Ghosts of Winter (7 page)

After my inspection of the rooms I decided it would be advisable to consult the architect again. Surely Anna would have some constructive input into my plans. However, a week of total isolation and immersion in the house, concentrating mainly on avoiding the ghosts of the recent past, made the prospect of dealing with her, in all of her professional glory, quite frightening. I told myself I was merely intimidated by her confidence, a quality I’d always struggled to possess. Yet the prospect of meeting the equally assured and competent Maggie Potter again was something I welcomed. Maggie made me feel that if she could make the best out of life then so could I. No, with Anna it was something else too. I knew perfectly well what it was. Why did my architect have to be a stunning and compelling woman? Why not a bumbling old man who I wouldn’t feel remotely attracted to?

Before I could think twice about it, and knowing I’d never get anywhere with the house if I didn’t consult her, I picked up my mobile phone and dialled her number.

“Hello, Anna Everest.” She’d answered after just one ring. I was momentarily taken aback. I’d expected to have to leave a message with her secretary, not to get through to the great one herself. At first, her clipped tones were not comforting.

“Oh, hello,” I mumbled, quickly gathering my scattered thoughts. “It’s Ros Wynne at Winter Manor.”

“Hi, Ros, how’s it going there?” Her voice was warmer now that she knew who she was talking to, and I felt encouraged.

“Good. Well not much has happened, but I do have some power at least. I’ve spent the week looking everything over and going through what Auntie Edie had already prepared. I think we should get together and talk about it.” I paused and waited for a reply. “If you have time,” I added awkwardly when none was immediately forthcoming.

“Yes. Hang on a second, I’m just looking at my diary. Do you want me to come there, so we can look at some of the work in question?”

“That’d be great,” I replied, secretly dreading another visit to my disorganised squat in the hallway.

“I can make it tomorrow afternoon, after lunch. How does half past one suit you?”

“Perfect,” I replied, thinking how little time that was to prepare myself. “Thanks.”

“No problem. See you tomorrow then.”

“Yes, bye.”

“Bye.” I pressed the button to end the call, left with the feeling there had been something else I wanted to say, but with no idea what it was.

I discarded the phone and lay down on my camping bed, wondering when I’d grown so uncertain of myself in the simplest situations. I looked up, beyond where the staircase reached towards the first storey. The ceiling here above the hallway was the full height of the two storeys of the house, white plaster with dark wooden beams supporting it. A comprehension of the vastness of the house hit me full on, and I felt lost and small. What was my insignificant life in comparison with the years of this house? If I was Winter Manor, I’d be viewing my arrival here with some scepticism. The potential for me to screw up this new phase of my life was endless. And I really knew all too well where my unfamiliar insecurities were founded. For the first time in my life, I didn’t have family, friends, or Francesca to rely on. The fixed points, the guiding lights of my life, had all gone. I knew I’d still not come to terms with that. Now I had to meet new people, begin new friendships. Somewhere into that, I couldn’t help but hope, slotted Anna, my architect.

Nervous tension built in the pit of my stomach at the thought of Anna coming to Winter Manor the very next day, and that feeling remained with me whatever I did and was still there when I woke up in the morning. I washed, dressed, and climbed into my car to navigate the five miles to the nearest supermarket. I had tea and coffee, but nothing else to offer at all.

In the bright lights of the supermarket I felt like I’d been a hermit, now finally emerging from a cave after many years to find the outside world overwhelming. I wanted to return to my cave. In a shop I was unfamiliar with, the array of products, the bustle of shoppers, and the piped music were both dazzling and disorientating. I bought a few essentials to keep me going for at least another week, and then deliberated for five minutes as to whether Anna was likely to prefer chocolate cake or carrot cake. In the end I purchased both.

I spent the remaining hours of the morning ensuring the part of Winter Manor that was now my home seemed as clean and tidy as it was possible for it to be. I’d still not found another chair, but I’d offer Anna my folding stool and take the bed myself. I placed the two cakes on plates on the low table, and then concluded it made me look over-prepared, so I returned them to their packaging and put them away in the cardboard box in which I was storing my food.

Determined she wouldn’t think I wore clothes that looked as though I slept in them every day, I dressed in my dark jeans, an Indian embroidered top, and a mauve velvet jacket with the sleeves rolled up. I dabbed my lapels with patchouli oil, then brushed my hair and tied it back. I found my turquoise pendant and draped it around my throat. Turquoise, one of the more expensive stones, was very helpful to the throat chakra, coloured blue, which aided communication. I wasn’t sure I still held my old faith in the power of stones and crystals, but I figured a little possible help wouldn’t go amiss. If nothing else, turquoise made an attractive piece of jewellery.

I suspected Anna would be punctual, and sure enough, it was exactly 1:30 when she knocked on the door. I’d been lingering just inside nervously awaiting her arrival, and I made myself pause before I opened it.

She was not exactly smiling, but her gaze was friendlier than the last time I’d opened the door to her.

“Hi,” she said.

“Hi, come on in.” I tried to match the tiny smile she offered me with an equally restrained one of my own. I couldn’t help a furtive inspection of her appearance. She wore her long black coat again today, but this time with a thinner scarf of green crushed velvet. Her pale hair was loose, hanging sleekly to just above her shoulders where it curled under neatly. I wondered if she had to style it to achieve the effect, or if her hair simply grew in that precise, tidy way. Nothing could have been much further from my own unruly frizz.

“Can I make you a cup of tea or coffee?” I asked, as she came in looking around her keenly once more. I found myself burning to know what she was thinking. I wondered if she was expecting me to have achieved more, or if she was pleasantly surprised by the more organised appearance of the hallway compared with her last visit. Her expression was inscrutable.

“Tea would be lovely please. Black, no sugar.” I turned on the gas burner below the already-filled kettle and put two tea bags into mugs. While I did so, Anna balanced her briefcase on the lowest step of the staircase, then removed her coat and hung it over the end of one of the banisters. When I looked back at her, I found she was less imposing without the coat. Still I stared at her, couldn’t stop myself. Anna was slim, in a beautifully linear way I couldn’t help but admire. Her suit, today a combination of dark grey woollen trousers and jacket, was perfectly tailored. There were no darts at the waist to give the illusion of a narrow waist and wide hips, rather it was cut in very angular, yet graceful, lines, defining her tall, lithe figure. The trousers were cut close to long legs and slim thighs. She wore those unusual flat black leather brogues again. Beneath the jacket was a wide-collared shirt, pale blue with thin dark grey stripes. Nothing was at all out of place, and it suited her perfectly.

Anna was regarding me evenly with those ice blue eyes through the magnifying lenses of her square glasses. I turned red as I realised she was most likely wondering what the hell I was staring at.

“Sorry,” I said, searching for an innocent explanation for my fixation with her appearance, “that’s a beautiful suit. I’m guessing it’s not from the high street.”

She smiled more broadly than I expected at my compliment, showing straight white teeth. “Thanks. You’re right, not even off-the-peg, I have a tailor. I designed it myself actually.” She said it with no hint of bragging, and as if having a tailor was the most normal thing in the world.

“You can design buildings and clothes?” I secretly wondered if there was anything this woman couldn’t do, and was even more impressed.

“I studied design in general to begin with. It was a toss-up between fashion and architecture at university. The possibilities of working with historic buildings swayed me in the end. I don’t so much design new buildings these days as bring my knowledge to the renovation of old ones.” She gave me a slightly crooked smile and her eyes were inquisitive, as though she was feeling out how interested I really was in her career and what compelled her.

“Like this one, I guess.” I hoped my expression showed my genuine enthusiasm for learning from her.

“Exactly. Winter fascinates me actually.”

“Does it really?”

“Yes. It’s more like someone’s personal project than a large scale prestige property. Someone designed it exactly as they wanted to, with very little concern for architectural fashion.” The timbre of her voice grew warmer and deeper as her passion for her subject increased.

“Like you and your suit,” I said, then flushed. “Not that it’s not fashionable—”

“I hope it’s not actually.” She smirked slightly as though she rather enjoyed an element of the awkwardness between us. “Style and fashion are rather different things, don’t you think?”

“Absolutely.” I saw her brief examination of my own outfit and wondered what conclusions she drew. “Is it the same with this house?”

“Yes. As I mentioned before, the façade is pure Palladian, but the clock tower is baroque.”

“I think I know what baroque is, but you’ll have to enlighten me what you mean by Palladian,” I admitted. “But have a seat first.” Anna glanced at the small folding stool and the camping bed and elected to perch on the bed. I felt an odd twinge as she did so, the action feeling like an invasion of my personal space but not a wholly unwelcome one. The way she held my gaze as she lowered herself gave me the unsettling feeling she knew exactly what effect she was creating. I tried not to think about it, looking away as I settled myself onto the stool. But I felt strangely compelled to learn more of what was behind her rigid façade, so I forced myself to continue the conversation, looking back into those intense eyes. “I am interested to learn a bit more about architecture. I really know very little.”

 I was glad of my ignorance in the next moment because Anna’s entire expression lit up with enthusiasm at the chance to explain the architectural concepts she’d mentioned. With that fire in her eyes and a smile she barely seemed conscious of on her pink lips, she was transformed from striking to beautiful. I felt a dangerous heat creep through my body and willed myself to concentrate on her words.

“Baroque bent all the rules. It was curvy and feminine.” Her eyes flicked to mine as if she was watching for a reaction. I wondered what she expected, and felt warm. Her smile curled wider before she went on. “Even the word itself is rather beautiful. It’s from the Portuguese meaning
misshapen pearl
. You had twisted columns, oval rooms, sculptural designs. Though it followed patterns, it didn’t seem precise. It was artistic and dreamy.” Her voice, infused with zeal for her subject, deepened further, while remaining within its clearly defined range of expression. I found my gaze drawn from our intermittent eye contact to those pink lips that curved and shaped with such appeal when she spoke. I made myself look back to her blue eyes, the ice entirely melted now.

She hesitated and raised her eyebrows. “Are you sure you’re interested?” I wondered if I’d missed something, a question I was supposed to answer, while I was busy contemplating the change that had occurred in her eyes.

“Very much so,” I said, leaning forward on my stool.

“In the architecture?” she enquired, in what sounded suspiciously like a teasing tone. I frowned and flushed. Had I heard her correctly? Or was my imagination adding implications that weren’t intended?

“I’m very interested in the architecture.” I tried to keep any trace of either embarrassment or indignation out of my tone. It was possible I’d misheard her. Again her eyes lingered on mine for a moment longer than was necessary, and I thought I saw amusement there. Her measured expressions were infuriating to interpret. But it was also a rather compelling game to play. Her face grew more matter-of-fact again as she returned to her specialist subject.

“Palladianism takes its name, appropriately enough, from a man called Palladio, who was a sixteenth-century Venetian architect. It became popular mostly in the mid-eighteenth century. It was really the total rejection of baroque and drew its influence from ancient Greece and Rome. Proportion and rules were suddenly all important.” Her hand made a vertical gesture in the air in front of her. My gaze was drawn to her slender fingers briefly before her words recalled me to myself, and I made eye contact again. “You get a lot of straight columns and pediments, like the front of Winter.” Precision and straight lines. It described Anna in every detail. That was what she was: perfectly Palladian. I held back a smile at my conclusion as she went on. “The sculptural aspects were reserved for statues, like in classical times.”

“That explains Phoebe then,” I replied.

“Phoebe?” She looked at me, bemused.

“The woman who looks like a Greek goddess on one side of the front steps.”

“She’s called Phoebe?” Anna raised her eyebrows, clearly unsure whether to laugh at me or be concerned for my mental health.