No Way To Escape | Novel

CHAPTER 51: IN THE ATTIC

'The landlord said that his father bought this place in 1967. Before that this house was uninhabited by anyone', Father said as we got to the stinky attic. 'When he came in, he got all the stuff from around the house which belonged to the old owner and stacked them all up here – in this attic'.

'So 'Sir' didn't have any kin to look after. Thank God, the man didn't throw them away'

'Hm. Now let's have a look around, shall we?', he said as he switched on the bulb hanging from a wired support at the centre of the roof. It blinked twice before it glowed up bright.

We started searching desperately for any note or something that was relatable to Edward. The attic smelled like rat-shit having not been taken care of for long. This gave us a feeling of being in a lion's den, at the mercy of some unknown note which would tell us the way out – something like a hypothetical map.

The room looked absolutely sooted and wrecked with some old furniture and paintings lying here and there. Sir must had been a drawing enthusiast. Three canvases were standing upright in a circle at the centre of the attic. There were old lamps and lanterns, a couple of cabinets, a wooden termite-fed bed and almost a dozen of cardboard boxes all around the place.

Father Richard got stumbled upon an old, wooden, empty cupboard and was about to fall when I got him by the arm. 'Be careful', I said as he nodded and opened the cupboard. Nothing in there. There were some carton boxes lying at the far end of the attic. I pointed at it. 'There. I can see some diaries'.

We made our way through the creeping furniture and the dust all over to the boxes. There were actually two of them. One over another. We got one each and put them down just under the light of the bulb.

'I can see you perspiring, Liam'

'Ah, excitement, Father'. I gave him a pale grin, wiping away the sweat over my forehead.

Being amiable was not a priority now; this needed to be hurried. I got one of the boxes and flung all of its contents upside down. As I did so, bunch of diaries and documents gathered up under my feet. At the other end, Father Richard, with all his gentle etiquette, started picking up one diary at a time.

'His personal ones', he said.

'Indeed'. Now my smile was real. Personal notes. If anything about Edward could be there, it has to be in something like a personal note. I was excited. Pretty damn excited. Him. He is the one. Oh Edward, I am so close. But at the same time, I didn't want myself to be overjoyed before the conclusion. Whatever happened there at the Cathedral regarding Father Frank, after all we did, had broken me down from within. I was in a mixed mood – happy for being so close to success and worried about a crunchy failure.

We went through all the diaries, some sixty-seventy of them, for about an hour – but in no avail. The three o' clock sun was now shining brightly outside, with its sunlight reaching in faintly through the heavily sooted sunroof.

My fear was now taking shape into terror. 'The fuck there has to be something!', I cried out. 'I know. I fucking know it'. But eventually to our horror, there was nothing in the diaries apart from his day-to-day daily meetings and preaching. I hurled the last diary in my hand onto the wall in anger. Father Richard was just standing there speechless. What could he say to console me? Before him was a man who knew he was going to die anyhow if he didn't get any remedy.

I crouched as my hands started shaking. There was not the fear of death. There was the resentment of defeat, of failure, of not being able to avenge my friend. Hanging my head down, I started crying. I was just into my sobs when Father asked me to look up. I saw another diary in his hand.

'Where-wha-how?'. I was confused.

'I saw it lying down there'. He pointed at the place from where we had picked up the boxes. 'Let's just—'

I hesitated. 'No. No. No, no, no Father!'. I shook my head. 'I can't do it anymore. It feels like my guts have sinked. I feel so void within!'. There were still tears in my eyes. Father nodded and opened the book while my head drooped down again into silent sobs. I could just hear the fluttering of the pages as he was going through it.

'Liam!'. He suddenly called out. I looked up swiftly in shock. There was hope in his eyes, and happiness, as he gasped and turned the diary to me.

The title – The Warwick's – was written over the left side page. Startled, I got up and snatching the diary from Father's hand, started reading it.