Abigale Hall (27 page)

You know what you must do
.

Eliza woke in darkness to the feel of hard-packed dirt beneath her hands as the smell of damp lingered in the air. She could not see where she was, but, as her thoughts returned, she remembered her fight with Mrs Pollard. She was in the kitchen cellar. She felt the ground around her, but could not find the stairs. From her pocket, she withdrew her matchbox and shook it, trying to discern how many were left. It rattled lightly. The scent of marrow liqueur tickled under her nose. No. No, there was no time for those thoughts. In utter blackness, she willed her hands to calm as she slid the box open. A drop of sweat, or blood, trickled down her face. Her fingers, less nimble than she liked, grasped one of the small matches. She closed the box, nearly dropping the small match onto the hard ground, where it would have been lost forever. She struck it. It took three times to light.

Father's feet dangled above her.

She screamed. The dropped match extinguished in the dust.

‘Stop it! You saw nothing. Nothing.'

She found another match and lit it. The smell of marrow faded away. Cupping the fragile flame with her hand, she tried to get her bearings. No one's feet hung from above. She glanced a wooden staircase that led up to the trapdoor. She scooted towards the nearest wall and used it to pull herself up. Her head felt like it had split open where Mrs Pollard smacked it on the kitchen counter. The match burnt down and nipped her fingers. She dropped it and lit another. There were shelves beside her, and she found the stub of a candle just as the second match burnt out. Her fingers failed to find another. The marrow smell became strong again.

Eliza drew back her hand, took a breath, and searched again. There was one match left, stuck in the inner edge of the box. As careful as if handling a sick animal, she drew the stick out, lit it, and transferred the flame to the candle.

She searched the wooden shelves for any other tools, hoping for a torch or a lamp. There was an old lantern, but it held no oil. On a bottom shelf, she found another candle. This she lit and, after melting its bottom wax with the fire from the first, stuck it to the lowest stair. Carefully, she climbed up to the trapdoor. It wouldn't budge. She put her shoulder into it. Not even the slightest movement. Perhaps there was another way out.

After crawling down to the floor, she took more time to examine the modest cellar. It ran from underneath Mrs Pollard's office to the width of the kitchen. Wooden shelves lined both sides, but they were mostly empty, home only to dusty, disused items – broken lamps and gardening shears, bits of chicken wire and rusted meat hooks. Eliza crossed underneath the staircase, hoping for a second entrance, some other means of escape, but there was nothing save a cold, white brick wall turned yellowish-grey from centuries of soot and dirt.

She turned and spotted the trunk. It was large and domed, made from some type of metal. Faded stickers decorated the top and sides – Cunard Line, White Star, Paris, Belfast, India. It was locked, but the key from Mrs Pollard's room was still in her pocket. It slipped straight in. Eliza lifted the lid.

The entirety of Mrs Pollard's life lay before her for the taking. Old children's clothes and toys. Clothes for a young woman, hair clips and a box of jewellery. Books on archaeology and Ancient Egypt, their pages left unscarred, hand brooms, line levels and a trowel. At the bottom was a cigar box filled with photographs – names and dates scrawled on the back. The top photograph, dated 1907, featured Mr G. Pollard, wife and infant daughter. A family portrait for each year followed, and Eliza saw Mrs Pollard's sharp features in the growing girl. She removed the photo of
Georgina and nanny
from her pocket. It fitted between the years 1913 to 1914. The family portraits continued until 1919. The final photograph had only mother and daughter, dressed in black.

A second cigar box contained frail, yellowed letters. Eliza skimmed through, stopping when her fingers fell on a piece of familiar grey stationery. She held it to the light. The envelope listed an address in Dover.

6 June 1919

Dear Mrs
Lilith Pollard,

Thank you for your recent correspondence. I am
sorry to hear of your unfortunate circumstances. It is indeed
true that I seek additional help at my estate. While
your daughter is young to perform the duties required of
this house, she is of a prime age to begin
proper training for the position. Send Georgina upon receipt of
this letter. Her salary will be sent directly to you
as per your request. Your daughter shall work hard, but
you shall want for nothing.

Sincerely,

Mr E— Brownawell

Eliza reread the letter until she heard the footsteps above her – heavy and hurried. Another pair followed – lighter but firm. The voices were muffled but loud enough for her to hear.

‘Which was it? Which?' Mrs Pollard. Eliza wasn't sure if it was the distortion of the cellar, but the housekeeper sounded panicked.

‘New Cware.' Mr Drewry.

‘Have they gone through old Cware? Well, have they?'

‘That's all the information I have.'

‘You must take me there immediately.'

‘It'll be faster . . .'

The footsteps moved, carrying into the kitchen. Eliza moved with them, missing only some of the conversation.

‘. . . that is final.' Mrs Pollard again. ‘. . . would you go? Who would take in a worthless murderer such as you?'

A murderer? Of course. What if Mr Drewry was entirely responsible? Maybe she and Ruth were both wrong.

‘What about the girl?' he asked.

‘She's been taken care of for now.'

‘For now?'

Mrs Pollard's voice came again, but she spoke too low for Eliza to understand. There was no reply from Mr Drewry that she could hear. The footsteps resumed. She made to follow them but was distracted when wax dripped onto her hand, scalding her skin before cooling quickly. She peeled it off and flicked it away. As she watched it fly off into the darkness, something else caught her eye – a large black shape frozen in the far corner. An old, iron furnace. Though it was cool to the touch, the ash smelled fresh, like a bombsite in Hungerford visited the day after it was hit, not old, like the ruins of her parents' home.

She opened the door. Unidentified bits were half-buried in soft grey peaks of ash. Eliza reached in and pulled out a piece of leather. She dusted it off. It was the cover of a journal. The pages inside had all been destroyed, but an embossed inscription could still partially be seen.

. . .lasto

‘Vlasto,' she decoded. ‘Sorry, Pip.'

She set the piece aside and looked again. Another book emerged from the ashes, this one still mostly intact, enough for Eliza to recognise it immediately. Rebecca's Bible – the child's Bible Father gave her the day prior to their evacuation. Its once white cover was now black and grey, the gold cross on the cover turned brown. She opened the first page, which, protected by the heavy leather, still had Rebecca's name written in Father's familiar scrawl.

Rebecca surely would have taken this with her, Eliza thought, if she was sent to hospital. Unless Eliza overlooked it when cleaning Rebecca's room, and Mrs Pollard decided to dispose of it.

A dog barked.

It could be any dog, a stray from the village. Any dog at all.

Mr Drewry shouted. ‘Kasey! Stay!'

The dog fell silent.

The Bible trembled in Eliza's hands. If Kasey was alive, who was buried in the new grave? Eliza looked from the charred Bible to Pip's journal. Pip, whose belongings were burnt in this same furnace. Pip, who was dead. Rebecca, who was . . .

‘No!' Eliza dropped the Bible and candle to the ground. The flame went out, leaving only the light on the stair. She ran up the cellar steps and banged on the trapdoor.

‘No! No, she's not! She's not!' Eliza screamed, pounding her fists on the rough wood. Rebecca wasn't. She couldn't be. Eliza threw all her weight into the door again and again. It jerked then snapped back down. Eliza launched herself at it again, feeling no pain.

A crack of light. She shoved her hands into it. Something sat on top of the door but it was moving, sliding. Eliza shouted as she pushed. Whatever was holding her down fell over, and the door flung itself back under her force. She climbed up the last few stairs, shoving aside the overturned crate of potatoes which had been her barricade. She went to the garden shed and grabbed the shovel then ran for the little cemetery.

Kasey was lying alongside the garden wall, panting happily. He saw Eliza and wagged his tail. As she ran for the cemetery, he followed at a trot by her side. Her nausea increased the closer she came to the grave. Behind the cemetery, the silent wood watched her approach. She wiped the sticky blood from her forehead.

The freshly turned ground was easy to spot. It was just below Victoria's grave. Eliza began digging. Kasey sat across from her, watching. The ground, still loose, moved easily but was heavy from the constant rain. She kept going, down and down. The sun moved in the sky, but Eliza did not look at it. She only knew by the changing shadows. The ground rose above her as she sank into her self-made pit. How deep would it have to be? How far into the earth would he have buried her? Her muscles ached. Sweat dripped from her forehead, mingling with the blood from her cut. The mixture dripped into her eyes. She felt nauseous, but she would not stop. She must be close now.

Kasey began to bark. Someone was approaching. She did not stop. Let it be Mrs Pollard. Let it be Mr Drewry. She did not care, not about any of them. She kept digging.

‘Eliza?' A woman's voice. ‘Eliza, what are you doing?' Ruth's shadow fell across the grave.

‘You see him, don't you?' she asked.

‘See who?'

‘The dog.'

‘Kasey? Of course. He's right here.'

Eliza spared a brief glance upwards. Ruth stood beside Kasey, her hand stroking his head. She looked back at her work.

‘Mrs Pollard said he died. I saw Mr Drewry digging a grave and she said it was for the dog, but it wasn't. It couldn't have been.' She kept digging.

‘Oh, Eliza, you don't think . . .' Ruth could not complete her sentence, and Eliza would not finish it for her. Her shovel hit something soft.

‘Eliza, stop.'

She tossed the shovel aside and brushed the dirt away to reveal a large canvas sack.

‘Eliza, please.'

As she already felt sick, the smell from the sack made her no worse. She tore it open with her hands and staggered back against the grave's dirt wall. Eliza looked away, taking in the dirt and blood covering her clothes, legs and arms, her chapped and bleeding palms, the grey sky so far above her, and she laughed.

The sack was filled with dead foxes and the maggots which crawled through their eyes.

*

It took Eliza longer to run her bath than it did for her to bathe. She let the water reach above the five-inch line, let it go all the way to the brim, then scrubbed herself clean. After she pulled the plug, she watched the muddy, warm water spin down the drain.

Ruth waited for her in the kitchen with two cups of tea. Eliza ignored them and walked straight into Mrs Pollard's office.

‘Eliza, you must sit down a moment. You've exhausted yourself,' Ruth urged, following her to the office doorway.

‘There's no time for that.' Eliza kicked a potato away and rummaged through Mrs Pollard's desk.

‘There is. The entrance to one of the mines has collapsed. Mrs Pollard and Ben will be there the rest of the day, possibly most of the night, trying to clear it.'

‘Why would Mrs Pollard care?' Eliza said, remembering the housekeeper's frantic response. ‘And who is Ben?'

Ruth looked away. ‘It's Mr Drewry's Christian name.'

‘Murderers aren't Christian.'

‘You mean the foxes? They're vermin.'

Eliza opened a drawer and pulled out a blank piece of heavy grey stationery. ‘My aunt had a letter written on this.' She set it aside. ‘And it's not the foxes that worry me. Don't you ever wonder why he's here?'

‘He's the caretaker.'

‘Some job of it he's doing. The lawns, the gardens, even the cemetery. It's all a mess. So what is he taking care of except Victoria's dirty work? If she's stealing their souls, that would still leave the body behind, wouldn't it?'

She dug deeper into the drawer and pulled out a small, well-worn Moleskine notebook.

‘Leave him alone. You shouldn't judge people you don't know.'

The book's pages were filled with names and addresses. Those towards the front had faded, but those at the back were not. Some were crossed out in a single line of red ink. Others were left alone.

Ruth peered over Eliza's shoulder. ‘Is that your great discovery? An address book?'

‘But how did she get my address?' Eliza pointed to the last page. Aunt Bess's name was written in a neat, slanting hand along with the address of their Whitechapel Road flat. A line of red ink ran through it. Eliza turned to the page before. ‘And why is Pip's name here?'

Pip Vlasto's name also had a red line through it.

‘Do you recognise anyone?' Eliza handed the book to Ruth. Ruth scanned through it, shaking her head.

‘No. No, I don't . . . Wait. Here.' She pointed to a name above Pip's. ‘Hawthorne. I don't know an Eric, but Jane, her surname was Hawthorne, I think. And this one – Marsh. When I first came to Plentynunig there was a Marsh girl. I remember now, her talking in the pub about wanting to join the Land Girls but not being permitted to quit the manor. Molly, I think. Where do these names come from?'

Eliza took the book back and slipped it into her trouser pocket. ‘Knowing her, probably the Devil himself. Do you still think Rebecca's at Cefn Coed?'