The Haunting of Maddy Clare

by St. James, Simone

  I could still feel the sting of his beard on my neck, his hands on me. I could still feel him inside me. I closed my eyes, and after a long time, I slept.

  Chapter Sixteen

  I slept late the next morning. When I finally awoke, the sun was already coming through the dingy window of my room.

  I washed and dressed and looked in the mirror. I appeared no different than I had yesterday. I was still myself, dressed in skirt and blouse and cardigan. A foolish rush of questions came over me. I had always thought myself plain, unremarkable. Was I truly? Did Matthew think so? Did he think I was in the least bit attractive? One would think, since he had visited me last night, that he had seen something in me. And yet, I knew that men were perfectly capable of intimacy with a woman who interested them not in the least. They were susceptible to the physical closeness of a woman, any woman, if mixed with boredom and desperation. Last night I had felt powerful, but that power dissipated in the pitiless sunlight.

  I looked down at myself. I knew I was slim. I knew my legs were well shaped, my ankles pleasing. I knew my arms were slender, complemented by the narrow watch I always wore. Yet I also knew my breasts and hips were awkward, and that I tended to slouch my shoulders down, as if hiding, and that my face, with its dark slashes of brows, brown eyes, and narrow nose, was not the kind that made men look twice. Perhaps he had simply been using me. In fact, it was likely. The confidence of last night had vanished, and I wanted to hide in my room.

  I won’t be back.

  I took a breath and turned from the mirror. Well, if he had used me, so be it; life would go on. I went downstairs to the private room and found Matthew and Alistair there already. Alistair was at the table, his chair pushed away, one ankle crossed rakishly over the other knee. Matthew stood at the sideboard, pouring himself a glass of water from a jug, his back to me.

  “Ah, there you are, noddyhead,” said Alistair, and his grin was enough to set any normal girl rocking back on her heels. He was freshly shaven, his light brown hair combed back from his forehead, lean and fit and strong. In that moment he looked like the ideal of English manhood, perfect and unscarred and whole, and only someone who knew him would suspect anything otherwise. “We have been wondering when you’d bother to arise.”

  “Hello,” I said softly. My heart was hammering in my chest. I could not help glancing at Matthew, watching his arm hold steady as he poured the water, the back of his neck as he bent his head. I now noticed his silhouette, strong and lithe, the way the waist of his trousers sat perfectly just above his hips, where his clean white shirt narrowed from his broad back. I forced my gaze away and maneuvered carefully around him at the sideboard, taking a little toast and some tea. Matthew did not look at me.

  “We have been discussing today’s plan,” Alistair said jovially. Something had made him very happy this morning, and I wondered what it was. “Matthew thinks we should make another call on Roderick Nesbit. What do you think?”

  While Alistair and I had been shopping for new clothes for me yesterday, Matthew had in fact found a lead regarding Maddy Clare. He had spent yesterday morning taking a tactic he called “the shortest route to the real truth.” That was to say, instead of questioning the villagers, he had questioned the servants.

  The servants were willing to talk, but their knowledge was scanty. They had not known Maddy, who had never left the Clare house during her tenure there. Most of what they could tell Matthew was rumor, conjecture, or outright lies. The Barrys had been mentioned often in these conversations; despite their money, they were despised by even the servant class as employers no one of any quality would want to work for—an attitude that followed Mrs. Clare’s. Tom Barry’s claim to be Waringstoke’s leader of opinions, it seemed, was not founded in truth.

  However, the morning had truly paid off when a groom told Matthew of walking a horse past the graveyard during Maddy’s small funeral service. Attending the service had been only the vicar, Mrs. Clare, and Mrs. Macready; but the groom had seen someone else far back, hidden in the trees, who had quickly disappeared. He recognized the man as Roderick Nesbit, an odd-job man who lived in the village.

  Matthew had promptly found direction to Roderick Nesbit’s house and gone there to interview the man. He had found the place on the edge of the village, isolated and run-down. No one had answered the door, or any of Matthew’s shouts, but Matthew was certain someone had been home.

  It was yet another piece of the puzzle unsolved. Why had Roderick Nesbit gone to Maddy’s funeral, unseen?

  I sat at the table and forced a small bite of toast down my throat. I looked at Alistair, but my awareness of Matthew just out of my line of vision was distracting.

  “I think that’s a good idea,” I said, hoping I sounded normal.

  Alistair smiled at me and tipped his chair by flexing one long leg. “It is a good idea,” he said. “An excellent idea. However, I have a better one.”

  “And what is that?”

  “We’re going back to the Clare barn.”

  I set down my cup of tea as a chill went through my body. Behind me, I heard Matthew go still. “I beg your pardon?” I said.

  “We’re going to the barn,” Alistair said with absolute confidence. “We’ll go as a team this time. Matthew will bring the sound recorder. I’ll operate the camera myself. Sarah, I would like you to take notes.”

  “You mustn’t,” I managed to say, though it felt as if my throat had closed.

  Alistair tipped his chair back down to the ground and leaned forward. “And why is that? Because you sensed some sort of danger to me when you were there last? I appreciate that, Sarah—truly I do. But I am not afraid.”

  I looked at him and knew that he told the truth. He wasn’t afraid in the least of Maddy Clare, whom he saw as an echo, a vibration of sorts, a cobweb. He would go into that barn as fearlessly as if he were in his own home. Part of me knew that he should be afraid—that there was something terrible waiting to happen if he did this. But I knew Alistair well enough already to know that he would not be swayed. After he’d fought in the trenches, it would be a rare thing indeed that would give Alistair any fear.

  I turned my head and looked at Matthew, who was standing at the sideboard, leaning his hip against it, watching us. “What is your opinion?” I asked him.

  Matthew frowned pensively at the floor. I wondered if he was even considering the danger, but when he looked up, I knew he wasn’t. He looked as fearless as Alistair. “The recorder is fixed, as far as I know.”

  “Excellent!” said Alistair.

  I kept my gaze on Matthew. “You didn’t answer my question.”

  He turned to me. In the late-morning light he looked beautiful to me: not a golden beauty like Alistair’s, but large, looming, solid, and male. I remembered how his strong shoulders had felt under my palms last night, and pushed the thought away. I knew what his answer would be before he opened his mouth.

  “I’d like to see this ghost for myself,” he said. “I’m in.”

  I turned away in helpless frustration. Why had I been saddled with two pigheaded men so completely unafraid? I tried another tactic. “Mrs. Clare hasn’t given permission. You’ll be trespassing.”

  Alistair nodded. “I knew you’d say that. But as you so sagely pointed out yesterday, Sarah, Mrs. Clare wants us to rid her of this ghost. I’ve decided I can’t do that unless I experience it. It will just have to do.”

  “You’ll break the padlock on the door in daylight?”

  It was Matthew who answered. “Padlocks aren’t a problem.”

  I stood up and paced the room, unable to stay still. “You saw those crows last night. They were uncanny.”

  “It was quite fascinating. I wonder if there are any bird experts in the area who can help us.”

  “Alistair!” I could have screamed in frustration.

  “They are birds, Sarah.”

  I stared at him helplessly and he leaned toward me, his elbows on his knees. “This brings me to something else
,” he said.

  “What is it?”

  “Sarah, I hired you to replace Matthew. Now Matthew has returned, and it seems to me I’ve not given you the option of going back to London if you wish. Do you wish it?”

  I opened my mouth, dumbfounded. “Are you—?” I stuttered. “Do you wish me gone?”

  “No, no, of course not. But this assignment has been upsetting for you. The encounters with Maddy, having your room ransacked—I just thought you might have a wish to put all of it at the back of you for good. Perhaps you don’t want to say it, so I should offer you the opportunity. Matthew and I can make do now that he’s back, if we have to. What do you think?”

  I looked at Matthew. Had this been his idea? Did he still hold a grudge against me, even after last night? But Matthew’s dark eyes gave nothing away.

  I thought of going back to London, of my damp flat and the oppressive heat and the noise of the city, and most of all my lonely, routine life. I could not go back to that, not now, perhaps not ever. And there was no chance on this earth that these men were going to encounter Maddy without me along to help.

  “I would like to stay,” I said.

  Alistair blinked, as if that was not the answer he was expecting. Then a grin broke across his face, so handsome and so genuine it gave my heart a squeeze.

  “Well, that’s good, then!” he said. “Don’t you think so, Matthew?”

  Behind me, Matthew only gave a low grunt.

  Alistair rolled his eyes at me. “Such manners on a gentleman. Let’s get the equipment together and we’ll go.”

  “Alistair,” I tried again, “I have to say I don’t think this is a good idea.”

  “You must stop worrying so, Sarah,” he said to me. “Everything will be fine.”

  We left the inn and crossed the narrow road, taking the now-familiar path across the fields and through the small cluster of trees. Alistair strode ahead, confident and eager. Matthew, to my surprise, let himself drop back to walk level with me.

  As soon as I saw what he was doing, I felt myself blushing, and I hated myself for it. Could I think of nothing else but what had happened last night?

  But Matthew made no mention of it. Instead, he said in a low voice that Alistair would not hear: “I think you should know something. When I came down this morning, I found Alistair outside, talking to Evangeline. She was walking her dog.”

  I took this in and said nothing.

  “I don’t know how long they had been talking,” he continued, “but I believe it was a long conversation. It’s affected his mood all morning.”

  “I take it it was not an interview about Maddy,” I said.

  “No. No, I don’t think so.”

  So, they had spoken to each other, and had perhaps even come to an agreement—an agreement that suited Alistair very well. I should have been shocked that Alistair would have a tête-à-tête with a married woman, for all to see and gossip about, for a long length of time. But I could not find it in myself to be shocked anymore. And if he’d found some happiness in having a conversation that was years overdue, I couldn’t find it in my heart to begrudge him it.

  It made depressing sense. Ahead of us, Alistair was still walking as if his feet were not quite touching ground. And it explained why he had made the offer to send me back to London, for that had almost certainly been Evangeline Barry’s idea. Likely couched in terms of concern, wondering if perhaps I were secretly yearning to leave and unable to ask. Alistair had taken the suggestion at face value, of course, as a man infatuated will do. But Evangeline had been making her move. She had been trying to get rid of me.

  It even explained this sudden resolve to go to the barn. Alistair wanted to wrap up this business, perhaps to look better in Evangeline’s eyes. And so he plunged ahead, the valiant knight who will fix all. And all for a woman already married. I thought of her calm obedience to her husband the day before, and the languid, condescending wave she had given me, and I hoped he was not on the road to disaster—though I very much thought he might be.

  “Oh, Alistair,” I sighed.

  I turned to see Matthew looking at me, and I would have given anything, all I owned or would ever own, to read what I saw in his eyes. But as always, Matthew remained a mystery to me.

  I turned away as we crested the small rise, approaching the place we had been the night before, photographing the barn.

  “I thought you had a torch for him,” Matthew said softly, next to me. “For Alistair.”

  Ahead of us, Alistair stopped and turned. “Hurry, slowpokes!” he shouted. I saw the barn become visible over his shoulder as we drew closer. Before I could answer Matthew, the words dried in my throat with fear.

  The barn was covered in crows, just like last night. They nestled everywhere, along the roof, in the eaves, the sills of the windows. A low gabbling reached us, the sound of their bird chatter. There was motion as they flitted through the surrounding trees. In daylight, the scene looked different—less terrifying perhaps, but somehow sickening. It did not make it any better, to see the weak morning sunlight glancing off their oily wings.

  Alistair had turned again and was approaching the building. I made myself put one foot before the other, following him, following Matthew, who had set out ahead of me at a brisk pace, despite the heavy suitcase he carried.

  “It looks like the padlock won’t be a problem,” said Alistair as we got close. I could see the lock lying on the ground. It had not been opened and dropped, or even forced. It was in pieces, the body in one place, the heavy arm twisted and lying nearly a foot away. As if it had exploded.

  “I see we’re welcome,” said Matthew.

  “Wonderful,” said Alistair. “In we go.”

  Chapter Seventeen

  Once inside the barn, both men went to work. Alistair set up his camera, and Matthew righted a dusty, overturned crate to use as a table for the wire recorder. It was something I had not thought of, having put the recorder on the packed-earth floor of the barn when I had used it earlier.

  All was quiet, at first. A few early-summer flies buzzed, and the morning sunlight, already filtered by the gray clouds outside, came weakly through the streaked windows. Alistair looked at the chaos of the barn—ropes and rotted blankets strewn about, dry and dirty straw in the corners, large pieces of equipment and old boxes smashed as if flung against the walls—and gave a low whistle. “Interesting,” he said, bending to his camera, now mounted on a tripod, and taking a few photographs of the scene. “Unless Mrs. Clare is harboring a circus strong man at Falmouth House, it looks like classic poltergeist activity to me.”

  “This is no poltergeist,” said Matthew from behind me.

  Alistair’s brow creased as he took another photograph. “It’s certainly stronger than any poltergeist I’ve ever seen. I’ll grant that.”

  “What is a poltergeist?” I asked, feeling stupid.

  “It’s a ghost of sorts,” said Matthew. He turned the knobs on the recording machine and watched in satisfaction as the reels turned, then shut them off again. “Yet without a personality. Not exactly a ghost.”

  “I don’t follow,” I said.

  Alistair snorted. “What my learned assistant is trying to express is that a poltergeist is a spirit, but it manifests itself in uncanny bursts of energy. Often they’re mischievous—breaking crockery, slamming doors, that sort of thing. There is a theory about poltergeists that is rather fascinating—that unlike ghosts, they actually manifest through the energies of the living. So say, perhaps, if you are under great stress, Sarah—then the poltergeist in your house will be more active than if you are calm.”

  I tucked my hair behind my ears. I did not know where to look; I felt that Maddy would appear at any moment, and I did not know from what direction. My skin was prickling with sweat. “That sounds horrible,” I said.

  “Yet fascinating.” Alistair grinned at me. He’s having fun, I thought. “Don’t you think, Matthew?”

  I turned to see that Matthew had stilled,
the recorder apparently forgotten. He was looking upward to the rafters, a strange look on his face, as if a memory or a thought had come over him suddenly, taking him deep inside himself. He raised a hand, wiped it over his forehead as if he was in some sort of pain. “I fucking hate barns,” he growled.

  The grin left Alistair’s face and he turned back to his camera. I was wondering what had just passed between them when I heard the sound.

  It was the light sound of bare feet, behind me—the brush of the heel against the dirt floor, the slap-slap of the base of the toes. Someone running, toward me from behind and, before I could turn, past me and into the gloom. A cold chill brushed my neck. I saw nothing move.

  I turned on my heel, staring, and turned again. “Did you hear that?”

  “Hear what?” said Alistair, suddenly alert.

  And there it was again, the quick brush of footsteps, from another direction this time, toward me and past. Again I felt the cold breath of icy air on my neck. I turned, realizing my throat was closing and it was becoming hard to breathe.

  “There,” I said. “Did you hear it?”

  “I heard nothing,” said Alistair.

  “There was something.” This from Matthew. “I saw it.”

  Alistair turned to him, his hand on the camera. “What did you see? Where?”

  “I’m not certain,” said Matthew. “It was—”

  A long, low creak came from overhead, a groaning coming from the rafters. The sound was centered above where Alistair stood. I was covered in sweat now; I felt trickles run between my shoulder blades, felt my dress begin to stick to my skin. I struggled to breathe. The groan came again, like something heavy dragging on the wooden beams overhead.

  I looked up and saw nothing. But Matthew was staring, too, and the look on his face was truly horrible, shocked and pale. “Jesus God,” he said, his voice nearly breathless.