by Sarah Rayne
I understood and respected his feelings, for I, too, had my ghosts from those days – the ghosts of gnawing anxiety for my husband-to-be who had come through the horrors and dangers of active service, and had then been sent on a difficult and uncertain mission into a country with whom Germany was at war. For me, those fears and those ghosts were somehow bound inside a charcoal sketch, drawn by a young man who had been in extreme fear of a brutal death sentence. Stephen Gilmore’s sketch of the Holzminden courtyard hung in our house for many years – my husband had carried it with him from Germany – and I sometimes stood beneath it, staring into the dark shadows so deftly drawn, so cunningly suggestive.
‘Who is that figure within the shadows?’ I once asked my husband.
‘I don’t know. But I believe the young man who drew the sketch saw it as the symbol of his own insanity.’
The sketch’s macabre qualities seemed to deepen over the years, although I repeatedly told myself that it was no more than a sheet of paper with pencil markings. But the mind is a strange thing and at times it operates at curious levels. There came a night when, from nowhere, a thought formed: supposing that figure – what Hugbert had called the ‘symbol of insanity’ – escapes? That was the night I took the sketch down from the wall and burned it.
My husband stood with me, watching it curl and brown in the flames. Then, very quietly, he said, ‘Sometimes, in dreams I still walk along that tree-lined drive to Fosse House. I see the house through the trees and I see the lights glowing faintly at the windows – the lights Stephen longed to see, that he thought of as a symbol of his home. Only, in my dream they aren’t quite real, those lights. It’s as if they’re flickering ghosts, or the goblin lamps of some lost world. And, in those dreams, something always comes out of the house to meet me. I never quite see it, but I know it’s there.’
‘Stephen,’ I said, for I had always known that Stephen Gilmore’s ghost had never quite left my husband.
‘Yes,’ he said. ‘I think it’s Stephen who comes to meet me in those dreams. Who walks with me along that drive. Because I think he’s still at Fosse House, Freide. I know that is a strange statement to make – a fanciful statement – but I believe it to be true. And it’s a bad feeling to think of him in that lonely, dark old house.’
The book ended there, and Nell closed it with a sense of loss and also an awareness that there were too many loose threads – the loosest being what had happened to Stephen Gilmore. Did Hugbert’s silence about that long-ago night mean the execution had gone ahead? That it had affected him so deeply, he had never been able to speak of it? Or did it mean he had found some way to sidestep Niemeyer’s order, but had done it in some way he dared not disclose?
There was also no clue to Iskander’s fate, or Leonora’s. It was unreasonable to expect Hugbert to have reported an idyllic, hand-in-hand into-the-sunset conclusion for them, but Nell would like to believe Iskander and Leonora had had some kind of happy ending.
But life did not always give people happy endings.
The bumbly local train out of Norwich was on time and painted bright scarlet with green trims, like a picture from a child’s storybook. This pleased Nell, who spent the first ten minutes of the short journey pretending she had stepped back into a 1940s film. Will Hay, perhaps, or Arthur Askey in The Ghost Train. She amused herself by imagining what the station would be like, and whether she would be greeted by the shade of some old station master who had died fifty years earlier but who could still occasionally be seen wandering through the dark tunnels, his lamp still burning in his hand.
There did not seem to be any shadowy station masters or spectral ticket collectors at the station; in fact, the station was little more than a platform with two small seats, a flower bed, and a narrow exit. It was dark by now, but Nell saw that Michael’s taxi was waiting on the roadside. This was good, because the train had been more than ten minutes early.
‘A good journey?’ asked the driver, companionably, stowing away her small case.
‘Very, thanks. We’re going to the Bell, I think?’
‘’s right,’ he said. ‘Dr Flint phoned the details through. He’s been doing some work out at Fosse House, seemingly. Shame about Miss Gilmore going like that. News got round pretty fast. Bit of a local legend, Miss Gilmore.’
‘I’m sure she was. Do we go past Fosse House on the way?’ Nell would quite like to see Michael’s House of Usher from the security of a car.
‘We don’t,’ he said. ‘It’s on a road to nowhere, as they say. But if you want to see it I can take a detour. Take us about fifteen minutes.’
‘Will you do that, please?’ said Nell. ‘We’re earlier than I was expecting anyway.’
‘Lonely old road, it is.’
This turned out to be an understatement; the road that led to Fosse House was very lonely indeed. There were no street lights, and the taxi’s headlights picked out trees and fields and little more. The roads were strewn with branches, which must be from the storm that had uprooted an entire tree and trapped Michael.
Nell tried to imagine living out here, especially in the depths of winter, and found it a rather depressing prospect. But these would be the lanes Hugbert and the others had walked all those years ago, spying out the terrain for their assault on Fosse House. She remembered again the sentence pronounced on Stephen Gilmore and repressed a shiver.
‘All right in the back?’ asked the taxi driver, half turning his head.
‘Fine. Are we coming to the house now?’
‘Just along here on the right,’ he said. ‘There’s a bit of a wall – see it now, can you? The gates are just coming up.’
‘Yes,’ said Nell, leaning forward. ‘Yes, I see them.’
He slowed down, and Nell peered through the windows at the gates and the clustering trees. This would be where Hugbert had stood that night in 1917, looking towards the house.
‘You can’t see the house at night, unless the lights are on in the front,’ said the driver.
‘Actually, there are lights on,’ said Nell, suddenly.
‘Are there? So there are. I thought Dr Flint was going off to the Bell?’
‘It looks as if he hasn’t left yet.’ Michael was quite likely to have become absorbed in some esoteric piece of research and not noticed the time, so Nell said, ‘Could you drive me up to the house? If Dr Flint’s there you can drop me off here, and I’ll go along to the Bell with him.’
‘OK.’ He turned off the road and drove through the gates.
The drive was quite long and rather dark. Had Hugbert crept along it, keeping to the concealment of the trees, dodging out of sight at every sound? But the lights were still glinting through the darkness. Were they Hugbert’s ghost lights? No, of course they were not.
The taxi driver pulled up in front of the house, and Nell got out. The house was all that Michael had said, and it was rather daunting to think he had been forced to spend last night here by himself.
The taxi man got Nell’s case out and hesitated.
‘I’ll see you in, shall I?’
‘It’s fine,’ said Nell. ‘I can see Michael through that window.’ She indicated the long, low window on the right of the main door. The curtains were closed, but a light shone through them, and they were certainly not ghost lights, because there was a clear silhouette of a man seated at a table or a desk, his head bent. Nell smiled, because it was such a characteristic pose for Michael; he would be lost in reading something or tracing some reference, and he would not have realized the time. It did not look as if he had even heard the taxi draw up, although the walls of Fosse House were probably thick enough to blot out noises. She reached for the heavy door knocker, while the helpful driver deposited her case at the door. He accepted his fare and the tip with thanks, then paused again, as if wanting to be sure she went safely inside.
The silhouette in the window stood up and Nell heard footsteps coming towards the door.
The taxi man heard them as well. He smiled and nodded, then
got back in the taxi and drove away down the dark drive.
Twenty-One
Michael had worked in Fosse House’s library until the middle of the afternoon. He found several old newspaper articles about the Palestrina Choir and two concerts it had given in Paris in 1904 to celebrate the Entente Cordiale.
The article listed some of the music performed – mostly Vivaldi and Bach – and also several of the more notable guests. These apparently had included the Archdeacon of Lindisfarne, the Venerable Henry Hodgson, together with his young son, William.
William Hodgson, thought Michael. That’s surely W.N. Hodgson – better known as Edward Melbourne. I’m sure his father was in the church; in fact, I think he ended up as a fairly eminent bishop. He transcribed the details on to the laptop. Melbourne had not been one of the most famous of the War Poets, but he had written the deeply moving ‘Before Action’, and Michael was pleased to find this report of him listening to Vivaldi and Bach as a young boy, and perhaps being influenced by them in his later work.
Around three o’clock, the solicitor, John Pargeter, phoned to say he was very sorry, Dr Flint, but they would not be able to make the journey that day. Could they meet at the house tomorrow morning, though? Say around eleven? Most grateful – he would look forward to that.
The distant church clock was chiming the half hour, and Michael saw that the shadows were already starting to crawl out from the corners. He was meeting Nell at the Bell around six, so he might as well pack his things now.
He tidied away the papers he had been working on – the newspaper cuttings of the concerts, and some correspondence between Luisa and the present incumbents of the revived Liège convent, which was not yielding very much – and made a quick check of the rest of the house. The rooms were orderly and neat; there was a large drawing-room at the front of the house, which Michael had not yet seen, and which looked as if it was hardly ever used. It contained large old-fashioned furniture, and several paintings hung on the walls, dim with age. Michael paused to study them. Stephen, are you in any of these? But the paintings were all rather turgid landscapes, except for one lady in elaborate Victorian dress, and two small oval-framed images of rosy-cheeked, ringletted little girls. It did not look as if there were any papers or anything private in here, so Michael, finding it rather a sad room, closed the door.
In the kitchen he was relieved to find a set of house keys. Taking them from their hook, he went diligently round the house, locking everything that could be locked, bolting the garden door and a little door off the scullery, and making sure all the windows were closed and the lights switched off. He would leave the various files and papers until the solicitor gave permission for him to take them, but rather guiltily he dropped Luisa’s journal into his case. Then he set off for the Bell. He was relieved to find, when he reached the end of the drive, that the tree had been cleared. The road was still in a bit of a mess, with large branches and debris everywhere, but it was easy to negotiate this, and Michael would not have cared if he had to drive through the ditches and dykes if it meant getting away from Fosse House.
The Bell, when he reached it, was warm and friendly, and the room he had originally booked was still available – it was chintzy without being twee and oak-beamed without being self-conscious. Michael thought Nell would like it, and he thought she would like the Bell. Their tastes coincided on most things.
He unpacked his few things, then went downstairs to wait for Nell’s arrival. It was just on five, which was much too early for her to get here, but he would prefer to be in the normality of the Bell’s bar for the next couple of hours. He bought a drink at the bar and carried it to a quiet corner table. He had brought Luisa’s journal downstairs with him, and there were only a handful of people in the bar, so he could finish reading it without interruption.
A faint, appetizing scent of cooking came from the direction of the kitchens, and Michael remembered he had not eaten a conventional meal for what seemed a very long time. Providing Nell’s train was on time they could enjoy an early dinner together. And an early night afterwards? He remembered the deep, wide bed upstairs and smiled slightly. But in the meantime, there was Luisa.
He found the page he had reached last night, which was Luisa’s description of finding Hugbert’s second letter, describing how he and the others failed to get into the house because they had seen someone they thought was Iskander at the window. Michael began to read. Luisa had written:
It’s late at night. I’m in my bedroom, seated at my writing desk, and I know I have to set down what happened the night my father invited Stephen in.
Leonora says I should do so. ‘Write it all down, Luisa,’ she says. I can hear her voice as clearly as if she’s in the room with me. ‘Your diary is the place where you should always tell the truth, and confession is good for the soul …’
That’s her convent training, of course. But will I feel better for having written it down? And what if someone finds it?
‘Then keep it a secret – keep it so well hidden no one will ever read it … Unless one day you decide the truth should be known … Because one day you might meet someone you feel you can trust with it …’
I don’t believe this particular truth will ever need to be known, or that there will ever be anyone I will be able to trust that much.
But there was someone, thought Michael, coming out of Luisa’s world for a moment. She met me and for some wildly incredible reason she thought she could trust me. It might only have been because she was dying – she might have trusted anyone in that situation. But he still found it moving that she had trusted him.
I’m terrified that this might be another of Leonora’s tricks to take over my mind. Is that what she wants to do? Did she live in this house once? With Stephen? That thought makes me rather jealous, but I believe Leonora is a friend rather than an enemy, so I’m going to do what she says. It will be difficult, but I’ll follow the advice from Alice in Wonderland: ‘Begin at the beginning, go on until you reach the end, then stop.’ I know when the beginning is. It’s three nights ago when I let Stephen into the house.
‘He’s here,’ my father had said, pointing to the faint footprints across the floor, and I had felt such a mixture of fear and excitement that I had not been able to speak.
My father left the room, and I heard him cross the hall. There was the sound of a door opening somewhere with a slow creak, although I had no idea which door it was. I stayed where I was, huddled into the chair, wrapping my arms around my body, watching the wet footprints gradually fade, as if Stephen was fading out of my reach. Or was he? Father had seemed so sure he was in the house. And the memory of Stephen’s hand closing around mine was still vivid. It’s vivid now as I write this.
At last I went out into the hall. It looked different, as if something had been altered. I looked round, trying to see what it could be. It was a large hall, nearly always dark because of the panelling and the narrow windows on each side of the door which did not let in much light. Then I saw that a small section of the panelling seemed to have come away from the wall, but when I went closer, it was a small door, set so deeply and so cleverly into the surrounding oak that unless you knew it was there you would never have noticed it. I certainly had never done so. It was slightly ajar. Was it the door I had heard being opened earlier? Was Father in there?
Mother was in the small sitting room at the back of the house – I could hear the faint murmur of a wireless and I knew she would be there for the rest of the evening. She always pretends to despise the wireless, but she listens to it avidly.
I walked towards the panelled door and pushed it wider open. It gave a faint groan, and stale air gusted into my face. Beyond was a flight of stone steps leading down. I glanced behind me, then went down the steps.
To describe what I saw at the foot of those steps is easy enough. A low-ceilinged room, with floors and walls of thick old stone. There was a wavering light from an oil lamp placed on the ground, and there were a few pieces of furnitu
re – a small table, one or two broken kitchen chairs, a jumble of household rubbish in one corner.
But there was one other object in that room, and although I can describe it, I don’t think I can put into words how it affected me. It was a massive oak chest, carved and elaborate, a little like those stone structures you see in paintings of Egyptian tombs. To me it was exactly like a deep old coffin. It was repulsive and frightening, but somehow it was also sad.
My father was kneeling in front of the chest, but he turned at the sound of my footsteps, his eyes wild and strange – wilder and stranger than I had ever seen them.
‘It’s all right,’ he said, in a conspiratorial whisper. ‘I’m going to save him. I’ve found a hiding place for him.’ He was unwinding a thick length of chain that had been around the chest.
‘Father, what’s happening? Please tell me. I’m scared.’
He lifted a finger in the traditional hushing gesture. ‘You must never tell anyone about this,’ he said. ‘Never. Niemeyer’s butchers are nearby. I can hear them whispering to one another, creeping towards the house. But even if they get in, they can ransack the entire house and they’ll never find him down here.’
He terrified me. I saw that he believed himself to be back in Stephen’s time – the time when the German soldiers had come here to kill him. It was all in the letters he had found in Belgium. And after all the years, my father could still hear those men … But if I listened intently, couldn’t I hear them as well? As for Stephen— The logical part of my mind knew Stephen was just an echo of the past, a fragment of an old memory blown forwards to the 1950s, like a dry leaf.
And yet … And yet I could still feel the pressure of his hand against my palm. I could still see his eyes looking imploringly into mine. ‘You must let me in …’
‘I’m going to open this and let him get inside,’ my father was saying. ‘Then I’ll chain it and lock it – you see there’s a padlock, Luisa? Then I’ll lock the door upstairs and they’ll never know this room is here. You didn’t even know it was here, did you, Luisa?’
