by Kirsty Ferry
‘Or somebody had overheard her being told that,’ said Alex.
He had finished his cake. Elodie pushed the remainder of her slice towards him, defeated.
‘Are you sure?’ Alex looked at the cake. Elodie nodded. ‘Okay. Give me a minute, then we’ll head up to the church.’
‘Sounds good to me.’ And as Elodie watched him finish off every last crumb, she sent a little thought message out to Georgiana.
Please, Georgiana, if you’re anywhere around us when we get to the church, it would be great if you could let us know.
The rest, she supposed, was up to Georgiana.
Chapter Twelve
The Hall was, thankfully, closed to visitors by the time they left the kitchen with the Bible wrapped in one of the big, clean towels Elodie recognised from the bathroom, and a torch in Alex’s back pocket. Polly’s altar cloth had been folded up and left in the lounge, ready to clean up and put back on display.
Alex had managed to get some scaffolders over, the day Elodie had been in London, and the church was as safe as he could make it, but not safe enough for the general public yet, he’d told her. They didn’t want to run the risk of anyone following them and asking awkward questions.
‘Oh, did you get anyone to cut up the tree?’ Elodie asked, remembering how that had been Alex’s plan originally, ‘because I haven’t seen anyone up there today.’
‘No. I can’t get anybody to come until the end of the week, so I suppose we just have to live with it until then.’
‘A lot of trees must have come down with the storm. All the tree people will be busy.’
‘There’s a queue, that’s for sure, but I hope our name rises to the top of the list pretty soon.’
‘You really don’t like that tree, do you?’ She laughed. ‘You’re very weird.’
‘Not as weird as you,’ he countered, with a twinkle in his eye that promised more if she dared to believe it, ‘seeing your ghosts and your shadows and everything.’
Thankfully, they had reached the church and she didn’t have to look at his twinkling eyes any more. Or imagine that martial-arts toned body in black trousers and black boots and very little else … Stop it, Elodie! ‘I can’t deny I’m weird, but I can try to explain it,’ she offered, crushing those images. ‘It’s not all the time. It’s just sometimes.’
‘Do they choose to be seen?’ asked Alex. ‘I mean, the normal ghosts. Not the things that have been happening to you lately.’
‘Not all of them have the capacity to choose. Some are just recordings, doing what they always did. They haven’t got any consciousness and they are the ones I see most of the time. The other ones who want to talk to you are few and far between.’
‘And the ones like Georgiana and Ben?’
‘That is something I’ve never experienced before. They’re more like memories. You know. You’ve seen it too. So maybe you’re weird as well?’ She flicked a teasing glance up at him, and he laughed.
‘Perhaps I am. But you never seem scared.’
‘I’m not. I’d just like to know why it’s suddenly happening like that.’
‘Do you think they had a hand in the storm and the way it hit the church?’ Alex asked as they looked up at it, surrounded by scaffolding. It was like an old drunkard being propped up by several pairs of helpful hands and escorted home from a cosy pub. Although perhaps that was a somewhat sacrilegious comparison.
‘Poor old church,’ Elodie said with a sigh, trying to focus on that instead of Alex and his midnight blue eyes. ‘Who knows? It’s definitely stirred them up, so it worked for them if so. Oh, well, let’s give this a go.’ She took the bundle from Alex and he opened the door to the church.
‘It just seems awfully strange,’ he commented, ‘that a body can disappear, or was never buried and nobody has any record of it. I wonder if she even died here, on the estate. Or if it was elsewhere.’ He shrugged and stepped into the church. His voice echoed back to Elodie. ‘I just hope she sees fit to tell you where she is, if nothing else.’
‘Me too,’ Elodie murmured and followed him in.
The church was dark and dreary and cold. It also smelled quite bad and Alex wrinkled his nose. ‘So this is what real damp smells like.’
‘Apparently so. Ugh.’
‘Maybe it’s just as well we rescued Polly’s altar cloth. I don’t think the old girl would appreciate it staying in this environment.’ Alex wound his way through the debris and went over to Georgiana’s tomb.
He touched her cheek and tried to see the resemblance to Elodie that he had witnessed in the vision; there was certainly a little. ‘She definitely looked like you.’
‘Ben had your smile and your eyes. And your colouring. Dark hair.’
‘Georgiana had your eyes and fair hair.’ Elodie’s eyes had always been the thing he’d found most attractive about her. It was her eyes, blue as the sky and hazy with cider, that had made him decide to whisk her away on Prom Night; but look how that had ended.
Even now, after all that had happened since then, and since he’d had a chance to know her as an adult, there was a hell of a lot he still found attractive about Elodie; but it had always been her eyes that drew him the most.
Elodie made a half-hearted attempt at a smile. ‘Unless Georgiana and Ben had a child who is, somehow, related to one of us, I’m not sure how we look so much like them.’
‘At this point, nothing would surprise me, but it’s a theory. As far as we know, the Hartsford direct line died out with those three siblings.’ Alex walked away from the shattered tomb and over to the pews where Elodie was busy unwrapping the bundle.
The Bible lay in the middle of the towel and they both looked at it as if it would jump up and growl.
‘I just don’t think Ben would have had a hand in leaving it here. It was more than likely put in to save her eternal soul as you say.’ Alex was curiously reluctant to touch it.
Elodie picked up the Bible and walked over to the tomb. She paused by Georgiana for a second, then put the old tome on top of the effigy. ‘Oh, this is silly. I just don’t think her body was here – ever. And I’ve dragged you here thinking we’ll get a memory popping up – I’m sorry.’ She looked around the church. ‘But I can feel her watching us. If it’s not her, it’s someone very like her.’
‘Can’t you just ask her?’
‘It doesn’t work like that. They don’t always communicate. I can just feel her. Over there.’ She pointed to, of course, the darkest and dankest part of the church. She looked at Alex, her eyes burning into him. ‘Can’t you feel her too?’
‘No.’ He looked where she was pointing and shook his head. He turned away from the area. ‘There’s nothing. Nothing and nobody.’
Elodie looked back at the shadows, and her next words made Alex’s skin prickle. ‘Oh, my!’ Her eyes widened. ‘There’s a light in there now. Alex! Look. It’s a candle!’
And it was. Right at the back of the darkest part of the church, over near the altar, a single, orange flame flickered and danced.
‘Come on!’
‘Elodie, it’s not safe through there!’ Alex shouted after her, his voice echoing in the big, empty building. ‘It’s where the beam fell in.’
‘But perhaps it’s Georgiana and she’s trying to tell us something.’ She started to climb over the beam, despite his protests.
Elodie had been very single-minded when they were younger, and Alex had learned the hard way it was no use arguing with her. ‘Elodie!’ He began to follow her. ‘Seriously?’
‘Have you got your torch, please?’ She held her hand out behind her. He passed it across to her and watched her go further into the darkness towards the candle.
‘Here we are.’ Her figure dipped as she bent over and the torch beam swung around the area, lighting up the white plastered walls and flashing off the brass memorial plates. ‘No sign of anyone living.’
‘Nobody living?’ Alex repeated.
‘Nope. I’d like to think someone just paid
us a visit.’ She flashed the torch light around again and then settled it on the candle. The light wavered just a little and she made a funny little noise that seemed like a mixture of excitement and disbelief.
‘What is it?’
‘I wouldn’t like to swear to it, but I think she’s given us a clue.’ Her voice was softer now. ‘Look. What do you think?’
She stepped to one side and Alex reluctantly went towards her. The candle was, after all, still lit. What if the ghost was still there too? He just hoped he didn’t come face to face with an eighteenth-century girl in there – that would be a very different kind of interesting addition to Alex’s world.
‘What do you see?’ Her voice wasn’t much more than a whisper. ‘Just here.’
He stared at the area she was holding the torch over. She had it directed onto what had been a highly polished wooden surface. Now, the surface of the altar was covered in dirt and puddles of water.
Apart from that, there was a big dribble of wax next to the flickering candle.
‘Can you see what it looks like?’
Alex looked at the dribble for a moment and then peered at it more closely. ‘It looks like a letter. An old-fashioned letter. Cursive handwriting.’
‘And can you see what letter it might be?’ Elodie’s body was very warm next to his, her breath close to his neck as her hair tickled his cheek.
He tried to ignore the sensations her proximity set off around his body and peered at the wax. ‘It looks like an L.’
‘L for Lucy,’ replied Elodie. He sensed her turn towards him and he swivelled his face to hers. ‘Georgiana is telling us Lucy put the Bible there. I’m quite sure of it.’
‘Elodie …’ he began.
Then a bitterly cold whirlwind ripped through the church, swirled past them and blew the candle out in its wake.
Elodie gasped and caught her breath, and the inside of the church wavered and tumbled into disarray. Memories flooded into her consciousness – long-buried, mixed-up memories that were bubbling to the surface like lava. Lucy was there – Lucy was trying to talk – Lucy was tumbling into the chasm, forcing her thoughts into the gaps between.
‘When you were happy, you were nice to me.’
‘When Ben was here you were happy.’
‘You’re going to Hell.’
‘I have to stop you going to Hell.’
‘I love you.’
Lucy had a little basket on her arm. She was staring into the marble tomb; into the gaping void. Her father had said her sister was locked away in the crypt in her coffin and she wouldn’t come up, into her beautiful stone sarcophagus, until it was a very quiet night and they could do it carefully with nobody watching. Lucy wouldn’t even be allowed to see it. Nobody would. She didn’t know why, but Father had to be obeyed. Always.
‘These are for you,’ Lucy muttered to Georgiana, to the lovely statue of her pretty sister on the top of it. ‘I found some things in the woods and I think they’re yours, but the Bible isn’t. The Bible is from me.’ Her voice sounded odd and stilted. It had been so long since she had spoken to anyone that she had quite forgotten she possessed a voice and had to think very, very carefully about her words. She laid the Bible down. ‘No. Not Hell. Not for you. Now you will be safe. And I am safe too, I think. And nobody must see these things. When the man comes to put you in here and you’re all closed up inside, I can still look at you on the top. And you will be in the attic in your picture as well, and I will still see you.’
Lucy laid her hand on the white marble and closed her eyes briefly, then her restless gaze flitted around the church until she saw a candle dripping wax onto the altar. She walked over to it, picked it up and stared at the flame. Carefully turning the candle sideways, she drew a loopy “L” on the altar with the wax. She dripped wax on her fingers and pressed them into the “L”. She thought it might be burning but she was numb everywhere and it didn’t hurt, not really. Not much.
The candle wax was ridged and smudged with her fingerprints. ‘There. Now God will know I was here and he will protect us both.’
She left the church with lighter steps and thought it would be all right now.
Chapter Thirteen
‘Was that her?’ Alex’s voice was almost a whisper, his eyes wide and bright in the torchlight.
‘I think it was Lucy.’ Elodie felt that her expression must mirror Alex’s. She was thoroughly shaken; the little girl’s emotions had flooded her senses and she felt disorientated and scattered to the four winds herself.
‘Lucy?’
‘Yes, she left the Bible here. There was a whole jumble of memories that came through with that little whirlwind, and they all seemed to come from her. She had some other things too, but I couldn’t see. The locket perhaps? And there was a coin …’
‘A coin? Like the one from the dressing up box?’
‘Yes. It reminded me of one of Georgiana’s memories. Ben told Lucy to go and find a magical horseshoe that would change into a coin in daylight. I think he left it deliberately for her. She was only ten, it was easy to buy her silence, I suppose.’
‘Most ten-year-olds would take the money then blackmail you for more.’
‘Perhaps.’ Alex was joking but Elodie didn’t want to discuss that. Now was not the time to mention the nasty little handwritten note she’d found under the floorboards.
‘That’s the Hartsfords for you,’ said Alex wryly, ‘above contempt in any way. Of course little Lucy wouldn’t blackmail anyone.’
Elodie had to change the subject and quickly. ‘She was sweet enough to give her sister a Bible to help her, though.’
‘She was, yes. But I’m willing to bet Daddy was involved somehow with Georgiana’s disappearance. He did his best to cover up Jasper’s death.’ He pulled a face. ‘Hey, when I die, will you put me in a nice respectable hole or build a mausoleum to me? Or does that all depend on my sins?’
She tried to make light of it. ‘You’ll be in a mausoleum, definitely. But it won’t be my job to put you in there. Your wife and children will have to sort that one out.’ The words were in the air before she could stop them and didn’t sound half so teasing when they were spoken out loud.
There was the briefest of pauses as Alex tucked the bundle under one arm. ‘Thanks for reminding me I’m supposed to repopulate this place,’ he said lightly. ‘And to continue the line so I have kids to tidy up my messes for me. No pressure.’
‘Oh, God, I’m sorry. I didn’t mean it like that.’ Elodie felt a bit sick; Cassie’s conversation about Alex giving up everything to return to Hartsford came back to her. ‘You don’t need to do it very quickly. You can wait a bit. Can’t you?’
‘Seems like I’ll have to,’ he said. ‘And it seems like it’s up to me to continue sorting my family’s messes out, both ancient and modern, as prescribed by my birth right. I can’t even manage my own, so God help me with anything else. Never mind.’ He turned to her and switched on a smile, all the more fake for its brilliance. ‘Shall we?’ He indicated the door and Elodie took a few steps towards it. Then she turned and retraced them back to Alex.
‘I’m sorry.’ Standing on tiptoe, she kissed him on his cheek. She was gratified to feel his arm come around her and hold her for a minute.
‘So am I,’ he said softly.
She knew she was, on the face of it, apologising for what she’d just implied and was sympathising with the position that Alex was in, through no fault of his own. But beneath that, for both of them, there were so many undercurrents that she thought she might drown if she gave way to them.
They walked back towards the Hall in silence, but somewhere along the path Alex’s arm had come to rest about her shoulders and she hadn’t shrugged it off.
She stopped, reluctantly, at the fork that led off to her cottage. ‘Thanks for coming to the church with me to see about my silly idea with the Bible.’
‘It wasn’t that silly. It sort of worked. And at least you got your candlelight. That was quite special
if it really was a message.’ He looked at her, almost searching her face for answers to some unspecified question. ‘I don’t suppose you fancy coming back to the Hall, do you? We can finish that Post Office wine.’
‘Oh, Alex! Normally I’d love to! But I really have to be getting home. I need to call Cori – I promised I’d search out some contacts to help her with her latest web commission and then talk her through a few things.’ It was only half a lie. She had promised to do all of that, and she was going to do it; but she knew Cori would also be talking to her about the portrait and she couldn’t risk Alex overhearing anything about that just yet.
‘Oh. Okay then.’ His face fell and his arm slipped off her shoulders. It was very cold without it there. Then, suddenly, his head snapped around to her, dawning horror in his eyes. ‘Hang on – Cori? You’re not going back to London, are you?’
‘God, no!’ she replied quickly. ‘No. Not at all.’
‘That’s good.’
She chanced a glance up at him and was mesmerised by the fact he was staring right back at her, his sometimes teasing, sometimes unfathomable deep blue eyes framed beautifully by his long, dark eyelashes. She’d never really taken much notice of his eyelashes before. She’d known, on some level, that they were dark, like his hair. But she hadn’t realised quite how dark …
‘No. No, I’m not going back.’
‘That’s very good.’ He slanted another glance at her. ‘Ever?’
‘Forever is a long time. “Not for the foreseeable future” is all I can offer at the moment.’
‘That’s better than nothing.’ The arm came back over her shoulders and he started steering her towards the cottage. ‘I’d best take you home then. Do you want Georgiana’s keepsakes, or do you want me to take them?’
They were on safer ground now. ‘I think they’ll be fine with me for the night. If that’s okay with you?’