Every Vow You Break (30 page)

Gina slapped her forehead with her open palm. ‘Forget it. Forget I said anything. I’m such a klutz.’

‘You started, so you’ve got to tell me now.’ Lara sat back and folded her arms, waiting.

‘Oh God. You promise you won’t freak out?’

‘I promise.’

Gina chewed on her cookie, then set her mug down on the table. ‘Well, that place has been empty for, what now, nearly five years?’

‘OK.’

‘It’s hard to sell a house like that.’

‘Like what?’

‘OK, then. This guy Larssen lived there for it must have been sixty years. I remember him from when I was a kid. He kept himself to himself, went around in the same pair of baggy old pants all that time, done up with string. He’d walk all day, for miles, just round and round the village, talking to himself. He was real stinky. We all used to laugh at him. Well, kids can be cruel. He had the house full of dogs. Let them poop all over the place.’

‘I thought I smelled dog.’

‘Your imagination’s working overtime.’ Gina laughed. ‘It was years ago. So, in the middle of one summer, Larssen stopped walking around. We noticed, but we just reckoned he was sick or something. But those dogs, they just howled away day and night inside the house. And the smell – which was pretty bad in the first place – started getting worse. In the end, Andy Schmidt, who used to live next door, just couldn’t stand it any more, so he goes round and, getting no answer when he knocks, he breaks the front door down.

‘The first thing meets him is the smell. Rotten, mixed up with dog-shit. Smell of hell, he said. Then, as the door swings open revealing the hallway, he sees it.’

‘What?’ Lara asked in a small voice.

Gina put her hands over Bert’s ears. ‘What remained of old Larssen,’ she whispered. ‘After the dogs had finished. They reckon he must’ve fallen down the stairs, broken his neck and the dogs, not having anything to eat … well, you can guess …’

‘How horrible.’ Lara thought of the stain on the carpet and her stomach turned.

‘And that’s not all,’ Gina said.

‘No?’

‘Andy Schmidt goes right ahead and calls the police, and, while he’s waiting, he rounds up the dogs and ties them to the porch. He said they were quite docile, like they were ashamed of what they had done. But when he takes himself back inside to take one last look at old Larssen he hears the thumping coming from under the stairs.’

‘I don’t like this,’ Lara said, thinking of the cellar and the bed.

‘I’ll stop then,’ Gina said. ‘You don’t need to hear the rest.’

‘I think I do.’

‘Well, eventually, Andy finds this secret door under the stair.’

‘I know it,’ Lara said.

‘And he opens it, and this even worse stink hits him, and there’s this whimpering. He finds the light switch and flicks it on, then he goes down the stairs.’

‘He found the room down there.’

‘Yep. He finds the room. And he finds Jane.’

‘Jane?’

‘Mean anything?’

‘I think I found a photograph of her in Bella’s room.’

‘No way. That’s too weird. I thought they’d completely cleared the place out.’

‘Who is she, then? And why was she down there?’

‘She couldn’t get out. He’d chained her to the wall, like a dog.’ Gina paused and took a bite of cookie.

‘The manacles,’ Lara said.

‘The manacles are down there still? Ew. Well, we knew he had a retarded or mad or something sister, but everyone said she was in some home in Buffalo. In fact,’ Gina narrowed her eyes, ‘he kept her down there in the basement all that time. She was like an albino mole, Andy said. Hadn’t been out of there for years. Just hugging herself, starved of course, rocking backwards and forwards, blind. Making little moaning sounds.’ Gina demonstrated for Lara, as if her words hadn’t been quite vivid enough.

‘Horrible,’ Lara said.

‘So the police come in. They take Jane away and put her in a home, where she should have been all that while. Seems old Larssen didn’t want to pay, so he took it into his own hands. But it turns out he had this stack of money in the bank. Nearly a million dollars. Poor old Jane didn’t last long, she was dead within a year. So all that dough he’d hung on to went to some distant cousin in Nebraska.’

‘And the house?’

‘It had a For Sale sign outside until this spring, when a person unnamed bought it and gave it to the theatre company. The price had dropped to almost nothing with the property crash anyhow.’

‘James should have told us about all this.’

‘What good would that have done?’ Gina said. ‘Ignorance is bliss. I wish I’d never opened my mouth.’ She started on another cookie.

‘I don’t know if I want to stay there any more.’

‘Hey, it’s just a set of walls. They did a load of work on it before you arrived, too. There were vans parked outside and guys working for a couple of weeks.’

‘I don’t know what they did. The place was filthy when we got there. I’ve spent the past three days cleaning it up.’ Lara thought about the carpet with the stain and shuddered. ‘What happened to the dogs?’

Gina drew a finger across her throat. ‘Well, all except one, which ran away while they were trying to get them into a van. Headed off up on the back road over the river and into the forest.’

‘What did it look like?’ Lara asked, thinking of Dog.

‘I have no idea,’ Gina said.

‘Which house is this Andy Schmidt in?’

‘He’s not there any longer.’

‘He moved?’

‘Dead.’

‘Jesus.’

‘Mummy look!’ Jack stood in the kitchen doorway, flanked by Gladys and Ethel. He was wearing a long, glittery dress, blond curled wig and full make-up, including turquoise eyeshadow, plastered-on rouge, and big red lips. ‘I’m pretty, Mummy.’

‘You certainly are, darling.’ Lara scooped him up and held him close.

Not for the first time, she wondered what sort of mess following Marcus over here had led her family into.

GINA SAID SHE FELT TOO GUILTY ABOUT EXPOSING LARA TO THE
story of the house and, by way of apology, pressed her to stay for lunch. Lara tried phoning to let Bella and Olly know that they’d have to fix themselves something, but there was no reply. She supposed they were either still asleep or had gone out. Either way, she and Jack wouldn’t be missed.

Over lunch, Lara told Gina about her car situation, and Gina immediately offered the use of her old Volvo. ‘I just haven’t gotten around to getting rid of it,’ she said. ‘It’s sitting there, doing nothing. You’d be doing me a favour.’

She took Lara into the garage down a lane at the side of her house. The rusting wreck was the same model as the Waylands’ vehicle back home: same colour, everything – although this one was even older.

‘She’s all yours,’ Gina said. ‘Please, take her away.’

By the time she and Jack left Gina’s house, with an invitation to bring everyone back that evening to a gathering around their fire pit, Lara had decided she needed to move out of the Larssen place. The story was too awful. She skirted past the theatre to see if she could catch James or Betty, to have it out with them in person.

Sure enough, James’s little sports car was parked outside the building. Lara helped Jack up the steps to the porch and banged on the front door, which was locked.

Almost immediately, James answered her knock. He looked worn out, and his eyes were bloodshot.

‘Hello darlings,’ he said, kissing Lara on the cheek. ‘To what do I owe the pleasure?’ One of the more irritating things about him was that he normally had the energy of an overexcited puppy. To see him quite so subdued was unnerving.

‘Are you all right?’ Lara asked.

‘Oh, you know. Just a bit overstretched.’

He let them in, sat behind the foyer desk and gestured to Lara to take the chair opposite. ‘I’ve got extra rehearsals for the musical
and
the worry of the Scottish play. June and Brian have had a tiff and aren’t speaking to each other – not even on stage – and I’ve got Lady M gnawing my ear off because she doesn’t like her digs. I mean as if I haven’t enough on my plate.’ He got up and went over to the kitchenette cupboard, where he filled a kettle. ‘Anyway, less of me. What can I do for
you
, Lara my love? Coffee? Mint tea?’

‘Mint tea, please.’ Lara had drunk too much coffee at Gina’s and could hear her heart pounding.

‘Well then,’ James said, turning to face her. ‘Isn’t this nice.’

‘I wanted to talk about the house,’ Lara said, hearing her voice echo in the high-ceilinged wooden room. ‘I’ve just been told what happened there.’

‘Ah.’ James rubbed his fingers deep into his temples. ‘Hang on a tick,’ he said. He pulled out a basket of toys labelled
Stay’n’Play group ONLY
.

Jack wriggled off Lara’s lap, headed for the playthings.

‘Betty. Are you still there?’ James called down the stairs. He poured two mint teas and carried them to the desk.

‘I just can’t seem to drag myself away,’ Betty said, coming up the stairs with a tape measure around her neck. ‘Oh hello, Lara darling.’ She went over and kissed her.

‘She’s found out about the Larssen place.’

‘Oh,’ Betty said. ‘Oh dear.’

‘Before you say anything else, Lara,’ James said, ‘I want you to know we had no choice. We promise to house our actors, and, in Marcus’s case, we found ourselves committed to putting his whole family up too, which presented us with a massive headache. We have to rely on people offering their space for free or for very little money, and Betty and I spend months before the summer sorting out accommodation. To find someone to take all five of you would have been nigh-on impossible if it weren’t for the generosity of an anonymous benefactor, who bought the house from the Larssen estate and donated it to us, thereby solving the problem you, the Wayland family, posed us.’

‘But you know what happened in the house?’

‘Of course we know what happened in the house,’ James said.

‘Everyone knows.’ Betty sat by Lara and took her hand. ‘But really, darling, how long ago does it have to be?’

‘Why didn’t you tell us?’

‘What good would that have done?’ James yawned, leaned back and put his hands behind his head.

‘But surely you knew we’d find out?’

‘I have a zillion things on my plate, Lara,’ James said. ‘I guess we thought if we cleared it out and cleaned it up, you would settle in, get comfortable and then, even if you did find out, it wouldn’t be so bad. I mean, it’s not so bad, is it? It’s a beautiful house. I’m not asking you to live there for ever, just the summer. Most people would be grateful,’ he added.

‘That’s unnecessary, honey,’ Betty said to James.

‘I’m just so tired,’ James said, rubbing his eyes.

‘I wouldn’t have called the house clean or clear when we arrived,’ Lara said, swallowing hard.

‘You said, honey. But we did tell them to clear it out completely before they put the furniture in, didn’t we?’ Betty looked at James.

‘And there’s a load of weird stuff in the basement, and there was that disgusting carpet with the stain in it.’ Lara felt quite sick now, at the thought of it all.

Betty looked at James. ‘I wish you’d gone and checked.’

‘Like I haven’t got enough to do?’ James said, getting up and striding across the room.

‘I suppose you’ve got nowhere else to put us?’ Lara said.

James laughed.

‘It’s just I can’t bear the thought of all the misery that went on there. That poor girl.’

‘Girl? She was well past middle age when they found her,’ James said.

‘Oh, James, that’s hardly the point,’ Betty patted Lara’s hand. ‘Tell your Aunt Betty.’

‘There’s this horrible feeling to the place.’ Lara rubbed the back of her neck and shivered. The air-conditioning in the theatre was too efficient. She wished she had brought her jacket along with her, but she hadn’t thought, with the day being so hot outside.

‘Say,’ Betty said to James. ‘How about Danny?’

‘Oh God, Betty.’ James rolled his eyes and put his head in his hands.

‘Danny?’ Lara looked at Betty.

‘Danny’ll help you out with the place. He’s a beautiful guy, lives just outside the village. A Seneca Tribe elder.’

‘So he says,’ James said, picking up the mugs and taking them to the sink.

‘And he does this great space-clearing ritual,’ Betty continued, ignoring James.

‘Space clearing?’

‘Sage burning and chanting. It rids a place of bad spirits and energies. It so works. It’s been passed down through his family, who used to live on this very land. Danny did it for us when we opened the theatre. I was certain we had a ghost downstairs. I couldn’t stay for one minute on my own. Now I practically live down there.’

‘Give me strength,’ James said, splashing water around in the basin. ‘Betty, honey, rehearsals start in ten minutes. Are you ready?’

‘I’m always ready, James,’ Betty said. She leaned towards Lara and took her hand again. ‘I’ll talk to Danny and tell him it’s urgent. I’m sure he’d love to help you out.’

What else could Lara do? She hated all that mumbo-jumbo, those purple New Age shops full of crystals and incense. But perhaps this Danny, with his people having inhabited the land long before the houses were here, was the real deal. Perhaps, she thought, he could waft his sage over her too, cast out the spell Stephen had put over her and make things simple again.

‘I’ll give it a go. But don’t let Marcus know. I’ll never hear the end of it.’

‘Well, that’s sorted then,’ James said, standing in the hallway and showing with his body language that this meeting was drawing to a close. ‘I’m sorry if you thought we were trying to deceive you.’

‘No—’

‘But I hope you see it from our point of view.’

‘Of course,’ Lara said.

She prised Jack from the basket of toys with the bribe promise of a lolly. When she finally got him away, she turned, with him on her hip, to find James and Betty standing together, smiling sweetly at her.

‘Go on,’ Betty nudged James.

‘I’ve got a vacancy for young Jack here,’ James said. ‘If he’d like to make his acting debut.’

‘Vacancy?’

‘We need a pretty chicken for the Macduff scene,’ Betty said. ‘Do you think he might be interested?’