The Silk House : A Novel (2020)

by Nunn, Kayte

  Acknowledgments

  One of the first movies I ever saw was a ghost story where children from the past haunt an old country house. The Amazing Mr Blunden had a lasting effect, both chilling and thrilling me, and lodging firmly in my memory. Perhaps partly because of this, I have long wanted to write a book where past events leak through time to the present day.

  The germ of an idea for this story came from a display in the Victoria & Albert Museum. I’ve made many visits to the museum over the years, particularly when I lived in London, and the costume section is my absolute favourite. On a visit about three years ago, I spotted an extraordinary eighteenth-century silk gown on display and could not drag my eyes away from it. The cream background of the fabric was woven with sprays of flowers and it had a glow that appeared undimmed despite its several hundred years of existence. I took a photo and made a note of the designer, Anna Maria Garthwaite, later discovering that she was a renowned silk designer at a time when men more usually fulfilled that role. I began to imagine how hard it must have been for her to forge her way as a woman in a male-dominated trade.

  I grew up in an English market town, where there is a restored silk merchant’s house, and so revisiting there gave me another thread (ahem) for my story, and I would like to thank Lynda Nunn for her liaison assistance and Ilse Nikolsky of The Merchant’s House, Marlborough for her help with my queries as to life there in the eighteenth century. Marlborough is also home to a highly regarded public school, and I should stress that the school I imagined here bears no relation whatsoever to that one.

  I know that Wiltshire is not alone in being a place where witches were said to practise dark magic in centuries past, but as I researched further, I came upon many instances of women in the county – often poor and elderly, often working as healers and herbalists – accused of witchcraft, blamed when crops failed or illness afflicted the towns and villages. This persecution continued throughout the fifteenth, sixteenth, seventeenth and early eighteenth centuries, and some of the stories of what happened to those women are still well known there today; the story of the Handsel sisters is one of them.

  My interest in the powers of medicinal and poisonous plants led me to imagine what a fabric woven with such plants might look like. It seemed fitting to combine a story about an unusual and powerful length of fabric with notions of herbalism and suspicions of witchcraft.

  Before she died, my mother was a minister in the Church of England for a number of years. She had a special interest in exorcism, and underwent additional training in this area. A natural storyteller, she often had me transfixed by her stories of the power of spirits and the manifested thoughts of the human mind.

  I’m also fascinated by the notion that traumatic events can leave a mark on a place, that the energy can be felt even centuries later, and so I began to imagine an old house haunted by the ghosts of its past, and where characters in the present are able to help put to rest unquiet souls.

  Thanks, as ever, to my patient and encouraging husband, Andy, to my always enthusiastic agent Margaret Connolly, and to everyone at Hachette Australia for their continued support of my work. Special thanks to Alex Craig, for her ability to see the wood from the trees in the first draft she read, and her invaluable suggestions as to how to improve the manuscript, and also to Celine Kelly and Claire de Medici for their keen insight and direction. Thanks also to Becky, for story brainstorming help exactly when I needed it. And finally, there is one person whose opinion of my work matters to me more than anyone else’s: I am so delighted by Rebecca Saunders’ overwhelming enthusiasm for this manuscript, and consider myself incredibly fortunate to have her as my publisher and editor.

  Loved The Silk House?

  READ ON for an extract from Kayte Nunn’s atmospheric and mysterious love story…

  London and Little Embers, Autumn 1951

  It wasn’t their usual destination for a holiday and the timing was hardly ideal. John and Esther Durrant generally took a week in Eastbourne or Brighton in the final week of August, so the far south-west tip of England was an odd choice, even more so considering it was early November. John, however, had been adamant. ‘It’ll do you good,’ he said to his wife, in a tone of false jollity, when he suggested – no, insisted on – the trip. ‘Put some colour back in your cheeks. Sea air.’ Never mind that a bitter cold gripped the nation with the kind of weather that you wouldn’t put the cat out in and Esther couldn’t have felt less like a week away even had she spent the previous year down a coal mine. She also didn’t understand why they were leaving Teddy behind with the nanny, but she couldn’t begin to summon the necessary enthusiasm for an argument.

  Before catching the train south, they dined at a restaurant near Paddington station. Esther wasn’t hungry, but she allowed John to decide for her nonetheless. After a brief perusal of the menu and dispatching their order to the black-clad, white-aproned waitress, he unfurled his Telegraph and spent the time before the arrival of their food absorbed in its pages. Winston Churchill and the Conservative Party had been returned to power she saw, noticing the headline on the front page. John was pleased, although privately she believed Mr Churchill terribly old and probably not up to the job. They didn’t discuss politics anymore, for they saw the world quite differently, she had come to realise.

  Esther managed a little of the soup that arrived in due course, and half a bread roll, while John cleared his dish and several glasses of claret. Then Dover sole and tiny turned vegetables, all of which he ate with gusto while she pushed the peas and batons of carrot around on her plate, pretending to eat. Her husband made no comment.

  Esther declined dessert but John, it appeared, had appetite enough for both of them and polished off a slice of steamed pudding made with precious rationed sugar and a generous dollop of custard. He glanced at his watch. ‘Shall we make our way to the train, my dear?’ he asked, wiping the bristles of his moustache on a starched napkin. She couldn’t help but be reminded of an otter who’d just had a fish supper: sleek, replete and satisfied with himself. He was wearing the dark suit – his favourite – and the tie she’d given him several birthdays ago, when she had been expecting Teddy and the future felt as if it were the merest outline, a sketch, waiting for them to paint it in bold and vivid colours. Something to look forward to, not to fear.

  She nodded and he rose and reached for her hand, helping her to her feet. It was a short walk from the restaurant to the station, but Esther was glad of her thick coat and gloves. She’d not ventured from the house in weeks – the November weather had been simply ghastly – and she shivered as she felt the wind slice through her outer garments and numb the tip of her nose and lips.

  They entered the cavernous terminal and Esther was almost overwhelmed by the bustle and noise, the hissing of the giant steam engines and the raucous cries of porters as they effortlessly manoeuvred unwieldy barrows top-heavy with luggage. It was as if they were part of the opening scene of a play, the moments before the main characters take the stage. She might once have enjoyed the spectacle, found the purposeful activity invigorating, but today she gripped John’s arm as he steered her towards Platform One. ‘We’ll be there in a jiffy,’ he said, reassuring her.

  Everywhere she looked, lapels were splashed with poppies, blood-red against dark suits. A brief frown creased the pale skin of her forehead as it took her a moment to place them. Then she remembered: it would soon be Armistice Day. The terror, uncertainty and deprivations of the recent war were a scarlet tattoo on every Englishman and woman’s breast.

  Eventually, the train was located, tickets checked and they were ushered to their carriage by a porter. She took careful steps along a narrow corridor and they found their cabin: two slim berths made up with crisp cotton sheets and wool blankets the colour of smoke.

  She breathed a quiet sigh of relief that they would not be expected to lie together. In recent months John had taken to sleeping in his dressing room and she was still not ready for him to return to the marital bed. ‘I co
nfess I am rather tired,’ she said, pulling off her gloves. ‘I might settle in.’ She opened a small cupboard, put her hat on the shelf inside and hung her coat on a hook that was conveniently placed underneath.

  ‘I shall take a nightcap in the Lounge Car. That is if you don’t mind, darling,’ John replied.

  He had taken the hint. So much between them went unsaid these days. Esther turned around and inclined her head. ‘Not at all, you go. I shall be perfectly fine here.’

  ‘Very well.’ He left in a hurry, likely in pursuit of a dram or two of single malt.

  She sat heavily on the bed, suddenly too exhausted to do more than kick off her shoes and lie back upon the blankets. She stared up at the roof of the cabin as it curved above her, feeling like a sardine in a tin. It wasn’t unpleasant: if anything, she was cocooned from the activity going on outside and wouldn’t be bothered by it.

  Before long, a whistle sounded and, with a series of sudden jerks, the train began to move away from the station, shuddering as it gathered speed. After a few minutes it settled into a swaying rhythm and Esther’s eyelids grew heavy. She fought to stay awake. Summoning the little determination she still possessed, she rallied and found her night things. It would not do to fall asleep still fully clothed, only to be roused by her husband on his return from the lounge.

  John had asked their daily woman, Mary, to pack for them both, telling Esther that she needn’t lift a finger. Normally she wouldn’t have countenanced anyone else going through her things, but it had been easier not to object, to let them take over, as she had with so much recently. She had, however, added her own essentials to the cardigans, skirts and stockings, and tucked away among her smalls was a small enamelled box that resembled a miniature jewellery case. She found it, flipped the catch and the little red pills inside gleamed at her like gemstones, beckoning. As she fished one out, she noticed her ragged nails and reddened cuticles. A different version of herself would have minded, but she barely gave them a second thought, intent as she was on the contents of the box. Without hesitating, she placed the pill on her tongue, swallowing it dry.

  She put the box in her handbag, drew the window shades and changed quickly, removing her tweed skirt and blouse and placing them in the cupboard with her hat and coat before pulling a fine lawn nightgown over her head. After a brief wash at the tiny corner basin, she dried her face on the towel provided and ran a brush through her hair before tucking herself between the starched sheets like a piece of paper in an envelope. She was lost to sleep hours before John returned.

  On their arrival in Penzance the next morning he escorted her from the train, handling her once more as if she were his mother’s best bone china. She didn’t object, for she knew he meant well. His concern for her would have been touching had she been able to focus her mind on it – or anything else for that matter – for more than a few minutes, but it was as if there were a thick pane of glass, rather like the ones in the train windows, separating her from him, the world and everything in it.

  In Penzance harbour, John engaged a small fishing dinghy – ‘hang the expense’ he had said when Esther looked at him with a question in her eyes. ‘There is a ferry – the Scillonian – but there was a nasty accident last month, she hit the rocks in heavy fog by all accounts, and anyway it doesn’t call at the island we want to reach. I looked into the possibility of a flight – there’s an outfit that flies Dragon Rapides from Land’s End, which could have been awfully thrilling, but they only operate in fine weather.’

  Esther had no idea what a ‘Dragon Rapide’ might be, but thought that a boat was probably the safer option. As he spoke, she glanced upwards. The sky was low and leaden, the grey of a pigeon’s breast, and the air damp with the kind of light mist that softened the edges of things but didn’t soak you, at least not to begin with. She huddled further into her coat, hands deep in her pockets. What on earth were they doing here? The boat looked as though it would scarcely survive a strong breeze. The hull was patched and its paintwork faded; translucent scales flecked its wooden rails and it reeked of fish.

  ‘Shall we embark?’ His face was hopeful.

  Esther did as she was bid and climbed aboard, doing her best to avoid stepping on the purple-red slime that stained the decking. It was definitely the guts of some sea creature or other.

  They huddled on a bench in the dinghy’s small cabin as the captain got them underway. Beneath a pewter sky and afloat an even darker sea, she was reminded of Charon, the ferryman of Hades, transporting newly dead souls across the Acheron and the Styx. The air was undoubtedly fresh here though. Sharply scented. Briny. Far more pleasant than the filmy London fog, which coated your hair, your skin, even your teeth with a fine layer of dirt. It roused her a little from her somnambulant state and she glanced about the cabin, seeing a dirty yellow sou’-wester, a length of oily rope acting as a paperweight on a creased and frayed shipping chart.

  ‘Look!’ John called out as they puttered out of Penzance’s sheltering quay. ‘St Michael’s Mount. Centuries ago the English saw off the Spanish Armada from its battlements. At low tide you can walk across the causeway. Shame we didn’t have time for it.’

  ‘Perhaps on our return?’ she offered, her voice almost drowned out by the roar of the engine and the sound of the water slapping against the hull of the boat.

  John didn’t reply, looking out to sea instead. Had he even heard her?

  ‘Oh look! Kittiwakes.’

  Esther raised her eyes towards the horizon; there were several grey and white gulls wheeling above them, their shrieks rending the air. To the left, a trio of torpedo-shaped birds whipped past. ‘And puffins!’ he cried. The new sights and sounds had invigorated him, while she was already feeling queasy as the dinghy pitched and rolled. She registered their fat cheeks and bright orange bills and was reminded briefly of a portly professor friend of her father’s. She tried but failed to match John’s enthusiasm, pasting what felt like a smile on her face and swallowing hard to prevent herself from retching.

  The captain cheerfully pointed out the site of several shipwrecks but Esther did her best not to pay too much heed to his story of a naval disaster in the early eighteenth century, where more than fifteen hundred sailors lost their lives. ‘One of the worst wrecks in the whole British Isles,’ he said with a kind of proud awe. As he spoke, a lighthouse, tall and glowing white against the grey sky, came into view. It hadn’t done its job then. But then perhaps it had been built afterwards, to prevent such a tragedy happening again.

  They motored on as the rain thickened and soon a curtain of fog erased the horizon completely. Esther’s stomach churned and bile rose in her throat. Even John’s high spirits seemed dampened and they sat, saying nothing, as Esther fumbled in her pocket for a handkerchief and pressed it to her mouth, hoping that she was not going to empty the contents of her stomach onto the decking. She tried not to think about them mingling with the fish guts and salt water that sloshed just beyond the cabin. She gritted her teeth against the spasms of nausea while her insides roiled and twisted as if she had swallowed a serpent.

  The boat pitched and heaved in the rising swell as the waves frothed whitecaps beside them. ‘It’s getting a bit lumpy,’ said the captain with a grin. ‘Thick as a bog out there too.’ John hadn’t mentioned the name of the particular godforsaken speck of land that they were headed for and Esther didn’t have the energy to ask. She tried to think of something else, anything but this purgatory of a voyage, but there were darker shapes in the yawning wasteland of her mind, so she forced herself instead to stare at the varnished walls of the cabin, counting to five hundred and then back again to take her mind off her predicament. She was only vaguely aware now of John next to her and the captain, mere inches away at the helm. Outside, the sea appeared to be at boiling point, white and angry, as if all hell had been let loose, and she gripped a nearby handhold until her fingers lost all feeling. She no longer had any confidence that they would reach their destination. She had ceased caring about
anything very much months ago, so it hardly mattered either way.

  Eventually, however, an island hove into view, and then another, grey smudges on the choppy seascape. Almost as soon as they had appeared they disappeared again into the mist, leaving nothing but the grey chop of the water. The captain’s expression changed from sunny to serious as he concentrated on steering them clear of hidden shoals and shelves. ‘They’d hole a boat if you don’t pay attention. Splinter it like balsa,’ he said, not lifting his eyes from the horizon.

  All at once the wind and rain eased a fraction, the fog lifted, and they puttered alongside a small wooden jetty that stuck out from a sickle curve of bleached-sand beach. Like an arrow lodged in the side of a corpse, Esther imagined.

  The bloated carcass of a sea bird, larger than a gull, but smaller than an albatross, snagged her attention. Death had followed her to the beach. Her thoughts were so dark these days; she couldn’t seem to chase them away. There was, however, some slight relief at having arrived, that the particular nightmare of the journey might soon be ended. For now that would have to be enough. ‘Small mercies,’ she whispered. She tried to be grateful for that.

  The captain made the boat fast, then helped them and their luggage ashore, even as the boat bobbed dangerously up and down next to the jetty, its hull grinding, wood on wood, leaving behind flecks of paint. An ill-judged transfer and they would end up in the water. Esther stepped carefully onto the slippery boards, willing her shaky legs to hold her up.

  Once they were both safely on land, the captain slung several large brown-paper-wrapped parcels after them. ‘Pop them under the shelter and when you get there, let the doc know that these are for him – he can send someone down for them before they get too wet. The house is up thataway. A bit of a walk, mind and none too pleasant in this weather. There’s not many that care to come this far.’