by Sarah Rayne
The whisper came again. ‘You do understand …? It’s important that you do … I must get into the house, before they catch me …’
It seemed inconceivable that this totally strange young man could be addressing these words to Michael, but there was no one else about. Uneasily aware that this might be some local ruffian, fleeing from the police – he said, ‘It’s all right. I understand they mustn’t find you.’
The boy did not look like anyone’s idea of a ruffian. He put up a hand in what might be a gesture of acknowledgement, then turned and went back around the house’s side. Michael waited, but nothing else happened, and whoever the boy had been, and whatever his reasons for getting into the house were, it was nothing to do with Michael. He would mention it to Miss Gilmore, though, and there would probably be some perfectly innocent explanation. But by now he would have given a great deal to be able to get back into his car and drive as far away as possible from this house. It was not just that it was bleak and remote, or that elusive young men whispered sinisterly in its gardens; it was that he was finding it unpleasantly easy to visualize dark echoing rooms beyond those walls – rooms that might hide decaying memories or cobwebbed humans, or in which forgotten tragedies might still linger and sigh. Nell would look at him quizzically if he said that to her, and tell him the place was nothing more than a slightly run-down old house, and what did he expect in a house standing in the most waterlogged part of the country?
The thought of Nell’s sharp bright logic brought a semblance of reassuring reality back, and Michael stepped up to the massive old front door, and reached for the heavy door knocker. It fell against the thick oak and echoed sonorously inside the house. Michael waited and was just beginning to wonder if Fosse House was empty after all when there was the sound of footsteps from inside. They were slow, rather uneven footsteps, and he remembered that Luisa Gilmore was in her seventies.
The door opened, and a thin lady stood in the doorway. A dusty light illuminated a large hall behind her.
With only a faint question in his tone, Michael said, ‘Miss Gilmore? I’m Michael Flint.’
‘Dr Flint. Come inside,’ said Luisa Gilmore, and, as if conforming to all the opening lines of sinister ladies dwelling in remote mansions, added, ‘I’ve been expecting you.’
She stood back, and Michael stepped over the threshold.
Two
The inside of Fosse House was much as he had expected. It was vaguely shabby and run down, and there was a faint dimness everywhere – not so much from lack of care as gradual decay from the damp that must seep through the walls and stones and lay a quenching bloom on mirrors and bright surfaces.
But if the house was run down, its owner was not. Luisa Gilmore was certainly in her seventies and she leaned slightly on a walking stick, but as she led Michael across the big panelled hall, although she limped slightly, her movements were sharp and coordinated. She did not appear to subscribe to modern ideas about preserving youth or keeping up with modern fashion; she wore a dark-blue dress of the style Michael thought was referred to as classic, and there was a shawl around her shoulders – although that might be against Fosse House’s coolness. Her hair, which was silver, was brushed in a general style that, like the dress, might have belonged to any era.
She ushered him into a room which she referred to as the small sitting-room but which was still twice as big as Michael’s own sitting room in Oxford. It was not very well lit, but when she sat down in a wing armchair, gesturing him to a seat facing her, the light from a low lamp fell across her face and he thought that she must have been very good-looking in her younger days. But he also thought her pallor was more than the pallor of age – that it might be the pallor of illness. Or was it Morticia Addams after all? Don’t be absurd.
He expressed to Luisa the gratitude of himself and the Director of Music for being allowed access to Fosse House’s annals.
‘I hope you’ll find useful material,’ said Luisa. ‘Would you like a cup of tea or coffee before you drive along to the village? Or perhaps a glass of sherry?’
It was clear she did not want him to start work that evening and even clearer that she would prefer him to go as soon as politeness allowed, so Michael thought sherry would be the easiest and the quickest option. It came in fragile, thin-stemmed glasses, and it was so rich and strong that it would probably lay him flat before he had driven fifty yards. Setting it down after three sips, he explained how he hoped to approach the task ahead.
‘I’ll let you have a note of everything I make use of, of course, but while I’m here I don’t need to intrude on you or your day at all. If you’re happy to leave me with the various papers on the Palestrina Choir I’ll just quietly get on with it.’
‘You will have lunch here, of course.’
‘Well, thank you. There’s no need for you to go to any trouble. Just a sandwich will do.’
‘It won’t be any trouble. I have cleaning and cooking help on several mornings. Someone will be coming in tomorrow morning, and lunch can be prepared for you.’ So might a duchess have referred to unknown underlings who would do whatever they were bidden.
‘Most of the papers are in the library,’ she said, getting to her feet. ‘I’ll show you before you go – I thought it would probably be the best place for you to work. Let me go ahead, then I can switch on lights for you. This is rather a dark house.’
‘I liked the lights you put at the front windows when I arrived,’ said Michael. ‘It was very welcoming to see that.’
She gave him rather a sharp look, but only led him across the hall without speaking. Michael noticed that the slightly limping gait was more strongly marked than he had previously realized. He also saw that she glanced uneasily around as they went, and he wondered if she was not alone in the house after all. Was there someone here she did not want him to know about or to meet? He was about to tell her about seeing the boy earlier, but as soon as she opened the door to the library he forgot about Gothic heroines and young men with leaf-blown scars. The atmosphere and the scents of old leather and vellum, the crowded shelves and stacks of what looked like manuscripts and unbound books, beckoned invitingly and insistently. Come in and unravel the past, said the books and the stored-away papers. Find the pathways into the long-ago, for it’s not very far away, not that particular part of the past you’re looking for. On a more practical note, there were several deep, soft chairs drawn up to the old fireplace, as well as a large library-table under the window. Michael smiled at the room and knew if the research took longer than the planned two days it would be no hardship.
Luisa drew the curtains against the night. ‘The storm is returning,’ she said. ‘If you listen, you can hear it coming in from the fens. I sometimes think it almost sounds like whispering voices.’ Without giving him time to think how best to answer this, she said, ‘So you will be as well to set off now, Dr Flint. With a storm brewing, the road from here to the village centre is an unpleasant one in the dark.’
Michael was about to say he would leave right away, when he caught sight of a thick folder placed on the table, together with a deep cardboard box, both clearly marked ‘Palestrina Choir: 1900–1914’.
It was impossible to ignore them. He sat on the edge of the table and opened the folder, which contained thick wodges of handwritten notes on various sizes of paper, clearly from several different decades. The box held a mass of miscellaneous material, including envelopes of what looked like press cuttings, old theatre or concert programmes, and a number of music scores in a cracked plastic sleeve. These last were largely incomprehensible to Michael, but J.B. would seize on them eagerly. In addition were several pages of typed notes, which looked as if they had been taken from reference books, and which, at first glance, gave a brief outline of the Choir’s creation.
He was distantly aware of his hostess saying something about the contents of the room having been sketchily catalogued some years ago – something about someone writing a thesis which had never been completed �
� but he scarcely heard, because a sheet of paper, half folded inside an old envelope, had partly slid out from the clipped papers. It was a letter, handwritten but in writing so erratic that Michael received the impression that urgency or despair had driven the pen. The stamp on the envelope was foreign, and did not convey anything particular to him, but the letter was on thin, age-spotted paper, and the date at the top was November 1917.
He could not, out of courtesy to his hostess, sit down and read the entire thing there and then, but he had caught sight of the first few sentences and the words had instantly looped a snare around his imagination. The direction at the top was simply to ‘my dearest family’.
They’re allowing me to write this farewell letter to you, and I should be displaying bravery and dignity in it, so that you all remember me in that way. Only I can’t do so, for I am facing a deeply dishonourable death – and an agonizing death – and I’m filled with such terror that I’m afraid for my sanity …
For my sanity’s sake I mustn’t be caught, the young man in the shadowy garden had said. There could be no connection with this letter, though. This was one of the heart-rending farewell missives that soldiers wrote before going into battle – the letter that was sent to their families in the event of their death. The reference the writer made about facing a dishonourable death was slightly odd, though. Had he been an army deserter, facing a firing squad? But in that situation would he have been allowed to write to his family?
It took all of Michael’s resolve to put the folder back on the table, but he did so, and then realized that a phone was ringing somewhere nearby, and that his hostess had gone out of the room to answer it. He remained where he was, looking longingly at the folder. Who were you? he thought, and he was just thinking he might have time to read more when Luisa returned.
‘It seems there is a problem on the road to the village,’ she said, and Michael heard the note of strain in her voice. ‘A short while ago the storm brought down a tree, and it’s lying across the road just outside the house.’ A brief shrug. ‘It happens here at times. But it means the road is impassable and likely to be so until tomorrow when they can clear the tree. I’m sorry, Dr Flint, but it will be impossible for you to reach the village tonight.’
‘Can I drive round it?’ asked Michael, after a moment. ‘Or go in the other direction? There’s surely a pub or something where I can get a room.’
‘I’m afraid not. The tree is almost immediately outside the gates. Even if you could drive in the other direction, that’s more or less a straight run until you come to the coast road. There’re a few odd houses, but no pubs or inns.’ With an obvious effort, she said, ‘So of course you will stay here.’
She did not manage to completely conceal her reluctance, but Michael thought it was because she had suddenly been faced with the practicalities of an unexpected guest. He said, ‘All right. Thank you. But you don’t have to go to any trouble. I can make up a temporary bed for myself somewhere.’ Banishing recollections of his many culinary disasters, he said, ‘I can even sort out a meal this evening.’
‘That won’t be necessary. The girl who comes in the mornings prepared a casserole today. It only needs heating and there will be more than enough for two.’ With a return to her previous imperious air, she said, ‘We will dine at seven.’
It will be all right, thought Michael, standing in the large bedroom on the first floor. This is simply an old house, a bit creaky and whispery, a bit gloomy. But it’s in the depths of the Fens, for goodness’ sake, so it’s entitled to be gloomy and whispery. As for the boy I saw earlier, he was most likely a local, caught where he shouldn’t have been. He remembered he still had not mentioned it to Luisa, and thought he had better do so over dinner.
And, looked at in a positive light, staying here might mean he could get to know Luisa a bit better – they would be eating together this evening, and she might open up about her family, which could be interesting and also useful.
On closer investigation, the house was not as bad as its exterior suggested. It was a bit dingy, and there was an overlying dimness in most of the rooms which might be due to the damp, or simply to some thrifty person having put low-watt light bulbs in all the fittings. Most of the rooms looked as if they were closed up, and Michael thought Luisa probably only used two or three of them. It was rather sad; a house like this ought to be filled with people. He wanted to believe that Luisa had a large family who frequently came to stay, but when he remembered how definite she had been about not being able to offer a couple of nights’ hospitality, he doubted it.
His bedroom opened off an L-shaped, partly galleried landing and had dark, old-fashioned furniture and a deep bed. There was a slightly battered radiator which, when Michael tried the dial, clanked into a reasonable degree of heat, and sheets and blankets were to be found in a linen cupboard. By the time he set out his washing things in an outdated but adequate bathroom, he was able to inform his reflection that it would be quite safe to stay here for one night. He did not examine his use of the word ‘safe’.
It was not quite six o’clock, and the folder with the sad, desperate letter was calling to him with a siren’s lure. If nothing else, he could at least read the whole thing before tracking down the dining room for dinner with Madeline Usher. Presumably, Fosse House was not so far into Gothic or baronial tradition that somebody bashed a bronze gong for dinner, and Michael supposed his hostess would find him when the promised casserole was ready.
Flurries of wind blew spitefully through the ill-fitting windows, and when Michael went past what seemed to be a chimney wall he could hear the gale moaning inside it. Luisa was right, it did sound like whispering voices. Perhaps that was all he had heard earlier in the garden.
The walls of the main landing were partly panelled, and a series of framed photographs and prints hung on them. Some of these looked as if they were of Fosse House, and Michael paused to study them more closely.
The shots were nearly all rather smudgy groups, the faces indeterminate, and without names or dates they were not very informative. The sketches were fairly bland landscapes, probably local scenes, but one sketch was not a landscape, and it drew his attention at once. It hung at the far end of the landing, partly in shadow, and it was not very big, perhaps twelve inches by sixteen. But even from its shadowy corner, it was vivid and imbued with life. It showed a spartan-looking dormitory with wooden-framed bunk beds and deal tables. Young men, wearing some sort of uniform, sprawled on the beds or lounged over the tables, some apparently playing cards or even what could be chess with home-made pieces.
Michael found the sketch disturbing. At first he thought it was because the room was obviously a prison, with the men having the air of animals herded together. But as he went on looking, he began to realize his sense of unease was not engendered solely by the bars at the narrow windows or the glimpses of an enclosed yard beyond them. It was because the young men were being watched – and apparently without their knowledge. Three or four other men were standing outside the narrow windows, peering furtively in. Even depicted in pencil, their faces were unmistakably sly and gloating. They wore uniforms with an insignia lightly drawn on the arms and shoulders, and spiked helmets. Michael knew next to nothing about military history or uniforms, but he thought it was a safe guess that these were the distinctive headgear of the Imperial Prussian Army. Then was this a German prisoner-of-war camp? If so, it was a curious thing to find in an English country house. Or did it tie up with that letter dated 1917?
He stepped closer to the sketch, trying to make out more details, and it was then that he saw the figure seated on the edge of one of the card schools. The young man was dressed carelessly and casually like the others, but the artist had taken more trouble with the details. The deep-set eyes under the slightly untidy hair were distinctive, and on one cheekbone was sketched a small mark – a mark that might have been a leaf that had blown there and become stuck.
It was an exact replica of the young man Michael had
seen earlier. The young man who had feared for his sanity and had begged not to be caught. But it could not possibly be the same person. In any case he had only seen the boy for a few moments and he might not be remembering him clearly. But he knew he was, and with the intention of finding something to dispel his wild imaginings he took the sketch down and carried it to a nearby wall light to examine it more closely. In one corner was a squiggle of unreadable initials – presumably the artist’s – and beneath it the words ‘Holzminden, November 1917’. Michael thought Holzminden was a place rather than a name, and he foraged for the notebook without which he seldom moved to note the details. It could all be checked later. The sketch itself might even be something Nell would find interesting and want to investigate, although pictures were not really her province.
The sketch did not seem to yield any more clues, and Michael replaced it. The likeness would be due to nothing more than a strong family resemblance, and it had nothing to do with his research into the Palestrina Choir, and the music and poetry of the Great War.
He walked slowly along the landing, studying the rest of the display. The photographs included several sepia faces in romanticized surrounds, but there were later ones as well, mostly from the 1940s. It looked as if Fosse House had been used as a small hospital of some kind in WWII; there were photos of the house with nurses and young men in wheelchairs on the lawns. Near the end, half in shadow, was a shot of a long room which Michael thought was at the house’s front. It seemed almost to echo the Holzminden sketch; again there were young men in uniform, some clearly badly wounded, others happily waving crutches or plastered arms at whoever had been behind the camera. As in the sketch, some were playing cards. Others were reading newspapers and looked as if they had put their papers down to pose for the photograph. A typed label proclaimed it as having been taken in Fosse House in November 1943.