Winter’s Children (29 page)

Soon the looking-glass will be covered in black cloth and the funeral wreaths hung at the door. The house will be in mourning and a new grave dug in the churchyard where rosemary garlands will be hung in honour of the little maid.

Hepzi has no heart for yuletide silliness but now it saddens her that there is no household busyness to celebrate the birthing of the Lord; dust will gather on the cupboard, the rushes afoot will not be swept this morrow, the fowls will go unfed, but out in the copse Blanche will feed on her victory and grow in strength once more.

Only the Lord in His wisdom knoweth His purposes in giving my cousin yet another consolation, she sighs as she fades into the shadows in defeat. I can give no aid in this matter. I have no strength beyond these walls but there is one mightier who can temper the wind to the shorn lamb if it is His will …

Fear stalked the kitchen at Wintergill, now the HQ for the search-and-rescue operation. Time was of the essence, but the weather report wasn’t good and the sniffer dog had lost the scent. If the child stayed put she could die of hypothermia, if she set off to come home, she could fall off rocks to her death. If she was hiding in a barn there was hope, but it was a wet chill out there. Nora kept on making tea and pulling out bag after bag of flour from the pantry to make mince pies, hundreds of them, using all her jars of mincemeat.

She no longer cared what anyone thought of her. It was her instinct to cut and kneed and roll and bake. She needed to keep her hands from shaking to blot out the panic and the memory of the accident all those years ago. It could have been yesterday.

The phone kept ringing as news of the second event at Wintergill spread like wildfire from pub to pub. Men came out with their sons, searching their own barns and ditches, prodding the falling snow with sheepdogs, scouring the fell for any sign of life. Neighbours were on the watch.

There had to be hope, and she would bake such a pile of stuff so that when Evie returned as she must … To lose a husband and then your possessions and a child in one season was unthinkable. It must not be so. It was against all natural justice.

Yet how small is mankind against the forces of nature. How small is a child on a savage moor top. She had feared the arrival of a child when the two of them first appeared less than two months ago but never in her wildest dreams did she imagine such a tragedy unfolding.

Poor Kay was sitting with a woman officer, rocking back and forth, clutching Evie’s pyjamas in her lap, beside herself with terror, rocking like an animal in pain. How well Nora knew that feeling but was helpless to say or do anything to relieve it. There were no words, only primitive foetal movements: a mother raging against the forces, against the truth dawning in her mind that her child is lost.

If Evie survived she was going to get the best Christmas in the world for to them she would be that greatest of Christmas gifts: the gift of life itself. That was what Nora was praying for as she pounded the pastry board and scattered flour all over Nik’s grubby floor, no longer caring that she was trespassing on his domain, once the family kitchen, where all the dramas of her own life had unfolded. She was here at her hearth and her stove, a woman possessed, a woman on a mission. Live, Evie, live! Don’t go to sleep! Stay with us! We all want you home.

Kay couldn’t sit down any more. This was all her own fault for not handling Evie’s grieving with sensitivity this morning. She’d been so carried away with getting out of Sutton and the stifling atmosphere with Tim’s parents that she’d put her precious child at risk in this wilderness country.

A house for winter … how could she have been so naïve as to suppose this flight of fancy was the answer? They should have stayed put and given Evie the usual suburban Christmas with grandparents who loved her, not brought her out to strangers, kind as they were. What a terrible costly mistake in every way, it seemed now, a calculated risk that was going so wrong. ‘Oh, forgive me,’ she cried.

You are a selfish coward, she sighed as she rummaged through Evie’s toys, the drawer full of other children’s hand-me-downs. Nothing of the old days was left. Everything was burned. It was then she stumbled upon the little drawing book Evie kept in the pocket of the back seat of the car but never showed her. It was full of strange tiny drawings and words she could hardly read, pictures of ladies in costume and Evie playing in the trees with a fairy lady. Kay fled down the stairs with it, bumping into Nik, who was supping in the kitchen with his relief team of farmers. The door was open and the snow flurries had cleared to reveal a clear sky full of stars with a moon the size of a brass plate. She shoved the book into his hand.

‘Look at this, Nik. I don’t understand what’s going on. Look at these drawings. How can a girl her age know such detail? Look at the figures and the costumes. Does she really see these people? First the fire, which no one knows how it got started. Then this. It’s doing my head in thinking she’s been hiding this from me. How many other poor souls have been haunting her?’

He put his arm around her, guiding her down onto one of the chairs.

He didn’t look surprised, fingering the pages with care. He smiled at the picture of the witch with the feather brush and the white fairy with the hair like some ancient hippy. His words were even more puzzling.

‘Kids sometimes see stuff we don’t. Remember the first day she sat on my wall and talked about the white lady and you laughed and I joked and teased her. I’ve not exactly been honest.’ He paused, looking at her with eyes wide with fear. ‘I’ve had the odd glimpse of that presence for years around the place. I never told anyone when I was a kid. That night when I crashed the pickup …’ he added.

Kay didn’t know whether to laugh or cry. ‘Now you tell me that some sort of ghost has been following my child and you’ve said nothing?’ she snapped.

‘It’s only the White Lady. She’s been haunting this farm for generations. She’s a bit of a legend, flitting about like a faded photograph. The old biddy with the feathers by the stairs is a kind old soul, part of the furniture. Evie’s drawn her just as I used to see her … I always think of her as an extra housekeeper.’ He was trying to keep his voice casual but it wasn’t fooling Kay one iota.

‘Let me get this straight. You see ghosts?’ she asked, seeing him blush.

‘Keep your voice down,’ he said, steering her away from earshot. ‘Just now and then … around the house. An old house always has spirits … It’s faded as I’ve got older, but recently I have seen a few things …’

‘Why you? How? Are you psychic?’ She stared at him full on, wide-eyed with suspicion.

‘Dunno … it just happens. Why do some folks snore or scratch their heads in a certain way? I never gave it much thought until I found this old book a few days ago.’ Nik pulled an old leather-bound book out of his cluttered bureau drawer.

‘This belonged to my great-grandma, Agnes Snowden, the po-faced one on the stairs. It’s full of old recipes and herbal concoctions. See for yourself. There’s a story here you should read. It’s obvious she was another who had the knack. It must run in some families and she was of gypsy stock. Mother told me you’re from Norton stock so maybe it runs in your genes too.’ He was trying to make all this sound normal so as not to scare her.

‘For some reason this thing hasn’t passed away in peace because something’s holding her back, some miscarriage of justice, a sudden death. I don’t know, but my guess is she’s been stuck around this house for centuries and the folk tales of the white lady of the fells is probably a distillation of legends, sightings and rumour. If I’m right she needs laying to rest once and for all before she does any more mischief. Time to find if she’s behind all this or whether I’m just going off my head.’

‘You mean an exorcism? You think she’s behind all the bad things, and now Evie … Oh God, what have I brought her to? This can’t be true … it’s the twenty-first century.’

‘I don’t think time has any meaning in these matters. Agnes left this book as a sort of warning or a guidebook, I’m not sure which. Wintergill seems to be the focus of all this restless energy. Whatever happened in the past, happened here, I fear.’

Kay couldn’t believe what she was hearing. ‘So what can we do?’

‘We’ve got to find Evie and bring her home, never mind the rest. Come on, let’s get out of here. I can’t stand by idling. There’s one place that might be a good starting point …’

Kay was poring over the book, screwing up her eyes to read the script, shaking her head.

‘I don’t believe a word of any of this,’ she whispered. ‘Are you telling me that Evie acts as some psychic magnet, drawing this spirit back into action? It sounds such a lot of hocus-pocus to me.’

Nik steered her further into the hall with his arm. ‘I know it sounds crazy but we have to go and find them and bring them home. This is Wintergill business from the past, and most of it is beyond me. I’m just a farmer, not a priest, and I don’t know what the hell’s going on any more than you do, but sitting here’s not the answer. You mustn’t despair. Sometimes things turn up for the right reason at the right time.’

She nodded, seeing he really believed what he was saying. Kay had never seen him so animated and so concerned. She felt that warmth between them again. ‘I trust you, Nik.’

‘Come on, let’s slip away and follow our noses. I know it sounds crazy but all isn’t lost yet. I just feel we’ve a chance if we strike now. Open your mind, Kay. Think the unthinkable. The clues are here in the book and I’ve been mulling over Agnes’s story. The rest is up to a higher authority than my puny mind … whatever you call it. There has to be a way.’

‘I’m scared,’ Kay answered, grabbing the book. ‘I’m too knackered to take much in but I’m coming with you. I’ll do anything to make it up to Evie. This is all my fault, bringing her here on a whim.

‘No time for guilt trips, Kay. This’ll be more like a trek through a dicey bog moor. There’s a list of stuff to gather up, warm dry clothes, kitchen bits, but first get us a flask of tea. It’ll have to be a fly-by-the-seat-of-your-pants sort of effort but while there’s hope we must do something.’

Kay hovered in the doorway, watching as he stood in the hall, lighting up the storm lamp, head down as if in prayer. Perhaps it was time she asked for guidance too.

The snow was swirling around Evie as she peered out of her shelter towards the speck of bright light. She felt no cold now, only a tiredness, and the drift of snow piling up before her felt like a plump cushion with comfy pillows to rest her head. Muffin had found her and lain at her feet. He was fast asleep but he kept the wind from her legs. The lemony daylight was brightening the corner of the sky but she was too scared and frozen to lift her legs. She wanted to lie down on the duvet of snow and sleep but the light coming towards her blinded like a torch in her eyes. They were coming to get her! Mummy would be waiting and worrying. How she wished she’d never left home now.

Out of the light came the face of a beautiful lady and she smiled, holding her hand out to pull her from her hidy-hole. Evie felt such relief. The White Lady of the woods had come to find her and take her home to Mummy. She felt herself floating over the grey fields, flying in the air like a Christmas angel with wings, like the Snowman in the cartoon book, and it was magic. Wait till she told them all back at school!

The Search

 

‘I know you’ll think he’s crazy, Nora, but Nik thinks this house is haunted by an unquiet spirit; not within these walls, for they’re protected by a kindly presence, but outside in the fields. He thinks we have a troubled presence and it’s about time she was put to rest.’ Kay looked up, expecting Nora to burst into peals of laughter, but she shook her head solemnly as she looked over Evie’s drawing book.

‘That’s the old Lavender Lady Evie was always on about? My own daughter used to see her, and Mistress Hepzibah was the name my mother-in-law gave her years ago. She said she’d do no harm to anyone, for she loved this place.’ Nora looked up as she was carrying on with her pastry as if it were noon, not the middle of the night.

‘Nik’s got some book … Agnes Snowden’s book. Can there be anything in it or have we flipped in our panic?’

‘If Nik thinks there’s summat in all these funny goings-on, it’s worth a try,’ said Nora, as if she was talking about some aunt down the road. ‘All I know is, our Shirley was taken badly and lost after snow. That fire was a funny do … I wasn’t going to say anything to you but surely that is more than a coincidence? I’d like to get my hands on this poltergeist.’

She paused from her frenzy of activity to add, ‘All these years my son’s had the Snowden second sight and never said … Talk about see all and say nowt! Tom used to laugh when Shirley told us things. I never thought my son would be the same. I wish he’d told me. I’ve been so hard on him. He got the brunt of it after Shirley died. He told me so only the other day. Now he’s trying to make things right for you, trying to save your little one. We must do as he says and trust that he’s right.’ Nora sighed, shaking her head. ‘I’m baking up a storm for when Evie gets back. She’ll be starving.’

She was still baking mince pies as if there was no tomorrow, sending trays out to the police team and the ambulance drivers.

‘They’re not having much success out there, searching blindly. If only we could find old Muff. He were always a good ‘un for setting on trouble.’ How quickly Nora’s accent broadened when she was fired up.

‘I’m going out to find her with him. I can’t wait in here any longer. I have do something.’ Kay made for the hall again and Nora caught hold of her, hugging her tightly.

‘It’ll be all right. It has to be. See this?’ Nora pointed to one of the storm candles and placed it in the hall window where it flickered for a second and then blazed steadily. ‘Now I’m lighting a candle in the window, an old German custom. It’s the wayfarer’s candle to guide the Christ child and all wanderers back from the darkness. Trust the light will bring you all home.’

Hepzibah watches the flickering candle. She sees bustle and doors banging, she scents the spices on the air and sees the comings and goings. Someone is stirring in the night, summoning all the women who have wept within these walls. There is no fire yet in the yule grate, no smoke in the chimney, only the damp chill of fear on the air. Lord have mercy on us. The time is ripe and the struggle begins in earnest now ’I will lift up mine eyes unto the hills: from whence cometh my help …’

Adrenalin was pumping Kay forward now. She felt strangely calm, with a growing strength of purpose within herself. I have to do something to make amends, she resolved. My child’s life depends on all our combined strengths. How curious, she thought looking up the staircase at the portraits, a line of disembodied faces, yet she sensed for one brief moment that she was not alone: that all the mothers and daughters of this strange house over so many generations were standing close at hand, praying in their own fashion, willing her good fortune in the coming crucial hours.

Nik watched the shaft of moonlight make a circle on the carpet. He could smell candle wax, the bitter taste of panic on his tongue. He looked again at those old drawings. What did they mean, the five-pointed star … an old witchy symbol of protection. The circle of star and light. It was all mumbo jumbo and yet the drawing of the stones was leading him out onto the moor tops and he sensed exactly the direction they must take. But what to do after that? Common sense said he should be out there with the search teams on his quad bike, scouring the fells, not striking out on his own.

Trust your instincts, he heard the voice whispering, a softer side of himself. First things first: find them and bring them home. If only it were that simple. He was out of his depth but desperate as he grabbed Kay and headed for his bike.

‘Come on, Agnes Snowden, do yer stuff!’

Nora sat herself down in the hall, drunk with exhaustion and fear. She lifted the pile of unopened cards from her table and fingered all the good wishes lovingly, picturing each one in turn, feeling mean that she had not sent a card yet. She thought of all who had loved this house: Sam the builder, Joss the farmer, who prettified the house for his wife; Jacob; and all their wives; Tom, Klaus, Shirley and Nik; Kay and, most of all, Evie. She prayed for good times to come back to her home for she loved it in her own way as much as Nik did. She prayed for forgiveness for neglecting her son’s feelings in the past. He was doing his best to find the child with everything stacked against him. She trusted his instincts would find true north.

Her heart was thumping like a slow drum. This was a queer do and no mistake. What would Tom make of it all? She hoped he could see the effort Nik was giving out on their behalf to protect this blessed place from any more harm. ‘Come on, Tom, you know I did you a great wrong. Shirley, wherever you are, help us find the child before it’s too late,’ she prayed.

Hepzibah stirs from her slumbers by the embers of the yule-tide log. Someone was calling her name: ‘Hepzi, Hepzi … Guardian of the hearth’ She senses a gentle breeze wafting through the house, a breeze that wafts and cleans out the corners, that makes the linen dance along the hedgerows, rustles the rushes on the floor, sends smoke straight up the chimney and has maids scurrying to their morning chores.

It is time to step towards the open doorway and the wind that blows the cobwebs from the lintels. The household is stirring and she must go to the door and sniff the morning air. Someone is calling her over the years with words she can scarce fathom but their meaning is becoming ever clearer. It is time at last, Lord have mercy on us!

She must stand by the doorway at the furthest reaches of her domain and guide the voices back.

‘Come hither, Cousin! Good tidings! Come and see. I have news of Anona. She is found at last’ she shouts into the breeze looking out across a sea of snow and mist. ‘Come hither and take my hand … it is time you came a-calling. I can help you find her. I have waited over the years for this moment. I will not let you fail us now’ Her weary eyes strain to see if there is movement.

Nothing stirs in the copse, no sign that Blanche is heeding her, but she knows her cousin can’t be far away, not in this season of frost and ice.

‘Come home. We mean no harm by you. ‘Tis time to patch up our quarrel and seek forgiveness, one from the other. You have caused great mischief in your anger but no matter. Our time is ending. Come home!’

‘You stole what was mine’ comes a faint voice as Blanche appears out of the mist, holding her hand out to her side as if she clutches something that her cousin cannot see.

‘I didn’t steal your child. You were always wrong on that score, Cousin,’ Hepzi pleads. ‘No one here ever harmed a hair of her head. Anona was safe from harm with me. Come closer, see for yourself. You were so close and yet so far … ‘Twas no one to blame for the storm that divided us. Hear the truth for once and harken now to one who knows where Anona abides in safety. Listen. Can you hear her laughter? Look, see, she’s safe within. The Lord is merciful. He has heard your petition. He wants you back home. Listen to His words, for He speaks the truth. Come closer.

‘It is time for us to leave these mortal confines in peace, time to move out of this earthly bondage, out from these shadows into a brighter light where all we love are waiting for us. Look through the open door, see the tallow candle lit to welcome you. The child is within.’

Blanche can see only her cousin through the mist, standing in the doorway of the cursed house. How old she has grown, how stooped and grey. She is a spent force and cannot harm her. Blanche pauses to hear a faint voice calling out. She clutches her bundle tightly.’I am not a spirit. I am but a weary woman travelling far. I am tired but I cannot cease from my travail’ she sneers, turning back to her cousin with disdain. Am I not flesh and blood as you who stand before me are my kith and kin?’

She sees Hepzibah shaking her head and whispering, ‘We’ve been dead for many a year, Cousin: two old crones who are stuck ‘twixt heaven and earth, going round in circles like mad dogs chasing their tails, going over the same track time over again. Take pity on us!’

‘You make jest. I can see your bony fingers and sunken cheeks. Granted we are old now – that is the fate of all flesh – but we are fixed to this ground. I have no grave, just as my own child’s bones lie unburied’ Blanche argues into the wind, but the far-off voice keeps slipping words into her ear.

‘You are misled to wander so far from your kin. Come see for yourself if you will, but hear me out. Come see, Coz. What I say is true’

‘’Tis not so! You lie. You are chained to this cursed house. ‘Tis all lies. My child is here safe with me’ she calls to her cousin in fear. She fears the power behind the words. How can a child be in two places? She sees the torches burning across the moor. She looks to Hepzibah for succour but there is none, only cruel words. She is afraid to let go now.

‘Oh, whisht and listen. These are the chains of love that have kept me here’ Hepzibah shouts. ‘Love speaks louder than hate. Look to the light and see for yourself. Step inside …’ Hepzibah is pointing to the doorway and the flickering light beyond. ‘Look through the casement if you don’t believe me. You have worked enough havoc. It must end. If you will not come closer, I can do no more to help you.’

Blanche hesitates, uncertain whether to slip back from the light or move towards its source … caught between doubt and mistrust. ‘How can that be? I do not understand … ’ she cries out.

‘You’re caught in a web of your own making, spinning round neither alive or dead, trapped by your pain and longing, by the rage of your grief against those you think robbed you of what was yours, but you are misguided in all these matters, I promise you. Come with me through the door and follow my words. She’s here, your heart’s desire. All you want is within.’

‘No, you are a trick of the wind to fool me. I know you … I have within my grasp all I desire. Leave me be’ she screams, swirling in the snow and the mist away from the piercing light.

She hears the hound growling round her ragged skirt and strikes him with her icy hand. Out of my way, you cur! Nothing will bar my way.’

Nik was frantic. He was no longer sure of his bearings but he knew now where he must search: the old wall marked with the pointed star on the page, the danger point in Agnes’s story. He was struggling out of dark mist up a steep hill and suddenly it was as if he were opening from a tunnel of darkness into bright light, familiar terrain: a stretch of dry-stone walls, pasture meadows, sheep pens and the far field barn towards the Celtic wall set against a rainbow of purple hills.

There was no sound or movement but he could smell fields full of grazing sheep, his Suffolks were grazing heads down, content. All was as it was before. It was a charmed stillness, but it was only a mirage. The land was bare but he could still sniff out the grazing fields. They must find Evie out there on the moor before the chill took her body across that bridge from which there would be no returning. She was somewhere not far away and if they could rescue her now, it might not be too late.

Kay was clinging for dear life on the back of the quad. Against all advice they’d shot out of the farmyard onto the track across the fields, headlights blazing towards the old footpath. The snow was turning back to sleet, stinging her cheeks, but but she did not care.

Nik’s face was glazed. He was silent and focused. He knew where he was going, his goggles splattered with slush. When he reached the drifts blocking his path, he dug a track like a mad man, hardly pausing for breath, and Kay dug with him with her bare hands until they raced onwards again, following the frosted stone walls that curved around the old track. She watched him stop and scour the horizon, calling out.

‘She’s got to be round here. This is where Agnes nearly lost her baby. There’s been too many accidents round here. Evie!’ he yelled into the wind.

Kay touched his arm. ‘What’s that … on the snow over there by the wall?’ There was a dark object outlined in the snow. They raced across in hope but it was just a boulder jutting out from the snow, a rock, not a signpost. Kay could feel her panic rising. This was a wild-goose chase and there was nothing out there.

‘It’s not going to work,’ she cried, making for the quad bike, her head bent in despair.

‘This is close to the spot in the book.’ Nik’s lips were cracked and his eyes blazing. ‘She must be here somewhere.’

‘This thing you see, what does she look like?’ Kay asked.

‘Sometimes she looks like any woman in a cloak, gathering mushrooms, but lately she is old with staring eyes and looks more like a bag of bones,’ he said.

‘You think she may be a mother, a once-upon-a-time mother, like some deranged woman out of her mind with worry … searching, searching like me? Don’t shout at her then. Anger never hears, Nik. Plead with her, speak to her better nature, hear her feelings. Show her compassion … Let me talk to her.’ Where were these words coming from, she wondered. She felt only hatred towards such a monster. ‘Perhaps if I leave you alone, this apparition’ll come,’ she cried, but he shook his head, grabbing her arm.

‘I don’t know, but let’s scout round and shout for Evie. I’m sure this is near the place where the pram rolled down the hill into the wall.’ he said.