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Episode 67 

Finally the wheels of the classic Wolseley ground to a halt outside the farmhouse front door.  And as the foursome extracted their bodies out of the car their eyes were automatically drawn towards the huge barn doors, noticing for the first time the moon as it began to slowly ascend behind the ever-darkening building.  While behind them, directly across the driveway, the last rays of the setting sun were locked behind the farmhouse.  The unusual, uneven, light that came with the oncoming evening set the mood for what was to come later that night.  An all absorbing darkness began to cocoon the tree lined area that ran at the edge of the farm; cocoon: as in a sheath for a spider’s prey.  Beyond the barn everything seemed to disappear into the nothingness of darkness with the single exception of the rims and edges of the building as the limited light from the sky and the moon turned the huge building into a silhouette that reeked of evil.  Then to add to the way the farm was influencing their collective minds, a large, low flying, owl obtrusively flew too close to their unprotected bodies. Its sudden outpouring of a screeching warning to those below its line of flight caused both Martin and Joseph to impulsively drop to their knees and cover their heads with their hands.
  And, as they began to get back up on their feet, they noticed a swirl of white running into the woods.  The strange apparition had disappeared as fast as it had arrived, but its movements were not fast enough to escape the eyes of the two men.
  “Did you see that, Martin?  Joseph asked.
  “I did.”  Raji piped in with a smile on his face,” but what was it?”
“Damn witches, I bet you.”  Martin replied, screwing his nose up as he spoke, “It would appear that Vittorio was right on that point.  Even with half of them dead they come back for more.  Stupid people!  I just hope that they keep out of our way tonight.
“Raji, do you have a gun on you?” Joseph enquired.
“Like my pretty face, I never leave home without it.”  Raji replied with a laugh.
“I doubt very much that these are the people that killed your friends, and I don’t suggest for a moment that you kill them; in fact I recommend just the opposite.  I don’t know how many there are in the woods over there, and I don’t want you to catch up with them.  But could you please pretend that you think that they did kill your friends – and that you are just a lousy shot as you shoot the fear of God into them?  Just keep them occupied for a couple of minutes, then come back and give us a hand to take the mirrors inside.”
“It would be my pleasure,” Raji replied as he pulled out a gun and ran towards the woods.
“Damn lousy witches.” He screamed at the top of his voice, “I will kill you all.” Then he opened fire, the bullets missing the potential targets, but hitting the ground and trees around them with but millimetres to spare.
White, silhouetted, blurs could just be seen flitting between the barely identifiable trees that frequented the woods.  Running in all directions as they tried to escape the hail of bullets that reigned down upon them, they completely disappeared out of sight by the time that a sweating and puffing Raji simultaneously reached the edge of the woods, and ran out of bullets.  Openly, purposefully, in order to take advantage of the limited light available and have his actions witnessed by those in hiding, Ravi pulled out another clip from his coat pocket and inserted it into the gun and fired two more shots into the darkened woods.  Then, attacking his intended victims with a final barrage of threats and insults Raji finally gave up the chase and made his way back to a grinning Joseph who, sensing Raji’s actions had been carried out satisfactorily according to their needs, turned and entered the house.
“Let’s hope that the power is still on,” Joseph remarked as he used his torch to locate the switch.  Finding it, he flicked it on but nothing happened.  “Hmm, we don’t seem to have any power.
“Let me check something,” Martin suggested.
Joseph stepped back and Martin shone his torch at the bulb then followed the path of the wiring till he found what he was searching for.  
“It might still be alright.  I think that the problem may be isolated to this light,  I vaguely remembered seeing some damage to the wiring the first time that we were here, and by the looks of it, it has only gotten worse.  There’s a burn patch on the wall I don’t remember seeing last time.  Perhaps it has shorted itself.  Well, there is nothing we can do to repair it at the moment.  Let’s try another switch.”  
The small crew edged their way through the narrow hallway, Mary hanging on tightly to the back of Joseph’s belt, until they reached the entrance to the combined dining/lounge room where the embers of the fire still glowed softly within the circle.
“God, this place gives me the creeps.”  Mary complained.  “The sooner we are out of here the better.”
“I thought that you were going to buy it?”  Joseph chuckled.
“That thought seems a long time ago.”  Mary replied with a shudder ringing through her voice, “A long, strange, time ago.”
“Let’s see how we go with this one.” Martin called out, as he located another switch.
Immediately the room was bathed in brilliant light.  The room had not changed much since the last time that they were there, save for the addition of what they now presumed to be Harranji’s remains several yards outside the circle.  The four of them looked momentarily at where his ashes lay.  A small tear appeared in the corner of Raji’s eye then disappeared just as quickly as it had come.
“Whew!  Thank goodness for the light.” Mary smiled, wanting to take her mind away from the morbid thoughts that were forming. “I felt that I was going to scream if we had had to stay here in darkness much longer.”
“What do we do now?”  Martin asked.
“Raji, could you please give Martin a hand bringing in the mirrors from the car boot?  Martin, would you mind?  I will show you what to do with them when you return.”
Martin nodded his head in agreement and Raji followed him out, and as they did so, Joseph turned to face Mary.  “Right, Mary.  We have a job to do while the boys are getting the mirrors.”

********

By the time Martin and Raji had returned with the first of the mirrors, Mary and Joseph had just finished laying a series of paper plates in an uneven pattern around the edge of the walls.“God these things are deceptively light.”  Martin admitted in a surprised voice, “They are incredibly easy to move indoors.  What are they, about five feet long and about two feet wide?   They feel light as a feather; so easy to move.  Not what I had expected to find in the boot.  Show me where you want them, and then we will go back and get the rest.
“Place them against the wall in the hallway with the mirror facing the wall so that they are not easily noticed by an casual passer-by, but close enough to the light in this room for us to locate them later and easily pick them up.”
“Oh, by the way what are these handles for?”  Martin asked as he had a closer look at the strange handles that were set into the rear of the mirror on both sides.  “I have never seen handles on mirrors before.  What are they for?”
“They are used to get a maneuverable grip on them which will allow you to walk forwards or backwards with them and move them to face whichever way you choose.”
“Oh.”  Martin felt a bit deflated with the answer; it had been nowhere as exotic as he had hoped for, “What are we supposed to do with them?”
“I will explain shortly.  But they really need to be brought in as soon as possible.  Time is running out for us very quickly.”
“Alright, we are going. Don’t get yourself in a huff.”  Martin went to place the mirror where Joseph had instructed when he noticed what Joseph and Mary had been doing with the plates for the first time.  “Hello!  Are we going to have a jolly little party or something?” he joked.  “Is anybody that I know coming?”
“I believe that you would be aware of our guest,” Joseph responded, “but I don’t think that he will be too happy when he arrives.  Now would you please go and get the other mirrors.  Oh, and when you bring back the mirror with no handle, could you please bring it here to the middle of the room.”
“No problem, Old boy … your wish shall be my command.”  Martin came to attention as he spoke, gave Joseph a sharp salute, then turning on his heels marched out of the room with a befuddled Raji following quickly behind him.

********

As Martin departed, Mary could control her curiosity no more.  She had bitten her tongue when Joseph asked her to help lay out the paper plates hoping that he would tell her why they were doing this seemingly ridiculous task when they were finished, but now, with the mirrors suddenly coming into the equation, she was bursting at the seams to know what he was up to. 
“What is going on, Joseph?”  Mary asked as calmly as she could.  “Why are we laying out paper plates all over the room and collecting mirrors in the hallway?”
“Good housekeeping, Mary.” Joseph replied in a soft voice as he then placed his fingers to his lips.
Mary sighed and slowly shook her head.  She so hated secrets.  But before she could linger on her frustration Martin and RaJi staggered into the room carrying more mirrors, only this time they had stacked several mirrors on top of each other and were sharing the load between them.
“Could use a hand for a second,” Martin requested, his breathing slightly heavy, “Seemed easier at the time to stack them all and make one trip … however hadn’t taken in the problem with unloading.   And please hurry, they are getting rather heavy.”
Joseph shook his head and rolled his eyes in amusement as he quickly moved over to the two men and began to remove the mirrors from their straining arms and gently placing them standing upright on the floor and getting Mary to hold them to stop them toppling.  As he removed the third mirror, Martin began to pull the last one into his chest as he advised Raji to let go of his end, then once he had established a firm grip on it he slowly moved it down towards the floor and took a deep breath before taking it to the wall.
Joseph passed the one he was still holding to Raji to also place against the wall and then took one from the three that Mary was still restraining and did the same with it.
By the time that Joseph had placed the one he was carrying in position, Martin and Ravi had the last two mirrors and were in the process of completing the mission, when Joseph stopped them both and examined the two mirrors.  Then to everybody’s surprise he took Martin’s mirror, lifted it high in the air … and threw it to the ground so hard that the glass shattered into a thousand pieces.
Ravi’s eyes lit up at Joseph’s actions and elatedly raised the one in his hands.  “I can do that!”  He cried out in an excited voice as he prepared to emulate Joseph.
The coldness in Joseph’s tone caused Raji to freeze on the spot.  “This is not a game, Raji.  Put it down gently.  Those mirrors are there to protect our lives.  There is only one mirror each.  If you break one – then that one is yours, and may God help you without it – because none of us will be able to.”
An unexplained fear reflected in Raji’s eyes, and he could feel a tremor running through his hands and arms as he did what he was told.  Suddenly the red hot adrenaline that had been flowing freely through his veins since he had run through the woods, guns blazing, shooting wildly to create fear and uncertainty, began to slow down; parts of his mind and body began to freeze.  And like Joseph and Mary before him … he began to wonder just what it was that he had gotten himself into.
“What is wrong, Joseph,” Mary asked, “Why did you break that mirror?”
“Yes … why?”   Martin interjected, “You’ll have seven years bad luck for that … and probably a bill from William.
“We’ll have a lot more than that to worry about if our friend comes before we are ready.”
“Our ‘friend’ sounds rather ominous, Joseph.” Mary asked in a soft, subdued voice.  “Who is our ‘friend’, Joseph?  And why is he coming.’  
Joseph stopped what he had been doing and looked deep into the eyes of his three associates.  “He is coming to kill us,”
“Who is?”  Mary asked in far more subdued, fear fuelled tone, Who is coming?”
Joseph paused for a further moment before answering, and when he did finally answer … his voice was soft and dry, and his reply sent a chill so cold across their hearts it threatened their lives in so many ways.