The Women of Heachley Hall

by Rachel Walkley

  ‘You’ve got enough on your plate, sweetie,’ she said.

  ‘Gosh, yes.’ Matt leaned across the table. He possessed the same bushy eyebrows as his brother. ‘Ruth says you live in a stately home.’

  My cheeks went hot and my fork clattered on my plate. ‘No I don’t. It maybe bigger than average—’

  ‘Average,’ Ruth shrieked. ‘Each room is the size of my ground floor.’

  ‘No they’re not,’ I squirmed on my seat. ‘The drawing room is large—’

  ‘Drawing room,’ Matt settled back in his seat. ‘Wow, sounds grand, ostentatious.’

  I stabbed at my penne. ‘It’s empty, devoid of any furniture. The house has nothing to make it grand or—’ I snorted, ‘ – ostentatious. The wallpaper hangs off the wall in places, the glass rattles in the window panes, the ceilings are cracked, the pipes—’

  ‘Miriam,’ Ruth cut across me, ‘You’re doing a fantastic job. The house isn’t derelict. Shabby, yes, but it will sell.’

  I focused on Ruth’s soft smile. My racing heart calmed and I briefly closed my watery eyes. The stress abated and I nodded. ‘Yes, you’re right. Sorry. It’s a grand house, not a stately, but not average and it will sell.’ I opened my eyes and smiled back at her. The optimism returned; I had to cling on to it somehow.

  She wiped a dribble of tomato sauce off her chin. ‘Good.’ She turned to Mick. ‘This ragu is lovely, darling.’

  For the rest of the meal Mick and Matt argued over who was the better cook. Both seemed to have been raised to look after themselves, which would appeal to Ruth and should to me, but Matt lacked something. There was no sense of common ground between us, nothing to draw us even into a decent conversation.

  When Ruth switched on the TV for the Big Ben chimes at midnight, I held back while Ruth and Mick conducted a protractive kiss. Matt’s eyes widened watching his brother’s embrace and he stepped towards me. Before he could touch me, I held out my hand.

  He hesitated, staring at my palm before taking it in a limp shake. ‘Happy New Year, Miriam. Good luck with the house.’

  ‘Thank you. Hope you get that promotion,’ I offered in return. He stepped back and we both waited for Ruth and Mick to disengage.

  I hugged Ruth close and she whispered in my ear, ‘I’m here for you, sweetie. I haven’t forgotten you and I mean it about the garden. Matt was Mick’s idea, sorry.’

  She squeezed my sides and released me. I wiped my watery eyes with back of my hand. ‘Thanks for the invite. I don’t know what I’d do—’

  ‘I couldn’t possibly let you spend your two week break with both of your aunts.’

  I laughed, hiccoughing and the room spun around me. ‘I should sit down, I’m drunk.’

  Matt left after breakfast and New Year’s Day proved to be leisurely and relaxed. We watched a film, ate a late lunch and went for a walk along the sea front and pier. Mick and Ruth held hands, but otherwise, they’d stopped short of groping each other.

  I crushed my fledging jealousy. Ruth deserved happiness and my enthusiasm for their relationship grew over that cold first January day. I laughed at Mick’s poor jokes, which Ruth seemed content to tolerate. Or perhaps they were good jokes and my sense of humour had hit rock bottom. Who was I to criticise – the queen of unsuccessful affairs had shunned yet another male opportunity. The next day, I left for a brief stop over at Chelmsford before returning to Heachley Hall.

  If there was one man I keenly awaited seeing, it was Charles.

  NINETEEN

  Weeks had passed since I’d spoken to Eva Kendal and the impression I’d been left with – that she’d forgotten about Felicity’s box – was probably true. There hadn’t been a peep from her about following up, so I decided to take action into my own hands and chase up the head office of Twilight Care Homes in Peterborough.

  The hallway at Heachley Hall was beyond chilly, and the ambient temperature transported me to what felt like the arctic tundra. My exhales mushroomed out of my lips and formed a smoky mist. Perched on a camping stool I’d acquired at a car boot sale in Hunstanton, I dialled the number and asked to speak to the manager. It took several minutes of persuasion to make it past the receptionist and be allowed to speak to a Mr Craven. I explained my situation, the missing personal effects of my great-aunt. When he asked me to describe the box, I floundered, unable to provide any details other than it contained documents and photographs. I’d only Liz Pyke’s description to go on. He promised to investigate and ring back. Somehow, as I lowered the handset, I suspected it would be another false promise.

  I’d only been back a day and the freezing temperatures indoors, never mind outside, had drilled into the core of my bones. The pipes hadn’t frozen in my absence and Kevin had assured me that the vulnerable pipes had been sufficiently lagged with insulation, but his reassurance didn’t convince me. Luck wouldn’t always be on my side, something would give eventually: a wall would collapse, the roof tiles would slip off on mass in a storm or the cellar would flood. I’d mapped out all the possible disasters and believed them to be imminent.

  A spate of negativity was how I generally started the New Year. Annually, I predicted doom and gloom, and each year, those scenarios failed to arrive. However, my mood swings didn’t stop me from projecting my worse fears into my daydreams. The arrival of Charles later that morning perked me up, until I noted his old clothing and no new boot laces either.

  ‘So what did you do for Christmas?’ I asked, unable to resist poking my nose into his affairs. There had to be something exciting in his life beyond me and Heachley.

  He knelt on the cold floor and picked at the edge of a cracked tile. ‘The usual,’ he muttered.

  ‘Are you Jewish?’

  He laughed as he shook his head.

  ‘Atheist? Do you hide away at Christmas, like Scrooge and bah humbug callers?’

  Resting back on his heels, he looked up at me. ‘Scrooge?’ He furrowed his eyebrows.

  ‘You know. Charles Dickens. A Christmas Carol. The three ghosts, past, present—’

  ‘And future. Yes. I remember, now.’ He rose, a sad smile on his lips. ‘It’s been a while since I read that one, not since I was a boy. Maybe I am Scrooge, waiting for my salvation.’ The corners of his eyes turned down. I’d made him sad and I hated the expression he showed, it made me upset how quickly he became morose.

  ‘No, not Scrooge,’ I hastened to add. ‘He was miserly and uncaring. That’s not you.’

  ‘Isn’t it?’ The frown on his face deepened and he moved away, heading towards the scullery door. ‘I need tools.’

  ‘I bought adhesive.’

  I hurried after him and his long strides made quick work of crossing the hallway. In the shed Charles collected together what he needed: brush, paint scraper and a hammer. I slid the tub of PVA glue across the table towards his hand.

  ‘This is what they recommended. And also, the guy in the shop said to use beeswax on the floor when you’ve finished. The tiles are in the corner.’ I pointed at the boxes that had been delivered weeks ago.

  I carried the tub of glue into the house for him, then stood around, wondering what else to do. I’d given up on asking him if he wanted to a drink, he always turned me down.

  Charles reappeared, sniffing the air. ‘You’ve lit a fire.’

  How he missed the smell when he walked in, I didn’t know. The stench of damp wood smouldering in the fireplace reeked throughout the house.

  ‘Earlier, in the living room. I’m sketching down here. A new project, I don’t need the computer or easel.’ I’d left the pad on the sofa. There was another reason – the opportunity for him to pop his head around the door and say hello. A small and heartening antidote to loneliness.

  I told him all about my assignment as he smashed the first tile with a hammer, disintegrating it into bits. Using the dustpan brush he swept away the debris of the tile and laid a new one in its place, checking the fit.

  ‘Monsters from outer space,’ he repeated the premise of th
e book. ‘And this is for children?’

  ‘Friendly aliens, but they have to look like monsters. They’re lost and they come to Earth for directions. I can design the monsters myself, the author has given me a few ideas, but it’s down to me.’ I loved it when I could be entirely creative with my drawings. I bounced on my heels and imagined a hairy monster with two heads, one for talking, the other for eating. I should be drawing by the fire, but chatting with Charles proved both productive and gratifying.

  ‘This doesn’t scare children?’ He painted the glue on the back of the replacement tile.

  ‘Younger ones maybe. It’s meant to breakdown preconceived ideas. The monsters are an allegory for foreigners in general and the book is to teach kids not to pre-judge those who don’t look or talk like us. I mean, you know, human and aliens. British and immigrants. That kind of idea.’ I fumbled.

  ‘An admirable fable.’ Charles gently laid the tile in the empty space.

  ‘Didn’t reading A Christmas Carol scare you? Especially the last ghost, the one who didn’t talk?’

  He paused and his body stiffened. ‘I don’t remember,’ he murmured. ‘Should ghosts frighten or terrorise?’ He glanced up at me.

  ‘Bad ones, surely. Those who mean harm.’

  ‘Is that what ghosts do, hurt people?’ He pressed down on the tile with a grunt of exertion.

  I shrugged. ‘I don’t know. I don’t believe in them. It’s all nonsense and probably meant to scare children. Don’t be bad or the boogey man will get you.’ I waved my hands in the air and made whooping noises.

  A faint smile trickled over his face. ‘But not your monsters, because they’re nice and friendly.’

  It was time to knuckle down to work. ‘Very friendly,’ I agreed. There were hundreds of tiles in the floor mosaic and probably a few dozen were damaged or loose. It had taken him fifteen minutes to repair one, then he’d have to wax the floor. It amounted to several hours work. I smiled, knowing I’d have company nearby. ‘Put your radio on if you like. I don’t mind it in the background.’

  I left him to work and left the sitting room ajar so I could listen to the gentle music.

  The fire blazed in the hearth, generating copious heat for my wriggling toes. Outside of the living room window, the grass remained crisp with white frost. I blew on my cold hands and picked up my pencil. Replaying our conversation, it dawned on me he hadn’t answered my original question – what the hell had he done over the Christmas?

  ·•●•·

  I hurtled down the stairs, out onto the landing, then down the next lot of steps. The telephone trilled louder and with an urgency that had even penetrated my den in the attic. Charles hovered by the telephone, his hand outstretched.

  ‘I’ll get it.’ I skidded across the tiled floor and snatched at the handset. ‘Yes? Miriam here.’ I wanted it to be Mr Craven, to have him announce he’d found Felicity’s things safely stowed in a storage box somewhere and in it would lie the answer to my question – why was I here?

  ‘Miriam, are you ready for this?’ Guy’s abrupt style greeted me.

  I rested my shoulders against the wall and rubbed my fingers across the creases in my forehead. ‘For what?’ I waved the lurking Charles away and he tiptoed to the other end of the hall where he’d been working.

  Half an hour later I hung up. He’d sweet-talked me into more work. Another project to sit alongside my existing one, plus the drawings I was doing for Ruth, which we handled directly between us, rather than through Guy. Now I would have plenty of work to keep the winter month’s flying by and a long list of things still to do in the house that hounded me whenever I wandered into any room. Three days after I’d returned to Heachley and the rhythm of my life had returned to drawing, eating and sleeping.

  I sank my bottom onto the lowest step of the stairs and buried my face in my hands.

  ‘What’s wrong?’

  I peeked between my fingers. Charles came over and crouched before me, his hands clasped between his knees.

  ‘Just, too much going on,’ I sniffed.

  He touched my chin with his forefinger using it to lift my head – the gentlest of nudges. Those voluminous eyes of his with tiny pinpoint pupils stared right at me. ‘Tell me.’

  ‘I need money, so I’m working my socks off and I don’t usually take on this much work. My agent’s given me another book to work on and it’s a good contract and the author is well-known. But, this damn house.’ I thumped the step next to me. ‘The rooms need painting, some of the floorboards need replacing and there’s the rotten window frames. Oh, and the jungle garden needs a chainsaw. Argh!’

  ‘Miriam, I’m here to help.’ He settled on the step next to me. ‘What else is bothering you?’

  Charles’s radar of perception often surprised me. He refused to stop at the obvious and rightly suspected that other things heaped stress on my shoulders.

  I sighed. ‘Felicity. I was hoping to find out more about her and why she left this place to me. She wanted me to live here and went out of her way to make it the better option, even with the lack of money up front, but I’m not convinced she simply saw this place as the pot at the end of the rainbow.’

  Propping his elbows on his knees, he leant forward, entwining his fingers together. ‘Can’t help you with that. She kept secrets for a reason and they died with her. However, I liked Felicity and she always had time to talk to me.’

  ‘What about?’

  ‘Books, primarily and her time in India.’

  ‘You said she’d quite a library.’

  ‘Yes. A mixture of novels, art books, pamphlets about travelling abroad, others about different religions. Lots on India, its culture and people. I borrowed a few. I love history books and maps. She had a big atlas.’

  My ears had pricked up when he mentioned the one thing I hoped I had in common with my great-aunt.

  ‘Art books?’ I queried.

  ‘Illustrated tales from India. Great epics with exquisite plates. Postcards, too.’ Charles waved his hands at the walls. ‘Tapestries. She draped these walls in colourful pictures and didn’t care much for the cracks forming behind them. The rugs were from Persia or Nepal. The pottery in the kitchen – bright and nothing like what I use.’ He coughed and waved a dismissive hand. ‘You know, china and porcelain, old stuff.’

  I tried to imagine what the house might have looked like: exotic sculptures, symbols of religion, perhaps Hindu elephant gods or a chubby Buddha sitting cross-legged. ‘Was she religious?’

  He chuckled softly. ‘No, not really. She didn’t care for a particular religion and was very broad in her tastes. She had a crucifix on the mantelpiece in the drawing room alongside a statue of some Hindu god.’

  I smiled. Felicity embraced life with an openness I admired. But then I remembered the bonfire Tony described, when Felicity’s things had been unceremoniously burnt. ‘Why didn’t he sell her things?’

  Charles straightened. ‘Who?’

  ‘Effing Mr Porter. Didn’t he want to make money out of this place? So why not sell her things rather than burn them.’

  ‘Probably because much of her things were foreign in style.’

  ‘Around here, maybe, but in other parts of the UK it would be common to have Indian art decorating houses. Birmingham, Leicester, Manchester all have Asian communities, so why did he get rid of it all.’

  ‘Did he?’

  I opened my mouth then changed my mind. I’d assumed Porter told the clearance guys to burn her things, but perhaps he hadn’t. Perhaps, he had no idea what the contents were and had relied on local people to deal with the clearance, that led me to wonder if they’d burnt what had no value and sold the rest without telling him.

  ‘I supposed it could have been sold. So where’s the money?’ I pondered.

  ‘Seems to me you have some questions to ask.’ Charles stood and a puff of dust fell from his trousers.

  ‘Do you think you could remember what was in the house? Help make a list?’

&nbs
p; He didn’t answer straightaway. He wandered back to where he’d left his tools. ‘I only know about a few rooms, the downstairs ones. I couldn’t tell you the value of anything.’

  ‘All I need is a rough idea of what was here. If only I could find Maggie and ask her. She would have cleaned all the rooms.’ I rose, turning to climb the stairs. ‘I doubt this will come to anything. Knowing Mr Porter, he’ll have some excuse for what happened to the contents of the house.’

  ‘She wasn’t proud, Felicity,’ Charles said, his attention on the broken tiles at his feet. ‘It’s quite possible the contents had little commercial value. She spoke of a love of markets and bazaars, buying things for her mother. I think she wanted to recreate her life in India between these walls, and it had nothing to do with intrinsic value.’ He paused, then spoke softly, ‘She missed the warmth of the sun, the colours, the monsoon storms.’ He lifted his head and the whites of his eyes shone under the light.

  ‘Why didn’t she go back?’

  He shrugged. ‘Because she’d no family there. Her mother gone, no sisters or brothers. If she had other relatives out there she never spoke about them. Ever.’

  How I regretted not knowing her better. If only my parents had visited more often. ‘Family. Me and Dad, we were it. Except, we never bothered to visit her once Mum died.’ I ran my hand along the smooth banister; Charles had polished the surface into a sheen. ‘When Ruth was here we went to Old Hunstanton. While we were on the beach, I remembered being there with Felicity. I must have been a young child.’ The same image over and over: the sand sifting between her painted toenails.

  ‘She loved the sea. The waves.’ He blinked and turned away, bending over to pick up the hammer.

  ‘Do you go swimming in the sea?’

  His back stiffened, half bent. ‘As a boy. I swam, yes.’ He straightened. ‘Felicity lived by the sea in India.’

  It explained the happy expression on her face. Those memories re-emerged with clarity, unlike the house, which I barely recalled. ‘She wore a yellow sari, that day on the beach.’