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  Dovecote

  Anne Britting Olesen

  © 2017 Anne Britting Oleson

  All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced or transmitted in any means, electronic or mechanical, without permission in writing from the publisher.

  978-1-945805-38-7 paperback

  978-1-945805-39-4 epub

  978-1-945805-40-0 mobi

  Cover Design

  by

  Bink Books

  a division of

  Bedazzled Ink Publishing, LLC

  Fairfield, California

  http://www.bedazzledink.com

  For Julia Hawkes-Moore, who sees ghosts, and possibly the future.

  Special thanks to the Hewnoaks Artist Colony for the residency which enabled me to work on this novel.

  Part I

  Blue Door

  1

  GWYNNETH APPROACHED THE blue door, key in hand. On the stoop before it, a small earthenware pot was tipped on its side, the dry friable soil spilling out onto the stone, the unrecognizable plant dead and spindly. A sudden shiver wracked her, and she glanced around hurriedly. A dead plant on the step of a dead woman’s house. Why hadn’t it been cleaned off, taken care of? In her exhausted state, she was petty. Peevish.

  A cold pelt of rain had her ducking forward on the tiny stone terrace, shoving the key into the lock. At least this had been oiled recently. The key turned easily, and with one last look down into Eyewell Lane, where the cab had disappeared, she put her shoulder to the door and bumped her suitcase inside.

  Inside, she found the front entryway, this late in the afternoon, to be dark and cold. Unwelcoming. She shook herself. Don’t be stupid. It’s just a house. A faint scent of beeswax and lavender floated on the air. She left the suitcase behind, moving warily, a hand to the wall. To the left, a door leading into a room that ran the length of the cottage. Her footsteps were hushed on the worn carpet. She explored the wall for a moment before she realized there was no switch. The fading light falling from the single window to the front of the room didn’t reach far inside, but was enough to show her the lamp on the table beneath it. Other lamps, beside two chairs at the opposite side of the room. In the center, a dining table surrounded by four carved-back chairs. She moved and was startled until she realized that the motion on the far side of the room was only her reflection in a heavy-framed mirror. Slowly she backed out and turned to the right hand doorway.

  Here was the sitting room. Two more arm chairs, one of them wing-backed, faced a Queen Anne sofa. To her left, a bookshelf, atop which a steadily ticking clock reposed. A wood-burning stove in a low stone arch took up the far wall. Kitty-corner to that, the door, which should lead to the kitchen—or so she surmised, anyway—and Gwynn made her way around the sofa toward it. The carpet here was less worn, and her footsteps made no sound. The kitchen door was closed, and she put a hand to it, suddenly cautious again, suddenly nervous. She pushed the door open. No one was there. Of course there was no one there. The appliances stared back at her blindly. This room had a small window to the front, but this late in the day, this late in the season, very little light came in anyway. A wall switch to her right gave life to an overhead light, and the room sprang up, bright, newly scrubbed.

  A tea tray stood near the polished stove top, an electric kettle, flex cord wound loosely, next to it. Gwynn crossed the tiled floor for a closer look. All set save the milk. She opened the refrigerator to find an unopened pint, and a pan of what revealed itself to be, when she lifted the cover, lasagna.

  A welcome of sorts. Gwynn closed the refrigerator, then unwound the cord and plugged it in. She wondered whether she had her great-aunt’s solicitor to thank for this. Or the cleaning lady—also her great-aunt’s—he’d kept on to make the cottage presentable for her.

  Either way, when the kettle clicked off, she made the tea and carried the tray back into the sitting room to have a cup, and to consider her next steps.

  THE SOLICITOR’S FIRM. Simms and Son. The particular Mr. Simms she had spoken to earlier today in his office had to be the son, as he couldn’t have been much older than she; and any son he had couldn’t have been old enough to have been called to the bar—couldn’t have been old enough to get into a bar, come to think of it. Sitting across from him, she had smirked to herself, watching his long-fingered hands sift through a sheaf of papers as he had spoken.

  “Mrs. Chelton was adamant,” he had said, shaking his head, his tone mournful as he mouthed her great-aunt’s name. “You were to be the heir.”

  “But there are others,” she had protested once again. Some distant cousins: she knew of them, though she did not know them. She didn’t even think she knew their names. Your English cousins, her mother had always called them in passing, when anyone had mentioned them.

  “You were to be the heir,” the solicitor had repeated. He had held out first one page for her to sign, then another. His glasses pushed up unto the bridge of his nose, he had peered at her. “Perhaps she thought you might be the one relative who would live in the house. The one who wouldn’t sell up. At least not immediately.”

  It might have been a question.

  “We’ll have to see,” she had said cautiously.

  When they had finished the formalities, she had risen, clutching the folder of documents to her chest. Mr. Simms had stood as well, had come around his great ark of a desk to hold out his hand. “You are still intent upon staying at the cottage this evening, at least?”

  Gwynn had nodded. “For a few days, yes.”

  A nod in answer. “So you had said.” He had turned back, jotted something on a square of paper, then handed it to her. “This is the telephone number of Mary Tennant, whom I asked to clean after we spoke last week. She was formerly Mrs. Chelton’s housekeeper, and can answer many of your questions about the cottage, I expect.”

  Mary Tennant. Gwynn now dug the paper from the inner pocket of her purse. She’d give the housekeeper a call in the morning.

  FOR NOW SHE uncovered the lasagna pan and slipped it into the oven, then hit the switch to heat the water for more tea. While she waited, she climbed the stairs to investigate the bedrooms. To the left of the narrow landing, the bigger bedroom had the flowered duvet turned down and the pillows plumped; Mary Tennant again, she assumed—that woman must have decided that the new mistress of Gull Cottage should sleep in the master bedroom. Gwynn left the bedside lamp on, then looked in at the smaller bedroom and the bath. Both were tidy and ready. She had dragged the suitcase upstairs behind her to the landing, and now she shoved it into the room she guessed she’d be occupying until she herself decided otherwise.

  Downstairs the tea water was boiling. She rinsed the teapot, remembering that, if she was going to be a good English person like her grandmother Lucy, she needed to dump that and fill the pot again. She had done it wrong the first time. Warming the pot, she vaguely remembered her grandmother saying, suiting action to words. Gwynn wished now that she’d paid more attention to the old woman, who had died when Gwynn was barely in her teens. Carefully she made another pot of tea, then refilled the creamer, and returned to the sitting room.

  Gwynn seated herself again in the chintz-covered wing-backed chair to pour the steaming tea and realized how chilly it was. She threw a glance at the wood-burning stove, remarkably clean and black. Next to it, a basket for logs: empty. Something the charwoman had forgotten. There was a woodshed at the side of the cottage, she remembered the solicitor saying; but the night had fallen rather quickly, and she didn’t think she could bring herself to explore further, even in search of wood and possible heat. Tomorrow would be good enough for that; for tonight, she would have some dinner, then crawl under the thick duvet upstairs.

  Decision made, she returned to the kitchen at
the summons of the timer. As she bent to pull the warmed pan from the oven, she heard the front door. Just a snick, as though someone were closing it gently. She straightened quickly, listening. Nothing further. She shook her head: she was just unused to the cottage. Imagining things. She reached into the cupboard for a plate, then searched until she found silver. As she was closing the drawer, she heard the steps on the stairs.

  THERE WAS NO one else in the house. No one upstairs, no one in any of the other rooms. The front door was locked, and she checked the kitchen door as well, just to be certain. Also locked. She left all the lights on, looking over her shoulder frequently as she ate her dinner at the coffee table before the sofa. There was a television in the corner—surprisingly new, considering the previous owner—and she turned it on. She flipped through channels until she stumbled upon a replay of Qi on Dave, letting Stephen Fry keep her company. There was no one in the cottage with her; of course there was no one else there. She was just tired—overtired—having come all this way out of London by train this morning, having met for the better part of the afternoon with the solicitor. Just imagining things. Like she had done all those years ago, after Richard’s death.

  When the credits rolled, she brought the dirty dishes to the sink for the morning and took herself upstairs to bed. After checking the doors one more time.

  2

  THE TELEPHONE RANG promptly at nine the next morning, just as the mantle clock was chiming that last note—almost as though the caller had been watching that clock, or one synchronized to it, carefully. Gwynn staggered down the stairs, clutching the rail with one hand while wiping her eyes with the other; she felt drugged, and thought she might have had bad dreams, but they were all confused and incoherent. Jet lag, she told herself, following the sound of the ringing into the sitting room, to the book shelf at the side wall. The phone sat in its charging base on a hand-stitched runner.

  “Mrs. Forest?” The voice was business-like, no-nonsense. “Mary Tennant here. I was Mrs. Chelton’s char?”

  “Yes. Yes, hello.” Gwynn stifled a yawn. “I’m sorry. I’m still not quite with it this morning. I’ve got you to thank for the spotless house and the wonderful dinner last night, haven’t I?”

  “Yes. Was it all right, then?” Without waiting for an answer, Mary Tennant continued. “Mrs. Forest, I’ve still got the key Mr. Simms gave me, the key to your cottage. I wonder if I might drop it by later this morning, if that would be convenient?”

  “Of course. And—” The decision seemed already to be made, as though she’d dreamed of it in the night. “I’d like to discuss the possibility of hiring you for a few mornings a week, when you come by. Would that be all right?”

  Mary Tennant’s brisk voice softened over the line, but only barely. “That will be fine. Would ten suit?”

  That gave Gwynn an hour to shower and dress and clean up the mess she’d made in the kitchen; one could hardly present oneself or one’s house to a prospective cleaning lady at anything less than spotless. Judging from the precise timing of the call, Mary Tennant’s knock on the door would no doubt come at precisely ten by the ringing of the clock on the book case. Gwynn rushed upstairs, rifled the contents of her suitcase in search of clean clothes, and hurried into the bath. She came downstairs some half an hour later, hair wet but combed, and turned her focus to washing up the dirty dishes she’d left in the sink.

  The weak morning sun dappled the kitchen tiles through the starched curtains. After putting the last of the tea things away, Gwynn unlocked the rear door to look out into the garden and get a breath of air. She stepped out onto the stoop and the mess of overgrowth surprised her.

  The brambles had grown up in the rear garden, encroaching on the small square of scruffy grass. Gwynn froze at the kitchen door, feeling the malevolence, branches creeping ever closer, bearing their small sharp knives. A garden whose mistress must have lost hope in the end, must have given up the fight. She recognized the feeling. Above, the thick sky was pressing down, bruisy dark clouds fending off the sun: all in league with the thorny growth. If she had any thought to escape the claustrophobia of the cottage by stepping outside, she had been sorely mistaken. This garden was a jungle, angry and aggressive.

  Yet she could see, some yards away, a gate in the high stone wall which surrounded the garden, the heavy planks weathered and mossy. She was drawn to it. The brambles caught at her jeans as she forced her way through; she wished, as thorns tore at the skin of her hands, that she had gloves. An iron latch, rusty and black, held the gate closed. She pushed forward, grasped it: nothing. The latch refused to open, the gate standing fast, guarding the exit through the crumbling wall. She leaned back, looked upward. Ivy crept over the stones, displacing the mortar in spots. The tree branches beyond, skeletal and bare, whispered and dripped. She pulled at the latch again. Again, nothing.

  From the open door, the faint chimes of the mantle clock came to her. She turned quickly back to the house.

  “IS THIS YOUR plant?” The woman held the pot, with its dead contents, gingerly, eying it with distaste. “No, of course it isn’t.” She frowned, set the pot at the edge of the terrace. “I don’t know how such a thing came to be here.”

  Mary Tennant might have been forty-five, might have been sixty-five. Her face was stern but unlined, her hair gray but held back by an Alice band. She wore a short black coat over a flowered dress, and this coat she deigned to unbutton before she sat on the sofa, her square bag firmly on her lap. She looked uncomfortable sitting, and her eyes darted back and forth, as though listing things she needed to be doing instead of lazing about. Gwynn felt guilty, looking around the room as well, searching out things she might have disturbed since the char’s last going-over.

  Mrs. Tennant had a small notebook out now, and with a blue pen, she tapped a page. “I used to give Mrs. Charlton two hours, three mornings a week.”

  Gwynn nodded. “I’d appreciate your doing the same for me while I’m here.”

  “You’ll be living here?”

  Gwynn looked out the front window at the roofline of the pub across the way. A single seagull stood at attention on the ridgepole. “I don’t know. I’ve just come to see about the place; I don’t have any firm long-term plans as of yet.”

  The pen scratched on the rough paper of the little notebook. Mrs. Tennant wrote, squinted fiercely at what she had written, wrote some more. Wearing reading glasses was apparently something simply not done. “I’ve written you in, then, for eight to ten, Monday, Wednesday, and Friday.” She looked up. “I’ll keep the key, if you don’t mind. Now—what about cooking? Will you need me to do any of that? Mrs. Chelton didn’t require that, though I would have been willing.” For a moment a shadow crossed the stern features, but then was gone. Gwynn wondered if perhaps she had imagined it.

  “I’ll cook for myself, thanks,” Gwynn said. “But perhaps you could tell me where the nearest market is? The one you use yourself. I’ll need to stock up on the staples.”

  Mrs. Tennant nodded. “I’ve got to go myself later this afternoon. Perhaps I could call for you and we could go together.”

  For a moment Gwynn felt as though she were in the presence of a particularly demanding schoolteacher, one who would show her the correct way to do things before allowing her to try on her own.

  “Thank you,” she said meekly. “I would like that.”

  Mrs. Tennant got to her feet, snapping her black bag shut on the little scheduling notebook. “Then I’ll see you this afternoon, about three, after I get done with the Condons’.” Her smile was stiff, as though she didn’t bring it out all that often. “And I’ll see you again tomorrow morning at eight.”

  Gwynn, too, stood, and walked her out to the front door.

  Hand on knob, Mrs. Tennant turned back. “Is there anything else I can help with in the meantime? You have enough lasagna left for lunch, I expect.”

  Probably for the next three lunches. People of Mary Tennant’s acquaintance obviously ate heartily.

 
“I do,” Gwynn said. “Thank you. It’s delicious. But—” She glanced back into the sitting room at the empty basket near the wood stove. “Firewood?”

  “Ah.” The door was open on the gray morning. “Of course. “I’ll make sure you have some by this afternoon as well.” Mrs. Tennant looked up at the sky. “Cold’s drawing on.” She shook her head. “It always does.” Then she was clicking down to the street in her sensible shoes, bearing the dead plant away.

  3

  FIGHTING DOWN A quick stab of anxiety, Gwynn opened the door to a stranger, who had, having knocked, turned away to look down into Eyewell Lane, beyond the pub to the empty call box at the corner.

  “Yes?”

  “Forest? Mrs. Forest?” he asked, turning back slowly. His grey gaze was startling, steady.

  “Yes?” she repeated.

  He jerked a thumb over his shoulder. “Wood.”

  Down in the street, a battered work truck idled, pulled halfway off the road. The bed was laden with firewood, a barrow strapped to the top of the load.

  “That was quick,” she said, surprised. “I just mentioned to Mrs. Tennant about getting some in this morning.” She frowned, her eyes flitting from the truck to the tall man on the stoop. “But somehow I thought—her husband—”

  He shrugged. “Bert’s too old for that sort of thing.” His voice was low, unapologetic, as he delivered this doom upon the absent Mr. Tennant. “Moore. Colin. I used to do wood for Mrs. Chelton.”

  “My great-aunt,” Gwynn said, and then didn’t know why she felt the sudden compulsion to justify her presence in the cottage to this stranger.

  “Your great-aunt,” he repeated, as though fully cognizant of her defensiveness. “You’ll want the shed filled, then? It’s just about empty.”