Property of a Lady (3 page)

Blown up on to the computer monitor, Charect House looked benign and bland. The first three or four shots showed the frontage and views of the back. Michael remembered taking those to the sound of the locksmith’s cheerful whistling.

It was the fifth photo that caused an icy hand to twist into his ribs. He had moved a little way back into the garden for that one, hoping to get a good shot of the roofline and the chimneys. People worried about roofs and chimneys in old houses, and Jack would appreciate shots of them.

Almost all of the windows were splintered with sunlight, but the top row – the small attic windows directly under the eaves – were in shadow. At the very smallest one was the clear outline of a female figure pressed against the glass, obviously looking down into the gardens. One hand was raised as if she might be waving.

Or as if she might be banging on the glass.

Michael sent a non-committal email to Jack, saying he was glad the photos had been helpful, that he would of course go back to check the progress of the various work, and that he hoped Ellie would get over her spell of nightmares. It upset him to think of the small Ellie with her heart-shaped face and bright hazel eyes suffering nightmares and crying. He would send her a light-hearted email as if Wilberforce had written it, making up a Tom-and-Jerry-type story about the family of mice who lived under the stairs at Oriel College and who always got the better of Wilberforce, jeering and blowing raspberries at him from holes in the skirting boards. He sometimes did this, and Ellie always loved the stories and wanted more of them.

He made several attempts to respond to Jack’s veiled questions about the face at the window, but the first draft sounded as if he was discussing a silent horror movie, the second had an air of worried apology, and the third appeared to have been written by a too-eager estate agent trying to sell Borley Rectory or the Bloody Tower . . . (‘You get a lovely view of the river by night and the only ghost who’s in any way troublesome is Ann Boleyn and that’s only once a year on the anniversary of her beheading . . .’)

In the end he did not comment about the photo at all. He would prefer to let Jack and Liz suspect he was having a secret (and therefore presumably illicit) fling, rather than plant the idea that their house had a ghost. It did not, of course, because there were no such things and, even if there were, Michael was not going to believe in them. As for the meaning of charect, he would wait until Jack saw the house before he disclosed that it was a kind of rune – an ancient spell for warding off evil.

The photo apparently showing a female at the top window would have a rational explanation, and if Michael understood more about cameras and computers he would no doubt be able to provide that explanation. The obvious explanation was a freak reflection from a cloud. He looked at the photograph again, and this time he managed to increase the size to 150 per cent. He instantly wished he had not done this, because if it was a cloud, it was a very unusual one. It appeared to have a mass of dark hair, a slender neck and a garment with striped sleeves, and it could not be anything other than a human female form. Or could it? How about it being the remnant of an old curtain inside the room – or a piece of striped fabric that had blown against the window? He seized on this idea gratefully and was able to end the email to Jack by saying he hoped the house did not consign Jack to a debtors’ gaol and the rest of them to gruel by candlelight at Christmas.

Nell West hoped she would manage to buy the long-case clock for Jack and Liz Harper without it breaking their budget. They gave the impression of being fairly prosperous, but Charect House was said to be in such a tumbledown condition that it would probably bankrupt a Texan oil millionaire.

It seemed vaguely unfair that the Harpers had to pay for things that had once belonged to Liz Harper’s family, but business was business and their loss could be Nell’s gain. She had quoted a buying commission of twenty per cent of the eventual purchase price, which was pushing it a bit, but Liz Harper had said that was fine and they would love to have the clock and the table and pretty much anything else that could be found.

Nell had not been in Marston Lacy very long, but most people knew her quite well already because her shop was in the main street and she tried to have really striking displays in the bow window.

In the main, life was still bleak without Brad, but occasionally something pleasant or amusing happened and at those times Nell felt as if she had stepped out of the darkness into an unexpected splash of sunlight. And there were a number of things to be grateful for – it was important to remember that. Beth seemed to be getting over the loss of her father; she liked her school and had made friends there. This was a huge relief, because after his death Beth had woken sobbing each morning, because her daddy had been in her dream, alive again and smiling. Nell did not say Brad was in her own dreams as well.

On a purely practical level, she was surviving. There was enough money to live on – not a massive amount, but enough – and she was even starting to have a modest social life in Marston Lacy. Last month the Chamber of Commerce had issued a rather stately invitation for her to join their ranks. That was the kind of thing that would have made Brad smile in the way he always smiled if she achieved something new. She wondered if she would ever get over the knowledge that she would never see him smile again, and whether she would ever be able to stop thinking about his car skidding out of control on the icy road that night. But I’m coping, thought Nell, determinedly. It’s over a year now – it’s one year and nine months to be exact. And I’m all right.

The Harpers had emailed to say a friend of theirs, Michael Flint, was driving into Shropshire to take photos of the house – they were really keen to see what it looked like. Their daughter had drawn a bunch of pictures of how she thought it would be, but she had a crazy idea that all English houses had either thatched roofs, Elizabethan beams, or ghosts. They were not mad about thatched roofs, which might harbour rats, said Liz, or about old beams that might harbour infestation, and they certainly did not take kindly to the possibility of a resident ghost.

Nell was looking forward to meeting the Harpers. Liz Harper’s last email said they would love to know a bit about the house’s past and its occupants; if Ms West had time to do a little local research, they would happily cover her expenses. This was an intriguing idea – Nell had not seen the house yet, but she would love to find out more about it. She had already asked Cranston & Maltravers about the clock’s history, but they had only been able to tell her that Brooke Crutchley had been the last of a locally famous clockmaking family whose work had been considerably sought after in the county. You came across Crutchley clocks in any number of local National Trust or English Heritage houses in this part of the world, and this particular one was believed to have been made for William Lee in or around 1888. They did not know anything about William Lee, they said firmly, and Nell gave up on them and looked at land registers and transfers of title in the archives department of the local council. She wasted a lot of time trying to find Charect House until she found it had been known as Mallow House until 1890.

There was not very much to discover about William Lee or any of its owners, but early in 1940 it had been requisitioned by a rather obscure Ministry of Defence department. Nell glanced rather perfunctorily through a sheaf of letters clipped inside the file, thinking they would relate to the requisitioning of the house.

But they did not. The letters had apparently insinuated themselves under a paper clip on one of the MOD memos and been misfiled. They bore dates from the early nineteen sixties. Nell skimmed them, then began to read with more concentration.

THREE

Letter from: Joseph Lloyd, Planning Department, Council Offices.

To: Dr Alice Wilson, Special Investigator for Psychic Research.

D
ear Dr Wilson,

I am in receipt of your letter dated 10th ult. and will try to answer your questions to the best of my ability.

Charect House was built around 1780–1800, but its ownership is complicated and the Council is in a difficult situation. The last known owner vanished in 1939. However, in February 1940 the Ministry of Defence requisitioned the place, and it was not decommissioned until 1950. Those ten years ensured the fabric was kept in good condition, but since then the house has fallen into considerable disrepair. There are no funds to maintain it – National Trust and English Heritage were approached, but both declined, primarily because of the absence of a legal owner.

The title deeds cannot be traced – it’s believed they may have been destroyed in WWII bombings – but since the place cannot be allowed to deteriorate further, the County Council have appointed my committee to act in a caretaker capacity. We have passed a resolution that Charect House be leased to small business concerns on short-term tenancies until the legal owner can be found. The income can be utilized for repairs, and any monies remaining can be placed on deposit.

However, because of its reputation as the local ‘haunted house’, currently no suitable tenants can be found. We feel it is therefore necessary to quench the persistent and damaging rumours that surround the house, and for that reason I have (most reluctantly) agreed to an investigation by your organization.

I must tell you that I believe a normal explanation will be found for the reports of so-called ‘supernatural’ activity. The evidence all indicates that the problems are caused by one of the following:

1. Settlement in the foundations.
   
2. A fault in the plumbing, which admittedly dates to around the time of WWII.
   
3. A fault in the electrical wiring, which dates to the Abdication of Edward VIII.
   

No doubt you will bear these points in mind when conducting your investigations.

Yours sincerely,

J. Lloyd

From: Dr Alice Wilson to J. Lloyd

Dear Mr Lloyd,

In 20 years of scientific research into the paranormal I have never heard of settlement, plumbing, or electrical wiring that caused psychic disturbances of the kind being reported to your council.

Please let me have copies of the reports of all sightings, and advise whether the culprit house is actually empty. Of living people, that is.

Yours,

Alice Wilson.

From: J. Lloyd to Dr A. Wilson

Dear Dr Wilson,

Charect House is unoccupied.

I am enclosing copies of reports of what you term ‘sightings’, but do not feel any credence can be placed on these. I would point out that most come from:

– Teenagers, who might be thought to have taken illegal substances.

– Three typists who are known to be devotees of late-night television horror films.

– Revellers, whose testimony cannot be trusted, since they are known to frequent the Black Boar’s real-ale bar.

– A character known locally as Arthur the Quaffer, whose predilection for methylated spirits causes him to regularly see all manner of strange things.

If you can let me know when you could come to Marston Lacy, I can arrange accommodation for you at the Black Boar.

With good wishes,

J. Lloyd

Alice Wilson to J. Lloyd

Dear Mr Lloyd,

Please don’t tell me how to do my job; your council is paying my organization very handsomely to investigate this house, and I would prefer to earn that payment.

I will arrive on the 18th.

Good wishes to you as well.

Alice Wilson.

Nell read these letters twice. So Charect House really was Marston Lacy’s haunted house – to the extent that in the 1960s a ghostbuster had been called in. She considered Alice Wilson’s letters for a moment, rather liking the sound of her and wondering if it would be possible to find out the results of her investigation. She would like to find out more, purely for her own curiosity.

The auction took place the following afternoon in the barn-like auction rooms of Cranston & Maltravers’ offices. Nell found a seat near the front and settled down to wait, enjoying the buzz of speculation all round her. There were several dealers whom she recognized and a sprinkling of locals.

The clock was Lot No. 521. Nell did not like it very much. She had seen it on one of the viewing days, when she had checked it for signs of woodworm and repairs – if it had showed either she would have told the Harpers it was not worth the reserve price. But whatever William Lee’s reputation might be, his clock was unblemished.

It was described as a moon-phase clock – the face of the moon was set in its own secondary arch-dial above the main, conventional one. The workings would move around to mark the passing of the moon’s cycle, and the sphere representing this had been fashioned in blue enamel and lightly marked to indicate human features. Nell supposed it was intended to look a little like illustrations in children’s books of the Man in the Moon smiling benignly down from the night sky, but seen from this angle it did not look at all benign. The face was half visible, which presumably meant it was midway between moons when it stopped, and although it was probably a trick of the light or dust on the surface, it looked exactly like a full-faced man peering slyly over a wall. A Peeping Tom, thought Nell, studying it. However much you’re worth, and however famous a workshop you’ve come out of, I wouldn’t want you in my house.