The Whispering: A Haunted House Mystery (30 page)

It was like a macabre game of hide-and-seek. Several times she thought the man whispered something, but she could not hear what he said.

She was about halfway round; the man was a good fifteen yards behind her, and she was trying to decide if she dare risk a quick sprint across the grass to the gate, when the gate itself swung closed. The man shot round to stare at it, but Nell thought it had only been the wind that had closed it.

Or had it? Because there were other sounds in the garden now; stealthy movements. Footsteps – not as light as the lone man's had been, but still the footsteps of someone who did not want to attract attention. Nell had no idea if she could trust this new arrival sufficiently to shout for help. Or supposing it was Michael? Hope surged up, because perhaps Michael had realized the arrangements to meet at the pub had gone wrong, and so he had come out here. But wouldn't she have heard his car or seen its lights?

Now there were more than one set of footsteps, and the garden seemed to be filling up with shadows – shadows that were not quite solid but not entirely transparent. Nell shrank back, a kind of disbelieving comprehension starting to unfold in her mind.

Stephen Gilmore had fled to this house all those years ago, and on a night in 1917 – a night about which a young German soldier had never afterwards spoken – four men had followed him to execute him. Had they cornered him in this very garden? Was this a weird, incredible replay of that long-ago event? It was the wildest idea in the world, and once Nell would have rejected it out of hand. But tonight, in the shadowy old garden, she believed it completely. It was Stephen who had followed her through the grounds of his old family home, whispering to her as they went – whispering and treading furtively because he had not wanted Hugbert and the soldiers to know where he was. Had he been trying to warn her? Or ask for her help?

The shadows – yes, there were four of them – were forming a circle around the single figure. This could not be happening, this was her disordered imagination, it was a trick of the light – several tricks. But the shadows were closing in on Stephen, and somewhere inside the sighing wind were faint cries, as if for help, spun on the air with such fragility that it was difficult to be sure that they, too, were not illusions.

Nell began to move, with infinite stealth and extreme slowness, towards the gate. She reached it without mishap and eased the latch up, praying that it would not squeak. It did not, and the gate opened smoothly, but she turned to look back. Were the shadows moving in on their prey? They were like smoke, so that it was impossible to be sure of anything. Oh, Stephen, she said silently, I wish I could help you, but there's nothing I can do. Whatever happened here happened almost a hundred years ago, and I can only hope you managed to get away, or that Hugbert – dear, nice Hugbert – found a way of saving you.

She made a rather shaky way to the front of the house, taking deep, grateful breaths of the cold night air. She was reaching for her phone again, to find a taxi or to try Michael again, but before she could do either, headlights swept the night and his car came around the drive. He parked untidily, leapt out and ran towards the house.

Nell called out, ‘Michael. Over here.'

Michael stopped in mid-stride, saw Nell, and came straight to her.

‘Thank God you're here,' he said, grabbing her and pulling her to him. ‘I thought— I don't know what I thought. Are you all right? What on earth are you doing out here?'

‘I'm perfectly all right. But the walled garden—' She broke off and looked back at the narrow side path. ‘Michael, before I explain, could you bear to walk round to the back of the house to the walled garden.'

‘Now? Tonight?'

‘Yes.'

‘Certainly I will, if it's what you want, but—'

He glanced uneasily at the house, and Nell said, ‘I'm not suggesting we go inside.'

‘Thank goodness for that.'

‘I don't think there's any danger,' she said. ‘I don't think there ever was. Well, not in the walled garden anyway.'

‘What exactly happened?'

‘I'm not sure. Are you honestly all right to do this?'

‘No,' said Michael promptly. ‘But we'll go along to see what beck'ning ghost along the moonlight shade invites our steps.'

‘You do know how to add to an atmosphere. Where did you find that one?'

‘I think it's Alexander Pope, isn't it?'

‘One of the many endearing things about you is that you always assume other people are as knowledgeable as you are,' said Nell as they made a cautious way along the dark path.

The gate to the walled garden was wreathed in shadows, and there was a faint vapour on the air as if something had darted past it and left a barely-visible imprint.

Nell stopped. ‘The gate's closed and latched.'

‘Did you close it?'

‘No. I left it wide open.'

They walked forward and peered through the iron scrollwork.

‘We're like two children in a Victorian sketch,' murmured Nell. ‘Staring in awe through the gates of the big house.'

Michael put his arm round her. ‘Whatever you saw – and I think I could make a fair guess at what that was – I don't think there's anything in there now, Nell.'

‘But don't you have the feeling that we've missed something by only a few seconds? That something's just happened and we were too late – or too early – or we didn't know the right thing to say?'

‘I'm supposed to be the one who thinks like that. Talk about gamekeeper turned poacher.' He smiled at her. ‘You appear to be level with me on research, or even ahead of me.' He looked back into the shadowy garden, then shivered slightly and turned away. ‘Let's leave the ghosts to their lawful – or unlawful – occasions, and go to the Bell and compare notes over a meal.'

‘Now you mention it, I'm starving,' said Nell. ‘Wait a minute, I'll get my bag – I left it on the doorstep while I was chasing the ghosts. Or the ghosts were chasing me, I'm still not sure which it was.'

‘I'll fetch your bag. You get into the car.'

They rounded the corner of the house together. The wind was still stirring the trees, causing the branches to cast goblin-fingered shadows across the old stonework. Most of Fosse House was in darkness, the windows black and blind. But at one window a soft, flickering light showed, casting the silhouette of someone who was seated at a desk or a table, writing.

‘It's still there,' said Nell, stopping. ‘That's the light I saw earlier. I thought it was you – that's why I was trying to get into the house. But that light – it's gas light, isn't it? Or even an oil lamp. Because—'

‘Because the house didn't have electricity in Stephen's time,' said Michael softly.

‘Do you know what that room is?' Nell's eyes were still fixed on the glimmering light and the outline behind the curtain.

‘I think it's the main drawing room. I glanced in there earlier today. It had the air of hardly being used, but I do remember seeing a writing table by the window.'

‘I suppose there's no possibility of that being a – a real person?'

‘Who, for instance?'

‘The solicitor you spoke to?'

‘He couldn't have got in without these keys.'

‘Luisa's cleaner? She might have a key.'

‘Writing at a desk by gaslight?'

‘Well, no. What do we do?'

Michael looked down at Nell. Her eyes were dark smudges in her face, and she looked pale, although whether with fear or tiredness, he could not tell. He said with decision, ‘What we do is to drive away from this place like bats out of hell, and for the next few hours we pretend there's nothing and no one in there.'

‘We do?'

‘Yes. But,' he said, smiling at her, ‘we come back here tomorrow morning, to see what daylight shows up.'

After the eerie shadows of Fosse House, it felt vaguely unreal to be seated in the tiny dining-room, eating the Bell's very substantial chicken pot pie.

Between mouthfuls of chicken, Michael gave Nell the gist of Luisa's story. Nell listened with the absorbed interest that he always found endearing, then said, ‘Yes, I think I see. How sad. Was she mentally unbalanced, do you think?'

‘I think,' said Michael, and heard a slightly defensive note in his voice, ‘that she was affected by having spent her whole life in that house. She hardly ever saw anyone or went anywhere. I think most people might become a bit odd in those circumstances. And her father sounds very odd indeed.'

‘I do feel rather sorry for her.'

‘I think there was more in her life than it might sound. She was certainly regarded as something of an expert on the Palestrina Choir, and quite a number of very learned people used to contact her. I think there might have been a fair amount of interest – even purpose – in her life.' He laid down his knife and fork. ‘Can I see Hugbert's letters, now? If you're having pudding, I could skim-read them.'

‘I won't have pudding, but I'll share some cheese with you, please. You can skim while I eat.'

Michael read the letters, forgetting about the cheese, but occasionally reaching for his wine glass.

‘Hugbert fills in a lot of the gaps,' he said eventually.

‘Yes. And it sounds as if Luisa's journal fills in a lot more. There's still an awful lot we don't know, though.'

‘I wonder if we ever will,' said Michael, closing Hugbert thoughtfully. ‘The largest blank is what happened to Stephen, isn't it? Booth tried to find that out, but he doesn't seem to have done so. And his search was much nearer to it than we are now.'

‘But in the end it led him to an asylum,' said Nell.

‘I'd like to think he didn't die in there, but I'm afraid he probably did.'

‘I'd like to know about Leonora,' said Nell. ‘It sounds as if Iskander stowed her away with those people in Holland and collected her when they escaped from Holzminden – did you pick up that bit in Hugbert's letters?'

‘I did.'

‘Do you think she came back to Fosse House with Stephen?'

‘Yes, I do. I know I've given you a potted version of Luisa's journal,' said Michael thoughtfully, ‘but I don't think I've really conveyed the strangeness of it. There are passages where she almost sounds as if she thinks she actually is Leonora. Leonora had some kind of disability, according to Iskander – it sounds like club foot or something of that kind. Luisa seems to have developed a similar lameness.'

‘So you're following all the traditions of classic hauntings which would argue that for Luisa to be – um – shadowed so strongly, Leonora must have lived at Fosse House at some stage?'

‘Don't mock me, you heartless wench.'

‘I'm not,' said Nell, smiling. She snapped off a piece of celery, then said, ‘How about Stephen and the Holzminden affair? Do we think he really did shoot Niemeyer's brother?'

‘You're remembering the sentence, aren't you?' said Michael, seeing her shiver slightly. ‘Bayoneting.'

‘It's horribly brutal, isn't it? Did the brother eventually die, I wonder? Hugbert doesn't say. I suppose it might be possible to find out, although I'm not sure where you'd start.'

‘I can just about believe that someone else fired that shot at the brother,' said Michael thoughtfully. ‘But it's stretching credulity to snapping point.'

‘I could believe it. Those two were greatly disliked, and Karl – the Kommandant – sounds as if he was a vicious brute. Hugbert said the shots from Stephen's rifle went into the ceiling and the walls of the gatehouse, remember. And Stephen protested his innocence all the way through.'

‘I think he'd do that anyway.'

‘You don't believe he got away, do you?' said Nell.

‘No, I don't. I think that's why he's still there.' He glanced at her. ‘A violent death being one of the top ten favourite motives for a ghost to haunt.'

He said it with deliberate lightness, but Nell replied, quite seriously, ‘Hugbert thought Stephen was still there. What was it he said?' She reached for the book. ‘“I think he's still at Fosse House … And it's a bad feeling to think of him in that lonely, dark old house.”'

‘Luisa thought Stephen was still around, as well. So did her father, although I suppose some of his evidence can be discounted, poor chap. But I'll swear I saw Stephen myself, on two occasions at least. Only – it's all so ethereal. What we're seeing are little more than shadows. Silhouettes at lighted windows. What was it you said in the garden tonight? That we're just too late or just too early to see the reality. By the time we get there, only the shadows are left.' He grinned a bit wryly. ‘I do know how bizarre it all sounds.'

‘You seem to attract the bizarre,' said Nell. ‘But I'm getting used to it.'

‘Are you?' said Michael, looking up. ‘Enough to face a future filled with bizarre stuff?'

There was a pause, and he thought: damn, I've gone too far. I'm not even sure what I meant. But Nell said slowly, ‘That might be rather a tempting prospect. Hadn't we better sort out the spooks first, though?'

‘We'll go hand in hand into the spook-ridden sunset,' said Michael gravely.

‘You know, I've almost sometimes wondered if you and I together are some kind of catalyst for ghosts,' said Nell. ‘Like two chemical elements. You mix them or blend them and you get – I don't know – something explosive. Hydrogen or nitroglycerine, or something.'

‘You and I together are an explosive combination anyway, even without the spooks,' said Michael, putting his hand over hers for a moment.

‘I know. We're very lucky, aren't we?'

‘I do think,' said Michael as Nell withdrew her hand in quest of another sliver of cheese, ‘that Luisa would like me to find out what happened to Stephen. I almost feel as if she was handing me the ghosts, that last night. That sounds really way-out, doesn't it? Do you think I might have had too much wine tonight?'