The Devil's Serenade (10 page)

“Have you any ideas?”

Shona shook her head. “Not one, I’m afraid.” She paused. “Charlie’s lived here all his life and he’s a sensible sort of chap. Maybe have a word with him about anything he knows about this house. His reaction when you asked him about Pete shows he’s not one to give way to superstition and hearsay.”

The sound of chatter came from the hall. The rehearsal was breaking up for the night.

Shona looked at her watch. “Good gracious, is that the time?” She stood. “Try not to worry, Maddie. I’m sure we’ll get to the bottom of it. But I won’t promise a logical explanation this time. I know better than that.”

I followed her out into the hall. Most of the cast had already left. A chilly blast of air blew through the open door. “October’s with us all right,” Shona said as I helped her on with her coat. “It’ll be Christmas before we know where we are. I see the shops have got their Halloween paraphernalia out already.”

Halloween. The thought of it set my heart pounding.

* * * * *

I settled in bed for my first night’s sleep at Hargest House since Sunday. I reached to switch off the lamp but stopped. Somehow I couldn’t bring myself to plunge into total blackness. Tiredness overwhelmed me and my eyes closed. I pulled the duvet close around my shoulders to keep out the chill in the room. Apart from the cheerful, warming fires here in my childhood, I’d always been brought up to sleep in a cool, if not cold, bedroom. Over-heated rooms kept me awake.

A sudden noise jolted me from my near-sleep state. It came from overhead. Something had fallen down upstairs. I should go and investigate. I sat up. No, whatever it was would surely keep ’til morning. I lay back down again. Closed my eyes.

The crash was louder this time. I shot up in bed.

My mind raced with possible explanations. An intruder. In which case, investigating could be dangerous. I should call the police. I scanned the room, flinching at the shadows in dark corners, not illuminated by my bedside lamp. Silvery fingers of moonlight pierced the gaps between the curtains. I realized I was holding my breath and exhaled, wishing my breathing didn’t make so much noise.

I cursed silently. My phone was in my purse, downstairs in the living room. In future I must remember to bring it up with me when I went to bed. Fat lot of good that would do me now though.

I listened. Minutes ticked by. I got out of bed, went to the closed door and put my ear against it. Nothing. Above me was the junk room. Maybe Harry hadn’t stacked the stuff too well and it had worked loose and toppled over. Yes, that was it. Surely after all this time, any intruder would have realized there was nothing worth stealing on the upper floors and have made his way down. The key was in the lock and I turned it. He would have to break the door down to get to me. I lost track of time as my feet and legs grew colder by the second.

Not a sound.

Nothing was going to make me turn that key until daylight. Tomorrow I would also arm myself with something I could defend myself with. A baseball bat. Or a cricket bat maybe. Those umbrellas of Aunt Charlotte’s had vicious spikes, but they were so old, they were falling apart.

I was shivering. As certain as I could be that I wasn’t about to be killed in my own home, I climbed back into bed and pulled the covers tightly around me. Eventually, sheer exhaustion overcame me and I slept for a couple of hours.

I awoke at eight thirty. A gray, rain-soaked morning greeted me as I pulled back the drapes. I was hit by the feeling of profound sadness I always felt when autumn began taking its inevitable toll of the weather, leaving dankness and death in its wake. With a sigh, I moved away from the window.

By the time Charlie arrived, I was showered, dressed and drinking coffee, but still hadn’t plucked up courage to go and find out what had caused the crashes the night before. I’d almost managed to convince myself I’d dreamed it. Almost.

Charlie went upstairs and I followed. At least with him in the house, I felt less vulnerable to whatever I would find when I opened
that
door. Charlie disappeared into the rehearsal room, while I summoned up every ounce of courage I could muster and turned the door handle of the junk room.

I scoured the room for any sign of disturbance but, with everything in such a mess anyway, how would I know? Harry’s cleared area looked the same as before. For the first time, I paid close attention to the individual items that were stacked and strewn around the untidy room. The old, broken rocking horse leaned drunkenly up against one wall, the paint cracked and peeling. Try as I might, I couldn’t remember ever playing with it. It was probably broken even when I was a child. That appeared to be the only child’s toy and I wondered fleetingly who had owned it. Surely there had been no other children in this house but me? As I approached it, I saw the rockers were broken, hence the odd angle. No one had played with this in a very long time. Maybe it had been a favorite toy of Aunt Charlotte’s and she had brought it with her. Maybe it had belonged to Nathaniel Hargest himself when he was a boy.

Then I saw it—the wardrobe that had given off the sulfurous stench. It lay, face down. That’s what I must have heard crashing to the floor. I picked my way around it. There was no smell now and I could see the back, sides and feet. Solid, heavy wood. How could something so big and heavy have toppled over? Unless someone strong had pushed it.

Something glinted and distracted my attention. A tall, cheval mirror, partially covered by a sheet which I pulled across. Like others in this room, the glass was crazed and mottled, but otherwise it looked in good condition. My reflection stared back at me. I looked tired, and in need of a good night’s sleep. My eyes appeared dull and lusterless, my lips dry and pale. I pushed my untidy hair behind my ears and blinked.

My vision blurred. I blinked again. The image in the mirror swam before my eyes. I stared at the impossible. Looking back at me wasn’t my adult face. It was me as a child. But not the shy child I had been. This child stared out at the world with confidence and assuredness. Her blue eyes blinked steadily, shining and clear. Her long chestnut hair lay thick and straight, like a shawl around her shoulders, gleaming as mine never did. Her perfect button nose and sculpted lips with their natural rose tint. All were familiar. All my imperfections perfected. My antithesis and my ideal. I knew her. I had created her from my own imagination. She was everything I had aspired to be. Kelly.

Behind her, shadows swirled.

Over to my right, the gramophone crackled and hissed as the scratchy first chords of “Serenade in Blue”
started to play. I saw the record spinning on the turntable, even though I knew it couldn’t. The machine hadn’t been wound up in years. Even if it had, that record was in no fit condition to play.

A young woman’s voice whispered in my ear. “The devil’s serenade…”

The music stopped. The turntable was still. The door slammed, but I ignored it. My attention was all on the vision in the mirror. The child’s lips twitched, then broke into a smile. She put her right forefinger to her lips. I couldn’t have spoken anyway. At that moment, I doubted my voice would have made a sound if my life depended on it.

I wanted to run. God knows, I wanted to get out of there as fast as I could, but my feet wouldn’t work. I willed my hands to flex, but they stayed, rigid, at my sides. Something held me there, fast. I couldn’t even move my head. Beads of sweat formed on my forehead and coursed down my cheeks. I was straining as hard as I could to get some muscles working. None obeyed.

A scream formed in my mind, but my mouth stayed stubbornly shut and the scream only echoed through the chambers of my brain.

Out of the shadows behind the girl, a face took shape. A young woman. Shoulder length red-brown hair, dark eye shadow, shell-pink lips, and a serious expression. Thelma. So they were all here, in one way or another. Even my own alter ego.

The unmistakable scent of Opium wafted into my nostrils.

Kelly had gone, and I stared back at myself. Thelma moved off to one side. I staggered. At last, my muscles obeyed me and I could move.

A creaking sounded behind me. The rocking horse no longer leaned against the wall. It moved steadily back and forth, as if someone was riding it. I looked down; the rockers were still broken. Part of one was missing, yet the thing still rocked. I heard a giggle—the same one I had heard before. The giggle that couldn’t belong to Veronica but somehow did.

I raced out of the room and slammed the door. Charlie emerged from the rehearsal room. He frowned. “Is everything all right, Maddie?”

I was panting. I nodded. I couldn’t tell him what had happened.

“You look really pale. Shall I get you a cup of tea?”

“No, honestly. I’m fine. Really. I’ve been sorting some stuff out, a bit too energetically I think. I’ll be okay in a minute. I need to catch my breath.”

Charlie continued to stare at me, with concern in his eyes. “I need to pop down to the cellar and check the fuse box.”

“Fine,” I said and forced a smile, hoping it didn’t look as false as I feared. I followed him downstairs. My heart only stopped thumping painfully when we arrived in the kitchen.

The doorbell rang. Shona stood on the doorstep, dripping wet. Her breath made clouds.

I opened the door wide to let her in and a chill breeze followed her. At least I could explain that. I forced myself to make polite conversation. “The weather’s turned really cold today, hasn’t it?” I said, taking her wet parka. I hung it over the banister and she followed me into the kitchen.

“At least you’re nice and cozy here.”

“Thanks to Charlie Evans. He’s in the cellar at the moment, but he’s fixing a couple of new radiators in the rehearsal room. Should be much warmer than with the convectors.”

“Oh, lovely.” She frowned. “You don’t look very well. Did you get any sleep last night?”

“Not much.” I shook my head and tears pricked my eyes.

Shona put her hand on my arm. “Let’s have a cup of tea and you can tell me about it.”

My hands shook as I filled the kettle. She took it off me and did the job herself. I called down to Charlie in the cellar to ask if he wanted some tea but he declined. His voice sounded far away. Once again, the dank smell penetrated the atmosphere, and I shivered.

I closed the cellar door.

Shona had made her way to the living room with our tea. I followed her, casting a quick glance up the stairs as I passed.

“It’s happened again,” I said. “Only this time I saw myself as a child—I mean as the child I wanted to be all those years ago. The one I called Kelly. And I saw my imaginary eldest sister, Thelma. An old gramophone started to play a record all by itself. Not only that, last night, a heavy wardrobe crashed to the floor.”

Shona took a sip of tea and looked thoughtful. Did she believe me? In her position, I’m not sure I would have.

“I can see you’re really stressed right now,” she said.

I put my head in my hands. “I just wish it would stop.”

Shona set her mug down on a small table by her side. “It wouldn’t be unheard of for the stress itself to be causing hallucinations. You were happy with your imaginary family when you were a child, weren’t you?”

I looked up. “Yes, but it’s the strange things I keep seeing and hearing that are
causing
the stress.”

But Shona had latched on to something and she wasn’t about to let go. “Moving house—especially the way you did, leaving pretty much everything and everyone behind—is one of the most stressful experiences anyone can have. Your whole life changed with your aunt’s inheritance. You’ve had to deal with your ex-husband turning up and clearly wanting to get his hands on your money. It’s bound to drag things up from the past. I’m no psychologist, but I’m sure it wouldn’t be unheard of for your brain to search for a happier time and set of circumstances and console you with them.”

“So you’re saying I’m making all this up?” I couldn’t remove the indignant edge to my voice.

“No, no, not in the way you mean. To you it’s all too real.”

“But if it’s my mind that’s creating the images for me, how did Cynthia see Sonia that time? And how did that wardrobe fall over?”

Shona sighed. “That’s where my argument breaks down.” She held her hands up. “I haven’t a clue. It’s the one thing I can’t explain. I do know Cynthia had treatment for schizophrenia some time ago and is probably still on medication for it. Maybe she imagined it.”

“Maybe,” I said. “I know nothing about schizophrenia.” I tapped my forehead. “I still can’t remember anything from that last summer when I was sixteen.”

The door opened. I jumped. Charlie stood there. “You’re nervy,” he said, smiling. “I came to tell you I’m all done for today. I’ll be back tomorrow first thing. There’s something a bit strange though.”

My heart sank. I could do without any more shocks. “What is it, Charlie?”

“In the cellar. I think you’d better come and see.”

I cast a pleading look at Shona. “I’ll come too,” she said, to my relief. “My curiosity would never forgive me if I didn’t.”

Down in the cellar, Charlie turned at the bottom of the stairs. I gasped at the sight in front of me. The tree roots had grown from their original position, extending a few feet from the wall. They practically filled one corner of the cellar and had bushed out. Long, woody tentacles reached out along the floor.

“They must have sprouted a good three or four feet since I was last down here,” Charlie said.

I looked at Shona. She stared at the roots. “I’ve never seen anything like that in my life,” she said. “Aren’t they affecting the foundation at all?”

I grasped the nearest clump of root material and pulled it away from the wall, forcing myself to ignore the unpleasant sensation of maggots writhing in my hands.

“Can you shine the flashlight over here, Charlie?”

He picked it up off the stairs and returned within seconds. A bright beam of light lit up the bricks, revealing the veins of tentacles permeating them.

Shona gasped. “How on earth is that possible?”

I dropped the roots, glad to be rid of them. They settled back, as they had before.