Chapter Six
When Pixie entered the theatre she felt the spirit’s energy at once.
It wasn’t just the air that was hardened by the usual chill that denoted a spirit presence, but a closer, more direct feeling, like she was being watched.
It caused the hairs on the back of her neck to bristle.
She followed Emma slowly into the foyer and swept her eyes over the crimson-and-gold patterned carpeting, the shiny wooden ticket booth and souvenir shop, and the staircase at the other end.
She narrowed her eyes, suspiciously. Someone was most definitely watching her.
The skin on the back of her neck began to itch and she put a hand there to scratch it. Her eyes were drawn again to the stair. What she saw there took her by surprise.
She caught her breath and stopped dead in her tracks.
The woman, on realising that Pixie could see her, stared back with astonishment. The spirit clearly wasn’t used to being noticed, Pixie reflected. Pixie wasn’t used to being observed so blatantly, either. They remained frozen, the two of them, gawping at each other.
Ulysses put a soft hand on Pixie’s arm. ‘What do you see?’ he whispered, following the direction of her gaze and finding nothing but the empty staircase.
Emma spun round. ‘Are you seeing something already?’ she asked, blanching. Talking about ghosts had been quite fun until that moment. Now she was back in the theatre with the very real possibility of coming face to face with one, she was afraid.
Pixie nodded slowly without taking her eyes off the spirit. ‘There’s a young woman on the stair,’ she said quietly. As she uttered those words, the woman vanished. ‘Now she’s gone,’ she added in a normal voice. ‘I think I scared her away.’
‘Goodness, that was quick,’ said Emma.
‘Well, there’s no doubt now that you have an earthbound spirit,’ said Pixie with satisfaction.
‘Can you ask her to leave?’ Emma said hopefully.
‘I’ll try,’ Pixie replied. ‘But first I’d like to speak to Madge, if I may.’ The fact that this old woman knew about the haunting at St Sidwell was intriguing.
Emma ushered Pixie and Ulysses backstage and introduced them to her husband.
Joseph was used to creative, often eccentric people and wasn’t at all fazed by Pixie’s pink hair.
He greeted them with politeness, but hoped they’d quickly do their thing then return to the hotel so he could get on with tonight’s performance.
Rebecca was in the middle of rehearsing some of the more demanding scenes with Edward, and Joseph was keen that nothing disturbed her flow.
After the drama of the night before, it was imperative that nothing went wrong tonight.
‘Pixie has already seen the ghost,’ said Emma excitedly, regretting the words as they tumbled out, because Joseph didn’t believe in ghosts and thought mediums and psychics were charlatans.
‘I’m sure she has,’ said Joseph, trying to keep the cynicism out of his voice.
But Pixie picked it up and chose to ignore it; it made no difference to her whether people believed her or not.
She wasn’t here to convince or convert. She was here to help lost souls find their way home, and that was all that mattered.
‘I’d be grateful if you could get rid of this ghost before tonight’s performance,’ he said loudly, keen to be overheard so that the cast and stage crew would know that he was doing the right thing.
‘I’ll try my best,’ said Pixie, which was all she could ever do.
Ulysses was more assertive. ‘Of course she will,’ he said confidently. ‘Pixie succeeds where all others fail,’ he added with a smile, and even Joseph couldn’t help but smile back at such a charming face.
Emma, like a fly in the glare of a bright light, was momentarily distracted by Ulysses. Then she remembered Madge. ‘Darling, Pixie would love to have a chat with Madge. Is she about?’
‘She’s in the kitchen,’ Joseph replied. He was about to ask why Pixie needed to speak to the woman who made the tea, when Samantha, the new Witch One who had been promoted from lady-in-waiting to Lady Macbeth, interrupted.
‘Can I have a quick word, Joseph?’
Emma found Madge in the kitchen making sandwiches.
She was humming to herself as she stood hunched over the sideboard laying out slices of bread and scooping a knife into a big pat of butter.
Madge stopped what she was doing when she saw the trio in the doorway.
She recognised Pixie at once on account of her hair.
‘You’re the medium, aren’t you?’ she said, smiling cheerfully and wiping her arthritic hands on her apron.
‘It’s a good thing you’re here,’ she said.
‘We can’t have a repeat of last night or the entire cast will leave. ’
‘Do you have a moment?’ Pixie asked. ‘I’d love to ask you a few questions.’
‘Of course. Be my guest and take a pew. I’ll continue with the sandwiches if you don’t mind, or everyone will complain. Although, no one has complained quite so rudely as Miss Nash,’ she added tersely. ‘Perhaps it’s an American thing.’
‘It’s an Isadora thing, I’m afraid,’ said Emma, sitting down at the rectangular wooden table and gesturing at Ulysses and Pixie to join her.
Pixie sat down, put her elbows on the table and tented her fingers. ‘I gather you know something of the haunting at St Sidwell Manor, Madge,’ she began.
Madge nodded keenly. ‘Oh yes. My friend works there …’
‘You know Elsa Tregoning?’ said Pixie excitedly. It couldn’t be anyone else.
‘I do. Her late husband, Gerren, and my husband, Jacob, were childhood friends.’
‘So you know St Sidwell Manor?’
‘Oh, indeed I do. A beautiful house it is. Of course, it’s different now that it’s owned by a family. It was a sad place before, when Mrs Delaware lived there.’
Pixie knew that first hand. As soon as she persuaded the sad spirit of Cordelia Pengower to move on, the energy lifted, and the house felt warm and welcoming once again.
She wanted to talk about the Talwyns, and ask after Tabitha, but she realised time was of the essence, the play would start soon.
‘How long have you worked here, at the theatre?’
‘Since I was a teenager. I was born in West Cork, but my father moved us here to Seacombe when I was fifteen, in 1946. He was a carpenter. They employed him here at the theatre. It was amateur drama in those days. A little chaotic, but grand. He made sets. I used to come and help him in my spare time. I was quite good with a paintbrush and a hammer. Mam was a seamstress. A good one, too. She had to be. She had nine mouths to feed.’ Madge began to lay pieces of shredded chicken onto the thickly buttered bread.
‘She made costumes, and I helped her from time to time, but I wasn’t good at sewing.
My fingers don’t have the patience for that kind of work.
What I liked to do was keep the theatre clean and tidy, and watch the rehearsals.
I was never going to be an actress myself.
I didn’t have the talent. But I liked to watch.
Plays take you into a different world, don’t they? And no two nights are the same.’
‘Tell me about this spirit, Madge.’
Madge put down her knife and came to the table, where she hovered with her hands on her hips. ‘I’ll tell you right now that she’s a woman. Nessa Blunt.’
‘How do you know that?’ Emma asked. In all the twelve years that Joseph had worked here, Madge had never once mentioned a ghost named Nessa Blunt.
‘I didn’t like to say. People get the wind up them when you talk about ghosts.
But Nessa Blunt haunted this place when my father worked here and has haunted it ever since.
I see her from time to time, bless her heart.
I like her company. She’s a benign creature.
At least, she was a benign creature until the arrival of Isadora Nash.
Back when I was a child everyone seemed to know about her.
Now I’m the only person who does. I’ve been here nearly seventy years. I’m like a piece of furniture.’
‘That sounds like the woman I saw on the stair when I came in,’ said Pixie. ‘She was wearing one of those flapper dresses from the 1920s and a cloche hat.’
Madge’s eyes widened with interest. ‘That’ll be her,’ she said emphatically, forgetting all about her sandwiches and pulling up a chair and sitting down keenly.
‘She died here in the fire of 1923,’ she added.
‘Ninth of May to be precise. There used to be a framed newspaper article on the wall. I don’t know what happened to it. The fire was front-page news.’
Emma knew nothing of the history of the theatre, but she did know that the interior was Art Deco, her favourite style.
‘How much of the theatre was destroyed?’ Pixie asked.
‘The inside. It was gutted like a hare,’ said Madge.
‘That makes sense,’ Ulysses cut in. ‘The facade is Edwardian.’
‘Tell me what you know about Nessa Blunt,’ Pixie asked.
‘Not very much, I’m afraid. My father was touched by the four winds, if you know what I mean. He loved ghost stories and was an admirer of Sir Arthur Conan Doyle. If there was ever a strange noise, or it got particularly cold, he’d say: “That’s Nessa Blunt.” Everyone here knew about Nessa Blunt.’
‘Who was she?’ Pixie asked.
‘Well, Da worked here in the late forties and fifties, which was long after the fire. But she was an actress. It happened during a performance, apparently.’
‘Was anyone else killed?’
‘Not that I know of. Just Nessa Blunt. Poor lamb.’
‘And did they find out how the fire started?’
‘Oh yes,’ said Madge. ‘Nessa herself started it.’
‘Nessa started it? And she died in the process?’
‘She did.’
Pixie thought that sounded a bit odd. Surely, if you start a fire, you make damn sure you get out alive. She narrowed her eyes thoughtfully and nodded slowly. ‘Okay, I’ll see what I can get out of her.’
‘How do you do that?’ Emma asked. ‘I mean, will you talk to her?’
‘Yes, I’ll just talk to her.’
Emma grinned, eyes gleaming with fascination. ‘That’s pretty wild.’
Ulysses laughed. ‘If only you knew what else she can do.’