The Woman in the Woods

by Lisa Hall

  Naomi is quiet for a moment and then she says, ‘I think you’re exhausted, Allie. I think you’re tired, your body has been through a huge upheaval, and on top of that you’re still getting used to living here. You don’t have support from your mum, and Rav is working hard.’

  When Naomi puts it like that, without that undertone of scepticism that I get from Rav, it feels almost rational.

  ‘Maybe I should take the kids off your hands for a few hours,’ Naomi says when I don’t tell her she’s wrong, ‘when the new girl is back from being sick. I can look after them for the day, even overnight if you want. Mina can sleep in with me and the baby can go in the Moses basket; they can stay at the flat. There’s plenty of room. Then you can get some sleep and start feeling more like your old self. No one said you have to do this on your own.’

  ‘No.’ I am shaking my head before she has even finished speaking.

  ‘Or I could stay with you,’ she offers, hope written all over her face. ‘We could get a takeaway, then I’ll get up with Leo in the night.’

  ‘I’m OK, Naomi, honestly. You’re probably right, I just need to get a good night’s sleep. I’ll ask Rav to get up with the baby tonight.’ As if on cue Leo wakes with a thin, reedy cry and I lift him from the pram and attach him once again.

  ‘Maybe you should consider seeing the doctor?’ Naomi says, watching as the baby gulps greedily. ‘Just to … I don’t know, check everything is all right. That you’re all right.’

  ‘I told you I’m fine, Naomi.’ The words tumble out of my mouth as sharp, angry knives. ‘I don’t need to see a doctor.’

  ‘OK, OK. I just thought, you know … if you’re not sleeping very well with these nightmares, and then seeing things …’

  ‘I’m not “seeing things”. I did see someone in the woods.’ I unlatch the baby before he is finished and call to Mina to give me my phone as we’re going home, ignoring her grumbling response.

  ‘But what Miranda said to you about Aileen Gowdie seems to have really unsettled you.’ Naomi stands in the doorway as I try to squeeze the pram past her.

  ‘Agnes Gowdie,’ I snap. ‘I was just feeling emotional. It’s nothing. Look, I feel better already for speaking to you about it.’ I manage to get past her and out on to the street, the scent of the flowers on the pavement hitting me as I step out. Once outside I stick on a conciliatory smile. ‘It did unsettle me a little, but I know it’s only a story. I’m OK, promise.’

  ‘Well, you know where I am. The offer still stands.’ Naomi rests her palm on the handle of the pram before I can walk away. ‘I’ll see you after the weekend and … take care, OK?’

  I am in bed not long after Mina, and asleep pretty much straight away after Rav agrees to stay up with the baby and do the night feeds for me. I don’t dream of the staircase, of the thick, heavy air or the shadowy pictures on the wall. Instead, I dream of bones, of dried herbs twisted together, of blood splashes in a pestle and mortar, a strange smoky smell in the air. The cry of a child jolts me awake a little after three o’clock in the morning, my nightshirt stuck to my body with clammy sweat, the piercing sound ringing in my ears. I reach out for the baby only to find the cot empty. The space in the bed next to me, the sheets cold, tells me that Rav isn’t there either.

  I slide out of bed, shivering as the chilly air of the cottage hits my skin. I pull the open bedroom window closed and creep downstairs to the living room where a puddle of golden light seeps out into the hallway, shadows dancing across the living-room wall ahead of me.

  ‘Rav? Are you down here?’ My heart does a painful double thump, as I step into the living room, suddenly afraid that it won’t be Rav sitting on the sofa but someone else, someone dressed in white. But it is Rav. Of course it is. Heat prickles under my arms and I feel stupid, over dramatic. I tiptoe into the room, noting the open laptop on the low coffee table in front of Rav as he snoozes on the sofa.

  ‘Rav, wake up.’ I shake him gently, and he stirs, blinking awake sleepily. ‘Come upstairs, it’s cold down here. Come to bed.’ Rav sits up and I step back, nudging into the coffee table and bringing the laptop screen to life.

  Rav rubs his hand over his eyes, his gaze also drawn to the laptop screen, the glare seeming overly bright in the dimly lit room, before he looks up at me. ‘Allie. I must have fallen asleep. I was looking at …’ He gestures to the screen and I turn to look at it.

  ‘Oh.’ My face flushes hot as I see the last website I pulled up on the screen before I had slammed the lid closed when Rav came back down after kissing Mina good night. ‘I can explain.’

  ‘I hope so, because this is all a bit fucking weird.’ Rav is wide awake now, his eyes never leaving mine.

  ‘I was researching the house,’ I say flatly. After Miranda’s revelation about us living in ‘the witch house’, I resisted the itching urgency to investigate until I couldn’t bear it any longer, and I opened the laptop and started googling. It turned out that she was right. Gowdie Cottage was the witch house, known to the villagers by that name. I found a tiny mention in a badly written website, which said that Agnes Gowdie had lived here, way back in the 1600s, and was the sister of Isobel Gowdie, a well-known Scottish witch burned at the stake. Agnes had fled Scotland when her sister was condemned to death, and the locals believed she had brought her witchcraft with her. She gained a reputation in the village as a healer and as a witch, and it wasn’t long before rumours started to circulate about her, although I couldn’t find much more information than that. It seems that Isobel Gowdie is of more interest than Agnes, the article focusing more on her history than on Agnes’. There was a two-sentence paragraph on Gowdie Cottage and how strange things had been happening here for years. The words made my skin crawl, and I had slammed the laptop lid down without shutting the browser. I think now of the borders in the garden, the range of plants and herbs there that could all be used for either healing or harm, none of them, I think, planted just because they look pretty.

  ‘It’s ridiculous,’ Rav says. ‘Who put all of this in your head?’

  ‘No one … a woman at the baby group called it “the witch house” so I came home and did some research,’ I whisper angrily, not wanting to wake the baby. A single scratch comes from the chimney. ‘I hardly think you can blame me for wanting to know why she would call it that, and now I know. Rav, the reason this house was such a bargain is because the previous owners just upped and left over fifty years ago. Overnight, they just left, disappeared. And they weren’t the first ones. There have been weird things happening in this cottage for years. You would think the estate agent would have said something to us when we put in an offer.’

  Rav says nothing, reaching for a small bottle of water by his feet. He takes a long swallow and stands. ‘Allie, I need to go to bed, and I think you should too.’

  There is something about the way he says it that makes the hairs on the back of my neck stand on end. ‘You knew, didn’t you?’ A bubble of red-hot fury pops low down in my stomach, making my veins fizz. ‘Bloody hell, Rav, you knew the history of this place and you never even mentioned it!’

  ‘Because I knew you would react like this,’ Rav hisses back at me. ‘I knew you wouldn’t want to live here if you thought it had a past, but seriously, Allie! A house this age will always have a past, and I knew it might creep you out. I was trying to protect you; I didn’t want you to worry.’ He moves towards me, putting his arms out as if to embrace me but I take a step back. ‘Allie, please. We both love this house. I knew it would shake you up if you knew it had a reputation as a witch’s house but come on. It’s just a story, none of it is real. Let’s go to bed, it’ll all look so much better in the morning.’

  ‘You can sleep down here.’ I march to the understairs cupboard, pulling out a set of blankets. ‘Or I will. I need to be on my own.’

  Rav sighs, and for a moment I think he’s going to apologize, but he just says, ‘Fine. I’ll sleep down here,’ and holds out his arms for the blankets.

  It’s onl
y a short while later, when I have tucked the baby into the cot and climbed into bed, too wired and hurt by Rav’s decision to keep the history of the house a secret to sleep, that I realize I am cold, chilled to my bones. The sun is already starting to rise on the horizon, and I roll over onto my side, burrowing down into the duvet, my heart freezing in my chest as I see that the bedroom window – the window that I closed when I woke earlier – stands wide open.

  Chapter Ten

  Early morning sunlight is peeping in through the window when I open my eyes to a gentle pressure on the bed next to me. Rav is perched on the edge of the mattress, a mug of tea in his hand. My eyes feel gritty and sore. The open window had played on my mind until some time after the sun had appeared over the horizon. The shrill cries of a child had been ringing in my ears, but when I checked on Mina she had been sleeping soundly and then the baby had needed another feed. My head thumps as I struggle into a sitting position and take the mug from Rav.

  ‘I’m sorry,’ he says, his eyes not quite meeting mine. ‘I should have told you about the house before we put the offer in.’

  ‘Yes, you should,’ I say and then, ‘I’m sorry if I came across as overdramatic.’ It’s not a straight apology, but it’s all I can bring myself to say in light of things. The keys. The person in the woods. Agnes Gowdie.

  ‘You know I only did it to protect you?’ Rav asks, linking his fingers through mine on my free hand. ‘I didn’t want you to worry about anything, but I realize now I made the wrong decision.’

  Tears sting my eyes and I blink them back, not taking my gaze away from our linked hands. Rav did make the wrong decision, and the fact that he kept things from me hurts, but I don’t want to fight with him about it. The baby squawks and I feel a twist in my chest. It’s not worth ruining the weekend over. And maybe, I think, maybe Rav does have a point. Maybe I am reading too much into things, letting myself get upset over things that don’t really matter. I want that to be the case, anyway.

  ‘I know,’ I say eventually, ‘seeing someone in the woods … trying to find out about the history of the house … it freaked me out a bit. Can we start again?’ I lean forward and kiss him now, properly, not a chaste peck on the cheek. He looks as tired as I feel, and I can hear the faint strains of canned laughter from the television downstairs that tells me Mina is already up and awake.

  ‘Good idea,’ he says. I think I see a flicker of irritation cross his face when I mention seeing someone in the woods but it’s so fleeting, I can’t be sure. ‘So, no more about witches, or people in the woods?’

  I shake my head. ‘No more.’ But even as I say it, I picture the flash of white, moving at speed through the trees, Miranda’s words ringing loudly in my ears.

  The weekend passes in a flash, and I manage to get through most of it by trying not to think too hard about the house, and the strange things connected to it. It helps that the weather is beautiful, so we spend Saturday away from the house, away from Pluckley. Rav promises not to work for the whole weekend and we take Mina and the baby to the beach – Rav wants to go to Joss Bay, but I can’t bear the anxiety of all the sand, whipping up into the baby’s face or getting in Mina’s swimsuit and making her skin sore, so we compromise, ending up at Deal for chips on the pebbled beach, Mina running in and out of the waves as they brush the shoreline.

  Avó comes to visit on Sunday, much to Mina’s delight, and I am relieved when Rav uses her presence to go out on his pushbike for an hour. It is worth putting up with Avó’s thoughtless comments for a while if it means I have a little space from Rav. We might have agreed not to talk about it, and I might have told him I have accepted his apology, but I still have that unsettled feeling when I think about him knowing the history of the house and not telling me. It hasn’t helped that I have woken the last two nights with my heart pounding my chest, sure that I can hear a child crying somewhere outside, even though the baby and Mina have been sleeping. Avó sits, rocking the baby at the kitchen table, while I start to prepare the leg of lamb for dinner.

  ‘I can make the dinner for you, Allie,’ Avó says. ‘You should rest. You should be letting me do it.’

  ‘Avó, I can do the dinner. I make the dinner every night for all of us.’ I open the oven door, letting out a huge plume of hot steam into the already stifling kitchen.

  ‘Hmmm.’ Avó frowns, her black eyes on me as I move about the kitchen. I am about to give in and ask her to peel some potatoes, when she says, ‘That lamb won’t taste of anything you know, not if you don’t put some herbs in there.’

  Resisting the urge to roll my eyes and tut, I smile graciously at her. I should have known whatever I did it wouldn’t be right in Avó’s eyes. ‘How about you keep an eye on the baby and I go out to pick some rosemary for the lamb?’ Without waiting for her to answer, I walk out to the unruly border, weeds already beginning to grow back in the area that I cleared. I avert my eyes from the cluster of trees at the edge of the wood, sure that if I look directly into the forest I’ll see that flash of white, feel the prickle of someone else’s eyes on me, and suddenly, irrationally, I wish Rav were here to do his mother’s bidding. I snap off the rosemary stalks, releasing their pungent scent into the air and raise a stalk to my nose, breathing it in. Rosemary gets rid of negative energy. The words rise unbidden into my mind alongside an image of a bundle of rosemary twigs tied together hanging upside down in the kitchen doorway. I don’t know how I know this. Did I learn it at college when I was training? Or did I read it last night, when I stumbled down the internet rabbit hole trying to find more information on legends and tales about Gowdie Cottage? I blink and the image vanishes as the sun disappears behind a cloud, leaving me feeling chilled and, once again, a little spooked. That creeping sensation that we are not safe, that the children need to be protected from something washes over me. Maybe I should try and contact Ray Watts, the estate agent, myself – he might know more about the history of the cottage, he might be able to put my mind at rest, seeing as I’ve agreed not to talk about it with Rav. Some of the stories on the internet might be exaggerated, if Miranda’s reaction is anything to go by. I jump as the gate to the garden crashes open and Rav wheels his bike in, his face hot and sweaty under his helmet.

  ‘Allie, you all right?’ He frowns as he tugs his helmet off, and I swallow before pasting on a smile.

  ‘Yes, fine.’ I hold up the sprigs of rosemary. ‘Just getting some herbs for your mum.’ I look towards the kitchen window – she’s taken over and started preparing us dinner. I roll my eyes good-naturedly and without looking back at the woods, follow Rav into the house.

  Later, when we’ve eaten and Avó has refolded the baby’s vests, done a pile of ironing that didn’t really need to be done, and told me all about her neighbour’s daughter who has a new baby and still manages to cook a three-course dinner every night, Rav drives his mother home. I get Mina to bed and lay the baby in the cot, relieved at no longer having to stifle my annoyance at Avó’s interference. It’s hard work trying to keep Avó happy and keep my temper, and exhaustion tugs at my bones as I sink onto the sofa, tucking my feet underneath me, as Rav heads upstairs to work, his promise to leave it for the weekend forgotten now he’s spent time with us. I’ve barely slept again all weekend, the open window from Friday night playing on my mind, but as I promised Rav I wouldn’t mention it again I’ve kept it to myself, like a worry doll living deep at the back of my mind, that I keep taking out and turning over. A worry doll, full of uncertainty and sinister ill-feeling.

  A yawn pulls at the back of my throat and I get to my feet. I’ll make Rav a cup of tea, try and persuade him to come to bed. I step out into the hallway, my feet cold on the quarry tiles as I catch sight of my reflection in the mirror. I step closer, smoothing my hair down, wishing I didn’t have such huge bags under my eyes, when I see it. Movement again, from the corner of my eye as if someone has walked past the mirror behind me. The air stirs, and the tiny hairs on the back of my neck stand up, as I think I see the shadow of a fi
gure on the stairs.

  ‘Rav?’ I turn, suddenly feeling cold. The hallway behind me is empty. I turn back to face the mirror, my mouth dry, looking not at my own face, pale and tired in the glass, but behind me, waiting to catch that glimpse of movement again, but there is nothing. A pulse starts to beat in the soft hollow of my neck, a double beat that makes my breath come faster. There is a creak overhead and for a brief, dizzying moment I am back in the dream, seeing my bare feet on the carpet of the stairs, hearing the floorboards creak beneath them. I close my eyes, the world feeling strangely off kilter, resting one hand against the frame of the mirror to steady myself. The silver is warm beneath my palm, despite the chill in the air. After a few seconds, the feeling passes, and my eyes go to the glass again but there is just the reflection of the empty staircase behind me. The only sound is the shower running overhead, the hot water pipe giving out an intermittent bang as the creaky old plumbing tries to keep up.

  Water. I head into the kitchen and pour myself a glass of water from the tap, swishing a mouthful around to ease my dry throat. Rav’s mobile sits charging on the kitchen worktop and, straining to hear if the shower is still running upstairs, I tap in the passcode intent on looking up Ray Watts’s email. I don’t get as far as Rav’s email account. The screen unlocks on his messages screen, and the third message down is not what I was expecting to see. It’s from Naomi, received at 1.14 p.m. on Friday, not long after I went to see her at the florist. The message has already been read by Rav and I quickly swipe to open it.

  Rav, call me. I need to talk to you. It’s important.

  The shower goes off abruptly, and I hear Rav’s footsteps thud overhead as he walks from the bathroom to the top of the stairs.

  ‘Al?’ His voice drifts down the staircase and I lay the mobile back on the worktop with shaking hands.

  ‘Be right up.’

  I feel sick, the roast lamb dinner from earlier sitting heavy in my stomach. Why has Naomi texted Rav a message like that – what could be so important that she needs to speak to him so urgently? And why wouldn’t she tell me what was so important? I know we talked mostly about what Miranda had said about the house, but wouldn’t she have mentioned to me if she was worried about something, or had something urgent on her mind? A thought settles in my mind, pressing down as sure as a hand on my shoulder. Maybe it’s something she doesn’t want me to know about. Maybe it’s something that neither of them wants me to know about. Rav lied to me about the house, by hiding the fact that he knew the history behind it. Lying by omission is still lying, isn’t it? I remember the faint scent of alcohol on his breath after work, the floral scent that I thought might be incense, but now that I think about it could have been Naomi’s perfume, the one I bought for her birthday last year because it reminded me of the violets she loves. Have they met without me, behind my back? And if so, why? If he lied to me about the house, what else is he lying to me about?