The Whispering House Read online

  Chapter Ten

  Mrs. Grocott

  AT THREE O’CLOCK ON Friday afternoon, the school entrance hall was full of people planning things to do together on the weekend. Most people, anyway. Hannah noticed that Bruce Myers was standing by himself near the front door. She was gathering the courage to go and speak to him when Sam came careering down the corridor, expertly dribbling a piece of balled-up paper like a soccer ball. It landed neatly at Hannah’s feet and he grinned at her. “What are you doing this weekend?”

  “Well, tomorrow morning I’m going to visit someone who might be able to fill me in on what happened to Maisie Holt.”

  “Cool! Can I come?”

  Hannah bit her lip. “It might be better if you didn’t.” Introducing Sam unexpectedly to what must by now be a very frail old lady didn’t seem like a good idea. The shock might kill her. “Tell you what, though,” she said, seeing the disappointed expression on his face. “Why don’t you come over to my house after lunch? Then I can tell you what I’ve found out.”

  “Okay.” He seemed satisfied with the compromise, and they parted at the school gates.

  By the time she woke up on Saturday morning, Hannah felt a lot less confident about the approaching visit. For all she knew, Mrs. Grocott could be bed-ridden or suffering from dementia by now, and even if she wasn’t, how would her daughter react to a complete stranger knocking on her door and demanding information?

  But now that the opportunity was there, she couldn’t simply ignore it, so after breakfast she set off through the village until she came to the gas station on the main road. Laurel Drive was a small street just beyond it, lined with about a dozen modern bungalows. When Hannah got to number three, she stood on the doorstep for a moment or so, nervously rehearsing what she was going to say. Then she rang the bell.

  A tall, bony woman with tightly waved gray hair and glasses with dark red frames opened the door. She wore brown slacks, a fawn cardigan, and a pair of bedroom slippers.

  “Mrs. Wilson?”

  “Yes?”

  “I’m Hannah Price. My family has rented Cowleigh Lodge for a few months, and I was told that there was a Mrs. Grocott living here who might be able to tell me something about the history of the house.”

  “That’s Mother,” said the woman, her face brightening now that she realized Hannah wasn’t trying to sell her anything. “Her gran used to be a nursery maid up at Cowleigh Lodge.”

  “Is she in?”

  “Mother, you mean? Oh, she’s in, all right. Doesn’t go out much now. Was it something in particular you wanted to know about the house?”

  “Not really,” said Hannah, trying to sound casual. “I just thought it would be fun to find out something about the people who’d lived there.”

  “Oh, well, you may be lucky. She can’t always recall what she’s had for breakfast, but she can often tell you all sorts of things that happened eighty years back! Come in, anyhow. My name’s Pat, by the way.”

  Hannah followed her into a small, cluttered living room that seemed to be all curtains and cushions and rugs. A sofa and two armchairs were arranged in front of an electric heater, and in one of the armchairs sat a very old lady, covered in so many shawls and blankets that she looked like part of the upholstery. Her eyes were closed and her breathing came in short rasps.

  “Mother!” Pat Wilson put a hand on her shoulder and shook it gently.

  The old woman’s eyes opened, but they looked cloudy and unfocused. It was hard to tell how much she could see.

  “There’s a young lady to see you. She wants to know about Cowleigh Lodge.”

  Mrs. Grocott’s jaw worked up and down rhythmically, as if she were chewing something. “Have I had my dinner?” she asked.

  “It’s not dinnertime yet; you’ve only just had your breakfast,” replied her daughter patiently. She turned to Hannah. “We get this all the time. Doesn’t necessarily mean you won’t get anything else, if you’re prepared to wait. Sometimes it’s just a question of saying the right word—something that jogs her memory.” She leaned forward and raised her voice slightly.

  “Cowleigh Lodge, Mother! Where your gran was nursery maid. She talked to you about what went on up there, didn’t she?”

  “Yes,” said the old lady unexpectedly. Then she looked away. Apparently that was all they were going to get. Meanwhile, Mrs. Wilson drew up a chair for Hannah so that she could sit closer. Hannah thanked her, sat down, and leaned forward. “Mrs. Grocott, did she say anything about the family who lived there? Their name was Holt.”

  Mrs. Grocott turned her head and seemed to notice Hannah for the first time. “Do I know you?”

  Hannah shook her head. “I’ve just moved here. I’m living at Cowleigh Lodge.” She began to feel they were going around in circles. Somehow she needed to find the right words. On an impulse, she took the old lady’s hand. “A little girl lived there. Her name was Maisie. Maisie Holt.”

  Whether it was the pressure of her hand or the name, or a combination of both, she couldn’t tell, but suddenly Mrs. Grocott’s eyes opened wider, and a shrewd intelligence could be seen lurking behind the cloudy film.

  “She died, poor child.”

  “Do you know how she died?” Hannah felt a sudden twinge of excitement.

  “She was ill,” replied the old lady, as if this were explanation enough.

  “What was wrong with her?”

  “My mouth’s dry,” she complained, turning toward her daughter.

  “I’ll get you a cup of tea. I expect you’d like one too, wouldn’t you, dear?”

  “Thank you.” Hannah didn’t want tea, but it seemed a good way of keeping the conversation going long enough to get as much information as she could.

  “What was wrong with Maisie?” she repeated.

  Mrs. Grocott was quiet for a few seconds, and then a word shot out of her mouth like a pellet.

  “Stomach.”

  “Stomach?”

  “Terrible cramps she had. And vomiting. Poor little mite.”

  Hannah raised her eyebrows. So maybe Sam had been right about appendicitis after all. That would fit.

  Then a thought occurred to her. “Your grandmother was a nursery maid. Does that mean she nursed Maisie when she was ill?”

  Mrs. Grocott’s mouth pursed in a frown. “Nursery maid was more like maid than nurse. Besides, she wasn’t much more than a child herself. Changing linen was her job. That, and fetching fresh water for washing the little girl. Up and down those stairs day and night, she was. There was no bathroom then, see? Water had to be brought in a pitcher and poured into a basin. Besides, there was that other one.”

  “Which other one?”

  But now her wrinkled eyelids were drooping. That last speech seemed to have worn the old lady out.

  Mrs. Wilson appeared with a tray and three teacups. She glanced at her mother, then put the tray down.

  “We’ll just leave her for five minutes,” she said. “Then I’ll wake her. She dozes all the time. You may still be lucky.”

  But the sound of the teacups had already woken Mrs. Grocott. She opened her eyes, sat up in the chair, and took the cup from her daughter. It rattled alarmingly in the saucer as her hands shook, but she managed to raise it to her lips and drank noisily. When she put the cup down, her eyes were focused once more.

  Hannah waited a few seconds, then asked the question again. “You said there was someone else. Someone else who nursed Maisie when she was ill?”

  “Well, of course! There was Miss Holt, wasn’t there?” Mrs. Grocott’s voice sounded stronger now, even slightly indignant, as though Hannah hadn’t been paying attention. The tea seemed to have revived her and sharpened her brain.

  “Do you mean Mrs. Holt?” asked Hannah. “Maisie’s mother?”

  “Miss Holt,” repeated the old lady severely. “Captain Holt’s sister. She lived with them as a kind of governess to Maisie, on account of never having got married herself. And not surprising, Gran used to say. She was a diff
icult woman.”

  “How was she difficult?” asked Hannah, sensing something interesting here.

  “Always finding fault. Interfering with the way the house was run. Not that it was her place to say.” Mrs. Grocott sniffed disapprovingly. “When Maisie got ill, she insisted on taking over the nursing of her. Even prepared her meals for her. Cook was so put out about it, she near gave notice, I’m told! And Miss Holt wanted to move the child in with her—I believe she got her way over that right at the end.”

  “You mean Maisie didn’t die in the little room at the back of the house?”

  “No. She died in Miss Holt’s room. That was when all the talk started.”

  At first Hannah was so relieved to find that Maisie hadn’t died in the room she herself slept in that she didn’t take in the second part of this. Then it dawned on her that Mrs. Grocott had just said something significant.

  “What talk?”

  “Talk among the other servants. They didn’t like Miss Holt.”

  “But Miss Holt wasn’t a servant. She was Maisie’s aunt.”

  “She acted as governess. Taught the child her lessons and that. She was a clever woman, I believe, but those who had no husbands and no money were second-class citizens in those days—not like now. Whatever she thought of herself, the servants knew she was one of them. Besides, she was Captain Holt’s sister, not his wife’s, and the two of them never got along.”

  Hannah felt a moment’s pity for Miss Holt, who seemed to have been liked by no one.

  “What was all the talk about? After Maisie died?”

  But the eyes had begun to cloud over again. The jaw hung loose, and Hannah watched helplessly as the old lady seemed to slip away into a light doze.

  She heard the door click and looked up to see Mrs. Wilson coming in. Hannah hadn’t even noticed her leaving the room, but now she reappeared, holding something.

  “I knew I’d find it if I looked hard enough.” After shifting the teacups to one side and wiping a space with a tissue, she laid a brownish photograph on the table. It was mounted on stiff card and showed a group of six people posed on some steps at the back of what was still recognizable as Cowleigh Lodge. All were female—two were seated, wearing long skirts and light-colored blouses with high necks and full sleeves, and four were standing. Two of these wore black dresses with white aprons; a third had a lighter-colored dress with an apron but no cap.

  But it was the sixth person who immediately caught Hannah’s attention. This was a slender little girl of about nine or ten, in a knee-length white dress with a deep-frilled hem and broad sash. A cloud of dark hair fell loose to her shoulders, drawn back from a high forehead above widely spaced, intelligent eyes. Her nose was small and straight and her mouth full, the gently curving lips slightly parted—and cradled in her arms was a doll. A doll with fair curly hair.

  “That’s Maisie, isn’t it?” Hannah’s voice was excited. “And this must be the doll we found in the attic! It’s got dark hair now, but this blond stuff’s still underneath.”

  Mrs. Wilson raised her eyebrows. “You don’t say! Still there after all that time? Well, well . . . who’d have thought it? Anyhow, you’re right, this is Maisie, of course. Pretty little thing, wasn’t she? And a little angel, by all accounts. Mind you, people always say that about a child that’s died, don’t they?”

  “Angel,” muttered a voice from the armchair.

  “You with us again, Mother?” Pat Wilson smiled encouragingly. “I was just saying that Maisie was a good little girl, wasn’t she?”

  There was no reply. Her daughter turned back to the photograph. “And this one here”—she pointed to one of the standing figures wearing a cap—“is my great-grandmother.”

  Her voice had a note of pride, and Hannah dutifully dragged her gaze away from Maisie to the young girl, about fourteen or so, who stood with her feet together and her hands folded demurely in front of her. She regarded the camera with a wary expression, as though at any minute she expected it to explode.

  “Then this would have been the housemaid,” continued Mrs. Wilson, pointing to the other capped girl, “and this one here was the cook. She’s not wearing a cap, to show she’s senior to the maids.”

  Hannah frowned. “It seems like a lot of servants for quite a small house. It’s hardly big enough for me and my parents!”

  “Don’t forget you’ve got a bathroom now. That would have been a bedroom in those days. And there’s an attic, isn’t there? That’s where my great-grandmother slept, with the housemaid here. People didn’t have so many possessions in those days, and they expected to sleep two to a room, often.”

  Hannah thought of the grimy, cobweb-filled loft and tried to imagine it as a neat, plainly furnished bedroom shared by two young girls not much older than herself, perhaps. Would they have whispered and giggled as they lay in bed, gossiping about what went on in the rest of the house?

  She stared at the photograph, and for the first time properly noticed the two seated figures. “Is one of these Maisie’s mother?’

  “That’s her.” Mrs. Wilson pointed to a pretty, dark-haired woman who, unlike the others, wasn’t looking at the camera at all. She seemed abstracted, as if the photographer had caught her when she wasn’t ready and was thinking about something else.

  “Angela,” said Mrs. Grocott unexpectedly.

  “What’s that, Mother? Mrs. Holt’s name wasn’t Angela.” She shook her head. “Getting confused now. Not surprising.”

  “She looks just like Maisie,” said Hannah. “Mrs. Holt, I mean.”

  Pat Wilson frowned and seemed about to say something, but then appeared to change her mind. She pointed to the second figure. “And this one’s Miss Holt.”

  “Maisie’s aunt?”

  “That’s right. No oil painting, was she? No wonder she never found a husband!”

  Miss Holt had a narrow, pinched face, thick black eyebrows, a long, pointed nose, and a jutting chin. In between, her mouth had an expression of angry disapproval. It was hard to see how this woman could possibly have been the aunt of that pretty child, but quite easy to see why she might have been unpopular.

  “Where’s Maisie’s father?” asked Hannah. “Do you know why he wasn’t in the photo?”

  “Captain Holt was a soldier. He was away a lot, fighting some war or other, and got himself killed soon after Maisie died. I rather doubt he even knew what had happened to her, which was just as well, considering.” Again Mrs. Wilson frowned, and Hannah sensed it was the right time to ask the question she’d tried to put to Mrs. Grocott.

  “Your mother said that after Maisie died, there was talk among the servants. Do you know what she meant?”

  Mrs. Wilson glanced at the old lady in the chair, whose eyes were closed once more. “You’ve got to remember,” she began slowly, “that feelings run high when a child dies. And everyone loved Maisie, I believe. The trouble was, so far as I can tell, that this Miss Holt took all the nursing on herself, and when the little girl died, everyone looked for someone to blame.”

  “They thought she’d let her die unnecessarily?”

  “Worse than that.”

  Hannah stared at her. “You can’t mean . . . ?”

  Mrs. Wilson nodded. “It seems crazy, doesn’t it? What did she have to gain from the child’s death? All the same, the servants got it into their heads that she’d deliberately done away with that little girl.”

  “But were they right?”

  Mrs. Wilson simply spread her hands helplessly. “How can anyone be certain, after all this time? Nothing was ever proved, that’s all I know.”

  “So if she did”—Hannah swallowed—“deliberately kill Maisie, she got away with it?”

  “I wouldn’t say that, exactly. Miss Holt might not have been found guilty officially, but the result was much the same as if she had been. Word got around, you see, and after Maisie died, no one would employ her aunt. I believe eventually she ended up in the workhouse, and she died there shortly after.”
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br />   Hannah shivered. She had heard of conditions in Victorian workhouses. Then a thought struck her. “Did Maisie’s mother think she was guilty too? Is that why she couldn’t stay on at Cowleigh Lodge?”

  Mrs. Wilson’s face flushed. “No one stayed on after Maisie died. Mrs. Holt moved away and the house was sold.”

  Hannah looked curiously at her, wondering why she seemed suddenly ill at ease. Was it the thought of Maisie’s mother, living out the rest of her life with her only child dead and no husband to support her? Whatever the truth, it was a depressing story. But there was still something she needed to know.

  “Did Maisie . . . did she ever say she had dreams? Nightmares?”

  “Nightmares? Not that I know of. What kind of nightmares?”

  “About being in a wood. Surrounded by leaves.”

  “I daresay she might have been delirious toward the end. Is that what you mean?”

  “No. I don’t think so. It doesn’t matter.” Hannah was about to get up and go, but then she hesitated. “Your mother must have talked to you a lot about all this—for you to know so much?”

  Mrs. Wilson nodded slowly. “She has. But, funnily enough, not when I was younger. It’s only been in the last ten years or so, as her short-term memory’s worsened, that all this past stuff has come out. And I believe it was the same with her mother. Grandma never said a word about it till she was quite an old lady, apparently, but it must have been preying on her mind all those years. Oh, well.” She smiled sadly. “That’ll be the end of it now, anyway. I’ve no children to tell the story to. My husband and I would dearly have liked some, but we were never blessed.”

  There was a slightly awkward silence. Then Hannah got up to go. “Would you mind if I borrowed this for a while? I’ll take care of it.” She pointed to the photograph.

  “Of course you can. Hold on to it for as long as you want. And listen”—she looked anxious—“maybe I shouldn’t have told you all that about Miss Holt, not when you’re living in the house. It won’t give you nightmares, will it?”

  “Well, if it does, it’s not your fault. I asked for information, and you gave it to me!”