The Dead Summer

by Helen Moorhouse

  They had reached the entrance to the Abbot’s Rest car park and Martha pulled into a spot and switched off the ignition.

  She turned to face Gabriel, riveted by what he had to say. “So they’re in a whole different parallel existence then?”

  Gabriel thought for a moment. “Sort of. Some of them are on different planes to each other but what they all have in common is that they were once alive. They were people with jobs and relationships and worries and they needed to pay the bills and they fell in love and out of love and had families and – and – hobbies! They were accountants and knights and postmen,” Gabriel nodded toward the pub, “and monks.”

  “Did you just see one?” asked Martha, staring at the exterior of the building.

  Gabriel shook his head. “I don’t see one every time I open my eyes and look out the window, you know,” he said with a smile. “Laurence was my first one and after him I began seeing others occasionally. The first bad experience I had was a colleague who was blown up in Northern Ireland. He was presenting as he looked when he died – not pretty – and he was as confused to see me as I was to see him. He didn’t actually know he was dead. I hadn’t a clue what to do of course, so I couldn’t help him but he made me want to work on my – skills, I suppose you’d call them. I did some training – started going to a spiritualist church. Did a lot of practice.”

  Martha was again gobsmacked. “You make it sound like Grade Five Piano.”

  “Well, no one’s just given a skill that they’re instantly brilliant at, are they?” retorted Gabriel. “You have to work at it – which I did – still do. I left the army a year later. I couldn’t focus on it because my gift was getting stronger but I couldn‘t really figure out what to do with it. I kept getting bombarded at inopportune moments with old dears who wanted to say goodbye, and worse still, more soldiers but from all points in history – and let me tell you, people do horrible things to each other in war. And out of it, I guess.” Gabriel trailed off, looking pensive. “The army was just the wrong place to be till I knew what to do with myself so I just worked on the gift, I suppose. Went on the dole for a few years while I learned how to handle it all.”

  “So is Laurence the reason that you don’t do children?” asked Martha.

  “Oh no – Laurence is the reason I do this in the first place. It’s just that since I learned how to use this gift better – I’ll never use the word ‘mastered’, mind – I’ve seen a lot and because children are defenceless, awful things happen to them sometimes. People treat them as though they’re not human – they often treat their animals better. I’ve seen dreadful things, Martha. I’m not going to tell you about them because I don’t want to burden you but where I can I try to avoid cases with children. I don’t walk away if they come to me – it’s just that I’m not very strong around wee ones. But I’m trying.”

  Gabriel’s eyes were sincere and tinged with pain. Martha was more sure now than ever that he was genuine, that he wasn’t making any of this up. And still unnerved that a ghost had been in her car. Funnily, she didn’t feel frightened, but almost honoured. Weird, she thought, for someone who hadn’t been entirely sure ghosts existed at all until the last day or two.

  “You’ve got your own spirits, you know,” said Gabriel. “With you all the time, looking out for you.”

  “What?”

  “Oh yes. They’re like arseholes and mobile phones.”

  Martha furrowed her brow – had Gabriel finally lost it?

  He tutted. “Oh keep up, woman – everybody’s got one is what I mean.”

  “Oh,” replied Martha, only slightly the wiser.

  “Your Ruby, for example – she’s got a host of grannies. There’s a skinny old thing with wonky glasses – connected to your . . . husband?”

  “Oh God, Granny Goodwin!” exclaimed Martha nervously. “My husband’s grandmother.”

  “You have a husband?” It was Gabriel’s turn to be taken aback.

  Martha rolled her eyes. “Ex. Very much ex. Trust Ruby to have a minder from his bloody side after he ran out on her.”

  Gabriel’s eyes widened. “Bloody hell, you have a history?”

  “Another time,” said Martha.

  Gabriel nodded, seeing her reluctance to speak, her face carrying an expression like she had just tasted something unpleasant. “Fair enough,” he said. “But fear not – there’s a second one – a tubby lady, beautiful face and shiny black hair – wasn’t too old when she passed. Was her name Ruby as well?”

  Martha felt tears at the back of her eyes. “That’s my own grandmother. I never knew her because – you’re right – she died young, but she was an amazing woman.”

  “Well, there you go. She looks after you as well sometimes. There’s another woman too – thin and small but she’s not very well from what I can tell?”

  Martha knew instantly that he meant her own mother but she couldn’t go there with him. “I know who that is,” she said, the tone of her voice suggesting that it was all that needed to be said.

  Gabriel barely took any notice. “Right then. So now you know. When it comes to spirits, you have to remember that they’re just people. Sometimes it’s startling when they try to communicate but look at it from the point of view that they’re just doing what they can to get their point across – like we might in a country where they speak a different language. But maybe we’d do it with less flinging stuff and moaning!”

  Martha smiled. “That’s for sure!”

  “I know it’s not that simple, nor that cut and dried, but tonight – when you’re . . . on your own –”

  A shadow flickered across Martha’s face.

  “Just maybe remember what I’ve told you and remember there’s folk looking out for you.”

  Martha nodded, processing the words, but distracted by the thought that the evening was wearing on. “Thanks, Gabriel.”

  “No worries. Now let’s get this done and dusted, eh?” he said, searching for the door handle to no avail. “This bloody car!” he roared in frustration and Martha leaned across and gently pulled on the handle to open the door.

  “How did you spend time in the army without being able to drive, by the way?” she asked.

  Gabriel leaned toward her and spoke in a low voice. “Big difference between ‘can’t drive’ and ‘won’t drive’, my darling. But don’t tell William – he’d have me carting equipment round for him from John O’Groats etcetera. And besides which, it would interfere with the pleasures in life . . .” He mimed drinking a glass of something and rubbed his belly.

  Martha burst out laughing. “Gabriel! You’re such a liar!”

  She shook her head and turned on the ignition, putting the car into reverse. Gabriel began to climb out but then she stopped him.

  “By the way again – what did you put under Ruby’s mattress when you were up there?”

  Gabriel smiled. “Contrary to popular belief that I am the spawn of the devil, I am, in fact, by birth and baptism a . . .” He made the sign of the cross across his chest and mouthed the word ‘Catholic’.

  Martha opened her mouth wide in surprise, only half in jest.

  “Proper Catholics, of course, think I am the antichrist itself,” continued Gabriel, “but when you’re brought up Holy Roman then it’s very difficult to shake so I’ve just left the babe a loan of some extra protection – a trinket of mine if you will. It can’t do any harm anyway, no matter what God, if any, you choose to worship. If all else fails, my sweet, then do as St George of Michael bids us and have a little faith. Now begone, woman! And good luck!”

  Gabriel stepped from the car with little ceremony and without a look back, and flounced into the doorway of the Abbot’s Rest, leaving the car door wide open so that Martha had to get out and close it before clambering back in and reversing out of the parking spot.

  She arrived back at the cottage to find Will on his hands and knees in the hallway taping cables to the floor while Ruby lay beside hi
m, red-faced and fascinated. The smell from her nappy hit Martha the second she reached the doorway.

  “Oh Ruby!” she exclaimed in disgust, stepping around Will as he reversed toward her, and picking her up. “Sorry, Will!” she said, wrinkling her nose at feeling a damp stain on the baby’s jeans.

  “S’alright. Happened a while ago though so I can’t smell it any more. I was going to have a go at changing it once I’d finished this.” He sat back on his ankles. “How did it go with Gabriel?”

  “Oh, we got chatting,” replied Martha.

  “So you’ve kissed and made up then?”

  “Something like that. I’m amazed he used to be in the army!”

  Will shuddered in mock horror. “I’ve seen the photos! Here, if you hang on two minutes I’ll go with you upstairs. To change Ruby.”

  “Oh, I’m fine to go on my own,” said Martha, suddenly realising that she was – she didn’t feel at all nervous about going upstairs by herself.

  “You sure?”

  Martha figured that Gabriel’s pep talk had worked. “Yeah – I’ll be fine. If I need you I’ll shout.”

  Ruby’s room felt cool with the window open but otherwise just like any other room. This is fine, thought Martha as she changed her daughter and selected some clean clothes for her. She dropped the used nappy into the nappy bin and rotated the dial on the lid to seal it inside in plastic. Better empty that before we leave, she thought, reminded suddenly that tomorrow she’d be leaving for good. The thought cheered her immensely.

  Strapping Ruby onto her changing mat, Martha turned to the cot and reached in under the mattress where she had earlier seen Gabriel do the same thing. Her fingers instantly found what they sought and she took the object out to have a better look. She smiled as the delicate silver rosary beads glinted in the sunlight coming from the window. You old softie, Gabriel, she thought. She was touched that he had left an object so beautiful and probably personal here to give Ruby the extra protection that he believed she might need.

  Martha slid the beads back under the mattress and turned to retrieve her daughter. She must make sure to get them back to him tomorrow. Chances were, anyway, that everything would be fine. She kissed her daughter’s chubby cheek and went downstairs to rejoin Will.

  Chapter 28

  Eyrie Farm,

  Shipton Abbey,

  Norfolk,

  England

  February 1st, 1956

  Dear Caroline,

  “Through her holy intercession with our Father in Heaven, may St Brigid bless you and make you generous in your giving, pleasant in your greeting, honest in your speaking, loyal in your loving, clear in your thinking, strong in your working, and joyful in your living. And when it’s time for your homecoming, may there be peace in your passing and a warm welcome in heaven.”

  Isn’t that a lovely blessing all the same? I got it from a book of the saints’ blessings that Mrs Collins gave us, would you believe? She had a distant cousin from Cork visit her last year and this cousin brought a book about saints to Mrs Collins and she a staunch Protestant. How she laughed when she received it but then she thought of us and imagined that I might like it. I was pleased to receive a gift but, to be honest, Caroline, as I haven’t been to Mass nor received Communion since we arrived in Shipton Abbey three years ago I am sure that I am no longer part of the Holy Catholic Church. And indeed I think God is angry with me, he must be, for despite my regular prayers, and my teaching them to Henry, this past year has brought us nothing but sorrows.

  It began in the springtime last year when finally a letter from Daddy arrived. I was sure it would have details of all the arrangements for our homecoming and my heart sank when I saw it for now that Henry is almost three years old I could no more be without him than without my own two legs and there’s no lie in that. I feared beyond fear itself that this letter contained news that someone should come to take him away to the loving home that I so wanted for him once. The letter said no such thing, however, and all it contained was a letter saying that Daddy was very sorry but there was nothing left for us, that his business had been lost to creditors and that the house where we grew up had been sold to try to raise funds to clear debt. We are penniless, Caroline, our father having lost everything he worked for since he came back from the war.

  In the letter he told us that there was no point to our coming home because there is nothing there and that he himself could now be reached only by sending post to Granny Flynn’s old address where I assume he must have moved to stay with Uncle Thomas who inherited her house when she passed. I am glad in a way for the first time that my mother is gone, Lord rest her soul, for she could never have lived through this. Although I feel somehow that if she were still here everything would have turned out differently.

  There was no mention of Henry in the letter, my one consolation, for I can take it that my father has arranged no adoption and that my darling boy is to stay with us. The letter made Marion very angry indeed but for the first time she didn’t fly into a rage but very quietly went outside for a long walk. I fear it has hit her hard that our inheritance, indeed our dowries, should we ever be lucky enough to marry, is gone and that we are paupers with no hope of a return to our childhood home nor even Dublin.

  Gone too from me is Robert, my one true love. At first I was angry beyond belief. I wanted to kill Marion with my bare hands for it was she who ruined everything, but now that we are to stay here forever what is the point? All I can do is get on with my life as I am destined to be alone. At least I have Henry and if I will never be a wife at least I can know some of the joy of being a mother.

  It was Marion who found out about Robert and me when she spied on me one day leaving the house. I had taken to leaving Henry with Mrs Collins in secret rather than with Marion because I feared that the child would be hurt if left in her care. She saw me leave the house and hid in the bushes and saw Robert pull up in his motor car on the road outside and worst of all she saw him kiss me hello. Of course this drove her into a fury and when I returned she told me that she had gone straight to Mr Mountford and told him of the unsuitable match that his son was making. She slapped my face, and began acting the older sister for a change, and told me that I was impertinent and who did I think I was, in a romance when I had Henry to look after and a house to keep and us ruined with no money and no dowries.

  The next day word came from Robert, a letter, to say that he was forbidden from seeing me, that his father felt we were an unsuitable match and that he was to go to university in the autumn as his father wished for him and it was imperative that he obey his father’s wishes. I cried as though my heart should break, Caroline, for though the letter was in Roberts’s handwriting, the words not his own, but his father’s. What have I become, I ask myself? Penniless, living on the charity of others, with no prospects and a small child, though I would not be away from Henry for the world. And hanging over us forever is the shame that my sister has brought on our name.

  When we had money there was some hope of banishing that shame but now we are cast adrift, our father uncaring, left to our own devices in a strange land that has never felt like home. It’s like being a prisoner on Devil’s Island, Caroline. For sure, a paradise with the trees and the estuary and the simple changing of the seasons, but we are prisoners here. Where do we go? What do we do? My prospect of marriage seemed to be a future for us but thanks to Marion that is never now to happen.

  I thought my heart would break in those weeks after Robert’s letter. How I craved his warm kisses and embrace, to hear his voice reassure me and tell me that we should be together forever, how he couldn’t wait to, like the song, shout our love from the highest hills. I have since realised that there is no point in even thinking about it, let alone long for it, so I have shut the part of my heart that is too painful to open. He will never come back to me. I have not seen him since. I take it just that he is at university where he will meet new friends and rise high above my humble station. I am s
ure he has forgotten me already.

  The strangest part of our fortunes in this most desperate of years is on the part of who but Lady Marion herself. You’ll remember that I mentioned that Iris Mountford had married a Frederick Forbes? Well, Frederick has a brother called Albert, or Albie as he is known, and by some twist of fate he and Marion are courting. She met him at a party that she had managed to attend – Marion has never lost her desire to gad about and at the time spent more nights away from this cottage and her son than she spent in it. I have no notion how she inveigled an invite to this particular party but it seems that her ways caught the eye of Albie Forbes and she has been stepping out with him steadily since last Halloween, an appropriate time of the year for such a horror as Marion!

  You wouldn’t believe the change in her, Caroline, since this all started. She paints herself to Albie as some picture of virtue and indeed in some ways she lives up to that – she has stopped being flighty and hanging about with whoever will keep her company or show her a good time. Albie picks her up in his motor car when they go out together. Like the Mountfords he is very rich and lives over near Bickford. She makes sure that he waits outside and also that Henry is hidden away when he calls. If Henry so much as tugs at a curtain she comes home in a rage and once she beat him soundly with her shoe so that the poor little boy was bruised for days on his back and legs and little bottom. Now, when Albie is coming, I make sure that Henry is safely up the stairs in the little back room so that he can’t be seen from the front of the house.

  Marion has completely denied him and what else did I expect? She has always wanted the finest things in life and now, she says, she has her chance because Albie is truly besotted and if she is attentive and virtuous and all the other things that a fiancée should be, then she and Albie will be married and she will never have to want again. Albie must never know that she has a son and she has managed in some way to ensure that Mr Mountford will also keep her secret, he being the only other person other than Robert and Mrs Collins who is aware of Henry’s existence. I dread to think what she has done to ensure Mr Mountford’s silence but silent he is, and Marion now goes to respectable parties and on days out and to Bickford dancing. She has even been to Norwich to a dance, which is further than either of us have been in our three years here.