‘Meaning, if anyone’s going to look, it’ll be me.’
‘What’s the betting she’ll come in looking like a little snowman? Or she’s out there making one.’ Allegra lit the cigarette, coughed hard, her hand held to her mouth.
‘Your cough’s getting worse. You need to stop smoking.’
‘It’s a frog in my throat. Don’t fuss.’ Allegra rummaged in the dresser. ‘We ought to dig the camera out.’
‘Do we still have one?’
‘Here,’ Allegra said. ‘And good gracious, it’s even got film in it.’
Meredith was incapable of standing still long enough to have her photograph taken and Allegra refused to pose. As the heroine of her own rose-coloured narrative she expected people to catch her unawares and immortalise her.
No one did.
No one came to Gull House, with or without a camera.
Meredith hurled herself through the door, snow flying around her. ‘It’s like Narnia! It’s so cold out there, I have frostbite! Look at my fingers. They’re purple! Verity, come on! We have to make snow angels.’ Turning on her heel she ran off.
Verity and her mother watched the snowflakes as big as silver moths. This was no ordinary snowfall. It lay like a great white cushion muffling the sound of the sea.
Snow in April: rare and without reason.
They could hear Meredith plodding round to the terrace, laughing as she fell, picking herself up and carrying on.
‘Verity,’ Allegra said, ‘you better get out there before your sister drowns.’
‘I’m going.’ Verity pulled on her coat and a pair of mittens, stood in the doorway pushing her feet into her boots. ‘You should come too, Mam, it’s beautiful.’
Apart from Meredith’s footprints the garden was becalmed in unbroken, glittering drifts. In the centre of the lawn the fountain stood like a snow ghost. Verity stepped into the holes made by Meredith’s feet, following them round the corner of the house to where the stones steps lay buried.
Meredith lay on the ground, arms and legs akimbo, moving them up and down. ‘Help me up, Verity; I want to see my angel.’
Verity grabbed her sister’s hands and hauled her to her feet.
‘Look! Watch me!’ She fell back again, delirious with joy, flapping her arms and legs, climbing out by herself this time, making half a dozen more angels before she collapsed, panting and exhausted.
‘You have to make some now.’
Within no time the entire lawn was covered in snow angels. The two girls raced about in the pure blue-white, calling to one another, their voices lost in the echoing vastness of it.
Verity remembered the camera. She pulled it from the pocket of her coat.
‘Lie in one of the angels, Meredith – I’ll take your picture.’ She took off her mittens and pointed the camera.
Meredith’s teeth were chattering. ‘Did you take it?’
‘Yes, don’t worry, it going to look great.’ Verity had a keen awareness of a memory being made. ‘Come on now, that’s enough – we’re soaked to the skin – we have to go in and dry off before we die of cold.’ She began pulling her sister toward the steps. Meredith grabbed her hand and stopped her.
‘Be careful,’ she said. ‘We mustn’t disturb the angels. I want Angharad to see them.’
Verity stopped. ‘Do you think she comes out here?’
‘I think she’s everywhere. It’s her home. Or at least it was. She loved it here once, like we do. What happened to her might have made her hate it though.’
‘Meri, you can’t know that.’
‘No, but I can guess. In my dream last night I heard crying and I saw the shadow of a bad man. It was her dream too and then I woke up and I was crying as well.’
‘Oh, Meri, you poor thing, that’s awful.’ Verity put her arm around her sister’s shoulder.
‘No it isn’t. It’s just sad. Hearing her is what I’m supposed to do.’
‘Aren’t you even a bit scared?’
‘Of what? A sad ghost? Why would I be? I told you, she needs me. And I’m not frightened of the dark.’
It was true. Meredith was like her grandmother: she wasn’t scared of anything.
‘But a ghost? I’d be terrified.’
Meredith touched her sister’s cold hand. ‘Verity, you’re trembling. And I thought you were the one who never feels the cold.’
Verity thought about the night in the garden and the shadow in the trees.
It wasn’t the cold making her shiver.
Twenty-five
The following morning the world woke again to an unfamiliar light.
In the silent white there was no sky or garden, only snow suspended on the air, icing the windowpanes, erasing the edges, hushing the land.
As much as she loved it, snow in April seemed to Verity like a spell gone awry. She didn’t mind the cold but something about the intensity of the snow made her unsure, as if it was trying to hide something. Around the house, icy puddles reflected a soft grey sky; frozen spikes of grass stood like spears and icicles hung from the eaves.
‘Snow in April is so cool,’ Meredith said.
Verity found her digging out the chickens. They stood in an indignant huddle, fluffed up to twice their normal size.
‘Poor chickies, it won’t last and you’ll be fine.’ Meredith gave them extra grain, swept the roof of the hen house free of snow, found some old blankets in the glory hole to spread over it.
The snow fell and fell in fat calm flakes lying across the garden in dense stretches of silent white, rising and falling in solemn, blue-tinged waves.
Verity and Meredith made so many snow angels there was barely a space left without wings.
Allegra decided it was too much. The wet clothes draped everywhere were steaming the house up. ‘And it’s giving me a headache. It’s so white. How am I supposed to paint white.’
She went to bed and asked for tea. Meredith refused to come indoors, and when Verity took a tray up, Allegra looked taken aback.
‘How nice of you,’ she said. ‘Biscuits too.’
‘I do my best.’
‘Yes,’ Allegra said. ‘I know you do.’
Deciding not to try and unpack any meaning in her mother’s unexpected words, Verity left the room, went in search of Meredith. If she stayed outside any longer she would turn to ice or catch a chill and then there would be trouble.
And it was bound to be her fault.
She found her sister at the lookout tree next to the outline of a single angel. Meredith had written something in the snow.
‘What does it say?’
‘It’s for Angharad.’
‘Only you, Meri.’
‘I don’t suppose the poor thing would have been allowed to play in the snow.’
By late afternoon the sky turned to the colour of ash, heavy with the promise of more snow and it was so cold Allegra panicked, thinking the pipes would freeze.
‘That’s all I need. Oh God, how I hate this house.’
‘No you don’t,’ Meredith said. ‘Don’t say that.’
‘Oh darling, I didn’t mean anything.’
You so did.
She watched Verity cutting bread and Allegra whisking eggs for an omelette.
‘Well don’t joke about it, please.’ She warmed her toes in front of the range. ‘Everything’s fine and dandy and you aren’t allowed to spoil it.’
‘Oh, my little snow goose, I’m sorry. I won’t ever say it again.’
Later, when darkness fell and Meredith had gone to bed, exhausted and happier than she had been for weeks, Verity slipped outside. Something wasn’t right and she found herself thinking about the ghost again. She was still afraid, though she didn’t know why.
There was something odd about this snow-filled night. The garden lay eerily still, transformed and peculiarly beautiful.
It’s like I’m the last person alive in the whole world.
The only sound was the light crunching of her feet in the snow. The power of th
e silence overwhelmed her. Having seen her sister’s face unexpectedly glowing with colour, all notions of dreams and terror banished, at least for a while, Verity had been overcome by a desire to make things normal again.
Fine and dandy…
She couldn’t get the idea of a weird spell out of her head. A girl with her feet on the ground, Verity normally had no truck with spells. Spells were her grandmother’s domain – or silly games her sister played.
It’s her … I can hear her … what if it’s my imagination … what if I’m as mad as Angharad…
‘And what if I try and find out.’
Verity found a spade in the shed and at the entrance to the blue garden, shovelled snow from in front of the gate. She pressed down on the latch and stood as still as could be, holding her breath, willing something to happen. It was time to face her. If Angharad’s ghost was real then Verity wanted to be sure. She wanted to stand up to her, or stop her and make her go away.
If you’re real, then show yourself. Stop bullying my sister and get out of my grandmother’s garden.
Still holding her breath, she heaved open the gate, breathed out and the air billowed in front of her face in a cloud.
Deep in drifts of snow, the garden appeared unearthly. Imagining icy breath on her face she swept her hand across her cheek. From the corner of her eye, Verity caught a movement, a distorted shape as though someone tried to paint on the air and the melting snow made it run and blur.
The night listened.
I don’t believe in ghosts.
Each atom of Verity’s being didn’t want to call what she wasn’t sure she was seeing, a ghost.
‘I don’t believe in ghosts,’ she said into the dark garden. ‘So stop haunting us.’
For a moment she thought it was going to be all right. The vague shape was no longer there and she let out a tight sigh of relief. She closed her eyes for a second and when she opened them, knew she had been mistaken.
It wasn’t a dream. She wasn’t asleep; she was outside in the dark with the cold on her face and the figure was real.
It turned and Verity felt its gaze as if a real person stood in front of her and not a ghost.
Because, oh my life, it’s what you are … a ghost…
Something cold slid down her back and she wanted to blink again because in stories that’s what happened, you blinked and the thing disappeared; only her eyes were stuck open and the apparition was still there.
Are you really Angharad? Are you who my sister keeps hearing?
A whirling mass of snow flew at her, caught the side of her head and for a second she saw a face, white with fury, eyes blazing and as she fell to the ground the world turned black.
She came to, covered in snow, shaky, unsure how much time had passed.
Did I faint?
Getting to her feet she looked around. There was nothing to see, only the shape of the dark night and a smattering of snow caught in the ends of her hair.
He came to my room that night.
Outside the snow lay thick as clouds. In spite of the cold, I had already settled into sleep. The creak of the doorknob woke me, and peering from beneath my bedcovers, I saw him in the dimness of the open doorway. Save for my shallow breathing, the room was silent. I didn’t dare sit up or turn my head.
‘You.’
His voice unnerved me and needing to be on my feet, I slipped out of bed. My robe lay across a chair. I caught his cold eye and found myself rooted to the spot, afraid to move.
I could smell whisky and knew he had been at Papa’s decanter.
‘Look at you, standing there, half naked as a harlot.’
‘What am I meant to wear in bed?’ Shaking, I pointed to where my robe lay.
He took a step forward and I faltered, my nightgown fluttering around me making me more like a ghost than a girl.
‘You have no right to come in here uninvited. What do you want?’
‘I have every right.’ He took a step toward me. ‘And you chose to get out of your bed. Why did you do that?’
‘Why wouldn’t I?’ Puzzled, and in spite of my nervousness, I couldn’t stop myself even though I knew I was probably making things worse.
Like a magician, he summoned my words and turned them on me. ‘Why wouldn’t you?’ He licked his fleshy lips. ‘Of course you would, you are wanton, like all women.’
Only half aware of what he meant, I nevertheless bridled.
‘You are foul, brother, and worse; you are disgusting for thinking such a thing of your own sister.’
He gave no answer, only stared his fish stare, looking at me with such contempt, fear coiled in my stomach. And there was something else; behind his eyes, something I didn’t understand, yet still recognised as a thread of madness.
My voice faltered. ‘It’s not attractive: bullying.’
‘I am no bully! Don’t say that! And it’s your own fault.’ He edged closer and whispered at me, his voice sibilant with menace. ‘Little wanton.’
The whisky on his breath stank. His eyes were dull with drink and he gave a grunt.
‘How am I responsible for this … this hateful behaviour?’
He lurched across the room and to my horror I saw him fumble with his clothing.
The force of his assault paralysed me. It was brutal and in a state of terror I was too small to fend him off.
Afterwards, he laughed although it was more snarl than mirth and my fear turned to abject dread. His eyes narrowed and in them I saw pure evil.
When he spoke, his words struck me like a hissing cat. ‘Don’t imagine this is over. Or that anyone will believe you.’
In an instant, I saw with blinding clarity a probable future.
However naïve I was, however sheltered my life, I wasn’t a total ignoramus. Maids gossiped, even my governess allowed herself the occasional salacious disclosure if only as a warning against any fall from grace I might contemplate.
My mother had told me nothing of sexual matters. She even left the business of my monthly courses to an embarrassed maid. What little I knew about it I’d gleaned from whispers and cautionary tales overheard at doors left ajar: servants gossip concerning girls no better than they ought to be; women of ill-repute, and references to women ‘in trouble’.
If my understanding of bodily functions was rudimentary, I knew enough to understand I was in terrible danger. Innocence would not save me. I knew there were rules and that a terrible fate befell girls who were perceived to have broken them. The kind of rules my parents shaped their life by.
Somehow, with a single, shocking act, without asking for or inviting it, I had become one of those girls.
Above all I recognised that by stepping over the boundary of verbal bullying into the foulness of his assault, my brother now relied on another set of rules, unwritten and yet as ingrained in our society as the evil in his heart.
Sick with disgust and in pain, I watched him adjust his clothing and leave the room.
My arms were drained of strength, I held onto myself as if the act of doing so was the only thing stopping my body from disintegrating.
Before that night, I hadn’t been afraid of the dark. This was a different kind of darkness and it stole my hope. Everything about my life, my room, the house, was tainted.
I smelled my own blood and knew I was tainted.
My hair was a weight threatening to topple me, I wanted to unpeel my skin and step out of it.
Too numb to cry, I crawled under the covers.
I must have slept. When I woke I had no way of knowing what time it was. I listened for the familiar sounds of the house to give me a clue. Save for the ticking of a clock somewhere, it was utterly quiet. Crawling from my bed I drew the drapes and looked out on an altered landscape. More snow surrounded the house. Snow and silence, the austere lines of the garden softened.
My heart beat sharp as a blade. Gazing down at the terrace below my window, I saw a line of animal paw prints in the powdery snow, a fox perhaps or one of the cats an
d I longed to follow them, to disappear.
You cannot walk away from such a degree of horror.
There was a danger to the day; only the light behind the heavy curtains holding it in check. Elsewhere throughout the house, the rattle and clatter of morning began: a door opening, a clock chiming; my father’s voice.
The echo of my brother’s…
Don’t imagine this is over…
The sense of an ordinary day made abominable. A day like no other I had known or expected to ever know.
The maid brought a jug of hot water. Ignoring her greeting, I waited until she left the room. Shaking, I rose from my bed, washed my wounded body as best I could and dressed, still stunned, and with no clear idea of what I ought to do.
Tell someone? Who would I tell? Who would believe me? My mother was a woman wrapped in self-interest; vain and brought up to please men, to be subservient. She would never challenge or gainsay either my father or my brother. Even so, I still harboured a faint notion that she might take pity and help me.
I met her on the dark, unlit landing. She stared and asked, was I sick? Mute with shock my words choked me. My mother’s eyes raked mine, scanned my body and it was as if my shame seeped through my pores, soiling my clothes. I saw her falter before she swallowed whatever words had formed in her head. Her face was unreadable and yet every line on it spoke a hideous truth.
There was no doubt in my mind; the lie would be mine.
I made my escape, grateful for only one thing; for a day at least, as if by some unspoken agreement, she set me no tasks.
My father had always treated me as if I were a nonentity. My mother I believe had a fear of how alive I was; she would do everything she could to supress this.
As for him – my depraved brother – hehad always been a stranger to me, now he became the coldest kindof threat.My sly, unclever brother who at school I believe must have been bullied, at home turned into the worst kind of abuser. A boy who pulled the wings off butterflies had grown into a man who tore mine from my body.
I am a ghost and I am not mad. I am a thing made from grief, treachery and a terrible secret.
Ask the birds, child… The birds know everything.
Snow Sisters Page 13