The Silence of Ghosts Read online

  So our little rabble weren’t shivering, and the fresh air seemed to be putting a glow in their cheeks. I had an uncomfortable feeling that none of them would want to go back home to Liverpool when the war was over. I wrapped Octavia well in her little red coat and Rose found a beret for her that she herself had worn at about her age. It was black and went well with the coat. As I put it on, I noticed that Octavia had what looked like a rash on her jaw. I asked Rose to examine it and she said it could be eczema or early signs of acne. She would ask Dr Raverat to look at it when he got back.

  My spirits were lifted by the trip. I tried as hard as I could to put last night behind me. When we ferried the last two children to the landing stage, they were jumping up and down in delight. Some of them had already made friends; others had been isolated on their farms, but didn’t take long to start chatting.

  We spent some time instructing our landlubbers about how to behave on board a yacht. They were issued with their life jackets. On questioning, none of them said they could swim, so I insisted they keep the jackets on all the time. A cold wind blew past and the surface of the lake grew a little choppy. I decided that a strong following wind would help speed things up and make the sailing part of the trip more exciting.

  And so it was. We set off, Adrian at the helm, myself on the sails, while Rose brought up a couple of kids at a time on to the deck. Some of them started out frightened, the movement of the yacht quite unlike anything they’d ever known on trams or buses. Most of them settled quickly and got the hang of how it all worked, and those who didn’t retired below decks.

  Cherry Holm is a tiny island near the end of the lake, with Glenridding to the west and Patterdale to the south. It has a single tree that I, in my urban ignorance, take for an alder, and masses of bushes. There isn’t much room to sit and contemplate the universe. Not much room to run and play. On the other hand, I’d thought, perhaps it was just as well that they wouldn’t be able to scarper off in all directions, getting lost and getting into trouble.

  It’s not far from the shore at Glenridding to Cherry Holm. There was no hope of mooring the Kingfisher at the island, but we dropped anchor on the lakeside where Glenridding comes down to meet the water. Adrian manoeuvred the dinghy round to the side, and we lowered the children down, first a group of three, then another of three, and finally two. Then he got Rose down and came up to tie a line round my waist so he could lower me into Rose’s waiting arms. Then he took us over to the island, to a spot where there was a wooden dock with a cleat to tie the dinghy up. The kids were bubbling over with enthusiasm.

  I was churning inside, for my thoughts were with Father Carbery and how he must have died. I hoped it had been quick, but feared that it had not. Would Dr Raverat have the answer when he came home today? I hoped to hear that it had been a heart attack, something without mystery.

  But my worries prevented me from thinking about Cherry Holm Island and the children I had brought there. Dear God, if only I had used my head, a great tragedy might have been averted.

  Later

  I have had to take a break from writing, to steady my nerves before recalling the rest of our trip to Cherry Holm. When I was younger, as I have mentioned previously, I often repaired there alone or with friends to play or read. It was a benign place, big enough in a child’s eyes to serve as a kingdom. My father never came with me, for which I felt some relief. He did talk to me about brave and honourable men who built shining realms by standing up against all others and beating them to submission. He tried to instil this idea into me, and to show me how a well-run business was a ruthless enterprise, that a true businessman was as much a warrior as any general, that such a man should be cold-hearted, pitiless, single-minded and self-interested.

  The kingdom I built in my imagination during my childhood days on Cherry Holm was built on kindness. At home or at Hallinhag, my father frequently boasted of how he’d sacked this or that worker, or even one long-serving member of his board. He had a reputation for hardness, and prided himself in the fact that his workers all lived in fear of him. From an early age, I resolved to be unlike him and swore that if, by some twist of fate, I should ever become head of the firm, I would cancel his petty rules and regulations and institute a new regime based on loyalty and trust. And I would deal with my customers in the same way.

  It was dreams like these that I took with me to Cherry Holm back then, and today I set foot there with equally naïve thoughts about giving my abandoned children their first real chance in life. Hallinhag House and its ghostly inhabitants faded in my mind and were blown away by the light breeze and the cries of laughter and excitement from the children.

  Rose in particular knew how to deal with them. She would sit down with three or four at a time and take out their lunches, chatting with them while she distributed the food and saw that everybody got their fair share. She was everybody’s favourite that day, and the more I watched her with the children the more I loved her and wanted children of our own. Much to her credit, she spent what time she could with Octavia, who was having her usual difficulty in winning acceptance from the other children, children with little notion of politeness, experienced in the rough ways of the school of hard knocks and unfamiliar with the deaf.

  The lunches came with bottles of pop, most of it ginger beer, and we quickly learned that several of the children had never tasted such luxury. There was much hilarity when the first one burped audibly. Apart from Octavia, there were four girls and three boys, and I determined, once there was a chance, to talk to them in order to find out what sort of lives they had lived until now. They had seen some bombing, but didn’t like to speak of it. If I asked, they said they weren’t afraid of Herr Hitler, but I could sense that, underneath, they took the bombs very seriously indeed. They had seen houses brought down on top of whole families, bodies laid out among the ruins, children running through the streets in search of their fathers and mothers.

  After lunch, we decided to play hide and seek, a game they were all familiar with, but which they had only ever played in the street. There wasn’t much space on Cherry Holm, but it offered some very enticing bushes, quite a few good-sized rocks, and the sheer excitement of being outside amidst such stunning scenery. Off behind Glenridding, the children could see the great height of Helvellyn, one of our country’s highest peaks, and everywhere they looked were the tallest fells and the most wooded slopes. There was snow on the higher parts. I thought it could not have been a better place for them to play.

  Then we did another countdown, and Rose and Adrian and I dutifully closed our eyes. Then, half-way through, I heard a low cry and opened my eyes. Some of the children were running to the east side of the island, as though in alarm. Octavia was standing right next to me, and from her expression I could see that something was wrong. She gestured, but I could not make out at first what it was about. Rose and Adrian still had their eyes covered.

  Just then I noticed someone moving on the western side, where the island faces Glenridding. The late afternoon light was dipping towards the west, but it still had some time to go, and it shed a grey beam across the lake and on to the island, near where the dinghy bobbed at the landing dock. Someone was walking towards the little jetty. Four children. Three girls and one boy. But even as I watched, three of the children turned and looked at me. I knew them, for I had seen them before, and they turned their heads and continued to walk with young Jimmy Ashton just behind, as though transfixed. I called out, bringing Rose and Adrian to the alert, and I pointed.

  ‘What is it, love?’ Rose asked.

  ‘Can’t you see them? The children from the house.’

  Adrian strolled over from his place near the tree.

  ‘Is something wrong?’

  I pointed towards the jetty, where the four children stood while Jimmy climbed on to the narrow deck. Jimmy must have taken off his life jacket earlier, and it was suddenly clear what was about to happen. I shouted at Jimmy and started clumsily off in his direction. He did not behave
as though he had seen me. Next thing I saw, the four ghost children had vanished and Jimmy was in the water.

  Adrian saw it. I could not have got there in time, and I couldn’t have swum in any case, but he hared off to help. Rose turned to me.

  ‘I saw them just before Jimmy fell in. You should stay here. I don’t want you to have an accident. Adrian will get Jimmy, but I have to see to the children. I want them all together, in case the other children return.’

  It made sense. I told her to get them together, but to bring them to me, so we could deal with them in a united fashion. In our concern for them, I almost forgot Adrian’s more urgent mission at the water’s edge. But it was not long before we got the youngsters in one place, all shivering, some weeping, and it was a little after that when Adrian turned up, dripping wet – for he had gone into the freezing water. He had dived and dived repeatedly, but the water was murky and the boy had gone in deep and could only be found now by a professional diver.

  ‘What happened to Jimmy, miss?’ asked one of the girls.

  ‘He fell into the water,’ Rose replied. ‘I think he tripped or something. Did you see what happened?’

  ‘Yes, miss. We all saw it, didn’t we?’

  Heads bobbed up and down.

  ‘There was four children a bit older than us. They must have come across on a boat, ’cause they wasn’t here when we got here. They appeared out of nowhere and spoke to Jimmy, then somebody said they was ghosts and we all scarpered.’

  ‘It was me thought they was ghosts. They was wearing real old clothes and their faces was like dead ’uns. I saw my old man when he was dead, and they looked just like that. That’s why I said they looked like ghosts.’

  It has been a very hard day. The evacuees are terrified still, and there will have to be an investigation into Jimmy’s death. Rose has been in tears since it happened and won’t leave my side or Octavia’s. Her mother only knows that one of the ragamuffins from Liverpool has suffered a terrible, unnecessary accident. She says little, but there is an unspoken accusation that a yacht trip to Cherry Holm – at the far end of the lake – had been an indulgence too many. We didn’t argue, but we passed the whole thing off as an accident owing to the boy’s over-enthusiasm in a world he knew too little of.

  Adrian had seen the four children as well, and had taken them for evacuees, dressed perhaps in old rags they had brought with them. But as Jimmy fell from the planking, the children seemed to vanish, and he could not work out where they had gone to. We told him. We told him their names, Clare, Adam, Helen and Margaret. Ordinary names, names for ordinary children. Names for the living and the dead.

  After supper, there was a knock on the door. Rose answered and brought in two visitors, the Reverend Braithwaite and Dr Raverat, both men looking the worse for wear. By this time, Jeanie had smelled several rats. Rose tells me that her mother got her alone in the kitchen and confronted her with it all.

  ‘Don’t tell me this has aught to do with you and your supposed wedding to Mr Fancy Man Lancaster. I don’t believe you’re getting married, though I could well believe you’re with child and that’s what the good doctor is doing here. Shame on you for making such a fool of me. Shame on both of you.’

  An argument followed, audible in part to the rest of us. I tried to get Octavia to go upstairs to bed, but she shook her head violently. She had something quite different in mind.

  ‘We’ll have to tell her,’ I said. ‘This isn’t fair on her or Rose.’

  The others nodded in agreement, so the Reverend Braithwaite went to the kitchen and asked them to come out. They did so reluctantly, but the presence of the minister and the doctor did much to calm Jeanie down. We all found seats. Rose came over and sat on my knee, putting her weight more on my sound leg than the other.

  Oliver Braithwaite spoke first.

  ‘Mrs Sansom, I owe you an apology, in fact we all owe you one. We’ve not been straight with you, and that has roused your suspicions when there need not have been one. First of all, you need to know that Rose is carrying nobody’s child. The doctor here will confirm that.’

  ‘Actually,’ Dr Raverat said, ‘I think that’s a matter between Rose and her fiancé, but I’m certainly unaware of any pregnancy.’

  ‘The thing is, Jeanie,’ the priest went on, ‘something bad happened today, something related to earlier events. To things that happened down at Hallinhag House.’

  And so he told her. Not in too much detail, but as fully as made sense. She was a credulous woman and had no difficulty taking the supernatural stories on board. The one thing that caused her real distress was his full account of today’s tragedy. As he was telling it, I remembered the story of her husband’s death, lost in the lake when trying to save a boy who had fallen overboard. She seemed to see an echo as well, and when I looked there were tears on her cheek.

  ‘Have they found him?’ she asked. ‘The little boy.’

  The doctor nodded.

  ‘We got a couple of divers in from Barrow,’ he said. ‘There’s a navy vessel due to go out the day after tomorrow, so all the crew were ashore to put things shipshape before they set sail. The divers went in with underwater torches and found the lad at around eighty feet. They attached a line and brought him up with a winch. He’s at my surgery for the night, and I fear I’ll have another journey to Barrow tomorrow morning.’

  We talked a little longer and managed to get Jeanie back to her old self, as much as was possible under the circumstances. The Reverend Braithwaite spent some time alone with her.

  We told Octavia it was time for her to go to bed, but she shook her head and reminded Rose that she planned to ask Dr Raverat about her rash.

  ‘Surely you can see the doctor during his regular surgery,’ I said. ‘He’s not very far away.’

  There was a flailing of arms indicating a measure of agitation on Octavia’s part.

  ‘It’s okay,’ said the doctor, ‘I’m here now. Why don’t I just take a quick look?’

  He took her to a back room, where Jeanie kept oddments for her sundry activities. Five minutes later, he came back, smiling and patting Octavia on the back.

  ‘Nothing to worry about,’ he said. ‘Now, run up to bed while the rest of us have a chat about your brother’s wedding.’

  She waved goodnight to us all and headed for the stairs, exhausted by the day she had just spent.

  When she had gone, Dr Raverat did not sit down, despite the temptation of a glass of ginger ale and brandy that had been left on the mantelpiece for him. He took me to one side while Rose and the minister chatted.

  ‘Dominic,’ he said, ‘I’m not in a position to comment on Octavia’s rash at this stage, but I must warn you that I don’t like the look of it. It’s not eczema, it’s not acne, it’s not dermatitis, it’s not psoriasis – in fact, it’s nothing I’ve ever seen in my surgery. I’d like her to be looked at in hospital on Monday, just for a short visit. The North Lonsdale in Barrow has a good skin unit, and there’s a first-class man there, Robert Thackery.’

  ‘She’ll be alarmed if we say she has to be seen, after you’ve given her the all clear.’

  ‘I’ll think of something. But I don’t like the look of the lesions, and I’d rather get her there sooner than later. I’d like to enlist Rose’s help in this. Skin conditions can get out of hand if you don’t nip them in the bud. Now, if you don’t mind, we have another matter to look into.’

  He took his brandy and ginger ale and gulped it down in a single mouthful. The others had grown quiet. He sat down.

  ‘This has been a stressful day,’ he said, ‘more for you folks than for me, although I’ve not been free from worry. I went to Barrow late this morning and was in time to catch Philip Woodroofe when he came out of the post-mortem. He’s released Father Carbery’s body for burial and written “not known” for the cause of death. It was the best he could do. He brought me in to the post-mortem room and showed me what he’d found. I have never seen anything like it, and I’ve attended quite a
few post-mortems in my time. I still don’t believe what I saw. Somehow or other, the priest’s body had been drained of blood. There were traces of powder in the veins, and when this was tested it turned out to be dried blood. But it wasn’t all the blood from the corpse, there were only a few teaspoons of it. Philip and I agreed that making this more widely known would serve no purpose. I’m only telling you now because you were involved in his death.’

  ‘What about the little boy?’ I asked. ‘The one they took to the North Lonsdale today. Does there have to be a post-mortem in his case? I’m afraid they may find something similar in his body, and that would open up questions I’d rather not see asked.’

  ‘I can understand your reservations,’ Raverat said, ‘but I’m afraid there’s nothing I can do to prevent it. The police are already involved, and you must know how the wheels start to turn once official forms are filled and everything takes its course.’

  We parted in a melancholy fashion, and the moon took its light away behind a grey and windblown cloud. It grew colder than it had been. Rose came to the room where I slept with Octavia.

  ‘I wish I could stay in bed with you,’ she said. ‘You need cuddles and goodness knows what.’