“That was a dull business,” I said to one of the country-looking fellows whom I was next to as I went out.
“Much the same as usual,” he said. “Been to many of these?”
“No,” I said, “actually it’s the first.”
“Come out of curiosity, did you? I didn’t notice you doing any bidding.”
“No fear,” I said. “I just wanted to see how it would go.”
“Well, it’s the way it runs very often. They just want to see who’s interested, you know.”
I looked at him inquiringly.
“Only three of ’em in it, I should say,” said my friend. “Whetherby from Helminster. He’s the builder, you know. Then Dakham and Coombe, bidding on behalf of some Liverpool firm, I understand, and a dark horse from London, too, I should say a lawyer. Of course there may be more in it than that, but those seemed the main ones to me. It’ll go cheap. That’s what everyone says.”
“Because of the place’s reputation?” I asked.
“Oh, you’ve heard about Gipsy’s Acre, have you? That’s only what the country people say. Rural Council ought to have altered that road years ago—it’s a death trap.”
“But the place has got a bad reputation?”
“I tell you that’s just superstition. Anyway, as I say, the real business’ll happen now behind the scenes, you know. They’ll go and make offers. I’d say the Liverpool people might get it. I don’t think Whetherby’ll go high enough. He likes buying cheap. Plenty of properties coming into the market nowadays for development. After all, it’s not many people who could afford to buy the place, pull that ruined house down and put up another house there, could they?”
“Doesn’t seem to happen very often nowadays,” I said.
“Too difficult. What with taxation and one thing and another, and you can’t get domestic help in the country. No, people would rather pay thousands for a luxury flat in a town nowadays up on the sixteenth floor of a modern building. Big unwieldy country houses are a drag on the market.”
“But you could build a modern house,” I argued. “Labour-saving.”
“You could, but it’s an expensive business and people aren’t so fond of living lonely.”
“Some people might be,” I said.
He laughed and we parted. I walked along, frowning, puzzling to myself. My feet took me without my really noticing where I was going along the road between the trees and up, up to the curving road that led between the trees to the moorlands.
And so I came to the spot in the road where I first saw Ellie. As I said, she was standing just by a tall fir tree and she had the look, if I can explain it, of someone who hadn’t been there a moment before but had just materialized, as it were, out of the tree. She was wearing a sort of dark green tweed and her hair was the soft brown colour of an autumn leaf and there was something a bit unsubstantial about her. I saw her and I stopped. She was looking at me, her lips just parted, looking slightly startled. I suppose I looked startled too. I wanted to say something and I didn’t quite know what to say. Then I said:
“Sorry. I—I didn’t mean to startle you. I didn’t know there was anyone here.”
She said, and her voice was very soft and gentle, it might have been a little girl’s voice but not quite. She said:
“It’s quite all right. I mean, I didn’t think anyone would be here either.” She looked round her and said, “It—it’s a lonely spot.” And she shivered just a little.
There was rather a chilly wind that afternoon. But perhaps it wasn’t the wind. I don’t know. I came a step or two nearer.
“It is a sort of scary place rather, isn’t it?” I said. “I mean, the house being a ruin the way it is.”
“The Towers,” she said thoughtfully. “That was the name of it, wasn’t it—only I mean, there don’t seem to have been any towers.”
“I expect that was just a name,” I said. “People call their houses names like The Towers to make them sound grander than they are.”
She laughed just a little. “I suppose that was it,” she said. “This—perhaps you know, I’m not sure—this is the place that they’re selling today or putting up for auction?”
“Yes,” I said. “I’ve come from the auction now.”
“Oh.” She sounded startled. “Were you—are you—interested?”
“I’m not likely to buy a ruined house with a few hundred acres of woodland land,” I said. “I’m not in that class.”
“Was it sold?” she asked.
“No, it didn’t come up to reserve.”
“Oh. I see.” She sounded relieved.
“You didn’t want to buy it either, did you?” I said.
“Oh no,” she said, “of course not.” She sounded nervous about it.
I hesitated and then I blurted out the words that came to my lips. “I’m pretending,” I said. “I can’t buy it, of course, because I haven’t got any money, but I’m interested. I’d like to buy it. I want to buy it. Open your mouth and laugh at me if you like but that’s the way it is.”
“But isn’t it rather too decrepit, too—”
“Oh yes,” I said. “I don’t mean I want it like it is now. I want to pull this down, cart it all away. It’s an ugly house and I think it must have been a sad house. But this place isn’t sad or ugly. It’s beautiful. Look here. Come a little this way, through the trees. Look out at the view that way where it goes to the hills and the moors. D’you see? Clear away a vista here—and then you come this way—”
I took her by the arm and led her to a second point of the compass. If we were behaving unconventionally she did not notice it. Anyway, it wasn’t that kind of way I was holding her. I wanted to show her what I saw.
“Here,” I said, “here you see where it sweeps down to the sea and where the rocks show out there. There’s a town between us and that but we can’t see it because of the hills bulging out farther down the slope. And then you can look a third way, to a vague foresty valley. Do you see now if you cut down trees and make big vistas and clear this space round the house, do you see what a beautiful house you could have here? You wouldn’t site it where the old one is. You’d go about fifty—a hundred yards to the right, here. This is where you could have a house, a wonderful house. A house built by an architect who’s a genius.”
“Do you know any architects who are geniuses?” She sounded doubtful.
“I know one,” I said.
Then I started telling her about Santonix. We sat down side by side on a fallen tree and I talked. Yes, I talked to that slender woodland girl whom I’d never seen before and I put all I had into what I was telling her. I told her the dream that one could build up.
“It won’t happen,” I said, “I know that. It couldn’t happen. But think. Think into it just like I’m thinking into it. There we’d cut the trees and there we’d open up, and we’d plant things, rhododendrons and azaleas, and my friend Santonix would come. He’d cough a good deal because I think he’s dying of consumption or something but he could do it. He could do it before he died. He could build the most wonderful house. You don’t know what his houses are like. He builds them for very rich people and they have to be people who want the right thing. I don’t mean the right thing in the conventional sense. Things people who want a dream come true want. Something wonderful.”
“I’d want a house like that,” said Ellie. “You make me see it, feel it…Yes, this would be a lovely place to live. Everything one has dreamed of come true. One could live here and be free, not hampered, not tied round by people pushing you into doing everything you don’t want, keeping you from doing anything you do want. Oh I am so sick of my life and the people who are round me and everything!”
That’s the way it began, Ellie and I together. Me with my dreams and she with her revolt against her life. We stopped talking and looked at each other.
“What’s your name?” she said.
“Mike Rogers,” I said. “Michael Rogers,” I amended. “What’s yours?”
This didn’t seem to take us much further but we went on looking at each other. We both wanted to see each other again—but just for the moment we didn’t know how to set about it.
Five
Well, that’s how it began between Ellie and myself. It didn’t really go along so very quickly, because we both had our secrets. Both had things we wanted to keep from the other and so we couldn’t tell each other as much about ourselves as we might have done, and that kept bringing us up sharp, as it were, against a kind of barrier. We couldn’t bring things into the open and say, “When shall we meet again? Where can I find you? Where do you live?” Because, you see, if you ask the other person that, they’d expect you to tell the same.
Fenella looked apprehensive when she gave me her name. So much so that I thought for a moment that it mightn’t be her real name. I almost thought that she might have made it up! But of course I knew that that was impossible. I’d given her my real name.
We didn’t know quite how to take leave of each other that day. It was awkward. It had become cold and we wanted to wander down from The Towers—but what then? Rather awkwardly, I said tentatively:
“Are you staying round here?”
She said she was staying in Market Chadwell. That was a market town not very far away. It had, I knew, a large hotel, three-starred. She’d be staying there, I guessed. She said, with something of the same awkwardness, to me:
“Do you live here?”
“No,” I said, “I don’t live here. I’m only here for the day.”
Then a rather awkward silence fell. She gave a faint shiver. A cold little wind had come up.
“We’d better walk,” I said, “and keep ourselves warm. Are you—have you got a car or are you going by bus or train?”
She said she’d left the car in the village.
“But I’ll be quite all right,” she said.
She seemed a little nervous. I thought perhaps she wanted to get rid of me but didn’t quite know how to manage it. I said:
“We’ll walk down, shall we, just as far as the village?”
She gave me a quick grateful look then. We walked slowly down the winding road on which so many car accidents had happened. As we came round a corner, a figure stepped suddenly from beneath the shelter of the fir tree. It appeared so suddenly that Ellie gave a start and said, “Oh!” It was the old woman I had seen the other day in her cottage garden. Mrs Lee. She looked a great deal wilder today with a tangle of black hair blowing in the wind and a scarlet cloak round her shoulders; the commanding stance she took up made her look taller.
“And what would you be doing, my dears?” she said. “What brings you to Gipsy’s Acre?”
“Oh,” Ellie said, “we aren’t trespassing, are we?”
“That’s as may be. Gipsies’ land this used to be. Gipsies’ land and they drove us off it. You’ll do no good here, and no good will come to you prowling about Gipsy’s Acre.”
There was no fight in Ellie, she wasn’t that kind. She said gently and politely:
“I’m very sorry if we shouldn’t have come here. I thought this place was being sold today.”
“And bad luck it will be to anyone who buys it!” said the old woman. “You listen, my pretty, for you’re pretty enough, bad luck will come to whoever buys it. There’s a curse on this land, a curse put on it long ago, many years ago. You keep clear of it. Don’t have nought to do with Gipsy’s Acre. Death it will bring you and danger. Go away home across the sea and don’t come back to Gipsy’s Acre. Don’t say I didn’t warn you.”
“We’re doing no harm.”
“Come now, Mrs Lee,” I said, “don’t frighten this young lady.”
I turned in an explanatory way to Ellie.
“Mrs Lee lives in the village. She’s got a cottage there. She tells fortunes and prophesies the future. All that, don’t you, Mrs Lee?” I spoke to her in a jocular way.
“I’ve got the gift,” she said simply, drawing her gipsy-like figure up straighter still. “I’ve got the gift. It’s born in me. We all have it. I’ll tell your fortune, young lady. Cross my palm with silver and I’ll tell your fortune for you.”
“I don’t think I want my fortune told.”
“It’d be a wise thing to do. Know something about the future. Know what to avoid, know what’s coming to you if you don’t take care. Come now, there’s plenty of money in your pocket. Plenty of money. I know things it would be wise for you to know.”
I believe the urge to have one’s fortune told is almost invariable in women. I’ve noticed it before with girls I knew. I nearly always had to pay for them to go into the fortune-tellers’ booths if I took them to a fair. Ellie opened her bag and laid two half crowns in the old woman’s hand.
“Ah, my pretty, that’s right now. You hear what old Mother Lee will tell you.”
Ellie drew off her glove and laid her small delicate palm in the old woman’s hand. She looked down at it, muttering to herself. “What do I see now? What do I see?”
Suddenly she dropped Ellie’s hand abruptly.
“I’d go away from here if I were you. Go—and don’t come back! That’s what I told you just now and it’s true. I’ve seen it again in your palm. Forget Gipsy’s Acre, forget you ever saw it. And it’s not just the ruined house up there, it’s the land itself that’s cursed.”
“You’ve got a mania about that,” I said roughly. “Anyway the young lady has nothing to do with the land here. She’s only here for a walk today, she’s nothing to do with the neighbourhood.”
The old woman paid no attention to me. She said dourly:
“I’m telling you, my pretty. I’m warning you. You can have a happy life—but you must avoid danger. Don’t come to a place where there’s danger or where there’s a curse. Go away where you’re loved and taken care of and looked after. You’ve got to keep yourself safe. Remember that. Otherwise—otherwise—” she gave a short shiver. “I don’t like to see it, I don’t like to see what’s in your hand.”
Suddenly with a queer brisk gesture she pushed back the two half crowns into Ellie’s palm, mumbling something we could hardly hear. It sounded like “It’s cruel. It’s cruel, what’s going to happen.” Turning, she stalked away at a rapid pace.
“What a—what a frightening woman,” said Ellie.
“Pay no attention to her,” I said gruffly. “I think she’s half off her head anyway. She just wants to frighten you off. They’ve got a sort of feeling, I think, about this particular piece of land.”
“Have there been accidents here? Have bad things happened?”
“Bound to be accidents. Look at the curve and the narrowness of the road. The Town Council ought to be shot for not doing something about it. Of course there’ll be accidents here. There aren’t enough signs warning you.”
“Only accidents—or other things?”
“Look here,” I said, “people like to collect disasters. There are plenty of disasters always to collect. That’s the way stories build themselves up about a place.”
“Is that one of the reasons why they say this property which is being sold will go cheap?”
“Well, it may be, I suppose. Locally, that is. But I don’t suppose it’ll be sold locally. I expect it’ll be bought for developing. You’re shivering,” I said. “Don’t shiver. Come on, we’ll walk fast.” I added, “Would you rather I left you before you got back into the town?”
“No. Of course not. Why should I?”
I made a desperate plunge.
“Look here,” I said, “I shall be in Market Chadwell tomorrow. I—I suppose—I don’t know whether you’ll still be there…I mean, would there be any chance of—seeing you?” I shuffled my feet and turned my head away. I got rather red, I think. But if I didn’t say something now, how was I going to go on with this?
“Oh yes,” she said, “I shan’t be going back to Londo
n until the evening.”
“Then perhaps—would you—I mean, I suppose it’s rather cheek—”
“No, it isn’t.”
“Well, perhaps you’d come and have tea at a café—the Blue Dog I think it’s called. It’s quite nice,” I said. “It’s—I mean, it’s—” I couldn’t get hold of the word I wanted and I used the word that I’d heard my mother use once or twice—“it’s quite ladylike,” I said anxiously.
Then Ellie laughed. I suppose it sounded rather peculiar nowadays.
“I’m sure it’ll be very nice,” she said. “Yes. I’ll come. About half past four, will that be right?”
“I’ll be waiting for you,” I said. “I—I’m glad.” I didn’t say what I was glad about.
We had come to the last turn of the road where the houses began.
“Good-bye, then,” I said, “till tomorrow. And—don’t think again about what that old hag said. She just likes scaring people, I think. She’s not all there,” I added.
“Do you feel it’s a frightening place?” Ellie asked.
“Gipsy’s Acre? No, I don’t,” I said. I said it perhaps a trifle too decidedly, but I didn’t think it was frightening. I thought as I’d thought before, that it was a beautiful place, a beautiful setting for a beautiful house….
Endless Night Page 3