He mimes 'Put the kettle on' to Armstrong, sensing that this may be a long interview. Taking up a pencil and notepad he asks,
“Now, madam, perhaps you could spell out your name, first of all?”
Before she can reply, the phone rings and Croft picks it up, mouthing 'sorry' at his formidable guest.
“Yes? They got there all right, did they? Fine. What? It was open? You can't find them? Oh, that's bloody marvelous. No, no, not your fault, lad. You'd better get back to the search. I'll give his lordship a ring myself, later.”
Putting the phone down, he returns to his visitor.
“Inspector Croft,” the woman says, “we have little time. I take it that Major Beaumont and his wife have arrived at the house?”
Taken aback for a moment, Croft can only nod dumbly.
“You ask yourself, how can Madam Castanos know this?”
Again, he nods.
“Because she communes with the spirits of the dead!” she declares, just as Armstrong arrives with more tea. The officers exchange meaningful glances, then the sergeant leaves, closing the door.
Why do I always get the nutcases? Croft asks himself. Did I do something bad in a previous life?
“Very well, madam,” he says wearily, picking up his pencil again. “Perhaps we could start at the beginning?”
***
The policeman leaves the Manor's new owners and their guests to settle in. Rachel and Tony settle in a big, well-furnished room at the front of the house with a charming four-poster bed. Bill and Charlotte take adjacent single rooms at the back.
“Good thing Bill's out of range,” says Tony. “I had to sleep in the same barracks with a chronic snorer, once. Every morning, we'd find his bed had moved across the room, thanks to the vibration.”
“You really have lived a life of adventure!” she laughs.
“Much of it, thanks to you, m'lady,” he replies, shoving socks into an old chest of drawers. “Erm. How much space do you want for your, you know, feminine things?”
“One day, I will persuade you to say shocking words like ‘pantyhose,’ you repressed Englishman!”
After unpacking, they stand looking out over the grounds.
“All this is really yours?” she asks.
“No,” he replies, putting his arm around her. “All this is ours.”
Rachel feels conflicted. Just a few years ago, she'd dreamed of nothing more than marrying a lord, living in an English country house as a genuine lady of the manor. And here she is, apparently just a few legal steps away from becoming Lady Furniss. But another part of her wants to carry on being a career woman, working as a reporter in Britain, and in the wider world after the war. Yet, there's something about Furniss Manor that makes her reluctant to become part of its long history.
Sensing her uncertainty, Tony says, “Look, we don't have to decide anything. We're here to look at the place and find out if it's livable. Let's take a good look around, and if you see too many ghosts, I'll put the place on the market.”
“Okay, it's a deal!” she smiles up at him.
He holds up a bunch of keys, each one bearing a paper label.
“I found these in the caretaker's quarters. It seems there's one for every room except the tower, for some reason.”
“Well, if it's the oldest part of the house, maybe it's unsafe?” she replies.
“Yes,” he says, thoughtfully, “that's probably it. But I would like to see what's in there, sometime.”
“Okay, let's get exploring!” says Rachel.
Bill and Charlotte have the same idea, and soon, the four are opening up rooms, pulling off dust-sheets, and peering at paintings. Every time she enters a new room, Rachel braces herself for a ghostly encounter, but nothing happens. She mentions this to Tony, who shrugs.
“Hey, don't look a gift horse in the mouth! Maybe all the ghosts have moved on. You know, to the astral plane, or wherever Madam Castanos says they go to.”
Rachel is almost satisfied by the answer.
How come there are no ghosts here? Shouldn't a place this old be a classic haunted house?
After a while, she shoves the issue to the back of her mind and focuses on what's in front of her.
Furniss Manor is poorly lit, with wood-paneled walls decorated with ancient weapons, and suits of armor cluttering the corridors. Rachel tries hard to like it, because she feels the family connection to Tony should make it special to her, too.
Trouble is, I don't like it, or at least not much. If it's a haunted house, why don't I get any sense of ghosts being present? I never thought that would seem weird, but it does.
As she looks around the library, Rachel starts to think of the books as the memories of the house, and wonders what strange, perhaps insane, thoughts they may harbor.
Metaphors are all very well, but can a house be alive? And what would a house as old as this be like? An old, clever creature, quietly sizing up the tiny, short-lived humans that are now wandering around inside its jaws, or in its belly.
She shudders and tries to push the thought away.
***
Maisie Warburton stares up at the statue of the lady with the bow and arrows. Her muddled mind struggling to grasp what's happening to her. She's standing in the snow, but doesn't feel cold. She's outdoors on a winter's day, but hears no sound of wind or wildlife. In fact, she's enclosed by complete silence that she suddenly wonders if she's gone deaf.
“Hello?” she says, hesitantly. Her voice is audible.
Well my ears are working; that's some comfort I suppose.
“Hello!” says a voice from behind Maisie.
Maisie jumps and turns to see the barefoot girl.
“What's happened to me?” asks Maisie.
“He got you. He got me, too,” says the girl. “But that was ages ago. I feel a lot better now. Apart from being dead, of course. No help for that.”
“What do you mean, dead? Who got me?” asks Maisie. Fragments of memory return. She recalls huge, flabby hands running over her body, the foul stench of a being that was somehow made of rotting flesh.
“Don't think about him!” warns the girl. “He can hear you thinking. He might come back.”
Maisie looks around in panic, but there's no one else to be seen. There's just the house with its weird tower, the chapel, and the statues dotted around the snow-covered garden.
“We haven't got long,” the barefoot girl goes on. “Come with me.” The girl turns and starts to run towards the house. Maisie, with nothing better to do, follows her. Soon, they are inside the Big House that Maisie was keen on reaching that morning, and there are people. Not the Marlows, but still people she can ask for help.
Smiling anxiously, not wanting to be a nuisance, Maisie walks up to a petite young auburn-haired woman who looks like the nicest of the group.
“Excuse me, Miss, but could you ...”
The pretty woman walks straight through Maisie, who stands gaping at the barefoot girl.
“Sorry, I should have warned you. They can't see or hear us, at least, not at the moment. But we can still make a difference, with luck. You've got enough energy left to move things a bit, and I can tell you how to do it. The others and I have had plenty of time to practice. Now, follow me. Quickly!”
The barefoot girl leads Maisie into the library.
***
At the police headquarters, a small crowd has gathered discreetly in the corridor outside Croft's office. The detective's visitor has the sort of voice that carries through closed doors. While Croft's replies are not so clear, the gist of them is evident from his tone. Bets are being taken on whether the boss will call for help to eject 'that massive Spanish woman' from the premises or whether she will simply storm out.
Inside, the detective runs his fingers through his thinning hair for the umpteenth time and asks, “Please, madam, what real, material evidence leads you to believe that Major Beaumont or any of his party are in danger? I can't accept spirit messages as evidence from you or anyo
ne else, no matter how many cabinet ministers attend your séances!”
Madam Castanos bridles, and for a horrible moment, the detective fears she is about to launch herself across the desk at him.
Instead, she takes a deep breath and says, in a low voice, “She is very proud of you, you know.”
“What?”
“Your Elizabeth. She is never far away. She is proud of you, all you have done. It would have been so easy to hide in that bottle after you lost her. But, you were brave. You endured. ”
Angry, now, Croft stands up and says,
“I don't know who you've been talking to, madam, but this interview is over!”
Madam Castanos shows no sign of hearing him. She tilts her head with her eyes closed, listening.
“Elizabeth asks if you remember the picnic on the island, the old fisherman you talked to, the daisy chain she made and put on your head. She says has many such happy memories.”
Croft sits down again, all anger gone.
“All right,” he says. “I'm not saying I believe you, but even if that's just a trick, it still proves you're cleverer than I am. Why are you so obsessed with Furniss Manor?”
The listeners in the corridors strain to hear, but they can’t make out any words, only the sound of urgent conversation. After twenty minutes, the statuesque woman appears and sweeps out of the police station, and Sergeant Armstrong wins five shillings.
***
“Penny for your thoughts?”
Bill Rolt's words jolt Rachel out of a reverie. She's standing in the library staring at a badly stained picture unable to even tell if it's a portrait. A vague shape in the center of the canvas suggests a head and shoulders, but that's about it.
“One of Tony's ancestors, maybe.” she says.
“Clearly nobody thought it worth finding out,” he remarks.
“No. Kind of sad, isn't it? All that work on a picture, now we can't see it.”
Bill nods thoughtfully.
“So, nothing much in here apart from the books. Let's see where the others have gotten to.” Rachel is following him out of the room when she hears a gentle thud and turns to see a book has fallen off a shelf. She recalls a similar event in the summer of 1940, one that led to strange revelations and her encounter with the ancient Sentinels of Duncaster. Ghosts often communicate in strange ways. She's still trying to figure out their rules.
Okay, let's do this.
Rachel goes back into the room and takes a look at the slim, dog-eared volume. Bound in red leather, untitled, and its pages are brown with age. It exudes the familiar old book smell she likes, but there's a trace of another odor. Without thinking, Rachel lifts the book closer to her nose.
“Anything interesting?” asks Bill.
Wow, he moves quietly for such a big guy.
“Don't know,” she says, a little embarrassed to be caught sniffing an antique volume.
She holds the book normally and hastily flips through it. There's an odd sense of familiarity about some of the handwritten pages, although she can't understand a word. But she realizes that the writing and the diagrams are very similar to those Madam Castanos scribbled in Rachel's notebook. She mentions this to Bill.
“Pity we can't compare the two,” she adds.
“No, sorry again about that,” he mutters, glancing at the book before handing it back.
“Do you think it could be a diary, maybe?” she asks.
“Possibly, but I doubt you'll get anything useful out of it,” he says dismissively, walking out into the hall.
Rachel is not so sure, and puts the book in her purse. She can at least show it to Tony. As she's about to follow Bill, she sees something else on the floor. Rachel picks up a square black card, about four inches across. There are swirls of paint on it, though the colors are long-faded. The pattern doesn't look random, but despite a few moments of scrutiny, Rachel can't figure out what it's supposed to be. She pockets the card, too, and goes to find the others.
Tony, Bill, and Charlotte are in a storage room under the grand staircase that's cluttered with years of discarded stuff, ranging from china to tennis racquets. Tony is in his element, rummaging around, while Charlotte looks on in amusement while smoking.
“Oh, great, the junk room. He'll be here all day,” sighs Rachel. “Tony likes nothing better than a heap of random items he can dig through.”
“Let's go and make some lunch, shall we?” suggests Charlotte, brushing dusty cobwebs off her elegant clothes.
“Sounds good, I'm famished,” says Bill. “Come on Tony, let's give the girls a hand!”
“I'll be along in a minute,” Tony says.
They leave him to his rummaging and go to the kitchen, a huge one, designed to cater to banquets. Luckily, there's a modern stove and plenty of tinned food, so they've got an improvised meal together. Shouting for Tony to come and get it fails, so Rachel goes to drag him to the table, if necessary, and finds him dragging something out of a junk-filled corner
“Hey, baked beans, eggs, and sausages, all getting cold!”
He gives no sign of hearing her and Rachel goes to stand by him. His find is a square cabinet, about eighteen inches across and a foot deep. It stands at waist height on simple wooden legs. The sides of the box are made of some dark wood, the top is transparent. The grime of decades, perhaps centuries, obscures what's inside.
“Hey, honey, you need to eat. This can wait.”
“There's a winder, here, so it's clearly clockwork,” he says to himself. “Chances are it hasn't run this century.”
Rachel, trying to meet him halfway, asks,
“Okay, I give in, what is it?”
He looks up, points to a tarnished brass plate on one side of the object. She bends down and spells out CELESTIALLE ARMAMENTARIUM. Below it is a date, 1593.
“Oh, well, that explains everything. Silly of me not to realize.”
“Exactly!” says Tony, with boyish enthusiasm. “I have no idea what on earth it is, but it's beautifully made. Fascinating!”
“It'll still be fascinating after lunch,” she says, taking him by the arm and leading him to the food. As soon as they get to the kitchen he starts describing his find to Bill and Charlotte.
“You think it's really old?” asks Bill.
“Maybe as early as the Renaissance! After all, this house dates to the mid-16th century. Lot of interesting mechanical devices were made in those days. It would be wonderful to get one working again!”
“He loves to tinker,” confirms Rachel. Then, with a wink at Charlotte, “That's why we had no running water for two weeks last summer.”
“Oh ye of little faith!” says Tony.
“I found a couple of things, too,” says Rachel, producing the small book and the black card. They're passed around the group. Again Bill only gives the book a perfunctory glance. But Rachel notices he looks closely at both sides of the card before passing it on with a smile and a shrug.
“Could it be an artist's palette, or whatever they mix their paints on?” asks Tony.
“I think it's a secret portrait,” says Charlotte. “I've seen one before. It's very clever. And it suggests your family got up to some serious shenanigans back in the day, your lordship!”
“I've no idea what you mean,” says Tony.
“Yeah, how can a smear of paint be a portrait?” asks Rachel, staring at the card. The back side is blank except for two faint marks that might be initials.
E.B., perhaps?
“Give it here,” says Charlotte, taking the card back and laying it on the table. She points to a space in the center, a black circle surrounded by the swirl of colors.
“You put a cylindrical mirror here, you see? And if it's the right size and look at it from the right angle, the reflection forms a picture. It's always of someone whose portrait you couldn't display openly. A rebellious lord, a religious heretic, that sort of thing.”
“Were any of your ancestors rebels or heretics?” asks Rachel.
“I've no
idea,” Tony concedes, staring at the card. “So we need to find a cylindrical mirror of the right size to see who this is?”
“After all these years, the original one will have been broken,” puts in Bill.
“Curses!” says Rachel. “I forgot to pack my collection of cylindrical mirrors for the vacation!”
“Yes, but I'm sure we could improvise,” says Tony.
The discussion is cut short by the sound of a bell.
***
The mailman has become used to the bicycle ride up to Furniss Manor in recent weeks. There have been quite a few letters to deliver, some with fancy envelopes and return addresses in London. It was obvious to him, and thus everyone he chatted with on his rounds, that after years of neglect, life is slowly returning to the Big House.
As he cycles up the driveway through the trees, he gets the shivers, and not just because of the February chill. True, there's low cloud and the threat of snow later but it's more the feel of the place that bothers the postman, the sense of always being watched. He's glad when he emerges from the stark trees and sees the house. At least there are people there. There's even a light flickering in one high window. Oddly, though, it doesn't give the place a more homely feel on this dark day. It doesn't help either, that the statues seem to watch as you go by.
There's no mailbox, so he rings the bell, expecting old Ted Marlow or his missus to answer the door. A pretty young woman with an American accent surprises him.
“Oh, good day, miss! I've got a couple of letters, and one's recorded delivery, so it needs signing for it, if you don't mind?”
“Thanks!” she says, taking the mail. “Wow, it must be really cold on that bike of yours! Would you like to come in and get warm by the kitchen stove?”
“Oh, no, you get used to it, miss. But that's very kind of you.”
“Say,” she says, as she signs his form, “you haven't seen any strangers around here, lately? Apart from me, I mean?”
“No, miss, only folk I've seen are the Marlows.”
“Right. You don't happen to know where they might be?”
The Haunter (The Sentinels Series Book 2) Page 7
