The Room Beyond (17 page)

A short time later she heard footsteps in the corridor. Mr Eden’s
familiar face suddenly filled the doorway and then from behind him a small neat
looking woman with dark hair hurried in. The woman nodded courteously and
perched in the chair by Mrs Eden’s bedside. Her chair. She caught at a lump in
her throat and left quickly.

Mr Eden’s broad back lead her downstairs and out onto the narrow
street. She hadn’t ventured outside since their arrival and after the sick-room
the cold fresh air hit her face like a sharp slap of icy water. A carriage was
waiting. Her hand slid into his palm.

‘Thank you so much,’ he said.

She felt her chin tremble.

‘I’ll take her to Paris, we have some friends living on an old farm
just outside the city. But I think it’s for the best if we don’t remain in
contact. I hope you understand. It’s for her safety and yours.’

‘Yes of course.’

‘One last thing. When I first came to you, looking for my wife, I
gave you a sealed letter for Lucinda. It contains information about your
husband’s past. Please do read it. I implore you to read it! Of course it’s
your decision what to do, but I advise you to remain as far away from that man
as possible.’

He gave her a small bow and her eyes blurred as the carriage moved
away. Soon she could see nothing but the shimmer of his waistcoat, radiant with
turquoise and blue; just like the peacock feathers she’d once seen in his
wife’s hair.

The journey home was long and tiring. It was impossible to rest; the
carriage jerked her bones about too much and her body felt cold and shivery. There
was a blanket but its bristles scratched at her and it seemed to give no warmth
at all. Her feet had turned into icy blocks of granite. She screwed her eyes
shut and tried to summon up the memory of warmth.

Italy. Their honeymoon. Orange trees and the sparkling sea and those
delicious almond biscuits which they’d found in their hotel room. People had
smiled at them when they’d arrived; she’d even taken hold of Tristan’s hand,
clasping onto it stubbornly.

Their hotel room had been smaller than they’d hoped for, but with a
stunning view and the sea lapping against the rocks below. As a child she would
have imagined mermaids sliding blissfully through the small triangular waves.

‘Shall we perhaps take a rest darling?’ she’d asked, her face
turning scarlet.

‘No, I’m fine. This room is rather small don’t you think?’

‘Yes, but so pretty and how wonderful to be able to look out at the
sea.’

She’d raised her hand falteringly towards his shirt collar.

‘Well it’s far too small for me. There’s an empty room next door, I
think I’ll go and see if I can get that one for myself.’

‘If that’s how you feel darling, then we’ll both move together!’

‘No, you seem to like it here. I wouldn’t want to spoil that for
you.’

The journey had been strained and unloving enough but she’d felt sure
that things would change once they arrived. She was wrong. She’d come to Italy
with nothing but the shell of a husband. The real man had stayed somewhere
behind and that absence had suddenly sucked every last trace of warmth from the
lovely air. She’d felt as cold then as she did now, shivering in the back of a
carriage. An entire marriage of separate bedrooms and closed doors.

‘One day I will have a house with no doors or locks inside it at
all,’ she murmured softly to herself.

At last the carriage rumbled down Marguerite Avenue and then, once
again, she was peering up at her home. Her body ached to turn around and run
away.

‘Hello.’

The voice seemed to have come from the direction of a cluster of
charms and small coloured bottles hanging from a chain. They glinted against a
backdrop of purple velvet: beads with evil eyes, feathers, a silver skull and
little bottles, green and orange and blue, with delicate silver tops, all
hanging jumbled together.

She followed the chain up and up until she found a small face at the
top crowned by a halo of wispy hair. Of course she knew the face well. She’d
seen it enough times on its way next door, but never close-up like this.

It was a very small face considering the extreme dimensions of the
body beneath it and lined like a walnut, the eyes black pinpricks with barely
any eyelashes to frame them at all. But although it was an ugly face, it was in
no way threatening and it gazed down at her with a rather worried looking
expression, as if she were the one who appeared to be at odds.

‘Hello,’ she replied. She wobbled a little and for a moment his face
split into two identical twins.

‘Are you alright?’

‘Yes, just very tired. I’ve been looking after my sister, she’s
ill.’

‘I’m so sorry. My name is Walter Balanchine. I’m a friend of Mrs
Eden’s father.’

He nodded in the direction of Lucinda’s house. The front door and
windows had all been forced open.

‘I believe she was your neighbour,’ he went on. ‘You do live at 34?’

‘I do.’

‘Yes. I’ve often seen you sewing in the window.’

He edged towards her and she found that she couldn’t move her legs. The
bottles around his neck became even clearer; they contained powders and
liquids.

‘May I ask what it is that you do?’ she said.

‘Yes, of course. I mend broken souls.’

He was watching her intently, those tiny eyes of his drawing her
gaze into them. She couldn’t bring herself to look away. She didn’t want to. It
felt so comforting, as if he’d leaned forwards suddenly and cupped her tired
head in his hands.

‘All those things around your neck. Are you a doctor?’

‘Of a sort.’

‘Then perhaps you can help me with something.’ The bottle of poison
hugged her hand from inside her pocket. ‘Find out what this is, please.’

‘Of course.’

‘My name is Mrs Whitestone.’

‘But I shall call you Miranda.’

‘How did you know that?’

‘Your eyes told me. You clearly need some rest, it’s a long way from
Dover. Go inside and I’ll come back soon.’

‘Yes... How did you know I came from Dover Mr Balanchine?’

‘It was a good guess. But please, call me Walter. Rest now, as I said
I’ll come again soon.’

With a blink he set her free and her legs felt full of blood again,
strong enough to walk up to her front door, climb up to her lonely old bedroom
and slide open her dresser drawer. There inside was the envelope with
Lucinda
written on the front in Mr Eden’s hand.

Serena’s Story

‘Come on Beth, you’ve got to be scared of something!’ Seb exclaimed
from across the dining table.

‘Nooo,’ she nibbled on a breadstick. ‘I can’t think of anything.’

‘Not even monsters?’

‘Or large bloody wounds oozing with blood?’

‘Robert! Don’t terrify the child on her birthday!’ said Arabella.

‘Noooope.’

‘As I was saying... everyone’s got a phobia,’ continued Edward.
‘Beth just hasn’t discovered hers yet. I have one.’

‘Do you dear?’ Arabella looked around the table with stunned eyes.
‘I never knew.’

‘Yes, I do: the sound of two pieces of polystyrene squeaking against
each other. Makes the hairs on my arms stand on end. I have to leave the room.’

‘Goodness, after all these years of marriage I never knew. But does
that really count as a phobia?’

Robert smiled authoritatively. ‘I would say so. It’s not unlike the
fear of fingernails scratching the surface of a blackboard. Doesn’t bother me,
but spiders do.’

‘Boring!’ bellowed Edward. ‘Spiders, snakes, I’ve heard it all
before. Anyone got something more interesting to add?’

‘Serena’s got a good phobia,’ said Seb quietly.

An array of expectant faces landed on me.

‘Do I?’ I stammered. ‘I wasn’t aware of one.’

‘Yes you do: broken glass. You hate broken glass.’

‘Is that true?’ Edward asked.

‘Yes, in a way. It makes me want to cry when I see it, or be sick. I
don’t know, one of the two.’

‘Broken glass, that is a good one,’ he mused. ‘Well you win, a round
of applause for Serena.’

They all began to clap heartily and I tried to make a gracious bow.

‘That’s a very pretty necklace Beth, is it new?’ asked Eva.

Beth was wearing a delicate little Celtic cross around her neck
which I hadn’t seen before either.

‘Yes! Raphael left it here for me for my birthday. I’ve been waiting
all this time to open it. Aren’t I good?!’

She blinked softly at us all with her innocent blue eyes and Seb
began to laugh, so infectiously that in a moment we were all laughing too.

‘Ah! Am I interrupting anything?’ came a voice. Sasha was standing
in the doorway, his eyes fixed on Eva.

‘Can I keep my necklace on tonight?’

I tucked the blanket under Beth’s chin. It had turned cold and I
could hear rain scratching at the windows. ‘Yes, I suppose so. But take care of
it. It really does look very special.’

The pendant rested in the small cave between her two collar bones: a
thin spider’s web of silver crafted into a cross with a ring around the centre.

‘Night night darling. Happy birthday.’

I tiptoed down the stairs. Gladys would be sorting out the kitchen and,
as we’d planned Beth’s birthday meal together, she could at least let me help
her clear up for once.

When I reached the first floor I noticed that Arabella’s office door
hadn’t been shut properly. A well of light from the room scorched across the
corridor carpet and up the wall, just brushing the edge of the painting of
Walter Balanchine on the opposite side. Although the picture was bathed in
shadow I could still detect the vivid hues of his wizard-like garments and the
cluster of trinkets around his neck. The picture drew me closer.

‘Why do you do this Mummy? First you let that bastard in and now her!
They love her you know, how are we ever going to get rid of her?’ It was Eva’s
voice, coming from Arabella’s office. My feet glued themselves to the spot.

‘How on earth could I have known what she’d be like?’

‘You shouldn’t have employed anyone in the first place! I told you
time and time again not to let a stranger in.’

‘Beth needs looking after, and some sort of an education.’

‘And couldn’t we have done that?’

‘Hardly. You know how busy I am and you wouldn’t have a clue. Serena’s
bright.’

‘Well thank you very much. And you know Sasha’s at it again:
threatening me one minute, his hands all over me the next. He says he’ll go to
the tabloids.’

‘Oh dear, really? And I thought I’d been keeping him busy with my
Africa stuff for once.’

‘Oh screw your Africa stuff! He’s been going on about Raphael again
and the Burnside money. What the hell am I to do? I’m still the only one in
this house who doesn’t pander to that bloody man but I don’t know if I can take
much more.’

‘Keep them close darling. It’s the only way.’

‘How bloody close do you intend him to get! I can feel his breath on
me MOTHER, right now. It’s so real I could vomit. And just remember, if you
hadn’t kept Sasha quite so
close
in the first place then he wouldn’t
have found out all this stuff about us.’

There was a biting pause before Arabella spoke again, now in a
slightly shaky voice. ‘I am aware of that, darling. Sometimes we cannot help
but fall into our mistakes; you know that too... But even if we talk about it
until we’re blue in the face, the main thing to remember is that still, after
all these years, Sasha has remained perfectly blind to it all. And that’s all
that matters.’

‘But
she
isn’t, which is even worse. And to cap it all you’ve
asked her for Christmas! Is there no escaping her?’

‘Keep them close darling. God, the door’s open.’

I heard footsteps and dived back, pressing my body into the recess
of the next door along. In the corner of my eye I saw Arabella poke her head
out and look up and down the corridor. She slammed the door shut and muffled
footsteps moved away again.

I waited for a minute and then made my escape, down into the light
of downstairs.

Keep them close
.

It was like that old saying:
Keep your friends close and your
enemies closer
. Is that what Arabella had meant?

My feet carried me to the kitchen but Gladys soon saw that I was no
use to her there.

‘Go to bed, you look ill.’

She was right. I must have looked like a zombie shuffling around
behind her in a haze, putting things in cupboards and then taking them out
again for no reason. I mumbled an excuse and left, taking solace in my
sketchbook.

Eva’s face appeared before me from my pencil for the first time, her
gaunt cheeks hugely exaggerated, her eyebrows arched in anger. But when I drew
her eyes they peeked out at me, soft and sad. I had wanted to fill them with
wrath, hatred, anything ugly and cruel and yet instead they welled up with
tears.

That night Seb took me in his arms. I ached to tell him about what
I’d heard but couldn’t face fighting about Eva yet again.

‘Thanks for organizing this evening. Beth thought it was great, she
loves you. I love you,’ he said.

‘Do you really mean that?’

‘I wouldn’t have said it otherwise.’

‘I think I’m trying to live in a world that isn’t my own. Is the
bubble going to burst soon?’

‘No. Does that mean you don’t love me?’

I could see lines of agitation, panic even, on his face.

‘You know I do. I can’t remember a time when I didn’t love you.’

I pressed my forehead against his and we fell asleep together, but
in the morning he was gone.

The internet café was just off the high street. I found a quiet
place in the corner and drank bad coffee from a polystyrene cup. The first
thing I searched for was
Burnside money
, just as Eva had said it.

A few old articles about a Lord Burnside popped up at the top, but
most of them now led to nowhere and had lost their content. One, however, from
a financial bulletin and entitled,
Where did all their money go?
still
remained intact. This Lord Burnside it seems had masterminded some sort of
rogue pension scheme, swindling all sorts of poor people out of their
life-savings before disappearing to South America. I scrolled down the entries
but found out nothing more.

And then I tried
Lord Burnside
and
Hartreve
together. As
the results came up I almost took a large bite out of the cup I was sipping
from. Again, the articles were mainly old and lost, but the titles alone were
enough to throw a great big spotlight over Eva’s past.
Lecherous Lord Spawns
Hartreve Baby
, was the first. It was dated five years back, coinciding
perfectly with Beth’s birth.
Lord Cradle-Snatcher Gets Heiress into Trouble
,
was the second. The next article came up with a picture of Eva on it, looking
particularly young and winsome in black and white. The journalist described her
teenage pregnancy as the
undisputed
result of an affair with her father
Edward Hartreve’s acquaintance Lord Burnside. Eva was described as a
spoilt,
rich brat
, who had snubbed
loony
Lady Burnside’s repeated efforts to
clear her husband’s name. It finished with the lines:

So, how did the mysterious Lord escape the country with the police
hot on his heels? Not with the help of Edward Hartreve, that’s for sure, or any
of those poor old pensioners he screwed over either. But clearly Lord Burnside
still has friends somewhere, South America better watch out.

I swung back in my chair and read it over and over again. I’d been
wrong about Sasha being Beth’s father then, if these articles were to be
believed. But Sasha was clearly involved in this somewhere along the line. He’d
been threatening Eva about the
Burnside money
after all. Could this be
something to do with those dodgy pensions? Where had Burnside’s money ended up?

I looked at my watch. Jessica would be arriving soon to visit me, I
didn’t want to be late. But there was one more thing I wanted to look up before
I left. Even his old-fashioned, funny sounding name made me want to smile when
I typed it in:
Walter Balanchine
.

This time the result was quite literally breathtaking. I felt a
buzzing in my ears, excitement and astonishment all cocktailed up together. This
was how detectives must feel when they’re onto a good lead, or explorers at the
gateway of a newly discovered tomb. There at the top of the page I read:

Discussions on ‘Walter Balanchine and the Art of Hypnosis,’ a
lecture by Sasha Apostol
.

I let the cursor hover over the word
Sasha
for a moment and
then clicked.

The link led to a lengthy dialogue on an academic chat room about
hypnosis. In spite of its title the discussion seemed to focus only briefly on
Sasha’s work, citing him as an
esteemed lecturer
and Walter Balanchine as
a
... colourful East End character born to eastern European parents, an early
devotee to the art of hypnosis and the act of disappearance
. And yet
further down, in spite of Sasha’s apparent academic prowess, he was criticized
for
... not having yet uncovered enough material to reveal more about his
subject. Perhaps he will go on to find something more meaty about this elusive
Victorian mystic.

That was all. I grabbed my coat and dashed out onto the street;
definitely late for Jessica now. It had turned chilly and with every gust of
wind leaves with sad faces floated down about me. I squinted my eyes and tried
to imagine this man Walter Balanchine, in his funny wizard-like clothes,
kicking up the leaves along the London streets before me. Perhaps he had Lord Hartreve
by his side, or his daughter Lucinda.

Sasha seemed to know an awful lot about the Hartreve family. Enough
to threaten Eva with in his creepy lustful way. But the one thing he didn’t
seem to know enough about was this man, Walter Balanchine. Was this what he was
blind to
, as Arabella had remarked? Is this what he really wanted? But
the thing that made no sense at all was why I was such a threat as well.

I could see Jessica already standing on the doorstep as I approached
the house.

‘Hello!’ I called, jogging up to her.

‘There you are! I knocked but no one answered.’

‘That’s funny, I thought Gladys was in. Beth’s been taken out to buy
clothes so it’s probably just us. Oh it’s so lovely to see you!’ and I gave her
a great bear-hug. ‘Come on in. Sorry I’m late, I was at an internet café
messing around.’

‘What happened to your laptop?’

‘Oh, I sold it to buy some canvases. Too lovely to resist.’

‘Typical! Ah, you’re wearing the peony brooch I gave you.’

‘I wear it all the time.’

Now that we were inside I hugged her again. I could smell the
familiar scent of home on her clothes: lavender mixed with a sort of generic
washing-up aroma. I felt a sudden surprising pang.

‘What a glorious house,’ she murmured as I pulled her into the
drawing room.