The Chandelier Ballroom (35 page)

She fell silent, letting him hold on to her. What he said did make sense, but in that case, what was wrong with her? Maybe she
was
going off her head, letting herself be affected by local superstition.

The thought was discomforting and comforting at the same time, for no one in their right mind would have themselves believe in ghosts. Yet she
had
seen something. Local rumours played in her head: some oddly dressed woman seen at Crossways Lodge, said to speak warnings of betrayal, those she spoke to suddenly behaving irrationally with dire consequences. But then, people loved making the most of hearsay. True there had been some drastic acts here in the past, but that wasn’t to say it had prompted ghostly appearances.

Even so, it didn’t explain away what she’d seen. Yes it could have been Evelyn with a mind to help herself to one or two things lying about. She knew the layout of the house and had seen some nice things. A little more clear-headed now, she let David continue to hold her close. Tomorrow she would ask Evelyn where she was last night. Or better still, first have a word with the girl’s mother, who she felt she could trust to answer truthfully rather than Evelyn.

The following morning they were their usual selves, Edna Calder talkative as ever, Evelyn too completely at ease as she went about her work.

When they stopped for their usual cup of tea, Eileen sat with them, Mrs Calder busy nattering away concerning every little thing that went on in Wadely. Evelyn, however, had begun to seem just a little on edge. Put on the alert, Eileen hardly heard what Mrs Calder was saying, and it wasn’t long before she burst out, ‘Did you have a nice time last night, Evelyn?’

The girl looked startled and Eileen felt she had to justify the question. ‘I thought you mentioned yesterday you were going out last night?’

She’d tried to make it sound casual but it felt more as though she was interrogating her, like some detective.

‘Last night?’ Evelyn queried uncertainly, then pulled herself together noticeably. ‘Oh, yes, last night – I went to the pictures – in Brentwood.’

Eileen hadn’t meant her inquiry to be so direct and Evelyn’s mother was looking protective of her. ‘Why d’you ask, Mrs Burnley?’

She’d intended to go on to enquire what film Evelyn had seen, but that would have appeared even more like an interrogation.

‘I just … I thought I saw her here last night,’ she stumbled on, now feeling somewhat ridiculous.

‘Here?’ Edna Calder echoed, her tone one of bewilderment.

‘I just thought …’ She stopped, aware that she was making an utter ass of herself.

Moments later came a wave of relief that she hadn’t continued as Mrs Calder said, still bewildered, ‘Me and Evelyn always go to the pictures on Thursday night. I hate going on my own. I suppose one day when she meets a nice young man to take her, I’ll probably stop going, unless of course I find a friend to go with.’

Eileen let the woman ramble on, glad to have the matter dropped. But who was it she had seen two nights running? The question continued to plague her for days.

At least the person, whoever it was, hadn’t come back, leaving her to wonder if it was some unidentified intruder, or even Evelyn, her mother lying on her daughter’s behalf. For surely it couldn’t have been anything more sinister. That thought was ludicrous.

The only thing she could think was to tell Jennifer Wainwright about it, who said, ‘Who in their right mind would return to the scene after almost being caught the first time?’ adding darkly, ‘I think, deep down, Eileen, you know what you saw.’

It wasn’t the advice she’d been looking for. Had she merely come upon some flesh and blood intruder or had she actually seen an apparition? Neither thought sat easy with her. Unable to help herself, she told David how she felt. He gave a somewhat patronising chuckle.

‘You probably didn’t see anyone, love, real or unreal. Maybe just some reflection or other, some trick of the light, like when we’re sure we see a movement or something out of the corner of our eye and it turns out there’s nothing there.’

It sounded a limp excuse and somehow put her on her guard. What if it had been Evelyn, crossing the hall from the library at that time of night? If that didn’t point to something going on, what did?

Her senses sharpened, she was sure she’d noticed a hesitation in his explanation, seen him catch his lower lip briefly between his teeth, like someone checking over what he’d said. Even his laugh sounded false now.

‘Although who can say if there is something in it … you know, not of this world. I suppose there could be such things?’ It sounded an excuse, he even willing to grab at straws to cover his tracks, his conduct more parrying than patronising. ‘Whatever it was, love, it’s done us no harm. Old houses can be full of strange things. Just don’t let yourself dwell on it too much.’

Her mind was working. The idea of a ghost would suit him down to the ground if he was trying to cover something up. For a second she wanted to leap at him, reach out and smack him across his lying face. The next, sanity had returned. She trusted him. He’d never deceive her. Not David.

Yet doubt continued to linger. She couldn’t believe his explanation of some trick of the light or seeing things out of the corner of one’s eye. She’d definitely seen a young woman crossing the hall from the library and he had been in there. It could only have been Evelyn, in those silly clothes far too old for her. She had to be sure.

The next two weeks she watched but nothing more happened. Either he was keeping a low profile or she’d truly not seen what she thought she had. In any case, the passing of time was starting to dull the memory, she even a little angry with herself for having doubted him.

More and more it seemed akin to a bad dream. She wasn’t given to a fanciful imagination. She might have interrupted someone bent on burgling the house, or maybe someone not quite right in the head. Although to come back a second time was cheeky. And locking the conservatory door to the garden could have been overlooked on both occasions. She’d always left it to David to lock up at night but it might be better to go round after him to check in future. But since there’d been no more disturbances, it didn’t matter any more.

Despite telling herself all was well, she watched Evelyn as she worked, and although the girl appeared utterly tranquil, Eileen couldn’t avoid the suspicion that continually hovered inside her.

This evening David was in the library, these days calling it his office, going over some work he’d brought home. In the cosy lounge Eileen sat before a still, bright fire, a cup of cocoa beside her, a historical novel open on her lap.

Her eyes grown weary, she finished her bedtime drink and laid the book aside to go and see if David was ready for bed, first raking down the fire and switching off the light. As she went out into the unlit hall, a movement caught her eye, a shadowy form flitting across it from the direction of the library. Startled, she let out a gasp.

For that split second the figure paused before disappearing through the door to the big room. But in that brief glimpse she was again sure it had been Evelyn, dressed as always to look ten years older. She could only have been with David.

An overwhelming flood of fury engulfed her. He must know she was only a couple of rooms away, could have burst in on them at any time. Or was that part of the thrill?

Rage exploded inside her such as she’d never felt in her whole life. In that split second it took to spring into action, she bounded for the room into which the figure had disappeared.

Already there came visions of plunging a carving knife into David’s traitorous heart, but first she’d overtake her quarry and tear her face apart with her own bare hands.

She was screaming out in blind fury, ‘You bitch … you bloody little bitch … it
was
you … it was you all along!’

It had taken less than a second to gain the room, yet already the girl was at the far end. How had she got so far in so short a time? The question brought Eileen to a halt, as if caught by some unseen hand as the figure now turned without haste to look straight at her.

‘We are ever deceived …’

The voice seemed to come from a distance, trailing off, sounding so sad. Nor did the figure look at all like Evelyn, and all Eileen could do was to whisper, ‘Who the devil are you?’ even as she felt herself shudder.

‘He vowed to love me … all men lie …’ The words faded into silence as though from a dying person’s lips.

Rooted to the spot, Eileen watched her turn, go out of sight through the French windows, very slowly, as if without any need of haste.

Coming suddenly to herself, Eileen leapt into action to run after her. The doors were wide open yet she’d seen that they’d been locked earlier. A shiver ran through her despite a vague, almost stupid thought that ghosts didn’t open doors, they floated through windows and went through walls.

With an effort she took herself in hand. These windows had been opened by human hands. Who else could it have been but Evelyn? Proof now that Evelyn and her own husband were …

A movement behind her made her turn sharply, heart in her mouth. David was standing there behind her.

‘What was that?’ he said. His voice sounded strangled.

For a moment she glared at him, wanting to scream the word adultery at him, but the look on his face stopped her. He was staring past her, his voice husky, filled with disbelief.

‘She just vanished. Those doors were locked. I locked them myself, both doors. I took the key out. Now they’re open. She just disappeared.’

He looked so genuinely scared that she hurried to him, strangely convinced that whoever it was who’d been here tonight had nothing to do with him. He would never have deceived her. She was a fool ever to have believed he would. What she’d seen or thought she’d seen had been induced by the tales of people wrapped up in superstition.

But David wasn’t a superstitious man. He was the sanest man anyone could wish to meet. So what had he seen? With her, it might have been her own self-induced visions, but he was a different matter. The all-consuming, murderous rage she’d experienced earlier made her shudder. If he had seen something unnatural, then something unnatural it must have been. In a moment she had thrown herself into his arms, wanting to say how sorry she was for doubting him, for feeling so near to hatred as to even think such an evil thing as plunging a knife into him.

‘If it’s that interloper again we’ll have to talk to the police tomorrow,’ she said, trying to reassure, but he made no reply, except that his hold tightened ever more, like someone who’d been thoroughly scared.

Throughout Christmas he remained quiet, her parents spending it with them wondering what was wrong, something she couldn’t answer, leaving them bewildered, her mother remarking that he could be sickening for something and to keep an eye on him.

A week after New Year he came home from London, a determined expression on his face: ‘I’ve been wondering that we ought to do away with that chandelier,’ he said, surprising her. ‘It’s far too large and ostentatious. It might have been okay in the thirties but it’s so very old-fashioned now.’ It was the most he’d said in one go in a long time, in fact since that incident before Christmas, still a paradox.

The sudden statement shook her. In her mind the chandelier would hang there for as long as the house stood. It was somehow part of it. Why she should think this she didn’t know. She could still recall the sheer excitement that had swept through her the first time she had seen it lying in that outbuilding. Maybe because she discovered it, she actually felt a deep affinity with it and to see it go would be like saying goodbye to an old friend she’d never see again. Yet common sense asked what the attraction was exactly? She couldn’t say. Suddenly she was feeling mesmerised by it and for some odd reason the words ‘chandelier room’ played in her brain.

‘The whole room needs modernising,’ he was saying, suddenly so emphatic that she found herself almost being forced to agree, even as her mind cried out ‘No!’

It was after they’d had tea and retired to the comfortable lounge with its cheerful fire and the curtains closed against the January cold that he said, ‘I am thinking too that it might be a nice idea to separate that room back into the three. I’m told it used to be three. Or maybe just two. They’ll still be quite big. This is a big house, almost too big for just us. Maybe we should find something smaller …’

‘Oh, no!’ Eileen burst out, wondering why she should feel so against that idea. ‘No,’ she said in a more controlled tone. ‘It’s a lovely house. It feels like home and anything smaller would feel cramped after this. And I’ve made so many friends here. Having to make new friends somewhere else, I couldn’t bear it.’

He nodded sombrely and understandingly. ‘Maybe you’re right. But as regards the big room …’

‘The chandelier room,’ she interrupted, wondering why she needed to have made the distinction.

‘Yes,’ he said, and fell quiet for a moment before continuing. ‘People who’ve come here tell me they don’t feel comfortable in that room as it is at present.’ He gave a little laugh then again fell silent. Finally, speaking slowly, he said, ‘I’ve often wondered why. So I decided to look into it and make some enquiries and in the process found out some of the history of the house. But it’s what I learned about that chandelier that’s made me decide to get rid of it.’

He sounded strangely concerned and looking at him she noticed he’d seemed to be faintly embarrassed by what he was saying, he who had scoffed so many times at her own over-active imagination. And when she pushed him on it, he became even more uneasy in front of her.

Finally she managed to get from him what he had learned: his enquiries had led him to the wife of the man who had bought the house back in the early thirties.

‘Her name is still Butterfield and she told me a lot. She’s getting on in years and a bit rambling, but what she told me was quite a story concerning that blessed chandelier.’

Going on in a low voice, he repeated what she’d told him, the reputed suicide of a once-wealthy woman said to have lost everything in the Wall Street Crash of the late twenties.