The Dead of Winter

by Jane A. Adams

  ‘Viv!’ Robin was caught between shock and agreement.

  ‘Now who’s being rude.’ Toby was laughing at her, but everyone could see that she had touched a nerve.

  ‘Please,’ Edwin said. ‘We should not be fighting like this.’

  Robin added his voice. ‘No, we shouldn’t. Viv and I are going to bed; we’ve both had enough for one night.’

  Viv opened her mouth as though to argue and then changed her mind. Instead, she turned on Toby yet again. ‘When we get back to uni, I’ll be asking for a new supervisor,’ she said. ‘And I’ll be telling them why.’ She marched from the room and Robin chased after her. It seemed to take Toby a moment for her words to sink in.

  ‘What the hell do you mean, telling them why? Little bitch!’ He, too, left the hall, and the door swung shut, cutting off the argument that continued up the stairs.

  Melissa sighed and started to load dishes and glasses back on to the tea trolley.

  ‘Do you need a hand, my dear?’

  ‘Thanks, Edwin, but I’m fine. I’m going to dump this lot in the kitchen and sort it out in the morning. Later this morning, I mean. I’m guessing it’ll be just us lot for breakfast.’

  ‘I suggest we all turn in,’ David Franklin said. ‘We are all feeling a little fragile, it seems.’

  ‘Good idea,’ Edwin agreed. ‘Though . . . Gail, you said there was a familiar feel to the other presence. Can you tell us any more than that?’

  She hesitated, and then she said, ‘If I didn’t know better, I’d have said it felt like Simeon, Professor Meehan, but he’s not dead, is he? He’s just gone home.’

  TWELVE

  Rina paused at the foot of the attic stairs. Instinct and good sense screamed at her that she should forget about this and go back to bed, but curiosity told her that she wasn’t going to be able to sleep even if she did. As usual, curiosity won. She began to ascend, annoyed at stairs that creaked far more than she remembered and oppressed by the smothering silence she recalled from her previous foray. Anyone up there would be sure to hear her coming. She decided to try a different tack: forget about being quiet and just be the guest disturbed by some odd bumps and thumps in the floor above her room.

  ‘Is there anyone there?’ Rina called out. ‘Hello, is everything all right?’

  No reply, just the gathering silence, like an audible fog blocking her ears.

  Reaching the landing, she pushed open the door to the room used for storage. Nothing appeared to have been disturbed. Once she’d got the second door open and the light switched on, it became obvious that no one had been there recently. Rina herself had probably been the last visitor. She went through to the second room, just to be certain. The debris left by the rewiring still sat on the bed, the fragment of paper still in the grate.

  Sighing, Rina turned to leave, and then swore under her breath. ‘You idiot woman, this room isn’t above yours. It turns the wrong way.’

  She hurried down the stairs, blaming lack of sleep and the events of the evening for fuddling her brain. So where was the stairway to the other attic rooms?

  Back on the landing, she remembered that she had seen that other bedroom door left ajar the first evening they had been here. Could that be her answer? She stood and listened, not sure if she really heard the sound of someone up above or if her overstretched nerves now just imagined it. Back along the corridor, she tried every door. An airing cupboard; a bathroom; an empty bedroom, the mirror image of her own, furnished for guests but still covered down with dust sheets. Then her own room, and next to that the door she had seen left just slightly open.

  Taking a deep breath, Rina turned the handle expecting to find yet another bedroom beyond. Instead, she discovered a short and narrow lobby, with an even narrower flight of stairs leading off. Reluctant now, but still determined, and with the candlestick-weapon firmly clasped in her hand, Rina mounted the stairs, senses so stretched that each tiny creak and groan of the wooden treads seemed magnified. Just one door at the top this time. Rina opened it and reached round the frame to find the light switch she hoped would be there. She was relieved on two counts when she found it: first, that electricity had been connected and she was able to see; and second, that it was unlikely anyone would still be there in the dark. Would they? Surely she hadn’t made that much noise coming up the stairs.

  The room was empty: of people, anyway. A rodent squeaked and skittered into the shadows, and Rina told herself that it wasn’t really as big as it looked. She could smell mice up here, musty and musky and damp, and traps, recently set, told her that Melissa was aware of the problem.

  So that was what she had heard, perhaps. A trap snapping shut and an unfortunate rodent coming to a sudden end? A fine explanation, except that Rina knew she had heard two bangs and not one. Was it really likely that two traps had been set off in such quick succession? Her experience of mice was that they fled at the slightest sign or sound of danger, and of rats that they were extremely adept at taking the bait from the trap without setting anything off.

  She relaxed a little and loosened her grip on the moulded glass candlestick, suddenly aware that she had been gripping it so tightly that the hobnail pattern was now impressed into her palm. This attic had been used as a storeroom too, though someone had started to sort out what was up here. Large boxes, tea chests and the like filled most of the space. It would have been a tight squeeze getting them up here, Rina thought. In the one closest to where she stood she could see newspaper wrappings that had been slightly disturbed, revealing an old teapot. The remainder of the service was stacked beneath, she discovered as she poked about. Next to that was a box of old clothes, some of them from the nineteen twenties and in surprisingly good condition considering the mice population. The slight smell of camphor and lavender that still clung to the fabrics when she examined them suggested why that might be the case. Her mother and aunts had always sworn that camphor and lavender kept both moth and mice at bay.

  A wooden crate filled with sheet music had been less fortunate.

  Rina glanced around, looking for whatever it was that had made the noises she had heard. Drag marks on the dusty floor looked fresh, and one of the tea chests had only recently been opened: its lid, resting on top, had been splintered and broken by use of something like a nail bar. One piece of the frame now rested on the floor beside the chest; most likely the lid had also fallen and that was what she had heard.

  So, who on earth would want to go firkling about in the attic at this hour of the night – or morning, rather. In Rina’s experience, late night firklers were rarely up to any good.

  The tea chest in question was half empty. She removed a sheet of newspaper that must have been used to wrap something or other and smoothed it out. It was dated from June 1875, three years after the seance evening and about two years before Albert Southam’s death.

  Taking the newspaper with her, she left the attic room, careful to switch out the light but painfully aware that anyone going there again would be see the extra footprints on the floor and the additional disturbance of dust.

  Back in her room, she locked the door and took a clothes brush to her dressing gown and slippers, and then smoothed out and brushed off the newspaper she had found. The bedside clock told her that it was just after five.

  Rina decided she’d had enough for one night. She really needed to snatch at least a couple of hours sleep. Her days of being able to work and then party and then sleep through the morning were long past. She switched out the light and crossed to the window, peering out at the snowy landscape. The snow had almost stopped falling, but the sky still hung heavy with the promise of more and it was clearly thick on the ground. She hoped Mac would be able to make it to them in the morning. No, this morning, she corrected herself. She was about to let the curtain fall back when something caught her eye. A line of footprints not yet buried by falling snow started from some point close to the house and hidden from her view, but led out across the lawn and towards the line of trees beyond. />
  THIRTEEN

  Aikensthorpe, 1872:

  Dr Pym had left the house that night with something like despair in his heart. He had never seen Albert so angry, and nothing Pym had been able to say had assuaged that rage.

  At the crux of it, Pym realized, was not that Elizabeth had sought to deceive them, or even that she had accused Spinelli – a man Pym had been certain was innocent until this night. It was that Elizabeth had not only acted in opposition to Albert’s wishes, but had also done so in such a public manner.

  Had she spoken to Albert about her suspicions, or, better still, confided in him earlier, then Pym was certain he could have convinced Albert to look at the matter again. He just had to hope that a new day might bring clarity and calm, and he had promised Elizabeth that he would return the following day to speak to them both once more.

  He knew that Albert had other ideas though. That Pym had seemed to take Elizabeth’s side had incensed him, and angry words had passed between the old friends that Pym knew would take more than a good night’s sleep to forgive and forget.

  ‘She says that George Weston convinced her to do this,’ Pym had said. He had realized immediately that this was a big mistake.

  ‘George would do no such thing. This is a female foolishness, hysteria. Jealousy.’

  ‘Your wife is jealous of what, Albert?’ Pym tried to sound reasonable. He being one of only a handful of people who knew the truth about George Weston, he knew that Albert was oddly protective of this illegitimate son of his. ‘Your wife knows nothing of that unfortunate liaison. You were young. Foolish, perhaps. But you have always done right by the child.’

  ‘And you have always disapproved of my bringing him here.’

  ‘Not exactly disapproved, no. I admit I thought it unwise.’

  ‘Unwise.’ Albert’s tone was cold.

  Pym had sought to justify his view, and the argument had turned nasty. Pym did not want to think of it. Instead of remaining for the night, he had called for his horse and chosen to leave before his host demanded it of him. Pym’s only regret now was that he had passed no words of comfort to the poor young woman sitting on the stairs. Her eyes as she watched him leave seemed to follow him still, even as he rode from the house and towards the wood.

  He would give Albert a few days to cool his temper and then return. They had been friends since boyhood; surely a little female foolishness could not come between them so irreparably.

  ‘She has brought scandal upon my house,’ Albert had said. ‘Do you think those who were here tonight will remain silent? My name will become the object of ridicule, and you may be certain that scoundrel Spinelli will use all of this to his advantage. He could sue for slander and claim with justification he had a lawyer witness it.’

  Poor Elizabeth, Pym thought. Young and foolish and so eager to do right that she had followed terrible advice and then been betrayed by the very man who had given it. Pym was in no doubt that George Weston had set this whole cascade in motion. Pym made up his mind that he would prove that. Weston would be made to pay.

  He had entered the woods at the edge of the estate. Not an easy route, but the most direct to his home and one he had travelled many times. He had instructed the servants to go to bed, telling them he would not be home that night. Tom would have to be woken; the boot boy and general factotum slept on the floor by the kitchen, so Pym could be sure of rousing him; Pym’s housekeeper slept far too soundly to be woken by his knocking on the front door.

  The horse shied as a shadow moved on the track up ahead.

  Pym reined in the horse and soothed it, stroking the animal’s neck. ‘Who the devil’s there? Oh, it’s you.’ With certainty, the devil, he thought.

  George Weston stepped on to the path in front of him.

  ‘Get out of my way,’ Pym said.

  George Weston struck out at him with the pommel of a silver topped cane. Pym fell to the ground and did not move again.

  Sleep had come briefly, but by seven thirty Rina was up and dressed and back in the small room where the seance had been held.

  She tapped the panelling, tipped the table, rapped on the floorboards and opened all of the stiff shutters and let the light flood in, cold and crisp and very white. Soft flakes of snow drifted down, and the footprints she had observed from her window a few hours before had now been obliterated.

  Rina sighed, suddenly concerned for Joy and also for Bridie when she learned of all these goings-on. ‘Patrick, dear,’ Rina said softly, addressing Joy’s dead brother, ‘sometimes the dead really should keep their distance and let the living get on with what they have to do. Don’t you worry, Joy is well loved and she is happy and we all plan to make sure she stays that way.’

  ‘Talking to the dead, Miss Martin?’

  She hadn’t heard Rav come into the library and was momentarily embarrassed to see him standing in the doorway, a slightly amused expression on his angular face.

  ‘Yes,’ she told him firmly. ‘I don’t happen to believe you need all of this malarkey.’

  He smiled at her. ‘I tend to agree.’

  ‘I didn’t think you held with the spiritual.’

  ‘Oh, I’ve no argument with the spiritual – or, at least, no argument with people’s personal needs and beliefs. I tend to think that’s their own business, and besides, I agree with our young friend Robin, it may well be the vocabulary that needs to change. We still need to have the discussion, but perhaps use less emotive language if we can ever hope to reach a proper conclusion.’

  ‘And have you experienced the spiritual for yourself?’ Rina asked playfully.

  Rav laughed. ‘Rina, I grew up with the unlikely parental combination of an Asian Hindu mother and a Welsh Christadelphian father and we lived in a small town ten miles from Cardiff. They made it work by celebrating everything. We spent Diwali with her family in Cardiff and Christmas with his and somehow it all turned out fine. Yes, as a child and a teen I had my “moments”, you might say, but for my parents, what might have been divisive turned out to be a bond. They both believed in something, and they loved one another, so they accepted the whole of the other person. I have to say, they taught me a very valuable lesson, not in tolerance, but in genuine respect.’

  Rina smiled. ‘They sound like very exceptional people.’

  ‘Oh, in many ways they are, and what is more, they are still as much in love as ever – and that, I think, is precious.’

  Rina nodded. She had to agree with that. ‘And when you ceased to believe?’

  His smile was a little sad. ‘They accepted it because they love and accept me. I know they both pray that I will find a way to reconcile with belief of some kind but . . .’ He shrugged. ‘My parents and their families learnt to accommodate one another, and so they acknowledge my right to find my own particular path as well. I suspect that when the habit of acceptance has been established, it is, thankfully, a hard one to break. But changing the subject wildly, what were you looking for? Didn’t Tim and Jay already examine every speck of dust in here?’

  ‘Oh, I’m sure they did, but the trouble with experts is that they tend only to look for evidence of other experts. They sometimes miss what is right under their noses because it doesn’t seem clever enough to be relevant.’

  Rav was amused. ‘A nice observation,’ he said. ‘And correct, of course. Spiritualists look for the spiritual, scientists for what they see as scientific, psychologists hope to unearth some childhood trauma, and engineers probe for clever devices. Cynics like me, of course, we always just hope to prove someone tried to dupe us.’

  ‘Are you really such a cynic?’ Rina asked him.

  ‘Most of the time, yes. Though I am always open to the possibility that life can surprise me. Did you find anything?’

  ‘No,’ Rina said. Frowning, she glanced accusingly around the room once more, then looked at her watch. ‘Breakfast time, I think, and my friends should be arriving soon, if they can make it through that lot.’ She gestured irritably at the snow out
side. It had finally ceased to fall, but the sky was filled with more.

  ‘Are you still planning on leaving today?’

  ‘I think so, yes. A lot depends on the condition of the roads. We’re a bit cut off from civilization here, so we’ll make a decision when Mac has arrived. If it’s fairly clear, I think we’ll go before the next blizzard. You?’

  Rav nodded. ‘I think so, but I want to have a long talk with Edwin first. I’d hate to think of us parting on bad terms.’

  ‘He’s a nice old man.’

  ‘He is, but of late I’ve been concerned that he’s, well, being less rigorous in his experiments than he once was. There is such a pressure for results in every field these days. Frankly, Rina, I wish he would just finally retire, go and write his memoirs or something and do the occasional lecture. He’s always been a man of great integrity.’

  Rina looked keenly at the younger man. The dark brown eyes were troubled. ‘Sometimes,’ she said, ‘people get carried away by the desire to demonstrate what they believe to be the truth that they can forget truth actually has to be there.’

  Rav nodded. ‘I don’t usually agree with Edwin,’ he said. ‘In fact, on most scores we are diametrically opposed, but I do like and respect him. In both our fields there are those who, as you say, get carried away by their own desire to prove their points. There are scientists and mathematicians using the same faith based language as religious zealots. Not that they realize it, of course. Our friend Robin is right about use of emotive language; the wrong vocabulary, if you will. I’ve always tried very hard to avoid extremism in any form, and it bothers me a great deal that, at the end of his life, Edwin should have allowed himself to be drawn into that deep water.’

  In the dining room it was evident that they were diminished in numbers. Gail and Dr Franklin had left very early, Melissa told them. They had left her a note in the kitchen saying that Gail wanted to try and get home.