Chapter Sixteen #4
Arabella doesn’t elaborate on this, but it must be a reference to what Reacher hinted at earlier, that there’s a further story behind her belief in the curse.
So how do I find it? I flick through the journals, the different dates.
Arabella told me that the curse has come once every three years, starting with her parents.
If this year, 1926, is Arabella’s turn, then I should be able to count back through her relatives to work out that …
Yes, the parents must have died in 1911.
I find the diary for that year and place it on the floor beside me.
But where does George come into it? I don’t recall what date of death was on his headstone, but I remember that Henry Lascy paid for it – so it must have happened before 1911.
I take a few earlier volumes, going back to 1908: whatever Arabella believes started the curse, it must have happened near enough to her parents’ passing that she’d connect the two events.
The books are small, just large enough to hold in the palm of a hand, so I’m able to squeeze all four into my pockets.
Don’t want to be caught reading them here – I’ll take them away for later.
I mourn the absence of the latest, green leather journal.
I want to know what Arabella has written about me.
Still, a thrill of pleasure to be taking something precious away from her. I have what I came for. Time to get out before I’m spotted.
Again cupping my hand around the candle flame, I pass down the corridor and out on to the wooden walk that encircles the upper storey of the main hall. In my haste to leave, I make a mistake: I don’t check that I’m alone.
A flash of illuminated movement from the hall below.
I’m stuck in place, a clench of cold in my chest, as Arabella stares back up at me.
For a moment, we are both still as the figures in the statue garden outside. I try to think what to do. Run away? Attack her? Beg her to keep quiet?
Arabella speaks first: ‘No …’ The word chokes out of her, horrified and hoarse.
She carries her own candle – this is what alerted me to her presence – and its light reveals a face that’s bloodless, eyes round as buttons.
Her hair is loose, hanging unbrushed around her shoulders.
Tucked under one arm, I realize she has the green diary; she must have been writing in it this evening, and that’s why it wasn’t with the others. ‘Not you,’ she pleads. ‘Not again.’
Again? I don’t know how to reply to that, so I just wait to hear what she’ll say next.
‘George sent you, didn’t he?’ The candlelight flickers – her hand is trembling. ‘He realized he took the wrong person.’
Bloody hell … She thinks I’m a ghost! Some kind of vengeful spirit, returned from beyond to punish her for the evil deed she did me. Well, I’m not going to disillusion her. Let her feel a little fear.
She takes a small step forward, drawing closer. ‘I’m so sorry, Vee, I thought if I could just …’ Her voice trails off into a sob.
While I’d love to listen to her beg my forgiveness, I should get away before she realizes I’m the same flesh and blood that I’ve always been. But how? If I take the staircase down, I’ll have to pass her by.
Then I remember there are back stairs in the closed wing, no longer in use.
What could be more suited to a ghost than disappearing into seemingly thin air?
I turn and, still not saying anything, continue down the walk until I come to the one door I haven’t been through yet – the one leading to the old servants’ quarters.
Without turning to look back at Arabella, I go in.
No matter where I go, staff rooms always have the same uniform decoration.
Maybe our employers think the familiar will make us feel at home.
Or perhaps that we aren’t a high enough class of being to care for luxuries like aesthetics or comfort.
In this dank corridor, I’m faced with peeling beige paint, rows of unvarnished wooden doors, cracked linoleum flooring.
The only points of difference are the aura of decay and the occasional dust sheets hanging over abandoned furniture.
Moving fast now, I hurry through these uninspiring passages until I find, as expected, the top of the back stairs.
Now I’ve learned my lesson, I extinguish the candle and proceed with caution, creeping down once more into the Allens’ quarters.
Still empty. Arabella doesn’t appear to have raised any alarm.
I pass through the kitchen into the cellar, then make my escape through the waiting exterior hatch, closing it behind me as I go.
When I reach the lane, my heart is still racing fit to burst, and I’m quivering all over with adrenaline – or perhaps from the exertion; I’m still not recovered from my dip in the river, after all. But I’ve done it! In my pockets, I have Arabella’s diaries. I could whoop with joy.
Once I make it back to the Wights’ cottage, I find that Peggy has been waiting up for me in the front room, working at her knitting by lamplight. The blanket’s advanced by a good length.
‘How’d it go?’ she asks as I poke my head in. ‘All fixed with her Ladyship?’
‘I’d say we both came away with things to think about.’
It turns out that the bed I’ve been occupying is normally shared by Peggy and Ellen.
In the meantime, Ellen is in with Daniel, and Peggy’s been sleeping on the settee down here.
Now I’m on the mend, I try to convince her to swap, but she’s having none of it.
‘Nonsense, you’re the guest. Get on upstairs. I’m perfectly happy here.’
So, trying to squash my guilt, I head up to the sisters’ room.
Light the lamp to see that my sheets have been carefully remade, the borrowed nightgown folded up on the pillow, and a jug of water and a little vase of daffodils left on the bedside table.
Oh, Peggy … I feel bad not telling her the truth when she’s been ever so kind to me, but what can I do?
She’d be up at Harfold with a pitchfork if she found out the half of it.
After changing my clothes, I get into bed and prop myself up against the pillow, Arabella’s pilfered diaries in my lap. I start with 1908.