Lilian's Spell Book

by Toby Litt

  ‘Please!’ said Jack.

  I’m sorry to say I shouted at him. I think I was feeling more guilty than Peter. Mrs. Forster obviously loved the house. Being here probably brightened her days. Wherever she lived, this place was going to be nicer, wasn’t it?

  After breakfast, we piled into the car and set off for the supermarket. The drive took about twenty five minutes, though Peter reckoned he could have done it in fifteen if he’d been on his own. We had the radio on. Steve Wright playing the same soppy records he’d played the week before, for happy people sending the same messages to one another. That’s why I like it so much – hearing about people who’ve been married longer than you’ve been alive. It gives you hope, shows it can be done.

  I didn’t have a shopping list, so we bought everything we could think of. It was annoying not to be able to stock a freezer. I wasn’t yet prepared to trust the larder with fishfingers and ice cream.

  Peter said he would go out and buy electrical goods on Tuesday or Wednesday.

  ‘The village shop probably has the basics,’ he said.

  ‘I hope so,’ I said. ‘Jack can’t survive without fishfingers.’

  ‘And ketchup,’ Jack said. ‘And Daddy’s sauce.’

  We drove back and spent the whole of Sunday settling in. I unpacked the rest of the kitchen stuff, and all the clothes I had – not so many. The grand house made me feel I needed a whole new wardrobe. I didn’t want to dress country, like Mrs. Forster, but I really couldn’t slop around in sweatshirt and maternity trousers any longer. What if I had to answer the door? People would think I was a squatter. I shoved my grey knickers and nursing bras into the drawer, feeling ashamed of them, too. Jack was amazingly helpful – putting his own clothes away in his old covered-in-stickers chest of drawers. Mary was more difficult. She was used to a lot more attention from me than she was getting that day, and by the middle of the afternoon she had started to become distressed.

  I took her with me and went to find Peter. He was in the living room, trying to get our television to work.

  ‘There’s no signal,’ he said. ‘I need to put an aerial on the roof.’

  I told him I thought Mary needed a walk. She was letting him know this too, in her own loud way.

  ‘We’re nearly done,’ he said. ‘Just a couple of boxes of books. I’ll put them in the study for now.’

  We were still working out what to call everything. The study was Michael Francis’ old office, the one full of animal heads and filing cabinets. The dining room was where Elizabeth was. The living room was the one downstairs, the one upstairs we called the other living room or the playroom.

  ‘I’ll see if Jack wants to come,’ I said.

  But he was quite happy playing with his unboxed toys in his new bedroom.

  I got Mary into the buggy, stuffed a muslin under the hood, had a quick look at myself in a mirror – ugh! – and then went out the front door.

  It wasn’t until then that I’d thought about where we were heading. The path to the back garden had too many roots growing across it to be a comfortable ride for either Mary or me. And I wanted to go further than that. The only alternative seemed to be down the drive, and then left or right at the end.

  When we got there, Mary already a lot calmer, I decided to turn left. Right was the village, and I knew I’d be going there tomorrow.

  Once we were away from the dark trees surrounding the house, I found that it was quite a hot day. The road was smooth grey Tarmac and felt sticky under the soles of my flip-flops. I wished I’d brought some sun cream for Mary. The best I could do was drape the muslin over the hood of the buggy to keep the sun out of her face.

  After about a quarter of a mile, the Tarmac ran out and the road turned into a pair of parallel gravel tracks. Off to either side, behind tall hedges, were fields of wheat and of rape.

  We were just coming to a turn in the road, to the left and quite sharp, when I heard the chug of a large engine. This sounded too deep to belong to a car. It was coming from the direction I was heading in.

  The track was too narrow and the hedges too close together for me to be sure I could squeeze out of the way. So, I pushed Mary’s buggy up against the verge and ran round the corner to slow down whatever it was.

  The tractor – that’s what it turned out to be – was coming even faster than I’d feared. It was only about ten metres away when I rounded the corner. And the driver, I could see, had a newspaper propped up on the steering wheel.

  I shouted, but the engine was chugging too loud for him to hear me. He would probably glance up before reaching the corner, but I couldn’t take that chance. There were a few clods of mud to the side of the road – ones that had probably fallen out of tractor tracks earlier in the year. I picked up a couple and chucked them towards the windscreen as he drove past. The first flew wide. The second overshot, but hit the roof.

  As the tractor went past me, I saw the driver look up, spot me, panic, drop the newspaper. The wheels locked and the tractor began to skid. It had been going at least twenty miles an hour.

  I turned and ran along behind it.

  The tractor, still skidding, disappeared round the corner. It was slowing down but was it slowing down fast enough? My poor little baby.

  When I came into sight of the buggy, I saw that the tractor had stopped only a few inches from where Mary lay.

  The driver immediately got down out of the cab. He was a man of around thirty four or five, bald but with a very neat dark brown beard. He was dressed in blue dungarees over a blue gingham shirt, but his wellies were bright green.

  ‘I’m so sorry,’ he said. ‘I know I shouldn’t have been doing that. It’s just – Well, I’ve been driving back and forth along this road for five years, now, and you’re the first person I’ve ever come across.’

  ‘People,’ I said, indicating Mary.

  ‘Of course,’ he said. ‘I always stop looking at it just before the turn. Up until that point it’s just a long, straight, boring road. It’s the Telegraph crossword. I usually get two or three clues.’

  ‘You’re the farmer, then,’ I said.

  ‘If you mean, I own the farm. Yes, I do.’

  ‘I’m the – We’re…’ I didn’t know how to say it. ‘We’ve just moved in to the Jonson house. I’m Jeane Jonson. This is Mary.’

  ‘Lovely,’ he said, coming forward and offering his hand. ‘Matthew Maddox. Great. I mean, we’d heard you were in.’ He was very posh-sounding for a farmer. His teeth were perfect, not country teeth.

  ‘You’ve been here five years?’ I asked.

  ‘I bought the farm after I retired from the firm.’

  ‘Aren’t you very young to retire?’

  ‘Well, I could, so I did. Corporate bankruptcies. Not very interesting. But lots of money. And I always wanted a farm, from this high.’

  He touched the side of his stomach with his hand.

  ‘I have another one, about that size. Jack, he’s called.’

  ‘I look forward to meeting Jack. If he’s interested in animals at all, we have plenty. Horses. He could have a ride. Can he ride?’

  ‘No,’ I said. ‘Not yet.’ I thought about his guided pony rides at the city farm. ‘Do you have children?’

  ‘No,’ he said. ‘Sadly not.’

  I felt we’d got onto awkward territory, and very quickly.

  ‘Did you know Michael Francis Jonson very well?’

  I’d hoped this would move things to safer ground. But if anything, Matthew Maddox seemed even more unsettled.

  ‘No. Not very well. He kept himself to himself. I know that’s the cliché they use about serial killers, isn’t it? Not that he was a serial killer. Oh dear. This isn’t going very well. I think I’m still a bit flustered about the crossword.’

  Matthew Maddox was the most un-farmerlike farmer I’d ever come across. Not that I’d come across many farmers.

  ‘We don’t really know much about him,’ I said. ‘He was a distant relative. I think my husband only
met him once. When he was very young.’

  ‘It’s a lovely house. I hope you’ll be very happy there. If you need anything, just ask. We do a bit of everything. We’re not really a proper farm. I mean, last year we even made a profit.’

  I was starting to like Matthew Maddox. We talked for a while longer. I told him about how different everything was, us having come from the city. He assured me that the village shop was very good for everyday items. If we wanted eggs, milk, butter, bacon, he’d be happy to sort us out. I asked what his wife’s name was.

  ‘Gracie,’ he said. ‘Gracie Dearie. She kept her maiden name. Did you want to carry on down the road? I can reverse…’

  ‘No, I think we’ll head back.’

  ‘I’ll reverse anyway. Goodbye.’

  Matthew drove the tractor a little way onto the opposite verge, allowing us to squeeze past him. Then, with a wave, he chugged off.

  I waited a while, until his diesel fumes had dispersed, then pushed Mary back to the house.

  ‘I’ve just met our next-door-neighbour,’ I said, when I eventually tracked Peter down to the living room.

  ‘Well,’ he said, ‘I’ve just met our M.P.’

  ‘What? Was he canvassing?’

  ‘Not exactly,’ Peter said. ‘Tea?’

  ‘Oh, yes, please,’ I said. ‘Where’s Jack?’

  ‘Out there,’ said Peter. I looked through the French windows, and saw Jack throwing a model airplane down the exact middle of the lawn. ‘And look…’ He stepped up to the garden door, turned the handle, pushed it open. ‘I found a bunch of keys in the kitchen.’

  I immediately wondered if any of them would open the three mysterious doors in the cellar. Peter, reading my thoughts, shrugged and said, ‘I haven’t tried them anywhere yet. How’s Mary?’

  ‘Asleep in the buggy.’

  Peter went off and made tea while I sat on the sofa and watched Jack. He seemed incredibly happy. It was a shame Matthew and Gracie had no children of the right age. Jack needed to find someone nearby to play with, preferably without having to wait until school began. Mary probably wouldn’t ever be all that much interest to him – the gap between them was too big. Not that we’d intended to wait so long. Not that we’d waited, in fact. After Jack, I’d had two miscarriages. The second was quite late on. Which was one of the reasons why I made such a fuss over Mary, when she arrived.

  ‘Tell me about the M.P.’

  ‘He’s a Tory, of course. And a mason.’

  ‘How do you know that?’

  Peter held out his right hand, took hold of it with his left and shook it up and down.

  ‘I thought that was a joke,’ I said.

  ‘No,’ said Peter. ‘I made that mistake, too.’

  ‘What do you mean? You’re awful. Tell me properly. From the beginning.’

  ‘There was knock on the door. I answered. The Right Honourable Douglas Longbone was standing there, all tweeded up, his Jaguar XJS behind him. “Jonson,” he said. “Good to see someone in the old place, at last.” And he grabbed my hand, before I’d had a chance to offer it. And he gave it a proper squeeze, all the time pressing his thumb down between my knuckles. I can still feel it.’

  ‘And that was the funny handshake?’

  ‘Don’t interrupt. He looked disappointed. Gave my knuckles one last go. “So you’re not…?” he said. “No,” I said. “I’m not.” “Ah, well,” he said, “If you’re interested…” “I’m not,” I said.’

  ‘Thank God for that,’ I said. ‘Mason as well as Catholic. All in one day.’

  ‘Anyway, he was really disappointed. He tried to hide it, but I could tell. In fact, he started giving me the old sales pitch. How it was useful, living out here. Contacts. Support. Blah-blah.’

  ‘I hope you kept a straight face.’

  ‘I did my best. When he saw he wasn’t getting anywhere, he began to point out all these Masonic symbols in the hall. Triangles, squares, compasses, dragons, eyes, the letter G, whatnot. Some of them are hidden. The number of wood panels is significant, somehow or other. And he told me the dimensions of the hall, length and width, obey the Golden Mean.’

  ‘It’s an old house, isn’t it?’ I said, not exactly sure what he meant by Golden Mean.

  ‘What he eventually said was that, before Michael Francis, the Lodge used to be here, in our hall. But, being strict Catholic, when he took possession Michael Francis turfed the Masons out. And they’ve been slumming it in the village hall ever since.’

  ‘What’s the village hall like?’

  ‘Not like here. That was sixty five years ago.’

  ‘God, so it was a big day for him, coming here.’ Another thought struck me. ‘How old was Michael Francis when he died?’

  ‘I don’t know, really. Have to find out.’

  ‘There was something else,’ I said. With the M.P. There was more, wasn’t there?’

  ‘Well, yes. He didn’t exactly threaten me. But he did say how extremely well appreciated it would be if I would reconsider.’

  ‘And you…?’

  ‘I said we’d think about it.’

  ‘We’re not going to say yes, though, are we?’

  ‘No, we’re not. But it’s not a good idea to piss off your local M.P. on day one. Not if you can help it.’

  Then I told Peter about Michael Maddox, the crossword, Gracie and free horse-riding.

  Jack came inside just in time to hear the last bit.

  ‘Would you like to learn to ride?’ asked Peter.

  ‘Maybe,’ he said. He seemed a lot less keen on this than on going back to the chapel. It was understandable – he was a city boy. He hadn’t been around big animals all that much. But he wasn’t going to tell us directly that he was frightened.

  We had one final visitor that day. It was Gracie Dearie, she came at teatime, and she was carrying a large wicker basket full of farm produce.

  ‘Jeane?’ she said. ‘Matthew told me what happened. I’m really sorry. You are all right, aren’t you?’

  ‘I’m fine,’ I said.

  ‘And Mary, too?’

  I’m always well-disposed towards people who know the names of my kids without ever having met them.

  ‘She slept through the whole thing.’ Mary was asleep, again – in the recliner, in the living room.

  Gracie smiled and handed me the basket. Even younger than her husband, she was – I guessed – around thirty. Her hair was bright yellow, done in Heidi plaits, and you could easily tell it was dyed. (The woman from Carpet Superheroes had had dyed blonde hair, too. It was one of the things I felt most angry about. How could Peter fall for something so obvious?) Gracie’s cheeks had lovely freckles on that made her look very healthy. She was wearing a short sleeve shirt, jeans and trainers. The weird thing was, the shirt was made from just the same gingham material as her husband’s. They probably bought cloth and had their clothes made for them. Her voice wasn’t as posh as her husband’s – I could detect more London in it, which made me feel a little homesick.

  Just then, Peter came through from the kitchen.

  ‘Hello,’ he said. ‘You must be Gracie.’

  She blushed and said that she was.

  ‘Please come in,’ Peter said.

  ‘I’m afraid I have to get back,’ Gracie said. ‘But I’d like to another time, if that’s okay.’

  ‘That would be lovely,’ I said. ‘I’ll write down our number.’

  ‘Oh, I’m sure we have it already. Well, goodbye.’

  I waved her off, then carried the wicker basket through to the kitchen. It was a beautiful spread. Radishes, carrots, sweetcorn. And all arranged as if for a country show.

  ‘I’ll put it in the larder,’ I said.

  ‘Should keep,’ joked Peter.

  We were both exhausted and were planning on an early night. But once Jack was in bed, Peter decided that he wanted to find out a little more about Michael Francis.

  I couldn’t stay awake. I knew I’d have to be up with Mary a couple of times
in the night.

  ‘What about trying the keys?’ Peter asked.

  ‘Not tonight,’ I said. ‘And you’re not doing it on your own.’

  He smiled.

  When Peter eventually came to bed, he tried to get in without disturbing me. But I’m a light sleeper. My alarm-clock told me it was two a.m. I knew Peter must have found something pretty interesting, to keep him from his kip. I wasn’t going to start a conversation, though.

  Chapter 10.

  On this second night in the house Mary only woke up once, at three thirty a.m. And all she wanted was a little feed to send her back off. I wasn’t so lucky myself. I started to wonder about Michael Francis. What had Peter been looking at, for three whole hours? My mind began to race through possibilities. Michael Francis had died bankrupt? Or he’d had a huge stash of hardcore pornography? Or he’d been gay? If it had been something really serious, Peter would have woken me up with the bad news, surely?

  When I couldn’t sleep in our old flat, I’d always made myself some hot milk. I thought I’d do that now. But the kitchen there was only ten carpeted steps from our bedroom. Here, it was quite a hike, and not a warm one.

  I didn’t want to wake up completely, so I didn’t turn the overhead light on, just the one above the hob. Then I went into the larder to fetch some milk.

  The carton, when I picked it up, felt gritty – and when I brought it into the light, I saw that it was covered in dirt. It was almost as if it had been buried and dug up again. I ran my finger down the side. Yes, that was definitely dirt and not dust.

  Going back into the larder, I switched on the light. I could hardly believe it. Everything was dirty. Everything that, only a few hours before, had been so pristine.

  I looked up. The ceiling was made of wooden boards. It was just possible, I thought, us moving about upstairs had dislodged something. Jack had been banging around rather a lot. But not really in the rooms directly above the kitchen, and not for very long. Certainly not after we’d had our evening meal. And I’d been into the larder since then.

  It was a total mystery.