The distant church clock was chiming the half hour, and Michael saw that the shadows were already starting to crawl out from the corners. He was meeting Nell at the Bell around six, so he might as well pack his things now.
He tidied away the papers he had been working on – the newspaper cuttings of the concerts, and some correspondence between Luisa and the present incumbents of the revived Liège convent, which was not yielding very much – and made a quick check of the rest of the house. The rooms were orderly and neat; there was a large drawing-room at the front of the house, which Michael had not yet seen, and which looked as if it was hardly ever used. It contained large old-fashioned furniture, and several paintings hung on the walls, dim with age. Michael paused to study them. Stephen, are you in any of these? But the paintings were all rather turgid landscapes, except for one lady in elaborate Victorian dress, and two small oval-framed images of rosy-cheeked, ringletted little girls. It did not look as if there were any papers or anything private in here, so Michael, finding it rather a sad room, closed the door.
In the kitchen he was relieved to find a set of house keys. Taking them from their hook, he went diligently round the house, locking everything that could be locked, bolting the garden door and a little door off the scullery, and making sure all the windows were closed and the lights switched off. He would leave the various files and papers until the solicitor gave permission for him to take them, but rather guiltily he dropped Luisa’s journal into his case. Then he set off for the Bell. He was relieved to find, when he reached the end of the drive, that the tree had been cleared. The road was still in a bit of a mess, with large branches and debris everywhere, but it was easy to negotiate this, and Michael would not have cared if he had to drive through the ditches and dykes if it meant getting away from Fosse House.
The Bell, when he reached it, was warm and friendly, and the room he had originally booked was still available – it was chintzy without being twee and oak-beamed without being self-conscious. Michael thought Nell would like it, and he thought she would like the Bell. Their tastes coincided on most things.
He unpacked his few things, then went downstairs to wait for Nell’s arrival. It was just on five, which was much too early for her to get here, but he would prefer to be in the normality of the Bell’s bar for the next couple of hours. He bought a drink at the bar and carried it to a quiet corner table. He had brought Luisa’s journal downstairs with him, and there were only a handful of people in the bar, so he could finish reading it without interruption.
A faint, appetizing scent of cooking came from the direction of the kitchens, and Michael remembered he had not eaten a conventional meal for what seemed a very long time. Providing Nell’s train was on time they could enjoy an early dinner together. And an early night afterwards? He remembered the deep, wide bed upstairs and smiled slightly. But in the meantime, there was Luisa.
He found the page he had reached last night, which was Luisa’s description of finding Hugbert’s second letter, describing how he and the others failed to get into the house because they had seen someone they thought was Iskander at the window. Michael began to read. Luisa had written:
It’s late at night. I’m in my bedroom, seated at my writing desk, and I know I have to set down what happened the night my father invited Stephen in.
Leonora says I should do so. ‘Write it all down, Luisa,’ she says. I can hear her voice as clearly as if she’s in the room with me. ‘Your diary is the place where you should always tell the truth, and confession is good for the soul …’
That’s her convent training, of course. But will I feel better for having written it down? And what if someone finds it?
‘Then keep it a secret – keep it so well hidden no one will ever read it … Unless one day you decide the truth should be known … Because one day you might meet someone you feel you can trust with it …’
I don’t believe this particular truth will ever need to be known, or that there will ever be anyone I will be able to trust that much.
But there was someone, thought Michael, coming out of Luisa’s world for a moment. She met me and for some wildly incredible reason she thought she could trust me. It might only have been because she was dying – she might have trusted anyone in that situation. But he still found it moving that she had trusted him.
I’m terrified that this might be another of Leonora’s tricks to take over my mind. Is that what she wants to do? Did she live in this house once? With Stephen? That thought makes me rather jealous, but I believe Leonora is a friend rather than an enemy, so I’m going to do what she says. It will be difficult, but I’ll follow the advice from Alice in Wonderland: ‘Begin at the beginning, go on until you reach the end, then stop.’ I know when the beginning is. It’s three nights ago when I let Stephen into the house.
‘He’s here,’ my father had said, pointing to the faint footprints across the floor, and I had felt such a mixture of fear and excitement that I had not been able to speak.