Ghost Song (45 page)

The Rat-Banish, when the cousin brought it, was in a big round tin with a huge scarlet skull and crossbones on it, and POISON! in even bigger letters. That was so no one could eat it by mistake, said the cousin, although Shona thought you would have to be pretty stupid to eat something out of a tin with a scarlet skull and crossbones. Anyhow, said the cousin, tapping the tin, this would put paid to the evil little bu— Pardon, to the nasty little creatures. You did not need much: a good dessertspoonful on the floor of the potting shed and you would be rid of the rats for good.

Shona was not allowed to help put the Rat-Banish in the potting shed on account of it being dangerous, but she helped the Cheesewrights find a pair of old gardening gloves for the cousin to wear. Edna said you could not be too careful and the gloves would be burned afterwards. The cousin said they would have a bit of a bonfire: it was romantic, was a nice bonfire. He dug Mona in the ribs and winked when he said this, and Mona said, ‘Oh get off with you, our Ted.' Edna said they all knew what a one Ted was with the girls but they did not want vulgarity, thank you very much, and Ted went meekly back to his poison.

S
HONA THOUGHT FOR A
long time about the rats who were going to eat poison without knowing. Would they die screeching and squirming? Or would they just fall down and lie stiff and lifeless?

Would something that killed rats kill a person and would that person screech and squirm? When she thought about Anna screeching and squirming—perhaps still wearing the rude trousers and the boots she had worn to the music competition—Shona was quite pleased.

She waited until Thursday afternoon. Once she got home from school she was supposed to do her homework. The Cheesewrights did not come to Grith on Thursdays, so this was the day her mother fussed about in the kitchen, cooking the evening meal. She spent hours on it. When Shona had her own house she would not spend hours cooking meals and then washing up the dishes afterwards; she would pay someone to do it for her or she would go out to restaurants all the time.

Anna was off out somewhere—when Anna was at Grith she was almost always off out somewhere—and Grandfather was in his study, pretending to do a crossword from
The Sunday Times
.

All this meant Shona was on her own for at least an hour. She put on a pair of old woollen gloves that could be lost somewhere afterwards—no one would bother about a crummy pair of gloves—and went out to the potting shed, careful not to be seen from any of the windows. The potting shed was small and dark and secret-feeling. It smelt of compost and wood. The tin of Rat-Banish was on a high shelf so it could not be knocked over by mistake. The shelf was too high for Shona to reach, but there were some big old flower pots in the corner: she dragged one across the floor and climbed onto it. Then she reached up and, cupping her hands around the fat tin, lifted it down. Ted Cheesewright had used the edge of a screwdriver to lever up the lid and Shona did the same, being careful not to spill any of the contents. The lid stuck a bit then came up with a horrid sucking noise.

She had taken a plastic bag from the kitchen drawer and the metal scoop which Mona sometimes used for baking Grandfather's drop scones. The scoop could be lost along with the gloves and Grandfather would have to do without his drop scones until another was bought.

She had not known what the Rat-Banish would look like, and she had not known, until this minute, whether it would look like any of the food they ate at Grith—in particular any of the food Anna ate. If it looked grungy or if it was a sticky grey mess the plan would not work, because Anna was not going to eat any kind of grey grungy stuff and Shona would have to think of another way of killing her.

But as soon as the lid came off she knew it was all right. The poison was straw-coloured—little pellets and wisps and seeds—and it looked almost exactly the same as the muesli Anna ate for breakfast each morning—the muesli which no one else at Grith ever touched. Shona took four scoops of Rat-Banish and tipped them into the bag. Enough? Ted Cheesewright had said one dessert-spoonful was plenty for the rats, so this much should be enough for one person. She sealed the bag with the plastic tie, stuffed the gloves and the scoop into a flower pot so she could come back later to bury them in the garden, then went back to the house.

Her mother had stopped banging around in the kitchen and Shona could hear her upstairs. She went cautiously into the kitchen, which was empty, unless you counted the smell of stew. Listening for the sound of her mother coming back downstairs, Shona went across to the larder, which had marble shelves and floor. Here was the screw-top canister where the muesli was kept. The Cheesewrights were careful about storing things in jars and canisters on account of the paper and cardboard packets sometimes getting soggy at the corners because of the larder being a bit damp. Anna's muesli did not get soggy at the corners because of the canister, but it would get a lot worse than soggy after today. Shona tipped the bag so the contents poured out, replaced the lid, and shook the canister.

As she went back to the potting shed to get rid of the gloves, scoop and bag, she wondered how long it would take before Anna worked her way down to the poisoned bits of muesli.

Coming out of the potting shed she suddenly felt very odd as if something might have come tumbling down from a roof and smacked her very hard on the top of her head. For a moment there was a really bad pain, as if her skull had been wrenched into two separate pieces. She thought she was going to be sick because there was the same feeling of panic you got when you were going to be sick, but after a few moments this went away. By the time she got back to the kitchen door, the being sick feeling and the head split in two feeling had gone, although she thought one of the Moil fogs must have come rolling in without her noticing, because everything seemed misty and sounds were muffled.

Her hands were a bit dusty and the front of her jumper had dry earth on it as if she had been gardening. Shona looked at this in puzzlement for a long time, because she could not think how it had got there. She did not remember doing any gardening today: it was not something you did on dark November afternoons. Perhaps she had been out to the potting shed and forgotten about it—yes, that must be it. Mother must have wanted one of the plant pots for her African violets; probably later she would say: Shona, did you fetch the plant pot, or the gardening apron, or the bundle of twine, or whatever it might be, and then Shona would remember.

She washed her hands and brushed the dry earth from her jumper, and went into the dining room to do her homework. While she was working out the sums which were tonight's task the misty feeling came back, making it quite difficult to do them properly. Mother did not say anything about sending her out to the potting shed, and Shona still could not remember why she had been outside, or how she had got earth on her jumper.

The next morning when she woke up the mist was still there, and it seemed to have got inside her head as well, because she felt as if it was stuffed with cotton wool. Perhaps she was going to get measles—two people at school were away with measles. But she ate her breakfast as normal, porridge and toast and a mug of milk. She and her mother always had breakfast together, then if it was a nice day they set out to walk to the school at half past eight; if it was raining or cold they did not need to leave until fifteen minutes to nine because they went in the car.

Today was Friday, so everyone at school was talking about the weekend. There was a birthday party on Saturday afternoon with a conjurer and everyone was to wear fancy dress. Shona had been invited to the party, but her mother had not thought it a good idea, so she was not going.

Mother collected her as usual at three thirty, bringing the car because it was raining. She looked a bit strange: her eyes were red as if she had been crying and she drove jerkily, as if she did not much care if they landed in a ditch. But when Shona said, ‘Is anything the matter?' she at once said, ‘No, nothing. Well—as a matter of fact, I have a bit of a headache. Nothing much—I'll take some aspirin when we get home.'

When they got home, her mother made toast in the kitchen—Shona usually had scrambled eggs or toast and honey when she got home from school. Mother toasted the bread and got out the jar of honey, and then she said, in a peculiar voice, ‘Shona, your Aunt Anna won't be coming to Grith any longer.'

Aunt Anna. It took Shona a moment to think who Aunt Anna was. Oh yes, Anna. She said, ‘Why not?'

‘She's going to live in London. Some friends she has there—' Here, mother broke off, and Shona saw her face working as if trying not to cry. ‘You know Anna,' said her mother with a dreadful attempt at sounding amused, ‘a real little butterfly.'

There was something wrong with this—Shona knew there was and it was something to do with the peculiar feeling she had had for two whole days now. The misty feeling was hovering in front of her eyes now, making it difficult to see things clearly. She could not see this Anna person properly at all—there was just a vague outline of somebody who wore clothes people stared at, and who got in the way.

‘But it will be better if you don't mention it to your grandfather,' Mother said, still intent on spreading honey on the toast. ‘He's very upset indeed. Anna was the apple of his eye, you know.'

‘No, all right. Can I have an extra piece of toast and honey, please, I'm absolutely starving because we had arithmetic today and it's really hard, arithmetic.'

While she was eating the toast and honey, her mother said, ‘I think you should have an early night, tonight. You look very tired. And a bit flushed. You'd better have half an aspirin.'

Shona did not say she was not tired, it was just that the misty feeling was still all round her, like thick fog. Nor did she say that whatever had split her head in two yesterday was still making it ache. She had half an aspirin, which was quite an important grown-up thing to have, and then went to bed. Once there, she found she was actually very tired indeed and went straight to sleep. She woke up once, because of having a horrid nightmare—all about getting up in the middle of the night, and seeing her grandfather and her mother building a wall in the cellar and putting the body of somebody inside it. It was a really bad nightmare, but after a while she finally managed to go back to sleep and by morning she had practically forgotten it. It was not something to make a fuss about; everyone had nightmares.

A log broke apart in the fireplace, sending showers of sparks out, and Shona sat bolt upright, momentarily unsure where she was, her eyes refusing to focus on her surroundings.

Realization came back slowly. This was not Grith with its cold rooms and its black secrets that had to be covered up; this was Levels House in Somerset. Or was it? She put up a hand to her eyes, because the two halves of her mind were slipping out of alignment again—she could feel them pulling against each other. Waves of pain went through her head, then receded, leaving her perfectly calm. This was good; it was good to be calm when you had to do something that no one must know about.

She had been perfectly calm on that day over twenty years ago: the day before her eighteenth birthday when she had confronted her mother with the truth about Iain Seymour, and her mother had said those words that had lain on the air like thick slime.

We lied and pretended and we guarded you… We knew, you see, what you did that day…when you were eight… We all knew you killed Anna.

In that moment, the glaring fury had swamped Shona: how
dared
her mother talk patronizingly of protecting her! Of lying and pretending and guarding!