Out of Sight

by Rebecca Duval

  Had it been one of Ethan’s considerations, when he’d bought the place? Surely the size of the castle, and its potential as a family home hadn’t escaped the notice of a successful property developer? But was it a family of his own that he’d planned to renovate for, or someone else’s?

  Questions circled Isla’s mind like hungry predators, nipping at her concentration as she moved through the room, taking notes and pictures.

  The hairs on Isla’s neck prickled. She was suddenly convinced that she wasn’t alone in the room. Someone was watching her. Her eyes flickered to the toy cupboard. Through the crack in the door, the marionette met her gaze, with its painted black eyes. Behind her, a floorboard creaked. Isla whirled around.

  “Oh my god, you scared me!”

  The man in the doorway didn’t apologise.

  Isla’s heart thundered against her ribs, as she sized him up. A few years older than her, perhaps. Tall, slim, with short, jet-black hair. His clothes were scruffy, and his hands dirty. His skin was sallow, with hollows below his cheekbones.

  “Who are you?” Isla tried to sound less afraid than she felt.

  The man went on staring at her. His green eyes ran over her from head to toe and back again.

  Isla resisted the urge to take a step back, but she couldn’t repress the shiver that ran through her.

  “I came to warn you.”

  Isla swallowed. “Excuse me? Warn me about what?”

  He looked away from her at last, and Isla felt a burst of relief at being released from his stare.

  “The electricity will be off from four,” he said dully.

  He was a workman. Of course. That explained his clothes, and why he was creeping about the place. But how had he known where to find her?

  “How did you-” Isla started to say, but he was already gone.

  Isla lifted her camera from where it hung around her neck and saw that her hands were shaking.

  Thirteen

  The lights went out at four. Exactly as the creepy workman had promised. Isla had already finished and was on her way back down the main staircase when it happened. The castle plunged into darkness and Isla stumbled. Her heart leapt into her throat, and she grasped at the bannister with one hand. In her other, she carried a small, wooden lockbox. She gripped it tighter as she felt for the next step with her toe.

  Come on, she chastised herself. Since when was she afraid of the dark? But it wasn’t the gloom that was bothering her, but the sense of someone in it, watching her falter. By the time she reached the bottom, sweat was gathering at the nape of her neck and a pulse fluttered in her throat.

  If it hadn’t been for the box, she’d have been tempted to grab her coat and make a run for it, but the box was of little value without its key, and besides, that was ridiculous. What was she running from anyway?

  Isla shifted the box from one arm to the other and marched towards the study. The sound of her heels echoed off the walls, making it sound like someone was chasing her through the thick blackness. Isla quickened her step, which only made it worse.

  “Hey.” A hand brushed her shoulder, and Isla screamed and spun around, wielding the box like a weapon.

  “It’s me, Ryder!”

  Isla strained her eyes and could make out the hazy outline of Ryder’s features in the gloom.

  “What the hell?” Isla gasped.

  A second later, Isla heard footsteps behind her and spun again. Ethan. His cane stretched out before him.

  “What happened?”

  “Ryder scared me half to death is what happened!” Isla tried to regain control of her breathing. “What the hell were you doing creeping along behind me like that?”

  “I sent him,” Ethan said. “To check on you.”

  Ryder stepped forward, his hands still up in surrender. “I didn’t know where you were, and then I heard your footsteps...sorry.”

  “You would have been in another minute. I nearly bashed your head in with a bible box.” Isla grumbled.

  After the gloom of the corridor, the study was like a beacon, although in reality, the only light came from the roaring fire and a pair of tapers on the mantelpiece. Isla supposed it made no difference to Ethan, but it took her eyes a minute to adjust. She set the box down on the coffee table.

  “So, what’s with the box anyway?” Ryder asked, sheepishly.

  Isla ran one hand over the lid. In the grainy light, the fleur-de-lis pattern was just visible. “I found it tucked away in the back of the cupboard in the single bedroom next to the nursery.”

  “Is it valuable?” Ryder sounded intrigued.

  “It could be if we had the key…”

  Ethan frowned. “If it wasnae with it, then I dinnae ken where it would be.”

  “I might,” Ryder said suddenly.

  Both Isla and Ethan turned to him expectantly.

  “The old key cabinet.” Ryder turned from Ethan to Isla. “It’s in the gun room. There are hundreds of keys in there though- you could be there for hours and not find the right one. I’ve no idea what most of them are for.”

  “It’s worth a go,” Isla said, but she couldn’t keep the tremor of doubt from her voice. For one thing, she couldn’t imagine the key to a bible box ending up with the household keys, and for another, she didn’t much fancy the idea of spending her evening in a gun room rummaging through a key cabinet on her own. “But it might be better to wait until daylight...”

  “Ryder, why don’t you empty the key cabinet out and bring the keys in here. That way Miss Belmont doesnae have to freeze, and fumble about in the dark.”

  “Of course.”

  Isla opened her mouth to protest, to say it wasn’t a big deal, and she should really be going anyway- but it would have been a lie. The box was a rare find, and she had nothing to rush back for. She closed her mouth and watched Ryder leave.

  “If you want more light there are candles in the desk,” Ethan said.

  Isla lit the candles in the fire, feeling like she’d travelled back in time. She could be the original owner of the bible box, kneeling there before the hearth.

  “How long will the lights be out for?” she asked.

  “A few days, apparently.” Ethan was at the sideboard, pouring himself a drink.

  Isla told herself she’d refuse if he offered.

  “I met the electrician, you know.” She got to her feet. “He scared me.”

  Ethan turned towards her, the whisky bottle in his hand. “He did?”

  “Well, he made me jump. I was in my own world.”

  Ethan grunted. “Care for one?” he held up the bottle.

  Isla bit her lip. She shouldn’t really. He was her client, and she was working, and it would be the second evening she’d found herself sitting around an open fire drinking with him…

  “Just one then.”

  *

  Ryder hadn’t been joking about the keys- there were literally hundreds. He’d scooped them all into a wine crate to carry through, and Isla had tipped them out onto the table, where she and Ryder were examining them to narrow down the possibilities.

  “What about this one?” Ryder held one up and Isla scrutinised it in the flickering candlelight. The key glinted in the glow of the flames.

  “Hmm, about the right size, but looks too new.” She took it from Ryder and tried it in the lock, but she was right- it wouldn’t even turn.

  Ethan was sitting in one of the armchairs, a half-empty tumbler resting on his knee, while Isla and Ryder knelt on the thick, faded rug sifting through the keys.

  Ethan had hardly spoken since Ryder had returned, but Isla couldn’t fail to be aware of him, of every shift and movement, of every time he raised his glass to his lips. It was like an invisible thread connected them, and as much as she tried to ignore it, it tugged on her, forcing her to glance up at intervals, her eyes drifting over his pensive features before turning back to her task.

  He hadn’t offered her another whisky, though he’d had two more himself. Her phone was tucked aw
ay in her bag and without it, she had no clue what time it might be. She felt suspended outside of time, in a place where only the crackle of the fire and the jangle of keys marked the minutes.

  The sweet taste of the scotch lingered in her mouth, her fingertips smelled of metal and rust, and her legs had gone pleasantly numb beneath her. She felt a strange sort of contentment sitting there, that she hadn’t in a while, and it both soothed and unnerved her.

  Her eye caught on a small bunch of keys on a narrow ring. One, in particular, looked promising- slim, and bronze, with an ornate bow. Isla slotted it into the lock and twisted. Yes.

  “It worked!” Ryder’ exclaimed, and Isla wasn’t sure if it was for Ethan’s benefit, or just his enthusiasm bubbling over. She slowly opened the lid, noticing as she did that Ethan sat forward in his chair, placing his empty glass onto the table.

  “What’s inside?” Ryder craned his neck to see.

  “I think the clue is in the name,” Ethan drawled.

  But he was wrong. There was no bible in the box, but lying against the red-satin lining, was a bundle of papers, tied with a ribbon. A sudden feeling of disquiet overcame Isla at the sight of them, but she shook it off. So the box had been repurposed at some point, what did it matter?

  “Looks like old letters,” she said, lifting them carefully. “But at least now we have the key.”

  “We have to read them!” Ryder said.

  Isla looked up at him in surprise. She hadn’t realised quite how invested he was. “Well, I suppose…”

  The letters felt heavy in her hand, though the paper itself felt almost dangerously thin. Depending on their age, Isla knew that she could be compromising their integrity just by handling them with her bare hands, but then what were the chances they were historically significant in any way? She rested them on the table, and carefully untied the ribbon, and unfolded the letter on the top of the pile.

  “What does it say?” Ryder asked impatiently.

  Isla scanned the letter and felt the blood drain from her face. Oh no. She folded it back up again quickly.

  “What are you doing?” Ryder asked.

  “Here- read it for yourself,” she held it out to him.

  “Hello?” A shout echoed along the corridor.

  Isla jumped, before remembering they weren’t alone in the castle. The workmen, of course.

  “Excuse me.” Ryder slipped from the room.

  “Well, go on then,” Ethan said. “Dinnae keep me in suspense.”

  Isla shifted on the rug, the blood rushing back to her calves and feet. “I really don’t think-”

  “Ryder may be able to read them himself, but I cannae.”

  “No, I know, it’s just…”

  “What?” Ethan quirked his head.

  Isla sighed. “Nothing.” She was being ridiculous. It was just a letter. A very personal letter, but a very old letter, with absolutely zero relevance to anyone in this room.

  She unfolded it and began to read quickly.

  “My dearest, who I dare not even name, and yet I feel sure that if this letter were to be discovered it would be clear to all to whom I address, for how could anyone fail to see my devotion to you?”

  Ethan cleared his throat. He’d obviously got the gist of where it was going, but he didn’t tell her to stop, so Isla pressed on.

  “At times I can hardly bear it, to come across you as you go about your day, and not to exchange more than a brief word. Remember that day in the parlour, when your hand brushed against my own? Innocent to any onlooker, and yet I feared I might shatter to pieces beneath the intensity of feeling behind it and lay there broken into shards for all to see the effect you had upon me.”

  Isla took a deep breath and raced on.

  “You, my darling know how I fall apart at your touch, that with your hands upon me, I come undone so easily, it is as though I were put together only for you to take apart and rearrange as you wish. Oh that all our days could be spent so, instead of this wretched sham. How much longer must we go on pretending?”

  Now Ethan was shifting in his chair. Isla watched as he raised his glass to his lips, and found it empty. He lowered it slowly to his knee, his knuckles taut around the cut glass.

  “You spoke of Paris once, did you mean it, my love? That we could leave this unhappy place and journey together to build a future overseas, where neither mine nor your position would mean anything to anyone, least of all ourselves. For you know it matters not to me, and you have assured me enough times that my status never enters your mind, not when our thoughts are as one, as our bodies are as one…”

  Where the hell was Ryder? She’d been counting on him to get back and interrupt her agony. Isla closed her eyes, but when she opened them again, the letter still shook lightly in her hands, the fire still crackled beside her, and Ethan was waiting, his face and body tilted towards Isla’s, a strange expression on his face.

  “Oh, how I long to touch you again and to have your hands upon me.” Isla swallowed. “I never knew there was such pleasure as the kind I felt when at last you came to me that night. I can hardly recall it without my skin flaming at the memory, as though your hands have branded me and to remember illuminates your name across my skin, for all to see.”

  Isla’s own skin was flaming. She could feel the heat in her face. She shifted, away from the glow of the fire, but of course, that wasn’t the cause, and besides, it only put her closer to Ethan. She risked a glance at him. Were his cheeks red too, or was that a trick of the candlelight?

  Isla turned back to the letter, and steeled herself, blurting out the final paragraph in one rush.

  “Let them see! What do I care? But I know that I must care, for your sake if not my own, and so I console myself with this letter and hope and pray that when you read it you will send me some sign that you feel the same way, and that we might soon have no need of words. Tonight?”

  She took a shaky breath. “It’s signed ‘yours’, with no name, just...a kiss.” Isla placed the letter on the table and ran her tongue over her lips. Ethan shifted in his chair, clearing his throat.

  The study door swung open.

  “Sorry to interrupt-” Ryder faltered, and Isla could tell that he knew, somehow, what he’d walked in on. The air felt like it was statically charged, and both she and Ethan were silent and flushed.

  Ryder cleared his throat. “Ethan, one of the workmen has a query about access to the tower-”

  A look of irritation flashed across Ethan’s features, but his jaw set and he gave an almost imperceptible nod.

  “I should be going,” Isla blurted. She got to her feet and began scrambling her things together.

  “Isla.”

  At the sound of Ethan saying her name, Isla turned to him. She could feel Ryder’s eyes on them both, and she knew Ethan would be able to sense it too. Still, he didn’t say anything.

  “Good night Ethan.” Isla rushed from the room, clutching the bible box of illicit letters against her hammering heart.

  Fourteen

  “Oh my god,” Zoe said.

  “I know.” Isla winced.

  She’d just climbed out of the bath when Zoe had called to find out how things had gone the day before, forcing Isla to fill her in on the creepy encounter with the electrician, and the embarrassing incident with the letters.

  “So you just...ran away?”

  Isla switched to speaker-phone so she could continue getting ready. “Well, I had just read a hundred-year-old thirst letter out loud to a client. I mean, what else should I have done?”

  Zoe didn’t answer.

  “Zo?”

  “Hmm? Oh, sorry. I was thinking.”

  “I need to leave in-” Isla checked the time, “-ten minutes. What am I going to do?”

  “Well, you could just pretend it never happened...”

  “Yes, I like that plan,” Isla said.

  “Or,” Zoe continued sternly, “you could be an adult and have a conversation about it. After all, if you’re feeling
awkward, he probably is too.”

  Isla wasn’t sure that awkward quite covered the way she’d felt, rushing out of the study the night before. Mortified, yes. Flustered, maybe. Wondering what would have happened if Ryder hadn’t chosen that moment to walk back in? Definitely.

  Still, Zoe was right. They were both adults. She would bring up the letters, ask him what he wanted her to do with them, pray he didn’t say ‘throw them on the fire’, and then they could both move on and forget about it.

  *

  It had all sounded so simple, back at the shop, but once she was inside the castle, Isla’s nerves got the better of her, and instead of heading straight for the study to face Ethan, she scurried to the kitchen.

  She needed a cup of tea. Or something stronger. But it was 9 am- tea would have to do.

  She set the kettle on the stovetop and hummed to herself as she waited for it to boil, trying to calm her nerves. This was ridiculous. Why was she nervous anyway? It was only a conversation.

  She began to sing quietly. Between her singing, and the whistling of the kettle, she didn’t hear the back door creak open.

  “Nice voice.”

  Isla shrieked, and jumped about a foot in the air, throwing hot tea all over the countertop, the floor and herself.

  “Ow, ow, ow,” she gasped as the boiling water seeped through the fabric of her trousers.

  Ethan stepped forward. His cheeks were pink from the cold, the collar of his dark coat turned up. His expression was full of alarm. “Are you okay?”

  “No!” Isla grabbed a cloth from beside the sink and dabbed at her trousers, but it was no good, they were wrecked, and her legs were burning.

  “I’m sorry,” Ethan said sheepishly, and despite the pain, Isla realised it was the second time he’d apologised to her in as many days. “I didn’t mean to scare you. What can I do?” He ran a hand through his hair.

  “I don’t know. I’ve scalded my legs.”

  “Shit.” Ethan swung into action, striding across the kitchen, his lips moving as he counted the steps under his breath. He shrugged out of his coat, tossing it down beside the sink, and turned the tap on full.