I—’

‘She has all the sins of the free world inside her.’

Tweezer nodded and plucked a flake of dried blood from his beard. ‘She might be a witch, Father.’

Ebb squinted at Tweezer as if he’d just challenged him to a dual at dawn. ‘A witch?’

‘Yes, Father. I think we might have to drown her.’

‘You do, do you?’

‘Yes, Father. It’s the only way to rid her body of the evil inside her.’

Ebb smiled. ‘Perhaps we ought to put you both down the wishing well in the garden. What do you think about that?’

Tweezer clamped his mouth shut and focused all his attention on his dripping nose.

‘The girl’s not a witch. She needs purging, nothing more than that.’

‘She’s dangerous, Father.’

Ebb ignored him. ‘But you’re a different kettle of mackerel, aren’t you?’

‘I didn’t do—’

Ebb slapped the table. ‘Save your tongue. If you tell me one more time that the girl lured you to the bedroom, I shall render your mouth incapable of speech. Is that clear to your ears?’

Tweezer nodded. ‘Yes, Father.’

‘You are supposed to be my right-hand man. What do you suppose that means?’

‘I carry out your instructions, Father. I help you to keep order.’

‘What else?’

‘I serve the Lord?’

Ebb fought an impulse to bang Tweezer’s head on the table. ‘You’re meant to set an example to the group. Do you think attempting to rape an uninitiated member is setting a good example?’

‘No, Father.’

‘I trusted you.’

‘You can still trust me, Father.’

Ebb shook his head. ‘Not anymore. You have proven yourself to be weak. Weak and open to attack. I fear Satan has attached himself to you.’

‘No, Father. No, he’s—’

Ebb held up a hand. ‘Stop babbling. The weak always deny the truth, even when it’s perched on their shoulders like a parrot.’

‘Satan’s inside the girl, Father.’

Ebb crossed his arms. ‘I truly believed that we’d purged all traces of Satan from you when we tied you to a tractor and hauled your sinful body back and forth across the North Field during your inauguration.’

‘You did, Father.’

‘I remember nursing you back to health and being certain that there was no trace of that weasel left inside you.

Download

Copyright Disclaimer:
This site does not store any files on its server. We only index and link to content provided by other sites. Please contact the content providers to delete copyright contents if any and email us, we'll remove relevant links or contents immediately.