The Darkest Hour. Barbara Erskine

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СКАЧАТЬ and skylights had new wooden frames with locks on their elegant ironwork latches.

      ‘I don’t suppose Evie haunts this house?’ Lucy asked tentatively. Or Ralph, she added silently. Why was it she felt compelled to ask that wherever she went? She softened the question with a rueful smile, implying that she was joking.

      To her astonishment Elizabeth nodded, her face suddenly taut with anxiety. ‘It is strange you should ask. We have often wondered. There are footsteps sometimes, you know, and Georgie, that’s my eldest grandson, who was about seven at the time, said he could smell paint up here. Can you smell paint?’ She held Lucy’s gaze for a moment. ‘No. Neither can I, but occasionally Georgie says it was very strong and oily. We took him to an art shop and he identified the smell as oil paint. None of us is artistic so he wouldn’t have smelled it here, and the house itself was redecorated a while ago and anyway house paint smells nothing like oil paint.’

      Lucy felt a jolt of unease deep in the pit of her stomach. ‘No one is afraid, though?’ she asked cautiously.

      There was a moment’s silence. ‘Not of the smell, no.’ Elizabeth put her hand up to the necklace she was wearing over her cotton sweater and twisted it nervously. She had moved away from her visitor and was standing by the train track staring down at it as if lost in thought. I’m often alone here,’ Elizabeth went on at last. ‘My husband travels a lot.’ She paused, as if regretting that she had said too much.

      Lucy hesitated. ‘My husband died a few months ago,’ she said at last. ‘I know how it feels, being alone.’

      ‘My dear, I’m sorry.’ Elizabeth looked at her as if seeing her for the first time. ‘So you understand. He’s supposed to have retired but he runs a consultancy, advising people on buying overseas properties, and,’ she hesitated for a moment, then continued softly, ‘when I am here by myself, at night, sometimes I think I can hear people in the house. It is a big house for one person.’ She gave an awkward smile. ‘When it is full of family and children and my daughter’s dogs it comes alive, then it belongs to us. But when I am by myself I am sure it still belongs to the Lucases. They were here for generations, you know.’

      For a moment Lucy was stunned. ‘But you said there were other families here in between,’ she said at last.

      ‘Yes. And of course it could have been them.’ Elizabeth shook her head. ‘But it isn’t. Evie’s brother was killed, you know, in the Battle of Britain. There’s a memorial to him in the village church. I think his mother went mad with grief.’

      Lucy held her breath, staring at her in horror, intensely aware of the silence around them.

      ‘I hear her crying,’ Elizabeth went on almost under her breath. ‘I tell myself it’s the wind in the chimneys, perhaps an owl screaming into the night, but it isn’t. It’s Rachel. I sometimes think I can’t bear it.’ She gave a small wistful smile. ‘I’m sorry, my dear. You must think I’m ga-ga.’

      ‘How do you know it’s Rachel?’ Lucy asked at last. Her voice was husky.

      ‘I just know.’ It was a whisper. She shuddered. ‘Let’s go downstairs. Do you mind? I’ll make us some tea. Then you must see the outbuildings.’ Suddenly her voice was stronger. ‘They were all farm buildings in Evie’s day and I think you’ll see they have probably changed much less than the house has. In fact I doubt if they have changed in hundreds of years. The land itself is all owned by a huge company now. There is a farm manager who lives on an estate the other side of Chichester.’

      Lucy followed Elizabeth down the two flights of stairs back into the kitchen. While they waited for the kettle to boil on the Aga Elizabeth disappeared into the old-style walk-in pantry to find some biscuits and Lucy stared round the room. With part of herself she was listening, afraid she was going to hear Rachel’s cries.

      The kitchen was immaculately tidy. There had only been one car outside, a smart new Mini. It was obvious that Elizabeth’s husband must be away on one of his trips. The woman was living alone in the house with nothing but the ghosts of the past for company.

      She looked up as her hostess put the plate of biscuits in front of her. ‘Do people in the village remember the Lucases?’ she asked, trying to change the mood.

      Elizabeth shook her head. ‘I doubt it. I don’t know. To be honest we don’t mix with the village much any more.’ She reached down the teapot from a shelf and set it on the hotplate to warm.

      ‘But your family come down to see you?’ As soon as she had said it Lucy regretted it. She had already guessed what the answer would be

      ‘They used to. All the time. But they have other calls on their time now. The children have grown out of the countryside. They want to go abroad or spend the holidays with their friends. You know how it is.’ Elizabeth helped herself to a biscuit and broke it in half, scattering crumbs on the pine table before putting it down without tasting it. She didn’t seem to notice. ‘There was a time when I could have offered you a homemade biscuit. Not any more. It’s not worth making them just for me. I bake when there is something on in the village of course. I do my bit, but even that has been taken over now by young families. The mothers are very energetic, very bossy,’ she laughed quietly. ‘They like to do things their way.’

      Lucy’s heart went out to her.

      Behind them the kettle began to whistle. Elizabeth stood up abruptly and went over to the Aga. She made the tea and came back to the table. ‘There you are, my dear. I am so sorry; you must think I am pathetic. Drink that, and then we’ll go outside. I love my garden. It’s mine. Out there I have no sense of Rachel at all. Out there I feel as if I still have a use in the world. I’ll show you.’

      Rachel. Once more she was talking about Rachel. Only in the studio was there an echo of Evie left behind.

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