“If we have to go anywhere,” said Isabella, “I would like to go to Great Yarmouth. If we have to, that is,” she added.
“Great Yarmouth?” I asked, surprised by her sudden declaration of interest. “Why there particularly?”
She shrugged her shoulders. “It has beaches. We could make sandcastles. I’ve always wanted to see it but never have. Miss Bennet said she’d take us there but she never did. She lied to us.”
I thought about it; in fact, Great Yarmouth had been one of the places I had considered for our day trip, but I had discounted it in favour of Norwich as I thought the children might enjoy looking at the shop windows in the city. But now that Isabella was showing an interest I thought it only fair to meet her halfway and nodded my head.
“All right then,” I said. “It’s as good a place as anywhere, I suppose.”
“But the castle,” protested Eustace, his lower lip turning down in disappointment.
“Another day, another day,” I said. “We have so much time in front of us. We’ll go to Norwich next week perhaps. Today let’s take Isabella’s suggestion and visit Great Yarmouth.”
And so we went. Heckling took us in the carriage to Thorpe Station and from there we boarded a train for a short journey of no more than forty minutes, passing through Brundall and Lingwood along the way, the green of the fields moving past us at such a speed that I found the whole experience entirely relaxing. A young mother with two small children joined our carriage at Acle and I felt pleased that I might have some adult conversation for a change, but no sooner had the doors closed than the two, a little boy and girl, twins I thought, began to cry for no apparent reason. Isabella and Eustace stared at them as their mother tried to console them but only when she rose and left the carriage did their tears dry. With the return of silence, I felt happy to see them go.
It was pleasant to sit back and stare out the window, not having to make conversation with anyone. We had the carriage to ourselves now and the children entertained themselves with a pocket game they had brought with them while I watched outside and occasionally dipped in and out of The Life & Strange Surprising Adventures of Robinson Crusoe by Mr. Defoe which, risking Isabella’s disapprobation, I had borrowed once again from her father’s library.
It was a bright, sunny day; indeed the more distance we put between Gaudlin and ourselves, the more temperate the day became. When we disembarked the train on to the platform at Great Yarmouth I breathed in deeply, filling my lungs with fresh air. I hadn’t realized quite how stuffy Gaudlin was until I was away from it, and resolved to ask Heckling, upon our return, to enter the house and open some windows during the day from now on. (I was rather nervous of opening windows ever since the incident in my own bedroom and had stayed clear of them.) The children appeared pleased by the change of scenery too and I noticed that Isabella’s mood had visibly lightened. She was chattering away now without any self-consciousness, while Eustace, staring across towards the sand and sea, looked as if he wanted nothing more than to run and run until he exhausted himself, much like a dog who is only accustomed to his home and the lead and is suddenly released to the freedom of the mountain, the thrill of clambering up and down rocks, the joy of liberation.
“We have you to thank for this, Isabella,” I remarked as we walked towards the beach, climbing over a small wooden fence and making our way across the dunes. “Who needs stuffy old Norwich when you can have this?”
“Ann Williams always said good things about Great Yarmouth,” she replied, taking off her shoes and letting her toes sink into the sand. Eustace followed a moment later and I picked up his shoes and stockings and placed them inside my holdall. “She had a very happy childhood, Ann Williams. Or so she told us. Happy childhoods seem to be things one reads about in books, don’t you think? They don’t seem to be the stuff of real life.”
“Ann Williams?” I asked; this name was new to me. “And who might she be? A friend of yours?”
“No, I don’t have any friends. Surely you can see that, Eliza Caine.” I looked away, uncertain how to respond to this. “Ann Williams was the third governess, after Miss Golding but before Miss Harkness.”
“Ah,” I said. “I see.”
“I liked Ann Williams,” remarked Isabella, looking out to the sea. “Doesn’t it look blue!” she added, staring across at the sea, her face lighting up with pleasure for once. “And the waves are so inviting. I think I should like to swim.”
“Miss Williams would play hide and seek with me,” whispered Eustace, tugging at my sleeve. “She would cover her eyes, count to fifty and then come looking for me. She never found me, of course. I’m a very good hider.”
“I don’t doubt it,” I said, eager to move on from this subject. The business of the previous governesses was one that I had yet to get to the bottom of. I thought it would take another appointment with Mr. Raisin in order to do that but, unlike my eagerness of a couple of weeks earlier, I had put this off, uncertain that I wanted to know the full story, even though I felt that I should.
“I brought my swimming costume with me,” said Isabella, turning to me. “Can I go in?”
“I don’t see why not,” I said. “What about you, Eustace? Do you feel like a swim?”
He shook his head and clung close to me.
“Eustace doesn’t care for the water,” said Isabella. “But I’ve always liked it. Mother used to say that I might have been a mermaid in a different time.”
I stared at her and noticed her pale a little; this was a child who never made reference to either of her parents and yet here was this remark. She swallowed and looked away, certain I have no doubt that I was looking directly at her, and unwilling to catch my eye.
“I’ll change in the dunes,” she said, running away from us both. “I won’t be long.”
Eustace and I walked a little further on in order to offer her some privacy and we found a nice stretch of clean white sand to settle ourselves upon to watch her swim. It was a perfect paradise sitting there with the sun on my face and the sensation of honest sea air filling my lungs. If only we could live here, I thought. We could come to the beach every day, regardless of the weather. Wash away the taint of Gaudlin Hall.
A few moments later, Isabella went dashing past us in her swimsuit and I had a vision of how she would look a decade from now, when she was the same age as me. She would be very different, of course, for she was turning into a beauty while I was no such thing. She would be much sought after by young men and would, I suspected, break several hearts before she found one that she wished to cherish. It would have to be a very special young man, I was certain, who would capture her affections and hold on to them.
“It’s nice here, isn’t it?” I said and Eustace nodded. “Haven’t you ever gone swimming?”
“Once, when I was little,” he replied. “I couldn’t do it. I got frightened whenever the ground went from under me.”
“It’s not so very difficult,” I told him. “It just takes confidence, that’s all. We’re naturally buoyant, you know.” He turned his face to look at me, his expression crinkled up with lack of comprehension. “We naturally float,” I explained. “Of course, there are many adults who claim not to know how to swim, but do you know, if you threw a baby into the sea, it would swim without any difficulty.”
“Why would anyone throw a baby into the sea?” he asked, sounding rather horrified by the notion.
“Well, I’m not advocating it,” I said. “I just mean that before we learn to feel afraid of things, our bodies know how to do them anyway. It’s one of the more disappointing aspects of growing older. We fear more so we can do less.”
He thought about this but shook his head, as if it was all too confusing. Reaching down, he picked up handfuls of sand and let them pour slowly over his bare legs and feet, waiting until they were covered entirely before slowly lifting them and allowing them to emerge, like monsters from a swamp. He seemed to enjoy doing this for it made him smile every time.
&nbs
p; “I’m glad we have this time together, Eustace,” I said after a while. “There was something I wanted to talk to you about.”
He didn’t turn his head or cease his game but I could tell that he was listening. I thought about how to phrase this; it had been on my mind for some days and I had been waiting for an opportunity to broach it.
“Do you remember the day I burned my hands?” I asked. He didn’t say anything but I took his silence as assent. “You made a remark that afternoon,” I continued. “About an old man.”
“Did I?” he said innocently.
“Yes, Eustace. You did. It was when you came into the house after you hurt your leg.”
“I fell over,” he replied, remembering it, and lifting his right leg now to examine where the wound had been, but it had been fairly insignificant, if a little bloody, at the time, and had entirely healed now.
“That’s right. You fell over. Because you saw an old man.”
He sighed deeply, the sound of his breath exhaling through his nose so loud that it rather startled me. I hesitated. If he did not wish to discuss this, perhaps I was wrong to challenge him on it. But no, I decided, I was there to take care of the children, to look after their well-being, and I needed to know if something had happened to upset him.
“Eustace,” I said. “Are you listening to me?”
“Yes,” he replied quietly.
“Tell me about the old man,” I said. “Where did you see him?”
“He was standing in the driveway,” he replied. “At the opening between the two tall oaks.”
“He’d walked into the estate from beyond the trees then?” I said.
“No, I don’t think so. I think he was just there. In the driveway.”
I frowned. “And did you recognize him?”
“No,” said Eustace. “Well, yes, I’d seen him before, I mean, but I don’t know who he is.”
“He’s not from the village then?”
“He might be,” he replied, shrugging his shoulders. “I don’t know.”
“Perhaps he’s a friend of Mr. Heckling’s?”
“Perhaps,” said Eustace.
“And what did he say to you?” I continued. “This old man. Did he say something to upset you?”
Eustace shook his head. “He didn’t say anything,” he replied. “He was just watching me, that’s all. At least I thought he was watching me. But when I looked at him I realized—oh look! Isabella’s waving at us.”
I turned my head to the sea and, sure enough, Isabella could be seen waving in our direction. I waved back. I should really be watching her more closely, I thought. But observing her as she pulled her hand down and dived deeper into the surf and swam in a perfect groove, I could tell that she was a strong swimmer—perhaps her mother had been right about her—and that she would not come to any difficulty out there.
“What happened when you looked at him, Eustace?” I asked, turning back to the boy now, and he stood up, brushing all the sand from his legs and turning to look at me with an expression of alarm on his face.
“I don’t want to talk about it,” he said.
“Why not?”
He breathed heavily again and, as much as I could see this was a subject that disturbed him, I felt it imperative that I should press him on it.
“If he wasn’t looking at you,” I continued, “who was he looking at? Was he staring at the house? Perhaps he was a potential burglar.”
“It was nothing like that,” insisted Eustace. “I told you, he was an old man.”
“Well, what kind of an old man? What did he look like?”
“He looked like every other old man,” he said. “Not very tall. A little stooped over. He had a beard.”
I sighed. That was a description that could have suited almost every old man I had ever seen in my life. “Eustace,” I said, placing a hand on his shoulders, and he looked up at me, his pale face trembling a little, and I could see tears forming in his eyes. “Who was he looking at?”
“There wasn’t anyone else there,” he said finally. “Just Isabella and I. But he was looking behind us and saying that she should leave.”
“That who should leave?”
“I don’t know!” cried Eustace, raising his voice now. “He just said that she should leave. That she wasn’t needed here.”
I frowned. I could feel a thousand different thoughts and explanations running through my head, but what seemed most curious of all was the idea that the old man, whoever he was, might be addressing the presence. That he could see the spirit in physical form. But if he could, then why could I not?
“Eustace,” I said firmly. “If you see this old man again, or if you feel surrounded by … how shall I put this … someone or something you don’t recognize, then I want you to—”
“Look,” said Eustace, raising his hand and pointing to the distance, where a black shape appeared to be making its way towards us. I glanced back at the sea and could make out Isabella still swimming, although closer to the shoreline now, and then turned back, following Eustace’s gaze towards whatever it was that was approaching us.
“It’s a dog,” said Eustace quietly after a moment. “It means us harm.”
I raised an eyebrow and watched and it was true that the dog was running towards us at an accelerated rate. I turned round, thinking perhaps that its master was on the beach behind us, summoning him, but no, we were alone. As it came closer I began to feel nervous and wanted to turn and make my way back to the path, but I knew of course that to run from a charging dog would serve only to encourage it. We would do better to befriend it, to make it know that we did not mean to injure it in any way.
Closer it came and I could make out its face now, and it was the stuff of nightmares. A dark black dog, as black as night, with a bright-pink tongue emerging from its mouth. It began to bark as it approached us, to bark so ferociously that my heart beat faster in my chest and I could feel my very breath being taken away from me.
“Don’t run, Eustace,” I said quietly, placing an arm around his shoulder protectively. “Whatever you do, don’t run. It won’t harm you if you stay very still.”
“It doesn’t intend to harm me,” he replied in a calm voice, and I looked down at him, but he was staring at the dog and not looking at me at all. I glanced over towards the sea again and now Isabella was emerging from the depths, smoothing her swimsuit down and watching us and the dog.
Now it arrived. It stopped before us and rooted itself in the sand, a low, throaty growl emerging from somewhere deep inside its body. Stalactites of drool slipped from the corners of its mouth.
“Good boy,” I said in a conciliatory tone. “Good dog.”
I reached out to pat it, thinking this might persuade it to relax, but as I did so it barked so angrily that I pulled my unfortunate scorched hand back and wrapped my arm around Eustace even more tightly. This, however, served only to infuriate the beast for it began to drool and whine, then bark with such ferocity that a panic started to rise in me. It darted forward, not pouncing on me yet, but with such a sudden speed that Eustace and I were separated, the dog standing between us, ignoring the boy entirely, turning its dark rage completely on me.
“Please,” I said, knowing how ludicrous it was to try to reason with a dog that appeared to have lost control of its senses, but then what else could I do but beg, beg it to spare me?
“Please.”
I saw it drag its hind left paw on the sand a few times, then sink its body into a crouch, its head lowering as it kept its eyes fixed firmly on me, and I knew that the moment was upon me. I had but a matter of seconds before he would jump, and when he did I would have no choice. I would have to kill or be killed. I said a silent prayer and positioned myself, ready to defend my life.
“Go away!” came a voice as if from nowhere and, to my astonishment, Isabella had appeared and placed herself between the two of us. “Go away,” she insisted. “Do you hear me? Be gone.”
The dog retreated a little, beg
inning to whine in protest, but the child was not to be disputed with. “Leave us,” she cried. “Do you hear me?”
It did not need to be told again. It turned on its heel and, defeated, trotted away, the very picture now of a kind, obedient pet. I sank to the sand, amazed by what I had witnessed, as Isabella turned back to me, looking down at me with a mixture of disapproval and contempt.
“You’re not afraid of dogs, are you?” she asked. “They just need to know who’s in charge, that’s all.”
Chapter Seventeen
IT WASN’T UNTIL after lunch that I began to recover my equilibrium. I had been badly shaken by the encounter with the animal but the children appeared to have already forgotten it. Eustace, who of course had been there throughout, did not seem to be in the least concerned by what had happened, and when I questioned him about it, all he could say was, “It was just a dog. It didn’t mean me any harm.”
And on that point, I believed he was absolutely right. The dog had not meant him any harm at all. It was me he wanted.
The children, however, seemed to be enjoying their day thoroughly. Isabella was quite refreshed from her swim and her spirits were higher than I think I had ever seen them.
“We should come here again,” she said, dancing around me on the street, appearing like a little girl for once rather than the young adult she often seemed to be. “It’s a splendid place.”
“Perhaps,” I said. “Although there are other wonderful places in Norfolk, I’m sure. We wouldn’t have to come here all the time. But you’re right. It is good to get away for a day.”
“Thank you for taking us,” she replied, dazzling me with a rare smile. “Eustace,” she added, turning to her brother, “tell Eliza Caine how appreciative you are.”