‘Thank you!’ I bustle out of the door before she can think again . . . about how if we were friends I’d know where he lives, or I’d have his number.
What sort of a house does a boy like that live in? I picture a great Gothic mansion, all spires and chimneys and leering gargoyles, and a gaunt old butler opening a creaking door. And it gives me a little thrill inside, even just the imagining of it. The reality’s probably going to be a bit of a let-down, I tell myself, as I head up the hill. It’s probably going to be a safe little semi with net curtains. My breath steams in the winter air, and the pavement glitters with frost, and I’m kind of laughing at myself now, because what the heck am I doing, trudging up this hill with all this stuff, to find a boy who wants to hide? It’s not the best idea I’ve ever had, but I keep going anyway, and then I get to the top of the hill and look up and there it is, Meridown House spelled out in great curved iron letters over a vast gate and wow.
Just wow.
It’s the yellow house. The one on the hill. The one that screams Gothic trapped beneath a layer of sunshine paint. And here I am at the gate, with the coat and the basket, and puffing a bit, because it’s a steep hill. Clouds are gathering over the jagged skyline of a hundred chimneys, and a shiver runs down my back, so I take a deep breath and turn my back on it for a minute. The lines of the town spread out beneath me, from the church along the river to the farms in the distance, houses to either side in neat little rows, all of it directly overlooked by the house. It’s an amazing view, with the low winter sun making all the shadows stretch.
I look back at the house. It’s incredible. Like something from a film, and I’m right here. Only thing is I haven’t quite tried to get in yet. I mean, there’s this huge gate, and I don’t know if I should just go in, or if I should ring the brass bell at the side. I’m not sure I want to ring the bell; it seems a bit like overkill. Like I might ring in the end of the world, or something. But I’ve now been here for about ten minutes and I’m starting to feel a bit stupid, and cold. And I have this old coat, not to mention the basket.
I look up through the gate and count the windows again. Ten full-length ones along the bottom, divided by the porch. Ten windows above, each the size of a normal house. Or you know, about that. And then the gable windows in the roof. And the chimneys, and the towers. And a couple of gargoyles thrown in. Leering figures carved in stone, climbing up the towers, perching on the roof tiles.
Something moves in one of the upstairs windows. I shiver and move away to the bank of grass that you could imagine goats grazing on. After a couple of minutes arguing with myself, I spread out the coat and sit on it, and open the basket, take out the roll. Ham. Quite good ham, actually. Not your wafer stuff. I sit back, munching and watching all the little people and the little cars going about their business, from my quiet spot up high on the hill. And then I eat the apple, assuming it’s not a fairy-tale one and about to send me to sleep for a hundred years. Not that I’d mind that. But anyway, it’s good. It’s peaceful. And in a minute I’ll ring the bell.
I am not eating that cake. Looks like raw liver.
I’m in the bed, with the curtains drawn around it. Feels like a boat out at sea, but at least I’m not drowning in the boat any more. It’s about the right size for me, I can see that now.
‘This house is your house,’ Uncle Sal’s soft voice, a year ago, just after my parents went. His glasses obscured his eyes. ‘We are its caretakers for the moment, and you are its master.’
‘I’m twelve.’
‘The house doesn’t care about that, Bavar.’ The smell of the leather chairs in the study, the shaft of sunlight through the stained glass, bleeding on to the carpet. The heat, and the sick feeling in my stomach. They’d really gone. After everything that happened, they’d just turned their backs on it all, left me here with an aunt I barely knew, and this funny little man who smelt of old books. ‘It was always your destiny to be its master. One day, you will come into your own.’
‘And now?’
‘Now things will be quiet, for a time.’
‘Now that they’re gone.’
I needed to say it out loud. It didn’t feel real. But Uncle Sal didn’t contradict me. So. It was real.
‘Do you miss them, Bavar?’
‘No.’
Uncle Sal sighed. ‘It’s been difficult, I know. But we will be all right, Bavar. You and me, and your Aunt Aoife. We’ll get on; it’ll work out.’
Was it a statement, or was he seeking reassurance? I didn’t know then. I don’t know now. All I knew was that there was an expectation, somewhere. When it was time – when I was ready – he would listen to me. He would do as I bid. So would Aoife. So would the house.
I am Bavar, master-in-waiting. And I think the time is coming, whether I’m ready or not.
‘Bavar!’
Aoife twitches the dark curtains aside, her narrow face suddenly appearing between embroidered vines and birds. ‘Your catalyst! My, but she’s a live one!’ she crows, flapping at me and rushing across the room, going from window to window.
I put my book down.
‘My what?’
‘Catalyst! The girl! Come, see! She was at the gate, but she went – I thought she’d gone, but she’s just sitting on the hill. She has your basket, Bavar! She’s come to see you!’
I join Aoife at the window, and there she is. Sitting out there, just outside the wall, sitting on my coat, eating my lunch.
How did this happen? What’s she doing? My coat stretches like a blanket around her; she’s very small. Her pale hair shines in the sunlight. She puts her hand into the basket, starts to eat the apple.
Who does that?
I turn from the window, fed up with the whole day and planning on getting back into the bed, and then Uncle Sal comes out of his study, a frown on his round face.
‘Off you go, Bavar,’ he says.
‘Pardon?’
‘Stop hiding in the house and go and get your coat back, and that ridiculous basket.’
‘I’m not going out there!’
‘You are,’ he says, his eyes flashing behind his glasses. He’s a small man, but in this instant there’s a new steel in him, something I’ve never seen before. ‘You absolutely are. I am not going to sit by and watch you hide from everything for one minute longer. Besides, your aunt is disturbing my work with all this fluttering about.’
Aoife stiffens by my side and mutters something about ‘work’, and Sal rolls his eyes, and they don’t often argue, but when they do the whole house joins in, ancestors howling from the portraits, lights flickering, windows rattling. So I make for the stairs, watched by the pale faces of those who came before me. And heckled by a couple of the more cranky ones.
‘What are you doing?’
I jump up, the hairs on my arms bristling. I don’t know how the heck someone so big can creep up on a person so effectively. He looks proper grumpy too, all looming and scowling and hiding behind his hair.
‘Came to bring your coat and your basket.’
‘And eat my lunch . . .’
He noticed. I smile. Just on the inside.