Heather Farm Read online

  Heather Farm

  A short story of love, ghosts and suspense

  Copyright 2011 Dorte Hummelshoj Jakobsen

  Cover photo: Steffen Melsen Bräuner

  Published by Candied Crime 2014 via Smashwords.com

  www.candiedcrime.com

  License Notes

  This ebook is licensed for your personal enjoyment only. This ebook may not be re-sold or given away to other people. If you would like to share this book with another person, please purchase an additional copy for each recipient. If you're reading this book and did not purchase it, or it was not purchased for your use only, then please return to Smashwords.com and purchase your own copy. Thank you for respecting the hard work of this author.

  Heather Farm

  I

  “Our new home, darling!” Thomas wrapped his strong arms around me and kissed me.

  I just stood there, staring at our house, too touched to speak.

  “Wait a second, Joanna.” He lifted me up and carried me over the threshold.

  “But we're not exactly newly-wed, silly,” I laughed, kicking and squirming because he took the opportunity to tickle me.

  “I know, but this is our first real home.” He put me down in the dark and damp living room. “And just wait, in a year or two it'll be a splendid place.”

  I ran aimlessly around, checking every nook and corner, seeing everything with fresh eyes, because now it was ours. We helped each other open the old windows with their thick layers of paint.

  “It seems they've painted all the doors and windows green,” I observed.

  “Of course. The colour of hope, spring, new life. We're going to stick to that colour, aren't we?”

  “And keep chickens and a temperamental turkey, and fetch water from the pump outside. You are trying to make a real countrywoman out of me, aren't you?” I skipped around like the Energizer Bunny, opening all of the doors and closets, not sure yet which skeletons would jump out at me.

  “Well, I'd have guessed you wanted water and electricity put in first, but if you insist on going native with a chicken coop and all, sweetheart...”

  “I'll tell you what to do first. You can begin by scrubbing all the dirt and grime off each and every surface, and when you've done that, come back and I'll have some new ideas for you. And it won't even cost you extra."

  We laughed and we cried a little bit because it was so overwhelming. When dusk came and transformed the world into long, daunting shadows, we lit plenty of candles. Like teenagers, we squatted in the living room in our sleeping bags, sharing a cheap bottle of Spanish plonk. We had lots to do, but it didn't matter because we were young and strong and very much in love.

  And our gorgeous, new home was right next to the nineteenth-century lighthouse which must have cast yellow rays of light through the living room windows in the past. I was sure the old building also yearned to be bought by a family who would give it a new lease of life.

  II

  Squeak, squeak.

  The piercing, squealing sounds tore me out of my heavy sleep. I tried to get out of the sleeping bag, but I must have zipped it all the way up to my chin during the cool morning hours so I wriggled about like a helpless chrysalis.

  “Dear me, I can see I've spent the night with a mummy.” Thomas pretended to help me out of my cocoon, but of course he took it as an opportunity to kiss me and tickle me, and then kiss and tickle me some more.

  “Will you stop your despicable behaviour and release me before I pee in my pants! And I suppose you haven't even installed a tiny shower while I've been asleep?”

  “Don't tell me I walked all the way to the baker's to buy a fresh loaf for a wriggly worm.”

  “So it wasn't you trying to strangle someone out there a few minutes ago?”

  “The water pump, you mean? I confess I did manhandle her a bit, and she squealed terribly, but the old gal wouldn't deliver the goods.”

  “So there's no water for my morning coffee?” I drew the sleeping bag up over my face.

  “I have found some clean plastic cans, and I'll go and fetch some water from the lighthouse. I think there's an outside tap. There's a pint of milk in the bag, though.”

  As if milk could replace that first shot of caffeine. Well, he was a darling, really. It was just that all my limbs were growling at me, telling me they wanted to be left in peace after all that scrubbing yesterday.

  I could see already that drinking water would have to be our first priority. We had brought a thermos and some soft drinks with us yesterday, and for our cleaning project we had used sea water. Plenty of that commodity right across the dunes.

  Enjoying the luxury of waking up in a remote spot, far from curious neighbours, I walked outside in the skimpy t-shirt I had slept in.

  “Good morning, Miss. Didn't mean to frighten you.” An old woman stood right in front of me. She raised her arms and took a step back. “I thought you came out because you had seen me approach the house.”

  “Hello. No, I'm afraid I didn't hear a thing." I studied her as discreetly as I could, wondering if she was one of our new neighbours. She blended in perfectly among the heather and the dunes, so weather-beaten that even the colour of her eyes seemed a bit washed-out.

  “I didn't mean to disturb you. You must have lots to do. Young couples always have.” Her gentle smile showed me she remembered what it was like.

  “But don't you want to come in? I'm afraid we are not up to offering you coffee or tea yet, but...” I felt a bit exposed in my all-but-transparent nightie, but we really wanted to have a go at settling down here and get to know the neighbourhood and the few families who lived around us.

  “Perhaps some other time. I just wanted to see who had bought my old home. I'm sure you are going to be happy here.”

  “So you lived here?” I tried to remember what the realtor had told us about the previous owner. I thought it was a middle-aged man, certainly not someone who seemed to go back all the way to the old war as my granny used to put it. Even though this was as far out as you could get, I was a bit taken aback by her black lace-up shoes and mended cardigan.

  “Most of my life.” She looked around her, taking in every bit of the battered old buildings around us. “He sold it without asking me, you know. They said I was too old to make decisions and sign papers.”

  “I'm so sorry to hear that.” I really was, but what could I do. “Was it your son?”

  She nodded and stretched out a leathery hand to touch the water pump. “Yes. It doesn't matter so much now I've seen you. You both look as if you are going to love Heather Farm.”

  “Heather Farm? Is that what you called it? What a lovely name!” No one would call it a farm nowadays, but I liked the sound of it.

  “He was probably right anyway. I couldn't cope on my own here. I couldn't even make that darn pump work.”

  I heard Thomas whistle seconds before I actually saw him on the path between Heather Farm and the lighthouse. I took a few steps towards him, wanting him to hurry so we could offer our first guest a cup of coffee, but when he turned round the thicket of rose hip bushes, the old woman had gone.

  III

  After her visit the awful dreams began. Now that we had a proper bed in the bedroom I could snuggle up to Thomas until I fell asleep again, but I woke up two or three times every night in a sweat, my heart beating ferociously. I´d sit up and pull the duvet around me, unable to chase the nightmares away. Whenever I closed my eyes, it all came back. The growling monster dog and the couple who argued, accompanied by the squealing pump. He swore and ranted at her, and when he started to hit her, I wanted to scream at the grey figures to get away from our home. They were just dreams, figments of my imagination, and I had every right to be here.

&nbs
p; If I whimpered in my sleep, a drowsy Thomas would put his arm around me and whisper, “it's just a dream, darling.”

  The days were better, but if I turned around abruptly, I'd catch glimpses of the retreating shadows of the family who lived here before us. The tall, grim man and the children who were both far too quiet. The little girl sucking her thumb and wetting her pants when her dad shouted at her. The watchful boy observing both parents, unsure whose side to choose. His strong, brutal father or my sweet, old woman. Whenever he left the house, they huddled together on the sofa, the mother singing to them or telling them stories.

  We hammered and sawed, painted inside and whitewashed out of doors, and week by week we restored Heather Farm to its former charm. It was exactly what we had always dreamed of. Except for those festering ghosts.

  “You won't make the pump work. She said so.” I wiped my forehead, smearing new streaks of whitewash into my hair.

  “Who?” Thomas glared at me, annoyed at my unwillingness to admit that the old woman had also been a dream.

  He couldn't see any of them, not yet, but I had seen him jump when doors slammed behind him on calm days, or when the pump sent out its melancholy cries untouched by any of us.

  “She doesn't dare to speak to you. She just doesn't trust men.” I didn´t even bother to discuss if she was real or not. She appeared whenever Thomas was away, telling me bits and pieces about her life on the farm. Her happiness when they were first married and she gave birth to their children, but also the years of fear and violence when her husband turned to drinking.

  “She says we'll have to remove the cement cover around the pump. There is something beneath it.”

  “Something beneath it? And she didn't tell you what that something was? A ton of sand, or perhaps a million dogged heather roots, I guess.” He tried to be patient with me, but I could see he was getting worried.

  Last week, when I had tried to explain to him that the small woodpile at the house end was growing slowly, by a few logs every day, he had urged me to take a rest.

  “Why don't we just remove the cover and check?” I was dying to tell him everything about the old woman, but I had a feeling I'd better take it one small step at the time. First the pump, and then I could try to plant the idea of looking into the outhouse behind the farm house.

  “The car is in the shed,” she had said. More than once.

  IV

  “Here we go. Caaaareful now... slow... and no toes under it. Yeees... stop!” Old Mr Hansson who was in charge of the tiny lighthouse museum conducted the process like a traffic policeman.

  “That's it, me dears. Now it's just a question of digging the sand and roots away, and she'll be as good as new.” He patted the rusty pump and beamed at us.

  Thomas prodded the roots and the rubble with the toe of his trainers. “I hope so. We really like the idea of restoring the old pump.”

  “But what's that? That white thing over there?” My mouth felt dry, and I was certain I knew already, yet I hoped they would tell me I was wrong. Off my rocker, expecting to see blood and bones everywhere.

  “Some bones, I think. A deer, probably.” Hansson kneeled down in the coarse lyme grass, tugging at the twig-like phenomenon.

  Suddenly he jumped up, pointing down at the remains. “So that's where he went!”

  V

  The local constable had warned us to stay away from the well until the police had had a chance to look at our find. It was not as if we wanted to excavate the shaft either. We kept indoors until they had dug out the remains of a human skeleton and what seemed to be a large dog. I shuddered, knowing exactly what the brute had looked like.

  Not expecting any kind of sense from newcomers, Constable Penrose turned towards Mr Hansson. “So you know who this is?”

  “Think so. I grew up nearby.” Hansson pointed to the south. “When I was a child, some people called Weston lived here. The man went missing. Vamoosed one night.”

  Again, Constable Penrose told us to stay away from the yard. The pump and its surroundings had been cordoned off with red and white scene-of-crime tape. It looked oddly inappropriate among all the brown and green shades.

  Thomas brewed some coffee, and we tried to wash away more than the sand and dust. He didn't look at me when he asked, “do you still want to stay here?”

  “I don't know. I just want him to be gone.”

  “I'm sorry if I've been stupid. I just didn't expect it to be like this.” In a sweeping movement, he indicated the whole scenario around us.

  “I know. Neither did I. But do you mind if we take a look at the outhouse to the north? The constable didn't warn us off the outhouses, did he?”

  VI

  Someone had done his or her best to keep prying visitors out of the old shed. The gate had not just been locked, it was secured with an impressive chain and what was probably the largest padlock one could get.

  Thomas found a crowbar and equipped me with a bolt cutter. Without speaking, we attacked the gate, trying to find its weakest points. I remembered how the rather phoney realtor had assured us there was nothing of interest in any of the outbuildings. She was a tiny woman in high heels, a city person who couldn't hide the fact that all she wanted was our signature so she could get away from the crawling spiders and earwigs.

  “What the...” Thomas glared through the dark opening without even noticing that the gate had grazed my shin.

  In spite of the dust and the cobwebs there was no doubt that we had found the car. One of those huge, old classic things from the fifties.

  “There's his car. You'd better not touch it.”

  “Why not?” Thomas was itching to get a closer look at this old beauty. He bent over it, trying to look through several decades of filmy dirt.

  “Just don't.” I took his hand and dragged him away. “You can tell the police we have found it, and when they've finished with it, I'm sure you can look at it just as much as you like. If you still want to.”

  VII

  We went back to town for a few days after that, staying with my parents. We just told them we wanted to leave the police to it, but my mother scrutinized my pale face and the dark shadows under my eyes.

  The constable told us about the large pool of blood on the front seat and the empty brandy bottle. He was disarmingly honest when he assured us they were doing what they could to solve the mystery, but he wouldn't put his bets on it. Not after sixty years.

  “What do we do now? We could try to put it up for sale, but it won't be easy.” Thomas stroked my chin with the tips of his fingers. He had stopped tickling me weeks ago.

  “Let's go and see the son,” I suggested.

  “The son?”

  “The little...” I began, but then I remembered that it had happened long before I was born. “The son who sold us the house.”

  Sven Weston didn't live far away, and there was no doubt that he recognized our faces from the local newspapers. “So there you are.”

  “We don't want to intrude or anything, we just want to know what happened,” Thomas began.

  “You don't want to intrude?” He laughed humourlessly and turned around, not caring whether we followed him or not.

  “My father died. Apparently.”

  “Apparently. But of course you can tell us more than that. He beat your mother, didn't he? And perhaps also you and your sister?” I knew this was the only chance we'd get. If we came back, he wouldn't open the door.

  “I can't see that's any of your business.”

  “But I can. We live in the house. Your home!” I wasn't prepared to let him off the hook, not after all the nightmares he and his family had caused me.

  “Okay. So he hit us, and one night my mother got enough. She hit him back, probably a bit harder than she'd planned. I've already told the police, and no doubt it will be in the papers soon.”

  “Your mother killed him? With the brandy bottle?” Thomas did his best to help me get to the bottom of the case.

  “Oh, yeah. And I don't
know what she did to him afterwards. She sent us to bed, and the next day she bought the chain and that padlock.” Weston waved us out of his house, probably regretting he had ever let us in.

  “And your mother?” I tried.

  “She went about her business, didn't she? Took care of us and survived as best she could like she'd always done.”

  “Why didn't you sell the house until now?”

  “She couldn't do that, could she? When she grew too old to live there, we tried to rent it out, but no one ever stayed there for more than a couple of months. And then she died last year.”

  VIII

  Constable Penrose came back to tell us what they had found out. It had taken some time, but they were reasonably sure it was Mrs Weston's fingerprints they had lifted off the brandy bottle. The forensic evidence was shaky, but after the son had come forward with his explanation, they had decided to close the case.

  I nodded even though the constable had left out a couple of things. Afterwards I talked Thomas into going with me to the cemetery.

  “I just want to see her burial plot.” I had gathered a large bouquet of wild roses for her, convinced that my old woman would love them more than any hothouse flower.

  “Can't we forget about all this?” Thomas implored me. “We'll move away if you want to, as long as we can just leave this behind us.”

  “Yes, I think so. I'm just going to leave these flowers for her, and then we can go home.”

  I knelt down in front of the fairly anonymous headstone, feeling a bit nauseous. Was this all Sven had granted her, or had she told him she wanted it to be as simple as this?

  “He lied, you know.”