Andrew decided that this was not the time to point out to Aidan that doing this was bad magic. Aidan had been shaken enough to find someone in Melstone actually wanted him dead. “So it was you!” he said. “That’s a relief. They had me wondering which of us was mad. But the kids knew the truth. It wasn’t until the Chinese boy chased after me—”
“Henry Lee,” Aidan put in. “He’s brainy. Stashe left you a parcel. Over there, on the piano.”
Andrew realised he was glad that Aidan had interrupted him. It would do no good to tell Aidan who his father was — although it did, now Andrew thought about it, account for Aidan’s astonishing gift for magic. He went over to the piano. On the way, he paused to gesture at the fire that Mrs Stock had laid ready in the hearth. Pull out a wisp of Earth’s fiery centre, his grandfather had taught him and Andrew now remembered, and flick it among the kindling. The fire blazed up, popping and crackling. “That’s better,” Andrew said, picking up Stashe’s small parcel.
“Can you teach me to do that?” Aidan asked as Rolf trotted eagerly to the hearthrug and threw himself gratefully down in front of the fire.
“Probably,” Andrew said absently. He opened the packet and was flooded with yet more memories. A small silver pendant fell out, trickling a silver chain behind it. It looked like a very ornamental cross, but when you examined it, it was more like a tree, or a man, or an ankh. It was, Andrew knew, very potent. His grandfather had made him wear it whenever, as old Jocelyn used to put it, there was “a spot of bother with him down at the Manor”.
And there was a spot of bother now. Andrew held the pendant out to Aidan. “Wear this,” he said. “It’ll keep you safe.”
Aidan inspected it disdainfully. “I don’t do bling,” he said. He had been rather scornful to find that nearly all his football friends wore gold crosses or silver charms round their necks. “Gran said charms are mostly superstition,” he explained.
“Superstition,” Andrew said, “is something you believe. They believe in this, so it works against them. Take it. Put it on.”
Aidan remembered his conversation with the strange voice. Steps have been taken, it had said, by you and by others. He saw that he might be being silly. “OK,” he said and grudgingly put the pendant round his neck. As soon as he had the chain over his head, he found himself sighing with a feeling of deep peace. The urgent, tense feeling he had had ever since the Puck had appeared was suddenly gone. “It works!” he said.
“Yes.” Andrew relaxed too. He treated himself to a thimbleful of whisky and sat with his feet stretched out to the fire and Rolf stretched out by his feet. It felt very comfortable to have a snoring dog on the hearth — even if the dog was not quite a dog.
Mrs Stock had been generous that day and left them a fine, juicy pie. And the rain stopped while they were eating it. After supper, they were able to lug the box of giant beans round to the woodshed.
Groil was waiting for them, rather damp, leaning his elbows on the roof. He beamed when he saw the box and lifted it up on to the woodshed himself. “What are you wearing?” he asked Aidan uneasily as he dragged out two fistfuls of the beans. “It makes me feel sore.”
Aidan thought of himself and Tarquin’s leg. “It’s a charm to make my enemies believe that it hurts them,” he said. “It can’t hurt you because you’re a friend.”
“Ah.” Groil took a mighty bite of beans, pods and all. He munched a bit and thought. “You’re right,” he said, after one of his drainlike swallowings. “It’s all a trick. Do you still want me to keep your wallet?”
“If you wouldn’t mind,” Aidan said. “It’s safe with you.”
“Fine,” Groil said. “This could be fun.”
“What did he mean by that?” Andrew asked as they went back to the house.
“No idea,” Aidan said, pushing the back door open. This reminded him. The glass. “I forgot,” he said. “I meant to tell you there are faces in the coloured glass. I’ll show you tomorrow when it’s light.”
But Andrew fetched the big torch from his study then and there, and made Aidan stand outside and shine the light through the glass. Aidan stood there patiently, listening to Groil’s steady munching from around the corner, while indoors Andrew stared and marvelled. Here was one more thing he had forgotten his grandfather telling him. He had only remembered that this stained glass was somehow precious. “It shows you my counterparts,” old Jocelyn had said. “But we’ve only got two so far.” Indeed, in his grandfather’s day, Andrew had only been able to pick out two faces: Mrs Stock in orange, left-hand top, and Mr Stock in red, right-hand bottom, and Andrew had never been sure if he was really seeing them or not. Now he could, very definitely, see six people, all of whom must have counterparts among Mr Brown’s folk. Andrew could see Tarquin clearest of all, in the purple pane. Tarquin’s elfin face stared out at him from what seemed to be the thrashing branches of a tree, with some kind of storm raging behind it. But Rolf was almost as clear, in the yellow glass at the bottom. Rolf must count as a person then. So who did he correspond to? Security’s dog? And what about Shaun, in the blue pane — or was that Groil?
Andrew spent the longest time gazing at the misty image of Stashe, in the green glass, until Aidan complained that his arms were aching. Andrew ignored him. Really that girl was a delight. So beautiful. Like a spring day…
“My arms are killing me!” Aidan shouted. “This torch is heavy!”
Andrew sighed. There was still a day to go before Stashe came to the house again. “Oh, all right. Switch it off and come in then,” he said, wondering how he was going to live through tomorrow.
The next day was clear and bright, as if the rain had never been. Andrew solved the problem of how to live through it by saying to Aidan over breakfast, “Get your boots and jacket as soon as you’ve finished. We’re going to walk the boundary from where the rain stopped us last time. Does Rolf want to come?”
Rolf did. Energised by two packets of cereal, he bounded eagerly ahead until they reached the dip in the road. Then, nose down, he went off unerringly along the line of the boundary that they had somehow missed when they ended up in the wood.
“That’s a relief,” Andrew said. “No need to zigzag.”
Aidan nodded a little morosely. He had hoped to play football today. And he was not at all sure that the silver charm was going to protect him if any creatures appeared. In addition, he could hear the church bell across the fields, summoning people to Sunday worship, which made Aidan feel guilty. Gran had been very strict about going to church. He was afraid that Gran would have called Andrew godless.
Andrew became very godless indeed at the point where the boundary swerved away from the road to his old university and their way was blocked by an impenetrable tangle of barbed wire. Rolf turned back, whining. Andrew stood and swore. Aidan was astonished at how many swear words Andrew seemed to know. “It’s Brown again,” Andrew said. “I know it!”
It did seem to be Mr Brown’s doing. According to the map, which Andrew spread out angrily over one knee, the grounds of Melstone Manor made a great bulge at this end of the village, surrounded by a wall. They could see the wall through the coils of barbed wire, but they could not get to it, although it was fairly obvious that the line of the boundary ran along outside the wall, following the bulge.
“Trying to take over more land!” Andrew said furiously. “Let him just wait until my lawyer gets back from holiday!”
“Is this bit yours too?” Aidan asked.
“No. It’s the principle I object to!” Andrew said between his clenched teeth.
Aidan was puzzled. “Isn’t Mr Brown one of those who don’t use iron?” he asked.
“Yes,” snapped Andrew.
“Then,” said Aidan, “what is this barbed wire made of?”
Andrew stared at him. “That is quite a point,” he said after a while. “Perhaps it’s all an illusion. Let’s try and push through.”
They tried it. All that happened was that Andrew tore his jacket and Ro
lf whined unhappily all the time they were trying. Whether the barbed wire was an illusion or, as Aidan suggested, simply made of zinc or something, it was quite as impenetrable as it looked.
“Let’s go home by the road,” Andrew said disgustedly. “I need to think about this, before he surrounds the whole of Melstone in barbed wire.”
They trudged back along the tarmac and arrived back at Melstone House hungry, hot and cross. Rolf was the only one who was even remotely happy. After lunch he led Aidan joyously up the village to the football field, where Aidan had a very satisfactory afternoon and Rolf vanished to chase rabbits in the fields beyond. Andrew spent the time soothing himself by playing the piano and telling himself that he was thinking what to do about the encroachments of Mr Brown. In fact he had not the remotest idea what to do. He decided to ask Stashe when she arrived tomorrow.
That Monday Stashe breezed in wearing another green dress, this one with beads around its high waist. She seemed to Andrew like the antidote to all his troubles. “Have you read those letters yet?” she asked him cheerfully.
“No, I had to go to London,” Andrew said. “And — er — other things.”
Aidan looked carefully at Andrew’s face and slipped away with the pendant winking round his neck, first to chase about the fields with Rolf and then to the football field. Andrew barely noticed him go.
“Have you any idea what I can do about Mr Brown?” he asked Stashe. “First he grabs half my wood, and then he seems to be putting barbed wire all along the boundary of my field-of-care.”
Stashe thought about it. “I don’t know,” she said. “I don’t know how you deal with those people. They’re so strange. But I intend to finish that second box today, and the third, if I have the time. I think we must find that parchment. Dad told me about the trouble on Saturday and how he thought he’d lost his leg again. He thinks that a look at that contract, or whatever it is, might help sort things out. And do find time to read those letters. They’ll surprise you.”
She breezed away to the box room, moments before Mrs Stock arrived.
“Lovely weather,” Mrs Stock announced, handing Andrew today’s paper. “If it stays this way, it’ll be just right for the Fête on Saturday. I’ve sent Shaun to go on with that shed, is that all right? Had a good trip to London, did you? Mind you, I still can’t be happy about that sideshow Trixie’s thought up. I think it’s indecent really. Why can’t she come on the old clothes stall with me, like last year?”
She was interrupted by Mr Stock with a truly massive box, which he bunted against the back door to attract Andrew’s attention. Andrew leaped up at once to open the door. He knew now that the stained glass was even more precious than he had thought. Mr Stock was not particularly angry with anyone that day, but he had been sorting out the vegetables that were not up to the exacting standards of the Fete and he had nothing else to do with them. As he carried the box past Andrew, Andrew glimpsed a jumble of outsize marrows, colossal potatoes and a vine of tomatoes like pulpy cricket balls. He left Mrs Stock to deal with them and fled to his study.
Stashe had put several piles of letters beside his computer, carefully labelled. Finance, Andrew read, on the first pile. “I never knew he was a Lloyd’s Name.” And on the next, Letters from fellow occultists, mostly technical. The third pile read, Fifty years of letters from Aidan’s gran! Andrew carried them all to the living room and settled down to read.
Mrs Stock, who had decided to move the piano again today, whatever Andrew said, was thoroughly thwarted to find him there. She revenged herself on Andrew by throwing the French windows wide open and saying, on her way out, “I thought you were too old to be reading comics!” She then removed herself to Andrew’s study, muttering, “Well, at least I can get to dust that computall today!” She proceeded to wreak chaos and mayhem in there by piling all the papers into neat, random heaps, pushing pamphlets into an old box she found there and stacking every book she could discover into a cupboard where Andrew would never find them. Finally she dusted the computer with a heavy hand. The machine was switched off, but it nevertheless gave out protesting whirrs and beeps.
“Nothing to do with me,” Mrs Stock declared. “I never touched it. Stupid thing. World of his own!”
In the living room Andrew was interested to find that the first letter from Aidan’s gran to his grandfather was indeed written fifty years ago. It said:
Dear Jocelyn Brandon —
May I take a liberty? —we are such a divided family —my parents quarrelled with your parents —and then they quarrelled with me for becoming a singer —but this seems no reason why you and I should not be friends —I have just acquired a field-of-care here in London and it would be a great boon to me if I could consult you from time to time —I am told you are the best occultist in the country —If you don’t wish to acknowledge me I shall understand —but I hope this will not be the case.
Yours hopefully,
Adela Cain (née Brandon)
Andrew laughed aloud. Though some of it was at Adela’s idea of punctuation, most of it was with astonished pleasure. Quite by accident, he had not lied to the Arkwrights, or not as much as he’d thought. Adela Cain really was a distant cousin, and so of course was Aidan. It meant that Aidan had a perfect right to come and live here, just as Andrew had a perfect right to go and ask the Arkwrights about him. Oh, good! he thought, turning to the next letter.
Obviously, old Jocelyn —who must have been in his fifties then and not that very old —had sent Adela a cordial reply. Her next ten letters, scattered over some years, were all friendly requests for advice, or thanks to Jocelyn for his help. In the next letter after this, Adela was giving Jocelyn advice in turn. If your beastly Mr Brown, this one went, is really one of those who don’t use iron, make careful note of what he actually says —they’ll trick you if they can —those people —but they’re quite careless too —they leave loopholes and so you can often trick them back.
Two letters further on, there was a sad little note.
My dear Jocelyn —
Thank you for your kind letter on the death of my beloved Harry Cain —I miss him terribly — but I shall pull myself together — I have my little daughter Melanie to care for —
Yrs
Adela
Strange, Andrew thought uncomfortably. This feels like prying into someone’s feelings.
He read more letters. …and how do you stand on voodoo? —I wouldn’t interfere myself —but some of their gods are actually walking my streets now… and … I don’t know what is in her love potions —I only know one poor girl has killed herself… And then suddenly …Some personal advice now —as I know you too have a daughter you don’t get on with —how do I deal with Melanie? —she is fifteen now and she seems to have nothing but sulky contempt for me…
Andrew was jolted out of what seemed to be a story that had nothing to do with himself. Adela was talking about his own mother. By the date on this letter, this was long after his mother had stopped having any dealings with Jocelyn. Andrew never knew what their final quarrel had been about. He had been above such things then, a hard working and ambitious graduate student, studying furiously for his doctorate… And, yes! This must have been about the same time as he had had that sudden blinding sight of the true nature of history, the revelation that had led to his decision to write the book he was trying to write now… Anyway, on with these letters.
Melanie came into the letters a lot after this. She came home drunk. She came home high on drugs and was lucky that Adela prevented her being arrested for drug dealing. She insulted her mother all the time, in any way she could. Adela begged for advice in almost every letter. Andrew would have called Melanie a thoroughly bad lot —except that most of Melanie’s insults were remarkably like the things his own mother used to say about Jocelyn. Superstitious old fogey! was entirely familar, and so was Ha ha! My parent believes in fairies, stupid old fool!
Perhaps Adela was simply mishandling Melanie, being too strict with her, just
as Andrew had always suspected Jocelyn had mishandled his own mother and caused her to decide to be the opposite in every way she could. Rebels, both of them.
Then came a letter of thirteen years ago, dated at the time when Andrew himself had been in France studying, and rather out of touch with his grandfather.
Dear Jocelyn —
Thank you — I’ll bring Melanie down to you myself —but I won’t stay —You have no chance of sorting her out if I’m with her —I pray you can —arrive 2.15 in Melton —
Gratefully
Adela
So Melanie had actually come here! Andrew thought. I wonder if that helped. Wait a moment. Thirteen years ago?
Sure enough, the next letter said, Yes, Melanie is pregnant, I’m afraid —she insists it’s none of my business —but from some of the things she says I suspect the father to be that odious Mr Brown of yours —no —no —not your fault —how can you stop a girl walking in your wood — I know how sneaky he is —and I know Melanie…
Feeling more than ever as if he was prying, Andrew leafed on through the letters —or even more as if he was guiltily turning to the end of a detective story to find out who the murderer was, which was something he always felt ashamed of doing. Melanie ran away from Adela, disappeared completely for a couple of years, and then returned home dying of cancer… and the child —she’s called him Aidan because she says only the right people get that name right —and Aidan has fleas and head lice —Jocelyn —I’m not sure I can cope!…
Andrew had just read this cry of despair, when Stashe knocked at the door and sang out, “May I come in, Andrew?”
“Yes, of course,” Andrew said, laying the letters down.
“Thank you,” she said, not from the door but from the open French windows. “We have to be invited in, you know.”
She was not Stashe.
Chapter Thirteen
She was not Stashe, although she was remarkably like her. She was wearing a long, fluttering dress the same green as the dress Stashe was wearing that day. Her hair was a brighter gold than Stashe’s and it fell in long curls around her shoulders. Her eyes were huge and green and slightly slanted, more luminous than Stashe’s, and when she smiled at Andrew, he felt dizzy for a moment, as he did sometimes when Stashe smiled. She was beautiful. She was not Stashe, but she was so like her that Andrew knew at once that she must be Stashe’s counterpart among the folk who did not use iron. He whipped his glasses off and took another look as she came undulating towards him. She was wearing a hefty layer of glamour, like thick make-up all over, but she was still beautiful and still very like Stashe.
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