Chapter Fourteen
FOURTEEN
Sam and I walk fast until we are past the church and into the sunlight between the houses, when our pace finally slows. Cheeks flushed and breathless, I catch Sam’s eye and we both snicker at ourselves, slightly embarrassed.
“You know, I read once that a cat was found up a chimney that had survived seventeen days just drinking rainwater. All kinds of things get stuck up there I bet. Seagulls or bats or foxes, even. It happens all the time in these old places.”
I can’t tell if I’m trying to convince Sam or myself. Either way it doesn’t matter. He scuffs his foot against the curb, hands deep in his pockets, chin to his chest. Buried in his thoughts.
“The bike’s bothering me,” he says finally, as we turn onto the High Street. I glance over at him. “I’m surprised that no one has tried to steal it or dismantle it for parts. If what Alice told us is accurate, that means it’s likely no one has gone up to Tanner’s Row since that day last winter. Not kids, not squatters, not the developers. No one.”
“We can’t know that,” I tell him, but I’m being punctilious. I’ve been wondering the same thing. Of course, I tell myself, there’s no reason that people would want to go up there—the house smells bad and there are obviously dangerous structural issues with the buildings—but I don’t think that is all it is. I remember what I told Alice about mass psychogenic illness earlier that morning and how easy it is to seed ideas into soft minds. All it takes is one person to whisper a story and soon the whole town hears about it. A witch in a bottle, a girl hearing voices, hagstones and amulets and bE Not afrAId written in pale colors.
There’s something wrong with that house on Tanner’s Row. I felt it the moment we stepped inside the hallway with its peeling wallpaper and swollen, bulbous ceiling, those tadpole shapes burned into the rafters. The air inside was oppressive; hot and heavy as treacle. Oscar had once told me about a disaster which took place in Boston back at the beginning of the twentieth century. A large storage tank had exploded and flooded downtown Boston with millions of gallons of hot, sticky molasses. He’d described how people and horses had drowned, thrashing about in the boiling viscous liquid. The harder they’d struggled, the deeper they were ensnared. That’s how it felt inside that house. Slow moving, suffocating. Like drowning in tar.
We don’t speak again until we’ve nearly reached the video shop. There are a couple of figures waiting outside it, one tall, one short. I recognize the short figure immediately, even at a distance: the bowl haircut, gap-toothed smile, and that sweet, doughy face. It’s the little girl we nearly hit with the car outside the churchyard, the one who grudgingly decided not to shoot me.
“Mummy!” she is yelling, jumping up and down. “Come on! Quicker! It’s almost starting!”
There’s Fern crossing the street and hurrying toward her, a big, welcoming smile on her face and I realize the little girl—Stevie, she told me her name was—is her daughter. I don’t know how I didn’t see the resemblance before. Stevie catches sight of Sam and me, and her face changes, just for a moment.
“You’re the Mina lady,” she says thoughtfully. Then Fern is lifting her up into her arms and swinging her giggling through the air. The taller figure steps back to give them room and I see it is Bert Roscow, the man who lives next door to the Webbers. He nods a greeting to Sam but it’s me he turns toward, his eyes gleaming with interest beneath silvering, bushy brows.
“Ah, Mina! I was hoping to see you. How are you finding things? All this has been rather a baptism of fire for you, I imagine. I hope Alice is okay. They should turn the hose on those ghouls outside the gate.”
“She’s doing her best to ignore them,” I tell him. The people outside the house say I’m holy. “Alice speaks very highly of you and Mary.”
“Ah, Bert and Mary have been my saviors since Stevie was born,” Fern says, lowering Stevie to the ground. “Being a single parent and having a business to run? Forget it. Honestly, I couldn’t do it without them.”
“It helps that Stevie is easy-peasy-pudding-and-pie,” Bert says and laughs softly when Stevie wraps her arms around his legs. “Just like you were.”
Fern catches my eye and winks.
“He’s being generous. I was a troubled kid.”
“You were a delight,” he says, as Stevie reaches for the door handle, urging, “Mummy come on, it’s starting! Ninja Tuttle is starting!”
“See you later, Stevie-Beans.”
Stevie yanks the door open so hard she staggers backward, her face comically alarmed. Then she’s laughing and through the door, kicking off her shoes, feet pounding on the stairs. “Bye-bye, Bert! Bye-bye, Man and Mina-Lady!” over her shoulder.
Sam waits until Stevie is inside before saying, in a low, confidential voice, “Mina and I just paid a visit to Tanner’s Row.”
Bert and Fern exchange a bemused glance.
“Whatever for?”
I tell them both a brief, condensed version of Alice’s story of the previous winter. When I reach the bit about the bottle in the chimney, Bert nods solemnly.
“Witch’s bottle.”
“A what?” Sam shields his eyes from the sun, stepping under the shade of the awning.
“Witch’s bottle. It’s an old folk magic. Traditionally they were filled with sharp metal objects and vinegar or urine. Sometimes they’d pack them with hair or thread. The idea was that the thread created a maze that the witch would get lost in, trapping her inside. Did you say Alice broke it?”
I nod, fanning myself. It’s so hot, so close. The air is thick in my lungs. I think of that shoe just lying there buried beneath the ash and feel sick and dizzy.
“Mind, it’s a shame they’re knocking those old places down,” Bert says sagely. “They’re full of history, you know.”
“There’s old marks on the rafters, and the ceiling has come down in the kitchen, but I caught a glimpse of the floor in there,” Sam tells him. “It’s proper Cornish slate. Someone should recover what they can before the developers move in.”
“They won’t stop building work for some old graffiti,” Fern spits, her face flushed with what looks like real anger. “These money-grabbing bastards will raze the lot to the ground without a second thought.”
“Not graffiti, Fern.” Bert grins, giving us another flash of his dentures. “‘Apotropaic marks.’ I’ve seen similar before in old farmhouses. Those are historically significant. They should take those beams out and put them in a museum.”
I think of the little tadpole shape, burned into the wood.
“What were the apotropaic marks for?” I ask Bert. He looks animated, as if he has been waiting to talk about this subject for years. It reminds me of Oscar when someone asks him to explain black holes. That flare of excitement and enthusiasm.
“ Belief, Mina. The marks were protection against the witches and devils. Look around you, we’re still doing it even now, hundreds of years later! Hanging hagstones and saluting magpies, hoping it will keep us safe from bad luck and bad dreams.”
“Mummy!” From inside the house. I can see Stevie’s shadow on the stairwell. “Tuttles is on!”
“I better go,” Fern tells us all, smiling apologetically. “One day I’m going to cook those ninja bloody turtles into a big old soup. Thanks, Bert.”
She kisses him affectionately on the cheek and waves goodbye to Sam and me. I smile, but I notice Sam is more subdued, pained and lost in his thoughts. I think again of that shoe with the yellow stitching— Maggie’s shoe —just waiting to be found.