The Wayward Girls

by Amanda Mason

  ‘Like this?’ Her fingers, slick with juice, slipped and she narrowly missed gouging a hole in her finger.

  ‘Nearly,’ said Simon. ‘Just put it down on the table and I’ll help you core it.’

  Bee was hovering close by. ‘Do they take long to cook?’ she asked.

  ‘Half an hour or so.’

  Behind them the kitchen window slammed shut.

  ‘Bianca,’ said Cathy automatically.

  ‘I didn’t touch it,’ said Bee, slipping into Simon’s seat as he stood and opened the window. She picked up an apple and bit into it.

  ‘You can’t eat that, it’s sour,’ said Loo.

  ‘Watch me,’ said Bee.

  They sat in the kitchen, the four adults and the older children crammed around the table, eating ham salad as the oven belched out heat and the scent of sweet cinnamon. The little ones, Flor and Anto, sat on the rag rug, Anto chewing on a soggy crust of bread.

  As they ate the grown-ups talked about art and books and music and Cathy began to relax. It was, Loo thought, like it used to be back in Leeds when Joe and Cathy would have their friends round. Simon fetched the apples from the oven and he and Loo served them in a variety of mismatched bowls, each scorched and sagging apple topped with a dollop of runny ice cream.

  ‘Do you like it?’ Loo asked, as she solemnly handed each bowl out around the table, her hands sticky with vanilla and brown sugar.

  ‘Delicious,’ said Michael, scraping his spoon around the bowl.

  After dinner, they went out into the garden. Bee and Loo and Cathy carried out blankets and old quilts and cushions and the adults sat quietly under the tree as the children, even Dan for a short while, lay down on the quilts and looked up into the darkening sky, waiting for the stars to come out.

  ‘Look,’ said Bee, pulling her skirt back to reveal a bruise, a dark purple ellipse on the inside of her knee.

  ‘What have you done to yourself now?’ said Cathy.

  ‘I didn’t do anything. I just woke up today and it was there.’

  Loo shifted along the quilt, drawing up her legs, as if she was trying to get away from Bee, from all of them. She had bruises too, Simon noticed, tiny brown fingerprints scattered along her arms. He wondered if the professor had noticed. Maybe they should get Issy to take some pictures later.

  ‘Why are you leaving?’ asked Bee.

  ‘Well, we have to leave at some point,’ said Simon, who had grown used, over the weeks, to Bee’s abrupt manner, her habit of ignoring the cues and prompts of polite conversation. He’d found it irritating at first, childish. Now he almost admired it.

  ‘Why?’

  ‘We have notes to go over, reports to write,’ said Michael.

  ‘About us?’

  ‘Yes.’

  ‘You could do that here. We could help,’ said Loo.

  The professor smiled and said that was a kind offer.

  ‘We should leave you alone,’ said Simon. ‘Let you get back to normal. Joe will be back soon, won’t he?’

  ‘End of the month,’ said Cathy.

  ‘See?’ said Simon. ‘There’d be no room for us.’

  ‘Will you come back?’ asked Bee. ‘Will you come and see us again?’

  ‘Yes,’ said Michael, ‘if your mother and father don’t mind.’

  Dan went up after an hour or so. Even in the garden they could hear the distant thump thump thump of his music. Then Cathy stood and picked up Anto. ‘Come on,’ she said, holding her hand out to Flor, ‘bedtime.’

  ‘Don’t want to.’ Florian folded his arms and stuck out his lower lip, a parody of a sulky child.

  ‘Florian.’ Cathy waited a moment or two then he stood and took her hand. ‘One more hour, you two,’ she said as they walked towards the house.

  ‘God,’ said Bee, kicking her long legs up at the sky. Cathy had got very keen on bedtimes ever since Michael and Simon had arrived. As if she had something to prove.

  It took Cathy longer than an hour to settle Flor and the baby. When she came back outside, she found Bee and Loo still sitting under the tree with Isobel. Bee was holding one of Issy’s cameras and was looking through the lens.

  ‘Can I take some photos?’ she said, swinging around to face her mother.

  ‘It’s too dark,’ said Isobel, reaching over and taking the camera back.

  ‘Bedtime,’ said Cathy.

  ‘I’m too old for bedtime,’ said Bee, looking at Loo who was already scrambling obediently to her feet.

  ‘Both of you,’ said her mother.

  Bee sat down on the quilt, crossing her legs and her arms. She looked just like Florian. Cathy glanced over at Michael and Simon; both men were watching quietly.

  ‘Bianca, please.’

  ‘I don’t want to. I don’t want to go up there.’ Somewhere inside the house a door banged and Bee turned to look at Simon. ‘I’m frightened,’ she said. He glanced at the professor, surprised at her tone of voice, that she should single him out to back her up.

  ‘There’s nothing to be afraid of,’ he said.

  ‘There is. It won’t let us sleep.’

  ‘Really?’ Michael reached into his bag for his notebook. ‘What makes you think that?’

  ‘It won’t leave us alone.’

  ‘Bianca, stop making a fuss,’ said Cathy. ‘You’re spoiling a perfectly pleasant evening.’

  ‘It’s not me! It’s not my fault.’ Bee’s voice rose into the air, jagged, threatening. ‘Tell them, Loo.’

  Loo was edging closer to her mother, she looked as though she might burst into tears at any second. ‘It’s too noisy,’ she said. ‘We don’t like it. We want it to stop.’

  ‘Well, what if we stayed?’ Michael said. ‘What if we stayed until you both fell asleep?’

  It took them another half hour to persuade Bee and Loo to go to bed. They agreed that Cathy would sleep with her door open, and Simon and Michael would sit on the landing with one of their machines, the EMF monitor, which measured changes in the air, and a tape recorder. Isobel would stay for a little while, she said, but she had to be at work in the morning. Satisfied with this arrangement, Bee followed her mother and sister through the kitchen and up the stairs, Michael, Simon and Issy trooping obediently behind.

  They probably wouldn’t have bothered washing their faces or brushing their teeth if Michael and Simon hadn’t been there. Issy too, always hanging back, snapping her photos. But because they were, they did, squashing themselves into the little bathroom, taking turns to pee and to use the sink. Bee liked having her picture taken, Loo knew, but she didn’t really like Isobel doing it. Something about Isobel made her angry.

  ‘Are you two done?’ Cathy rattled the door handle.

  ‘Nearly,’ said Bee, looking at her reflection in the mirror, pulling at the neckline of her fading cotton nightie.

  The bedroom was quiet. For once everything had been left in place. The little bits of makeup Bee had managed to acquire were clumped together on the dressing table. Cathy had picked up the girls’ clothes and hung them in the wardrobe. Someone had lit a candle and placed it on the window sill.

  ‘Right.’ Cathy bent down to kiss Loo. As she did, Bee hauled herself into the top bunk and rolled onto her side in one swift movement, facing the wall, out of reach. ‘Goodnight, then.’ Cathy looked around the room. It was dusty and a couple of Loo’s posters were starting to come loose. It smelt of stale bedding and cheap perfume and it was hot despite the open window.

  Loo picked up a book from a pile on the floor and got into bed. ‘Goodnight,’ she said.

  Cathy closed the door behind her, shutting them in.

  When the noises started, the first thing Michael did was make a note of the time and the position of everyone in the house. He, Simon and Isobel were on the first-floor landing, the Corvino family were all in their respective bedrooms.

  It was a random series of thuds and bangs at first, erratic and arrhythmic. Then one of the girls, possibly Bee, called out, sounding sleepy and bad-temp
ered.

  ‘Shut up!’

  Then silence. Michael stayed in position, sitting on the top stair, hunched over his notes.

  Behind the door something heavy rumbled across the room and the banging in the walls started up again.

  Dan’s voice drifted down from the attic. ‘Will you bloody well stop it?’ He slammed his door shut. At the same time, Cathy came out onto the landing, barefoot and fastening her dressing gown, an old-fashioned, oversized man’s one, pulling the collar close at her throat, as if she were cold.

  ‘Cathy? Mum?’ In his room Flor sounded uncertain, on the brink of crying, and Simon could see Cathy was torn; she couldn’t decide which child she should go to first. Flor called out again, properly awake now, clearly frightened. ‘Mum.’

  ‘It’s OK,’ Simon said. ‘Get Flor, we can manage here.’

  Cathy brushed past him and went into Florian’s room. Simon could hear her murmuring soft, comforting words as the faint orange light from his bedside lamp pooled out onto the dim landing.

  Above them, Dan’s door opened and he padded downstairs, barefoot, bad-tempered. ‘I’ve got work in the morning,’ he said. ‘Aren’t you going to do something about that?’

  Michael stood up and went to the girls’ door. The knocking was so loud he’d later swear he saw the wood in the frame bulge. Behind him Simon was holding their tape recorder and a microphone. Slightly to one side, Isobel stood with her camera ready. ‘We should go in,’ Issy said, ‘shouldn’t we?’

  ‘Not yet.’

  Inside the room the knocking was building in a rattling, shaking crescendo, as if something was pulling at the bunk beds and then smacking them against the wall, harder and harder, intent on shaking the girls awake, on waking the whole house. Simon could feel it, the energy pulsing through the walls – the air was live with it. It was – enraged.

  Something landed heavily on the floor and Loo’s voice cut through the sudden silence that followed, rising unsteadily, out of control. ‘I don’t like it. Stop it. Stop it. Stop it!’

  Michael threw the door open and stepped into the room, Simon close behind him. Loo was curled up on the floor inside the overturned bunk beds, her arms wrapped around her head, crying softly.

  ‘I don’t like it, I don’t like it.’

  Bee lay on the floor underneath the window, in a tangle of sheets as if she’d been scooped out of her bed and dropped into place from on high. She was breathless, exhilarated, triumphant. She looked at Michael and Simon each in turn and then directly into Isobel’s camera, daring her to look away. Feathers from a torn pillow drifted dreamily down onto the upturned mattresses and scattered bedding.

  ‘Did you see that?’ said Bee. ‘It lifted me up. It lifted me right up and floated me across the room.’

  Michael took another step closer. ‘Who did? Bee, who lifted you up?’ he asked.

  Me.

  The voice was low, hoarse, uncanny.

  Me.

  Me.

  Me.

  14

  Now

  Hal waits until they’re approaching the outskirts of town before he speaks. ‘I borrowed your book,’ he says.

  Nina is next to him in the passenger seat. Lewis is crammed in with their bags in the back.

  ‘I was reading about them, about their investigation, Michael and your dad.’

  ‘We agreed you didn’t need to know too much background,’ says Nina. ‘You agreed.’

  ‘Yeah, well. I’ve changed my mind.’ The young mother in the book, so sad, so old now. The way Lucy seems so anxious, rattled. She can hardly bear to look at any of them. The whole situation bothers him in ways he can’t fully express. It doesn’t feel right. ‘It’s not just a story to them, it’s not a case; it’s their lives,’ he says. And the farm, the house, he wants to say, that doesn’t feel right either.

  ‘Well, we know that,’ Nina says. ‘That’s why we want them involved.’

  ‘The trouble with the original investigation was that it was incomplete,’ Lewis says. ‘After Michael Warren died, after the family left the farm, they never had the chance to reproduce their results.’

  ‘But we can,’ says Nina. ‘We are. This is an incredible opportunity.’

  ‘Don’t you think it’s making life a bit … difficult for them?’ says Hal.

  ‘You heard Cathy, she’s perfectly happy to help,’ says Nina. ‘It’s Lucy who’s being difficult.’

  ‘Well, maybe if you slowed down a bit – maybe if you listened.’

  Nina shifts around in her seat to look at him. ‘Whose side are you on?’ she asks.

  ‘It’s not a matter of sides,’ Lewis says.

  ‘I just think,’ says Hal, ‘that it wouldn’t kill you to be a bit more sensitive.’

  ‘Really?’ Nina looks out of the window. ‘Well, thanks for the feedback, Hal. I’ll bear it in mind.’

  They drive past the last few houses that look out over the bay, then turn inland towards the moors. ‘And what was the deal about the sister?’ Hal asks. ‘What went on there?’

  ‘You’ve got the book,’ says Nina. ‘Look it up.’

  They drive on in silence for a while. The drizzle turns to rain and Hal switches on the windscreen wipers. ‘I have a shoot this week,’ he says.

  ‘But you’re free at the weekend?’ says Lewis.

  ‘I’m not sure. I’ll have to see how things go. I’ve got other commitments, you know?’

  ‘Sure,’ says Nina, leaning back and closing her eyes. She’s not about to give up now, even if she has to go back with no camera, no technical backup. ‘Whatever.’

  It’s getting dark, it’s been one of those gloomy October days that never seems to get light, and Cathy switches on her bedside lamp. They have been talking in circles for over an hour now.

  She opens the sketchbook again, pressing the pages back, frowning. ‘But it’s her, yes? It’s the same girl, Lucia. The girl in their film is the girl I saw.’

  ‘Only it can’t be, can it?’ says Lucy. ‘That’s just – it’s ridiculous.’ If only she could get her mother to slow down, to see that she’s making connections where none exist, that she’s creating a story from little more than wishful thinking.

  ‘Why did I see her? The girl? Why did they see her?’ Cathy’s voice rises then breaks. Lucy hopes she won’t cry; she couldn’t bear that. ‘How can she be there and here too?’

  ‘She’s not real.’

  It’s not the same girl, Lucy wants to say. It can’t be.

  And outside, the marble in the grass, the marble in her pocket, that’s just … a coincidence.

  ‘I want to go,’ says Cathy. ‘I want to see.’

  ‘You can’t go back, Mum. You said it yourself, you’re not well.’

  ‘I need to know, Lucia,’ says Cathy, pale, agitated, determined. ‘I need to understand what happened. Don’t you?’

  Lucy makes the phone call once she’s sure Cathy is settled in her room, feet up with a book and a cup of tea.

  ‘Look, I’ll do what I can from here,’ she says. ‘I can stay on top of the paperwork and brief the team, but I can’t leave my mother right now.’

  ‘Oh, God, Lucy, I’m so sorry.’ Eloise sounds genuinely upset and for a moment Lucy feels guilty. She’s hinted that Cathy is ill, properly ill. But then, she thinks, what else was she supposed to say?

  I think my mother is haunted.

  She bites the inside of her mouth. The thought of returning to the farm makes her feel sick. She can’t possibly do it, but she certainly can’t let Cathy go either. Round and round she goes, convinced this is absolutely the wrong thing to do, but unable to find a way out.

  ‘Do you know how long you’ll be staying?’ asks Eloise.

  This is a big project, it’s her project, a retrospective of the work of women artists the gallery has shown over the past half century. She’s been working on this for two years on top of all her other responsibilities and she’s about to hand it over to her assistant, her team. She feels tears pr
icking her eyes. If she lets this go now, she will never get it back. ‘I’m not sure,’ she says, pulling the marble from her pocket, rolling it between her thumb and forefinger, letting it catch the light. ‘Certainly a week, possibly longer.’

  The silence at the other end of the line says everything. Lucy can feel it falling away: everything she’s worked for, the exhibition, the life she has so carefully constructed. ‘I’ll email you my diary and copy you in to all my correspondence from now on, OK?’

  That night Lucy waits until her mother announces that she’s tired, then she goes down to the kitchen, giving her some privacy as she heats up some milk and scavenges some biscuits. When she takes the tray back upstairs, she finds Cathy sitting up in bed, childlike, smelling of soap and skin lotion.

  ‘You shouldn’t have bothered,’ she says as Lucy hands her a mug.

  ‘It’s no bother.’

  Cathy blows across the top of the mug and then takes a cautious sip. Lucy takes her own drink and sits at the foot of the bed.

  ‘I rang Eloise, at the gallery,’ she says, ‘to let her know I’m staying on for a while. I spoke to Dan too.’

  That had been yet another circular conversation, with neither of them able to arrive at a satisfactory solution.

  I’ll deal with her, Loo. Leave her to me.

  As if he could succeed where she had failed.

  ‘Yes,’ says Cathy. ‘He sent me a message. I said I’d ring him tomorrow.’

  ‘I’ll speak to Nina in the morning,’ Lucy says. ‘Make some arrangements.’

  ‘So, you’ll go back?’ asks Cathy. ‘You’ll go and see?’

  ‘Yes,’ says Lucy. ‘Yes. If you want me to. Just me, though. You are going to stay here and look after yourself.’

  ‘I’m not a—’

  ‘I know. But please, Mum. Just finish your milk and go to sleep. Let me worry about everything else.’

  And for once Cathy does as she’s asked.

  15

  Now

  Once the presence had made itself known, the investigation took on an urgent quality. After all, for it, her, to speak with the living after so many years, surely that meant there was a message to communicate; that this was literally, a matter of life and death.