Verity offered him plenty of reasons to stay, filling the hole created by the empty bedrooms with dinner parties and day trips, holidays in Europe alongside involving him in her new projects on the estate. Yet every time, after maybe a couple of months, perhaps a year, she would detect the drawing away, the emotional distance that inevitably became geographical, too. Ten years into their marriage, she threw herself against the front door, blocking him from leaving for yet more ‘business’ in Antwerp. He responded by grabbing her upper arms so tightly, he left bruises, thrusting his face up against hers as he cried that he couldn’t bear to remain another night in this cursed house of shattered dreams.
Verity decided then and there that she’d had enough. Better to offer both of them the chance for happiness, for children, with someone else than continue this poisonous cycle of love and despair. They were still young; it wasn’t too late. Only, when Leonard returned, for the first time, he professed an interest in the land he’d declared doomed to another generation of misery. He spent hours learning how the estate ran, what was profitable, and when. With this new, shared interest came renewed energy and enthusiasm that crossed over into every part of their marriage. More than one person commented on how Verity’s eyes shone, and cheeks bloomed, with a not-so-discreet glance at her waistline.
The glow was soon extinguished when her husband sold two good fields to a neighbouring farmer.
Eight years later, and every acre of farmland was gone, along with the livestock and equipment. Anything beyond the main grounds, lost to pay off unknown debts and cover up countless lies. On her fortieth birthday, Verity celebrated her miserable life by getting drunk enough to allow her wastrel husband into her bed for one last time before she packed his bags and banished him forever.
Then, a month or so later, the whiff of eggs at breakfast caused her to throw up for the third day on the trot. After Leonard had sold, stolen or sabotaged almost everything that mattered to her, Verity was finally able to give him the only thing he’d ever truly wanted.
* * *
‘She was pregnant with you?’ I asked, having sorted through most of the trunk while Hattie told her mother’s story.
‘She was. I was born 1 May 1967. But you don’t have the time, and I definitely don’t have the energy, to get into that today. Come on, we can squeeze in a strong coffee before I head to the studio.’
I repacked the trunk ready for cataloguing another day and followed Hattie down to the kitchen. It was on the lower staircase that she stumbled, slipping a good few steps before grabbing onto the broad banister and jerking to a stop.
At least, I thought she must have stumbled. From my angle, a few steps above her, it appeared more as if shecrumpled. There was nothing on the stairs to trip over, not even a runner with a potential wrinkle for her white pumps to catch on.
‘Are you okay?’ I asked, hurrying to put an arm around her shoulders.
Hattie’s eyes were closed, her face grey. ‘Whew. I knew this project would be taxing, but, after all these years as a therapist, I had no idea how quite how exhausting digging into the past could be.’
‘Maybe that’s why people like to art it out instead, because talking can be so hard.’
‘A very good point!’ She offered a weak smile. ‘I’m tempted to add a dash of something stronger to my coffee, but I need my wits about me with those Gals.’
Reassuring me that she was startled, but not injured, Hattie gingerly continued down the remaining stairs and into the kitchen. I followed behind, adopting my professional attitude of calm as Lizzie made us both a drink and sliced up a fudge cake, reeling off some new sales figures, but I was now certain. A wan complexion, irregular naps, frequently distracted, and now an unexplained stumble… add that to suddenly needing to sort out three generations of possessions. Let alone the insistence on confidentiality.
I wondered how long it would be before Hattie told me she was seriously ill.
13
I’d made the conscious decision to arrive at the studio five minutes late, avoiding any chance of interrupting the Changelings, but Hattie thwarted my plan by relocating their session to outdoors.
I was taking Muffin on a quick walk through the woods, hoping to settle my pre-therapy nerves, when with unfortunate timing, I strolled into a clearing at the same moment a figure all in black charged towards me through the darkness, releasing a teeth-rattling scream while brandishing an axe above their head.
I dodged to one side at the same instant they also veered to avoid me, so for a dangerous few seconds, it looked as though something terrible would happen. Mercifully, we both skidded to a stop a metre or so before a collision could occur.
‘It’s you!’ The figure flicked their hood off, revealing the woman I’d last seen dressed as a crow. ‘Are you spying on us again?’
‘Who’s spying?’
When I turned in the direction of this other voice, the dim light from the house enabled me to detect who I assumed to be the rest of the Changelings, clustered beneath the trees.
‘I’m walking my dog,’ I stammered, scanning around for Muffin, who’d inconveniently disappeared.
‘A likely story!’ one of them scoffed, folding her arms. ‘She’s hoping for another peep at our fabulous, fifty-something figures!’
‘If you wanted a look, darling, you only had to ask.’ Another one laughed.
‘Um, speak for yourself, Marg; my physique is for my husband’s eyes only! Well, apart from you lot last week, of course, but after everything we’ve shared, you don’t count.’
‘Please, ladies, Sophie lives here!’ Hattie interrupted, stepping out from the shadow of a bush. ‘She had no idea you wouldn’t be in the studio today. No one did, because I keep the details of our sessions confidential, as you know full well.’
‘She’s right.’ I started to back away, eyes still on the crow’s axe, which she now held over one shoulder. ‘I have no clue what’s going on here, and I really don’t want to.’
‘We’re expressing our unhelpful hormones via woodcarving,’ the woman who’d been covered in caterpillars and butterflies last time said. ‘Jen has rather strong feelings about hers.’
