by Lorna Cook
Melissa was beyond caring about range cookers. She was starting to get a bit worried. A strange and uncomfortable feeling had been creeping on her since the door had first creaked and now with the slamming downstairs she just wanted to go.
They went back downstairs, entering the darkness again and navigating their way across the hallway and past the fireplace by their torchlight. They peered inside another large but long room.
‘If the first room was the sitting room, then this was the dining room, judging by the length of it,’ Guy suggested.
Melissa didn’t care. As Guy peered into the remaining downstairs rooms, shining his torch slowly along the spaces from side to side, Melissa turned and kept an eye behind her.
‘Let’s just check out this range cooker and then go, shall we?’ she asked.
‘Sure,’ he said, turning his phone torch on to her. She blinked in the face of the light. ‘Sorry.’ He instantly lowered the torchlight. ‘This way, I think.’ He gestured towards the far end of the house and Melissa reluctantly followed behind him, shining her torch and glancing round frantically.
The kitchen left a lot to the imagination. Where once there had probably stood a Victorian cooker range, there was now a 1930s Aga. Guy looked disappointed.
‘They were obviously a modern bunch. The Standishes, I mean, to have that,’ Guy said.
A few copper pans were hanging on a rack but, far from gleaming and shiny, they were tarnished and streaked with dark brown damp as if they’d been dipped in wet clay. Melissa shone her phone light around some of the kitchen dresser units and free-standing cupboards, which had obviously been of no use to anyone since the requisition, having been left behind. She paused to look at an old Victorian wooden laundry rack on a rope system, wound round a double-ended hook on the wall. She wondered at something so old that had survived the generations, survived requisition and was still here over a hundred years later, left intact amongst the devastation.
Guy wrestled with the Aga doors, trying to look inside. Melissa couldn’t work out why and so she left him to it. She moved across the large kitchen space, crossing the floor around the old scrubbed pine table. She imagined some poor kitchen maid, peeling and chopping and then clearing away, ready for the servants to have their meal.
Melissa shone her phone onto a thick wooden door and gave the round metal handle a turn. Nothing. She moved away and then looked back at it. So far it was the only door that had either not been left wide open or that wouldn’t open with a bit of brute force. Melissa tugged at the round knob again, twisting it in both directions.
Guy joined her. ‘Shall I give it a go?’ Shouldering it was no use. The door, if it moved, would open towards them, not the other way. He handed Melissa his phone, put one foot on the door frame and then yanked hard. Still nothing. ‘Curious,’ he said. ‘I wonder what’s in there.’
‘Probably nothing after all this time. Or maybe,’ she said, feeling mischievous, ‘it’s where they kept the family jewels. And they’ve been hiding in this cupboard for decades waiting for TV historian Guy Cameron and his now, rather unwilling, sidekick Melissa Turner to discover them and reveal their whereabouts.’
Guy rubbed his hand across his chin, thinking. Melissa was holding one phone in each hand, shining light on the door to show the doorknob and keyhole underneath it. She watched him thoughtfully. Suddenly, Guy put his hand into his pocket and pulled out Anna’s key. He slipped it into the door. It fit. He looked at her; his eyes wide. ‘Let’s see if it turns.’
Slowly, he started to turn the key in the lock. It stuck at first. But with a bit of gentle jiggling into place and a strong hand, it started to turn. Melissa realised she was holding her breath, shining both torches on to the lock as she watched Guy twist it firmly and slowly. The snap of the lock clicking out of place and recessing into the door shocked her. Melissa’s mouth dropped open as she exhaled loudly and Guy turned and looked at her again.
‘Bloody hell,’ he said. ‘I wasn’t expecting that to work.’
Melissa didn’t reply. Her eyes were on the door, which for some unknown reason she was expecting to fly open all by itself.
‘Right,’ she said with a false tone of bravery. ‘Let’s open this then.’ Melissa handed Guy’s phone back to him, stepped forward and turned the handle and when it didn’t instantly move she tugged at it with all her might. It creaked as it opened and she was instantly reminded of all the horror movies Liam had forced her to watch, even though he knew she hated them. When a door creaks like that, you don’t look inside. You close it and run away.
But it was only darkness that met her on the other side. They shone both their torches inside and were surprised to see a brick wall about six feet away. But directly in front of them, stretching down into darkness, was a wooden staircase.
‘Why does my grandmother have a key to Tyneham House’s cellar?’ Guy murmured.
The last thing Melissa wanted to do was go down there, even with two torches and Guy for company. It just felt like a terrible idea. Guy moved past her and peered down as far as he could see. He pushed at the first wooden step with his foot. It creaked horribly.
‘Seems safe enough.’ He shrugged. ‘Shall we give it a go?’
‘Are you kidding? Did you hear that creak? Don’t you think we should tell someone where we are before we do that?’ Melissa’s voice was high. ‘It seems a bit clichéd that we both go down there.’
Guy looked past her and into the abyss. ‘There’s no phone signal, remember. Perhaps I’ll just go down, have a quick look and then we’ll leave. My grandmother has been keeping the key to this room in her memory box for over seventy years. I just want to see what’s so important down there. I need to satisfy curiosity now – while we’re here. I’m certainly not coming back again.’
He put his foot on the step and winced as it creaked again. He withdrew his foot and sighed. ‘Perhaps not.’ He kicked at the door frame and a splinter of rotten wood came off. ‘Why the hell does she have this key?’
Melissa groaned. Guy was right. This probably was the only chance they’d get to find out what was so important about this cellar. She suggested something she wasn’t at all comfortable with. ‘I’ll go. I’m lighter.’
‘Wait a minute, I don’t think …’ Guy interjected.
‘Don’t panic. I’ll be careful.’ Melissa gingerly placed one foot on the top step. It creaked, but not as much as it had when Guy’s foot had been on it. ‘See? Nothing to worry about,’ she said with a brightness she didn’t feel. She trod as lightly and as slowly as she could down two more steps.
‘Stop,’ Guy said as Melissa continued. ‘This is a terrible idea.’
‘Stay there,’ Melissa called back. ‘I’ll be fine.’
The creaking continued with each step, but Melissa gave herself a stern talking-to. There was no reason to panic. Old buildings always creaked. She just needed to keep hold tightly of the bannisters with her free hand.
She stopped and lifted her torchlight up from the wooden stairs and down into the room below. She could just about make out the cellar’s nearest brick walls but couldn’t yet see the furthest one. She could see the flagstone floor beneath her though and knowing she was within reach of the floor gave her some small comfort. Not long now. But as Melissa stepped onto the next step an almighty crunch sounded underneath her. Wood splintered and her foot went through the stairs, her body juddered into the spindly bannister and the rotten staircase gave way underneath her, detaching entirely and hurtling towards the ground. As she hit the floor and crumpled into a heap, she could hear Guy shouting her name. But then the sound became quieter, further away, and her eyes slowly closed.
There was something cold against her face. Melissa blinked slowly and pushed the palm of her hand onto the cold flagstone floor, trying to lift herself up. Why was she lying on the floor? Her legs were higher than the rest of her body. But she had no idea why. Where the hell was she?
She put her hand to her head and felt blood in her ha
ir. She was in darkness and her eyes weren’t adjusting. The ringing in her ears started to clear and she could hear someone shouting at her. Had she been in some kind of explosion?
Melissa dragged herself forward, released her legs from underneath something heavy and sat up. She tried to focus on the darkness around her. Her eyelids felt heavy and she coughed, her dry mouth producing a dust-filled splutter. Melissa lifted her head and looked up. A small light shone some way above her from the direction of the shouting and when the ringing in her head had started to dissipate, the shouting from above became clear.
‘Guy?’
‘Oh thank God. Thank God. I thought you were dead. Are you hurt? Are you bleeding? Have you broken anything? Talk to me.’ He was laying on his front on the kitchen floor above, his head, shoulders, and arms visible as he shone his phone torch down on to Melissa. ‘Jesus Christ,’ he said as the faint light scanned across her.
Melissa slowly glanced around and suddenly realised what had happened. Large shards of wood had scattered around the room where the upper stairs had splintered. To one side, the entire bottom half of the staircase was intact, but on its side. Melissa was sitting in the middle of the debris.
‘I’m okay,’ Melissa said and then groaned as she tried to move. A searing pain spread across her chest. ‘I think I’ve broken some ribs.’
‘Can you move? How the hell am I going to get you out?’ Guy looked at the distance between them and then shone his torch around the kitchen. ‘I’m going to get one of the volunteers,’ he said.
‘No!’ Melissa called back. ‘I’m fine. If you go, you’ll have to tell them what we’ve been doing.’ She coughed and dust scratched the inside of her throat. ‘Is there anything you can use or throw down to me?’
Guy disappeared from view. Above her, there was the sound of something heavy being dragged.
‘Are you able to move out of the way?’ he shouted. ‘I’m going to have to lower one of these kitchen sideboards down. That will give us some height for me to drop down, lift you up and out hopefully.’
‘You can’t do that,’ Melissa cried.
‘Why not?’
‘You’ll damage it.’
Guy’s head appeared at the cellar entrance above. He indicated the collapsed staircase. ‘I think we’re well beyond that at this point, don’t you? I need you completely clear.’ His voice was strained and Melissa thought he sounded angry.
She moved slowly out of the way through a mix of shuffling and crawling, one hand clamped to her ribs. She backed into the cold stone wall and called up that she was out of the way.
The dragging continued above as Guy hauled the sideboard across the floor. Melissa put her head back on the wall and then winced in pain. She hunched forward instead and waited. She thanked God silently that both she and Guy hadn’t gone down the stairs. How long would they have been down here before anyone had found them? Would anyone have ever found them?
The sideboard became wedged at the entrance to the cellar and Guy barged it through. Shards of wood splintered off the edges of the sideboard and the door frame as he rammed the unit through the door. He angled the cabinet on to its side and tilted it so it was upside down. Above her, Melissa could hear him swearing. He took the sideboard legs in his hands and gripped them tightly.
‘This is phenomenally heavy.’ His voice shook as he spoke. He slowly levered it off the edge, leaning back and straining to hold it. He only managed to lower it a few feet before his grip failed and the unit slipped entirely from his fingers and crashed onto the cellar floor. Guy laid down on his front and looked into the cellar, shining his phone torch onto the sideboard. He gave an exultant, ‘Yes.’ The unit, while at an awkward angle and now missing a great chunk, had mostly still held together. ‘Are you all right?’ Guy called to Melissa as he lowered himself down through the hole. With his body dangling, he let go of the edge and landed on his feet on the upturned furniture.
Melissa was sat in the corner. He took his phone out of his back pocket and shone it on her face.
‘As fine as can be expected,’ she replied as she blinked in the light.
‘Oh shit,’ he said, kneeling down and looking at her. ‘You’re incredibly pale.’
‘I’m okay,’ she said. ‘I think it’s just the shock of it all. And I think I’ve lost my phone.’
Guy put his forehead on Melissa’s and his hand in her hair. ‘The phone is the least of all our worries. Thank God, you’re okay,’ he said. ‘I thought you might be dead. You didn’t answer me at first.’ He pulled his hand out of her hair and looked at his wet fingertips with horror. ‘Melissa, you’re bleeding!’
‘It’s not much,’ she said, touching the place where Guy’s hands had just been. It was damp with blood. ‘I didn’t land on my head. I think I just knocked it on the floor or the stairs at some point.’
‘We need to get you to hospital. Come on. Gently does it.’ Guy stood up and lifted Melissa, placing his arm around her waist. ‘Can you stand while I turn that sideboard round? It’ll make it higher for me to climb up and then pull you through.’
Melissa nodded. She wondered how her ribs were going to withstand all that. She held the torch for him while he kicked bits of staircase out the way and turned the furniture upright.
The torch was casting a faint light into the far corner of the room. Melissa squinted to see what was over there, but Guy’s body was casting a shadow as he moved.
‘It might be best if I lift you up and then I’ll boost you gently through.’
But Melissa wasn’t listening. ‘What’s all that?’ She pointed to the far corner and held the torch out where she could see lumps of large furniture had been stacked.
Guy turned his head and shrugged dismissively. ‘I don’t know and I honestly don’t care. Up we go.’
‘Wait a second,’ Melissa said, touching her sore ribs as she walked towards the corner. ‘Maybe it’s treasure,’ Melissa laughed and then winced at the resulting pain.
The torch threw a spotlight into the corner of the room. Stacked up against the wall were piles of old leather travelling trunks and half-height wine racks. The racks weren’t lined up as they would be in an ordinary fashion if they had held wine but were instead stacked haphazardly at odd angles, as if someone had thrown them there in a hurry.
Melissa crouched down, wincing at the pain in her ribs, and peered through the bottle-shaped holes in the racks. There was something at the back, but she couldn’t tell what it was in the dim light and her arm wasn’t long enough to reach through to investigate. It was a pile of frayed fabric, from what she could see, but it gave no other clue as to what its purpose might be and what it was doing there.
‘Is it covering something?’ Guy crouched down to join her and squinted through the racks.
‘I’m not sure.’ Melissa coughed as dust flew up from the racks as she withdrew her hand. The cough reverberated through her pained ribs and she cried out.
‘Right. Enough of this,’ Guy sounded exasperated. ‘We’re going.’
‘Not yet,’ Melissa said. ‘Help me move these racks. I think there is something else back there.’
CHAPTER 35
Tyneham, December 1943
The village was eerily quiet and the dull, winter light was fading. In the distance Freddie could see outlines of boxes and crates piled up outside individual homes, ready for the movers that had been hired by the army to ensure a smooth and seamless evacuation.
Freddie stood at the end of the tree-lined drive that divided the grounds of the estate from the threshold of the village. His legs had brought him this far, but suddenly he felt unable to move. He put his head in his hands and sat on a tree stump as the winter evening darkness descended. He wanted this feeling to end. He was in a nightmare. He must be. This couldn’t be real. Veronica had broken his heart once before and it was happening again now. But reluctance to leave engulfed him.
Would he ever see Veronica again? He doubted it and the thought crushed him. He would nev
er stop loving her. But tomorrow she was running from Bertie and if she was clever enough neither he nor his brother would be able to find her. She would be gone from him forever. It was clear she neither wanted nor needed him. And he couldn’t fight such a vehement dismissal. Darkness encircled his heart. He’d lost her. He knew it.
But something stopped him from moving. The moment he got up and continued his journey into the village, it would all be over. He didn’t know what to do. He couldn’t sit here all night and he couldn’t walk all the way to the train station in the blackout. It was miles. He was freezing. His mind was a whir and he couldn’t think straight.
He pulled his coat around him and looked down at his suitcase. He’d left the few items he’d come all this way to collect. Sod the cricket bat. He’d thought it was his possessions he’d wanted, but it was always the thought of seeing Veronica that had been the driving force of his visit.
In the distance, he watched the moon glinting off the duck pond and failed to force his mind on to other things. He was delaying having to move, having to make a decision, and he knew it. The moment he got up, it would be the end. He would never again see the woman he loved and his family home was being requisitioned tomorrow. Freddie had never felt so alone.
He closed his eyes and tried to pretend this wasn’t happening. The longer he sat, the colder he got. He looked at his watch. He had no idea how long he’d been there. Half an hour? An hour?
He felt his body creak as he stood up. He gave one final glance back at the house. It was in blackout and he could just make out its pale walls in the faint moonlight. He patted his pocket, then pulled his cigarette case out and fumbled with it, his cold fingers not quite working properly. He could see steam from his breath in the chill air as he pushed a cigarette in between his lips. He reached for his silver lighter, but it wasn’t in its usual place. He tried his inside pocket on the other side, but it wasn’t there either. His trouser pockets held only his wallet. What the hell had he done with his lighter? Had he left it behind in the house? It was another thing to mourn.
