The Devil's Ark

by Stephen Bywater

Genres: Ghost; General Fiction; Horror; Thrillers

Synopsis

'Creepy, classy ... full of dread and lust and echoing with the sorrows of war. We need more stories like this' Christopher Golden, New York Times bestselling author of Snowblind 'An impressive debut. As much about the horrors of war as the primeval horrors that lurk in the depths of the human psyche' F.R. Tallis, author of The Forbidden Sometimes the past is best left buried Twelve years after fighting in Mesopotamia in the Great War, Harry Ward returns to the land where he lost his faith, his mind and almost his life. Haunted by bloody visions of bayonets, shrapnel and shells, he takes up the offer of a simple job, working as a photographer on an archaeological dig outside of Mosul. As the dig progresses, Ward begins to realise that what they have uncovered is no ordinary temple; it holds a terrible secret. Now flashbacks are the least of his problems ... and he must face a new kind of terror.

Release date: May 8, 2014

Publisher: Headline

Print pages: 320

Sample

Baghdad, early November, 1929. A city of dust and flies, of covered bazaars filled with the sound of guttural tongues and the heavy smell of sunlit canvas and bitter coffee. This was my opportunity to make a fresh start, to glimpse again the half-forgotten empire we’d left behind. It was a chance taken with little thought, other than the ill-conceived idea that, after twelve years, a return to the country where I’d spectacularly failed might restore my faith. And it had been easy for them to organise – a Methodist subscription, a publisher willing to invest. The Study of the Bible was almost finished, but they needed a photographer prepared to travel across Palestine and Iraq.

This was my modern pilgrimage, one spent retracing my steps, viewing the relics that had survived the war, outfacing memories that had haunted me since we’d smashed the Ottoman Empire with bayonet, rifle and shell. That’s how we’d made history, in a mechanical war across mud and sand, crushing together bone and flesh beside silent antediluvian towns that had never witnessed such carnage before.

Returning to Iraq I was able to photograph some of the more recent discoveries: clay tablets, golden amulets, carvings of mythical creatures unseen for over three thousand years. I still have some of the photographs: braying donkey in the foreground, the ruins of a tower behind, a boy shepherd beside a mud wall. Recently, I’ve even been bold enough to keep a print beside the bed, Babylon’s Tower of Babel. At Babylon all was well. I had kept to my schedule and kept my thoughts from dwelling too much on the past. What had once been a battlefield was now no more than an undulating strip of scrubland. Where blood had been spilled, goats peacefully grazed. The flies were the same, but a wafted cigarette still kept them at bay. There was nothing there to trouble me other than the heat. Up until Baghdad my only concern was that I’d miss some biblical ruin.

My arrival in the Iraqi capital signalled the end of my odyssey. I understood the obligation I was under to return to England as the decent God-fearing man who’d first left its shores in 1915. It wasn’t meant to be my road to Damascus, nothing as grand as that. I didn’t expect an epiphany, just the beginnings of a campaign against doubt. In Iraq, floundering in the blood-black mud of war, all certainty had been knocked out of me. Yet now I felt I was making progress. My melancholia had begun to lift. The trepidation with which I had disembarked in Haifa had been replaced with the cheery suspicion that I was on the path to salvation. I’d found a room at the Clarendon Hotel and had one further excursion to make before taking the train to Mosul. From Mosul I’d travel to Constantinople and from the Turkish capital I’d make my way to London. On a small desk in my hotel room I composed a succinct telegram to the editor at Browns, telling him I’d come to the end and asking for the price of a ticket home.

The Clarendon was one of the cheapest hotels in Baghdad and what served as a bar was a dark, damp-smelling cellar. There were dust-covered bottles, four or five round tables and the obligatory picture of King Faisal. On the second night I felt I had the measure of the place and, with the last excursion in mind, was content to wait for my railway fare to be wired to the Anglo-Persian Petroleum office. Along with the British and American oil companies, there was still an army presence in Iraq and it wasn’t uncommon to see soldiers in certain bars. In the Clarendon you’d find the occasional pilot, or several junior officers. It wasn’t the place for a major, or for the swilling sapper and his painted doxy.

The bar was almost empty, except for two young officers and a middle-aged man in a fawn-coloured jacket. The man, sitting in a corner, had his tie loose round his unbuttoned collar. He was reading a well-thumbed newspaper which he’d spread out on the table in front of him. I decided to sit at the bar. I ordered a pale ale and placed my hat on the wooden counter.

The scraping of chairs behind me signalled the departure of the officers. I turned to see again if I’d come across either of them before. On several occasions the army had obligingly taken me to remote ruins. I was a veteran and my lips served as my service medal. The sight of the scar and what I had to say, when pushed to recall my own share of the slaughter, were validation enough; enough, at least, to be treated with a mix of respect and sympathy, occassionally enough to gain a bed for a night, or a tour of the local sights. With the officers leaving I felt that I’d missed an opportunity, which at the start of my odyssey could easily have soured my mood.

I was about to turn back to my drink when the man in the corner looked up from his paper. He caught my eye and, as the two young men disappeared up the stone steps, he smiled congenially. ‘Care to join me?’ he asked, or words to that effect.

In the Middle East I was every fair-skinned fellow’s cousin. The fact that he was Irish, given the lilt in his voice, certainly didn’t make any difference.

‘Same again?’ he asked, pointing at the glass in my hand as I crossed the bar.

‘That’s very kind,’ I said, though it had hardly been touched.

He gestured to the barman and pushed out a seat with his foot.

His name was O’Neil and he was a doctor. He was talkative and, having been starved of conversation, I was happy to sit and listen. During the war he had served at one of the hospitals but was now growing fat at the consulate in Mosul. It was his final stint of service and in the summer he planned to return to his practice in Exmouth. He’d seen me earlier in the lobby with my camera and the conversation turned to photography and my commission. I told him that I’d already spent several days working at Babylon and Ur, sites that had punctuated our march in the spring of 1916.

‘You know there’s a dig outside Mosul you should visit. The chap in charge has been there since the start of the month.’

‘And he’s hoping to m-match Woolley’s success at Ur?’

‘He is,’ O’Neil said. ‘You’ve heard of Kipling’s poem, the one that starts with “dominion over palm and pine … yet all our pomp of yesterday is one with Nineveh and Tyre ”?’

‘No. I’ve heard of Nineveh, but not the poem.’

‘Then you’ll know it from the Bible. Of course Babylon eclipses it, and the newspapers have put Ur firmly on the map. Though Tilden’s keen to find something that’ll do the same. Argues the Assyrian city will soon be as famous.’

‘Hard to imagine he’ll uncover anything to rival Woolley’s discovery. And as for Babylon …’

‘I know. I keep telling him that Nineveh’s been forgotten. You should see the walls though, they go on for several miles. In fact, you should meet Tilden. He’s taken his dig outside one of the gates. Thinks he’s onto something.’

‘Did he say what?’

‘No. But this might interest you: his photographer, a queer fellow, has just left them high and dry.’

‘In the middle of a dig?’

‘Just when they needed him the most.’

‘Why did he leave?’

‘No one knows. They say he walked out into a filthy storm; drunk, no doubt. Captain Fowler conducted some sort of investigation, but there’s no reason to suspect foul play.’

‘And the Arabs aren’t to blame?’

‘If they were there would have been some kind of song and dance. No, they’ve been quiet for the past year or so; bombed into submission. Since Sheik Mahomet’s departure things have settled down.’ O’Neil paused. I could tell he was wondering if I was some sort of Arab sympathiser. ‘There’s always tension, of course, Muslim, Christian, Jew, all cheek-by-jowl.’

He wiped his glistening forehead with his handkerchief. ‘It doesn’t bother you, does it, what you’ve heard about the tribes in the north?’

‘Why should it?’ I replied, as though unaware of what had been happening. ‘These things have a tendency to boil over.’

‘Such unrest can easily spread. I’ve seen it in Ireland. A firm hand’s required.’ O’Neil leaned forward. ‘A couple of years ago, when the insurrection was at its height, there was talk of gassing the Arabs; dropping canisters from aeroplanes. Even Lawrence supported it, couldn’t understand why some were being so prissy about its use.’

‘Lawrence,’ I repeated.

‘Have you heard what they’ve been saying about the colonel, why he’s been transferred again?’

I shook my head. I had my suspicions, which he was clearly willing to confirm, but I preferred to discuss the dig.

O’Neil drained his glass and signalled to the barman for the next round. ‘It’s going well,’ he replied after a moment’s reflection. ‘Tilden says he’s close to uncovering something significant and I’m inclined to believe him. It’s an opportunity for a fellow like yourself, if you’re in no rush.’

‘And this other chap isn’t planning to return?’

‘It’s been two weeks, and they’ve still no idea where he is. My guess is he’s either rotting in some bar in Aleppo, or working his passage home. Not the most popular man. I can’t imagine why they’d welcome him back, even if he had the nerve to show his face again. He was highly strung, unbearable towards the end. Seems to have put everyone on edge.’

‘What do you mean?’

‘Well,’ said O’Neil, weighing his words carefully, ‘last season it was all very happy; all laughter and high spirits. This year it’s different. Right from the start, with Bateman’s arrival, it soured very quickly.’

‘Bateman?’

‘The photographer who’s disappeared. He wasn’t here last year.’

‘And last year?’

‘It was a young chap named Munro. Pity he didn’t return.’

‘Why didn’t he?’

‘Not sure why. Tilden seemed happy with his work. I should think Bateman had a lot to live up to. Still, strange for him to wander off like that.’

‘Artistic temperament,’ I suggested.

‘In a photographer?’ said O’Neil dismissively.

‘Perhaps being cooped up together?’

‘It’s too early in the season, though there are few other newcomers this year, which can always unsettle things. Dr Tilden’s been there from the start, and Mrs Jackson’s an old hand. Secretary and general bottle-washer. Her husband was an archaeologist. Died in the war. She’s a charity case, really. Tilden worked with her husband in Syria. Feels the least he can do is keep her occupied. Tom Suarez, the architect, has been out here nearly as long as Mrs Jackson.’ He lifted his tumbler of whisky and swirled it around, the ice cubes clinking against the glass. ‘They didn’t have ice last year. Now that’s what I call progress.’ He took a sip, and nodded in approval. ‘The Russian’s new.’

‘The Russian?’

‘It’s an Anglo-American dig, but they’ve a chap called Stanislav who deciphers their clay tablets. Not sure about his background. Fought during the civil war, but can’t be a Bolshevik – otherwise he’d still be there now.’

‘New faces can unsettle things.’

‘Quite so. It’s a pretty close community. All the same there seems to be something not quite right. Tilden leads by example and, although he has little tact, he’s always managed to keep his expedition happy before, everyone on good terms and yet … well, it’s just a little tense at the moment.’

‘Are you trying to put me off?

O’Neil smiled. ‘I just think it’s worth you knowing. I tell you what, I’m heading back to Mosul tomorrow, I’ll mention your name to Tilden. If you turn up in the next couple of days you’ll have at least a fortnight’s work, which means board and lodgings, and a few rupees in your pocket.’

The doctor paused. He seemed to be studying my face. You’re not in any hurry to get back to Blighty are you?’

‘I won’t be sorry to leave the blasted heat behind. Easy to forget how much of a furnace this place is, even in November.’

‘Believe me, you’ll soon be shivering and wishing you were back here. Are you married?’

‘No,’ I answered. ‘I was engaged, b-but …’ Throughout the conversation I had hardly stuttered at all, but I couldn’t trust myself to talk about her without making a mess of it.

O’Neil nodded, and glanced again at my lips.

I had no serious intention of joining the dig at Nineveh. My conversation with O’Neil, at least until the thought of her, had been almost flawless and I was keen to get back to England. I didn’t want anything to spoil my triumphant return. The problems I had suffered appeared to have more or less disappeared. I was admittedly curious to visit the site, and if they were onto something significant then I felt almost obliged to stop by, but the talk of trouble was enough to put me off.

I sat down at the breakfast table and brushed a few crumbs that had been left behind onto the tiled floor. It was late and the room was emptying. When the waiter came over I asked him if he’d seen the doctor. The man shook his head. I ordered and he returned to the kitchen through the revolving door. I sat and watched the net curtains billow gently an inch or two towards my table. In the grey, filtered light I wondered if I’d ever see O’Neil again.

After breakfast I wandered out towards the bazaar. By mid-afternoon I’d managed to hitch a ride to a barren plain just beyond the outskirts of the city. What some say is Adam’s grave is little more than a depression in the sand, though it’s almost a hundred yards in length. Noah, at the age of six hundred, is said to have found the site. It was a deserted spot, made all the more forsaken by the lack of any vegetation.

The light was fading and I remember feeling quite alone. There was the emptiness of a Sunday afternoon, and the stillness in the air began to breed melancholy thoughts. Buildings must once have stood around it as piles of rubble lay scattered across the plain. It was easy to imagine the site as a place of pilgrimage, as having had a shrine of some sort. Had it all been smashed by the war, another unrecorded spasm of destruction in a worthless corner of the world? It had become convenient for me to blame others, to see peace as the thing we should desire above all else. Yet even after witnessing the bloodshed and brutality I can still recall the ache of excitement I’d felt, when the idea of fighting in some distant land appealed far more than a suburban life with its washing lines and carpet slippers. My loathing for monotony was therefore to blame for the thrill I felt when I heard the bugle’s call. There’s nothing noble about running away from boredom, but doing your bit for king and country makes it laudable, even heroic. In England I’d been prone to dwell on my unbearably dull life, my self-destructive nature, my propensity for evil. Standing beside a grave, no matter how unlikely a spot, was like picking at the scab.

Yet I’d been lucky. I’d returned almost physically unharmed. It had been an ignominious end, but I’d survived; sound in body if not in mind. I don’t remember much about the last day, though I can still see myself running, squelching through marshland towards the Turkish line, the mud sucking at my boots, sweat pouring into my eyes. My mouth is dry, but others are shouting, yelling obscenities as they run towards the canal. The Turks respond with cries of ‘Allah hu Akbar’. It’s a shouting match. Bullets fizz by. Shells whistle overhead. Shells explode. Shells begin to fill everything in front of me with flying metal. A deafening roar suddenly engulfs every other sound and a giant’s fist smashes the air out of my lungs. I’m catapulted into the sky. Thrown into the marsh. Debris rains down, pressing me into the slime. I can’t hear or see anything. There’s a throbbing silence, a stillness that is briefly welcomed. At first I don’t know where I am. Mud and blood start to fill my mouth. I can hardly move, with no sense of up or down. Stuck in the cloying ground, I begin to swallow. I’m trying to breathe, but I’m trapped.

A sergeant had seen my aeronautical cartwheel, saw one of my boots sticking out of the mud. It was kicking and he was curious. I know I was crying when they pulled me out. The sergeant thought it remarkable that I hadn’t lost a limb. My lips had split, my tunic was singed and several ribs had cracked, but I was still in one piece. A miracle, he was saying as he pressed a dressing to my mouth. I was crying, wiping mud from my eyes, squirming in his arms, twisting in pain. I’d been reborn, ejected from the earth’s slimy womb. What had once been Eden, what we were ploughing with shells and watering with men’s blood, had given birth to me. A foolish notion to have had in the middle of a battlefield, but it filled my mind. I became troubled, confused. The tears wouldn’t stop.

I don’t remember much else, other than being taken downriver. They gave me morphine and managed to stem the flow of blood from my lips. The injured slept on the open deck as we slowly steamed back towards Basra. Only fragments of the journey remain: the oppressive heat, the constant burr of bloated flies, the groans of other men. I can’t say whether it was the fear of being buried alive, or the heat, or simply the strain of serving on the front line that sent me over the edge, but my mind began to unravel. I started to see things. Sleek, beautiful creatures: half-girl, half-hyena. They sat quietly for hours, staring down into my eyes. There were other visitors too: strange amphibious lizards, strutting around with a bulldog’s gait. They paraded across the deck at night and then, later, through the ward in Amarah. Some sort of story was unfolding in front of me; I had a vague understanding that it meant something, that there was more to it. Even now I’m convinced it had some significance. I know it’s irrelevant, reason dictates that the dreams of a madman have no logic, yet I can’t escape the feeling that there’s an answer.

On the slow river journey I was oblivious to those around me. I ignored all the things that others deemed important. Beyond my own thoughts, my own world, nothing mattered; unless something found its way through, some innocuous scene or phrase: a wireless broadcast, a nurse’s greeting. On certain days they would burrow into my mind, until there was little room for anything else. But gradually it all started to make sense and the hallucinations subsided. In England I started to understand again, to recover my senses, to find my place, my function. To understand where I was, what I’d been and what I’d become.

My rehabilitation at Napsbury was relatively swift. Some cerebral sensitivity to the suffering I’d witnessed, and a scar which passes for a harelip, but otherwise unharmed. Up until Nineveh the most unpalatable effect was probably the conceited belief that I had gained a unique understanding of how miserably mankind had failed, with our slavish response to the factory whistle and our subsequent readiness to shed blood.

The sun had begun to set. I turned away from the grave and started to walk back to the dirt road. A black dog sauntered towards me. I eyed it warily. It was panting, though I hadn’t seen it running. It stopped about ten yards ahead and seemed to be staring beyond me, its head tilted to one side; looking either through me or just to my left. I gazed at its wide jaws, its thick, scarred muzzle and dark, protruding eyes. It was an ugly scavenger, about the size of a boxer, though it was patently a mongrel or pariah dog. Its mangy carcass was painfully thin, which made its bulbous head monstrously outsized. I was about to turn my gaze away, convinced that it was looking past me, when it started to growl. The sound, a hoarse, uneven rumbling, annoyed me more than anything else, though when it bared its yellow teeth I began to feel a little uneasy. With its black lips pulled back, it started to paw the ground. I glanced behind me, but there was nobody there. Rather than face it again, I looked out of the corner of my eye. It had stopped growling, but what appeared to be an involuntary ripple was contorting its upper lip. I wasn’t afraid of the dog; I knew I could land a hefty kick to its muzzle if it came any closer, but I didn’t relish the idea of having to defend myself against it.

I took a step away, and was glad to see it remained stationary. I was prepared to make a short detour back to the road to avoid any sort of confrontation when several other pariah dogs suddenly appeared from behind a mound of earth. Their eyes shone like blood rubies, a trick of the setting sun, but enough to unsettle me. The black dog, emboldened by the appearance of the pack, started its advance. It strutted towards me. I headed purposefully for the road, one hand holding the Leica against my side. The other dogs descended from the summit of the mound and joined their black companion. They were three or four yards behind, snarling and barking. The fear of being bitten, of feeling their teeth snapping into my flesh, reared up inside me. The dogs, as though sensing my nerve was about to collapse, inched closer. There was no stick to beat them with, no stone near enough to throw. The only thing I could do was to keep walking. To look back or to run would surely have given them a reason to attack.

I was thirty yards from the road when in the distance I saw a cart kicking up the dust as it made its way to Baghdad. The dogs continued to track me, their barking a cacophony of fury and hunger. One grizzled muzzle was sniffing at my calf. With an ungainly step I lifted my heel sharply and caught its jaw from below. It fell back with an angry yelp, while the others continued in their chase. The cart was making its slow journey towards me. I crossed the road, for no other reason than to keep moving. The heat was taking its toll. My hands were sweating. The black pariah followed me for a yard or two then turned round. I glanced back and saw to my relief that the dogs had stopped on the other side. I started in the direction of the cart. The pack moved in unison with me, but for some inexplicable reason the road kept us apart.

The cart and mule were coming closer. I could see a father and son sitting together. The barking continued, their anger unabated by my crossing to the other side. I wondered whether or not it would alarm the driver and his mule, but their progress remained steady. As the dark features of their faces became visible I waved at them. With a pull of the reins the mule lifted its head, and its soft shambling stopped. I walked up to the cart. The driver, wrapped in a grey robe, paid no heed to the barking dogs, but kept his eyes on me. I greeted them with what little Arabic I know and gestured towards Baghdad. The son, a boy of no more than ten, nimbly climbed into the back of the cart, which was full of pomegranates. The man leaned towards me, offering me his hand. He pulled me up onto the rickety frame and then shuffled over in order to give me some room. With one flick of his thin rod, the mule staggered forward. I looked over his shoulder to see if the. . .