The Winding Stair

by Millie Vigor

  A woman! Ginny sat down.

  ‘Perhaps one of your fans has got a crush on you,’ said Bill.

  ‘Then why don’t they make themselves known to me?’

  ‘Maybe they’re shy or perhaps they’re married and can’t,’ said Nancy.

  ‘I think you ought to report it to the police,’ said Bill.

  ‘That’s what Nancy’s been telling me. I don’t want to go to the police, but it’s turning me into a bag of nerves. I can’t concentrate and the slightest noise makes me jump. I suppose I’ll have to do something, but the person who’s doing this is anonymous. It would be like trying to catch a shadow.’

  ‘The police have their ways,’ said Bill. ‘I’m sure you’ll find that they’ll want to find out who’s behind it all. Flowers are harmless; at least you haven’t been threatened physically.’

  ‘No, only psychologically,’ said Ginny. ‘It’s the phone calls that really set me on edge. In spite of caller ID, whoever’s making the calls can still withhold their number. It’s like not knowing whose face it is behind the mask. I hate that.’

  ‘I’ve no doubt it plays on your mind. You really ought to go down to the station and report it. It will be no worse than talking to us this evening, so do. Anyway, I hope that’s been a help.’

  ‘Well, it’s given me something to think about,’ said Ginny.

  She wished her neighbours goodnight, closed the door behind them and went back to her kitchen. She emptied the teapot and rinsed the mugs then from a corner cupboard, took a bottle of wine, looked at it then put it back. It wasn’t wine she wanted. It was whisky, a dram to relax her and maybe help her sleep. She poured some into a glass. Bill had said the stalker could be a woman. If that was the case, then it must be someone local who knew where she lived, someone who was able to leave things on her doorstep and not be seen. Someone who was able to find out where she had gone and send that rose … aah… . Ginny gasped, then shouted, ‘NO,’ and forgetful of the glass in her hand, brought it down with a thump which sent what whisky was left in it flying high. ‘No, no, no, it cannot be.’

  But who ticked all the boxes? Who but Nancy, the friend who wrapped her in her arms to console her when things went wrong, the woman she would have trusted with her life? Who was better placed to secretly leave a flower on the doorstep? Who held a key to her house and could have walked in and seen the notes on her jotter with clues to where she had gone?

  Ginny’s heart sank. She had not lived in the village long enough to make many friends. Nancy had been the first and best, now she was not and there was no one. She poured another dram, picked up her glass, tossed the contents straight off then poured another. It was late when she went to bed and as she climbed the stairs, she was none too steady on her feet.

  THREE

  The shop in Blackton was a convenience store and gossip exchange; the big shop had to be done in Salisbury. So, to stock up after her absence, Ginny had come to a supermarket in the city. She was in a hurry and paying no heed to other shoppers, she grabbed a trolley from the rack and set it rolling. There was work waiting, work that had been hindered by going away and she had to get back to it. The store was busy. Fraught mothers with fractious children, bored husbands driving trolleys and a man who whistled tunelessly through his teeth thronged the aisles. As she made her way along, shopping list in hand, Ginny took packets and tins from the shelves and put them in her trolley. Looking down at the list and not where she was going, she was brought abruptly to a halt. Thinking she’d collided with someone she pulled the trolley back, then saw that a large masculine hand held on to it. She looked at it, then up the arm and into the face of Paul.

  ‘What are you doing here?’ she gasped.

  ‘I could ask the same of you.’

  ‘I live here. What’s your reason?’

  ‘I live here too and so does my aunt; she’s not been well, which is why I’m shopping for her. I didn’t expect to see you.’ Paul smiled. ‘How are you and who are you running away from these days?’

  ‘That’s not funny.’

  ‘Sorry. Did I hit a raw nerve?’

  Ginny glared at him. ‘Would you please move your trolley and let me move on? I’m in a hurry and I’ve got a lot to do.’

  ‘No.’ Paul made no attempt to move. ‘I offended you when you stayed at the Rushden and I wish to apologize. When you’ve finished your shopping, would you please let me buy you a coffee to make amends?’

  ‘I don’t think that’s a good idea.’ Ginny pulled her trolley away from him. ‘And how can I be sure you’re shopping for your aunt. You might be telling fibs like the first time I met you.’

  ‘You only have to look at what’s in my trolley to know that I’m telling the truth. I mean, can you honestly see me drinking a mug of Horlicks before I go to bed?’ Ginny did not appear convinced. ‘Oh, come on,’ said Paul. ‘It would more likely be a tot of whisky, don’t you think? I’m really not an ogre to run away from. I wasn’t when you were at the Rushden and I’m not now. You’re not planning to do it again, are you?’

  Somehow the man Ginny was looking at now was not the same one she had met at the hotel. But perhaps that was because here they were in an over-lit supermarket, not a darkening forest.

  ‘I’m sorry. I really am busy. I’ve got work I have to get back to,’ she said.

  ‘Work! It’s the middle of the morning, what work do you do if you can shop at this time of day?’

  If she told him she was a published author, albeit not famous, he would still be able to look her up in libraries and bookshops and she had no intention of giving him that chance.

  ‘You’d rather not know,’ she said.

  ‘Oh, all right,’ said Paul. ‘But listen, it’s so nice to see a familiar face and I wish you would have a coffee with me. You’d be doing me a favour; it would be nice to talk to someone of my own generation. Conversation with my auntie is mostly one-sided, she does nothing but complain about doctors, politicians, the weather and all her aches and pains. I don’t think I can take much more, so please …’

  His voice had descended into a childish whimper. It tempted Ginny to smile and she relented. ‘I guess I can spare a few minutes,’ she said. ‘But I’m not going to answer any questions, in fact, I shall be asking some of my own.’

  ‘All right, but don’t change your mind and run away, will you?’ said Paul.

  At the back of Ginny’s mind as she continued to shop was that, given half a chance, maybe she would make a dash for it. Shopping done, she looked for him as she went through the checkouts. The café was opposite them; he was already there and had spotted her. There was no getting away.

  Trolleys parked and coffees purchased, they sat at a table. Ginny watched Paul as he tore open a packet of sweetener.

  ‘Why did you tell me you were only at the hotel for a couple of days?’ she said. ‘Because you weren’t a bona fide guest, were you? You were just visiting your parents.’

  Paul looked up. He was smiling. ‘I thought you might get the wrong idea if I told you that the oldies owned the place.’ He laughed. ‘You might have thought real photographers didn’t live in the backwoods of Devon and that I only wanted to take a snap for some murky gratification. I am a professional photo-grapher; I’ve a studio here. Now, tell me why you left in such a hurry.’

  Ginny shivered. Suddenly the buzz of voices, hiss of the coffee machine, the rattle of cutlery and crockery and all the noisy comings and goings of a busy supermarket faded into a blanket of sound and she was trapped in a bubble. A vision of a red rose floated in front of her.

  ‘Something weird happened,’ she said. ‘A rose was left on my dressing table and I don’t know how it got there.’

  Paul threw up his head and laughed, leaned back in his chair and raised both his hands, palms facing Ginny. ‘WOW. He must be the most fabulous lover ever for you to abandon your holiday to rush back to him.’

  Ginny slapped both hands on the table as she jumped up. ‘It was not like that at all,�
� she shouted. Her voice was loud and heads turned. ‘I do not have a lover. I am being harassed by a stalker.’

  Nancy Graham, unaware that Ginny was in the store, was also there. She heard the shout and like other shoppers, looked to see what was going on. To her surprise, she saw Ginny standing by a table in the café, an angry look on her face. A man sat there, his hands raised as if to warn Ginny off. Who was he? Nancy, wishing she could overhear their conversation, edged her trolley closer to them, but was still too far away.

  ‘OK, OK, I’m sorry, sit down,’ soothed Paul. ‘I wasn’t to know, was I?’

  Embarrassed to find that she was the centre of attention, Ginny sat down. Paul leaned toward her. ‘God help us, you’re a bundle of nerves. What’s going on?’

  ‘You might be a nervous wreck too if you were being stalked,’ said Ginny. ‘I wanted to get away so I hadn’t told anyone where I was going and when that rose appeared, I thought he’d found out and followed me.’

  ‘Oh my God, hey, you didn’t think I was the stalker, did you?’

  ‘Yes, I did, especially when you said you were only staying there.’

  ‘Now I know why you ran,’ said Paul.

  ‘What I want to know is how that rose got into my room.’

  ‘That’s easy. I put it there.’

  ‘You!’ For moments that stretched Ginny said nothing, then she stood up. ‘I must be slipping,’ she said. ‘I don’t know what your game is, but why are you stalking me? I don’t know why you should. I’m not aware of ever having met you or had anything to do with you before—’

  ‘Hang on a minute,’ interrupted Paul. ‘I am not guilty. Why would I want to stalk you? You’re right. We hadn’t met. I had no idea who you were when you came into the bar. Believe me, I have better things to do than deliver roses to young women I do not know.’

  ‘But you’ve given the game away now, haven’t you? You’ve just said that you put that rose in my room. No one else knew I was there. I don’t know where you live but I’ll bet it isn’t too far from me.’

  ‘Please calm down,’ said Paul. ‘The rose I put in your room was delivered by messenger with verbal instructions to leave it in the room that was occupied by Miss Virginia Harvey. The olds were busy and goodness only knew where the housemaid was so I took the master key and delivered it myself. I do not know where you live and even if I did, if I wanted to give you roses they would be in a bouquet tied up with ribbon.’

  He sounded genuine, thought Ginny, but genuine or not she would not dismiss him as a suspect.

  ‘Was there a label on it?’ she asked. ‘And if there was what did you do with it?’

  ‘There wasn’t one and if there had been I wouldn’t have taken it off. Hey, wait a minute. Are you telling me you don’t know who’s doing this?’

  A groan escaped Ginny and she wilted visibly. ‘No, of course I don’t. If I did, I would have done something about it and I’m sure he or she would be suffering the consequences or at least be banged up by now.’ For a moment or two her hopes had soared, a florist’s label would have been a valuable clue.

  ‘I haven’t been much help, have I?’ said Paul. ‘But I hope you’ve eliminated me from your list of suspects. You do have suspects, don’t you?’

  Oh yes, and someone much closer to home than you. ‘Yes,’ she said, ‘but I have no proof yet.’

  ‘You will get it, though, whoever it is will eventually make a mistake.’

  Which you may have just done, she thought, but said, ‘I do hope so, now I’ve really got to go. Thank you for the coffee.’

  ‘You’re welcome,’ said Paul. ‘It’s been nice to see you again. Look, here’s my card, feel free to ring me when you need someone to talk to. I’d like to take you out to dinner … hang on.’ Ginny was backing away. ‘No strings attached, we can even go Dutch if you like.’

  ‘That’s very kind of you, thank you. I’ll think about it.’

  Retrieving her trolley, Ginny said goodbye to Paul, walked out of the supermarket and, she hoped, out of his life.

  At home she put her groceries away, fed her cat and made herself a sandwich. At her desk she switched on her computer, but instead of starting to write she stared out of the window. Meeting Paul had thrown her. She hadn’t expected to ever see him again. He lived in Salisbury, yet he was at the hotel when she was there and in both places roses had been left for her. Even though he protested his innocence could he be the guilty one? And then there was Nancy, who might also be guilty and who was no longer a friend to confide in.

  She didn’t want to see Nancy, didn’t want to look into the woman’s face and wonder what was going on in her head, and when she came knocking on the door Ginny hid herself away behind her curtains. There was no evidence against Nancy, nothing more than the seed of doubt that had been sown in her mind by Bill’s remark, but it had stopped her from going to the police station, for if her doubts proved to have substance, Bill would suffer too. And she liked Bill.

  Now there was no one. She was entirely alone.

  FOUR

  Ginny sang as she heated soup for her lunch and buttered a roll to go with it. It had been a very productive morning and she had been able to get a lot of writing done. Lunch over, she washed the dishes, fed the cat then put books to return to the library in a bag. Clad in a warm coat and boots, she set off to catch the bus into town. One of these days, when she was rich and famous, she would buy herself a new car and not have to rely on a second-hand one that was continually letting her down. But the bus service was good and the bus stop only a five minute walk away. From her cottage she walked down Church Lane, turned the corner into Drovers Way and then along to the bus stop.

  There was no one there and while she waited, Ginny looked across the road at a row of granite houses, homes of the elite of the village. She studied the one opposite her. Double gates led into a wide driveway. The front door was reached by a short flight of steps. Large sash windows were set symmetrically each side of the door and small windows at ground level indicated basements below. A creeper, now bare, clung to the corner of the house, its tendrils reached up to windows that were copies of the ones below. There were skylights in a tiled roof. Paintwork on windows and doors gleamed and window glass sparkled. It was a house that was cared for and loved.

  Ginny got off the bus in the shopping centre. The city was unusually busy. Shopping was not one of Ginny’s favourite occupations and as she would be spending Christmas in Scotland with her parents, she had already bought their presents. But she would like something new to wear and in one of the department stores she began her search. It was not that there would be a round of parties; it was more likely that the three of them would sit in front of a blazing fire to enjoy a dram and a bite of supper. Unless, of course, Brett McIvor happened to be home, in which case maybe he would call and take her dancing. When he said he was going to work abroad, she had hoped he would ask her to write … but he hadn’t, and she had been disappointed. He had said he would be away for several months and, ‘You might meet someone else while I’m gone and I wouldn’t want you to feel you were tied to me.’ He had never led her to believe that he was seriously interested in her so why did her heart leap when she thought of him?

  Her mother would ask when she was going to bring a boyfriend home. Her father would smile, look over the top of his glasses and tell her to leave her alone; there was plenty of time for that. And she would tell them, once again, that when she’d found the right one she’d be sure to let them look him over. It wasn’t that she didn’t have men friends, it was just that in her opinion any worth looking at twice had already been snapped up, except perhaps Brett. But Christmas was still, what, eight weeks away; there was plenty of time to prepare for it.

  Boyfriends, what time had she for boyfriends? She thought about the men she knew. There was Curtis: polite, well-mannered and intelligent who could converse in a manner that had her completely enthralled. To some degree she was fond of him, but purely as a friend, because he was gay,
wasn’t he?

  Now there was Paul. Feeling bored and at a loose end one evening, wanting only to talk, she had called him up. He was easy to talk to, amusing; she had warmed to him and let him persuade her to let him take her out to dinner. As an escort she couldn’t fault him, but at the same time there was something she was not sure of. His air of total confidence made her uneasy.

  Curtis was safe, platonic, a real friend. Paul she wasn’t sure of. Ashley at the computer store was the one she never wanted to see again. She had met him when she was selecting ink cartridges for her printer and he had asked if she needed help. It was the timbre of his voice that had first attracted her, then his eyes, big, brown and bottomless as a moorland pool, that had held her captive. He had been attentive and kind to start with, but when she insisted on having her own space he had become jealous and had made her life a misery. When she told him it was over he had punched and slapped her, threatened her and told her that by the time he’d finished with her, life would not be worth living. ‘You’d better watch your back,’ he had said.

  There had been no one else and there still was no one else.

  Rifling through the dress rails, Ginny abandoned them and settled on a couple of sweaters and a pair of fine tweed trousers. If the weather was good, she would wear them when she was at home, for there would surely be long bracing walks in the hills with her father. Shopping done, she made her way to the library to exchange her books.

  ‘Hi there,’ said Hazel when she walked in. When Ginny smiled she said, ‘That’s better, we’d had enough of that long face.’

  Ginny put her books on the desk. ‘Sorry about that but I’d been going through a rough patch and I had a lot on my mind.’

  Hazel pulled the pile of books toward her. ‘Good,’ she said. ‘And what are you going to look for today, crime or thriller?’

  ‘I think perhaps something light and easy to read. Nothing to tax the brain. I do enough of that when I’m tussling with my own characters.’

  ‘You might like to try—’