House of Echoes (25 page)

‘First-rate idea.’ Geoffrey smiled. ‘You do look washed out, Joss my dear.’

Washed out, she thought much later as she climbed the stairs to the bedroom. I suppose that’s one word for it. She felt almost sorry for the others. In spite of the heat they felt duty bound she suspected to go for that one last walk before setting off in their various directions. The Grants to Oxford – Mat was spending another couple of days with his parents before setting off back north – David and her parents to London. In some ways she was glad they were going. Having so many people in the house was exhausting; but in other ways she was sorry. While they were there, there were people to keep an eye on the children, people to create noise – critical mass – within a large house, drowning out the other sounds, the sounds that came from the silence.

Sitting on the edge of the bed she kicked off her sandals and
lay back on the pillow. She had drawn the curtains against the sun and the room was shadowy, the heat stifling. She could feel her eyes closing. Relaxing on top of the duvet she could feel some of the aching tension easing out of her bones, the heat and the darkness behind her eyelids like a warm bath of peace. Sleep. That was all she needed to soothe away her fears. Sleep, undisturbed by a crying baby or the restless, hot body of her husband next to her in the bed. Poor Luke. He was out in the coach house with Jimbo working amongst the smells of oil and petrol and the heat of sun-warmed metal.

The weight on the side of the bed was so slight she barely noticed it. For a moment she lay there, eyes still firmly shut, resisting the lurking flutters of fear, then slowly, reluctantly, she opened them and looked around. Nothing. The room was still. There was nothing near the bed which could have caused the slight frisson of movement in the air, the almost unnoticeable depression of the bedclothes near her feet – nothing beyond the stirring of the bed curtain in a stray breeze from the window. Feeling her mouth dry and uncomfortable she swallowed and closed her eyes again. Nothing to worry about. Nothing to be afraid of. But the moment of relaxation had gone. She could feel the uncomfortable trickle of adrenaline into her system, nothing dramatic, nothing startling, just a premonitory priming of the nerves. ‘No.’ Her whisper was long drawn out, anguished. ‘Please, leave me alone.’

There was nothing there. No shadow in the corner, no strange half-heard echoes in her head which seemed to come from some unrecognised aural receptor which had nothing to do with her ears, nothing but a shred of instinct which was telling her that all was not well.

Pushing herself up on her elbow, she could feel a trickle of perspiration running down her face. Her hair was sticky; it needed washing. More than anything, she realised suddenly she would love a long, cold bath, somewhere she could wallow sleepily with the door locked, and the humid heat of the afternoon kept at bay.

Swinging her feet to the floor she dragged herself off the bed, realising at once that she was still dizzy and aching with exhaustion. Padding on bare feet across the cool boards she headed for the bathroom and putting the plug in the bath turned on the taps
– mostly cold – and tipped in a little scented oil. Her face, as she examined it in the mirror was white, damp, and even to herself exhausted. There were dark rings over as well as under her eyes, where the lids were sunken and drawn, and her body, as she peeled off her thin cotton shirt and blouse and underwear was ugly – still swollen, her breasts huge and blue veined, damp with sweat. She scowled at herself, tempted for a moment to veil the mirror with a towel. The idea made her smile as she stooped to turn off the tap and step gingerly into the cool water. The bath was definitely an improvement on the bed. A huge old-fashioned bath with ornate iron legs she smiled to herself every time she climbed into it at the thought that such things were now the height of expensive fashion. Cool, supporting to her back, it felt solid and somehow secure. She lay back until the water lapped around her breasts, her head against the rim, and closed her eyes.

She wasn’t sure how long she had slept but she woke to find herself shivering. Chilled she sat up with a groan and hauled herself out of the water. She had left her watch on the shelf above the wash basin. Grabbing it she looked at it. Nearly four. The others would be back from their walk soon, and Ned would be wanting a feed. Snatching her cotton robe from behind the door she went back into the bedroom. It was just as before – hot and airless. Pulling back the curtains she stared down into the garden. It was empty.

Reaching for her hair brush from the dressing table Joss began to brush her hair vigorously, feeling the residual tension from her forehead and the back of her neck receding with every stroke. Throwing it down she was reaching into the drawer for fresh crisp clothes when she glanced up at the mirror and felt her stomach drop. For a split second she didn’t recognise the face before her. Her brain refused to interpret the image. She could see eyes, nose, mouth, like gaping holes in a waxen mask – then, as shock-driven adrenaline flooded through her system, the images regrouped, cleared and she found herself looking at a frightened facsimile of herself – eyes, huge; skin, damp; hair, dishevelled, her bathrobe hanging open to display the heavy breasts, breasts which for a fraction of a second had felt the touch of a cold hand on the hot fevered skin.

‘No!’ She shook her head violently. ‘No!’

Clothes. Quickly. Quickly. Bra. Shirt. Panties. Jeans. A protection. Armour. Outside. She must get outside.

The kitchen was empty. Throwing open the back door she looked out into the courtyard. ‘Luke?’

The Bentley had been pulled out of the coach house. It stood gleaming gently in the sunlight, strangely blind without the two huge headlights which still stood on a trestle table just inside the open double door of the coach house.

‘Luke!’ She ran across the cobbles and stared in. ‘Where are you?’

‘He’s gone out for a walk with the others, Mrs Grant.’ Jimbo appeared suddenly from the shadows. ‘With his Ma and Pa being here and that, he thought he’d take the chance.’

‘Of course.’ Joss forced a smile. ‘I should have thought of that.’ She was conscious suddenly of how hard Jimbo was staring at her. The young man’s face had fascinated her when she first saw it. Thin, brown, with strangely sleepy slanted eyes, the planes of the cheeks and brow bones were flattened into Slavic features of startling dramatic cast. She could never see him without picturing him on a pony, a rag tied round his head, a gun brandished in one hand as he galloped over the plain. It had been something of a disappointment when, unable to resist it, she had asked him if he could ride and he had looked at her askance with the unequivocal answer, no way.

‘You all right, Mrs Grant?’ The soft local vowels did not fit the hard features. Nor, she had to admit, did the eyes: the strange all-seeing eyes.

‘Yes. Thank you.’ She began to turn away.

‘You look tired, Mrs Grant.’

‘I am.’ She stopped.

‘The boys been keeping you awake, have they? I heard them when I stayed at yours with my mum when I was a lad. She says they always come back when there are folk in the house.’

Joss turned and stared at him. ‘Boys?’ she repeated in a whisper. He wasn’t talking about Tom and Ned.

‘All the lost boys.’ He shook his head slowly. ‘Like Pe’er Pan. I didn’t like the house. My dad said I might get taken too, but Mam had to caretake here some times for Mrs Duncan before she packed up and went to live in Paris, and I had to come too then.’

Joss’s mouth was dry. She wanted to turn and run, but, pinned by his sly gaze, she was suddenly rooted to the spot.

‘Did you ever see them?’ she managed to whisper at last.

He shook his head. ‘Our Nat saw them though.’

‘Nat?’ Joss could feel the tightness in her throat increasing.

‘My sister. She liked it up here. Mam used to clean for Mrs D and she often brought us to play in the garden while she was working. Nat would play with the boys.’ His face darkened. ‘She thought I was a wimp because I didn’t want to. I thought she was loopy. I wouldn’t stay. I’d go and hide in the kitchen and get under Mam’s feet or if she got cross I’d nip through the hedge and go home. No matter how often she tanned my backside I wouldn’t stay.’

He looked remarkably cheerful about it now.

‘But your sister liked it here?’

He nodded. ‘Well, she would, wouldn’t she,’ he said cryptically. He reached for a soft cloth and began buffing the huge head lamps.

‘You don’t mind working here now, though?’ Joss said thoughtfully.

He grinned. ‘Na, I don’t believe in that stuff any more.’

‘But you think I do?’

He winked. ‘I heard them talking about you. I didn’t think it was fair. After all, it’s not just you, is it. Loads of people have seen the boys.’

And the tin man without a heart?

Joss wiped the palms of her hands across the front of her shirt. ‘Does your sister still live in the village, Jim?’

He shook his head. ‘She got a job in Cambridge.’

She felt a sharp pang of disappointment. ‘But she comes back? On visits?’

He didn’t look too sure. With a shrug he rubbed at an almost invisible speck of rust. ‘Not often.’

‘And your mother?’

He shook his head. ‘When Mam and Dad split up, Mam went to live in Kesgrave.’

‘Does your Dad remember this house in my mother’s time?’

Jim shrugged. ‘I doubt it. He wouldn’t set foot in the place.’ He looked up at her and again she saw the narrow, calculating look. ‘He didn’t want me to take this job.’

‘I see.’ She supposed she didn’t need to ask why. Too many local tradesmen had explained with a shudder why they would not want to live here themselves.

She sighed. ‘Well Jimbo, if you see Luke tell him I was looking for him, OK?’

‘OK, Mrs Grant.’ He was smiling. As she turned away she felt rather than saw him straighten up from the lamp and stand watching her as she retraced her steps across the courtyard.

The French doors in the study were open onto the terrace. Standing just outside on the cool stone she surveyed the rather motley collection of garden furniture they had assembled from the outhouses round the courtyard. There were two Edwardian recliners – a little rotten, but remarkably solid considering their age. Two wicker chairs, chewed by mice, but again just about serviceable, and a couple of decidedly dodgy deck chairs both within days of the ultimate split which would deposit their occupiers unceremoniously onto the ground with total lack of dignity. She smiled involuntarily as she always did when she looked at them. Enough to make the owner of an upmarket garden centre go prematurely grey. To sit at this moment in one of those long, Edwardian recliners, which smelled of damp and age and lichen, even though they had cooked for weeks now on the terrace would be heaven. With a cup of tea. Just for a few minutes. Till the others came back.

She turned back into the study. She ought to take the opportunity to write, while the house was quiet. She looked guiltily at the pile of neatly printed pages on the desk. It was nearly three weeks since she had touched it. Picking up the last few pages she glanced at them. Richard – the hero of her story, the son of the house whose tale came so easily to her pen that she wondered sometimes if it were being dictated to her – had he been one of the lost boys? Were there generations of boys like George and Sam haunting the attics of the house? She shuddered. Had Richard in real life not survived his adventures to live happily ever after as he was going to in her story, but fallen prey like her brothers to another of the accidents and illnesses which plagued the sons of Belheddon? ‘Please, God, keep Tom and Ned safe.’ Throwing down the pages she went back to the doors. Geoffrey and Elizabeth had appeared on the far side of the lawn. Behind them she could see Joe and Alice with the pram just coming through the
gate. They must have all walked across the fields and down to the low red cliffs above the estuary. Mat had appeared now, with Tom Tom sitting on his shoulders, and Lyn beside him and last of all, Luke. They were all laughing and talking and for a moment she felt a wave of utter loneliness, strangely excluded from the group, even though they were of all the people in the world those closest to her.

She watched as they approached her across the grass.

‘Did you sleep well?’ Luke greeted her with a kiss.

She nodded. She stooped and lifted Ned from the pram. He was fast asleep, oblivious to the world. Hugging him against her she felt the ache in her breasts, the need to feed him. She glanced at Lyn. ‘Shall we have tea soon?’

‘Sure.’ Lyn was relaxed and smiling. Her tee-shirt had slipped off one tanned shoulder; her legs, long and slim, were dusted with sand beneath the frayed, cut-off jeans.

‘You all went on the beach?’ she asked.

Lyn nodded. ‘Mat and I took Tom down to make sand castles. It’s glorious there today.’ She stretched her arms languidly above her head. Joss saw Mat’s eyes go involuntarily to Lyn’s breasts, outlined so clearly under the thin blue tee-shirt. He was looking remarkably cheerful.

‘I’ll take Ned up and change him.’ Joss headed for the stairs as the others trooped, talking loudly, towards the kitchen.

She glanced warily around her bedroom. The sun had moved round slightly and the room was cooler. In her arms the baby had opened his eyes.

He was gazing up into her face with unwavering concentration. She dropped a kiss on the end of his nose, overwhelmed with love for him. No one. No one was ever even to think of harming him or she would not be answerable for her actions. Sitting down in the low chair by the window, she gazed down at him, overcome with love as he dozed off again, seemingly not ready yet to be fed. Breathing in the heavy scent of mown grass and roses from the climber outside the window she felt herself grow drowsy and as her eyelids became increasingly heavy her arms began to loosen the hold on the baby, almost as if someone was gently taking him from her …

‘Joss? Joss, what the hell are you doing?’ Lyn’s shriek brought her back to the present with a jerk of terror. Snatching Ned from
her, Lyn had turned on her with the ferocity of a spitting cat. ‘You stupid idiot! You could have killed him! What were you doing?’