Hidden (Marchwood Vampire Series #1) (20 page)

As her eyes
adjusted to the gloom, she saw that the cellar was a cavernous
space with piles of crates and boxes stacked against each wall.
Maddy walked towards the far wall, crunching over more glass and
picking her way past boxes, piles of papers and other stuff. A
narrow corridor lay to the right of the room and she walked down
it, brushing away cobwebs which floated into her face. It was like
being on a cheesy ghost train at the fair. There were some smaller
rooms off the corridor and she peered in. All empty. She turned
around and walked back to the main space.

Picking a
crate at random, she tried to open it, but found it nailed shut.
She went for a cardboard box instead and rested the torch on a
crate so it shone directly at the box. It was covered in an
inch-thick layer of dust. Just looking at it made her sneeze. She
pulled back the cardboard flaps to reveal scrunched up newspaper.
Maddy smoothed out a corner and saw a date – 1923. She opened it
out to reveal a wine glass. Not very interesting. She put it back
and opened another box – just an old patterned china tea set. She
was curious about the large crates though.

She went
upstairs to look for something to prise them open with. There was
nothing in the kitchen or utility room, so she braved the
horizontal rain and pelted round to the side of the house where
she’d noticed a couple of outbuildings. Both were locked so she
went back to the house, drenched, freezing and frustrated. Pulling
her sopping wet jumper over her head, she charged up the stairs and
bumped into Esther on her way.

‘
Oh!’ Esther gave a small scream. ‘You frightened the life out
of me.’

‘
Sorry. I’m just going to get changed.’

‘
Hmmm, you need to be careful on those stairs. We could’ve
come a cropper with you charging around like that.’

Maddy took a
deep breath to stop the sarcastic reply that hovered on her lips.
Instead, she asked Esther if she knew where the keys to the
outbuildings were. It turned out there was a set hanging in the
utility room by the back door.

Maddy pulled
on a dry pair of jeans and a sweatshirt and raced back downstairs,
barely missing Esther on the stairs again.

‘
For goodness sake, I need danger money working here!’ she
called after Madison.

‘
Sorry!’ Maddy yelled back up the stairs.

She skidded
into the utility room, shrugged on her parka and slipped her feet
into her old trainers. A large bunch of keys hung on a hook by the
door. Maddy grabbed it, hunched her shoulders and headed back
outside into the deluge. After a couple of goes she got lucky and
managed to open the door to one of the stone outbuildings.

All manner of
garden implements hung in orderly rows on the wall and a metal
shelving system housed other useful objects - tins, pots, bottles
and boxes. She picked up a large garden spade and thought it might
just do the job, but then she spotted a long black crowbar hanging
on the wall.

‘
Bingo.’

Maddy and the
crowbar made short work of the first crate and she lifted off the
splintered lid. Something large and square rested on the top,
wrapped in a thick piece of cloth. Maddy lifted out the heavyish
object and unfolded it from its grey shroud. It was a painting, a
portrait of a young girl from long ago in an ornate gilt frame. She
had a beautiful face with long dark hair pulled back in a loose
chignon. She stared confidently out of the frame and Madison stared
back at her for a few moments. She set the painting down carefully
on the floor, leaning it against the crate.

Delving
further into the box, she pulled out several other portraits of
different people. Maddy looked at their faces in the torchlight and
shivered. If this was her ancestor’s house, maybe these were
paintings of her family. She could ask Mr Vasey-Smith if he knew
anything about them. For now, she’d take the paintings upstairs
where there was decent lighting to study them properly. Perhaps
their names were written on them. Wow. She wondered what she’d find
in the other boxes and crates.

But right now
she was hungry and actually quite tired. She returned the paintings
to the crate except for the one of the girl which she brought back
upstairs. She looked down at herself and realised she was filthy,
covered in dust and grime. God, she’d have to change clothes again
for the millionth time. Esther was a moody old cow but at least she
did look after Maddy and Ben, what with doing all their washing and
stuff. Maddy knew that when she put her dirty clothes in the basket
at the top of the stairs, the next day they would be miraculously
clean, dry and freshly folded, ready for her to wear again.

Morris dropped
Ben back home at four fifteen and Maddy was dying to know how he’d
got on. She took his wet coat and bag and ushered him into the
kitchen where they sat in front of the large cream range.

‘
So? How was it? Did you make any friends?’

‘
I’m hungry,’ he replied.

Maddy pushed
the fruit bowl towards him.

‘
Not fruit, Mads, I need something proper,’ he pushed the
fruit bowl back at her.

Maddy stood up
and opened the larder. She took the lid off a dark green tin with
flowers and fruit on it. Inside, sat a round fruit cake. It smelt
delicious. She tipped it onto a wooden chopping board and hacked
off a large slice.

‘
Excellent,’ he said and started scoffing it.

Maddy cut
herself a smaller slice and nibbled a corner.

‘
Come on, Ben. How did it go?’

‘
Mmm, fine,’ he said, through a mouthful of cake. ‘Lessons
were pretty boring, but I met a few people. Seems okay.’

Maddy knew she
wouldn’t get any more information from him for now, so she didn’t
quiz him any further.

‘
Gonna watch some TV, Mads. Okay?’

He took his
cake, dropping crumbs all over the floor and made his way to the
games room and the huge forty two inch plasma screen which Maddy
had purchased for him the previous weekend, along with some games
consoles, a couple of laptops and various other gadgets suddenly
vital to life.

Maddy spent
the next few days down in the cellar. It took ages to clear up the
broken bottles from the party and then, when she’d cleared away
every last shard, she started going through the crates. It was
dirty work. Everything was covered in a century of dust and
cobwebs, and every so often, fat black spiders would scuttle out to
startle her.

The contents
of the crates were fascinating. She came across more paintings,
this time of landscapes which looked very much like the local
scenery. She found bundles of postcards from all kinds of foreign
places, sepia photographs and hundreds of letters. She would take
some upstairs and read them later. The handwriting was beautiful,
all flowing swirls and flourishes, not at all like her messy,
spidery scrawl.

Then, she came
to the clothes - amazing vintage suits, silk dresses, bustle gowns,
voluminous white undergarments, rigid corsets, bonnets, lace
scarves and heavy wool coats. There were dainty dancing slippers,
high lace-up boots and beaded capes. They had all been stored
carefully and were in surprisingly good condition. She lifted out a
gold silk brocade dress, nipped in at the waist and billowing out
to the ground in waves. She held it up to her body, feeling
slightly ridiculous.

Maddy had
never been a ‘pretty dresses’ kind of girl, but could feel herself
becoming seduced by the luxury and sumptuousness of these
other-worldly garments. She imagined her predecessors drifting
around the house in their finery, like something out of a Jane
Austin novel.

They’d studied
the story of Mansfield House at school last term and Madison had
wanted to slap the heroine in it. Fanny, her name was. God, what a
drip. Maddy would never have put up with half of what she had.

Her English teacher tried to explain how different it was in
society for women and girls back then, but Maddy just thought they
were pathetic to just want nothing more for themselves than
marriage to a rich husband. But then again, she knew quite a few
girls who were like that
now
and this was the twenty first century. She knew
she was lucky she’d never have to make the decision between
independence and financial security - She now had both.

Ben would be
home from school soon, so Maddy clumsily folded up the dress and
stuffed it back into its crate. She picked up the torch, preparing
to go back upstairs, but from across the room something
beckoned.

A gleam of
light, a glint of something metallic. She shone the torch at the
far wall, but could see nothing unusual, so she walked closer,
waving the torch around. There it was again. An elusive golden
glint in the wall. She couldn’t get close enough to look properly.
Stacks of boxes blocked her way.

A few were
light enough to shift but she had to get her full weight behind the
larger ones. They scraped stubbornly across the stone floor. It was
no good, she was trying to do this too quickly and there wasn’t
enough space. She’d have to be more systematic but there was no
time now. Ben would be home any minute wondering where she was.
Maddy shone the beam at the glinting spot, just to make sure she
hadn’t imagined it. Then, satisfied, she made her way back
upstairs.

When Ben
arrived home, she told him about the hidden treasures in the
cellar.

‘
What, some old clothes?’ He made himself a jam
sandwich.

‘
Not just old clothes. Anyway, they’re amazing and they
probably belonged to our ancestors. And there was this shining
thing in the wall. I don’t know what it was though. I’m going to
check it out tomorrow.’

‘
Cool,’ he said with a mouth full of sandwich. ‘Some of my
mates are going to see the new X-Men movie in town after school
tomorrow. Can I go? Dan said his mum’ll give me a lift home
afterwards.’

‘
No, I’d like you to help me sort all the stuff out in the
cellar.’

‘
What? Oh ha, ha, very funny. Can I go then? To the
cinema?’

‘
Yeah, Ben. Course you can.’

*

Friday morning, and Maddy ignored the bright autumn sunshine.
Instead, she descended into the dingy cellar. Now she had the whole
day in front of her, she could approach things more methodically.
She shone her torch across the boxes until the light caught the
glint of gold on the wall. Or rather, it looked like it was
in
the wall. No, she
couldn’t quite work it out.

She dragged
and heaved the crates over to a large clear space on the right hand
side of the cellar. She hadn’t opened them all yet, but there was
plenty of time for that. It took her over an hour to move them and
now her hands were black with dirt, her arms ached and sweat
trickled down her back.

Esther would wonder what on earth she was doing to get her
clothes in such a state every day.
Well,
let her wonder
. Finally the far end was
almost clear and Maddy was able to get up close to the
wall.

A chunk of mortar had broken away from the brickwork,
revealing a gap. Through it, Maddy saw the glinting thing. She slid
in her fingertips and felt cold, smooth metal. There was something
there,
behind
the
wall.

Chapter
Twelve

1881

*

Beneath the
surface, the roar of the river instantly muted and Alexandre opened
his eyes to bubbles and foam. He swam downwards and the water
cleared. The rock he had clung to was indeed a stone column of some
kind and he saw another one, huge and cone shaped. Then,
Alexandre’s eyes widened.

There below
him was the cave, just as Havva had described.

Could it
really be the one from the ancient legend, or did this just
conveniently fit the description? Set into pure white rock, four
gigantic fairy chimneys rose up – two above the cave and two on the
river bed, like unwavering guardians turned to stone.

One of them
must have been destroyed, for Havva Sahin had spoken of five fairy
chimneys in the legend. The mouth of the cave sat low and wide.
Alexandre remembered the words of the story and could not help but
imagine the thousands of villagers waiting with their families,
ready to walk unknowing to their doom.

His lungs
began to ache so he shot up to the surface and swam back to the
river bank, ending up much further downstream. Sliding out of the
water, he sat, trying to regain his breath. Isik joined him and
Alexandre told him of his discovery.

‘
I am going back down,’ he gasped. ‘I am going to go into the
cave.’

‘
Wait, my friend. You need to rest and you need to eat. Lunch
was a long time ago and your energy must be low.’

Alexandre did
feel a bit shaky. He sat down and acknowledged Isik was probably
right.

Dry, fed and
rested, Alexandre returned to the cold river and dived down as
before.

The cave was
not deep and he found a narrow crevice at the back. Alexandre
squeezed through and wriggled out into another water-filled space.
He swam upwards, praying he would hit air soon. His lungs were
empty. He finally sprayed up out of the cold water and sucked in a
long gasp of air.

He found
himself in damp swirling darkness, a faint wash of light pulsing
somewhere above him. Alexandre suddenly felt very uneasy. He could
not see beneath the surface of the murky water. His mind turned to
slimy river creatures and mythological monsters. He had to get out
of the water before panic overtook him. He swam until he reached
the edge and pulled himself onto a rocky shelf.