Читать книгу The Forgotten Cottage - Helen Phifer - Страница 10

Chapter One

She looked out of the bedroom window onto the front garden—a garden full of flowers, some wild and some she had planted herself. The brightly coloured blooms were swaying in the breeze. She heard the men and the dogs before they came into sight; they were a good distance away but they were coming. She took one last look at the garden she had so nurtured and locked it into her mind then she turned and ran. Annie Graham was running for her life. She held onto her left side to ease the stitch which was making it difficult for her to breathe. Running out of the back door of the house and over the dry stone wall, she wasn’t familiar with the woods she was in but she knew that if the dogs and men caught up with her it wouldn’t end very well. The dogs were snarling. She could hear their teeth clashing together; they were getting too close. Panting hard and clutching her side, she continued looking for a tree she could climb or a building she could take cover in. Her bare feet were cut, bleeding, and giving the dogs a trail to follow. It was no good, there was no way she could outrun them. She didn’t even know why she was running; tired and overwhelmed, her body was telling her to give up and wait for them to find her. Whatever it was she had done could be explained; she was a police officer so she couldn’t have done anything too bad. Slowing down to catch her breath, she heard the shouts of her pursuers closing in on her. They were hyped up and chanting the same words over and over:

‘Thou shalt not suffer a witch to live; thou shalt not suffer a witch to live.’

Fear filled her heart; she wasn’t a witch, this was stupid. Why would anyone think that? The voices were close now—too close. They were chanting in a frenzy. Annie looked down, expecting to see her police uniform, but was startled to see a long white cotton gown. She didn’t even own anything that looked like this. An adrenalin kick started her urge for survival and she began to run once more. She heard the sound of the bubbling river which wasn’t too far away; if she could run into that it would clean her feet and throw the dogs off her trail. With the fast-flowing river in sight, she felt hope that this might not end as badly as she’d thought. She pushed herself on, so focused on reaching the icy-cold water that she didn’t see the mossy boulder jutting out of the ground and ran straight into it. Excruciating pain shot through her foot and she lost her balance and began falling towards the water, jerking so hard that she woke from the nightmare and managed to wake Will at the same time.

‘Oh, dear God, it was a dream. It was just a dream.’

A groggy Will reached across and switched the bedside lamp on. He looked at the clock: it was three a.m. ‘Are you okay?’

‘Sorry, I didn’t mean to wake you. Bad dream.’

Will blinked and looked at her. She was covered in a film of sweat and her hair was stuck to her forehead. ‘Want to tell me what it was about?’

She shook her head. ‘No, thanks, I want to forget it.’

He nodded and then pulled her close to him. ‘I’ll protect you from your scary dreams; do you want me to help you go back to sleep, take your mind off them?’

She laughed. ‘Do you have sex on the brain permanently?’

‘Only when I’m with you, but in this case I’ll settle for a cuddle.’

He lay back and Annie lay next to him, his arms around her and her head on his chest. Almost immediately he began to breathe deeply and she lay listening to him, watching his chest rise and fall. She wished she could go back to sleep so easily; this was the second time in as many days that she’d had the same nightmare and had woken up at the exact same time. It left her feeling unsettled that there was something hovering in the distance, a dark shadow in the background which was keeping out of sight, and she had no idea what it was or what it could mean.

Pushing it to the back of her mind, she began to think about the wedding, which was only fourteen weeks away. She lifted her hand to look at the beautiful engagement ring Will had given to her. Who said that dreams didn’t come true? Hers certainly were and her life had never been so perfect. She felt as if she and Will were meant to be together; they were such a good match. Although it had taken some terrible detours to get this far, it had made both of them much stronger and surer about how much they loved each other.

She thought about the vintage wedding dress she had found in the small shop in Kendal last month and how straight away she had been drawn towards it. The high bodice, which had a whalebone corset and was covered in the most delicate lace, was so pretty she couldn’t help but reach out to touch it. The dress had a full-length silk skirt, which was covered in the same delicate lace and the tiniest crystals and pearls were sewn onto it, making it sparkle. Lily had been busy pulling out dresses for her to try on when Annie had turned to the assistant and asked her if she could try this one on.

‘I’m sorry but it’s for display purposes and not actually for sale. It’s very old but we do have some modern takes on it I can show you.’

Lily had turned around and seen the disappointment etched across Annie’s face. ‘Darling, everything has a price. Please let my friend try it on; it won’t hurt and we won’t tell if you don’t.’

The assistant had dithered for a second then nodded and began to remove it from the mannequin. Annie had taken it into the dressing room and let the assistant help her into it. Deep down she knew that this was the one and it was the only one. It was so delicate and stylish, she had to have it; she would be gutted if they wouldn’t sell it to her. It even fitted perfectly, thanks to her pre-wedding nerves and her loss of appetite.

An image of the first woman to wear the dress flashed across her eyes—she looked very similar to Annie but with much fairer skin and strawberry-blonde hair. Annie knew that the woman who had married in this dress had spent the rest of her life with her husband, happy until death separated them, and she took it as a perfect omen for her and Will.

When she opened the curtain and stepped out, Lily had gasped. ‘Oh, Annie, you look amazing, simply beautiful.’

Even the shop assistant had agreed. ‘Let me speak to my boss and see what we can do; it’s as if that dress was made for you.’

Annie looked in the mirror and smiled. It was a lot different to the awful green suit she’d worn when she married her first husband, Mike, when she was just nineteen. She felt like a princess and knew Will would love it. Lily brought over a large diamanté slide, which she tucked to one side of Annie’s hair.

‘I don’t care how much that dress costs, we have to buy it.’

‘Well, if it’s extortionate then I don’t think so; there are lots of others.’

The assistant walked back into the room with a smile on her face. ‘Phew, you caught her on a good day; she said if the dress was the one for you, and I’ve assured her that it is, then you can buy it. The only problem is it’s eight hundred pounds.’

Lily whipped out her credit card, ‘Done and thank you so much for all your help.’

Annie couldn’t stop grinning; even she could afford to buy it. She’d been saving up and had more than enough to pay for the dress if Lily would ever let her. She lay in bed, snuggled next to Will, thinking happy thoughts which pushed the nightmare away, losing herself in a world of weddings until she drifted back to sleep.

When she woke up she’d forgotten all about the nightmare until she tried to stand. Her foot was painful. She looked down at her left foot, which had a couple of scratches and the beginning of a large blue bruise on the side of it. She must have hit it on the bedside table when she’d been thrashing around in her dream last night. She hobbled to the bathroom, where she ran a bath and hoped a soak would take away some of the soreness.

Will had already left for work; he was on an early and she was on a late. Most weeks they were like ships that passed in the night but at the moment it suited both of them. Annie didn’t want Will to get fed up of spending time with her and if she wasn’t around all the time then he couldn’t, although she missed him. She never got bored of being with him, unlike Mike; she used to do anything to escape spending time in his company, never complaining about having to work over her finishing time, and she hoped she would never feel that way about going home to Will. She got out of the bath and went downstairs.

The phone was ringing and she picked it up to hear a breathless Lily. ‘Oh Annie, it’s Tom…he’s collapsed. We’re on our way to the hospital. He’s unconscious.’ She let out a sob.

‘Where are they taking him, Lily? Which hospital? We’ll be there soon. He’ll be okay, he’s in the best hands.’

‘Westmorland General.’

‘We’re on our way, Lily; I promise we won’t be long.’

Annie hung up and rang Will, who answered on the first ring. ‘Will, your dad’s collapsed; he’s on his way to Westmorland General in an ambulance with Lily.’

‘How serious is it, Annie—did Lily say?’

‘She doesn’t know; I said we’d be there soon.’

‘I’ll be there in a minute.’

‘I’ll be ready; drive carefully, Will.’

She got dressed, grabbed her phone and some money then waited on the front doorstep for Will. His BMW turned into the street and she ran down the steps and climbed inside. Will’s normally tanned face looked pale.

‘Has she rung back?’

Annie shook her head. ‘No, but it will take a while for them to get there. If you put your foot down we’ll not be that far behind them. He’ll be okay, Will; he’s like you, made of tough stuff.’

‘I hope so, Annie. I’d hate anything to happen to him now, especially before the wedding.’

Annie blinked back tears. She adored Tom and didn’t know what she would do if the unthinkable happened.

They drove in silence, Will with his foot to the pedal. The roads weren’t busy and they made it to the hospital in good time. They went to the Accident and Emergency Department, where Lily was standing in the corner, her face pale and her arms wrapped around herself. Will ran over to her and hugged her; she hugged him back. Eventually they separated and Lily threw her arms around Annie.

‘Thank you for coming so quickly… I don’t know what to do. One minute he was fine, the next he collapsed on the kitchen floor. I heard a loud crash and thought he’d dropped a plate. I got such a shock to see him lying there.’

‘Has anyone spoken to you yet? Did the paramedics have any idea what it was?’

‘They said it could have been a stroke or a heart attack… The doctor said he’d come out as soon as possible.’

Lily burst into tears and Will stepped forward to hug her again. Annie looked at him and once more thanked her lucky stars that she had him, then she turned to go and see if she could find someone to speak to and find out what was happening.

1^st July 1782

Betsy Baker listened to her mother groaning from her small bed behind the curtain in the front room and smiled. She did nothing but complain about the weather, the neighbours, what was for tea, what Betsy was doing and on and on. Since she could remember, her mother had liked to use her fists on her; any excuse would result in a clip around the ear. If she didn’t do her chores or was late to come in when she had been playing out, her punishment would be a sly punch in the ribs. Her mother had always been a drinker and how hard she would hit depended on how drunk she was.

Now that Betsy was much older and dared to hit her back, the punches were few and far between; instead, her mother preferred to use her vicious tongue to lash out at her, but Betsy was almost twenty-one and old enough to leave. If only she had somewhere to go, but her mother kept her there, always playing on her poor health. Betsy wanted a life of her own and a man, she wanted to live somewhere that wasn’t damp and dingy or smelt of stale ale. She wanted to be free to do whatever she pleased with whoever she wanted. Her father had died when she was only five; she missed him, he would sing to her and tell her stories and she knew that he had loved her a lot more than her mother ever had.

Now, thanks to Betsy, her mother really did have poor health. Several nights ago Betsy had heard talk in the village of a powder called arsenic that could be bought from the chemist. Joss Brown, who lived at the farm not too far away, had been telling the rest of the men in the pub that he had bought some to kill off the rats that were overrunning his hay barns. Betsy worked behind the bar of The Queen’s Head, where the men would gather each evening. Her mother hated her working in a pub but it gave Betsy a chance to get out of the cramped, cold cottage. She had been flirting with Joss for weeks now. She was always quiet around the other men but she liked Joss, or she should say that she liked the big cottage that he lived in with his two sons. It was part of the farm that his mother and father owned. Joss was a widower; his wife had died last year and he had kept to himself ever since, but three times a week he would come into the pub for some ale and conversation. Betsy would do anything to escape from her mother and although she disliked children and did not want to have any herself, she would be able to put up with the horrible things until something or someone better came along.

This morning she had gone to the chemist and asked for some arsenic powder to kill the rats which had suddenly appeared in their house. The chemist had handed some over to her and told her to be very careful with it and she was. She had taken it straight home and put it into an old tin at the back of the larder, after first sprinkling some into her mother’s broth. She thought that life would be much easier without her. Not half an hour later her mother had begun to complain of terrible stomach pain and feeling ill. She had taken to her bed and lay there all afternoon, moaning and groaning. Betsy had taken her a cup of tea with even more of the powder in and then left to go to the pub. Her mother had begged her to call the doctor and she had said she would go and fetch him, but she had no intention of doing that. She wanted to leave her to it while she went to work, hoping that by the time she came home the woman would be dead and then she would call the doctor.

As Betsy was walking through the front door of the pub she walked into Joss, who was on his way out.

‘Sorry, Joss, I’m running late. I never saw you there. Are you leaving so soon? It’s only early.’

‘Good evening, Betsy. It’s been a grand day, hasn’t it?’

Betsy nodded in agreement; if her mother was dead when she went home it would indeed be a grand day.

‘Yes, Joss, it has been a wonderful day. Why don’t you come back inside for one more drink—I like to see you and who will I speak to all night if you go home now?’

She could see the redness creeping up his cheeks and he was looking at her as if he was seeing her clearly for the first time. He noticed her long black hair, ice-blue eyes and her ample bosom.

‘I want to come back in, I really do, but my father isn’t well and I said I would milk the cows and take my boys back home. They’re up at the farm with my mother.’

Betsy reached out and let her fingers brush along his bare arm. ‘I am sorry to hear that, Joss. I hope he is better by the morning and then you can come back and talk to me tomorrow night. That is, if you would want to?’

Joss shivered at her touch and she smiled.

‘I’ll be here waiting for you. Do not forget that, Joss Brown.’

She turned away from him and entered the pub but she felt his eyes behind her. He was standing watching her until she let the heavy wooden door shut and he could no longer see her. Betsy was having a grand old day. If everything went to plan, Joss would call round to offer his assistance, she could cry and tell him she couldn’t bear to live in her cold, damp house, which still smelt of death. She hoped he would offer her a room at his cottage in exchange for some cooking and cleaning. Then she would work on him until he was besotted with her and ask for her hand in marriage.

The pub was busy and Betsy worked hard all evening. Old Jack Thomas would not leave her alone. For an old man he was like an octopus and whenever she passed him he would grab a handful of her behind. She’d laughed at him and slapped his arm away, telling him to behave himself or she would have him thrown from the pub. The other men had laughed. The talk in there had been good-humoured, the warmth from the sun today having a good effect on everyone’s mood.

When it was time to go home she felt her stomach begin to churn. She hadn’t seen a dead person before and hoped her mother didn’t look like something from a nightmare. She put her cloak over her shoulders and declined an offer from one of the younger men in the pub to walk her home. She didn’t want any gossip to get back to Joss and this was such a small village it would; there was no doubt of that. Her house was not a two-minute walk from the pub and she was home in no time, even though she had trailed her feet, uneasy about what she was about to find. She stood outside for a minute, trying to calm her shaking hands, then Betsy pushed the front door open and stepped inside, listening for any sound. It was so quiet; she couldn’t remember the last time she had heard such peace in this house.

‘Mother, I’m home now. How are you feeling—do you still want me to fetch the doctor?’ There were no candles burning as there would be every other night. The house was filled with darkness. Betsy’s heart was beating fast with fear and excitement at what she might find behind the tatty, moth-eaten curtain that separated the living room from her mother’s bedroom. She felt her way into the small kitchen, along the shelf above the stove for a candle and matches; she struck a match and the orange flame lit up the room briefly. She held the flame to the wick before it went out; it soon caught and the candle began to burn.

Not realising how much her hand was shaking until she lifted the candlestick up, she looked in the direction of the curtain; her feet did not want to move but she forced them to take a step forward one at a time until her outstretched hand was touching the coarse material.

She drew it back and screamed; not for one minute had she expected her mother to look as she did. Her face was frozen in an expression of contorted agony. Her head was turned towards the curtain, her eyes were wide open, staring at Betsy, accusing her of murder, and there was blood around her mouth—so much blood. Betsy had no idea what she had expected to see but it had not been this and she carried on screaming until the neighbours came running to see what was the matter. She was led away by Mrs Whitman from next door, who had taken one look at her mother’s body and gasped, crossing herself.

‘Come, child—there is nothing you can do for her now.’

Betsy let her lead her by the hand to her house next door; this one was full of light and did not smell like her house had. A bleary-eyed teenage boy came down the stairs and Mrs Whitman ordered him to run and fetch Dr Johnson.