Rachel told Louise why she wanted the pair to attend, and Louise agreed with the course of action. She mentioned it to Phil, and Peter’s spirit immediately came to the fore, informing her that it was a perfect opportunity. He would be with them, but would maintain utmost discretion.
Louise asked her parents to come over and baby-sit for them, and after Susan and Daniel arrived at five o’clock, Louise busied herself in the bathroom. She had no idea why she was going overboard on the titivation, but she felt she should make the effort to look her very best for Rachel’s other guests.
Shortly before six, she and Phil walked through the gate and up the path leading to Rachel’s front door, marvelling at how neat and tidy the garden looked now all the dead plants had been pulled up or cut back.
‘I guess she’s had some help recently,’ Louise said.
Earlier that week, Rachel had bemoaned the fact that with all her other hobbies taking up so much of her time, the garden was beginning to get on top of her. Louise had paid little attention, because she and Phil were always offering to help, and Rachel had always declined their offer in the past.
Painting was the latest in a very long line of new pastimes Rachel had embarked upon since Jeremy’s death, and it was gratifying to Louise that the art classes lasted longer than the pottery classes she had taken the previous year.
Louise smiled at the recollection of the lumpy vase Rachel had produced before pronouncing that pottery was far too taxing for her. She was much more adept at the painting in watercolours, and had come on in leaps and bounds since starting the evening classes in the summer – so much so that some of her work was currently on show along with some other paintings by locals, at an art show in the village hall.
The trouble was – and Louise understood more than most how such a thing was possible – that Rachel lost all track of time and often found herself neglecting other tasks. Gardening had gone by the wayside all through the summer months, and Rachel only really tore herself away from her painting in order to baby-sit.
Louise opened the front door, calling Rachel’s name as she and Phil entered the cosy cottage.
Rachel’s voice floated from the rear of the cottage. ‘We’re in the kitchen, dear.’
Louise and Phil crossed the living room, opening the door to admit them to the kitchen, where they found Rachel, Lesley, Joyce and Theo, sitting around the table sipping wine.
‘Hello again,’ Louise said, smiling as she was introduced to Theo. She handed the bottle of wine she had brought to Rachel, who immediately put it in the fridge. ‘Quite a cosy little get-together, Rachel,’ she added.
‘Yes, this is all Joyce’s doing, and there is one final guest yet to arrive.’
Louise arched an eyebrow. ‘Allowing other people to hold parties now are we?’
Rachel wagged her finger. ‘She does have a reason, which is why I specifically asked you and Phil to join us.’
‘I thought you might have some ulterior motive,’ whispered Louise. ‘Is it something we can openly discuss?’
‘Perhaps, but probably best not to. Just ask Phil’s companion to keep an eye on our guests, and then when everyone has gone, we can talk then.’
There was a loud knock at the front door. Rachel turned to the others. ‘That’ll be our final guest. Theo, would you be a dear and let him in?’
‘Sure, Rachel,’ responded Theo, rising to his feet, trying not to appear too eager to get to the door. He knew the final guest was Matthew, but was uncertain how his friend would react upon seeing him.
Matthew was genuinely surprised to see Theo when the door opened, and he could not help grinning. ‘Is your mother behind this?’ he asked, light-heartedly. I should have known she’d have some other motive for coming here!’
Theo chuckled a little hesitantly. ‘I did have some idea that you had been invited to dinner this evening. She’s determined to get us back together!’
‘I know,’ Matthew nodded. ‘And how do you feel about it?’
Theo glanced away bashfully. ‘Quite pleased that she still thinks we’re right for one another, and more than a little uneasy.’
Matthew frowned. ‘Why so?’
‘Considering our turbulent past and my own actions… well, I wouldn’t blame you if you hated me.’
Matthew tilted Theo’s head up until they locked eyes. ‘I don’t think I could ever really hate you, Theo,’ he said in a gentle whisper. ‘I love you as much now as I did the day we got together.’
Theo smiled through gently trickling tears. ‘Really? You mean that?’ When Matthew nodded, Theo’s trickle of tears became a torrent. ‘Oh Matt, you have no idea how good it is to hear that.’
The pair embraced and kissed tenderly.
‘It’s all water under the bridge,’ sighed Matthew when they disentangled themselves. ‘Four Oaks will be a new start for us, away from all the bad memories. I’ve decided to sell the house in Portsmouth.’
‘And what will dear Daddy have to say about that?’ chuckled Theo, remembering the trouble they had with Roger when they had first started living together in Portsmouth. ‘Bet he was thrilled to think we’d all but split up!’
‘To be perfectly honest, I don’t think it fully registered with him. He was too busy fretting about Four Oaks.’ Matthew noted Theo’s curious look, and held up his hand. ‘Don’t even go there!’ he said sharply. ‘Believe me, you don’t want to know the ins and outs of that little melodrama!’
Matthew wondered whether perhaps he ought to try and tell Theo some of the incredible things that had been going on recently, but decided it was better not to involve him for the moment. Theo probably would not believe him, anyway.
‘As to what Dad will say when he finds out that we’re together again, and moving into Four Oaks… well you can witness that when we tell him. He’s at Four Oaks even as we speak.’
Theo pushed Matthew away slightly. ‘I know! So, what’s the old codger doing there?’
Matthew shrugged, unwilling to divulge the truth. ‘With my father, that’s anyone’s guess! He’s probably come to make certain I haven’t been nobbled by the ghosts that supposedly haunt the place.’
‘Is the place really haunted?’ gasped Theo.
Again, Matthew shrugged. ‘Probably.’
‘What’ll your dad do if he gets nobbled by a ghostie?’
Matthew smiled weakly. ‘I don’t think a ghost would dare to nobble Dad!’
Theo laughed, but as they entered the cottage, he did not notice that Matthew failed to share the humour.
*
Roger sat upon the bed Matthew had designated his at Four Oaks, listening intently to the wind as it whistled outside, rustling the few remaining leaves on the trees. The light of the almost full moon cast eerie shadows on the wall beside the bed, while the wind creaked under the eaves, making the house itself sound alive, groaning under some misapprehension concerning its remaining occupant.
At times, as he lay wide-awake in the gloom, he thought he heard footsteps in the rooms below. He presumed it was Matthew returning to the house, having perhaps forgotten something, but the footsteps died away, with no sound of a closing door to signify someone leaving the house once more, so Roger put it down to mental mind-tricks, caused by the dreadful weather.
Matthew had been gone nearly half an hour before Roger decided he no longer wished to lie alone in the gloom, so he eased his aching body from the bed, and switched on the light. He sat there, contemplating how best to spend the remainder of the evening, and decided to avail himself of the library downstairs.
Slipping his feet into his shoes and tying the laces, he moved across the room and opened the door. As he stepped onto the landing, the door banged shut behind him, making him jump.
The landing was plunged immediately into darkness, causing Roger’s heart to palpitate wildly. As he waited for his nerves to calm, his eyes gradually adjusted to the darkness, and the landing took on life from the shadows caused by the moonlight that etched faint trail
s of light from the hallway below. He could just make out the shape of a light switch on the wall ahead, and moved cautiously towards it.
As he reached out, fumbling slightly, his alert ears picked up the sound of whispered voices, coming from the lower level.
He froze, his breath caught in the back of his throat as pinpricks of icy fear trickled down his spine. He fought the instinctive urge to call out; it would be ill advised to alert possible intruders to his presence.
He strained to hear what was being said, hoping to catch brief snatches of conversation to ascertain whether the voices were familiar. Perhaps it was Matthew?
Something instinctively warned Roger it was not so.
The voices stopped their whispering, almost as if the intruders had heard him. Yet he had not moved, had not even made a sound. Even the house itself had become ominously silent as the wind outside dropped.
Roger released his breath as quietly as he could, still straining to hear. The voices were gone, but a vague shuffling sound seemed to be approaching him up the stairs.
The hairs on the back of his neck began to prickle, and as his fumbling fingers finally found the light switch his fear got the better of him, and he snapped on the light.
Blinking rapidly as his eyes grew accustomed to the sudden brightness, he fearfully glanced all around. Hastening over to the top of the stairs, he peered down, half expecting to find an intruder loitering there, but there was no-one; he was quite alone.
‘Hello?’ he called loudly, his heart gradually slowing its thunderous pace. ‘Is anyone down there?’
There was no response, and silence engulfed his senses, interrupted only by the intermittent tapping of a branch on one of the upstairs windows as the wind began to pick up again.
It was only as he stood alone in the impenetrable silence of the cold house, peering down into the hallway below, that Roger realised that the presence in his mind, for so many years a perpetual, unwelcome, yet at times oddly comforting companion, was suddenly gone. It was odd, but as he thought about it, he began to realise the presence had been vacant from his mind since his arrival at Four Oaks.
‘The wandering spirit has finally returned home,’ he whispered quietly to himself, ‘This is where it wanted to be all along!’
It’s ridiculous of course, he reasoned. The entity in my mind that I had no control over spent the best part of the last year trying to prevent Matthew from coming here. Why would it do that if it wanted to be here itself?
Maybe the spirit had for whatever reason not actually wanted Matthew to be here, perhaps realising that by trying to prevent him from coming here, he would actually do precisely that, and in so doing Roger himself would have a legitimate reason for coming, bringing the spirit home.
Well it had worked.
Apparently.
But where was the spirit now? Had it fled his body, to rejoin other spirits wandering within the walls of the house? Were they, perhaps, the whisperings he had heard? Were the mysterious footsteps those of ghosts?
Roger wondered just who exactly the spirit was. In all the time it had shared his mind, rudely shoving him aside mentally from time to time when it wrested control from him, it had never once revealed itself to him properly.
He had the vague impression of a masculine presence, but the name was lost to his subconscious, as were any memories he might have shared. He was aware of interaction with other people whilst under the guidance of the spirit, but could recall nothing of any such experience. The spirit had been ruthlessly secretive about its motives, and the only thing Roger could recall with any certainty was the overriding urge to protect Matthew and prevent him at all costs from coming to Four Oaks.
Roger ruminated as he teetered perilously upon the cusp of recollection.
Something happened in this house!
Half-realised images enshrouded in mists evaporated back into the despairing depths of his bleak subconscious.
Something terrible had occurred, centuries ago; something that drove the invasive spirit away from this place, but subsequently drew it back once more.
Did the spirit once live here? Was the spirit the victim of some foul deed, a murder victim perhaps, or even the perpetrator, returning to the scene of the crime once more?
I have to get to the bottom of this mystery, Roger thought, before the spirit decides to return!
Were there perhaps records, kept by past owners of the house? The deeds to the property would almost certainly contain the names of previous occupants, and maybe those deeds were somewhere in the house.
Making a snap decision, Roger slowly descended the stairs, intent on making a thorough investigation of the house before Matthew returned from the dinner.
Uncertain where best to start, he finally decided the most logical course of action was to begin at the front of the house and work his way around the ground floor in a clockwise rotation, before doing the same upstairs. He did not know how early or late Matthew might return, so he realised by necessity it would have to be a swift search.
The front sitting room revealed nothing, and he had already seen there was nothing of interest in the rear sitting room, so he opened the door to the library and switched on the light.
As he did so, he thought he saw movement in the shadowy corner, but entered the room to find it quite empty; he put it down to over-anticipation in his mind.
Apart from the books.
A closer inspection revealed that the vast majority of the books housed within the impressive library were reference books, many of them general historical or pertaining to local history, all of them quite old with faded spines. Every now and then, an obviously newer book stood out on the shelves, its brightly coloured spine unfaded by sunlight, undiminished by time.
There were a few random scatterings of novels by authors he had not heard of – but then, Roger was not well read when it came to literature. Somewhere in his past, the interest in fiction had somehow passed him by. He had not even read any of his son’s unpublished works, even though Margaret had. His wife informed him that their son was quite an accomplished wordsmith with a fertile imagination.
Roger’s main interest had always been his antique business. He bought cheap and sold at a huge profit. It never ceased to amaze him that so few people had any clue as to the value of items they sold to him. Though quite ruthless and mercenary about his business, he nevertheless liked to think he gave everyone a fair and decent price for their unwanted furniture, ornaments and paintings, whilst at the same time knowing he would easily sell them on at any of the large London auction rooms for much more than he paid.
Wandering around Four Oaks so far had proved to be an eye-opening experience. Matthew was sitting on a veritable goldmine. Inheriting the house alone was profit enough, although taxes to be paid might force him to sell some of the valuables.
Roger decided it would be worth keeping on the right side of his son for the foreseeable future. He could make a sizeable profit for Matthew by selling many of the paintings and much of the furniture, which all seemed to be antique, and he could still maintain a large cut for himself.
Plus, of course, selling the property itself would set Matthew up for life. He could let his friend keep the terrace in Portsmouth and buy a nicer property elsewhere in one of the better parts of the city. A nice payoff like that would certainly get the lad out of Matthew’s life once and for all.
But then again, suggesting he pay off the lad with a house might upset the apple cart and antagonize Matthew. It was obvious there was still some kind of attraction between the pair.
Still, it did not necessarily have to be an obstacle that could not be overcome. All he had to do was find a suitable young lady who was willing to work hard at turning Matthew, and then he would see the error of his deviant ways.
Would that be any more successful than his previous plan? The lad had proven himself unreliable, untrustworthy and unfaithful in the past, and Roger was proud of the way he had manipulated that situation over the y
ears. He had no particular fondness for Theo because of the way he had led his son astray, but when he had met the slut, Carson, at an auction a few years ago, and watched the shallow youth trying to seduce every handsome young man who approached him, he had hatched the plan for getting rid of the troublesome lad. Their types were all the same, as far as Roger was concerned: always leaping in and out of bed with each other, which was how he could be so certain that his son was not gay. It had to be a phase Matthew was going through, because he was not the type of young man who would arbitrarily sleep around.
The passing phase had lasted far too long, and Roger just could not understand why Matthew kept taking the lad back after each cruel betrayal.
In one final last ditch attempt to split them up permanently, Roger paid for Carson to fly to Alicante after Margaret let slip that Matthew and Theo were out there, trying to patch things up.
Finally, his plan appeared to be working when Matthew returned home alone.
But then the infernal lad followed him home, and it now seemed they were once again about to pursue another reconciliation.
No, the only course of action available was to find a nice girl, perhaps someone from the nearby village, who would be willing to put in the effort to convince Matthew that his latent homosexuality was a mere phase, and once he had discovered the pleasures of the female flesh, there would be no more of this incessant depravity.
Of course, he would have to ensure Matthew found out nothing concerning his own involvement in the situation with Carson, or with the new plan, otherwise he could kiss goodbye to any profit he might make from Four Oaks.
‘You’re going to have to be very crafty and clever here,’ he muttered to himself as he perused the books in the library. ‘Not to mention careful.’
Several of the books he flicked through were on local history.
He found one that seemed oddly out of place. It was handwritten in an almost indecipherable scrawl, but it mentioned Four Oaks, and told how smugglers had once used it centuries ago. According to the book, there were hidden passageways that led all the way down to the River Dryad, which ran through the valley, before joining the River Rother, which itself ran down to the coast.
The Master of Prophecy (The Sawyl Gwilym Chronicles Book 2) Page 17
