Glittering Fortunes (7 page)

Chapter Nine

S
USANNA
WOKE
AT
one a.m. with the most formidable stomach cramps, her belly growling and gurgling as if it were about to explode. Cato’s side of the bed was empty, the blankets pushed back and the imprint of his body fresh on the sheets.

As she staggered to the bathroom, all she could see were those horrid slithery oysters grinning back at her. She retched over the porcelain bowl. Why oh why did she insist on trying them? After a weak bout of spitting and weeping, she crawled on all fours back into the bedroom, a pitiful shadow, and slid beneath the covers.

It was utterly freezing. Had Cato left a window open? Susanna forced herself to investigate, her nightdress shining white as she staggered to the panes, imagining how she might look from miles away: a lonely ghost belonging to some bygone era, Victorian perhaps. The drapes were musty and thick, and when she drew them the grounds of the estate gleamed before her, impossibly still and as quiet as a painting. A river of star-glow spilled across the lawns, snaking between giant trees whose hulking frames were black as crows. The cherub in his pond, youth everlasting, sang a silent song to the sky. An owl hooted in the distance, a low, melancholy call.

Darting back to bed, she pressed a hand to her forehead. It was clammy and hot. The four-poster was lumpy, pockets of air and knotted springs in the fabric beneath, as if she were lying on a slab of her own distressed intestines. She gripped the sheets up to her chin and watched the door hopefully, waiting for Cato to return. Perhaps he could fix her a sparkling water: carbon was the thing for nausea.

Several minutes passed. Susanna’s teeth chattered with cold. Through the curtains a milky ribbon of moonlight threaded into the room, the world outside so quiet it was deafening, and she cursed the damp walls and draughty windows that made everything so damn Baltic the whole time—oh, to be in her condo in Malibu, sunbathing by the pool! Though she hadn’t broached the subject with Cato, she couldn’t understand why he didn’t just sell off one of his cars—he scarcely drove the Porsche, for instance—and solve Usherwood’s heating problem once and for all. Did his conflict with Charles really run that deep? Was his refusal to help more than a proud conceit; was it that as far as he was concerned, the sooner Charles froze to death in here the sooner he could step in and reign supreme?

She’d had no idea that Usherwood was in such a state. Cato holding back when he could so easily make a difference spoke volumes. Susanna remembered a drunken litany he had delivered last year.

The golden boy isn’t so golden now
,
is he?
If Daddy could see what a failure he’s become
,
then he’d come running.
He’d come begging
me
for the money:
he’d pay
me
some attention
,
then
,
wouldn’t he?

It was a shame there had been such a spectacular falling-out over supper. Cato had been in a black mood when they’d returned, tossing her to the floor, unbuckling his trousers and demanding sex. Any other time she would have been desperately turned on by it, but tonight she had felt too queasy.

She hoped he wasn’t sulking. She vowed to compensate for it with an early morning blowjob, provided her gag reflex had settled by then.

With any luck the party would get things back on track, Susanna decided, and as she envisaged the revelry, the paupers’ gasps as they were led into the ballroom (which despite its raggedness was clearly where they had to have it) and the creativity she could unleash on the decorating process, she instantly felt better. Parties brought people together, didn’t they? Perhaps Cato and Charlie could use it as a bridge over their troubles, rendering Susanna not just a consummate hostess but also a saintly peacemaker, like Jesus, or the Pope, or a far younger and hotter Mother Teresa.

She was considering how this unification might also prompt Cato into the long-awaited proposal when she heard a short, high-pitched yelp coming from the far reaches of the house. Or had it come from outside? She couldn’t tell.

Her heart thundered in her chest. It came again, this time a prolonged whinny.

What was that?

Susanna gripped the bed-sheets. She listened for it, and where first there was silence she began to detect a thin moaning sound, high and reedy, almost a wail.

Her eyes were big as saucers. Her psychic in LA had promised her that this month would be spiritually fertile. Was she tuning into the desperate, drowning cries of a poor servant girl as she sobbed through the house of the dead?

Susanna gasped. Her eyes darted to the clock at her bedside, half expecting it to leap up and fling itself in her face because who was to say this wasn’t a poltergeist? Her ears searched for the sound, honing it to a pinpoint then just when she’d captured it away it would fly, offering up a moment’s respite before resuming its grisly song.

Perhaps it was the wind, a pesky current whistling through the deserted wings.

Perhaps it was a television, or a radio—? No, it was closer than that.

Perhaps it was a creaky floorboard...

That some heinous phantom was stepping on!

Her chest was about to blow open with all the blood that was hammering through it. She watched the door, convinced the handle was about to turn. Tentatively she extracted herself from the bed, the pains in her stomach all but eclipsed in the shadow of her fear. Her hand was like snow in the darkness, reaching for the door, disembodied as if it didn’t belong to her at all.

On the landing she backed up, forced to choke on her scream when a dour life-sized painting of one of Cato’s grandfathers assailed her vision from the top of the stairs. She crept down the passage, the yowling getting closer. The hall flickered uncertainly, a rich wood smell where the old panels seeped their age; and the framed ancestry of Lomaxes-past lined the walls, expressions shifting and melting in the gloom. Barefoot she padded among their watchful stares, the spectre at the feast.

A ticking clock matched her steps. By the time she reached the winding steps she dared not look behind her.

Here she could tune in to it more cleanly. It was a definite, protracted sigh, punctuated by an occasional whimper, and as Susanna tiptoed closer she swore the pattern was getting faster, the wailing higher, breaking momentarily into a screech, before a series of great sobs erupted, one after the other, an agony of ecstasy...

Abruptly, it stopped.

So did she. A chill prickled up the back of her neck and she knew then,
absolutely knew
, that she wasn’t alone. Her lips went dry and she gulped, swallowing the lump in her throat like a ball of cotton wool.

Too afraid to turn for fear of meeting the presence at her shoulder, Susanna reversed down the corridor, hands flailing behind her, fingertips exploring the unseen, and when she met the rough wood of her bedroom door she whipped it open and dived inside, slamming it shut and flinging herself into the safety of the bed.

It was ages before she got any sleep. Some time later she was distantly aware of Cato climbing in beside her, and bewilderedly she reached for him, content to encounter his solid, reassuring bulk. Only then did she drift into dreams.

Chapter Ten

T
HE
MORNING
AFTER
Saffron on the Sea, Olivia arrived at Usherwood early. The calm, quiet hours she spent in the gardens were a far cry from the hectic pace of city life, squashed in on the rush-hour tube or queuing for sandwiches in a café on Holborn, and while she was still hoping to get enough cash together by the end of the month to put down a deposit on a flat, she had to admit that being back at the cove was making her happy. With every day that passed she felt herself growing calmer, more centred and more like her old self—and she’d started drawing again.

‘Something’s got you inspired,’ Florence had commented at the weekend as Olivia had torn yet another page from her sketchbook. ‘Or should I say someone?’

‘Whatever, Mum.’

‘I’m just saying...’

‘Well, don’t.’

The last thing she needed was another lecture about Addy. It was so annoying!

Why did everyone feel the need to get involved in her love life? No wonder she hadn’t brought home either of the guys she’d dated in London, if this was the kind of interrogation they’d face. She ignored the voice that suggested it was because one had been a stoner who spent his entire time ‘gaming’ with nine-year-olds in Japan, while the other’s name had been Nimrod—he was Jewish, though, to be fair.

There was a mountain of weeding to be done and Olivia wanted to plant the geranium seeds before lunch. Her mother had given her a box of vegetable roots from the allotment and made her swear to ask Mr Lomax about them.
All that space and he hasn’t got room for potatoes?
Florence had wedged the crate into her pannier.

Olivia wasn’t sure
what
Charlie had room for in his life. He was perpetually indifferent. He never spoke to her. He never looked at her. He never touched her. Not that she wanted him to touch her, but just little things, like when he came to check on her progress and she held out a bulb, plump as a miniature gourd and gritty with soil, and he would never take it from her. Or if Barbara gave her a cup of tea to bring to him and he would never accept it directly, just keep on with whatever he was doing and wait for Olivia to leave it there, offering only a curt and dismissive, ‘Thank you.’ Or when she’d tripped one day in the Sundial Garden, putting out her hands to break her fall, and he could easily have caught her, but he hadn’t.

He seemed to go out of his way to escape having any kind of contact with her. If she had been the sensitive type, it might have upset her, but it wasn’t her business to dwell on the reasons for his withdrawal and so she didn’t bother taking it to heart. She didn’t like him, so there was only so far she could bring herself to care.

‘Breakfast!’ Barbara’s call travelled across from the house.

Olivia dusted off her knees, waving over the top of the wall to indicate that she’d heard. The orange bricks were mapped with vines that were brittle with age and perishing in the heat—climbing rose and wisteria and clematis, once upon a time—and the soil beds were crusted with earth, their borders collapsing. Beaten gravel paths ran towards a central kidney-shaped plot that years ago would have bragged an abundance of colour, azaleas, rhododendrons, fragrant lavender, but now was obscured in a burst of overgrown shrubs. It was more a wilderness than a garden, yet all it took was a bud pushing through the dirt, a swallow coming to rest on the dappled stone bath and beating its wings in a puddle of rain, or the sun setting behind the towering oak and throwing it into a heavenly blaze, to reassure Olivia that everything was salvageable. There was still life here, if you knew where to look.

She crossed to the house, aromas of black coffee and smoky bacon seeping into the morning. In the hall Sigmund was gulping noisily at a bowl of water, sandy paw prints dotted across the stones from where he’d been down on the beach. She glanced around for Charlie but couldn’t see him.

‘I hope you’re hungry,’ said Barbara as she entered the kitchen. Caggie was at the window buttering doorstop slabs of toast, and smiled when she saw her.

‘Starving.’

‘You’d better be. We had a delivery from Ben Nancarrow this morning—sausages, eggs, milk, you name it.’ Barbara poured the coffee. ‘He dropped by earlier, called it “a token of my admiration”. Cato always did know how to attract attention.’

Olivia’s tummy grumbled. After last night’s fall-out the evening had wound quickly to a close, with Cato angrily bolting his seafood and Olivia finding she couldn’t eat a thing. Susanna had chattered merrily about her plans for the party, prompting Cato to leap up and order a bottle of the establishment’s finest champagne, which he’d proceeded to quaff almost entirely himself.

‘This looks delicious,’ she exclaimed as Caggie deposited a plate in front of her. It was piled high with creamy scrambled eggs, herby mushrooms and crispy potato cakes, thick, salty bacon and sausages that popped with greasy flavour.

Susanna drifted in. She was bereft of make-up, a turban wound elaborately round her head. Immediately she put a hand to her mouth, her shoulders heaving.

‘Goodness, are you all right?’ asked Barbara.

Tightly she nodded. She was wearing a floating peach robe, and on her feet were dainty slippers with furry baubles on the front. Olivia had caught the end of one of her movies last year, a fluffy chick-flick about an eternal bridesmaid, and knew her friends would die to know she was sitting down to breakfast with its leading lady.

‘I’m seriously unwell,’ Susanna croaked, sinking into a chair.

Barbara was alarmed. ‘Do you need a doctor?’

‘I need caffeine.’

‘Here.’ Barbara was quick to oblige. ‘Have you a temperature?’

‘Something I ate,’ Susanna managed, casting a sickened squint at Olivia’s breakfast and turning a deeper shade of green. ‘I had to cut off a call to my agent, I felt so appalling. Just some dry toast, please, Mrs Bewlis-Teet.’

‘Right away.’

‘I hope it wasn’t something I cooked,’ offered Caggie.

Susanna glanced at her sharply.

‘You poor thing,’ said Olivia sympathetically. ‘Was it the seafood?’

Susanna checked the other women were otherwise occupied. She leaned in.

‘You do realise this house is haunted?’ she whispered hoarsely.

Olivia blinked. ‘No. I didn’t realise that.’

‘I heard her. Last night. A woman, crying out.’ She shuddered. ‘I was beside myself with fear. I don’t think I can sleep another night in this place.’

‘Old houses make all sorts of noises,’ comforted Olivia. ‘I expect it was the wind. Buildings like this throw sound all over the place.’

‘Whatever it was, it’s left me with the most piercing headache. That’s how I know this was a supernatural intervention.’

Olivia spiked a mushroom and put it in her mouth.

‘My psychic,’ Susanna went on, ‘she says I’m a vessel for these things.’

‘A vessel?’

‘The headache’s brought on by exhaustion. I’ve been working though the night, you see, connecting with the spirits.’ She straightened as Barbara returned with the toast. Alone again, she hissed, ‘
Unfinished business
, that’s what these energies are about. They simply cannot rest until the past has been rectified, until they’ve claimed their dues, and it takes somebody like me to facilitate that.’

‘Wow. That’s quite a responsibility.’

‘You’re telling me. Usherwood is swimming in it. She’ll be back.’

‘Who?’

‘The
ghost
, of course.’

‘How about some fresh air?’ Caggie dropped down opposite with a plate and a mug of tea. ‘A brisk walk might do you good.’

‘I’m too fragile to venture outside on my own.’

‘I’m sure the dogs will go with you.’

‘
The dogs?’
Susanna echoed disgustedly.

‘Where’s Cato?’ Olivia asked.

Caggie said, ‘Still in bed, I should think.’

Susanna pursed her lips. ‘That’s right,’ she muttered. ‘And
I
should know, since
I’m
the one who left him there.’

After a feeble endeavour with the crusts, she retreated to her chambers. Olivia joined Caggie at the sink to help with the washing up.

‘Do you believe in ghosts?’ she asked. ‘Susanna thinks she heard some strange sounds in the night.’

Caggie smiled. ‘No,’ she replied. ‘I do believe in night-time noises, but more often than not they’re in the land of the
very
much alive.’

* * *

O
LIVIA
TOOK
THE
back route out to the gardens, through the drawing room and on to the covered porch, from where the geometric lines of the greenhouse could be seen through the arches, glinting in the sun. The door to the library was ajar and she went to it, recalling her mother’s allotment offering, and tapped gently.

There was no answer.

She stood for a moment, thinking what to do. She ought to walk away, but her surroundings were so quiet, and the curiosity that had landed her in it on more than one occasion so great, that she found herself applying the slightest touch of pressure.

The door swung open to reveal a handsome office, wall to wall filled with books. A sliding ladder awarded access to a higher mezzanine, and a semicircular balcony jutted out above a large bust of Richmond Lomax. The smell was of leather, sandalwood and a recently burned fire. A bureau was opened to reveal scattered papers and hastily handwritten notes, and in the corner of the room a grandfather clock ticked mournfully. At the window was an impressive antique globe, polished by sunlight, and in the distance she could make out the dense green smudge of the forest.

She crossed the threshold. A mist of dust was suspended, dancing in the haze, and she felt if she walked straight through it she would leave an imprint, a mark of her trespass, like a hole punched in paper.

Without meaning to, Olivia came to his desk. Her fingers hovered over the clutch on the drawer, before slowly easing it open.

Inside was a jumble of ink-dry pens, loose drawing pins and a stapler snapped at its spine. She fed a hand in and caught the sharp corner of a piece of paper, which she slid into view. It was a black-and-white photograph of a young woman, worn at the edges as though it had been handled many times. She lifted it out.

At first Olivia thought she was looking at Beatrice Lomax, before deciding it was too contemporary. This looked as if it had been taken in the last five years.

The subject was reclining in the shade of a tree—here at Usherwood, Olivia guessed—and she wore a white vest with a pretty lace collar, beneath which the picture was severed. A loop of hair was wound around her finger and a playful smile danced on her lips. There was a glimmer in her eye, of secrets, of intimacy, that suggested she was sleeping with whomever was behind the camera.

Olivia brought the image closer. She flipped it round. On the back it read:
Now and always x

Her phone beeped. It made her jump, the tinny chirrup at odds with this dusty, history-soaked space. She placed the photo on the desk and scooped the phone from her pocket. An unrecognised number flashed up and she clicked on the message.

Drink at the Anchor, Friday, seven p.m.? Addy x

Pleasure soaked through her. She stared at it.

Get a grip
,
Olivia.

She couldn’t help it. Was it a date? It sounded like a date. A flurry of butterflies flew free in her tummy. There was a kiss on there. He never did that.

Quickly she replaced his number with the old one she had for him. Her fingers were shaking. She told herself off for being silly.

She was fumbling to compose her reply when a voice came from the doorway:

‘What do you think you’re doing?’

The phone slipped from Olivia’s hand and she scrambled to retrieve it.

‘Sorry,’ she mumbled, ‘I, er...’

‘This is private.’ Charlie’s stare was fierce, his words violently quiet.

‘Of course.’ She moved towards the door. He grabbed her elbow. It hurt.

‘What were you looking for?’

‘Nothing, I—’

‘Something you could sell to the papers?’

‘No.’ She was wounded he would think that of her. ‘I’d never do that. The door was open and I... I don’t know.’ Her mouth went dry. Why did he have to look at her like that, stripping her naked, making her feel like a silly like child?

‘Let me go.’

Their faces were inches apart. He was huge, his frame engulfing hers. His grip was painful. ‘I told you when you started here that the house owes you nothing,’ he said. ‘This is a job, do you understand? Not a fucking museum.’

‘I understand.’

He released her. ‘Never let me find you here again.’

She rubbed her arm. It was the same he had tended to the night Cato had knocked her down. A confusion of feelings assailed her and she translated them as anger. How dare Charlie Lomax make her feel like this? How dare he bully her, intimidate her with his size, his presence, his aristocracy, the advantage of his sex?

‘I won’t,’ she retorted. ‘Don’t worry.’

He frowned at her hard.

‘You work for me,’ he told her. ‘Watch what you say.’

What
she
said? There was only one person in this room who needed to get their attitude checked. The words were free before she could swallow them.

‘I’ve told you I’m sorry,’ she answered furiously. ‘What do you want me to do, beg? A working relationship goes both ways, you know. You can’t demand respect if you’ve never shown any to me, and from where I’m sitting you haven’t even bothered. You think that because of who you are and because of what you have we should all bow down and worship the ground you walk on—well, that’s not me and it never will be, and if that disappoints you then I suggest you find someone else to sort out your precious estate. Perhaps if you weren’t so aggressive all the time, I might have a better idea where I stand. Perhaps if you weren’t so shut off I mightn’t be afraid to say two words to you in the morning. Perhaps if you talked to me once in a while I might like you a bit more. Perhaps if you cared at all about other people or what they might be feeling then you’d have a shot at understanding what I’m on about. I’m only trying to do the right thing here; I’m only trying to do my job. I’m sorry if you feel I’ve overstepped the mark, but it’s not my fault Cato drags me along to things just so he doesn’t have to spend time alone with you.’