The House on the Hill
All houses wherein men have lived and died
Are haunted houses. Through the open doors
The harmless phantoms on their errands glide,
With feet that make no sound upon the floors.
from ‘Haunted Houses’
HENRY WADSWORTH LONGFELLOW
In the house on the hill, there was a light. A single, flickering flame in a room on the first floor, like a candle burning.
Daphne looked at it from her bedroom in Dean Hall, her hands resting on the cold stone window sill.
Her train from London had been late getting in, so she’d barely had time to say her hello to her cousin, Teddy, before being shown to her room.
The other weekend guests had arrived some time before.
She hadn’t had the chance to explore the parkland and was surprised there was so substantial a house within the grounds.
It looked both rather splendid and rather isolated, despite its proximity to Dean Hall.
Set on the ridge of the hill between two clusters of trees, a facade of brick, perfectly symmetrical, red tiled roof and tall chimneys.
Though half hidden in the shadows of the woods, Daphne imagined there’d be a fine view from the house across the South Downs and down to the sea some eight miles away.
She wondered if Teddy knew who lived there or if the house even belonged to the estate.
He had taken Dean Hall on a six month lease and this was the first of his weekend house parties.
She doubted he knew much about the place yet, though he’d sent her a photograph from the letting agent.
In the dying light, Daphne could make out the silhouette of the arboretum higher up the wooded hillside. Spread out below that, she knew, were fields of yellow rape like squares of a patchwork quilt, furrowed and brown now in the autumn.
She shivered, feeling the chill air creep over her bare skin, and drew back inside the comfort of her room.
Daphne pulled the window closed, stiff on its mullioned hinges, and rattled at the metal catch until it was properly shut.
She lingered at the window a moment longer, her gaze fixed upon the flickering orange of light on the distant hill, mesmerised, until suddenly it was gone.
If she’d been a jumpy kind of girl, she might have squealed.
As it was, Daphne felt oddly put out, as if someone had caught her snooping and blown the candle out.
She pulled more roughly at the curtains than she’d intended to block out the encroaching autumn night.
The brass rings rattled on the rails, but didn’t want to shift.
She gave it up as a bad job and left them for the maid.
At Dean Hall, Teddy had stressed in his letter inviting her for the weekend, there was still staff to keep things ticking over.
Like in the old days, before the war, when everything was easier.
The old days.
If Douglas hadn’t deserted her, life would have been so different.
As Daphne started to dress for dinner, she thought of her temporary room in the boarding house in Berwick Street, the single gas ring in the kitchen shared by four girls like her, who had not been brought up to earn a living by typing or working in a shop.
She thought of the tatty WC at the end of the corridor, and nylon stockings hanging over the bath, the scarcity of hot water, and could have cried for the world she had left behind.
Mrs Daphne Dumsilde, it had such a ring to it.
Douglas had promised to look after her, in sickness and in health.
But he had not looked after her. He hadn’t kept his word.
Daphne folded her travelling clothes on the armchair and shimmied into a silk underslip, appalled at how easily she had immediately fallen back into her habitual blue state of mind.
Why spoil a perfectly pleasant weekend? Invitations had been thin on the ground – a woman alone was always awkward and her circumstances made it doubly so – and she was too proud to ask for help.
At Dean Hall there would be plenty of hot water, plenty of food and drink, perhaps a little dancing and amusing company to keep the dark thoughts at bay.
She was glad to be here. Her cousin had seen out the war in America and had been abroad when the business with Douglas happened – but she liked Teddy and was determined not to spoil his weekend by being dull and gloomy.
In her slip and stockings, Daphne walked to the armoire and took a cigarette from her case, trying not to notice the inscription on the inside of the lid: TO DEEDEE FROM DEEDUM, their little joke.
She tapped it sharply to tighten the tobacco, picked up her Ronson and jabbed at it with her thumb until it sparked.
That, too, reminded her of Douglas. How idiotic that she kept the case and lighter to remind her of happier times, when in fact the sight of them only made her feel worse.
Daphne inhaled, feeling the calming smoke seep down into her lungs.
From the Oak Hall below, she heard the sound of the gramophone and whispers of jazz.
Oddly modern music for so antique a setting.
Madrigals and spinets would suit the wooden panels and trophies of big game hunts mounted on mahogany surrounds rather better than the smudged chords of Louisiana and New Orleans.
She glanced back to the window, wondering if there would be a light in the house on the hill again, but it was dark in the park.
Night had fallen, stripping the shape and character from the pleasant Sussex landscape.
Tomorrow morning, she promised herself, she would take a walk, perhaps sit a while and paint, aim for a likeness of the wonderful flint facade of Dean Hall.
Or, rather, perhaps she would go in search of the house on the hill, and paint that instead. She felt strangely drawn to it.
Daphne stubbed out her cigarette and finished dressing for dinner.
A soft pink silk dress, which suited her pale colouring, with a dropped handkerchief waist and low V beaded neckline.
Peach stockings and a light woollen blue shawl, to cover her bare arms. A ribbon tied around her forehead, a mist of scent, and she was ready.
Daphne hesitated a moment, then removed her wedding ring and left it on the table beside the bed.
She didn’t know if other guests would know about her situation but, whether they did or not, where was the sense in inviting questions?
Her bedroom was at the far corner of the south wing on the first floor.
She stepped out into the dimly lit corridor, hearing sounds of the party down below, feeling a mixture of shyness and nerves at the thought of a roomful of strangers.
She walked slowly, past perfectly acceptable paintings of sea and countryside, until she noticed, close to the top of the stairs, something delightful.
A wonderful doll’s house, painted facade of brick, perfectly symmetrical, red tiled roof and tall chimneys.
In the gable there was a clock, showing the time set at three forty-five and the date: 1810.
She ran her finger over the surface. There were ribbons of dust on the slope of the red roof and chimneys, but it was still charming.
Daphne had owned a doll’s house when she was little.
It kept her entertained for hours, as she moved the tiny people from room to room, inventing lives for them, playing house.
This doll’s house was far grander and there was also something familiar about it.
Daphne wondered if she’d perhaps seen a picture of it somewhere, it was so distinctive, but she couldn’t bring anything to mind.
The noise from the Oak Hall was louder now and Daphne knew she should go down and join the party, but instead she unhooked the latch and opened it up to look inside.
The wooden facade swung open, revealing the entire household from top to bottom.
A staircase ran like a spine up the middle of the house.
At the lowest level were the working rooms – servants and a flock of geese and ducks, the mud room with harness, and the kitchen, with brass copper pots and an old rocking chair to one side.
Cloth and wood figurines of a cook, parlour maids, and butler and boot boy, all perfectly dressed in black and white and green waistcoats.
On the ground floor, a red and grey tiled entrance hall, a stone fireplace with marble mantel and a grandmother clock.
To the left, a billiard room with the green baize table perfectly smooth and, to the right the dining room, with twelve mahogany chairs set round a polished oval table, and a maid in black and white uniform dusting the sideboard.
On the floor above, the ladies and gentlemen of the house, whiskered and gowned in a drawing room and, above the billiard room, a study.
A leather-topped desk, complete with inkwell and papers, bookshelves and a brass side table on which stood the smallest of glasses and a fold of paper, like a letter waiting to be read.
Daphne frowned, something about this room in particular setting a memory scuttling in her mind.
The chair was on its side. She reached in and picked it up, placing it back at the desk.
On the floors above, the family bedrooms. Each perfect in their detail, porcelain washbasins and jugs, matching counterpanes and portraits in tortoiseshell frames. In the attic, the maids’ quarters and a nursery with a metal cot and blackboard and chalk.
The gong rang for dinner, its brass song reverberating up from the hall below.
Knowing she couldn’t put off joining the party any longer, Daphne reluctantly stood up and closed the glass fronted doors.
She wondered if the doll’s house had been modelled on a real house, if it had been made for the daughter of the family that once owned Dean Hall, or whether it was a recent acquisition for decoration only.
The gong sounded again.