The House on Cold Hill

34

With his heart in his mouth, Ollie raced down the stairs, through the atrium and into the kitchen.

Caro was standing, wide-eyed, in the middle of the room. Shards and splinters of glass lay on the table, across her documents, and on the floor. Open-mouthed, she was staring upwards and pointing. He looked up and saw the remains of the light bulb hanging from the ceiling cord directly above the table.

‘It exploded,’ she said, her voice quavering with fear. ‘It just bloody exploded.’

‘It happens sometimes.’

‘Oh, does it? When? It’s never happened to me before.’

‘It’s probably from the flood — water was dripping down here yesterday. Must have caused a short or something — or leaked into the bulb.’ He peered up at it more closely. ‘Looks like it was used in the Ark! Probably some water leaked into it.’

She was shaking her head. ‘No, Ollie. I don’t believe it.’

‘Darling, calm down.’ He put an arm round her. She was trembling. ‘It’s OK,’ he said.

‘It’s not OK.’

‘There’s a perfectly rational explanation.’

‘I’m fed up with hearing you say perfectly rational explanation, Ollie. What’s happening in this house is not perfectly rational. We’re under sodding siege. Or are you in bloody denial?’ She was yelling.

He raised a finger to his mouth. ‘Ssshhh, don’t let Jade hear, I don’t want her freaked out.’

‘She’s up in her room with her music blasting, she can’t hear.’ Caro stared up at the light socket then down at the glass on the table and floor.

‘I’ll get a dustpan and brush and the hoover,’ Ollie said.

‘I’m calling Kingsley Parkin again,’ she said. ‘I want him to come here now, tonight.’

Ollie scooped up as much of the glass as he could with the brush, helped by Caro, who picked up the larger pieces in her fingers. He wondered whether it would help the situation to call his mother-in-law. But he was nervous that the woman, however well-intentioned, might only make matters worse. He emptied the pan into the rubbish bin, then went through into the scullery, returned with the Dyson, and plugged it in. He heard Caro leaving a second voicemail for her medium client. When she hung up, he switched the machine on.

It roared, and there were tiny clinking sounds as it sucked up the smaller, almost invisible glass splinters. Then, suddenly, there was a loud click. The room darkened as the other lights went out. The vacuum cleaner’s motor fell silent.

Caro looked at him, more calmly than he was expecting. ‘Great,’ she said. ‘How great is that?’

Ollie grimaced. ‘The electrics are totally fucked. They’re working on the rewiring but it’s a massive job.’

‘I don’t even know where the fuse box is,’ she said. ‘You’d better show me in the unlikely case I’m ever brave enough to be here on my own.’

He led her through into the scullery and showed her the two new plastic fuse boxes the electrician had fitted this week, up on the wall. He reached up and flipped open their lids, and pointed out the master switch at the end of the lower of the two boxes, which was down. He pressed it up and immediately the lights came back on, and they heard the roar of the Dyson starting up.

‘They’re very sensitive — the RCD trip is a good safety thing.’

She peered along the rows of individual switches.

‘When they’ve finished the rewiring they’re going to label each of them.’

‘Could that bulb exploding have caused this?’ she asked.

He felt relieved that she was taking a rational view. ‘Quite possible, yes, or more likely whatever caused the bulb to blow then caused this. I think we’re going to find it was water from the flood seeping into the electrics that caused both.’

‘I hope to hell you’re right.’

‘They’re due to start the rewiring down here tomorrow,’ he said.

As they walked back into the kitchen, she stared warily around. ‘I don’t know how much more I can take.’

‘I’ll go up and fetch my laptop and work in here with you until supper.’

‘I’d like that.’ She looked up at the wall clock, then at her watch. ‘Why hasn’t Kingsley Parkin called back?’

‘You only rang him half an hour ago. Maybe he’s with a client. Or out.’

She sat back at the table and began looking at a document. ‘Yes, maybe.’ She picked up her phone and dialled the vendor’s solicitor’s home number.

Later, lounging back on a sofa in the drawing room, after their supper of stir-fried prawns, they watched another episode of Breaking Bad. Caro was more relaxed now.

She looked, for the moment at least, Ollie thought, as if she had put her immediate worries behind her. She was enjoying the programme — as well as the second bottle of wine they were now well into.

But Ollie couldn’t concentrate on the television. One moment his eyes were darting warily around, looking at every shadow. The next he was far away. Thinking. Thinking.

Thinking.

The message on his computer screen that had faded within seconds.

Had he imagined it?

Was it possible for a message to appear like that, randomly, and then vanish, given the sophisticated firewall Chris Webb had installed on his computer?

Any more possible than for a photograph of a bearded old man to appear then disappear?

He felt deeply gloomy and his nerves were on edge. This dream home, which they had moved into barely a fortnight ago, had turned into a nightmare beyond anything he could have imagined.

They had to sort it out. They would. They bloody well would. Once the modernization of the plumbing and wiring was complete, maybe it would all settle down. Somehow he had to convince Caro of that.

Somehow he had to convince himself.

Then Caro’s phone rang.

She snatched it up off the old wooden trunk that was serving as a makeshift coffee table and looked at the display. ‘It’s Parkin!’ she said. ‘My client, the medium.’

Ollie grabbed the remote and froze the screen.

‘Hello, Kingsley,’ she answered, with relief.

Ollie watched her as she said, ‘Oh, I’m sorry. I wondered if I could speak with your partner, Kingsley. My name’s Caro Harcourt — we had lunch today — he—’

She fell silent for some moments, listening. Ollie watched her face tighten, then go pale.

‘No,’ she said. ‘No. Oh my God. No.’

She turned and stared at Ollie, looking shocked, shaking her head, then she folded her body over, pressing the phone even closer to her face. ‘Oh my God. Oh my God. I’m so sorry. I–I can’t believe it. I mean — he seemed so well. Like — this is such a shock. I’m so sorry — I’m so sorry for you — I don’t know what to say. Look — thank you for calling and telling me. I’m just so sorry. So sorry. Yes, yes, of course. It’s very good of you to have called me. Can you — can you let me know what the arrangements are, in due course. I’d like — I’d like — yes, thank you. Thank you. I’m so sorry.’

She ended the call and sat, gripping her phone in her hand and staring, white-faced, at Ollie. ‘That was Kingsley Parkin’s partner — girlfriend — whatever. She said —’ her voice was choked — ‘she said Kingsley collapsed in the street this afternoon, near the Clock Tower. That must have been just after our lunch. He was rushed to hospital — the Sussex County — but the paramedics couldn’t save him. She doesn’t know for sure yet, but it seems he had a massive heart attack.’

‘He’s dead?’ Ollie said, shocked too, and aware how feeble that sounded.

‘Dead.’ She pressed the back of her hand against her eyes, dabbing away tears. ‘Shit,’ she said. ‘Shit. I can’t believe it. He was so — so...’ She raised her arms in despair. ‘What the hell are we going to do now?’

Ollie looked at his watch. It was 10.15 p.m. Too late to call now. ‘I’ll call the retired vicar, Bob Manthorpe, first thing in the morning.’

‘It’s just so bloody freaky.’

‘How old was he?’

‘Not that old. I don’t know — I think he might have had a bit of work done. Around seventy, I’d guess. But he seemed so full of life.’

‘It happens,’ Ollie said. ‘I’m sure it’s a shock, but — that’s a fair age. Those old sixties rockers did their bodies in with drugs. Besides, things can happen.’

‘Sure. Straight after I had lunch with him. Things can happen all right. Don’t we bloody know it?’

‘That box of documents from your office, darling, about the house — do you remember how far back they go?’

‘They date right back to the early sixteenth century when there was a small monastic commune here, established by a group of Cistercian monks. But they then moved away up to Scotland around the early 1750s, which was when this house was built, using mostly the ruins as foundations. Why do you want to know?’

‘It was something the old chap I saw this afternoon suggested.’ He shrugged. ‘I want to go through them all, but some of them are pretty fragile, I’m worried about damaging them. Could you get some copies made at the office tomorrow?’

‘Yes — assuming we make it through the night,’ she said. Only very slightly in jest.