believe that they are still beneath us somewhere, the distant conduits of a forgotten inner peace.’
‘She’s been getting like this a lot lately,’ Kirkpatrick warned. ‘Ever since she started her hormone-replacement pills. The rivers are still there, you silly woman, they just built storm drains over the original tunnels. The idea was that the lids could be removed in times of flooding, and water drawn off to prevent it from invading the basements of local houses. I imagine they’re all asphalted over now.’
‘No,’ said David. ‘I know where there’s one. You can still get the lid off.’
‘Would you like to show me?’ asked Bryant.
‘It’s a secret.’
‘May I remind you that you’re working for the police now?’ warned Bryant. The boy’s mobile rang. ‘It’s my mother,’ he warned.
‘Give her to me.’ Bryant waggled his fingers and took the call. ‘He’s absolutely fine, Mrs Wilton, thoroughly enjoying himself. No, of course not.’ He placed his hand over the phone. ‘You’re not wet, are you?’ Then back to the phone; ‘No, dry as a bone, I’ll have him home in just a few minutes.’ He cut her off before she could continue. ‘Now, David, let’s go and have a look at your storm drain.’
‘We’re coming with you,’ Maggie told him. ‘Don’t tell us we’re not allowed.’ She knew what Bryant was like. If they were going to poke around sewers, someone needed to keep an eye on them.
The four finished their tea and set off. ‘You don’t need a dowsing rod to find tell-tale signs of the river’s route,’ said Maggie. ‘Remember how dry it was before this rain started? All the pavement weeds died, but look along here.’ She pointed to a ragged row of spindly plants pushing up through the paving stones beside the main road. ‘Epiphytes, these are weeds that grow on other plants and live on trapped rainwater. But there wasn’t any accumulated water until a few days ago, and where are the plants they grow on? Give me a hand, David, would you?’
Stopping beside a ditch dug out for the Electricity Board, they managed to pull up a loose paving stone. ‘Look at that.’ The underside of the slab was covered in dark, slippery moss. ‘It’s a very primitive plant form that feeds on moisture. Something under the street didn’t dry out during the drought. All we have to do is follow the weeds. We have a guide to the river right here at our feet. They say you can plot the course of the London rivers by following the paths of diseases, too. Makes sense, when you think about it. Respiratory troubles are brought on by damp air. You get plenty of that around sewers. Ghost sightings, too. There are more of them near water because of high infant mortality, early deaths and drownings.’
‘Sorbus Aucuparia,’ said Kirkpatrick, pointing to the trees that guarded the entrance to the alleyway behind Balaklava Street. ‘One usually finds Tilia Platyphyllos or Platanus Hispanica. But those are a pair of Rowans.’
‘Good London trees,’ Maggie agreed. ‘They are able to withstand high levels of pollution and lousy soil, and birds love their berries. They’re strongly associated with witchcraft, of course. Very unlucky to cut one down. There are terrible stories . . .’
‘Don’t fill the boy’s head with—’ began Kirkpatrick.
‘There’s one ghost story in particular that centres on your street,’ she interrupted. ‘A real ghost story that happened right where you live now.’ Maggie’s natural flair for the dramatic ensured that the boy’s attention was held. ‘This would have been long before you were born, in the early 1950s. It seems there was a penniless young man, a student, who lived in a flat somewhere around here. He was in love with a local girl who worked in a bakery behind the high street. Although neither of them had much money, they were very much in love and were soon engaged to be married. The boy was a talented watercolour artist, and told her they would marry as soon as he could sell some pictures. But he painted subjects that were too morbid. No one wanted to buy drawings of ghouls and graveyards. So he was forced to delay his wedding. The third time he did so, his girlfriend gave up on him and married someone else. The student’s heart was broken. It was said that he went down to the canal, filled his pockets with rocks and sank into the mud. But his body was never found.
‘Some time later, the people in