Gerri smiled. “It’s hardest in the first few months. Then, just about when you think you’ll go mad with it all, everything falls into place. You’ll see.”
“I hope you’re right. My mum really needs this to work. We both do.”
“Marlborough’s a friendly place. And it is popular for day trips and a bit of shopping. If you’re going to stock such gorgeous stuff I’m sure you’ll do well.”
“Thanks for the tip about where to get my wing mirror fixed, by the way. Liam’s finding me a replacement.” She unwrapped another plate as she spoke but was still able to catch Gerri’s raised eyebrow at the mention of the young mechanic.
“I expect he was only too pleased to help you,” she said.
Xanthe had a feeling there was more her new neighbor would have said on the subject, judging by her smile and her sudden apparent interest. She wondered if Liam was known for being a bit of a charmer, perhaps. Or was it that Gerri herself was keen on him? It was hard to tell. Xanthe decided to steer the conversation back onto less problematic ground. She pulled out the last piece from the box, stripping it of its wrapping with a flourish.
“How about this?” she asked.
Gerri gasped. “You’ve got the matching teapot! Oh, it’s divine. And now I have to have it. And I really shouldn’t. But I can’t resist!” she laughed, taking the teapot and gazing at it lovingly.
Xanthe thought about telling her she could pay in cake but stopped herself. They needed cash. Urgently.
“I can do you a good price for the whole set,” Xanthe said. “It’s incomplete, so it won’t be mad money. And, seeing as we’re neighbors…”
Gerri laughed again. “See? You’re a natural businesswoman! You’re not even open yet and you’ve made your first sale.”
They agreed on a price and chatted easily while repacking the china. Xanthe felt some of the anxiety that had been plaguing her lessen a fraction in Gerri’s company. It was cheering to think she had found a potential friend so nearby. When one of the more reliable clocks chimed the hour Gerri gasped, declaring herself late for collecting her children from their grandmother, and hurried away. Xanthe went to see how Flora was faring with the repairs and restoration jobs and found that she had all but disappeared behind a stack of small cupboards, occasional tables, umbrella stands, and assorted bric-a-brac.
“It’s not all rubbish,” Flora insisted, quite bright-eyed from the fun of delving into those unknown pieces. Then, noticing how tired her daughter looked, she declared work over for the day and decided they had both earned a drink at the pub.
“Oh, I don’t know, Mum.…”
“Come on. I need beer to wash away the taste of dust. And anyway, think of it as PR—we need to make friends with the locals, and where better to do that than at our local?”
Xanthe found this reasoning hard to argue against. They went upstairs to make themselves respectable, as Flora liked to put it. This amounted to quick showers, failing to find a hairbrush, and rummaging in suitcases for the least crumpled garments that could be found. Flora emerged from her room with a different scarf knotted in her hair, a dab of pink lipstick, and a cotton summer dress she had had for a number of years.
“That thing is nearly old enough to be classed as vintage,” Xanthe warned her.
“When it reaches that point you can have it,” she laughed. “Come along, I’ve worked up quite a thirst.”
Xanthe followed her out. For herself she found a long gypsy skirt that had survived being stuffed in a case for days better than anything else. This she had teamed with a clean black T-shirt which showed off her new gold locket to good effect. She had taken a moment to remove the photograph of her mother from its usual place in her wallet, trim it to fit, and then fix it inside the locket. She abandoned her attempts at taming her profusion of ringlets, settling for running her fingers through them and leaving them loose. The sun had bleached the outer layers to a gold that matched the locket.
The Feathers was bustling by the time they arrived. Inside it was all beams and brass and warm polished wood. It was not until they walked through the door that Xanthe remembered it was Friday night, and that meant live music. Flora saw the band setting up at one end of the low-ceilinged room.
“Oh, music! How lovely,” she said, shepherding her daughter toward the bar.
“Can’t we just get some beer from the off-license and take it home?”
“No we can not,” Flora said, nudging her way through the throng, uttering thank-yous for people who bothered to make way for her and her sticks.
There was a good-natured ambience, with a balanced mix of local residents and visitors to the town. The bar itself was manned by a huge man with a Viking beard. He was clearly good at his job, a natural host, grabbing glasses, pulling pints, flicking off bottle tops, taking money, all in an easy and familiar dance. When he spoke to the newcomers his deep voice revealed a rich Scottish burr.
“What’ll ye have, ladies?” He smiled the smile of a willing landlord.
“Two pints of whatever’s good,” Xanthe said, looking at the array of taps.
“If it’s real ale you’re after, and something local, I’d say go for a drop of Henge. ’Tis a joyful thing. Not heavy at all, but full bodied.”
“Sounds perfect,” Flora said, handing him a ten-pound note.
The barman noticed Xanthe glance toward the band, who appeared to be almost ready to play. It was difficult to see them clearly through the crush of people.
“That’s Tin Lid. Local boys. D’you like a bit of music with your beer?”
Before she could stop her, Flora piped up, “Xanthe’s a singer.”
“That so?” The barman raised his bushy brows. “Are ye any good, hen?”
“She’s wonderful.”
“Mum, please…”
“We’ve just moved here.” She was unstoppable, offering her hand to the man now. “Flora and Xanthe Westlake. We’re opening an antique shop down Parchment Street.”
“Old Mr. Morris’s place?” He shook her hand. “That’s a task ye have ahead of ye. I’m from off myself, as ye might have gathered. ’Tis a friendly enough place, Marlborough. A few snooty people, but ye get them anywhere. And there’s history and stories around every corner. I’ve made something of a study of the area. Annie”—he nodded toward the woman at the other end of the bar—“she thought it would help us fit in.” He laughed a little at this idea. It was true, he was far from the manner of middle-Englander one might expect, with his burly arms and tattoos and beard rings and Scottishness. “Anyway, I hope to see more of both ye ladies in here, now that we’re neighbors, so to speak.”
“Oh, I’m sure you will,” Flora told him. She had spied two seats in the window at the back of the room and headed toward them.
Xanthe picked up the drinks and followed. When they sat down she tutted at her. “You can’t keep doing that, Mum.”
“Doing what?”
“Trying to get me gigs.”
She shrugged. “You’re a singer. You need to find places you can sing.”
“I was a singer.”
“It doesn’t go away, a talent like yours. You need to get out there again, love,” she insisted, lifting the foaming beer to her mouth.
Xanthe drank in silence. It seemed to her she had more than enough to think about without trying to resurrect her career as a singer. As she sipped her drink she peered through the crowd for a better view of the musicians, and there, on lead guitar, was the man from the garage. Liam. He appeared relaxed and even more handsome than before. He looked up at that moment and noticed her. To her embarrassment, and Flora’s amusement, he gave a grin and a quick wave. Ridiculously, Xanthe found herself blushing, but she was spared any questions from her mother as the band finished their sound check and began to play.
* * *
That night, once they had returned home and Xanthe had helped Flora to her bed, she sat in her own room at the open window. Below, the garden was in darkness save for the faint glo
w of nearby streetlights, but the moon was bright enough to cast shadows and throw down patches of silvery light. While she waited for her mother to get to sleep, she searched for round stone buildings on the internet. A quick look revealed all manner of things—theaters, livestock markets, silos—none of them right. None of them a match for her own curious shed. She narrowed her search to English rural areas, particularly small towns or large villages, and then specifically Wiltshire. Suddenly she was finding images of many similar buildings. Small, humble constructions, always in heavy stone, often with slate- or stone-tiled roofs, with no windows, and a single, sturdy door. The captions read: Lock-ups or ancient jails, sometimes called “blind houses” due to their lack of windows or light. Used to hold offenders awaiting transportation to larger towns where there were law courts and proper jailhouses.
A jail! All at once Xanthe’s strong reaction to the place made perfect sense. Somehow, something in her had known it was a place of suffering, a place of despair. She closed her eyes against a painful flashback to her own time of incarceration. She would never forget her first night in the women’s prison in north London. She had had a cell to herself, which she later discovered was unusual. She did not know if this had made things better or worse, but when that door clanged shut, when the lock turned and she was in there, trapped, removed from everyone she loved and everything she knew, at that moment she knew what it was to despair. The sentence she had been given was three years, and it was not until she had been there four long months that her appeal was heard and she was released. On that first night she had been facing the prospect of being locked up for at least two years. Even now, years later, she could still feel the panic welling up inside her, still taste the bile in her mouth as she was sick again and again, reacting to the unjust horror, fighting a scream that she dare not start for fear she might never be able to stop.
And now it transpired she and Flora had bought a jail. At the bottom of the garden of what must have originally been a private house. It still seemed unlikely, though it would explain, perhaps, the vibration of sadness and fear she had felt emanating from it. But what could it possibly have to do with the chatelaine? And why had she also experienced that other, deeply disturbing presence? Had there, perhaps, been a murderer locked up in the place once long ago? Someone violent and vengeful?
Xanthe kicked off her boots, picked up the chatelaine and went downstairs, doing her utmost to avoid stepping on any treads that creaked. After the clamor and noise of the pub, and the stuffiness of her attic room, the garden was wonderfully quiet and the night air fresh. She could hear sounds of the weekend nightlife of the town continuing, but they were muffled and hardly raucous. Cautiously, more than a little nervously, she made her way over to the stone shed, or what she might well have to start thinking of as the jail, even if that made it harder to approach. She tried to give herself a talking to, tried to muster courage, tried to be rational: this was just an old building, and she was not a convicted criminal anymore. There was no reason for her to be frightened of the place. Even so, her whole body was tense. She did her best to concentrate on the grounding, gentle feel of the unkempt grass of the lawn, soft and stalky under her bare feet. As she approached the newly exposed walls of the building she felt the chatelaine begin to grow warmer. Even through the paper she could feel its increasing heat. When she unwrapped it and the silver touched her skin she was immediately struck by the now-familiar connection, powerful and urgent. She had left the shed door open to let out the old, stale air in the shed and let in some new. Where the moonlight fell through the doorway she could see that the floor inside was dusty but quite dry, there being a layer of cobbles just visible. She needed to go in, but was reluctant to take the next step. At that moment she experienced another vision, but not of the running girl or the tangled woods. This was from her own memory, her own past. She felt the dull pull of dread in her stomach as she saw again the narrow cell into which she had been led. The walls painted institutional cream. The high, mesh-covered window that afforded no view. The low, hard bed. The dismal sparsity of the furnishings that spoke of lack and loss and lonely weeks, months, years to come.
Xanthe shook her head, refusing to let her own experiences hold her back. She was not here for herself. Someone was calling her. Someone else was trapped and afraid. Aside from her own memories, she could feel another level of anxiety. One that was connected to the antique silver in her hands. Was the fear she was experiencing that of whomever had owned the chatelaine, or her own nervousness at what might be shown to her? At what she might be made to feel and to experience? Or at her reluctance to meet again that malevolent presence that had so scared her the time before? And then, as she hesitated, she heard a voice, as clearly as if someone had been standing right in front of her. It was a young woman’s voice, and it was taut with emotion.
“Help me!” she begged. “Oh, please, help me!”
Xanthe knew then that she could not hold back, could not turn away, for those words did not feel like a random snippet of the past, something merely transmitted through the silverware. Nor did they feel like a simple echo of an event lost in time that only some people have the ability to hear. They felt personal. Carefully selected specifically for her, as if that plea, that cry for assistance, was spoken directly to her and no one else. And she knew how it felt to be shut up, locked in, separated from those she loved. She could not turn away.
Taking a steadying breath, she stepped across the threshold.
She was deeply relieved not to encounter the earlier sinister presence she had so dreaded meeting again. She had but a moment to take stock, however, before she was assailed by a violent sense of movement, as if she were being shaken and then thrown, though without ever hitting the ground. There was a moment of blackness, of airlessness, where she thought she might suffocate, and then abruptly she was able to see and to breathe again. To take great gulping breaths.
But what she saw was not the inside of the shed, nor the little garden. She was standing on an old road, which was rough and stoney. It had been raining, and she could feel watery mud beneath her bare feet. Once again she felt she was having a lucid dream that was shockingly real. It seemed to be dusk. The track was set among sweeping farmland, with no fences. On one side there was a deep ditch and beyond that some trees. The road turned a corner behind her, so that the distance she could see in that direction was short. Ahead, the landscape swooped on down and then up, and at the limit of her vision she could make out stone gate pillars and what looked to be the beginning of a grand driveway. It was then that she started to both hear and feel the rumble and clatter of galloping horses. Seconds later she could see them, pulling fast out of the driveway, steering hard right and charging along the road toward her. The covered carriage was large and fine and pulled by four white horses, the driver atop urging them on with whip and voice.
Would he see her? What would he do if he did? Xanthe looked for a place to hide, but the trees were too far for her to reach. Dream or not, she could not allow herself to be mowed down by the hurtling carriage. She ran for the verge and then jumped down into the ditch. It was filled with weeds and dirty water that came up to her knees, soaking her long skirt. She crouched low so that she could not easily be seen, though she need not have worried about the driver noticing her, as he was far too taken up with controlling the galloping horses. Xanthe raised her head as the carriage passed. It was so close she felt the air disturbed as it swept by. It was plain in style, but expensive-looking, with glass windows, and a groom standing on the back, holding tight as the conveyance lurched and bumped along the uneven road.
And then she saw her.
It was little more than a glimpse, but it was sufficient to catch the expression of fear on the face of the girl at the window. She could have been no more than sixteen, her eyes tear-filled, her brown hair escaping from its pins and her simple cream cap. She wore a brown woolen dress with a pinafore over it, and as Xanthe watched she was convinced, beyond any doubt, th
at the girl saw her. She raised her hand and pressed it against the glass in a gesture of silent despair. Xanthe reached toward her, and as she did so she stumbled, falling onto the muddy ground. As she pushed herself up on her knees she realized the clasp of the chain around her neck had wrenched undone and the locket lay on the gritty earth. She snatched it up, fearful of losing something so personal, something that reminded her so much of her mother.
And as suddenly as it had started, the hallucination was over. Xanthe was back in the garden, laying on the ground, half in and half out of the stone shed, the chatelaine beside her. She clambered unsteadily to her feet and staggered out onto the lawn. Her pulse was racing, and her breathing labored as if she had been running. For a while she stood and waited, wanting to allow her disturbed senses, her shocked body, her confused mind to return to a steadier state before moving again. And as it did she stood there and became aware of two things. The first was that she could still hear the sounds of galloping hooves and the rattling of the carriage wheels as they faded into the distance.
The second was that her bare feet, her legs, and the lower half of her long skirt were soaked through with muddy ditch water.
6
An hour later she was still staring at that muddy hem. In her bedroom, she had undressed but could not bring herself to take the skirt downstairs and put it in the washing machine. Somehow, hanging it up so that she could sit and look at it forced her to think the unthinkable. Dreams might be scarily vivid, could feel frighteningly real, that much she knew, but however bright the colors, however clear the sounds and everything else about them, dreams did not send you back to the waking world covered in ditch water and mud. Wherever it was she had gone while she was in that shed, it had been somewhere real. Xanthe dearly wished that she had bought some beer or wine while she had been shopping. For a moment she even contemplated waking her mother so that she might talk to her, but how would that conversation have sounded? How could she explain that she believed she had just traveled through time? Would Flora think her only child was taking leave of her senses?
The Little Shop of Found Things--A Novel Page 6