Chapter Five
When Ulysses told Pixie about the next assignment, she knew right away that this was the one – the one she’d been waiting for.
She hadn’t been required to slide since New York, but she sensed, intuitively, that this time she would.
That this was going to be the slide that reconnected her with Cavill.
It had to be. It was too much of a coincidence that the theatre was in a town in Cornwall near St Sidwell.
In fact, when she looked it up on Google Maps, she could see that it was merely twenty miles from St Sidwell, a little further up the coast.
Pixie had put out the desire to reconnect with Cavill and now the Universe had responded, loudly. She slipped Cavill’s sketchbook into her carpet bag and set off with Ulysses to Paddington Station.
As she sat in the train idly watching London whizzing past her window, it crossed her mind to pay the Talwyns a visit.
It would be nice to see Tabitha again. The child had the makings of a gifted psychic, and Pixie was keen to encourage her.
But then the thought of returning to the house where Pixie had met and fallen in love with Cavill caused her heart to burn with longing and she changed her mind.
It would be foolish to go back, she conceded, especially as his gravestone stood outside the church on the estate, a cold reminder of the years that separated them. She couldn’t bear to see that again.
She couldn’t bear to return to the place where little Felix Pengower had died, either.
Even though it had happened over a hundred years ago, the memory of that traumatic slide still haunted her when she recalled it, which she made every effort not to do, but the mind was an uncontrollable thing, and often it caught her unawares and took her back down that dark and terrifying path.
It had been agonising to have to stand by and allow events to unfold when it had been in her power to prevent them.
No, it would be unwise to revisit St Sidwell Manor. Too much had happened there, and the wounds to her heart were still open.
Ulysses took his AirPods out of his ears and gave Pixie a knowing look. ‘I know you’ve brought the sketchbook you stole from St Sidwell,’ he said, and grinned mischievously. ‘And you’re going to try and use this slide to reconnect with Cavill.’
‘That’s right,’ she replied. ‘I have to shut it down, somehow. Even you told me that that’s what I have to do.’
‘But are you actually going to go through with it?’
‘If this slide takes me back to him, I’ll end it. I promise you that. I’ll end it for both of us.’
‘How? When he won’t know who you are. You can’t tell him the truth. That would be crazy. Anyway, he wouldn’t believe you.’
Pixie sighed and turned her eyes to the window where the grey city had been replaced by fields of long grasses, leafy hedgerows and trees of orange and red.
‘To be honest, I don’t have a clue. I’d like to tell you that I have it all planned out.
But I don’t. I really don’t know how I’m going to do it.
I just know that I must. If I want to let him go so that I can live my life, and leave him free to live his, I have to sever the connection somehow. ’
Ulysses frowned. ‘He’s finished his life, Pixie. He finished it about seventy years ago.’
She looked at him and her bright blue eyes shone obstinately. ‘You’re looking at it as linear, Ulysses. Life is not linear. It just appears linear so that we can do whatever it is we need to do here on this planet. As I told you, there is no past, present or future …’
‘I know,’ he interrupted briskly. ‘Everything is happening all at once. Christ, that does my head in!’ He slotted his AirPods back into his ears.
‘I can’t deal with that. Sorry, Pix. It’s too complex for my simple, earthly mind to comprehend.
But I hope you do finish whatever it is you have going with Cavill.
Because you’re not really here, are you? ’ He gave her a meaningful look.
‘What do you mean, I’m not really here? I’m here,’ she replied defensively. But she knew what he meant. Her mind was in the past, with Cavill. It was always in the past with Cavill.
‘You need to commit to this life, Pixie. It’s full of beautiful things, but you’re not seeing them right now. In fact, you’re wasting every precious moment, pining like a dog for someone who doesn’t exist. You’ll never fall in love if you don’t open yourself up to it.’
She smiled at him in amusement. ‘For a man who said he’d never fall in love, your fixation with Henry looks very much like love to me.’
Ulysses dropped his eyes to his phone. ‘I don’t know what it is. But Henry’s not like others,’ he admitted bashfully. Then he lifted his gaze to meet hers. ‘If I can fall in love, then so can you, a second time.’
She folded her arms. ‘I know I’ll never find anyone like Cavill.’ Her eyes drifted to the window again. To the immense sky and beyond, to where all truth lay hidden.
‘No, you won’t, Pix. Of course you won’t.
And you wouldn’t want to. How miserable for a man to love you in the shadow of the great Cavill Pengower!
No one can live up to him. Because, if you’re truly honest with yourself, you never really knew him in the first place.
You’ve put him on a pedestal and created this perfect man.
The Cavill Pengower in your memory probably doesn’t exist at all.
Probably never did. No, you need someone different.
Someone real. If the Universe can bring me Henry Stirling, it can bring you someone too. ’
She chose to ignore what he had said about Cavill. How could she explain such a deep knowing, such a profound connection? It had nothing to do with the amount of time they’d known each other. What she felt about Cavill was timeless. ‘Perhaps,’ she replied flatly.
‘And by the way, I’ll be heading out to New York soon, to see Henry.’
‘Really?’ Pixie felt a wrench in her stomach that brought her sharply back to the present. ‘When?’
‘In a week or two.’
‘That is soon,’ she said, trying to look as if she didn’t care.
‘It’s getting serious, Pixie.’ He grinned and began scrolling down his playlists for the right tunes to listen to.
Pixie felt low suddenly. The thought of London without Ulysses, even for a few days, made her feel quite desolate. Besides him, she didn’t have any friends of her own. The people she hung out with were his friends.
She turned her attention back to the window, only to be assaulted by one negative thought after another.
What would happen to her if Ulysses decided to go and live in America?
She’d be on her own; totally alone. What if she never got over Cavill?
What if she never met anyone else? What if Ulysses and Henry became a solid couple and there was no room for her? What if, what if, what if …
The train was late. When they arrived at the station it was already getting dark.
Emma Lightwater was waiting to meet them in a belted red coat and floral scarf.
Her long brown hair was swept up into a velvet scrunchie.
She recognised Pixie at once due to her pink tresses.
But she had imagined someone taller. Pixie was surprisingly small and slight, like an elf, in a long, bohemian cardigan worn over jeans, and a shabby carpet bag hooked over one arm.
Beside her – and striding down the platform with an air of great confidence, was the most handsome young man Emma had ever seen.
Truly, he looked like a movie star. Put him on the stage, she thought to herself, and you’d have all the women in Cornwall fighting for seats, and many of the men too!
‘Pixie,’ she called out and waved. Pixie and Ulysses both smiled in acknowledgement and made their way swiftly towards her.
‘Hello! I’m Emma, Joseph Lightwater’s wife.
Lovely to meet you. And you must be Ulysses Lozano,’ she added with a blush.
Really, she was old enough to be his mother!
But he was so handsome, she didn’t know where to look!
She shook their hands enthusiastically. ‘Thank you so much for coming all this way. I can’t begin to tell you what’s been going on at the theatre. ’
‘I’m dying to know,’ said Pixie. ‘It sounds like you’ve had a dreadful time.’
‘It’s been crazy. Really, I’ve never known anything like it, and Joseph has been the director at The Aphrodite for twelve years. Come, I’ll drive you to the hotel and then take you straight to the theatre. Is there anything you need? Are you hungry? Did you eat on the train?’
Pixie reassured her that they were fine, but Ulysses requested a sandwich. ‘I’m ravenous,’ he said, and his smile was so dazzling that Emma resolved to find him the most delicious sandwich in Seacombe.
Emma drove a navy-blue Volvo. It was clean and smelt of leather with a subtle undertone of wet dog.
As she drove the short distance to the hotel, she filled them in.
‘My husband thinks it’s someone playing a prank on poor Isadora Nash, but I saw the chair rise off the floor with my own eyes.
If someone’s playing a prank, they’re an extraordinary magician. ’
‘Isadora Nash,’ said Ulysses from the back seat. ‘I’ve seen lots of her films. I like her. She’s a character.’
‘You’ll find that none of the cast or crew like her. She’s a bit of a diva, I’m afraid.’
‘And nothing like this has ever happened before?’ Pixie asked. She was more interested in the spirit than in Isadora Nash.
‘Not in my experience. No paranormal activity whatsoever,’ said Emma.
‘But there’s an old Irish lady who has worked at the theatre since she was a child, which is probably over seventy years, called Madge Boylan.
She’s often mentioned the legendary theatre ghost and claims to have seen it mulling about the place.
But no one takes Madge seriously. You know, she’s old and a bit dotty.
In a nice way. Besides her, I don’t think anyone else has seen anything otherworldly. ’