Three Graces (28 page)

For a moment, nobody said a word. They were completely and utterly spellbound by Carys and what she was saying. It was a strange, almost powerful moment. This, she thought, must be how a good teacher feels when they have their students in the palm of their hands.

‘What kind of things?’ a young woman asked from the front of the group.

Carys paused. ‘More of a feeling than anything,’ she said. ‘A feeling that I wasn’t alone; that there was somebody with me.’

‘Have you seen anything?’ the young woman asked.

Carys and Georgiana had discussed this at great length and it had been decided that it would be totally insane for Carys to tell people of her new best-friend who came and went in a bright blue cloud and who gave her advice. They would keep things vague, mysterious and wonderfully enticing.

‘Only shadows in the shadows,’ Carys said enigmatically. ‘But other people have seen things - up and down the centuries.’

‘Then why haven’t we heard about Amberley being haunted before?’ a voice piped up from the back - Natasha’s ‘old lady’.

‘Perhaps because so much rubbish is published in newspapers today that it doesn’t leave much room for half-decent stories,’ Carys said with glee, causing most of the group to laugh.

Natasha frowned which was most unbecoming on her artificially lined face. ‘I’ve heard Amberley has financial problems. Are you sure this isn’t some sort of publicity scam?’

Carys’s eyebrows rose in surprise at her brazen question. ‘I have yet to hear of an historic house that doesn’t have financial problems. If you know of one, I’d be very interested to know who runs it because perhaps they could give us some tips.’

Again, there was a ripple of laughter through the group.

‘There may be some establishments that are unscrupulous in what they offer to the public but Amberley Enterprises is not in the business of extorting money from people under false pretences. That doesn’t mean I can guarantee you’ll all see a ghost today but I am hoping you will experience something wonderful for the price of your ticket. Now,’ Carys continued, ‘shall we go on?.’

After her words, there was an air of respect and of expectation too as they continued their tour of Amberley. Carys told them of Flemish tapestries, linen fold panelling, and all things made of marble and mahogany. In fact, she barely recognised herself or knew where all this information was coming from. It was as though Georgina’s confidence had bolstered her own or perhaps the steely presence of Natasha had encouraged Carys to do the very best job she could.

‘And here she is,’ Carys said, as they reached the Montella Room, standing underneath the portrait she’d come to love so much. ‘Georgiana, wife of the fifth Duke of Cuthland. There are several portraits of her by the Italian artist, Leo Montella, but none painted with such delicacy as this.’

There was perfect silence for a moment as fifteen pairs of eyes gazed up at Georgiana’s portrait.

‘Some of you might have heard of The Blue Lady.’

‘The ghost? Is this her?’ the excited young woman asked.

‘This is her,’ Carys confirmed.

Then, right on cue, the door leading from the Montella Room into the Reading Room slammed shut.

‘Oh my God!’ the young woman exclaimed as everyone’s heads spun round. ‘Is that her?’

Silence fell upon the room like a sudden cloud and there was a sense of hushed expectancy. What would happen next? Were they about to witness a visitor from the spirit world?

‘Just a draft,’ Natasha dismissed.

Somebody tutted loudly and somebody else told her to shut up.

‘I have a right to voice my opinion,’ Natasha went on.

‘Not when it spoils the enjoyment of everybody else,’ someone said.

‘Quite right.’

‘Hear, hear.’

Carys cleared her throat. As much as she was enjoying seeing her arch enemy being verbally lynched, she knew she’d better put a stop to it before it all got out of hand.

‘Amberley might be very old and certainly has a number of drafts but no draft could be strong enough to slam that door,’ Carys pointed out confidently.

‘See,’ the young woman said. ‘It was a ghost.’

‘It was a cheap trick,’ Natasha said.

‘Shall we see?’ Carys said, moving towards the door to open it. ‘Is there anybody there?’ she asked in a silly voice causing some laughter.

‘Shush!’ the young woman said, quite sure that they were about to make contact.

‘This is ridiculous,’ Carys heard Natasha muttering.

And then, suddenly, the door at the other end of the Montella Room slammed shut. Everybody span round, mouths open and eyes wide, including Natasha.

‘What was
that
?’ somebody asked.

‘It’s her again, isn’t it?’ the young woman said. ‘I can feel it.’

‘Nonsense,’ Natasha said, rolling her eyes heavenward behind her fake glasses.

‘Then how do you explain that?’ the young woman turned on her.

‘It was simply another door slamming. Doors slam. It happens every day.’

‘Not in this house,’ Carys interrupted. ‘Doors as heavy as ours don’t just slam.’

‘Then somebody slammed them,’ Natasha said as if she was talking to a group of backward children.

‘The same person who slammed this door just a few seconds ago?’ Carys challenged. ‘Because I can tell you that it would be impossible for somebody to get to the other side of this room in that time without climbing out of a window and running round the house which we would have seen from the window here and would have taken too long anyway.’

Natasha sighed in exasperation. ‘Then you must have two door-slammers in your employment.’

Carys frowned in bemusement. ‘I don’t recall seeing
Door Slammers
on the Amberley payroll,’ she joked, again, causing laughter.

‘And it has gone rather cold in here, hasn’t it?’ the young woman said.

‘That’s a myth,’ Natasha countered. ‘You’re merely imagining things.’

‘Look, lady,’ a burly man in his thirties stepped forward, frowning at Natasha, ‘I don’t know why you came on this tour if you’re such a sceptic but you’re spoiling things for the rest of us so I, for one, would be grateful if you’d keep your thoughts to yourself.’

Carys tried to hide a little smile as Natasha’s eyes narrowed.

‘Hear hear,’ somebody else said.

‘Shall we go on with the tour?’ Carys suggested, opening the door which had slammed first and leading them through to the Dining Room. Natasha was the last to leave the Montella Room and, as she entered the Dining Room, Carys noticed that she had turned a peculiar shade of white.

‘Are you all right?’ Carys asked.

‘Y-yes. Perfectly,’ Natasha said, clearing her throat.

The rest of the tour group turned to look at her.

‘Because you look awfully pale.’

‘I assure you, I’m perfectly fine.’

‘Good,’ Carys said, her eyes quickly darting into the vacated Montella Room where she saw the faintest hint of a blue mist.

‘There are four dining rooms at Amberley and this is the one used to entertain important guests. The Cuthland family have always been great supporters of the arts and Richard Burton and Elizabeth Taylor have dined in this room as have the playwrights Oscar Wilde and Arthur Miller. But, perhaps the most famous diner here was Queen Victoria.’

‘WHAT?’

Everyone turned to face Natasha who had blurted out the strange exclamation.

‘Queen Victoria,’ Carys repeated.

‘What was that?’ Natasha asked, looking round.

‘What was what?’

‘That - just now! I felt a hand on my shoulder. Somebody squeezed my shoulder!’

‘It wasn’t me, love,’ the burly man said.

There was a ripple of laughter but Natasha wasn’t joining in.

‘But there’s nobody behind you,’ Carys pointed out. ‘Are you sure you didn’t imagine it?’

‘I did NOT imagine it,’ she said, her head shaking furiously.

‘It’s her,’ the young woman said.

‘Will you stop talking nonsense?’ Natasha exploded.

‘Er - ladies and gentlemen,’ Carys said, raising her hands in a bid for calm, ‘I think we should, perhaps, move on, don’t you?’

They left the Dining Room and Carys took them through one of the old servants’ passageways and into what Georgiana had described as the bowels of Amberley.

‘Now that’s what I call a drop in temperature,’ somebody said.

‘These passageways are no longer used, as we - thankfully - have modern kitchens upstairs now, but they would have been teeming with life not so long ago,’ Carys said, careful to avoid naming any dates she couldn’t be sure of.
Long ago
and
in the past
seemed to be enough historical accuracy.

‘So your own staff don’t come down here?’ somebody asked.

‘Just to keep things clean,’ Carys said. ‘But, personally, I prefer to be upstairs. It is a little spooky, don’t you think?’

Right on queue, the sound of footsteps was heard from further along the passageway.

Carys frowned.

‘What’s that?’ somebody asked. ‘I can hear footsteps.’

‘Me too.’

‘Who is it?’

Fifteen pairs of eyes turned to Carys for an answer.

‘Well,’ Carys said, ‘there shouldn’t be anyone else down here except us.’ She glanced quickly at Natasha, half-expecting her to say something sarcastic, but she was looking as spooked as everybody else.

‘They’ve stopped,’ somebody said.

Carys took a deep breath. ‘We have to go this way anyway, so we’d better take a look.’

Now, there were fifteen pairs of feet echoing down the passageway and it became impossible to hear anything else. Carys led the way, turning left into one of the old kitchens where there was a large table and an ancient range. And then Carys began.

‘When I first came to Amberley, I didn’t think to venture downstairs to these rooms. To be honest, I had no idea they were here. But, I was later told about a young kitchen maid who used to work here,’ Carys said, repeating the story that Mrs Travis had recently told her. ‘Her name was Martha and she fell in love with one of the stable boys. It was in the days when it was strictly forbidden for members of staff to form relationships with each other but she didn’t heed the warnings from her colleagues and was found, one night, in the stable boy’s quarters.’

There was a collective gasp from the tour group and a few giggles too.

‘Both were dismissed and it was later heard that Martha lost the baby that was conceived at Amberley and died shortly after herself, and some believe that she haunts these kitchens to this day, crying for her baby and her lost love.’

There was a sad and stony silence.

‘That’s so heartbreaking ,’ one of the ladies said at last.

Natasha, who was stood at the back of the tour group, nearest the door to the passageway, suddenly turned white.

‘Are you all right?’ Carys asked.

‘Y-yes,’ Natasha stuttered.

‘Did you hear something? I thought I heard something,’ the young woman said, turning to Natasha. ‘A - a - crying.’

‘I didn’t hear anything,’ the burly man said.

‘Neither did I,’ another lady said, frowning in frustration.

Carys kept her eye on Natasha. ‘Did
you
hear something?’

‘N-no, of course I didn’t. What’s there to hear?’

‘I could’ve sworn-’ the young lady said.

‘Shush!’ the burly man said. And everybody listened in silence. But there was nothing but silence to hear.

Suddenly, Natasha shivered.

‘I felt that too,’ the young woman said. ‘It came from somewhere over there.’ She pointed to the end of the passageway.

Everybody moved out into the passageway but there wasn’t anything to see, hear or feel any more.

‘Onwards and upwards,’ Carys said, leading them down the passageway until they came to a door which led to a staircase at the back of the house. This was one of the servants’ routes to the bedrooms, Carys explained, reminding them that servants were expected to do their work almost invisibly.

‘Unfortunately, we don’t have the luxury of quite so many staff as the Bretton family once did.’

Carys led them across a landing and up another staircase before entering the Long Gallery and was delighted to hear low murmurs of appreciation at its grandiose beauty.

‘This is the Long Gallery,’ Carys began, ‘It used to be used for walking in on a winter’s day and dancing in on a summer’s evening,’ she continued, using the same words that Richard had when he’d shown her around that day which now seemed so long ago. ‘Obviously, it’s used as a library now.’

‘How many books are there?’ a young man asked.

‘Fifteen thousand,’ Carys said, thrilled at the ease at which she could answer such questions.

‘This is part of the regular tour, isn’t it?’ Natasha said, obviously regaining some of her earlier impudence, having forgotten her fright downstairs.

‘It is, yes. After all, it is one of Amberley’s finest rooms. But you’ll notice we have it to ourselves today. Please feel free to wander around but I would ask you not to take the books down from the shelves as they’re very fragile.’

Carys watched as the group broke up and wandered around the room at their own pace. Some gazed up at the fine plaster ceiling, some walked over to the windows to look out across the gardens and one stood awkwardly alone pretending to peer at the spines of books whilst reaching for something in a pocket. Could it be a hidden notebook and pen, Carys wondered?

‘Find anything interesting?’ Carys dared to ask.

Natasha looked up from the shelves and shook her head.

Gosh, Carys thought, it really was an appalling disguise. Hadn’t she noticed that her red hair was peeping out from under the grey wig?

Carys stared at her for a moment. ‘You know,’ she said, ‘I’m sure we’ve met before, haven’t we?’

Natasha looked dumbstruck for a moment. ‘I’m sure we haven’t.’

‘You haven’t visited Amberley before?’

‘No. Never,’ Natasha said, quickly and unpleasantly.

‘It’s just you look so familiar but, then again, I do see so many people, I could be mistaken.’ Carys smiled sweetly and turned to join a couple by the window. No sooner had she joined them than there was a loud thud. Carys spun around and saw a large leather-bound book on the floor by Natasha’s feet.