Distant Voices Page 2

  ‘I did not say that.’ She could see his pain. ‘I didn’t know if I could father more children; I had been wounded. But the American had long gone and Stella was above all honest. She said he had meant nothing and I believed her. I did not know he had taken so many of her pictures away …’

  ‘Surely the pictures didn’t mean anything.’ Obscurely she felt she had to comfort him. ‘He could have been going to sell them or exhibit them for her –’

  ‘Perhaps.’ He sighed. ‘The fall was an accident. A catastrophic, disastrous, tragic accident. She would not have killed herself. I’m sure she wouldn’t. And yet how can I be sure? And how will I ever know about the child?’ He took a deep breath and looked up at her again, suddenly almost pleading. ‘You will make your own mind up as to the truth of all this, and I think you will make the right decision.’

  Was he asking her to decide? To find out the truth for him? Jan bit her lip as the old man sighed again, a bone-weary sound which tore at her heartstrings.

  ‘In a way I’m glad all this has happened,’ he went on after a moment. ‘Simon has been trying to make me face the rumours and think about that house for years. It’s an albatross; a Pandora’s box. If there are people squatting there, which I doubt, then it’s time to let it go. I hope Simon will get married, then he could live there, but it’s too big for one person alone.’ There was another short silence. ‘Stella wouldn’t have liked squatters. She loved that house, you know. All her best painting was done there.’ He levered himself to his feet. ‘Did you see her studio?’

  Jan shook her head. ‘I’m afraid I left rather quickly.’

  The old man grinned. ‘Ran away, did you? Can’t blame you. I’ve always thought the house was rather spooky, myself, but Stella always filled it with people. There was never any silence. Only when she was painting, or when she said she was painting …’ He turned away sharply. For a moment Jan wondered if he were sobbing silently. She could see the movement of his shoulders and she ached to comfort him. But as she watched he straightened himself and with a visible effort he turned and went over to the window.

  Jan too had heard the car draw up outside. She waited, watching, as David Seymour turned to face the door.

  Simon’s first words were to the point. ‘If you have been upsetting Grandfather –’

  ‘No, Simon!’ The old man’s interruption was peremptory. ‘She has been doing nothing of the kind. I gave the girl permission to go to The Laurels. And I want her to write Stella’s story. It’s all so long ago now. No one is going to be hurt …’

  Simon swung round. ‘But Grandfather –’

  ‘Enough.’ David threw himself back on the chair with a groan. ‘I want you to tell her everything she wants to know. And go with her to check out the house.’ He gave a short laugh which after a moment changed into a cough. ‘She thinks someone is squatting there. She heard people in the dining room.’

  They went in Simon’s car. Jan had followed him out of the house reluctantly, sensing his hostility. ‘I’m sorry to inflict this on you,’ she said as she slotted her seatbelt into place. ‘I’m sure you have better things to do than chase out to the country at a moment’s notice.’

  ‘If there are squatters something must be done about it,’ he replied. Engaging gear smoothly he swung the car out into the traffic. ‘How long were you in the house?’

  ‘Only a few minutes.’

  ‘But you saw no one?’

  She hesitated. How could she tell him what she saw? ‘No.’

  ‘And the door was locked?’

  She nodded. ‘It didn’t seem to have been opened for ages.’

  ‘I have the back door key. I imagine that if there are intruders, they too have gone in that way. Only Grandfather still has the front door key, as far as I know.’

  ‘Do you remember your grandmother?’ Jan glanced at him curiously.

  He gave a short laugh. ‘Hardly. She died long before I was born.’

  ‘I’m sorry. Of course.’

  ‘You’ve seen her self portrait? The one in the town gallery?’

  Jan nodded. ‘She was very beautiful.’

  ‘Yes.’ He turned onto the bypass and accelerated away from the traffic. ‘I suppose the idea is to bring your book out in time for the exhibition they’re planning for next year to mark the fiftieth anniversary of her death.’

  ‘It will be wonderful to have so many of her paintings together.’

  ‘Even the ones in the States. Quite.’ His voice was dry. ‘We’re almost there.’

  He pulled the car around the back of the house and they climbed out, looking round. The house seemed as deserted as before. There was no sign of life at all as Simon pulled out his key and opened the back door.

  ‘No one in here, anyway.’ He walked ahead of her into the kitchen.

  Jan looked round. Oak dresser, table, chairs, deep sink, rusty range. It was obvious that no one had cooked here since that day in the war when David Seymour had walked out of the house after his wife’s funeral, locked the door and gone back to his squadron.

  She could feel her stomach clenching with nerves. ‘Perhaps they are camping in some other part of the house.’

  ‘Perhaps.’ Simon reached into his pocket and produced a torch. He did not switch it on however. Enough sunlight filtered through blind and shutter for them to see clearly as they walked slowly through the ground floor. Outside the dining room door he stopped. ‘You heard them in here?’ He had his hand on the knob.

  She nodded. She knew what they would find. Only dust and cobwebs decorated the room which had glittered with such life. ‘I suppose you think I’m going mad?’

  He grinned. It made him look suddenly and unexpectedly approachable. ‘No more than dozens of other people who have seen and heard it too.’

  She stared at him. ‘You mean you know about it – what I saw? You knew! Your grandfather knew?’

  He nodded. ‘Ghosts. Memories trapped in the walls. Who knows. None of the people in the village will come near this house. Which suits us fine.’ He pulled the door closed. ‘Come and see Stella’s studio.’

  He gave her no chance to say anything as he strode back to the kitchen and out of the house. She followed him, almost running, over the long grass of what had once been the lawn and through an overgrown shrubbery to a low, thatch-roofed building which overlooked a reedy pond. He reached for the key which was hidden beneath a moss-covered stone. ‘I can’t think why this place hasn’t been vandalised. But it seems Stella’s secrets are still her secrets,’ he said shortly. He stood back and let Jan go in ahead of him. ‘Did my grandfather not tell you about this place?’

  Jan shook her head. She stared round.

  The studio stood on the edge of the water, its large windows allowing the sky and the willows and the glittering ripples to explode into the room, filling it with light. All Stella’s painting equipment was still here: easels, canvases, paints, sketchbooks curled with damp, the pages stuck together, an ancient sofa, draped in a green silk shawl, the fringe trailing on the ground, black with mildew, vases of flowers, long dried and faded beyond recognition, on the table a straw sun hat amongst the scattered brushes and pencils and dried-up tubes of paint.

  Jan bit her lip, fighting the lump in her throat. ‘It’s as though she only left a few minutes ago.’

  ‘He would never let it be touched.’

  She picked up a palette knife from the table. The lump of paint dried on its tip matched exactly the colour in the foreground of the painting on the easel.

  ‘What do you think really happened that night?’ She was staring out at the water. A pair of mallard swam into view, the pond rippling into diamond rings around their gently paddling feet.

  ‘No one knows for sure.’

  ‘The article in the American magazine said that she was pushed. That it was murder.’ She turned and looked at him. He was very handsome, Stella’s grandson, with her colouring, if the portrait in the gallery was anything to go by, even if he had inherite
d his grandfather’s nose. ‘It said that she was pregnant by another man. An American.’

  Simon’s eyes narrowed. ‘Grandfather should have sued them. But he didn’t want to. He didn’t want anything to do with the article. He thought everyone would forget, and her memory would be left in peace.’

  ‘Instead of which I come along.’

  ‘Instead of which you come along.’

  ‘He told you –’

  ‘To tell you everything. I know.’ He had strolled over to the windows and was looking out, his shadow falling across the floor to the green shawl. He sighed. ‘I expect you know about the letters. To the GI. And that he had sent so many of her drawings and paintings back to the States. That rather supports the gossip in a way.’ He turned and faced her. ‘What do you think you heard in there? In the house?’

  ‘People? A tape? A radio? Echoes? Ghosts?’ She could feel her skin beginning to shiver even though it was warm in the studio. The air was heavy suddenly with the scent of oil paint and linseed and turpentine.

  ‘Did you hear a woman laughing?’

  ‘Yes, I did.’

  ‘And she sounded happy?’

  ‘I heard her calling him. Your grandfather. She sounded ecstatic. And then I heard her fall.’ She paused. She had heard the voice, but where had David Seymour been? Downstairs in the dining room with the others, or had he appeared suddenly on the landing next to her? She bit her lip. No. Surely it had been a happy voice. ‘I think it was an accident. I think she wanted me to know that. You’ve heard her too?’

  He nodded. ‘I think at that last dinner party they were enjoying themselves. They were all deliriously happy. Stella and Grandfather and John and Sarah and the Daniels and Peter Cockcroft. It was wartime. There was rationing. So many of the fit young people were gone, so many of their friends had died, but Grandfather had been invalided out after being terribly wounded. He was safe. He had recovered. They were all there and they were happy. After my father was born Stella had hoped and hoped for another child but none came. Then suddenly Grandfather was back and she was pregnant again. They were, celebrating. It was the happiest moment of her life.’ Simon turned away from the window and looked at Jan. ‘I’m guessing. No, it’s more than that. I’m almost certain that’s what happened. Grandfather trusts you. He likes you and I think that when he heard that you had seen something – heard something – in the house, he knew that she trusted you too. Only nice people hear her laugh –’ He stopped abruptly as Jan’s eyes flooded with tears. ‘Oh Miss Haydon – Jan – I’m sorry, I didn’t mean to upset you.’ He delved into the pocket of his jacket and produced a handkerchief. It was slightly painty.

  Jan wiped her eyes. ‘You are an artist too?’ She was feeling rather silly.

  ‘A bit. If I’ve inherited half her talent I count myself a very lucky man.’ Gently he steered her to the sofa. ‘Sit down a minute. Get your breath back.’

  ‘How could he bear to think of selling the house?’

  ‘He can’t. Not really. He’d have done it years ago if he were going to. After the inquest he went back to the war even though he wasn’t really fit – I don’t suppose they asked too many questions – they needed all the men they could get. As far as I know he never came back here, but I think he must still love the house in a way. And the house must have happy memories as well as sad ones. They shared so much here. Besides, don’t you feel it? She’s still here –’ He gestured at the easel. It was another self portrait, this time in Edwardian dress, unfinished, a few details completed: the face, which was vibrant, happy, glowing with life; the sparkling jewels around her throat and wrists; her hands, the ostrich feather fan …

  As they sat down Simon had left his arm around Jan’s shoulders. She was shivering. The sun had moved a little, and the studio was no longer lit across the water. It filled with weaving, drifting, green light.

  ‘If only she could speak to us,’ he went on. ‘Give us a sign. Something to tell Grandfather that the baby was his. It’s such a sad story, but at least then that last awful doubt would be gone and he would know once and for all that it was an accident; that she didn’t, couldn’t, have had any reason at all to kill herself.’

  Jan smiled. ‘What sort of sign?’ This was scarcely objective research, but she was beginning to enjoy the feeling of his arm, so lightly draped over the back of the sofa.

  ‘I don’t know. Move something. Say something. I’ll leave it to her. Anything.’ He grinned. ‘Listen, Grandfather asked me to take you back to tea. He wants to lend you her letters and diaries.’

  ‘Then he really does trust me.’

  Simon nodded slowly. ‘I told you. He wants the whole story of her life to be known at last. He said he was too old for them to hang him.’

  ‘But that’s admitting –’

  ‘No. It’s not admitting anything, except that he loved Stella more than life itself.’ Simon stood up. He held out his hand. ‘Let’s go back to the house.’

  For a moment she didn’t move, then, reluctantly, she stood up. For a second she stood looking down at the face on the easel, then she followed him outside.

  At the back door of the house she stopped. ‘Can I go in once more? To see the dining room?’

  ‘Of course.’ He stood back so that she could go ahead of him through the kitchen and out into the corridor. The dining room door stood open, a wedge of light pouring from it across the floor.

  They could both hear the music. Glen Miller. And the talk and laughter. The chink of knives and forks on crockery; they could both smell the cigar smoke, and through it all the faintest trace of oil paint.

  Jan found she was holding Simon’s hand. She was trembling, but she could not resist going nearer. Slowly, step by step, they crept towards the dining room as gradually the noise of the dinner party got louder. She could smell other things now. Cooking. Carefully hoarded coffee. Wine. A woman’s scent. One hand firmly clutching Simon’s, she reached forward with the other and gently she pushed the door open a fraction.

  The room was empty.

  In the echoing silence she gave a little sob of disappointment.

  It was Simon who spotted the soft curl of an ostrich feather drifting on the bare boards.

  The Drop Out

  Of course he wouldn’t really come. The idea was too bizarre. But then, a husband is a husband, even if this one had hardly fulfilled his matrimonial duties to the letter.

  Zara leaned forward and gazed into the mirror. If he did come he was going to see quite a change in her after all this time. She vaguely recollected that her hair had been not only a different style but a different colour then. Her figure had improved out of recognition and maturity had brought sophistication and confidence.

  ‘I wonder if he’s got a paunch?’ she asked her reflection out loud. And giggled. Gerald with a paunch was unthinkable.

  She looked at the letter again. It began, ‘Darling,’ – That too was unlike him. Gerald had never been one for endearments. He must be in trouble, she decided as she slipped on her elegant silk suit.

  Money? She had always understood that he had plenty. He had been ‘something in the city’ when they married. She had never bothered to find out what. Certainly he had from time to time continued to pay handsome amounts into her account. For old times’ sake and when he remembered, she always thought, rather than for any mundane idea that he should support his wife. Not that she had needed supporting for years, of course, thank God. But, come to think of it, there had been no money now for nearly a year.

  She stood sideways to the mirror and ran a critical hand down her flat stomach. No. She was the kind of woman who did well in business and thrived on it. Gerald’s conscience money or whatever it was had brought her some nice little extras, like the small Mercedes in the driveway. It had in no way gone towards her upkeep.

  Well. If not money, what? Women. She knew some wives were called on to extricate their husbands from the clutches of too-persistent girlfriends, but Gerald had never had that problem.
She had heard in fact that he merely turned the latest woman onto the last with a cold-blooded delight which often shocked both parties into flight. She paused for a moment. Perhaps he wanted a divorce? No. It was unthinkable. He, like her, found the state of absentee matrimony far too useful and pleasant an arrangement to end it.

  The police? She looked at the mirror for a moment, her eyes wide, and then shrugged the idea away. It was too ridiculous to contemplate.

  Zara gave up the idle speculation with a glance at her watch, ran downstairs, collected the car keys from the mantelpiece and went to the door. She was not usually given to conjecture and certainly not to day dreaming, and she had made herself uncharacte‌ristically late for the board meeting.

  He was sitting on the doorstep.

  In rags.

  For fully two minutes Zara looked down at her husband without speaking. Then, bleakly, she stood back and motioned him into the house, wrinkling her nose ostentatiously as he passed in front of her.

  He walked straight to the drinks table and poured himself a Scotch. Then he turned and looked her up and down. He was slim still, no sign of a paunch, lean and hard, brown and fit, and his eyes twinkled mischievously.

  ‘Go and run me a bath, Za-Za, dear. Then you can stop holding your nose, and we can talk.’

  ‘But, Gerald!’ Her usually well-modulated voice had risen to a squeak. ‘What’s happened to you?’

  ‘Fate hasn’t been kind, lady.’ He put on what sounded like a very professional whine. But still his face was laughing. ‘Go on woman, before my fleas start hopping onto your Persian rugs.’

  With a cry of horror she fled upstairs and, turning both taps on full, groped for the small bottle of Dettol in the medicine cabinet. It smelled very strong in the steam, but anything was better than Gerald’s … aroma.

  While he bathed she washed his glass assiduously, sponged the outside of the whisky bottle and then got out the vacuum cleaner and ran it over the carpet where he had been standing. Fleas indeed! She shuddered.

  With a sudden pang of guilt that she could so completely have forgotten her meeting she went to the phone and called the office to instruct her PA. ‘I don’t feel too well,’ she explained quietly into the receiver and was amazed to find it was the truth. She felt sick and slightly feverish.