Louise turned over in bed, trying to get the sound out of her head.
But when she reluctantly opened her eyes, the baby’s cries were
louder and even more insistent. How could they be, she wondered,
puzzled. There were no babies here, not in the huge and forbidding
manse her parents had rented in Edinburgh, while her father gave a
series of lectures at the university.
She got up. Had someone left the television or the radio on?
Yawning, Louise padded down the black wooden staircase of the old
house. Dour and heavily furnished, it had been home to many
generations of church ministers.
Now the crying seemed more desperate, so much so that she
could hardly bear it, and Louise’s heart went out to the baby who
was so miserable and frightened.
Louise had strong maternal feelings, and although she was only
twelve she often helped to look after her younger twin brothers while
her parents were working. Her mother was teaching part-time while
Robbie and Alan went to a nearby nursery and Louise spent a term
at primary school. Outgoing and assertive, she had no problem fitting
into a new school and had soon got used to the unfamiliar Scottish
accents.
Now, as she hurried down the final flight of stairs, the crying
suddenly stopped and Louise looked at her watch. 4 a.m. She
shivered. Everything in the manse seemed to be black – or dark at
best. Most of the furniture was made of heavy mahogany, there were
huge framed pictures on the walls: portraits of dead ministers or
paintings of highland glens that all seemed to be besieged by violent
storms, or at best surmounted by dark clouds.
Dark, damp – the words loomed large in her mind. None of them
liked the house and the twins, usually so happy and contented, had
been uneasy and rebellious and her parents quarrelling even more
than usual. But the building belonged to the university and the rent
was so low they felt they were stuck with the manse and its
forbidding black paintwork.
As Louise stood fearfully in front of the hall mirror, she noticed that
its surface was misted over, which seemed strange on such a cold
morning.
Staring into the mirror with creeping unease, she saw the mist
slowly evaporating and a young girl, just a few years older than
herself, looking out at her imploringly. Then the image faded and the
crying began again, this time further away.
For a moment, Louise was more amazed than scared. Could the
crying have brought her to the mirror and was it now about to take
her somewhere else? It was a weird thought – as if the crying was
controlling her – as if she was a servant to its demands.
Servant? That was what the young girl in the mirror had looked
like, with her neat hair and simple blouse with its starched collar.
Now the mirror had misted over again and she was left with the
sound of crying in her ears, partly overlaid by the sonorous chanting
of prayers.
Louise shuddered, her astonishment turning to a heart-thumping
fear. Suddenly she felt burdened by a nagging sense of responsibility
that wouldn’t go away. Another image swam into her mind – this time
of the twins – and Louise felt a painful rush of love for them. They
were so small, so helpless – so utterly in her power. She wouldn’t
ever let anyone harm them.
Shocked by the strangeness of her thoughts and by the sudden
fears they had sparked off, Louise returned to the mirror. She wiped
the surface clean and saw the young girl again. This time her lips
were moving. At first there was no sound but floods of silent tears
were pouring down her cheeks. Her mouth was working and then the
words came blurting through, frighteningly loud, but horribly
distorted.
‘Help me,’ she pleaded.
Louise knew she had to help her. But how? She looked at her
watch and saw with a start that the hands were at exactly the same
place as they had been when she had come downstairs. Time had
stood still yet so much had happened – and somehow this seemed
the most terrifying thing of all.
Then the crying became more insistent, the praying more
resonant, more hostile. Slowly, Louise mounted the stairs.
The attics of the manse were no longer used and the narrow
passageways and two musty rooms were empty, their bare boards
creaking. The grey, dusty window panes looked out over a small
dark side street.
Louise had briefly explored the attics with the twins when they first
arrived and had found them oppressive and claustrophobic, a shutaway
place for servants whose comfort had been ignored.
As she warily approached, the crying grew louder but the prayers
were now no more than a barely distinguishable mutter.
Louise paused by the battered blue door, knowing that she must
open it but not wanting to, a growing fear over whelming her. She
gripped the handle but it was so cold that she gave a little yelp of
pain, feeling too weak to open the door, too numb to take her hand
away.
The crying increased in intensity and Louise could feel the need of
the baby coursing through her. At last she managed to turn the
handle, and as the door swung slowly open she heard a terrible
choking sound. A young girl sat on a small truckle bed with a baby in
her arms, one hand round its throat.
‘Don’t!’ screamed Louise, running towards her, determined to
wrest the child away. But all she did was to hit her head on the
opposite wall as she fell over the empty bed.
‘Sleepwalking,’ said her mother, applying a cold compress to
Louise’s bruised head. She had been woken by a thump and had run
upstairs to find her daughter lying dazed on the floor of the bare attic
room.
‘She was going to kill the baby,’ Louise said over and over again.
Her parents exchanged glances.
‘The baby?’ muttered her father.
‘It was crying.’ Louise was still confused, not able to explain.
‘Just a bad dream,’ her mother said quietly. ‘Now I’ll get you to
bed with some aspirin.’
Louise woke with a splitting headache and dressed slowly, trying to
sort out what had happened in the night, recalling the horror of it all.
Why had the young girl tried to kill her own child? Why had she
pleaded from the mirror? Had she wanted someone to understand –
to realize why she had done it? Louise remembered the exchange of
glances between her parents, glances that seemed to hold a grim
acceptance.
She knew she had to confront them, to make them tell her what
they knew.
At first Louise’s parents refused to say anything, but as she
persisted, her father gradually began to weaken.
‘It’s just some stupid story that goes with the house,’ he said at
last with considerable reluctance.
‘Why didn’t you tell me?’ she asked him miserably.
Her mother took over. ‘Lots of these old houses have some story
to them.’
‘What is it?’
Her mother paused and then began too casually, ‘A young servant
girl at the turn of the century became pregnant and when the father
refused to marry her she killed the baby – and then herself.’
Louise closed her eyes.
‘It’s just a typical ghost story. You must have heard it all before. I
expect –’
‘I’ve never heard it before,’ she said quietly. ‘Never. You shouldn’t
keep things from me. It’s much worse to find out.’
There was a long pause. Then her mother began to speak slowly,
her voice shaking. ‘I know. And there’s something else –’
‘Not now, Diana,’ snapped her husband. ‘Not when Louise is so
upset.’
‘What is it?’ she asked bleakly.
There was another long pause. ‘There’s never a good time, Bill,’
she said quietly. ‘Not for this anyway.’ She gazed into Louise’s eyes
and said, ‘Your father and I are splitting up. We – I know it’s sudden
but –’
‘Of course we’ll see each other just as much,’ her father broke in,
‘and it won’t make any difference to –’ His words flowed over her as
she saw again the young girl’s face, felt her complete despair.
Then her mother said, ‘Perhaps you overheard us talking, darling.
That’s why you were dreaming, wasn’t it? You knew we were
separating. That’s why we should have spoken to you earlier –’ Her
mother continued to speak, but after a while Louise didn’t listen.
She was alone in her room when the knock came.
‘Who is it?’
‘Robbie.’
‘Come in.’
His round, four-year-old face was worried. ‘What’s the matter?’ he
asked.
‘Where’s Alan?’
‘Downstairs.’
‘What do you want?’ said Louise dully, lying on her bed, gazing up
at the ceiling.
‘We want you to play.’
‘I’m too tired.’
‘Why are you sad?’
Louise knew she couldn’t answer. Her parents hadn’t told the
twins they were splitting up. Not yet.
‘I want a cuddle,’ said Robbie piteously, the tears starting out of
his eyes.
‘Come on then.’
Robbie flung himself on top of her and she put her arms around
him. Everything was so awful. What would the twins do when they
discovered their father was leaving? They were devoted to him and
his departure would break their hearts. How could she stop them
being hurt? She held Robbie tighter – and tighter. She must protect
him at all costs. Suddenly she felt Robbie struggling to get free.
‘Don’t,’ he said, but it wasn’t his voice, it was the young servant
girl’s. Slowly, Louise’s arms dropped away and Robbie leant his
head trustingly on her shoulder.
*
‘That servant girl spoke to Louise,’ muttered Megan.
‘You’ve got to be in sympathy with someone to do that,’ said
Jamie thoughtfully, burrowing down into his sleeping bag as the fire
burnt low. This time there was no more wood left.
‘My father didn’t have much sympathy with the Watsons,’ Megan
replied. ‘He doesn’t really care for anyone who isn’t Welsh.’
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