All Things Undying

FIVE

‘When I was a little girl, I discovered I had a gift: communicating with those who are no longer with us. Some people say what I do is scary. Other people say I change their lives. I just say what I hear and see, and I see a lot.’Lisa Williams, www.lisawilliams.com

When Alison and Jon Hamilton arrived for dinner at Horn Hill House on Thursday and we’d settled ourselves down on the sofa in Janet’s cozy lounge, I asked Alison how her father was doing. I remembered Stephen Bailey as a spry, weathered man with a shock of Clintonesque white hair and hands calloused from a lifetime of farming.

Alison snorted. ‘Cantankerous as always. Just celebrated his eighty-sixth, but he’s still milking the cows himself every morning. He’s always had help with the crops, of course. Barley mostly. Some maize.’ She sighed. ‘Don’t know why he bothers with the bloody cows. Most of the milk comes from Holland these days.’

‘That’s one of the reasons we’ve put the farm on the market.’ From behind thick lenses, Jon’s smoky eyes considered me somberly.

Like a bobblehead doll, I glanced from Alison to Jon and back to Alison again in the moment it took for that news to sink in. ‘Oh, Alison! I’m so sorry. That farm’s been in your family for, gosh, how many years?’

‘Since Cromwell’s corpse was beheaded, at least that’s what Granddaddy always said.’

‘Which Cromwell?’ I asked. ‘Thomas or Oliver? There’s a century difference.’

Alison made a face. ‘The second one. They dug up his body and decapitated it later. I guess they wanted to make sure the old tyrant was really dead.’

‘I can’t imagine your father being happy with the idea of selling.’

‘Lord, no! But it was time, Hannah. He’s getting too old to manage the chores on a working farm. There’s Tom Boyd to help out, of course. I don’t know what we’d do without Tom. Dad’s been getting forgetful lately.’

‘Talking him into just visiting one of those retirement communities was like pulling teeth,’ Jon said.

‘Practically had to kidnap him,’ Alison added.

‘We took him on a drive up to Coombe Hill in Dittisham,’ Jon said, anticipating my next question. ‘It’s a historic house on Riverside Road, not far from the town center. They converted it into thirty-six one-bedroom flats. Nicer than most.’

‘Dad wasn’t very keen, at least not at first.’

Jon caught my eye and winked, then grinned at his wife. ‘And that extremely attractive widow who conducted the tour? I don’t suppose she had anything to do with your father’s sudden about-face?’

Alison looked at her husband sideways, through her lashes. ‘I think it was the fact that they’ll let him keep his cat.’ She waved a dismissive hand. ‘Anyway, once we were over that hurdle, and he actually agreed to help assemble the Home Information Pack, it was smoother sailing.’

‘With a few squalls,’ Jon added, sipping his wine. ‘Stephen complained that he wasn’t one of those white-shorted, tennis-playing types that they seem so fond of featuring on all the brochures. He’s afraid he won’t fit in.’

Alison snorted. ‘Did you see any tennis courts at Coombe Hill? Of course, he’ll fit in,’ she continued, without waiting for an answer. ‘I’m more worried about getting him to keep the house tidy for viewings. With Jon busy teaching, that falls to me, of course, and frankly, I’m exhausted.’

‘Any interest in the property yet?’ Paul asked.

‘We had an offer early on, but Dad turned it down.’

‘The estate agent is advising him to lower the asking price, the economy being what it is…’ Jon let the sentence die. ‘But Alison’s father is a stubborn old goat and we feel we can push him only so far.’

‘Doesn’t sound like he’s serious about selling,’ Paul commented.

Alison scowled. ‘And he won’t sell, either, if he can’t keep his dirty clothing picked up off the floor when he has viewings.’

While Janet puttered about in the kitchen putting finishing touches on the hors d’oeuvres, refusing all offers of assistance, and Alison and I waited for our husbands to reappear from the wine cellar where they were consulting with Alan on the wines to be served with dinner that evening, I filled Alison in on my trip to Slapton Sands with Cathy Yates. ‘She says her father’s body is not at Brookwood Cemetery in Surrey, nor at Madingly near Cambridge, so she’s convinced herself that he’s lying in an unmarked grave somewhere in Devon, along with hundreds of others.’

Alison heaved a long-suffering sigh, filled with exasperation. ‘We’ve heard those rumors for years, and there’s not a bit of truth in them, yet Americans keep reading that damn book, coming over here, tramping all over our fields, looking for the ruins of those bomb shelters Ken Small claims he saw. If the man were still alive, I swear to God I’d strangle him. I wasn’t born until after the war, of course, but as far as I know, there were no air-raid shelters out here in the countryside. Nobody considered us a target-rich environment, for one thing. Philips’ Shipyard up at Noss, sure, but not South Hams. The Naval College was bombed, as you know, but everyone seems to think that was more of an accident. Some German pilot jettisoning a couple of surplus bombs on his way back to France.’

‘Would your dad be willing to talk to Cathy about the war? Set her straight? I sort of volunteered him, I’m afraid.’

‘He’ll be flattered to be asked, but from what you say, she’s not going to be easily swayed.’

‘She’s a Duracell bunny, that’s for sure. Indefatigable. Bears more than a passing resemblance to Ken Small’s Sherman tank, too, if you want to know the truth.’

‘Is Cathy joining us for dinner tonight, then?’

‘No.’ I grinned. ‘She was having a Big Mac attack, so she went off in search of the golden arches. I didn’t have the heart to tell her that the nearest McDonald’s is in Torquay!’

Alison rolled her eyes. ‘And thank heaven for that! So, who else is coming, then?’

‘Didn’t Janet tell you?’

Alison considered me over the rim of her sherry glass, shook her head. ‘Maybe it’s a surprise? Prince Charles, perhaps? Sting? Sir Paul?’ She flapped a hand. ‘Be still my heart.’

I laughed. ‘No, but she is a television personality. Have you ever heard of Susan Parker?’

Alison had relaxed into the cushions, but at the mention of Susan Parker’s name, she snapped to attention so quickly that a bit of her wine sloshed on to the upholstery. ‘Susan Parker? The medium?’ She dabbed frantically at the wet spot on the cushion with her cocktail napkin.

‘That’s right.’ I explained about my strange encounter with Susan on the street earlier in the week. ‘Turns out she’s a friend of Janet and Alan’s.’

‘I can’t believe this. I love her show! I record every episode!’ She set her wine glass down on the end table and leaned forward, hands resting on her knees. ‘One of her shows was taped at the Naval College, did you know that?’

‘No kidding!’

‘You have got to see it! The woman is incredible.’ Alison slapped her chest with the flat of her hand as if trying to jumpstart her heart. ‘I can not believe that she’s coming here for dinner! Maybe I’ve died and gone to heaven.’

‘Not yet, I hope. Good friends like you are hard to find. But when you do pass on, Susan’ll be able to talk to you.’

‘Very funny, Hannah.’

We were giggling like schoolgirls when Janet breezed into the lounge carrying a platter of broiled mushroom caps. ‘Susan just phoned and said she’d be a few minutes late, but there’s no reason to hold off on these. Careful. They’re hot.’

I stabbed one of the mushrooms with a toothpick, waved it briefly in the air to cool it, then popped it into my mouth. Flavors exploded gloriously over my tongue – goat cheese, basil and another ingredient I couldn’t immediately identify. When the platter came back in my direction, I skewered another mushroom, chewed thoughtfully – for research, of course – and was able to put a name to it – kalamata olives. ‘These are so good,’ I moaned.

‘Dead easy, too,’ Janet said. ‘The recipe calls for pine nuts, but I’m not overly fond of pine nuts, so I leave them out.’

‘Fine with me. Pine nuts leave a metallic taste in my mouth,’ Alison said as she polished off another one of the hors d’oeuvres.

I speared a third. ‘You, too? I thought I was the only person in the world to suffer from a pine mouth affliction. Weird. Last time I ate pesto, it took me two weeks to get my taste buds back in order. One thing a person definitely needs while staying with you, Janet, is taste buds in proper working condition.’

‘Ooops! There’s the bell.’ Janet set the tray of mushrooms on the coffee table and hurried to answer the door.

When she returned to the sitting room with Susan Parker in tow, I was amused to see that the guest of honor and I had dressed in almost identical, loose-fitting linen dresses from Flax, except hers was lavender and mine was rose.

‘So, you are a psychic!’ I said, indicating our matching outfits.

‘No, not a psychic,’ Susan replied with a grin, shaking my hand. ‘Psychics can see into the future. I’ve never been able to do that. I don’t dream about fiery plane crashes, then rush off to Heathrow to start warning people not to take off on flight number whatever to Los Angeles, thank God. Think what a terrible responsibility that would be!’

Alison had captured Susan’s hand and was holding on to it with both of hers. ‘She’s clairvoyant. She sees things other people can’t. Like dead people.’

Susan extracted her hand, set her handbag down on the sofa and plopped down next to it. ‘Thank you. And the medium part means I serve as a go-between, bringing messages to the living from spirits on the other side.’

I felt a chill crawl up my spine. ‘Like my mother.’

‘Precisely.’ She might have elaborated, but I’ll never know because we were rudely interrupted by the return from the cellar of the ‘boys’, bearing half a dozen bottles of wine, each covered with a dusting of gray. ‘Here we go, ladies,’ announced Alan, carrot-topped, freckle-faced leader of the pack, as they jostled one another, tumbling into the sitting room like eager puppies. ‘Oh, Susan, you’re here!’ Alan tucked the bottle of Bordeaux he was holding under his left arm and shook the medium’s hand. ‘I’d like you to meet Hannah’s husband, Paul. And this reprobate over here, the studious-looking chap cradling the Chateau Macquin St George, is Jon Hamilton. He belongs to Alison.’

Susan shook Paul’s hand, then Jon’s, holding on to it – or so it seemed to me – a bit longer than necessary upon meeting someone for the first time. She glanced from Jon to Alison and said, ‘Excuse me for asking, but this isn’t your first marriage, is it?’

Jon fumbled the bottle he was carrying, nearly dropping it, but he recovered quickly. ‘Ah, no.’

Alison tripped across the carpet to join her husband, slipped an arm through his, squeezing tight, standing in we’ll-get-through-this-together solidarity. ‘Jon’s first wife died more than a decade ago in a sailing accident.’

Susan cocked her head. ‘I’m seeing a B. Bonnie? Barbara? Bess?’

‘Beth!’ Alison bounced up and down on her toes. ‘Jon’s first wife was named Beth!’

‘Beth.’ Susan stood quietly for a few seconds. ‘Beth. That’s right. I’m feeling… Oh, my gosh!’ Susan’s hand shot to the back of her head. ‘I’m feeling pain here.’ She massaged the spot vigorously, then pressed her hand against her temple. ‘And here.’ To Jon she said, ‘Is that significant?’

‘I… I don’t know,’ he stammered, the scalp under his pale hair turning pink. ‘Biding Thyme washed up on the rocks near Stumpy Steps with her sails still set. Beth’s body was never found. The River Dart can be unforgiving.’

Behind me, Janet clucked her tongue and muttered, ‘Every year, the Dart takes a heart. That’s what they say.’

A tremor shook Susan’s body. She shrugged it off, then turned to face the rest of us, hands raised in apology. ‘Poof! Sorry. Gone. Do forgive me. It’s sometimes hard to turn the voices off. That’s why I plug myself into my iPod whenever I drive or walk the dog.’

‘Ever try a tinfoil hat?’ Paul wondered aloud.

I found my husband’s foot and mashed down on it, hard. ‘You promised to behave,’ I hissed.

Susan dissolved into peals of laughter. ‘Hannah, your husband is a hoot!’

I shot said husband the evil eye. ‘Oh, he’s a laugh a minute, all right!’

‘Well,’ Janet announced from the doorway. ‘Now that we’ve got that all settled, I wonder if you’d like to move into the dining room. Dinner, as they say, is served.’

As I followed our hostess into the dining room, my stomach clenched. Alison Hamilton and I were supposed to be friends. But this was the first I’d heard of a previous Mrs Hamilton.

At my house, you’re lucky to get a salad accompanying your casserole or one-skillet meal, but things were different at Horn Hill House. I’d just polished off my starter of smoked salmon and quail eggs and was buttering a fresh-baked roll, when the conversation took a hard right turn. Away from the Devon weather – if you don’t like it, wait a few minutes – to something even more interesting than wondering about Jon’s marital history.

‘How long have you known each other?’ Paul asked Janet, his eyes ping-ponging between our hostess on his left and Susan Parker across the table.

Susan laid down her fish knife. ‘Janet, haven’t you told them how we met?’

Janet blushed. ‘I didn’t want to scare them off.’

Paul looked puzzled. ‘Why would we be scared off?’

‘It’s a long story.’ Janet stood, pushed her chair back. As she circled the table collecting our empty plates she said, ‘Why don’t you tell them, Alan, while I go and fetch the main course.’

Like spectators at a tennis match, all heads swiveled obediently in Alan’s direction. He squirmed in his chair.

Paul tipped his wine glass at our host. ‘Yes, Alan. Do tell.’

Alan took a fortifying sip of a fine Sancerre. ‘It goes back to when the twins were born,’ he began.

I remembered that the twins, Samantha and Victoria, were around six years old and did the math. ‘So, 2004?’

‘Yes, that’s right. The girls were delivered at Torbay Hospital in Torquay and everything was fine until we brought them home.’

‘The girls were ill?’

‘No, no, the babies were fine,’ Janet interjected from the kitchen. A second later she appeared carrying three fully loaded dinner plates, one in each hand, and a third balanced on her left forearm. ‘Once we got the girls home, though, the strangest things began happening.’ As Alan helped pass the dinner plates around, Janet continued. ‘It was little things at first. After their two a. m. nursing, I’d put the girls down in their cots and go back to bed.’

‘They had separate cots,’ Alan added. ‘That’ll be important later.’

‘I’d just get back to sleep when Victoria would start to fuss. I’d ignore it, and then Samantha would chime in. So I’d go up, burp them, check their nappies, get them settled. Up and down, up and down, sometimes it seemed I was awake all night. Excuse me for a minute while I get the rest of your dinners.’

It sounded like new-motherhood-business-as-usual to me, but I figured Alan would get around to the ‘strange’ part eventually.

‘Janet was breastfeeding, so by the end of the second week, she was exhausted,’ Alan went on. ‘So one night when they started fussing I told her, “They’re fed, they’re dry, ignore them. The girls will go to sleep eventually.” But she was a new mother, and worried over every little thing.’

‘As one should do,’ Alison chimed in.

‘Exactly as one should do,’ echoed Janet, reappearing with the four remaining plates. She set one down in front of me and I nearly swooned: lamb with leeks and ginger. The aroma was intoxicating.

Janet reclaimed her seat at the head of the table, picked up her knife and fork and indicated that we should all do the same. ‘One night, though, I was so tired that when Victoria started tuning up, I decided to stay in bed and see how long she’d cry. Five minutes? Ten? An hour? After three minutes Samantha had joined the chorus and I was crazy to get out of bed, but Alan held me back. “Do you hear that?” he asked me, and he started squeezing my arm. “What?” I snapped. “All I hear is babies screaming.”’

‘What I heard was singing,’ Alan explained.

Janet paused, a fork full of lamb halfway to her mouth. ‘I didn’t hear anything, but after a minute or two Victoria stopped crying and seconds later, Samantha did, too.’

‘Somebody was singing a lullaby, very softly,’ Alan whispered. ‘“Sweet and low, sweet and low, wind of the western sea,”’ he crooned in a gravelly baritone.

‘Thank you, Luciano!’ Janet raised a hand, cutting her husband off before he could reach the second stanza. ‘I never heard the lullaby myself, regrettably, but soon enough, other weird things began to happen. Victoria’s cuddly lamb would end up in Samantha’s cot, and Sam’s cuddly bear would be in Vicky’s. I thought I was losing my mind. One day when I put the girls down for their nap, it was a little warm in the nursery, so I didn’t swaddle them in blankets like I usually did. When I came back to check up on them, though, both the girls were tucked in. Alan was always so good with the girls that I accused him of doing it.’

Alan raised an honest-injun hand. ‘Not I.’

‘He didn’t believe me at first.’

‘Quite true. I’d read about post-partum depression and, just between us, I thought the old girl was losing her grip.’

Jon swiped at the strand of corn silk that insisted on flopping over his left eye no matter how many haircare products he used. ‘Post-partum depression has been known to cause hallucinations and delusions.’

‘Perfectly true,’ Alan agreed. ‘So I arranged some little experiments. I’d leave their booties untied; they’d somehow get tied.’

‘One day I left Vicky’s dummy on the dresser, and when I came back half an hour later, I found Vicky happily sucking on it,’ Janet added.

‘And every once in a while, late at night, I’d hear someone singing that lullaby again.’ Alan picked up a bowl of oven-roasted potatoes, spooned a couple on to his plate, then passed the bowl to me. ‘We came to the conclusion that our house was haunted, but it was such a gentle spirit that we started calling her the Child Minder.’

‘Runner beans?’ Janet asked, sending the vegetable bowl on a circuit around the table. ‘One afternoon I mentioned the Child Minder to a friend at St Saviour’s Church and right away, she introduced me to Susan.’

‘I was new to the community, then,’ Susan said, flushing modestly. ‘Word hadn’t gotten around about my special gift. Believe it or not, I’m really rather shy!’

‘No walking up to strangers in the street?’ I teased.

‘Exactly. That came later.’

‘Anyway,’ Janet continued, ‘this friend suggested that Susan might be able to communicate with our spirit, find out why she was hanging around the house. Our dream was to open a bed and breakfast, but we didn’t think a resident ghost would appeal to the kind of clientele we hoped to attract.’

‘I’m not so sure about that,’ Paul commented. ‘Horn Hill House could be a stop on the Haunted Dartmouth Tour.’

Alan frowned, Paul’s lame joke falling flat. ‘We really didn’t think it would be good for business.’

At the other end of the table, Janet’s head bobbed emphatically. ‘So, to make a long story short, we invited Susan for tea without telling her anything about our “little problem”.’ She drew quote marks in the air. ‘We walked her all around the house. Ground floor, nothing. First floor – that’s where Alan and I had our bedroom at the time – nothing. But when she got to the nursery!’ Janet pressed a hand to her mouth, overcome with emotion, as if the day were happening all over again.

Susan laid a comforting hand on Janet’s shoulder. ‘I’ll take the story from here if you like.’

Janet nodded. I thought she was about to cry.

‘Almost immediately,’ Susan began, ‘I sensed a strong female presence in the nursery. So I sat down in the rocking chair and waited. Gradually, the presence revealed herself. I got the impression of someone white-haired and fragile. She told me her name was Eleanor, and that she was there to look after the babies.’

‘We knew the history of the house,’ Alan interrupted, ‘so I informed Susan that I was positive that in all its one hundred plus years, nobody by the name of Eleanor had ever lived here.’

Susan leaned forward. ‘And Eleanor must have been listening, because she spoke right up to explain. She told me that she came home from the hospital with the babies.’

Alison’s eyes sparkled in the candlelight. ‘How spooky!’

‘When I asked her why she wanted to stay with the babies,’ Susan continued, ‘Eleanor told me that she was a widow. Her only daughter had died childless so she never had any grandbabies. When Samantha and Victoria were born, she simply decided to go home with them.’

‘But this is fascinating, Janet,’ I said, turning to face our hostess. ‘Why didn’t you tell me about Eleanor the other day when I told you about meeting Susan in Foss Street?’

Janet flushed. ‘I didn’t want to frighten you away, Hannah.’

‘Why would I have been frightened away?’

Janet stole a quick glance at her husband, then looked back to me. ‘Because the room that you and Paul are staying in used to be the nursery.’

I have to admit that I felt a shiver begin at the base of my spine, but another fortifying sip of wine kept it at bay. ‘Is she still there?’ I whispered.

‘Eleanor? No,’ Susan answered. ‘Eleanor explained that she worried when the mother – that would be you, Janet – let the poor babes go on crying for hours and hours.’

‘Two minutes!’ Janet sputtered. ‘Imagine being criticized by a ghost.’

Susan chuckled. ‘Spirits have their own timetables, dear. Anyway, after I explained that Janet was a good mother, and that recommended child-rearing techniques had changed a lot since her day, Eleanor agreed to go.’

‘Then Susan lit a candle, waved some rosemary about, and that was that,’ Alan added.

‘Woo-woo.’ Jon waggled his fingers.

Rather than take offense, Susan shot a benevolent smile in Jon’s direction. ‘I probably shouldn’t admit this, but I feel I’m in safe company. Lighting an aromatic candle and waving a bundle of herbs through the smoke doesn’t actually do anything, Jon, but it makes the client feel good because it’s something they can see. Mostly I simply reassure the spirit that all is well, pass on any messages the spirit may have for the living, and make sure they can both rest easy. Laying spirits to rest is one of the most popular segments of my television show.’

‘I just love your show,’ Alison gushed. ‘I’d love to attend some time.’

‘As a matter of fact,’ Susan said, reaching down for her handbag, ‘I’ll be taping a live broadcast at the Palace Theatre in Paignton on Wednesday night.’

‘Paignton! That’s just twenty miles from here!’

‘It’s sold out, I’m afraid, but if you call this number…’ She located her business cards and handed one across the table to Alison. ‘There’s always the possibility of a cancellation. Here’s a card for you, too, Hannah,’ Susan said, peeling another one from the pack.

The card was elegantly simple, printed on cream-colored stock: Dead Reckoning, website URL and telephone number, that’s all. No crystal ball graphics, no freephone numbers to psychic hotlines.

‘I’ll call first thing in the morning!’ Alison tucked the card into her pocket and patted it for security.

Paul leaned across the table. ‘Susan, I hope you don’t think I’m being impertinent, but do you mind if I ask you a question? Do you have a code word?’

Susan paused in the act of returning her business cards to her handbag. ‘Code word?’

‘Like Houdini. He promised his friends that when he died, he would try to communicate with them from the other side. I understand they had a prearranged code so that if a message came to them from the Great Beyond, they would know it was really Houdini speaking.’

Susan’s smiled seemed a tad forced. ‘The spirits I talk to don’t speak in code, Paul, but if I had to pick a word, it would be Basingstoke.’

‘Basingstoke!’ Alison clapped her hands. ‘How delightful!’

Jon was the only one around the table who looked confused.

‘It’s a town in Hampshire, darling. But that’s not the delightful part. Tell him, Susan.’

‘It’s from Gilbert and Sullivan’s operetta, Ruddigore,’ Susan explained. ‘Mad Margaret keeps lapsing into hysteria, so she and Sir Despard Murgatroyd hit upon using the word Basingstoke to calm her down whenever she goes off on a wild tangent.’

‘Poor child, she wanders,’ Paul quoted airily, having seen the production half a dozen times. ‘Margaret, if you don’t Basingstoke at once, I shall be seriously angry.’

I looked at my husband and grinned. ‘Basingstoke it is.’

‘How do you know Susan’s not making it all up?’ Paul asked Alan in an aside after Susan trailed off into the kitchen after Janet to help her get the dessert together – summer pudding with red fruits, as it would turn out. Paul wore skepticism on his face like a badge, but what Alan said next shut my husband’s I-told-you-so mouth right up.

‘That’s the astonishing part,’ Alan whispered. ‘Susan could have had no idea on what day our girls were born, yet when I had a friend check the death census at Torbay Hospital for January the third, there were only two names on it. A Henry Thomas, twenty-seven, who died in a road accident, and Eleanor Swindon, widow, age eighty-two.’