Whispering Corner

by Marc Alexander

  Then I saw that the cellar door was still ajar after my search for a saw, and it was from the cellar that the pitiful cries were emerging.

  ‘Take it easy, I’m coming,’ I called as I pulled back the door and stood at the top of the steps gazing into sheer blackness. The coldness of the air came as a physical shock; I was shivering as I ran my hand along the wall until I located the old-fashioned electric switch. Enough light filtered through the grime on the bulb for me to make out the shadowed heaps of junk round the walls, trunks piled on top of each other, a wooden-rollered mangle like a medieval torture instrument, a broken-legged chaise longue … but nothing living, nothing that cried.

  It could only be in the second cellar, through the arch. As I descended the steps with exaggerated care the brandy sweat on my face turned to drops of ice water. I was reminded of a dream which had recurred during the latter years of my childhood, in which some irresistible power was forcing me to descend a staircase into darkness.

  With only a couple of stumbles I reached the dirty stone flags of the cellar and crossed to the entrance of the second cellar, my eyes straining to see by the amber light which elongated my shadow. Apart from some empty crates at the far end the place seemed empty. I stepped through the doorway, hands outstretched to feel along the stone shelves where long ago bottles of blue-blooded port had stood in cobwebbed dignity.

  And the crying stopped.

  It did not fade away as it does with an exhausted child, but ended as sharply as a radio switched off. There was no baby in the wine cellar, only ancient dust and darkness and now a silence so complete that I could hear the pulse in my ears. I backed into the main cellar.

  Now that I was convinced there was no living child to rescue my only thought was for myself. I wanted to get out of the cellar. The puzzle about the crying could wait until later.

  I knocked against the mangle in my hurry, cursing the inanimate object childishly, and I was halfway across the floor when my body stopped. It was as though my energy drained away like water when a bath plug is pulled. I just stood there, feeling ill and wondering whether I was about to collapse. I told myself that it was the result of too much brandy, that I was stupidly pissed. A minute may have passed while I stood in the silence, taking deep breaths and trying to break the paralysis which had overwhelmed me. I decided to count to ten, and on the word ten I would move. It did not succeed the first time, and when I started counting again I became aware of the shadows. In certain corners they seemed to be forming into menacing shapes. It was just another symptom of my disorientation through stress and alcohol, but I must admit that at the time I was as afraid of those shadows as any unfortunate character I had terrorized in my fiction.

  I counted to ten again and this time I had enough willpower to put one foot after the other. The pathetic cellar light appeared to dim. Out of the corner of my eye I kept a wary watch on the shadow-shapes which seemed to be becoming more mobile in the gathering gloom. I hauled myself up the steps. The temptation to rest for a moment, to slump against the handrail, was almost irresistible, but fear kept me going. Fear of exactly what I did not know, any more than I knew what awaited me at the bottom of the staircase in my childhood dream.

  And then I was back in the house, back in its accustomed warmth with its tang of new paint, and when I had shot the cellar door bolt on my fears I fell full-length on the sofa. And it seemed to my morbid imagination that somewhere in the house something was again faintly crying.

  *

  It was the sound of intermittent tapping that dragged me back to consciousness. I sat up painfully, grateful that my heart was no longer fluttering inside my ribcage like a trapped bird. As my eyes focused I saw a figure pressed against the French window. I shambled over and admitted the Reverend Gotobed.

  ‘My dear soul,’ he said, his voice full of concern. ‘I was so anxious when I saw you sprawled on the sofa. Are you all right? You look as though you’ve seen a ghost.’

  ‘I had rather a bad night,’ I said vaguely.

  ‘I can see that.’ He could not help glancing at the empty brandy bottle on the coffee table, then became embarrassed in case I thought he was making a moral judgement.

  ‘Let me make you some coffee,’ he added, and as a surge of dizziness made me sink down on to the sofa I made no objection. While he was in the kitchen I took my pulse. It was too fast but steady; it’s when it misses the beat that I worry. The smell of fresh coffee in the percolator made me feel a little better.

  ‘I just thought I’d pop over and see if you’d had time to read the “Narration”,’ Henry said as he put a steaming cup down beside me.

  ‘I have indeed — it was fascinating. It’s given me some marvellous ideas for the current novel. I’m very grateful.’

  ‘So glad. I couldn’t believe my luck when I came across it. What a coincidence that you should come to a haunted house, in the light of what you write.’

  ‘I don’t believe in hauntings really. I’m sure there’s a logical explanation for the “Narration”. We only have the word of Mary Lawson, no corroborative evidence …’ My words disappointed Henry, I could see, so I added, ‘But still, it makes a great story. It certainly affected me last night.’

  He was so obviously interested that I felt it would be churlish not to discuss it with him, despite my aching head. ‘The story was vivid enough to have a curious effect on me,’ I explained. ‘Yesterday was a bastard, if you’ll excuse me putting it that way … an unexpected financial problem which will take a bit of solving. The result was that I drank far too much brandy. I didn’t intend to; one glass must have followed another without me realizing it until I passed out. Then I had a sort of hallucination, because when I came round it seemed that I heard a baby crying. It was so realistic that I actually went searching for it down in the cellar. Of course there was nothing there, and now I see how the story of Sir Richard Elphick must have triggered off the illusion or whatever it was … the unwanted child would most likely have been done away with in the cellar; or at least the body would have been buried down there. Anyway, the hallucination affected me enough to scare me half to death when I was down there. Now that I’m sober it’s obvious that the whole thing was in my imagination.’

  ‘You don’t think it was possible that in some way you tuned in, as it were, to an echo of the past?’ Henry asked tentatively.

  I shook my head and then wished I hadn’t. ‘Echoes from the past, psychical reverberations — they’re just modern euphemisms for the age-old ghost thing.’

  ‘Why are you so sceptical of paranormal phenomena when, if you’ll forgive me, they’ve been your bread and butter?’

  ‘It’s illogical,’ I said. ‘Just supposing a human being does have a spirit, why should it return after death in the likeness of its old body which it obviously no longer inhabits, to go through some trivial act? The ghost tradition began when one of our prehistoric ancestors was asleep in his cave and dreamed of some dead member of the tribe. Not understanding the mechanism of dreaming, he concluded that they had made a brief return from the dead. It’s just superstition, like …’

  ‘Like religion?’ said Henry gently.

  ‘That’s what I was going to say,’ I admitted. ‘No offence intended.’

  ‘And none taken. I can sympathize with your point of view. Neither religion nor the paranormal is logical, yet there may be more things in heaven and earth, Horatio, than are dreamt of in your philosophy. Is it necessary that the only things that can be accepted are those we can explain? Imagine trying to explain colour television to an early Victorian. At this stage of scientific knowledge the idea would have been mad, yet we accept it as part of everyday life. Religion has been dismissed as superstition, yet the further man goes into physics the more likely the metaphysical seems. Victorian theologians made an error in ridiculing the advances in scientific thought; they should have seen the hand of God in evolution. Alas, they were too indoctrinated by Hebrew folktales.’

  I drank my coffee whil
e he paused reflectively. ‘Jonathan, what happened to make you lose your faith so completely? You told me that you used to be an altar boy, so there must have been a foundation there.’

  It was the very last question I wished to discuss at that — or any other — time, so I merely said, ‘As I grew up I began to think for myself.’

  ‘Sorry,’ said Henry, abashed at the brusqueness of my tone. ‘Not my business, of course.’

  ‘It’s me that should be sorry. I’m not behaving very well,’ I said. ‘I must confess that I have a thumping head. Serves me right.’

  Henry brought me a second cup of coffee with Christian conciliation, and said, ‘I do hope something will turn up to solve your financial difficulty — I shall pray that it will. You should be free to concentrate on your novel. Now I’ll leave you to rest. Have a hot bath and get some more sleep and I’m sure you’ll wake up feeling better.’

  I took his advice.

  *

  After I woke up in the early afternoon my headache had gone, though I still had that post-drunk sensation that my skin was not a good fit. The first thing was to try and contact Charles Nixon, so I set off up Church Walk in the direction of the village phone box. Today there was no wind, and the wood was remarkably still and soothing to the spirit. The air, redolent of leaf mould, was a pleasure to breathe and I would have enjoyed my walk had it not been for the nature of my errand. If I managed to get hold of my partner I doubted whether it would achieve anything; I had a bet with myself that I would get a one-way spiel on how he was selling Shadows (‘They’re mad for it, Jonno, mad for it!’) to Universal or MGM or perhaps Channel 4 (‘Big co-production deal!’) and the money would be through before the bank (‘How dare they speak to you like that!’) could do anything.

  As it turned out my call was unanswered. His wife must have gone to Wales and Charles, who worked from home, was either on one of his ‘location-seeking’ jaunts or just not answering the phone.

  Returning down the path I managed to push Charles and the Regent Bank out of my thoughts and concentrate on what I was about to write. The brandy-inspired delusions I had suffered the night before suggested the next scene in my novel. Now that Falco and Lorna had become lovers the time had come to introduce the sense of menace which is about to overshadow their lives. Paranormal forces inspired by a story similar to that told in Mary Lawson’s ‘Narration’ are about to be unleashed upon the couple, their new-found happiness in contrast to the ancient evil which seeps — from where?

  The cellar, of course.

  That is where an unspeakable deed had been done, the murder of an innocent by a man obsessed by his need to keep a respectable face in the local squirarchy. Or did he use the strength of his personality to force the mother of the unwanted child to do away with it? And was that his first crime? If he was capable of killing a baby, murder obviously did not present a problem to him. Had he murdered before? Had he killed his ailing wife so that the attraction between him and his sister-in-law could burgeon within the walls of Whispering Corner? Or had the incestuous affair started while she was still alive and he had silenced her when she found out?

  As I went through the old wicket gate into my garden I tried to recapture something of what I had felt last night when I found myself in the cellar almost legless from drink. Much had faded as dreams fade before the onset of daily life, but some impressions remained, such as the chilling effect of the crying even though it had been illusionary, and the sensation of stark fear when it seemed that shadows were moving about me in that damned cellar. Then I went straight to my study, eager to get the words down while the mood was upon me.

  I described how Falco had been at work in his studio all day roughing out the illustrations for Lorna’s book. As evening draws on she prepares supper for them both. Having found each other, they are in the mood for a quiet celebration. Falco insists on candlelight again and an appropriate musical background. During the meal he asks Lorna about herself but her answers are vague; at this stage I wanted her to remain an enigmatic character. She talks about her ambitions as an author of children’s stories rather than about her personal life, and then deftly turns the conversation back to him.

  As I typed I hoped that I was building an atmosphere of pleasant intimacy, of romantic cosiness which my readers male and female (and not least myself) could imagine enjoying. Then I wrote:

  Lorna interrupted Falco in mid-sentence.

  ‘What’s that? It sounds like — like a baby crying. Turn the music off.’

  He obeyed with the air of someone indulging a lover’s whim, but as the stylus arm swung back he looked puzzled.

  ‘I do hear something. Wait a minute — I know what it is. A cat. It must be the Magic Cat that you saw in the garden. Its come back to its old home and now it’s shut in somewhere.’

  ‘That’s no cat …’ Lorna began but, amused by the idea, Falco went to the door and began calling, ‘Puss, puss. It sounds as though it’s in the cellar. Get some milk, darling; it’ll probably be famished.’

  He opened the door to the stairway which led down to the cellar and shivered as the cold hit him.

  ‘Poor little moggie if she’s been shut down in here,’ he said as he groped for the light switch. An ancient electric bulb cast yellow light but failed to illuminate any movement below. ‘Probably scared to death,’ he muttered as he went carefully down the steps. The mewling sound became faint, as though having led the man to this spot it was now receding.

  ‘Puss, puss,’ Falco called with less conviction. He stood in the centre of the stone-flagged cellar, thinking he would pay the handyman to clear the whole place out. It was as eerie as hell the way it was.

  ‘Puss, puss.’

  Somewhere in the house above Lorna screamed. Falco bounded back up the steps, tripping and barking his skin agonizingly on the brickwork.

  ‘Lorna!’

  There was no response. He ran into the living room. The French windows were open and he could see Lorna huddled on the steps between the two ornamental urns …

  My alarm clock trilled and I came back to reality. It was time to go and visit Ashley.

  *

  The next couple of days were the lull after the storm in my affairs. The knowledge that I was likely to lose Whispering Corner filled me with a dull anger in place of panic, and the previous sense of urgency about my novel was redoubled now that it seemed to hold the only hope I had of being able to come to an understanding with the bank. I began work early and broke off only when hunger forced me down to the kitchen for a snack. I was amused when I imagined what Warren, who I presumed was still visiting megaliths in the west, would have said about my bacon sandwiches.

  The highlight of my day was an evening drive to the cottage hospital to visit Ashley. The doctor had diagnosed delayed concussion, and there was something about her EEG which suggested that more tests should be made before she was discharged. She suffered from severe headaches, for which she was given analgesics, and always seemed to me to be sleepy despite the valiant effort she made to appear bright and cheerful during the visiting hour.

  On my first visit after my ill-starred trip to London she expressed concern over my haggard appearance, which I explained as a combination of too much work and a manic session with a bottle of brandy.

  ‘Only myself to blame,’ I said lightly.

  And bloody Pleiades films! I thought bitterly.

  Although I looked forward to making these visits I learned very little about Ashley from them. She seemed to like to talk about books most — afterwards it struck me that this was a safe neutral topic — and when I took her a couple of Judy Gardiner novels she declared that she was one of her favourite authors. When I mentioned that I knew Judy I rose in her estimation. But after a few minutes’ chat her eyelids had a tendency to flutter and it seemed to be an effort for her to keep a conversation going. At this point I would make a remark about ‘companionable silences’, and a few minutes later leave the little ward and walk down the over-lit cor
ridor with a sense of vexation.

  There was something about Ashley that intrigued me. Although I knew why she had visited Whispering Corner, there was still an air of mystery about her. When I sat in the chair by her bed, especially when she was dozing, I could not help imagining her as Lorna in my novel. Now I wonder if that was why, at that point, she held such interest for me.

  When I knew that she could not see me I found myself scrutinizing her for copy; the slight unevenness of her teeth, a mole high on her right cheek, her unusually long fingers, the habit of holding the back of her hand against her forehead while sleeping as though protecting herself against a glare — everything was grist to my literary mill. I was embarrassed when a nurse came in and saw me in rapt contemplation of the patient, and from then on I had to endure her suspicious looks whenever she saw me.

  My only other human contact at this time was Henry Gotobed, who made a habit of looking in once a day, ostensibly to lend me a book on local history or ask for some advice regarding his literary opus. I think I had become a cause he rather enjoyed, and I was touched by his surreptitious glances towards the table on which I kept my drinks to check on my brandy consumption.

  I found no difficulty in proceeding with Whispering Corner from the point where Falco finds Lorna unconscious on the steps outside the French windows. When she comes to she explains that after he had gone in search of the cat it seemed that an invisible hand took hold of the candelabrum, raised it slowly in front of her and then hurled it across the room. Falco sees the candelabrum lying on the floor and the wallpaper on the far wall spattered with wax.

  ‘You mean it just happened by itself — it rose up in the air and then hit the wall?' Falco asked, an uneasy thought in his mind.

  From the sofa Lorna nodded her head.

  ‘I never guessed anything like that could be so terrifying,’ she whispered. ‘All I remember is that I had to get out, and when I reached the steps everything went black, as they say. I know it must sound crazy to you but, James, it did happen. It just rose up as though the Invisible Man was lifting it.’ She shuddered and ran her fingers distractedly through her short hair while Falco handed her a glass of brandy.