The Death of Mrs. Westaway

The idea of starting again was frightening, and Hal thought of the huddled bodies on the pavements in Brighton, people just like her who had taken a leap—and slipped, falling between the cracks to end up homeless and friendless and alone.

It was a risk—a real risk. Hal had no safety net—and if she fell, there was no one to catch her. For a moment Mr. Treswick had seemed to promise a very different existence, one with savings, and safety, and security. But that moment, that promise, had gone. And whether it was Mitzi’s words to her today or the scratches on the windowpane, something inside Hal had crystallized into a cold, hard realization: she had to get away.

Everything was packed—almost. The final thing Hal did was to settle her glasses on her nose and pick up her tarot cards, shoving the tin into her back pocket.

Then she turned the handle of the door and pushed.

Nothing happened.

Hal felt her breath catch in her throat, and her heart seemed suddenly to be beating painfully hard.

The bolts. The bolts on the outside.

But no—it wasn’t possible. She would have heard. Surely she would have heard? And who—why?

A fluttering panic rose up inside her.

Forcing herself to breathe slowly and steadily, Hal set the case quietly on the floor, wiped her sweating palms on the back pockets of her jeans, and tried again.

The handle was turning, but the door still didn’t open to her shove. It was bowing at the top, but stuck at the bottom.

Hal’s breath was coming quicker now, but she made herself slow down—think rationally. There’s no reason for anyone to lock you in. You’re only panicking because you saw the bolts. Yesterday this wouldn’t even have occurred to you. Remember what Mrs. Warren said—damp makes the frame swell.

Taking a deep breath, she turned the door handle and pushed until a crack appeared around the edge. Then she put her foot against the part that was still sticking and leaned, slow and steady, with as much force as she dared, trying not to make any sudden movements that might wake the sleepers below.

There was a long, protesting creeeak, and then the door gave with a bang that sent Hal stumbling forwards, her hand over her mouth.

She waited for the protesting voices, the sound of feet on the stairs . . . but nothing happened, and at last she plucked up the courage to pick up her case and tiptoe out. As she left the bare little room, she could not stop herself looking back at the door, checking to see if . . .

But no. She was being paranoid. The bolts were drawn back, undamaged. It was just as Mrs. Warren had said—the damp, and nothing more.

Still, though. The kind of house that had locks on the outside of the doors was not one Hal wanted to sleep in any longer.

Holding the case in front of her like a shield so that she could fit down the narrow flight, she went as quietly and quickly as she could to the hallway below, and the one below that, and from there down the long curving staircase to the ground floor, and freedom.

13th December, 1994

I have to get away.

I HAVE to get away.

The words I scratched on the window are like a taunt, now. An admission of defeat. Because no one is going to help me except myself.

It is three days since I was locked in here, and apart from a hurried, whispered conversation with Maud, I have seen no one except my aunt. She brings up trays at odd times, and sometimes not at all, leaving me terrified and hungry.

And always—always the same question. Who is he. Who is he. Who is he.

Today, when I shook my head, she hit me again, so that my head snapped back with such a force that I heard my neck crunch, and the hot flare in my cheekbone blossomed across my face and into my ear, making it ring with pain.

I staggered backwards into the bedframe and I looked up at her, holding on to the metal with one hand, the other pressed to my face, as if to hold the bones together. For a moment she looked almost frightened—not of me, but of what she had done, what she might have done. She had, I think, lost control—perhaps for the first time since I had known her.

Then she turned on her heel and left and I heard the scraping of the bolts before she clattered down the stairs.

I sank down on the bed. My hands were shaking, and I felt a wave of cramps in my stomach, followed by a wash of sickness. At first I thought I might be losing the baby, but I sat quietly, waiting, and the pains subsided, though the heat in my cheek and the screech of tinnitus in my ear remained.

I wanted to write in my diary—to do as I always do when things get too much—let it out onto the page, like a kind of bloodletting, letting the ink and paper soak up all the grief and anger and fear until I can cope again.

But when I got the book out of its hiding place under the loose board, I looked at it with fresh eyes.

I can’t tell her the truth. Not just because if I do, I will never see him again. But because I am seriously beginning to fear that if I do, she may kill me for real. And for the first time, after today, I truly think she is capable of it.

She can’t make me tell her—but if she searches my room, she doesn’t need to. It’s all here.

So after I’ve finished this entry, I’m going to make a fire, and then I’m going to rip out every single page about him, score out his name, tear out every reference and burn them.

Because, whatever she does to me, she can’t make me confess. I just have to hold on until I’ve seen him—and after that we’ll decide what to do, together. Somehow, I will get word to him. I can pass a letter to Maud, perhaps. After all, I have paper here, and pens. And I can trust her—at least . . . at least, I hope I can.

He will come, when he gets that letter, surely? He’ll come. He has to. And then—we’ll go somewhere, run away—together. We’ll figure it out.

I just have to hold on to that thought.

I just have to hold on.

CHAPTER 27

* * *

The stairs creaked painfully as Hal made her way downwards, holding her breath at every sound, at the screech of an owl hunting in the garden, at the drip, drip of a far-off tap.

At last she reached the passageway on the ground floor, and, holding her suitcase rather than risk the rattling wheels, she tiptoed as quietly as she could towards the entrance hall, where the glass panes above the door cast moon-bright crescents on the panels opposite.

The door was bolted, top and bottom, and Hal struggled with the stiff fastenings, but after what seemed like a silent, trembling age, she worked them out of the shafts and turned the door handle.

It was locked. And there was no key. Hal looked around the entrance hall—beneath the silver salver that held letters and bills. Behind the dusty vase of dried leaves. On the lintel of the door. No key. No key.

Her heart was beating fast now. Leaving had become, instead of a longing, an imperative. If she was found here now, stealing out of the house like a thief in the night, it was quite likely someone would call the police. But it no longer mattered. The only thing that mattered was getting away.

Hal scanned the hallway, and then picked up the case and retreated into the drawing room. The tall windows in there were closed and shuttered, but on the inside, and after a long moment of struggling with the bar, it gave with a sudden thump, and the shutter swung open. Behind it, the window itself was fastened with just a simple latch, and Hal lifted it, her heart racing with a mix of relief and anticipation. The panes opened into the room, letting in a gust of frosty air, and she peered out into the night, making sure that she was not about to step out into a six-foot drop.

There was a drop—but only a couple of feet, to the veranda below, and she carefully lowered her case out, then dropped to her knees to clamber out herself.

She was halfway there, one leg over the sill, when a voice spoke from the darkness of the other end of the room.

“That’s right. Sneak away in the night. Coward.”

Hal’s head shot up, her blood suddenly racing with fear.

“Who’s there?” she demanded, the fright making her voice more aggressive than she had meant, but the speaker at the other end of the room only laughed, and walked into the shaft of moonlight.

In truth, Hal hadn’t really needed to ask. She had known who it was—who else would be prowling so silently through the darkened rooms in the middle of the night?

Mrs. Warren.

“You can’t stop me,” Hal said. She put her chin up defiantly. “I’m going.”