“Of course I’m sure! I’ve just this moment looked. And in the other attics too. I’m not a fool!”
Did no one but Ellen hear the sharp panic under this brusque answer? Did no one but she sense his terrified determination to prevent them going up the attic stairs? And they so much nearer to him, too, and able to see his face. … Ellen could visualise exactly how he would be looking. Surely someone must suspect …?
But apparently not. Roger’s voice now, amused, perhaps a little drunk….
“Perhaps she’s hiding….” And the rest of his words were drowned in merriment from one or two of his companions. At her expense, of course, Ellen imagined furiously, even in her terror. The panic-stricken old maid hiding on her wedding night … why, that would be the very story that Leonard could so conveniently spread abroad, after it was all over. That she must have plunged in blind panic into the chest to hide at the sound of her bridegroom’s approach … and then been unable to get out fast enough when the fire started … or perhaps, from her hiding place, had not noticed it in time….
And how had the fire started? Hadn’t she herself, only an hour before, been telling the whole company about the alleged danger of fire from the electric wiring? No doubt it would be found that the current had been switched on again at the main—she must have risked it because she was frightened in the dark, Leonard would say … and that foreman would nod sagely, savouring his Tightness to the full, the man who had Told Her So. All traces of petrol and candle, of course, would vanish in the conflagration; but there might still be traces of dangling wires … at this very moment, wires carefully arranged in dangerous positions might be hanging from some broken bit of Howard’s ceiling. Yes, Howard’s jerry-built ceiling, which on Ellen’s own showing might so easily come loose at a touch; what more likely than that it should do so at the hasty opening and shutting of the great lid below …?
Such a simple accident, when you came to think of it … you could understand exactly how it could have happened to the jittery spinster on her wedding night…. Ellen screamed, and screamed again, tearing like a wild animal to free her mouth from the blankets…. Scream after muffled scream … and surely, surely, even through all these obstacles they must have heard if only they would stop talking for one second…. Particularly Melissa—dear, brisk, managing Melissa, whose loud clear voice rang out above all the others as she organised the search. Apparently someone (was it Leonard?) had suggested that Ellen might have gone out for a walk to clear her head; for Melissa was loudly and whole-heartedly agreeing that the search should move beyond the house:
“Yes, of course,” she was saying. “That’s probably all it is —but I agree we ought to find her. After all that champagne she might get lost, or fall in the reservoir, or something. It was silly of you to keep filling her glass like that, Leonard—you know she’s not used to it. Now, if I go up towards the reservoir: and you, Leonard, go along Princes Avenue … And some of you had better go and have a look along the main road, though I don’t see why anyone should want to go there for a midnight walk. Oh, and Roger, you run over and see if she’s at the Bassetts—she might have dropped in there to ask them to come and join us, and then stayed talking….”
Ellen was almost choking now with her useless screams … more and more useless as her throat grew hoarser—and now she heard the multitudinous footsteps thundering back down the stairs again, down to the hall…. Doors slamming … voices calling to each other … dispersing … the laughter growing fainter. Yes; laughter; for they weren’t really anxious yet. They just thought it was a sensible precaution to fetch her back … and perhaps it seemed like a bit of fun, too, at the end of a party to set out in the moonlight in merry little groups in search of the missing bride. Yes; certainly it must be fun: through the open window, now, came the gay voices from the garden as the search parties set off in their various directions…. Even the children must have joined in, for Ellen could hear Adela’s shrill squeals of excitement growing fainter up the road.
They had all gone. Outside the locked chest, the house must be deserted; silent, except for the flickering of a candle flame somewhere very near. Whatever size the candle had been when Ellen had first pictured it, it must be smaller now; a lot smaller. The great fat handsome candle, the tiny guttering candle … whichever it was it was smaller now. Smaller … smaller….
At last Ellen had managed to get her face quite clear of blankets; her voice could carry further now. Ironic that this should happen just when there was no one to hear her—when the whole house must be empty.
But Ellen was wrong; the house was not quite empty. Poor Cousin Laura, tired and dazed from the long, noisy evening, had been sitting in her room trying to write a letter when Ellen’s absence was first noticed. As if in a dream, the old lady had heard the sharp questions and suggestions volleying hither and thither outside her room. “Where can she be?” … “No, she’s not in the kitchen.” … “I shouldn’t think so, he’s looked in the garden.” … First a restless irritation, and then a sort of uneasiness came over Laura as the increasing noise battered on her consciousness. Was something wrong? Was Ellen lost, or something? She tried to get to her feet, but a terrible tiredness held her back. She closed her eyes again. Perhaps it was all right … when you were as tired as this things had to be all right. Perhaps, even, it was some kind of game they were playing….
“… she’s hiding!”
Roger’s voice, and the accompanying laughter, sounded clearly down the staris, and at the words a strange, ancient thrill, almost like returning youth, seemed for a second to quiver through Laura’s limbs. Hiding! She’d been right, then; it was a game! Hide and seek! What fun to play hide and seek again after all these years—the game that she and Bessie used to play sometimes on winter evenings. Hide and seek with Bessie—and now hide and seek with Ellen! Hide and seek—hide and seek…. The words, like some wild tune, sent the blood pumping through Laura’s old veins. Almost, she felt, she could go scampering up those old stairs again, as she had scampered nearly eighty years ago. She could find Bessie—or rather Ellen—before any of them. For who knew better than she all the best places for hiding? The darkest corners—the most unsuspected cupboards—the most voluminous curtains.
The tiredness was gone—or nearly. Laura got to her feet with ease, walked at a good pace across the hall, and set off up the stairs, the old joy of childhood rising like a great new sun within her, giving strength to her worn out limbs. “Cuckoo!” she cried in her soft old voice. “Cuckoo! Cuckoo!”
At last Laura stood on the landing, clutching the banisters and gasping painfully; yet still she did not feel exactly tired; the laughing, excited little girl of nearly eighty years ago seemed more and more every moment to be taking charge of her old body, to be filling it with a sparkling, restless happiness that she had forgotten existed in the world.
What was that sound? It didn’t sound quite like “Cuckoo” but it was certainly a voice. It must be Bessie—Ellen, that is—and it came from somewhere in the attics.
“Cuckoo!” Laura called back encouragingly, and set off, quite gasping for breath now, up the attic stairs.
As she crept heavily from step to step, Laura felt some of her strange new vitality ebbing. She was an old, old woman—it must be years since she had climbed these stairs.
It wasn’t though. Suddenly Laura remembered that she had climbed them only a few nights back—though that had been almost in a dream. Yes that was it: when she had the dream about the dinner party, and the cream that turned into milk and wouldn’t whip … she had had that jug in her hands as she climbed these stairs to the servants’ bedrooms, desperately seeking her lost maids … only to wake and find that fifty years had passed, that there were no maids, no dinner party … only herself, an old, old lady, tired and shivering on the dark attic landing, with a jug of milk trembling in her hand, slopping in every direction…. Then, mercifully, the dream had begun again … she had somehow gone down to the dinner party … and here Laura’
s memories became confused.
But it didn’t matter; the point was that she had climbed these stairs, only a few nights back. Therefore she could climb them again now. “Cuckoo!” she called once more, with her failing breath, and an answering call, clearer than before, gave her strength to go on.
Oh, but she was tired, tired! And anyway, Bessie shouldn’t be hiding in the servants’ bedrooms. Mama would be terribly angry! Playing in the servants’ bedrooms! How had Bessie dared to think of such a thing!
Laura pushed open the door of the housemaids’ room, with its gay new rose-patterned paper, and tried to see where Bessie was. It was rather dark, the only light coming from a flickering stub of candle which for some reason was standing on the floor.
“Bessie!” she called softly—she dared not speak too loud or the grown-ups would hear, and poor Bessie would get into terrible trouble. “Bessie! Where are you?”
“In the chest!” came the muffled answer “Help me—quick. … Can’t get out….”
Laura understood the predicament at once. Of course Bessie could not get out of the chest until she was sure there were no grown-ups about to catch her in the act … or, indeed, to catch her in the servants’ bedrooms at all. Laura must go down to the landing and make sure that the coast was clear then run and tell Bessie and let her make a dash for it.
“It’s all right, Bessie,” she began reassuringly; but the voice from the chest interrupted her, urgently. Something about “Telling” … “Tell anyone….”
“Of course I won’t tell anyone,” called Laura indignantly, though still softly. “I’m not a tell-tale! But don’t come out yet, Bessie, I’ll go and see if it’s safe.” And carefully she set off down the attic stairs.
How light she felt now, how strong, and sure, and confident! She would soon get poor Bessie out of this scrape … just make sure that Mama and Papa were safe in the drawing-room … the servants in the kitchen … and Nurse, dear old Nurse, dozing over her mending by the nursery fire.
A sudden slamming of a door startled her…. A rushing of feet…. Roger calling up from the hall below … from the bend of the stairs.
“I say, she hasn’t turned up, has she?” he called. “You haven’t found her up there, in the attics?”
For a moment Laura felt confused. This anxious-looking man certainly wasn’t Papa—nor either of the uncles … and yet he wasn’t a stranger, either; she felt sure she knew him quite well. But whoever he was, he was a grown-up; he mustn’t be told the truth about Bessie’s naughtiness. Whatever happened, she mustn’t give Bessie away.
“No, she’s not there. I know she isn’t” she lied loyally, and was relieved to see the man rushing off downstairs again, and out through the front door.
The house was silent now. Laura should have felt relieved at the quietness, for now Bessie could escape safely. But instead of relief, a strange fear began to steal over her. Something … somewhere … was all wrong. The house shouldn’t be so still. Where was Mama? And Papa? And above all, where was Nurse—dear, kind, scolding Nurse—she would know what to do about it all, and she wouldn’t give Bessie away to Mama. Just scold her herself a little, that was all; just Nurse’s dear, familiar, comfortable scolding…. Bessie wouldn’t mind that. Strangely, there were tears in Laura’s eyes as she stumbled across the landing towards the nursery door. Within that door, if she could only get there, she would find a bright fire burning, the flames flickering on the shining brass rail of the old fireguard, festooned with damp gloves from this morning’s walk. And Nurse, in her old rocking-chair, would look up for a moment from her sewing, the firelight shining on her lined, smiling face; and tea would be almost ready on the nursery table. Why did the dear, familiar scene seem so far away; so immeasurably hard to reach? For there was the door, only a few feet away across the landing….
With a longing almost indescribable, Laura stumbled forward, burst open the nursery door—and fell headlong, striking her forehead as she fell. And so it came about that her eyes were already closed before she could see that there was no fire burning in the grate, no fireguard with its brass rail flickering: that there was no rocking-chair any more, and that old Nurse was gone for ever. Only Mrs Hammond’s ill-kept room with its bulging suitcases and its littered, dusty chairs—and now, in addition to all the rest of the muddle, a vase of dead flowers, strewn across the floor where Laura had knocked it as she fell.
But Laura did not see any of this; nor did she hear the crash of the broken vase. For her hearing had suddenly grown too clear to notice sounds like that. Already she could hear Nurse’s voice, the dear, kind voice that she had not heard for so long—not for the whole afternoon—or was it the whole of a lifetime?
“My goodness, Miss Laura!” came the old, familiar expostulation. “You did give me a start! Why you can’t look where you’re going, the Lord only knows! Now, come along, Miss Laura, dear, up with you! You’re not hurt, are you?”
Laura was hurt a little; but not very much. Not more than could be soothed away in a moment by the stout, comfortable presence that was even now bustling towards her, bringing with it sharp words, comfort, and infinite, immeasurable safety.
CHAPTER XXV
UPSTAIRS IN THE darkness Ellen heard the thud of the old lady’s fall—or rather felt it, as a vibration through the beams and floors of the old house, for it was too dull a sound to reach her ears. She had been aware, too, of Roger’s footsteps a minute before as he had raced up the stairs; she had heard the sharp anxiety in his voice as he questioned Cousin Laura, though she could not hear his words; and then she had heard his footsteps pounding down the stairs again, and the slam of the front door.
She was quite alone now, of that she was sure. She couldn’t, of course, know that Cousin Laura’s lifeless body now lay across the threshold of Mrs Hammond’s room, but the sense of absolute solitude was unmistakable. In the old, creaking house there remained only one living soul, her own … half a living soul, perhaps one should say, so near to death must she be by now. Leonard must have calculated that the candle would burn down to the petrol just about now … while everyone was out … no one to hear or smell the flames … no one to hear her cries. Or did he perhaps think there would be no cries? That she would remain sunk in intoxicated sleep until smothered by the smoke, and never wake at all? Or didn’t he mind one way or the other? Was it enough for him to feel that, even if she did wake, she would never know that it was he who was responsible? He who had locked her in the chest and fired the room? That he should be held blameless, beyond criticism—was that all that mattered to him as he contemplated the prospect of her sufferings? Was that all that had ever mattered to him—about anything?
As if the sheet of flame had already leapt up before her eyes, Ellen had a sudden, fleeting vision, almost a revelation, of Leonard’s mind; of a self-absorption so complete as to be indistinguishable from the most fiendish cruelty. The vision faded, and the blackness swept back against her straining eyes like a tidal wave. Almost, she thought, swamped in darkness, she must be already dead.
But no; her limbs still ached and tingled in their cramped space; her breath still came in quick, shallow gasps … and outside the candle she would never see must still be burning….
Footsteps again. Frantic, rushing footsteps, yet not noisy and clattering, like Roger’s footsteps a little while ago. Soft these were, soft and swift, like a tiger bounding up the stairs on padded paws. Hardly a sound at all really, more a shuddering … a beating and a thudding through the old walls … nearer … nearer … across the landing … up the attic stairs….
The Rose Room door groaned softly on its rusty hinges, and the soft feet whispered across the floor like withered winter leaves skimming towards their death.
The key began to turn in the heavy iron lock of the chest, and Ellen hurled her whole weight upwards as the lid gave. Flinging it wide open from within, she scrambled up, and found herself blinking at what seemed to her like a blazing inferno of light—in fact merely the flicker of t
he tiny candle flame—and out of that inferno Leonard’s face, white, distorted with horror, stared into hers.
He had locked her in … he was letting her out…. Why? Why?
But was he letting her out? That blaze of horror in his eyes as she struggled up out of the blankets…. This grip on her arm, savage as a madman…. What …? What was he doing …?
Even before Ellen had properly framed the question in her mind, the answer was beyond her reach. For in that very second a section of Howard’s ceiling (already prised loose and with electric wires dangling from it, just as she had foreseen) sagged quietly down, overturning the candle as it fell, and momentarily blocking the doorway.
If Leonard had waited for a quarter of a second, he would have seen that the blow had simply knocked the candle out. Far from the petrol being ignited prematurely, the room was now entirely safe; the temporary blocking of the doorway by a bit of plasterboard was of no significance.
But he did not wait a quarter of a second: his intimate knowledge of the extent and whereabouts of the petrol must have overridden all other thoughts, for with a scream of terror such as Ellen had never heard before he was plunging towards the little window. For barely a second the dim square of starlit sky was totally blacked out by his squirming body; and then Ellen heard a slipping and a slithering, like some monstrous escaping rat, over the slates above her head as he scrambled towards the ladder left by the builders leaning against the side of the house.
But he never reached it. Perhaps some of the slates were loose; or perhaps they were slippery to his shoeless feet. The sounds of slithering and scrabbling lasted only as long as it took Ellen to remove the plaster board, get out of the door, and half-way down the attic stairs. The attic landing window was still within her view when a black, jagged shape, like some vast downward-flapping bird, swooped across the field of vision. In the fraction of a second before it passed the lower landing window it had gathered speed. It was plummeting down now faster than the eye could follow … faster … faster … like some spirit of darkness returning with the speed of thought to the depths from which it came.
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