The doors along the hallway were all closed, but the one right at the end was open, shedding a small rectangle of light onto the tiled brown floor.
The sounds of my clunky Doc Martens on the smooth tiles echoed around the narrow hall and I wished I’d put some of my ballet pumps on instead; even with Norman safe and sound in the pub, I felt extremely nervous about loudly stamping around his house. I sped up, wanting to get to the end of the seemingly eternal corridor as quickly as possible.
I got to the end of the hallway and turned to see a living room through the door, possibly one of many considering the size of the farmhouse.
I was just about to walk towards the doorway when music flooded out into the corridor, and it took me precisely three seconds to realise what it was; with the funeral still fresh in my mind, ‘Jerusalem’ was easy to identify.
What was Connor playing at?
That was soon to be the least of my worries.
As soon as I stepped onto the soft carpet, an overwhelming feeling of misery filled every inch of my shocked and unprepared body. Gasping, I steadied myself on the doorframe, trying to catch my breath.
It was as if - within the second it had taken me to cross over the threshold - I had been driven into a deep, dark depression. I took another deep breath as I straightened up, trying to clear my head, pushing the strange sensation out of my mind as I stepped further into the room.
This place seemed even more sinister than the kitchen. For one thing, the primary colour scheme was brown. The carpet, the walls, the photo frames; they were all the same disgusting, muddy colour. There were three old-fashioned green armchairs placed around a small wooden table, one of which had a knitted brown and yellow blanket thrown over it, adding to the overall hideousness of the piece of furniture.
There was a dusty old record player in the corner - from which the sound of Jerusalem was floating into the room - and I could hear the loud ticking of a clock coming from somewhere underneath the music. There was also an underlying odour of something stale; I thought I’d smelled it somewhere before but I couldn’t quite put my finger on it.
Connor was standing next to the table in the middle of the room, a haunted expression on his face and a piece of scarlet material in his hands.
“Connor…”
He looked up at me slowly. “It was in the table. In that drawer.” He nodded at the open drawer.
In a sudden movement, he walked towards me, thrusting the fabric at my hands. “Is this it? You saw her that night… is this from Emma’s dress?”
I backed away instinctively. “Hey, you’re not getting me to touch that!”
He stopped coming towards me, nodding. After a few seconds I leaned over to look at the material. It was definitely the right colour for Emma’s dress, and it looked about the right size from the tear I’d managed to see outside The Pit. “Looks like it.”
He nodded again. “I knew it.”
I looked at the open drawer in the table. Could I trust Connor? Had he come in here, immediately opened the drawer and found it? Or was it possible he could have planted it, timing it so he found it just as I was coming through the door?
And why the hell had he started playing music when we weren’t even supposed to be here?
I pulled my mind away from the red fabric and walked over to the record player.
“Stop.”
I turned back to look at Connor, exasperated. “Look, I know I’m new to the whole breaking and entering thing, but I’m pretty sure you’re not meant to start playing loud music.”
“I didn’t.”
“Oh, right. So it just started playing by itself?”
Connor just stared at me, expressionless, not saying a word.
Oh God.
Turning, I looked at the record player, not wanting to get any nearer to the source of the eerie music. In the church, the song had sounded powerful and patriotic; here it seemed grim and threatening.
Like most things in the room it was covered in a thick layer of dust, and from where I was standing I couldn’t see any fingerprints or marks to show it had recently been touched. In fact, I was amazed it could still play any records with that much filth encrusted on the needle.
The sensation I’d felt when I first entered the room was trying to inch its way back into my body, and I turned away quickly so I could no longer see the ancient vinyl record spinning eerily around.
“It started playin’ as soon as I opened the drawer. I thought for a second that maybe I’d gone mad,” he let out a shrill, piercing laugh, “but when you could hear it too…” His face was ashen, perspiration was forming on his upper lip, and I realised that he wasn’t lying, at least about the music.
“It’s ‘Jerusalem’.”
“What?”
“The song… Jerusalem. They sung it at Emma’s funeral. Remember, I told you? Norman totally broke down during this song.”
Connor’s eyes widened.
“So can we leave, now? Please?”
My whining voice brought Connor back to his senses, and he shut the table drawer whilst shaking his head.
“No way. If there’s this, there may be more. Help me look.”
“For what? You think there are more scraps of dresses hidden around here?”
Connor moved over to the mantelpiece. “No, not dresses…”
I groaned loudly and gave in. If I helped him look for whatever else he thought he was going to find, then maybe we’d be able to get out of the house by nightfall.
The large mirror over the mantelpiece was so old and dirty I could barely see a reflection in it, and I noticed yet more photographs like the ones in the rest of the house.
I walked over to the little ledge under the mirror to inspect them, and in the middle of the ledge was placed the largest photo of them all. Glancing at Connor, I picked it up and wiped off some of the dust so I could see it better.
I immediately wished I hadn’t; it was one of the most disturbing pictures I’d ever seen. The photo showed Doris in a hospital bed, almost completely withered away, looking like a living corpse surrounded by machines and tubes. I put it down quickly and glanced at Connor, nauseated. “Why would he keep a photo like that? Why would he frame it?”
Connor shook his head, unable to come up with an answer. I looked at the rest of the framed pictures but they were all similar to the ones in the kitchen.
I was just about to turn away when I noticed another frame which had been hiding behind the disgusting hospital photo. Picking it up, I blew off some more dust to reveal a framed letter.
I held it up to the light coming from the window but the handwriting was almost illegible and I could barely read it. Squinting, I eventually managed to form some words out of the mess.
I read it out loud so Connor could hear.
“My dearest, I don’t have long. They won’t tell me but I can feel it coming. Death is waiting for me.”
My voice faltered; nothing was normal about this couple. I cleared my throat and carried on.
“I hope you can find it in your heart to forgive me. Please protect them. No one can ever know. This is my last wish, please honour it. All my love, Doris.”
Connor and I stood in silence for a good minute or so, and I kept looking over the words. Forgive her for what? Protect who?
“No one can ever know.” Connor spoke the words in a whisper which I could only just hear over the music.
He was staring at the letter. No, not staring. Glaring. I could see his jaw working beneath his pale skin.
Suddenly he turned to me. “You got a pen?”
“What?”
“Can you write that letter down? I want to remember what it says.”
“Why? Connor, what’s going on? Is this still about Emma?”
He stared at me in what I thought was probably exasperation. “Have you got one or not?”
After a couple of seconds I nodded, reaching into my shoulder bag for Will’s Evidence Book and a pen. Opening it to a new page so Co
nnor couldn’t see any of what we’d written (that would be bad), I started writing.
I was about to ask Connor what he thought it meant when the record stopped playing.
Looking up instinctively, I watched as a large, dark shape appeared in the filthy mirror.
It wasn’t something out of the corner of my eye or a smudge in the dusty glass. It was right behind me. And it wasn’t happy.
I felt like the wind had been knocked out of me, and I gasped and dropped the book, hearing it make a dull thump on the carpet. I turned round in a blind panic but even when I saw there was nothing there, I knew there was.
I could feel it.
“Beth? You’re kind of freakin’ me out.”
I couldn’t speak. I didn’t know what to say or what to do; all I knew was that I felt an incredibly powerful urge to get the hell out of that room.
The only problem was I seemed to be frozen to the spot.
“Beth?” Connor’s voice was surprisingly full of concern, and even though I could barely register anything in my state of paralysis, I was shocked that he even seemed to care.
Taking another deep breath, I looked back at the mirror; it was the same as when I’d first entered the room. Whatever - or whoever - it was, it wasn’t trying to make itself known to me anymore. Not that I really had to guess who it was. “Connor, get me out of here.”
“What?”
“Please get me out of this room, out of this house, now.” I could hear how dramatic I sounded and the embarrassingly desperate tone of my voice kicked Connor into action. He pulled on my hand until my body gave in and I ran behind him to the door.
It slammed shut before we could reach it.
***
Gasping, I stopped running, but Connor immediately started to try and open the door. It wouldn’t budge.
OK, breathe.
I watched Connor grappling with the door handle as if I were in a dream - the feeling of unreality was overwhelming. This couldn’t possibly be happening, could it?
I didn’t trust myself to answer my own question.
I was still watching Connor when the next attack came.
As far as attacks went, it was pretty abstract; one of the framed photos landed at my feet, as if it had just dived down there. The main problem with this was that it wasn’t one from the nearby mantelpiece; it had previously been positioned neatly on the windowsill on the far side of the room. Ten feet was an impressive length for an inanimate object to cover.
I bent to pick up the picture (not caring about fingerprints now), and went to walk over to the windowsill, when I registered what the photo was.
It was of me. Of Veronica. Our parents.
It was taken in the hospital, clearly not long after both of us had been born. Both sets of parents were smiling widely, each couple with a tiny baby on their laps.
That was V and I - together from the start.
As Norman was such good friends with my mum, it didn’t seem like such a weird thing to find in his home.
But something was wrong with this photo. Very wrong.
Both sets of parents - both mums and dads - looked immaculate. My own mum’s hair had been meticulously styled, and she was wearing an alarming amount of make-up. Even V’s mum, who hardly ever wore make-up, looked incredibly well-groomed. Neither of them looked like they’d just given birth.
The woman in the background, however, definitely did. She was wearing a highly unflattering hospital gown, her face was shiny with sweat, and her hair was plastered to her forehead. She looked tired. She looked sad. Her eyes were small black hollows.
I’d assumed that they’d been on some kind of ward, but looking closer, they were definitely in a private room. The woman’s private room.
I wondered vaguely if the nurse from A&E had been there when the photo was taken. The one who had asked about my sister.
The sound of the door slamming into the wall brought me back to the present. Connor was holding it open - seemingly using all his strength to do it - and his eyes conveyed his pure, unadulterated fear.
“Beth, come on!”
I snapped out of my thoughts and walked over to the windowsill, propping up the photo on the white painted wood before following a madly gesticulating Connor out of the room.
As soon as we stepped back into the hallway, the record of Jerusalem started up again.
This time it was Connor who seemed to freeze. I pulled on his arm, more able to move now that I was out of the living room, my thoughts filled with hospitals and babies rather than ghouls and ghosts, and we ran down the corridor back towards the front of the house.
As we entered the kitchen I heard the unmistakable sound of a car pulling up outside. I knew Norman didn’t have a vehicle anymore, but people often gave him a lift home when he’d had a few too many. I didn’t think we’d been at Hill Top long enough for him to have finished in the pub, but my mind was a bit preoccupied to say the least, and ignoring my common sense, I started panicking.
Connor’s face was still ridiculously pale, and we both ran across the room, hoping to get out in time.
By the time we got to the door, however, we could hear footsteps on the gravel outside and a man whistling. I looked around the kitchen, grabbed Connor, and pulled him under the big table.
We huddled together, waiting for the sound of the door opening and praying that Norman wouldn’t come and sit in one of the chairs. If he sat down and pretended to have a meal with his dead wife I wasn’t sure I’d be able to cope.
Connor was staring at me with wide eyes, looking as queasy as I felt, and I wondered what he must be thinking. At least I’d had some time to get used to the idea that things weren’t always as they seemed.
I turned my head to look at the doorway, but from under the table I could only make out the bottom of the door panel and the start of the frosted glass. After a couple of seconds, I watched in horror as I slowly made out the vague shapes of two dark boots appearing behind the door.
There were a few long, drawn-out seconds of silence, during which I could feel my heart hammering in my chest and my breath catching in my throat.
How on earth did I get myself into these things?
After what seemed like an eternity, I heard the wonderful sound of envelopes being pushed through the letterbox and falling onto the doormat. I sighed in relief as I saw the boot shapes disappear and heard the postman walk back to his van, still whistling, before driving off.
Without a word, we both scrambled out from under the table and ran quickly out the kitchen door, where I gratefully breathed in the fresh air as we ran back down the drive and onto the road.
I started off towards Little Forest - again without one word to Connor - and we walked back in silence. We got back to the village in a record ten minutes and had a quick look through the pub windows; Norman was still sitting at his table, enjoying his drink.
I said goodbye to Connor mechanically and went home. I didn’t particularly want to be on my own, but I didn’t think I could handle all his questions about what had happened at Hill Top. I had a lot more than that to think about.
It wasn’t until a few hours later that I remembered dropping the Evidence Book on Norman’s sitting room floor in my haste to get out.
***
The next day I called Will to an emergency meeting at the bandstand, and recounted mine and Connor’s Hill Top adventures while he sat there with an unimpressed look on his face.
“I can’t believe you went there with him. Alone. Do you not remember him scaring the crap out of you? What if he did murder John? What if he’d tried to kill you? Jesus, Beth.”
I sat there nodding, waiting for Will’s rage to subside. “Yes, I know, I know. I’m an idiot. But I was intrigued…” I hadn’t told him about Connor’s little seduction routine for obvious reasons. “But, Will, I think you’re missing the point. Or points. Lots of big, scary, pointy points that I really think are more important!”
Will sighed. “You mean like the red dre
ss?”
“The red dress. The letter. The Evidence Book. The photo?” I’d also deliberately left out the whole poltergeist-with-a-love-of-music part. There was already far too much to think about without getting into another argument with Will.
He stopped pacing around, as he had been during his rant, and came and sat next to me. “So you really think that V might be your sister? Have you called her? Have you asked your parents?”
“No. I don’t know. Do you think it’s even possible? Maybe I took the photo the wrong way, I was pretty freaked out after… after seeing Doris’s letter. Maybe I saw it wrong or something.”
“Didn’t Mrs Teasdale say V and her parents were arguing about a photo?”
He was right. I hadn’t even thought of that.
“Maybe it’s the same one. Maybe she found it… add in the comments you’ve been getting about your sister, and V arguing with your parents, and going on about lying and stuff… maybe it is true. Maybe you’re both…”
Adopted. Adopted was the word he was looking for. Adopted and split up. Brought up as friends rather than sisters.
“No.”
Will moved to grab my hand. “No?”
“It doesn’t make any sense. V and I… we used to wish we were sisters, living in the same house and seeing each other every day. We used to dream about it. If she found out we actually were, then why wouldn’t she tell me? Why would she push me away?” I paused, not wanting to say out loud what I was thinking. “Unless, of course, the thought just doesn’t appeal to her like it used to…”
“Hey.” Will put his arm around my shoulder. “Just ask her.”
“I haven’t had much luck getting her to talk to me. I’ve probably got it all wrong, anyway…”
“Tell her what you think you know. If she knew that you knew…”
I shook my head vigorously. “No, I can’t. Can we just leave it?”
After a few seconds, Will nodded and claimed his arm back.
“So what are we going to do about the Evidence Book?”
I shrugged, feeling despair creep over me again. “There’s nothing we really can do. Hope Norman doesn’t find it? There were a lot of rooms in that house. Maybe he doesn’t even go in that room.” Maybe it was her room.
One thing was certain; there was nothing - not even the Evidence Book - that could bring me to go back to Hill Top Farm. I’d already told this to Will, but not the reason behind it.