by Robin Jarvis
‘Be silent!’ Miss Ursula commanded.
Her sister's wrinkled face seemed to cave in on itself as she sucked in her bottom lip and screwed up her eyes. ‘I never said it,’ she sheepishly whimpered through the top row of her large, gravestone like teeth. ‘I wouldn't give it away, you know I wouldn't!’
‘Get you both upstairs,’ warned Miss Ursula.
Abashed, Miss Celandine and Miss Veronica ambled back to the stairs with downcast faces. Then, with one trembling and withered hand poised upon the bannister, Miss Celandine glanced anxiously back at their formidable sister.
‘Ursula,’ she uttered in a meek and plaintive voice, ‘does this mean that you won't permit me to begin knitting? You did promise—it's been an age or more since I last. . .’
‘Of course you can begin,’ came the calm reply. ‘Now begone.’
Miss Celandine's shrivelled face brightened immediately and she turned to the raven-haired and chalk-faced woman at her side. ‘Then you must cast on for me, my pet,’ she squeaked. ‘Let us begin at once. Quickly, we must be swift.’
‘I wanted to remain with the children!’ moaned Miss Veronica.
“Well you can't. You heard Ursula.’
‘But I don't want to measure the wool and cast on for you. It's been too long, I mightn't remember how.’
‘Of course you will.’
‘But there are so many things I do forget, so many faces I cannot recall and the museum crowds in so, it confuses me on purpose!’
‘You're being a silly.’
‘I am not!’
‘Are too!’
And so, squabbling, they made their way back up the staircase until they were out of sight but their voices continued to drift down for many minutes.
Alone with the Chapmans, Miss Ursula Webster allowed a wan smile to steal over her gaunt features. ‘Alas for my poor sisters,’ she sighed. They have so few excitements, your arrival is a great occasion. I would repeat, however, that they are not strong and tire easily. Kindly bear that in mind.’
With that, she gave both Josh and Neil a steady, chastising stare, then briskly opened the door. ‘Follow me,’ she instructed.
Neil nudged his father in the back. ‘Are you serious about this?’ he asked in disbelief. ‘Dad, these nutters could be dangerous. What we're doing is crazy.’
Mr Chapman let out an exasperated snort. ‘Do you really think I'd put you and Josh at risk? Give me some credit, Neil, they're just harmless old ladies.’
‘Well, they give me the creeps,’ the boy answered, “specially the head witch over there.’
‘Don't lag behind,’ his father said, turning to follow Miss Ursula, ‘come and see where we'll be living from now on.’
Beyond the hallway was a large, rectangular room. Great glass display cabinets crowded much of the space but here and there a marble statue peeped above, around or below them. The walls were painted a dusky blue and on them were hung many drab oil paintings depicting various unrecognisable landscapes and even more unrecognisable people.
Neil's footsteps rang on the wooden floor as he trod cautiously inside and glanced around the unfamiliar surroundings, conscious the whole time of the old woman's remarks concerning the heart and spirit of the museum and feeling terribly small within it.
‘Do hurry along,’ she barked, spinning on her heel and striding resolutely to the far side of the room towards a second doorway.
‘What's that?’ Josh asked, pointing to the tall display cases.
‘Boring stuff,’ Neil told him, ‘dull, dusty history. Old papers, old books, old rubbish.’
‘Oh.’
Through this room the elegant, elderly woman led them and next they found themselves traipsing through a smaller area jam-packed with fossils and countless mineralogical samples; from fragments of bubbled lava to a myriad of different coloured quartz. Running around the walls was a frieze showing a prehistoric landscape in which dinosaurs chewed lush vegetation and savagely attacked one another. Josh especially liked this room and would have lingered to gape at the exciting pictures but Neil said that he would get himself lost and hauled him smartly away.
Into one room after another Miss Ursula marched, sometimes turning right, then left or straight ahead, until Mr Chapman lost all sense of direction and began to feel that he would never find his way out again.
Finally, they came upon a dimly-lit passageway and were shown to a door covered in peeling green paint.
This suite of rooms is to be yours,’ the old lady told them, turning a key in the lock and ushering the Chapmans inside. ‘It hasn't been lived in for some years now but I'm certain you will find it to your liking.’
The accommodation was small and consisted of a living room, one double bedroom, a kitchen and a bathroom.
Standing in the poky living room, Neil surveyed the drab, flowery wallpaper and the few pieces of old furniture. There was a brown settee, the arms of which were black and shiny from years of use, a fold-down table with two unmatching chairs and a bookcase that was empty save for a dead spider plant and a chipped mug. In one corner stood an ugly standard lamp covered with a dusty turquoise shade and hanging over the narrow window was a net curtain that was yellow with age.
The disgust was plain on Neil's face and he glanced briefly into the bedroom to see if that was any better. It wasn't.
‘Dad,’ he muttered, ‘where are me and Josh going to sleep? There's only one bed.’
Mr Chapman began to get flustered and he pinched his nose as he stared miserably into the room.
Wearily, Neil shook his head and folded his arms. ‘Do you mean,’ he hissed at his father, ‘that you took this job without even looking at this place? I don't believe you sometimes.’
‘Is there a problem?’ inquired Miss Ursula.
‘No, not at all,’ Mr Chapman hastily lied before Neil could say anything. ‘This will be fine. Once we get our bits and pieces in it'll be cosier than our old place. Thank you very much, Miss Webster, I'm very grateful.’
The old lady smiled, icily. Then I shall leave you to settle in,’ she said. ‘If you can begin work first thing tomorrow, Mr Chapman, I shall inform you of your duties.’
Closing the door behind her, Miss Ursula left and Neil turned a belligerent face on his father.
‘Before you start,’ Mr Chapman protested, holding up his hand to halt the torrent of blame and criticism which was about to be unleashed, ‘I don't want to hear it! You know I couldn't afford the mortgage on the house since your mother left. OK, maybe I should have checked out this flat but I never expected to get the job. So what if it's a bit small? It's only for eating and sleeping in, you can wander about the whole of the museum when you want to. Look out there, there's a yard for you both to play in. As for the sleeping arrangements, I'll bag the sofa, you and Josh'll just have to share the bed for now, until I can get hold of a camp bed for him—or change it for two singles. Buck up, Neil, it isn't that bad.’
Neil said nothing but stared at his father reproachfully. They had left everything—their home, his friends, his school, and for what? For this tiny box of a place in the middle of nowhere with three barmy old loons for company.
At that moment Josh began to cry and though Mr Chapman tried to comfort him he would not be silenced.
‘You'll soon get used to it, Josh,’ he burbled. ‘A lick of paint'll cheer this place up and once you've unpacked your toys... Oh, stop crying for God's sake!’
Standing by the window, Neil gazed out at the dreary, walled yard, feeling thoroughly bleak and miserable. As his brother's wailing continued, he turned and gave a pitying groan.
‘I think he's wet himself,’ he muttered.
Chapter 3 In The Separate Collection
In the days that followed, the new caretaker and his family did their best to make the small apartment more comfortable. The walls were given several coats of canary-yellow paint and although here and there ghostly images of flowers were still visible, the overall result was most satisfactor
y and the living room appeared bright and brimming with sunshine. The shabby settee was covered with a colourful check blanket, their old television was given pride of place in the corner, where the standard lamp had stood; Mr Chapman filled the bookcase with his own precious volumes on bird-watching and steam trains and, as they could not afford any more paint, Neil covered the sombre bedroom wallpaper with football posters.
During this hectic time, the boys had little opportunity of exploring the rest of the museum and saw nothing of the strange Webster sisters. Mr Chapman was kept extremely busy for, as Miss Ursula pointed out, the general upkeep of the place was now up to him. Floors needed polishing, as did the glass cabinets; the statuary had to be dusted and it was his responsibility to ensure that the pot plants were well watered; and he had to be on duty on the rare occasions when the museum opened to the public.
The first of these took place on only the second day after the Chapmans’ arrival and Brian became extremely nervous as he realised that he would be quite alone. Miss Ursula instructed him in the plainest of terms that she had no intention of assisting in the supervision of the visitors. When the day came, however, Mr Chapman's anxieties proved foundless, for though the doors were open from half-past nine in the morning until midday, not one single person wandered into the premises. When he remarked on this to Miss Webster the following morning, she expressed no surprise and said that it was an unusual event when someone did stray into the museum.
When Neil and Josh finally left the confines of the flat, they ignored the dubious attractions under their father's care and decided instead to venture into the grimy yard outside.
The concrete-covered area was a sad and gloomy place. Hemmed in by the back of the museum on one side and twelve foot high brick walls on the other three. It was like stepping into the exercise yard of a prison. The lofty walls were tipped with iron spikes and although there was a wide opening in the side wall it was barricaded by a padlocked, metal gate which in turn was covered with sheets of wood.
In this colourless courtyard Neil and Josh kicked a ball around, using a spare plank and a drainpipe to mark out the goal posts. For a little while, the thud of the football resounded around the four walls, joined with Josh's happy laughter. But eventually the claustrophobic and melancholy atmosphere of the place began to affect them and Neil was soon glancing nervously up at the blank windows of the museum.
'There's someone up there,’ he murmured, ‘watching us. Maybe we've woken those barmy sisters.’
Unsettled, Josh shivered-in spite of the warm scarf that came up to his nose and the woollen bobble hat he had pulled low over his ears. Leaving his brother to continue the game alone, he shuffled despondently about the yard like a mouse in a cage.
Fixed to the wall, beside one of the windows, was a china drinking fountain and Josh stared long and hard at it. The glaze of the bowl was chipped and covered in a livid green, slimy moss which he touched with the tip of his mitten and sniffed gingerly.
Giving the ball a final kick into the air before catching it, Neil turned his face to the museum and glared defiantly at each window, trying to catch a glimpse of whoever was spying on them. Only the dull, grey light of the leaden sky was reflected in the glass and the boy's unease mounted.
‘It's as if the museum itself is watching me,’ he breathed, ‘all those windows are its eyes—it didn't like having a ball kicked against it. It doesn't like me...’ His mouth dried as this unwelcome thought took menacing shape in his head, then abruptly he shook himself and managed a deriding laugh.
‘Don't be soft,’ he scolded, ‘I'm letting this dump get to me. Its just a smelly old heap of bricks.’
Disgusted at his childish imaginings, Neil called to his brother that it was time for him to prepare their father's lunch and they'd better go back inside.
‘Neil,’ Josh piped up, ‘Why is this toilet out here?’
‘Dimbrain,’ his brother chuckled. 'That's not a bog, it's one of them drinking things—my old school had one.’
“What does it drink?’ came the fascinated response.
'The blood of little boys,’ Neil teased.
‘Doesn't!’ Josh moaned unhappily, taking a step backwards.
“Course it doesn't—you're supposed to drink from it. I wouldn't fancy anything that came out of that horrible old thing, though. It's all green and I bet the water'd be stagnant, probably full of germs.’
‘How does it work?’
‘You push this lever down and... oh, nothing. The one at school didn't work either. Come on, I'd better open a tin of soup for Dad—he'll be finishing round about now.’
Together they headed for the door to the apartment but, just as Neil was about to follow his brother inside, a faint trickle of laughter floated down into the courtyard from somewhere high above.
The boy threw his head back but saw no one. ‘It was one of those nutcases,’ he muttered to himself.
On New Year's Day, Neil finally decided to explore the museum. Josh had been listless all morning, having dreamed about their mother, and kept asking questions about her. Thankfully, it was a Sunday and Mr Chapman was there to deal with his son's confusion, albeit rather clumsily and with much shaking of the head, because he didn't fully understand either. Josh was too young to grasp that she had made a new life for herself and that they would probably never see her again. Yet his continual harping on the subject, combined with his father's inept and faltering explanations, made Neil irritable. Leaving Josh drawing a picture of her, with Brian looking glumly on, Neil left the flat and wandered into the Wyrd Museum.
The first of the large rooms now smelled strongly of floor polish and the cabinets sparkled in testament to the diligent labour of the new caretaker.
Above each doorway was a large brass plaque denoting what was housed in each particular room. Neil spent some minutes in 'The Fossil Room’ but was too eager to roam throughout the rest of the building to take much interest in individual exhibits.
It was a peculiar sensation, knowing he had the entire place to himself. According to what his father and Miss Ursula had told him, the three sisters hardly ever left the third floor, so he was not afraid of bumping into one of them. Through room after room he went, a lone figure intruding upon the unending solitude which lay heavily over the whole museum.
In his mind, Neil likened his slow exploration to an insect crossing the surface of a deep, dank pond. Before him all was calm and still but his progress caused rippling swirls of disturbance that eased only when he had left and the timeless peace gradually returned.
It was a perfect place for thinking and after nearly an hour of this idle meandering, his thoughts soon drifted back to Josh's preoccupation with their mother. He wished she'd been able to put up with his father for a little while longer; if he hadn't driven her to distraction she wouldn't have sought refuge in evening classes and would never have met that man. Sorrowfully, the boy wondered what she was doing now and found that he missed her far more in this strange, eccentric environment than in their house in Ealing.
Unexpectedly, Neil discovered the door that opened into the main hallway, and this reminder of that first day jolted him from his preoccupied thoughts.
The suit of armour was now reassembled and leaned, once more, against the wooden panelling. Idly studying the rusting figure, he wisely refrained from giving it even a tentative prod and gave his attention instead to the staircase.
With one hand on the bannister, Neil craned his neck to see the first-floor landing and began to climb.
It was obvious that his father's industry had not yet extended to the upper floors. The brass plaques above the doors were dull and unburnished, the floors had not been waxed and layers of dust had settled upon the cabinets.
The museum was much larger than he had ever imagined; perhaps it was the layout of the galleries and rooms which tricked him, for there was always another door to pass through and unless he looked out of the windows, he had no idea whereabouts in the building he was.
Several rooms were boxed within others and had no windows at all, relying on the electric light for their illumination, and were in total darkness when Neil came upon them. They were often filled with shadow that no amount of light bulbs could disperse and the hairs on the back of his neck prickled when he walked amongst the exhibits there.
One of these windowless rooms was called ‘The Egyptian Suite’, and when Neil found the light switch he discovered that it contained three large sarcophagi, complete with mummies, lying in long glass cases.
‘Well, those “mummies” won't be going to evening classes,’ he muttered, grimly. But despite these glib words, Neil had never liked horror films, where the embalmed and bandaged dead had come back to life to throttle everyone who disturbed their rest, so he hastened through and snapped the light off as quickly as he could.
By now it was late in the afternoon and just as he decided to return to the apartment, he came across a room entitled 'The Separate Collection’.
The musty smell was stronger here than anywhere else, and when Neil entered he wondered if one of the windows had been left open, for it was intensely cold and goose pimples crawled over his skin.
At first glance, the room appeared the same as the countless others he had strolled through but when he looked a little closer, Neil realised that the exhibits in here were totally different and increasingly bizarre.
It was the statues he noticed first; where before they had been competent but boring examples of reclining figures or tame representations of classical gods, now they were startling shapes with twisted expressions, contorting their faces. Several sculptures were incomplete and, near to the door, he came across a grand plinth covered with a relief of golden, scrolling ferns; but all that was left of the statue it had once supported was one shapely foot carved from ivory and snapped off at the ankle.
A grin spread over Neil's face when he saw this and he bent down to read the small inscription written round the base of the plinth.