‘You be careful, Arnold. If you think somebody’s been trying to kill you just on general principles, what do you think they’re going to do if they catch you snooping around like that?’
‘Damned if I do – and damned if I don’t.’ Arnold’s face tightened with a new determination. ‘If I have to go down, I’m going down fighting!’
‘Who are you fighting, Dad?’ Donald came into the kitchen, Donna just behind him. ‘Are you gonna get those guys who beat you up?’
‘Never you mind,’ Arnold said. ‘Sit down and eat your breakfast.’
‘You’re late, Daddy,’ Donna worried. ‘You’re going to miss your train.’
‘He’s already missed it,’ Donald said. ‘What’s the next train? Shall I get the timetable?’
‘Never mind,’ Arnold said again. ‘I’m not going up to London today. I’m going to, er, work locally for a few days.’
‘Will you be home to lunch every day, then?’ My practical Donna produced a question that had not yet crossed my mind. I waited with interest for the answer.
‘I might be –’ Arnold caught my eye and grinned suddenly. ‘On the other hand, I might come home every day and take us all out to lunch. How about that? There are a lot of nice-looking places around here that we haven’t tried.’
‘That’s one of your better ideas,’ I told him. ‘Starting today, I hope?’
‘Why not? I’ll begin at the library this morning and see how much they’ve got on file. When I’ve exhausted their resources, I’ll move on to the local newspaper. They might even have some back copies to sell me so that I can study them at home.’
That routine worked very well, right through to Saturday. To tell the truth, I was relieved to be able to keep a closer eye on Arnold – and not just for the lovely luncheons at country inns. Nothing else dire happened and I was gradually losing my conviction that he was the designated victim of some mad murderer – who would have to be mad to want to kill poor, innocent Arnold. But I was happier not having him disappear up to London every day, never knowing what condition he might be in when he returned.
If he returned. No, a discreet check on his condition over a lunch somebody else had cooked and served suited me very well.
It kept the twins happy, too. The only snag was that we couldn’t carry on much of a conversation with them around. We solved that by sending them upstairs early every evening to watch television while we retreated to the study to discuss Arnold’s discoveries of the day, if any.
All in all, Arnold and I hadn’t spent so much time alone together since the early days of our marriage. I began to remember why I had fallen in love with him. He could be very good company – when you got him out of his libraries and away from his dusty old records.
He was looking better these days, too, despite his injuries. The enforced rest had relaxed him, he had lost a certain amount of flabbiness since he had been so active catching trains and buses; most of all, a new sense of purpose had hardened his jaw and tightened his muscles.
‘Penny for your thoughts, Babe.’
Also, he was paying more attention to me. A few weeks ago, back in New Hampshire, he would never have noticed whether or not I was thinking anything.
‘I was just thinking you’re quite a guy.’ Then, so as not to spoil him, I added. ‘In your own way, that is.’
‘You wouldn’t swap me, then? Not even for Piers?’
‘Especially not for Piers. Richard, now ...’ I dodged a mock blow, laughing.
‘Lania’s crazy.’ Arnold sobered suddenly. ‘Messing around a nice guy like Richard. I wouldn’t blame him if he didn’t put up with it any longer.’
‘Do you really think she’s seriously involved?’
‘Would you let some guy use your living-room as an out-of-town showroom, if you weren’t seriously involved?’
‘Well, no, but this is England. Things may be different here.’
‘Not that different.’ Arnold rubbed his wounded arm reflectively. ‘I’d call it more than serious. I’d call it blatant. And I wouldn’t blame Richard if he did a bit of murdering on his own account.’
‘Lania’s so silly. She’s got everything: a lovely home, a good husband, two nice children, and –’ I looked at the piles of photocopies and back-issue newspapers on the desk. ‘And she’s got Rosemary’s example. She’s seen how easily it can all be swept away. Even at the best of times, life is so precarious. Why should she risk everything she’s got?’
‘Some women never believe it can happen to them.’ He looked at me sombrely. ‘Even you don’t, do you, Babe? Not down deep?’
‘I don’t want to.’
‘Yet it happened to the Blakes.’ He rifled one of the piles of photocopies. ‘There’s the collected evidence. We’ll begin sifting through it tomorrow. Maybe we’ll find a clue somewhere in there.’
‘Maybe.’ I clung to my doubt. I didn’t want to believe that Arnold could be in mortal danger. Yet, all those strange things had been happening ...
‘Let’s get a good night’s sleep.’ Arnold turned off the desk light. ‘We’ll come to the problem fresh in the morning.’
Eighteen
The twins were in bed and peacefully sleeping, which was more than we could manage. I lay awake, trying not to mind that I was occupying a dead man’s bed; trying not to think how swiftly Rosemary’s happiness had been swept away; trying not to believe that someone – for some unknown reason – might be planning to do the same to Arnold and me. I tried to lie quietly and not disturb Arnold. He was restless himself, however, and kept tossing and turning.
‘Sorry, honey,’ he muttered. ‘Maybe I should have taken the sofa in the study so as not to disturb you. It’s this damned arm — every time I’m almost asleep, it feels as though they’re pulling the stitches out all over again and I jump awake.’
‘It’s all right,’ I said. ‘Just breathe deeply and count sheep, or something.’
Maybe we actually dozed off for a bit, unlikely though it seemed. The next thing I was aware of was that peculiar silence the dead of night brings. No traffic, no sounds of human life anywhere; just the occasional hum of machinery carrying on a hidden malevolent existence of its own in some secret subterranean depths.
Then I heard a noise that was all too human. I blinked into wakefulness.
‘Arnold ...?’ I whispered uncertainly. ‘Are you all right?’
There was a low passionate groan.
‘Gee, honey,’ Arnold mumbled. ‘I’m sorry. I’m just too bushed. Can’t you take a raincheck?’
‘Arnold,’ I said. That wasn’t me. Wasn’t it you?’
‘Hell no!’ Arnold sounded more alert. ‘Maybe the lads are watching a late night television film.’ Television closed down for the night hours ago.’
I saw a circle of tiny fluorescent numbers sweep through the air as Arnold groped for his watch and brought it into focus. ‘You’re right,’ he said. ‘It’s two a.m.’
There came a long languorous sigh.
‘That wasn’t me! It wasn’t you – and it sure as hell wasn’t Esmond!’ I heard the thump as Arnold’s feet hit the floor, then the bedside lamp flashed on.
‘Arnold —’ My eyes closed in protest against the sudden blaze of light. I felt disorientated, far from home – and frightened. Everything I had ever read about Borley Rectory, headless coachmen, walled-up nuns, and all the dead but ever-present inhabitants of Olde England paraded through my mind. ‘Arnold – you don’t suppose the house is haunted, do you? Do you think we have ghosts?’
A very earthly chuckle suddenly answered me, jolting my eyes wide open. The bedroom was just the same, ordinary, familiar – and yet, there was someone in it with us.
‘It came from over there –’ Arnold advanced grimly on the farther wall. There’s something funny going on here,’ he said.
‘Arnold, come back to bed. We can investigate in the morning.’ If we were being disturbed by spirits, I didn’t want to know about it. ‘Maybe we ought to go to church �
�� and see what the parson’s feelings are about exorcism ceremonies.’
‘There’s a rational explanation, Babe,’ Arnold assured me. ‘There has to be.’
I wasn’t so sure, but I wasn’t going to wait alone in that big bed while Arnold antagonized the forces of darkness. I groped my way into my dressing gown and crept over to stand behind him. ‘Don’t wake the twins,’ I begged.
He didn’t even hear me. He was prowling along the wall, face intent, head cocked to pick up any sound from the lath and plaster.
‘Please, Arnold, come back to bed.’
‘Presently, presently ...’ He tapped experimentally at the inner wall. I don’t know why – he’d have no more idea than I would whether the right sound was bouncing back at him.
But the quality of the noise echoing through the room changed. An uneasy puzzled note crept into it.
‘Funny ...’ Arnold rapped the wall again. ‘Sounds hollow back there.’
‘Oh, my God!’ Suddenly, it came to me. ‘Arnold – that’s the wall between the two halves of the house. You’re banging on Lania’s bedroom wall.’
‘The noise is coming from there,’ Arnold said stubbornly, just before the enormity of his behaviour dawned on him. ‘We’ve never heard anything from there before.’
‘Maybe the wind has changed, or something.’ I caught at his pyjama sleeve. ‘Arnold, forget it –’
‘And Richard is away for the weekend –’ Arnold continued plodding along the one track his sleep-drugged mind was presenting. ‘What’s all this white stuff around the bookcase?’
‘I don’t know.’ I hadn’t noticed the fine white powder ground into the carpet until he mentioned it. But then, I’d been too busy to read lately. ‘Arnold, let’s just go back to bed and forget it –’
‘Take hold of the other end of the bookcase, honey. Let’s shift it a bit. Maybe there’s a disused chimney behind there, or something.’
‘Arnold, this is against my better judgement –’ But there was no use arguing with him. He was heaving at his side of the bookcase and he’d only give himself a hernia or a slipped disc if I didn’t help. Reluctantly, I grasped the edge nearest me.
‘This would be a lot easier if we took the books out of it first.’
‘It’s coming, honey. You’re doing fine.’
Gradually, the bookcase swung out from the wall. I was concentrating on keeping it steady so that we didn’t get an avalanche of books into the room, waking the twins, when:
‘Christ!’ Arnold exclaimed. ‘What the hell -?’
That was when I looked at the wall – or what should have been the wall — and screamed.
I couldn’t help it. It was a reflex action. There was no wall there!
There were the remains of a wall – around the edges of a great gaping hole, almost a second doorway. Strips of wallpaper, raw plaster, and brick formed an arc opening on to the unfinished wooden back of a piece of bedroom furniture.
Even as we gaped at it, the dressing table was wrenched away and we stood facing the people on the other side of the hole.
This time, it was Lania who screamed. Piers, standing immediately behind her and clutching a slipping duvet around himself, seemed dumbstruck.
‘What the hell is going on here?’ Arnold demanded.
‘That’s just what I’d like to know.’ Lania got a firmer grip on her dressing gown, but not before I had been able to see that she wore nothing underneath it. ‘What have you done to my wall – and why? Even if you are voyeurs, you seem to be carrying it to extraordinary lengths!’
‘Now wait just a minute —’ Arnold began.
‘Try waiting yourself!’ Piers stepped forward menacingly and we had a few moments of confused uproar.
‘Hold it!’ I put up my hand, silencing everyone momentarily, and leaned forward to get a better view into Lania’s bedroom. In the distance, two small pale faces had appeared briefly before withdrawing. It was a definite indication of guilty knowledge. I whirled abruptly to catch my own two in the process of a swift retreat.
‘Donna! Donald! Come back here!’ I ordered.
There was a long thoughtful pause before they reluctantly obeyed. Meanwhile, I leaned forward again and raised my voice.
‘Angela! Peregrine! We saw you. Come here this instant!’
‘What?’ Lania turned to the doorway on the far side of the room. Piers readjusted his duvet inadequately and took a few steps back.
‘Hurry up!’ I insisted.
Slowly, they crept forward. So did the twins, until they stood each on their own side of the hacked-out aperture. They looked at each other warily, trying to communicate caution in the face of the adult enemy.
Suddenly, it all fell into place: the way the twins had been quoting Angela and Peregrine – even though they had been confined to quarters and incommunicado for the past week. Even Esmond’s sudden appearance at the party last night was explained – he hadn’t slipped in when Hazel left, he’d found his way through the bedroom wall. And no wonder he’d been so upset when I accused him of slacking – there’d been no mice here for him to catch. ‘Okay, you kids,’ I said. ‘Start talking.’
‘Isn’t it great?’ Donald tried to brazen it out. ‘If those soccer hooligans ever come after Dad again, we’ve got an escape hatch for him. He can just disappear behind the bookcase and get away.’
‘We got the idea from television.’ Peregrine appeared to feel that this explanation sanctified their endeavour. ‘From The Wooden Horse. You know, when the prisoners of war tunnelled their way to freedom –’
‘You –’ Lania was shaking with fury. ‘You ripped our house apart because of a television programme?’
‘And you carried out the chunks of plaster and debris in your pockets,’ I accused the twins. It was all coming clear to me. ‘And in your shoes. That was why you were limping – it wasn’t blisters, at all. You were lying, too!’ I was fighting to control myself, but I was even more furious than Lania.
The twins cringed. Arnold put a restraining hand on my shoulder, but I shook it off.
‘This is monstrous!’ Lania raged. ‘A nightmare!’ She glared across the opening at us. ‘My children would never have dreamed of doing such a thing if it weren’t for your undisciplined brats! They’re the worst possible influence and —’
‘Now hold it right there!’ I snapped. ‘Mine could never have thought up such an idea by themselves. It was your little rays of sunshine who knew the layout of the house. If you hadn’t been too busy alley-catting around to pay the proper attention to them –’
‘I think we’d better sleep on this.’ Arnold pulled me back into our room. ‘We can discuss it in the morning like civilized people. We can’t do anything about it at the moment, and arguing isn’t going to get us anywhere.’
‘An excellent idea.’ Piers moved forward tentatively and grasped Lania’s arm. She shook him off. His duvet began slipping again. He was trying his best, but it was too bulky to drape like a Roman toga.
‘Mummy –’ Angela piped up innocently – ‘what’s alley-catting?’
‘Mummy –’ Peregrine was also swift to the defensive attack – ‘what’s Uncle Piers doing here so late? And why is he wearing a duvet?’
Those kids were going to be able to take care of themselves. They’d probably had plenty of practice.
Lania lashed out. Her hand connected with tiny ears and the air was filled with soul-satisfying howls.
For once, I was in total agreement with Lania. I turned grimly towards the twins. They began edging away.
‘Honey –’ Arnold tried to restrain me. ‘Honey, let’s leave it until morning –’
‘Shut up, Arnold!’ I advanced on the twins and did some lashing out of my own. Fresh howls rent the air.
‘I say, old man –’ Piers called across to Arnold. ‘I think we ought to leave this to the ladies and do something more practical ourselves. Shall we move the furniture back into position and call it a night? As you say, we can begin sorting
things out in the cold, clear light of day.’
‘Good idea.’ Arnold began tugging at the bookcase. He straightened abruptly as a new thought hit him. ‘I suppose these houses are insured?’
‘Bound to be, old man. Mind you, I don’t know what category this sort of damage would fall under. Act of God, perhaps? ... No, perhaps not ...’
‘Maybe you’d better find the insurance policy and check it out —’ Arnold paused, another unwelcome thought hitting him. ‘I mean, maybe Richard had better.’
‘Quite so.’ Piers looked across at him uneasily. ‘Perhaps we ought to have a council of war in the morning ... get all our stories straight.’
Nineteen
Morning eventually dawned, so dark and wet it was barely distinguishable from the night. Nearly as black as my mood, in fact. Another jolly day in Merrie England, fraught with danger and peril for all concerned. Especially my nearest and dearest. I could hear the twins shuffling about in the hallway outside, hungry for their breakfast but nervous about coming in and facing me. They were right.
‘Why don’t we tell Richard -?’ Arnold poured himself another cup of coffee. ‘Tell Richard that Lania was having a nightmare – and that was how come we heard her? She cried out in her sleep.’ He was warming to his story. ‘She cried out several times – it was a really bad nightmare. We heard her and started investigating – and that was how we found out what had happened to the wall.’
‘Why don’t we just tell Richard the truth?’ I asked coldly. ‘It will hardly come as any surprise to him.’
‘Oh, now, honey, we want to try to keep this respectable –’
‘I fail to see why we should worry about Lania’s respectability when she doesn’t.’ Since he was pouring, I held out my cup for more coffee. I’d already had too much and it would probably give me a first-class case of caffeine jitters, but who cared? I’d had little enough sleep last night; now I needed to keep awake.
Paws for Alarm Page 13
