Too Near the Dead

by Helen Grant

  While I’m looking for the 1870s, a bell rings somewhere, and most of the schoolkids file out. Now there’s space for me to examine the volumes in peace. I decide to start with the death of Euphemia Alexander, which should be mentioned in 1872, if at all. She died on 14th February, so I try Saturday 17th February. Nothing; the four deaths mentioned are all other people. I try the following Saturday, 24th, and there she is: ALEXANDER, Miss Euphemia, aged 60 years, of Barr Buidhe House.

  Two weeks further on, I find the first notice posted by Euphemia’s lawyers, trying to find her heirs. It seems from this that everyone assumed that Charles Robertson was dead – which stacks up with what I read in Strathearn Folk, about the house standing empty while the lawyers looked for prospective heirs. I keep going, turning the crisp and yellowed pages carefully with my fingertips. I don’t really know what I’m looking for. Perhaps there won’t be anything; not everything gets reported in local newspapers. What does get reported seems to be distinctly random: weird snippets from around the world mixed in with very dull local stories about crops and game. The front page is always a mass of advertisements, for writing paper, bonnets, boots and shoes, piano music.

  I look at the top of the page. I’ve only got as far as May 1872. The whole thing seems hopeless. All the same, I keep turning pages, taking great care because the paper is so thin and brittle. Perhaps the answer is in here somewhere. If it isn’t, I don’t know where else to look.

  In the event, I nearly miss it. A CASE OF AMNESIA, the article is titled. Lawyers for Miss Euphemia Alexander, recently deceased, of Barr Buidhe House, have advertised for Miss Alexander’s heirs, believing the named beneficiary of her will, Mr. Charles Robertson, to be deceased following a railway accident. However, in circumstances that might have been taken straight from the chapters of a sensation novel, Mr. Robertson has contacted Messrs. McRae & Son to advise them that he is alive and well, and had been suffering from amnesia.

  I have to read that again – twice. Amnesia? That doesn’t even seem possible. For twenty-seven years?

  The article continues: Mr. Robertson was a survivor of the Garside railway disaster which captured the public imagination nearly three decades ago, many of the dead having been so badly burned as to render identification impossible. At the time, he was engaged to be married to Miss Alexander of Barr Buidhe, a lady some years older than himself. Following the accident, Mr. Robertson fell victim to an amnesia so complete that he was unable to recollect anything about his fiancée or his previous life.

  I sit back and stare at the page. I don’t believe this. I suspect the writer didn’t either, from the reference to sensation novels. Charles got cold feet, is my opinion. The accident was a convenient way to get out of an unwanted entanglement.

  Seeing the advertisements for heirs to the estate, Mr. Robertson miraculously recovered his memory.

  I bet he did, I think. It’s hard to believe the brass neck of the man.

  Having contacted the lawyers and established his identity, he now finds himself master of the Barr Buidhe estate.

  That’s pretty astounding, but the last line is the kicker.

  Mr. and Mrs. Robertson are believed to have toured the house and land, with a view to carrying out some work prior to moving in.

  Mr. and Mrs. Robertson. So Charles had got married to someone else, while he was off supposedly suffering with amnesia. All those years Euphemia waited for him, standing on the threshold of Barr Buidhe House at twilight, staring dismally into the distance – and he was courting someone else. The years she wore lavender, mourning for someone she hoped would return, but who never did. And then she died...

  With a little help, I think, remembering the green glass laudanum bottle.

  She died, and was laid to rest in the wedding dress she never got to wear in life. I hope – I hope so much – that she was really dead. If not, she woke to the dark and the enclosed space and the stale air, and screamed herself to oblivion.

  And then, Charles came back. Not on his own, but with a wife by his side. And he inherited everything. The house and land that Euphemia had looked forward to sharing with him. The money. The future.

  I sit and think about that. After a while, I resume my laborious trawl through the pages of the newspaper, thinking that there may be something more. I get right into the middle of the following year and there is nothing. It seems that Mr. and Mrs. Robertson got their happy ending, while out by the chapel the remains of Euphemia Alexander crumbled away into the earth, unloved and forgotten. It’s sad, and horrible.

  I keep turning the crackling yellow leaves, scanning local headlines that have long been meaningless. It’s getting late, so I suppose I should give this up. I’ve probably found out everything there is to know. Then I turn one last page, and there it is.

  MURDERED IN BED reads the headline. Mr. Charles Robertson of Barr Buidhe House may be remembered by the readers of this newspaper as the inheritor of the estate of the late Miss Euphemia Alexander. His return to the area caused much interest because he had long been suffering from amnesia following a railway accident. Alas! Mr. Robertson enjoyed his inheritance for all too short a time. Yesterday morning, his manservant discovered him in bed with – horrible to relate! – a kitchen knife through his heart. His assailant has not yet been discovered. His wife, Mrs. Clara Robertson, is too prostrated with grief to be interviewed.

  I sit for a while and look at this page.

  It was all for nothing, I think. The disappearance. The lies. Deserting Euphemia and marrying another woman. All for nothing. How long did he enjoy his ill-gotten gains? A year? By 1875 Charles was dead. And in 1890 they demolished the house.

  At last I close the volume with care, and slide it back into its place on the shelves. It feels like sliding a coffin into a mausoleum. How long will it be before anyone looks at those pages again? Maybe they never will.

  I leave the library without looking back.

  Chapter Thirty-Nine

  James is still shut up in his study when I get back to Barr Dubh House, and I’m not sorry. I want to think about what I’ve found out. I stand at the window, gazing towards the place at the treeline where I’ve seen someone dressed all in lavender, her skirts billowing in the breeze. There is no-one there now. It is twilight and a cold wind is bending the naked branches of the trees.

  Do I feel sorry for Euphemia? Yes. I’m afraid to close my eyes at night in case I find myself imprisoned in her coffin again – but I do feel sorry. I feel her fear and anger and loneliness. All of it for nothing. Charles wasn’t worth it. Did he ever care for her at all, or just for her money?

  I feel a stab of something uncomfortable at that thought and push it away. James loves me, and I love him. There is no chink in that armour for doubt to worm its way in.

  So why? I think. Why did she show me these things? Is it possible that she just wants someone to know?

  I think about the Loughtys. They were the first people to live here in over a hundred years and they hardly lasted any time at all. I don’t know why they left, though. Don’t ask, says his social media account. Maybe they split up for the same reasons anyone does. Maybe the dream home was just the glue that was supposed to stick a broken relationship back together again. Maybe. Or perhaps Susan Loughty started having dreams like the ones I’ve been having – dreams of being confined in a coffin, of hearing the lid being nailed into place. She may have wanted to leave – she may have insisted on it – and Craig Loughty would have been angry or upset because of all the work that had gone into the place. Or perhaps he didn’t believe her. There are so many ways it might have gone wrong. Ways which I am not going to find out about, because the pair of them have made themselves untraceable.

  Can’t blame them for that, I think, biting my lip. If we’d spoken to them about the house and they’d told us all this stuff, I’d have thought they were both barking mad.

  Outside, darkness is
falling. We are fast approaching the darkest part of the year. It doesn’t get light until well past eight in the morning, and night falls around four o’clock. I go around switching lights on, warding off the dark. I remember what I saw in the mirror the last time I awoke from one of those dreams, and even though it’s only early evening and I am wide awake, my heart thumps at the thought of seeing it again. But the shapes that loom up in the darkened windows only coalesce into myself.

  I go into the dining room, now completely green, meaning to shut the curtains. There is the sideboard, its doors carefully closed. On impulse, I go over and open them. The inkstand has gone. All the other things I expected to see are there: the stacked plates, the glasses. But there is no sign of the inkstand. I will ask James about it, whether he has moved it, but I am fairly sure I know the answer already. He hasn’t touched it and nobody else has been in the house since Belle left. It has just gone.

  I wonder if it is possible that it is finished. Nobody else followed this trail so far, but I have pursued Euphemia’s story to the end; there is nothing more to know. Perhaps she can rest now.

  Please, I think.

  I think of Stephen again, too. I still feel nothing in the place where Stephen should be. There are so many things I would like to say to him, but can’t. But I suppose I should be happy, knowing that there is something afterwards – even if I don’t know why some people come back to speak to us, and others stay silent forever.

  I go back to the kitchen and a little while later James comes out of his study to join me. He looks tired and he’s carrying five empty coffee cups, but he looks cheerful.

  He says, “How did it go at the library?”

  And I say, “You won’t believe what I found.”

  Chapter Forty

  THE END

  I never thought I’d get there. But here we are, at the final page, which like the others is covered in red comments. The hero has defeated the villain (unsurprisingly, since the villain kept stopping what he was doing to deliver long exposés of his motivations), and is quaffing cocktails with the heroine. With one of the heroines. And they’re drinking strawberry daiquiris, of all things.

  I save the file and then I compose an email to send with it. It’s probably the most euphemistic email ever composed, larded with words like interesting and success. I can’t bring myself to say that the book is amazing, because that would actually be lying. It is with a great sense of satisfaction – not to mention relief – that I send the thing off. I expect it will ping back into my inbox after Christmas, with another round of checks to be done, but it won’t be as bad as this time, and anyway, that’s in the future.

  James is in a good mood, too. I can hear him singing in the kitchen, while he makes lunch. I expect that means the conversation with Laura went well.

  I decide to give Belle a call and tell her the thriller is finished. The first thing I notice when she appears on the screen is that her hair is no longer turquoise. Now it’s purple.

  “Fen!”

  “Hi, Belle.”

  “What’s up?”

  “You know that thriller? I’ve just finished it.”

  “Oh my God! That must be such a relief.”

  “It really is.”

  She peers at the screen. “You look... well, you look thinner but kind of... better. Was it that awful?”

  “No. Well, I mean, yes, it was that awful, but if I look better, it’s not because of that.”

  Belle squints at me. “What was it, then?”

  “Is anyone in the office with you?”

  Belle looks around. “No.”

  “Because this will sound crazy.”

  “Intriguing,” she says. “Go on, spill.”

  “It’s the house. I mean, it was the house. You were right about something being off. I didn’t tell you before, when you came up, because I thought maybe I was the one going nuts.”

  Then I tell her the whole thing. About the horrible dreams. About finding out that there really was an older house on the same site as ours. About the long and winding road that led me to the truth about Euphemia Alexander – and Charles Robertson.

  “Fuck,” says Belle, succinctly.

  “Indeed,” I say. “And I’m sorry. For reacting the way I did.”

  “So now what? Are you going to sell up and move out? I mean, that’s some weapons-grade creepy, right there. I wouldn’t want to stay somewhere where that had happened.”

  I shrug. “No. You’re going to think this is even weirder, but since I found out about Charles, I’ve just felt... better.”

  “You have?” says Belle, dubiously.

  “Yes. Honestly, I have. It took a long time to get to the bottom of the story, but now I have... I feel as though someone just had to hear it. Euphemia, she spent nearly half her life waiting for Charles to come home and he never did, not until after she was gone. And he’d married someone else.”

  “Arsehole,” says Belle. “But what about Euphemia? Do you think she was genuinely buried alive?”

  “I don’t know. I hope not.”

  Belle shakes her purple-dyed head. “I wouldn’t want to stay there, after finding all this out. No offence, but...”

  “None taken,” I say lightly. “It’s really alright, though. I haven’t had any more dreams, not since I found this out.”

  “How long has it been?”

  “A few days. I don’t know, nearly a week.”

  “Did you have that many dreams, before?”

  “It’s not that. I just feel different. Like a shadow has lifted. I don’t think the dreams are going to come back.”

  “And James? What does James think about all this?”

  “James is happy as long as I’m happy.”

  “Hmm.”

  “Seriously,” I say.

  “Okay.”

  There’s a pause.

  “And what about the wedding?”

  “How long have you got?”

  “Ages,” says Belle.

  So I tell her about a couple of places I’ve visited, thinking they might make good wedding venues, and about possible wedding colours (not lavender; I’m never going to fancy that ever again), and about flowers and music and a hundred other things. I’m smiling when I finish the call and I’m still smiling when I wander into the kitchen, where James is putting out plates. He’s also put out a bottle of Prosecco.

  “Celebrating?” I ask him.

  “Yep. The first chunk of my US advance is in.”

  “Wow.” I hop onto one of the bar stools. “So now you’re a single man in possession of a good fortune, which means...”

  “I must be in want of a wife, yes,” he says, grinning.

  We have far too much of the Prosecco considering it’s the middle of the day. I have to put off my plan to go into the town and see Seonaid, because I’m in no state to drive. But as soon as I get a moment, I’m going to drop into McBryde’s, look at some more fabric samples, and tell Seonaid the whole story. I reckon she’ll be amazed to hear exactly why lavender is supposed to be so unlucky – and what that song is all about.

  Lavender lady, lavender lady... she’ll put ye on like a suit of clothes...

  I find myself humming it around the house. It doesn’t feel sinister any more. Sad, yes, but not frightening. It’s true what I told Belle: it feels as though a shadow has lifted. I feel happy, and unsuspicious, and safe. Tomorrow is the solstice, the shortest day and longest night of the year; after that, the days will start to become longer and brighter. I feel as though I have been through winter. Soon, it will be spring.

  Chapter Forty-One

  How long have I been standing here, staring down? My head feels foggy. I think I have been here for a long time. It’s like waking from a dream – there is that sense of having been thinking very hard about something, something elus
ive that has slipped away with the coming of consciousness.

  I know this room. There is oak panelling, gleaming in the soft light of a candle. There are polished wood bookcases, full of carefully lined-up hardbacked volumes, the titles picked out in black or gold. There is a desk standing in front of the velvet-curtained windows. It is a large desk, with pigeonholes, a desk from which the entire work of the house can be organised. On it is an ebony inkstand.

  I look at that inkstand for a long while, and the slow anger burns its way through my veins and sinews. I sat here once, and wrote a last will and testament with that ink, with that quill. I had it signed by my housekeeper, and the maid. Everything that I owned was left to Charles Robertson: the house, the land, the money. I kept the faith. He did not. He married someone else and now the two of them will enjoy everything that I owned in the world. That, at any rate, is what they believe. They have no idea of the anger that can build up – an anger that is so strong that it can transcend anything. Even death.

  What was he doing, Charles, when I was discovered in my room, with the fire burnt down and a laudanum bottle in my lifeless hand? When they hammered the lid down and carried me to my last resting place? Was he sitting opposite her, laughing and smiling? The thought makes me fiery with anger – I am drunk with it. They cannot be allowed to get away with this. I will not allow it.

  I take up the candlestick and turn away from the desk and the inkstand. My bare feet whisper over carpet, and then wooden boards. I go into the hallway. It is silent here, and dark. Even the servants have gone to bed, in their attic rooms far removed from here. There is no danger of them hearing me moving about. Even if they did, what would they see? I pause before a print of the house that hangs on the wall here, seeing my own reflection dimly in the glass. They would see the new mistress of the house, Mrs. Clara Robertson, in her long white nightdress, her hair down, her feet bare.