An English Ghost Story (21 page)

Dad, startled, shrank in his chair as if she’d cracked a whip.

She liked the effect.

Was this what it meant to be grown-up? Being able just to shout and have people pay attention? She’d been speaking softly ever since she could make words, humbly beseeching and wheedling. From now on, she should issue demands.

‘No need to bite my head off, doll.’

She hated it when he called her that.

Mum appeared in the room like a ghost, dust smudges on her forehead and hands. She wore a ratty old dressing gown.

‘Darling,’ said Daddy, still not getting it. ‘That’s better. I was worried you’d vanished too.’

Mum held her dressing gown together with a knotted fist.

In a dream last night, Jordan had seen Mum with another person, someone frightening and wonderful.

‘You’ve got her clothes,’ Mum said.

Jordan realised Mum was right. The outfit she was wearing was what the other person,
the Old Girl
, had left behind. The Drearcliff Grange school uniform, complete with blazer badge. Her whole body writhed inside the clothes, as if everything she wore, and the top layer of her skin, turned to slime. The sensation lasted long seconds.

She hated to be made a part of something without being fully consulted.

‘I’m glad you’re both here,’ said Dad, missing what had passed between ‘his womenfolk’. ‘We need to talk.’

‘That’s true,’ said Mum.

Jordan smelled treachery, an alliance forming against her. Last night’s After Lights-Out all-girls-together session was forgotten, and it was back to the implacable tyranny of the parental junta. Orders handed down from the mountain.

‘It’s more than that,’ said Dad. ‘I need to talk and you, both of you, need to listen.’

His voice, even when not raised, echoed. He sat close to the fireplace. His words were sucked up the chimney and broadcast back at the room as if they came from everywhere.

Mum, shocked, let her dressing gown gape, showing her bra.

‘There’s nothing to be afraid of,’ said Dad. ‘I’m in control. That’s what I want to tell you. Things have been slipping, going to hell again. I’m stepping in to protect you. I’m suspending democracy in this house, taking up the reins of government. For your own good. It won’t be for ever. When I think you’re ready, I’ll let you back in. But there’s a real crisis. I’m the only one who fully understands it and is competent to face it. We have a chance for something good here at the Hollow, something precious and perfect. I wouldn’t be much of a man, much of a father and husband, if I didn’t fight for it. I may have to be hard, make firm rulings you won’t agree with, but you must believe me that it’s all for the best. I’m doing this because I love you. There, now that’s settled and we all feel better. Kirst, love, go into the kitchen and make us all a big pot of tea.’

* * *

K
irsty didn’t know whether to howl or scream. It was as if a series of jabs were aimed at her stomach, punches pulled so she felt only anticipated pain. She couldn’t look at Steven. With his talk of taking the reins and making firm rulings, he wasn’t on the same page. Or in the same book.

‘Tea all round would hit the spot right now,’ Steven said, rephrasing the order as a suggestion.

How could she have married this man? How could the man she’d married turn into this fool?

‘Come on, Kirst, hop to it.’

She didn’t want tea. She wanted a divorce.

‘You don’t want tea, Steven,’ she said. ‘You want your head examined.’

She expected a flare of rage. Instead, he smiled indulgently, like her own father a million years ago when she first dyed and spiked her hair.

‘You don’t mean that,’ he said, insufferably. ‘I feel your anger. It’s good that you give it vent…’

(Give it vent? Where did he get these things?)

‘…and I can take it. That’s what I’m here for. To take it all and soak it up, so you can get it out of your system and over with. Come on, love, give me some more.’

He stood and made a beckoning gesture with his fingers.

She was sputtering, incoherently.

How could anyone misunderstand so much? Steven was not only acting like an insane person, but was going dangerously against the will of the Hollow. She knew now that this place was not just populated, but was itself alive. The wonders they had taken for granted were provisional. There was an equilibrium. If it overbalanced, it would be his fault.

‘That’s better, dear,’ said Steven, thinking the explosion over. ‘Come and have a cuddle. Then pull yourself together and hie thee to the kitchen, wench.’

Horribly, Kirsty found herself wanting to give in, accept a hug and a tissue and turn into the creature Steven wanted. Helpmeet-supporter-confessor-servant-drudge-spermbucket. It would be so easy to give up and let someone else – no matter how misguided – run everything.

No. That wasn’t going to happen.

Red afternoon light poured into the Summer Room and gave her strength.

‘I said “no”, Steven, and I mean it.’

Her own voice sounded truer to herself.

A flicker of doubt crossed his face. Did he realise how insanely he was acting? No, he just wasn’t sure what to do next.

‘Jordan,’ he said, ‘make the tea. Your mother and I need to have a lengthy discussion.’

Jordan didn’t move. Steven looked at her, eyes dark. After a moment, she lowered her head and began to drag herself towards the kitchen. It was the films she was always watching, those horrible fantasies of hooking your man and chaining yourself to his stove, of twin beds and twinsets, of bridge parties and lawns and American chrome-finned suburban nowhere. Her daughter’s spirit had been sapped by that bad influence, and was now broken by the cruelties of the penis-bearing sex.

Her husband smiled. His order was being obeyed.

‘Jordan, don’t,’ Kirsty said. ‘This is your argument too.’

Jordan paused. In her uniform, she looked barely twelve, agonisingly young and lost.

‘It’s in the school rules, Mummy,’ she said. ‘Whatever a master says must be so, or else it’s the strap across the palm.’

Steven was triumphant.

Kirsty laid a hand on Jordan’s shoulder, stopping her dead.

‘Don’t leave this room,’ she said.

Her daughter’s face screwed up, preparatory to a burst of tears.

‘It’s not fair,’ she said. ‘You’re both picking on me, tugging me from either side.’

Kirsty withdrew her hand.

‘Tea,’ said Steven.

At this point, Kirsty hated tea. Its taste was constantly in her mouth, stronger than toothpaste or pepper. Throughout her life, there’d been no disaster that wasn’t supposed to go away after a swig of char. That stopped here. Tea. It was what was wrong with England. She would never again prepare or consume the vile stuff.

It was happening again. Just when she had something going, something that looked like it would work, Steven went behind her back and took it over. If he couldn’t, he would pull it apart, subtly at first and then blatantly. Rose Records, Oddments, Kirsty herself. Her interests, her projects, were threats to his pole position. He always reacted with decisive, destructive action.

She wouldn’t let him get away with it this time.

The Hollow, and all it contained, was hers. It had revealed its magic to her first. This time, she was at the heart of it and he the periphery. He couldn’t stand it. This was just a sneaky play.

He didn’t really want tea. He wanted to break her spirit.

* * *

T
his was only to be expected. He’d grasped the nettle and knew he’d be stung. The thing was to get it over with, to ignore the momentary pain. It was best done quickly. Later, he’d smooth it over and butter them up. What was important was that he make them realise this was where the slide stopped, where the weakness ended.

His wife and daughter stood together, close but not touching, eyelines divergent. He had to keep them apart. They were bad for each other, enabling each other’s weakness.

There was a natural division of labour. One to make tea, one to make the bed.

Tim should be here. He should see this scene, learn this lesson. It was in the way of things that Tim would rise in the family (fight and kill his father) and become the man.

Resistance was crushed. He had been firm, for once. There would be no more straying from the path. He was satisfied, confident.

(He had a half-erection.)

‘I’m glad we’ve talked this through,’ he said. ‘You’ll soon see it was all for the best.’

He let out the breath he had been holding.

Kirsty wheeled around, dressing gown falling open, red flush of anger on her chest, her hands claws. Surely, she wouldn’t make a punch-up of this? If she did, she would regret it. She would lose.

‘Steve, it’s time you listened to someone else,’ she said. ‘You’ve gone absolutely, barking…’

‘Are we early?’

* * *

J
ordan’s head hurt from the current of ill-feeling flowing between Mum and Dad. It was like the old days. For a second, as the new voice filled the Summer Room, she was sure Veronica had come back too. A jagged shadow crept into the room, twiggy arms extended to embrace them all.

But it was a man.

‘I say, we
are
too early,’ he said, coming through the French windows like a comedy vicar.

Mum’s face went as red as her chest. She appeared to have trouble breathing. She looked a complete hag, hair a-straggle, dressing gown limp over her mostly undressed body. Her bra and knickers weren’t even a pair.

‘The minibus is parked in the drive.’

It was the brown man, Bernard Wing-Godfrey, dressed nattily in a beige cardigan with matching scarf and beret. People came in with him.

Mum held her robe over her body. Jordan stood still, afraid her parents would fall like dervishes on this poor interloper and hack him to pieces.

Others crowded in eagerly behind Wing-Godfrey, looking around, eager to be admitted to the sacred turf. Jordan took in a group of mannish ladies and womanly men, mild and apologetic, unsure how to behave.

‘Oh, bravo, Miss Naremore,’ said Wing-Godfrey, spotting Jordan, clapping softly. For a moment, she didn’t understand. ‘What a welcoming touch, the Drearcliff Grange colours.’

Her uniform was uncomfortable for a midsummer day.

A pair of tiny Japanese women in kimonos stepped forward and snapped off photographs on twin cameras. The flashes burst in her head.

Mum bolted, without a word, rushing for the safety of her tower.

It was left to Dad to cope. The man of the house, he had called himself.

‘Come in, come in,’ he said. ‘Jordan, dear, could you get the tea going?’

The sentence took a long time to strike a spark in her brain. ‘Yes, Daddy,’ she said, finally.

As Jordan walked to the kitchen, the Japanese women snapped more photographs, a study of her in motion. She let her hair hang over her face and skulked rather than glided out of the room. Dad was going to get his way after all. Someone else – Jordan – was making the tea.

‘Will Kirsty, Mrs Naremore, be rejoining us?’ Wing-Godfrey asked Dad.

Good question, Jordan thought.

* * *

F
rom the tree, Tim saw non-combatants wander onto the field of fire. A platoon-strength group had come round from the drive and were infiltrating the house through the French windows. The smiling pane was laughing. With these hostages in its power, Tim could do nothing. Or so it thought.

If it was the only thing to do, Tim was prepared to be ruthless, to make sacrifices. He would cry later, after the war was over and the victory won.

The U-Dub was cocked. The aches in his shoulder and elbow had been there so long he was used to them, would miss them if they were gone.

DefCon 1. At least the waiting was over.

He fixed on the smile and smiled right back.

* * *

D
ressed hurriedly, hair at least combed, Kirsty dashed downstairs. She paused outside the Summer Room and caught a low rumble of chat. A blurt of genuine laughter startled her. She must have made a lasting impression on Wing-Godfrey’s Society.

She took a deep breath and pushed the door in.

Steven was playing host. Jordan meekly served tea, dreadful simper plastered on her face, eyes suggesting she was screaming inside.

‘Ah, Kirst,’ said Steven. ‘Come in and meet the Society.’

Attempting poise, she entered the room. Wing-Godfrey smiled at her, raising a mug in half-salute.

‘This is Mrs Twomey,’ said Steven, indicating a horsey, bluff middle-aged woman – Drearcliff Grange’s Angela the Boss grown up. ‘Miss Hazzard, Mr and Mrs Bullitt, and Cynthia and Megumi Kanaoka, from Japan.’

Miss Hazzard was young, blonde and angular enough to suggest spinal deformity. The Bullitts were an enormous woman and a tiny man, their matching mulberry cardigans studded with enamel badges of Weezie, the Drearcliff Grange coat of arms, the Gloomy Ghost and other Teazle characters. The Kanaokas, obviously, were the camera twins.

‘This is our After Lights-Out Gang,’ said Wing-Godfrey.

They all dutifully laughed and smiled. The Japanese women bobbed and bowed, which set the rest of them off again, like nodding dog car ornaments.

They must be expecting Kirsty to go mad again. With an axe.

‘It’s just as I always imagined it,’ said Miss Hazzard. ‘Hilltop Heights.’

‘Except it’s not on a hill,’ added Mrs Bullitt. She had a very strong Birmingham accent.

Kirsty thought of the exercise book upstairs on her dressing table. She was horribly tempted to tell them Weezie lived at the Hollow before Louise disguised it as the Heights, but kept quiet. She still needed to think out what to do with the relic.

‘Drink up,’ said Steven, ‘and you can take the grand tour. We have another child around here somewhere. Don’t be surprised if he pops up out of a hole in the ground.’

‘Like the Wiggy-Wig,’ ventured Miss Hazzard.

‘Indeed,’ said Steven, who had no more idea than Kirsty who or what the Wiggy-Wig might be. These people had their Teazle memorised.

‘You’ve a lovely day for it,’ said Kirsty, unclenching her teeth. ‘We’ve been lucky with the weather.’