House of Echoes

by Barbara Erskine

  ‘Sammy.’ Joss swallowed hard. Neither Georgie nor she, the rejected member of the Duncan family, were there.

  David stood back from the table, half diffident, half reluctant to relinquish his treasure. ‘Go on, have a look.’

  Joss sat down, leaning forward, her finger on the page. ‘There she is,’ she said, ‘the Sarah in the church. Sarah Rushbrook married William Percival 1st May 1861. Then Julia Mary born 10th April 1862, died 17th June 1862 – she only lived two months.’

  ‘It was a cruel time. Infant mortality was appalling, Joss. Remember your statistics,’ David put in sternly. He was suddenly strangely uncomfortable with this close encounter with the past.

  Joss went on. ‘“Mary Sarah, born 2nd July 1864. Married John Bennet spring 1893. Our firstborn, Henry John was born the 12th October 1900” – she must have written that. “Our daughter Lydia” – I suppose that’s my grandmother – “was born in 1902” and then, oh no –’ she stopped for a moment. ‘Little Henry John died in 1903. He was only three years old. That entry is in a different handwriting. The next entry is dated 24th June, 1919. “In the year 1903, three months after the death of our son Henry, my husband John Bennet disappeared. I no longer expect his return. This day my daughter, Lydia Sarah, married Samuel Manners who has come to Belheddon in his turn.”’

  ‘That sounds a bit cryptic.’ Luke was sitting opposite her, his attention suddenly caught. ‘What’s next?’

  ‘“Our son, Samuel, was born on 30th November, 1920. Three days later my mother, Mary Sarah Bennet, died of the influenza.”’

  ‘Incredible.’ David shook his head. ‘It’s a social history in miniature. I wonder if she caught the tail end of the great flu epidemic which spread round the world after the First World War. Poor woman. So she probably never saw her grandson.’

  ‘I wonder what happened to poor old John Bennet?’ Thoughtfully Luke sat back in his chair.

  ‘There is a letter in the study,’ Joss said slowly, reverting to a previous thought. ‘A note from Lydia to her cousin John Duncan telling him about her son’s birth. She must have written it straight away, before she realised her mother was dying.’ She glanced back at the page. ‘She had three more children, John, Robert and Laura, my mother, each born two years apart and then –’ she paused. ‘Look, she herself died the year after Laura’s birth. She was only twenty-three years old!’

  ‘How sad.’ Luke reached out and touched her hand. ‘It was all a long time ago, Joss. You mustn’t get depressed about it, you know.’

  She smiled. ‘I’m not really. It’s just so strange. Reading her letter, holding it in my hand. It brings her so close.’

  ‘I expect the house is full of letters and documents about the family,’ David put in. ‘The fact that your mother obviously left everything just as it was is wonderful from the historian’s point of view. Just wonderful. There must be pictures of these people. Portraits, photos, daguerreotypes.’ He rocked back on his chair, balancing against the table with his finger tips. ‘You must draw up a family tree.’

  Joss smiled. ‘It would be interesting. Especially for Tom Tom when he’s big.’ She shook her head slowly, turning back to the endpapers where the scrawled Italic inscriptions, faded to brown, raced across the page. The first four generations, she realised, had been filled in by the same hand – a catching up job in the front of the new Bible perhaps. After that, year after year, generation after generation, each new branch of the family was recorded by a different pen, a different name. ‘If I copy these out, I can take the list over to the church and find out how many of them were buried there,’ she said. ‘I wonder what did happen to John Bennet. There is no further mention of him. It would be interesting to see if he was buried here. Do you think he had an accident?’

  ‘Perhaps he was murdered.’ Luke chuckled. ‘Not every name in this book can have died a gentle natural death …’

  ‘Luke –’ Joss’s protest was interrupted by a sudden indignant wail from the baby alarm.

  ‘I’ll go.’ Luke was already on his feet. ‘You two put away that Bible and start to think about supper.’

  Joss stood up and closed the heavy book, frowning at the echoing crescendo of sobs. ‘I should go – ’

  ‘Luke can deal with it.’ David put his hand on her arm. He left it there just a moment too long and moved it hastily. ‘Joss. Don’t push Luke out with all this, will you. The family. The history. The house. It’s a lot for him to take on board.’

  ‘It’s a lot for me to take on board!’ She thumped the heavy book down on the dresser as over the intercom they heard the sound of a door opening, and then Luke’s voice, sharp with fear. ‘Tom! What have you done?’

  Joss glanced at David, then she turned and ran for the door. When she arrived in the nursery, with David close on her heels, Tom was in Luke’s arms. The cot was over by the window.

  ‘It’s OK. He’s all right.’ He surrendered the screaming child. ‘He must have rocked the cot across the floor. It is a bit sloping up here. Then he woke up in a different place and had a bit of a fright, didn’t you old son?’

  He ruffled the little boy’s hair.

  Joss clutched Tom close, feeling the small body trembling violently against her own. ‘Silly sausage. What happened? Did you rock the cot so much it moved?’

  Tom snuffled. Already his eyes were closing. ‘It might have been a dream,’ Luke whispered. ‘For all that noise, he’s barely awake, you know.’

  Joss nodded. She waited while he pushed the cot back into the corner and turned back the coverings. ‘Tom Tom go back to bed now,’ she murmured gently. The little boy said nothing, the long honey blond eyelashes already heavy against his cheeks.

  ‘Clever invention, that alarm,’ David commented when they were once more back in the kitchen. ‘Does he often do that?’

  Joss shook her head. ‘Not very. Moving has unsettled him a bit, that’s all. And he’s excited about Christmas. Alice and Joe and Lyn will soon be back. Lyn has agreed to come and help me look after him as a part-time nanny. And on top of all that Luke has promised him we will do the tree tomorrow.’ She was laying the table, her careless movements quick and imprecise. David leaned across and neatened the knives and forks, meticulously uncrossing two knife blades with a shake of his head. ‘The devil apart, do you think this house is haunted?’ he asked suddenly, squaring the cutlery with neat precision.

  ‘Why?’ Luke turned from the stove, wooden spoon in hand and stared at him. ‘Have you seen something?’

  ‘Seen, no.’ David sat down slowly.

  ‘Heard then?’ Joss met his eye. The voices. The little boys’ voices. Had he too heard them?

  David shrugged. ‘No. Nothing precise. Just a feeling.’

  The feeling had been in Tom’s bedroom, but he was not going to say so. It was strange. A coldness which was not physical cold – the Dimplex had seen to that. More a cold of – he caught himself with something like a suppressed laugh. He was going to describe it to himself as a cold of the soul.

  11

  ‘Presents, food, blankets, hot-water bottles. I’m like a Red Cross relief van!’ Lyn had driven into the courtyard next morning, her old blue Mini groaning under the weight of luggage and parcels. ‘Mum and Dad are coming back on Wednesday, but I thought I’d give you a hand.’ She smiled shyly at David. ‘I’m going to be Tom’s nanny so Joss can write world- shaking best sellers!’

  ‘I’m glad to hear it.’ David grinned. He had only met Joss’s younger sister on a couple of occasions, and had thought her hard and, he had to admit, a little boring. For sisters the two had had little in common. Now, of course, he knew why. They weren’t sisters at all.

  It was eleven before he managed to cajole Joss away from the house on the pretext of hunting up some of the names from the Bible in the church. They started in front of Sarah Percival. ‘I noticed her because the memorial was so ornate. There must be older ones,’ she whispered. She wandered away from him down the aisle. ‘Here we are, Mary Sar
ah Bennet died in 1920. It just says of Belheddon Hall. No mention of her disappearing husband.’

  ‘Perhaps she didn’t want him buried with her.’ David was staring absently up into the shadows near the north door. ‘There’s a lovely little brass here. To the memory of Katherine –’ he screwed up his eyes, ‘it’s been polished so often I can’t make out the second name. We need more light.’ He stepped closer, reaching up the wall to trace the letters with his finger. ‘She died in 14-something.’

  Katherine

  In the silence of the old church Joss flinched as though she had been hit. She was standing on the chancel steps, staring at a small plaque on the wall behind the lectern. At David’s words she turned, to see him stroking his fingers lightly over the small, highly polished brass. ‘Don’t touch it, David – ‘she cried out before she had time to think.

  He stepped back guiltily. ‘Why on earth not? It’s not like walking on them – ’

  ‘Did you hear?’ She pressed her fingers against her temples.

  ‘Hear what?’ He stepped away from the pulpit and came to stand next to her. ‘Joss? What is it?’

  ‘Katherine,’ she whispered.

  He had been riding – riding through the summer heat, trying to reach her …

  ‘That was me, Joss. I read out her name. Look. Up there on the wall. A little brass. There are some dead flowers on the shelf in front of it.’

  Riding – riding – the messenger had taken two days to reach him – already it might be too late –

  In the cut glass bowl the water was green and slimy. Joss stared down at it. ‘We must renew the flowers. Poor things, they’ve been dead so long. Nobody cares – ’

  Foam flew from his horse’s mouth, flecking his mantle with white …

  ‘There aren’t any flowers at this time of year unless you go to a shop,’ David commented. He wandered away towards the choir stalls once more. ‘Did you bring a notebook? Let’s copy some of these names down.’

  Joss had picked up the vase. She stared at it vacantly. ‘There are always flowers in the country, if you know where to look,’ she said slowly. ‘I’ll bring some over later.’

  He glanced at her over his shoulder. She seemed strangely preoccupied. ‘Shouldn’t you leave it to the flower ladies?’ he said after a moment.

  She shrugged. ‘They don’t seem to have bothered. No one has noticed. The vase was hidden there, in the shadows. Poor Katherine – ’

  Katherine!

  Furiously he bent lower over the animal’s neck, urging it even faster, conscious of the thud of hooves on the sunbaked ground, knowing in some reasoning part of himself that his best mount would be lamed for life if he kept up the pace any longer.

  ‘David!’

  The pounding in Joss’s skull was like the thud of a horse’s hooves, on and on and on, one two three, one two three, over the hard, unrelenting ground. Everything was spinning …

  ‘Joss?’ As she collapsed onto the narrow oak pew David was beside her. ‘Joss? What is it?’ He took her hand and rubbed it. It was ice cold. ‘Joss, you’re white as a sheet! Can you stand? Come on, let’s take you home.’

  Behind him, far behind, a scattering of men, the messenger amongst them, tried to keep up with him; soon they would have fallen out of sight.

  In the silent bedroom Joss lay on the bed. Sitting beside her was their new doctor, Simon Fraser, summoned by Luke. His hand was cool and firm as he held her wrist, his eyes on his watch. At last he put her hand down. He had already listened to her chest and pressed her stomach experimentally. ‘Mrs Grant,’ he looked up at last, his eyes a pale clear blue beneath his gold-rimmed glasses. ‘When did you last have a period?’

  Joss sat up, relieved to find her head had stopped spinning. She opened her mouth to answer and then hesitated. ‘What with the move and everything, I’ve sort of lost track –’ Her smile faded. ‘You don’t mean – ’

  He nodded. ‘My guess is you are about three months pregnant.’ He tucked his stethoscope into his case and clicked the locks shut. ‘Let’s get you down to the hospital for a scan and we’ll find out just how far along you are.’ He stood up and smiled down at her. ‘Was it planned?’

  Katherine

  It was there again, the sound in her head. She strained to hear the words, but they were too far away.

  Katherine: my love; wait for me …

  ‘Mrs Grant? Joss?’ Simon Fraser was staring at her intently. ‘Are you all right?’

  Joss focused on him, frowning.

  ‘I asked if the baby was planned,’ he repeated patiently.

  She shrugged. ‘No. Yes. I suppose so. We wanted another to keep Tom company. Perhaps not quite so soon. There’s so much to do –’ It had gone. The voice had faded.

  ‘Well, you are not going to be the one doing it.’ He lifted his case. ‘I’m going to be stern, Mrs Grant. That turn you had this morning is probably quite normal – hormones leaping about and rearranging themselves – but I’ve seen too many women wear themselves out in the early months of pregnancy and then regret it later. Just take it easy. The house, the boxes, the unpacking – none of it will go away by itself, but at the same time, none of it is so urgent you need to risk yourself or your baby. Understood?’ He grinned, a sudden boyish smile which lit his face. ‘I’ve always wanted to come and see this house – it’s so beautiful – but I don’t want to be coming up here at all hours because the new lady squire is overtaxing herself. Right?’

  Joss sat up and swung her legs over the side of the bed. ‘It sounds to me as though you’ve been got at. Luke must have talked to you before you came up here, doctor.’

  He laughed. ‘Maybe. Maybe not, but I’m a fairly good judge of human nature.’

  Luke’s hug, in the kitchen later, swept her off her feet. ‘Clever, clever darling! Let’s have some champagne! David, are you prepared to brave the cellar? There is some there.’

  ‘Luke –’ Protesting, Joss subsided into a chair. ‘I shouldn’t have champagne. Besides, shouldn’t we wait until I’ve had the proper tests?’ She still felt a little odd – disorientated, as though she had woken too suddenly from a dream.

  ‘No chance.’ Luke was glowing with excitement. ‘We’ll have another bottle then. Besides there’s no doubt is there? He said he could feel it! I’m sure, and you are too, aren’t you –’ he paused for a moment on his way to collect four glasses and looked at her shrewdly. ‘A woman always knows.’

  Raising her fingers to her forehead Joss pressed distractedly against her brow. ‘I don’t know. I suppose there have been signs.’ Queasiness in the mornings for one. In the rush to get Tom up and dressed she hadn’t taken much notice. Her tiredness she had put down to the fact that she was doing much too much. ‘So nanny –’ she looked at Lyn, ‘you’ll have another charge soon, it seems.’

  Lyn’s eyes were sparkling. ‘You’ll have to pay me more to look after two.’

  ‘Oh great. Thanks!’

  ‘At least writing your book will keep you sitting still. You’ve got no excuse not to start, now,’ Luke said firmly. He put the glasses down on the table and then dropped a kiss on the top of her head. ‘I’ll go and help David find a bottle.’

  David was standing in the cellar in front of the wine racks as Luke walked slowly down the steps. ‘It’s bloody cold down here. This is all vintage, you know. And some of it is still in really good nick.’ He glanced at Luke and lowered his voice. ‘If you need money you could do worse than sell some of this. There are some very valuable wines here. Look at this! Haut-Brion ’49 – and look Chateau d’Yquem!’

  ‘What sort of money are we talking about?’ Luke reached for a bottle and extracted it carefully from the rack. ‘This is –’ he squinted ‘ – 1948.’

  ‘Don’t shake it whatever you do! That’s about 350 quids’ worth you’ve got in your hand. You are looking at thousands, Luke. Ten. Twenty. Maybe more.’

  ‘You know, I did wonder. That’s why I wanted you to have a look at them.’<
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  David nodded. ‘I can give you the name of someone at the wine auction house at Sotheby’s who would come and value it and catalogue it. It would be a tragedy in a way to get rid of it, but I know you’re strapped for cash, and with another kid on the way, you could do worse than raise some like this. Besides, you’re just as happy with plonk, aren’t you, you ignoramus!’ He chuckled.

  ‘I think I’d better put this back –’ Luke glanced at the bottle in his hand.

  ‘You’d better! Come on. Let’s find some champagne for the baby.’ David selected a bottle from the rack and studied the label, ‘Pommery Brut 1945. Not bad!’

  ‘Just twenty or thirty quid a bottle, I suppose?’ Luke groaned.

  ‘More like fifty! It’s a strange life you lead here, isn’t it.’ David shook his head slowly. ‘All the trappings of grandeur, yet a bit short of cash.’

  ‘A bit!’ Luke grinned. He was not going to let himself think about Barry and H & G’s money. ‘We were planning to live off the land here. Literally. The money I can make from doing up cars is peanuts. It’s a mug’s game – so slow – but at least it will bring in enough hopefully for electricity bills and community charge, that sort of thing. Joss would never hear of selling anything out of the house – she is so obsessed with the history of it all, but wine is not quite the same, is it? I’m sure she wouldn’t mind about that. It could make the difference between hell and a hard place for us, David.’ He cradled the bottle in his arms. ‘Tell me something. Do you think Joss really could make any money out of writing?’

  David grimaced. ‘She can write. She has a wonderful imagination. I’ve told her that I’ve taken the liberty of showing some of her stuff to a publisher friend of mine. He particularly liked one of her short stories. He’s keen to see more, and he wouldn’t say that unless he meant it. But beyond that it’s in the lap of the gods.’ He gave a sudden shiver. ‘Come on, old chap. Let’s get out of here. It’s so bloody cold. A hot meal is what we all need, I think!’