The Dead of Winter

by Chris Priestley

  Charlotte joined me for breakfast. Our conversation was no less stilted than it had been the previous evening, but she did seem in better spirits. She encouraged me to roam where I wanted in the house, so long as I did not disturb Sir Stephen by going to his study in the tower. I had no desire whatsoever to do that, so it was hardly an issue.

  ‘Come along, I want to show you something,’ said Charlotte when we had finished. With that she linked her arm through mine and led me through the hall and then a number of rooms until she opened one of two very tall doors to reveal an enormous library.

  ‘This is my favourite room in the house, Michael,’ said Charlotte. ‘I have loved it ever since I was a little girl.’

  As we moved through the room, she brushed the shelves and the books they held with her hand, gently, as though they were the flanks of beloved horses.

  ‘My father was not one for great shows of affection,’ she said, ‘but he did indulge my mother’s love of books. It was she who built up this library. It is her memorial.’

  Charlotte turned to me and smiled, sensitive perhaps to the effect this talk of her mother might have on me, but it did not make me sad. If anything it lightened my heart to think that we shared some fellow feeling on this subject.

  ‘I will leave you now, Michael,’ she said. ‘Enjoy the books.’

  I was touched that Charlotte trusted me to be left alone in the library among those treasured books and, eager not to lose that trust, I stood a while in awe of the place, not quite daring to actually handle any of its works.

  The library contained more books than I think I had ever seen in one place. I had discovered my enjoyment of reading during my mother’s illness. Before that I had never really understood the appeal – or indeed the purpose – of reading for pleasure, but I now found that I could spend hours with no other diversion than the solitary exercise of reading a book, and by the vehicle of those pages would be transported to faraway lands on fantastic adventures. More and more this love of reading had become a medicine and tonic for my troubled heart and mind.

  But the library at Hawton Mere made few concessions to the interests of children. I did spend some time looking through a beautifully illustrated book about birds, but I soon tired of atlases and encyclopaedias and left the library in search of something else to keep me amused.

  Hawton Mere was an ancient house and so did not have the layout of a normal dwelling. The rooms followed on one from another in a vast wheel, each room much as the last, filled with great gloomy beasts of furniture. Some squatted in corners, some reared up against dark wood panelling and walls papered in dizzying patterns of deepest red and green and blue.

  Dour faces stared down at me from filigreed picture frames, and trophy stag heads fixed me with their dead eyes. Stuffed birds perched warily under dusty glass domes.

  The more I walked the circuit of the house, the more uneasy I became. I began to have a sensation of walking a maze, turning corner after corner, not knowing what it was I was going to find at each turn. Then, returning to the hall, I found Clarence the wolfhound standing in front of me and my heart skipped a beat.

  ‘Don’t mind Clarence,’ said Hodges, walking in through the door with a basket of logs. ‘He won’t hurt you. Go and say hello to Master Michael, you silly dog.’

  With that, Clarence loped forward and nudged my hand until I stroked his head. The great beast’s tail began to wag and I looked up to see Hodges with a grin on his face.

  ‘He likes you, sir,’ he said.

  ‘Does he?’ I asked.

  ‘Oh yes,’ said Hodges. ‘Bit the hand off the last boy who tried to stroke him.’

  Hodges laughed at the look of horror that must have appeared on my face.

  ‘I’m only joking, sir,’ he said with a chuckle. ‘Clarence wouldn’t hurt a fly.’

  I wasn’t entirely convinced of Clarence’s gentle nature, but I was sure he meant me no harm. He was evidently not allowed beyond the hall, however, because he stopped at the door as I continued my travels, whimpering a little at being left behind, until Hodges called him into the courtyard.

  I continued my explorations. The house now seemed deserted and a curious expectant hush had descended, like that in the moment before a clap of thunder. From every wall and every mantelpiece a clock was ticking, and this ticking deepened and synchronised until it became the hammering I had heard before. Every reflective surface in the house appeared to tremble at its beat. How could I be the only one who heard it?

  I moved from room to room, retracing my steps in a circuit of the house, searching for the source. Once again I stood at the top of the stairs leading down to the priest hole.

  I had not appreciated it before, but the stone steps led down into the walls themselves, creating a passageway bored into a hidden place beneath the skin of the house.

  I was determined to know what was making that noise and that determination was enough to overcome my sense of unease and allow my feet to move down the steps.

  The banging was definitely louder now and there could be no doubt about it. Someone was inside that place. Whatever Jerwood said about there being no other entrance, someone was banging on the inside of that panel, desperately trying to get out.

  I rushed to the panel and pushed, but it wouldn’t move. I searched for some kind of lock, but there didn’t seem to be one. I pushed again and this time the panel opened inwards with such sudden ease that I tumbled forward.

  There was actually quite a drop and the shock of falling in and the pain of landing, combined with the impenetrable darkness, utterly disorientated me.

  Then something moved. I didn’t see it, as the feeble light coming in from the open panel illuminated nothing.

  ‘Hello?’ I said, my voice sounding frail and feeble. ‘Is there someone there?’

  All at once I knew that I had to get out of that place. Whatever it was in there with me, it was not right; it was not right at all. I could sense it readying itself to move, to pounce.

  I turned and sprang for the open panel, but the thing in there was quicker. I felt – no, sensed – it brush past me at speed, hurling itself at the hole. I saw a shadow pass in front of me and the panel door was slammed shut.

  Blackness. Utter blackness. I leapt at the place where the light had been, clawing at the panel with my fingernails, but it seemed sealed shut once more. I was trapped!

  The panel would not budge. I banged and shouted, but there was no response. I listened, my ear pressed against the wood, but the only sound was my own gasping breath. I banged again and called out. The blackness was so thick it felt as though I were breathing it in and choking on it. I felt as though I were drowning in ink.

  I pounded on the back of the door until my fist hurt, and I began to wonder if all noise was so effectively smothered by those thick walls that no one would ever hear the blows, just as no one was going to hear the oaths and curses I bellowed.

  I slumped down, drained by my exertions at the door. I was in no danger, I told myself. Surely I would be missed before too long and, though it was a big house, there were only so many places I could be. I must not panic.

  But however calmly I talked to myself, that place was too foul to allow such efforts to slow my galloping heartbeat. With my sight denied by darkness, all my other senses seemed honed to a new sharpness. Something reached out towards me, I was sure of it – so sure I raised my arm to fend it off, but of course felt nothing there.

  But feeling nothing did not soothe my spirits. No sooner had I lowered my arm than I was just as convinced that something was crawling towards me. I kicked out with my feet; again, I felt only the dank air about me.

  These were phantasms of the mind, I told myself, nothing more, nothing more. They could not hurt me. They were not real. And yet with every passing second I became surer that there was more than my mere imagination at work in that place. There was something there. Something vile and terrible: a darkness made physical.

  I hammered at the panel again
, my blows becoming both more desperate and more exhausting. I could not even see my own fists pounding in front of my face, but they throbbed with pain. A deeper blackness within that foul gloom was congealing at my back, its cold and terrible presence chilling my blood. At any moment I felt that it would overwhelm me and smother me in its pitiless embrace. I yelled out with all the force my choking lungs could muster.

  Suddenly the panel opened. Light from the passageway that had once seemed so dull and feeble now shone in like a dazzling sunburst.

  I scrabbled out as if I had the hounds of hell biting at my feet and leapt across to the other side of the passageway, my whole body shaking with fear. Big arms enfolded me and a kindly voice comforted me. It was Hodges.

  ‘Master Michael,’ he said. ‘What on earth were you doing in there, sir?’

  I tried to reply, but my mouth was unable to shape the words. I looked up and was startled to see a figure standing in the doorway at the top of the steps who, to my slowly adjusting eyes, was little more than a silhouette. As I blinked and tried to make out who he was, he shrank back, covering his face, pressing himself into the wall, whimpering, looking from me to the priest hole and then back to me. To my astonishment he began to scream.

  Hodges left my side and moved towards him as Charlotte swept into view, her face pale and confused as she tried to understand what was happening. It was only when she embraced the screaming figure that I realised it was Sir Stephen.

  I began to try to speak but the sound of my voice seemed only to intensify his mania and he renewed his terrible shrieking with increased vigour, shielding his face with his arms, staring out between them like a madman. Hodges bade me be still and Charlotte took Sir Stephen away.

  ‘Take Michael to the morning room and wait for me there,’ she said as she left.

  ‘Yes, ma’am,’ said Hodges.

  I took one last look at my terrified guardian, whose face I could just make out over Charlotte’s shoulder, and then followed Hodges. The screaming rang out along the passageway, following me along, but by the time I reached the staircase it had calmed.

  I stood in the morning room with Hodges, not knowing what to do. The door to the hall was open. Other servants went to and fro about their business, glancing at me as they did so, looking up at the stairs and in the direction of the earlier screams. A large portrait hung above the fireplace showing a stout, square-jawed man. He scowled down at us, as though ready to box our ears for the impertinence of looking at him.

  ‘Sir Stephen’s father,’ said Hodges, following my gaze.

  I marvelled at how different he was from his children. They had clearly inherited their fine features and delicate frames from their mother. I could see nothing of this brutish man in them at all. Within a few moments Charlotte came down.

  ‘What were you doing there?’ she said quietly as she entered the room, closing the door behind her.

  ‘I meant no harm,’ I said. ‘I heard …’ But I remembered what Jerwood had said and thought better of saying what I had heard. ‘I was exploring the house, ma’am.’

  She smiled and half closed her brilliant blue eyes.

  ‘Charlotte,’ she corrected. ‘Sir Stephen is not well, Michael.’

  ‘I’m sorry if –’

  She held a finger to her lips to signal silence.

  ‘You were not to know,’ she said. ‘You are a child and children are inquisitive and irresponsible.’

  She said these words without a trace of admonishment. She smiled sweetly as if she were merely stating the obvious, and I could think of naught to do but nod at my own inquisitiveness and irresponsibility.

  ‘I can see that you are shocked at my brother’s appearance, but Sir Stephen’s health is precarious. Please do not think badly of him, but please understand that he must not be excited in that way.’

  ‘I’m sorry,’ I repeated, unable to think of anything else to say.

  ‘I know you are,’ said Charlotte kindly. ‘It must be very difficult for you. You have been through so much yourself of late. But I must get back to Sir Stephen. He will sleep now, but he will want me to be there when he wakes. We will talk later, Michael.’

  Charlotte turned and swished away, her dress slithering across the marble floor. I watched her climb the stairs and then turned to Hodges standing beside me.

  ‘Come along, Master Michael,’ he said, patting me on the arm. ‘Come and sit with me in the kitchen for a bit, eh? Mr Jerwood asked me to take special care of you while he was away and that’s what I intend to do.’

  Chapter Nine

  I followed Hodges into the kitchen, the hot air hitting us in the face as we walked through the door. The kitchen was a different world compared to the chilly gloom of the rest of Hawton Mere: the fire glowed like a setting sun and painted every surface with its golden light.

  Servants shared jokes and sang and whistled as they worked. They had created a sanctuary here and I fancied that if I could stay there for the whole of my sojourn at Hawton Mere, then things would not be so very bad. But I knew, just as Hodges knew, that Sir Stephen and Charlotte would never permit such a thing. I was to be a gentleman now. I could not be allowed to live among servants.

  Besides, the servants were too busy to spend time with me. For all his promise to pay special attention to me, Hodges had his duties to perform, which were many and allowed him little time to sit and keep me company. In no time at all I felt as though I was simply in the way and left the kitchen unnoticed.

  It was not until I crossed the bridge and left the confines of the shadowy courtyard that I felt the welcome heat of sunlight on my face. But sunshine did not lift the mood of Hawton Mere or the marsh that spread about it. The effect of those great, thick, high walls was still one of overwhelming gravity and gloom, but I found that at least by daylight – and from the outside – it held no special dread for me.

  The sun shone out of a pale and dazzling blue sky and I had to squint into the brightness of the day, my eyes having become too accustomed to the dinginess of the house. The frosted marshes twinkled as though scattered with diamonds and sapphires. For the first time I was awake to the possibility that this landscape could be thought beautiful.

  The air was clear and the horizon line was as sharply focused as the edge of the moat. I could see for miles. And this seeing for miles gave me the curious sensation of being on show. For though I was alone, the fact that I seemed to be the only living thing out in the open made me feel like a specimen on a dish.

  Just as I thought this, I sensed something rushing towards me through the marsh. I heard a whispering gathering strength behind me, but when I turned there was nothing there. Again the whispering at my back, as if something were running towards me through long grass, but again on turning round I saw nothing. Nothing.

  I stood in silent bafflement. And the silence was now absolute and just as disturbing in its way as the whispering had been, for it was as though I had become deaf in that instant.

  Then I saw movement from the corner of my eye. Blurred movement. White. Something white moving by the house. It flew – no, fell. I turned and whatever it was had gone, although the echo of it was still there in my mind’s eye, clinging like a dream on waking.

  I ran in that direction. It was the area of the moat under a lichen-covered stone balcony. Had something fallen from that balcony? Had someone fallen into the moat? I skidded to a halt, staring at the ice.

  There was nothing there. Nothing troubled the frozen surface, nor had anything fallen through: the ice lay unbroken all about. Neither had there been a sound of any kind.

  Could Jerwood be right after all? Could I really have imagined the woman that night? Grief can damage a mind, he had said. Had grief damaged mine? I suddenly felt less sure of things.

  I wandered back to the house in something of a daze. I was about to climb the stairs to investigate which of the upstairs rooms it was that had that balcony when Sir Stephen emerged from the shadows. He must have been standing in front of t
he mirror he said had held so much terror for him as a child. By the expression on his face, it was not without its terrors now.

  ‘Michael,’ he said.

  His face seemed thinner, if such a thing were possible, his body tense, as though waiting for an explosion. The memory of him screaming like a madman came back and I flinched from him.

  ‘Sir?’ I answered.

  ‘I wanted to talk to you about this morning,’ he said.

  ‘I’m sorry, sir.’ I paused on the steps. His whole body seemed arched towards me as if he were about to pounce. I could not help but back away. ‘I had not meant to … I only heard a noise and …’

  He strode over to me so swiftly that I involuntarily recoiled, tripping over in the process.

  ‘You heard a noise?’ he said. ‘A noise? What noise?’

  Each repetition of these words was spoken at increasing volume as he loomed over me, his pale, skeletal fingers clutching at the air between us.

  ‘Stephen!’ called a voice behind him. It was Charlotte.

  Sir Stephen did not move at first. I had assumed he was angry with me, for some unexplained reason, but his expression was not one of anger. Rather it was one of crazed inquisitiveness. He continued to look at me, his face only inches from mine, searching – or appearing to search – for something. But what?

  ‘Stephen,’ said Charlotte again, ‘you are frightening your guest. I think we have all had a little too much excitement for one day.’

  Sir Stephen blinked, his eyes losing their manic sparkle by degrees. His fingers flexed in front of my face and he stepped back, putting his hand to his temple and straightening himself. I stayed pinned against the panelling on the staircase, happy to keep as much distance between us as possible. Clarence trotted up the stairs to stand beside me, looking at Sir Stephen warily as though he did not know him.

  ‘I … I … must apologise, Michael,’ said Sir Stephen, without looking at me. ‘Forgive me.’