Casebook Of Oliver Cyriax - Case 1# The Burning Bush (Part 1) Poem by David Harris

I knocked on his front door
half expecting a weary face
when it opened to greet me.
Instead, Oliver smiled
with a small twinkle in his eyes.
He guided me through to his study,
cluttered in the corners with artefacts
kept as souvenirs from previous cases.
He gestured me to have a seat,
then lifted his briar pipe off the mantle piece,
lit it and then made himself comfortable
in the armchair by the fire.
He looked at me through a cloud of smoke
that billowed from his pipe.
Now Mr Rogers I guess you have read in the newspapers
about the Burning Bush at Little Pebblebury.
Some think it is a religious phenomenon,
while others say it is a warning
and that we should all take heed.
Upon reading the story,
I decided to investigate the Burning Bush myself.

I telephone The Saintly Sovereign Inn at Little Pebblebury
enquiring about a room for the week.
They told me they had one left
because of the interest in their Burning Bush.
I said I would take it
and would travel down that very day.
I arrived at the village
just as the sun was beginning to set.
After settling in my room,
I came down the bar for a meal.
I got to talking to one of the locals
and was quite surprised to learn
that there had been several other ghost fires,
in and around the village the last couple of years.
The first was about two years ago
on a farm about two miles from the village.

It started about dusk as the farmer
was bringing his cattle in from the fields for the night.
As he got closer, he noticed a light
in the barn where he stored his winter hay.
At first, he though his wife
might have left a lamp lit in there,
but as he got closer, he could see the flames.
Leaving the animals in the field,
he ran into the farmhouse
and yelled to his wife to telephone the fire brigade.
He shouted that there was a fire in the barn.
The farmer grabbed a wooden pail
and rushed back out the door.
He dipped it in the animal drinking trough,
scooping out as much water he could get,
then rushed into the barn
and threw the water on the flames.
Back and forward, he ran
with as much water as he could carry.
The more water he threw on it,
the less the fire seemed to go out.

The fire brigade arrived and aimed their hoses
on the flames to douse them out.
Still the fire raged on.
Nothing it seemed could douse the flames.
Deep into the night they battled it,
then just before the dawn a
nd as suddenly as it appeared the fire disappeared.
Everyone by this time was exhausted;
still an investigation had to be made
to ensure there were no smouldering ambers that would start to blaze.
As they entered,
they found that none of the barn interior,
nor any of the hay was burnt or scorched in anyway.
It was as if there was never a fire there at all,
yet dozens of people had seen it and fought it.
Oliver stopped for a moment to rekindle his pipe.

To be continued…