A House of Ghosts Read online

  ‘And yet you have had, I believe, direct experience of such false projections?’

  Kate considered the possible sources. It was most likely that C, or one of his people, had spoken to the headmistress of a certain girls’ boarding school on the East Sussex coast at which she’d had the misfortune to be educated. If so, the matter could probably be finessed. If the information came from the Highmounts, however, or a source close to them, things would be more difficult.

  ‘My direct experience, if I may borrow your words, would be the basis on which that belief is built. However, I have not reached a definite conclusion. There are some matters to which I have not yet achieved a satisfactory explanation.’

  ‘Very good, Miss Cartwright.’ C nodded his approval. ‘In which case, in the spirit of scientific enquiry, I think you should accept the invitation to the Highmounts’ house party. You may find additional evidence to underpin your conjecture. I understand the house has a certain reputation.’

  A reputation Kate knew to be richly deserved.

  ‘But I have already refused.’

  C waved her objection away. ‘The invitation will be extended once again. Your fiancé, young Miller-White – a staff officer over at the War Office, isn’t he?’

  She would be very surprised if C did not know the very room in which Rolleston Miller-White worked, not to mention his inner leg measurement. He appeared to know everything else. But there was one thing he did not know.

  ‘In the Ordnance Department, which is where we met. Captain Miller-White is, however, no longer my fiancé.’

  C looked surprised. ‘Really?’

  ‘It is a recent development.’

  ‘So not common knowledge then?’

  ‘No.’

  ‘Well, in which case I think we shall consider the engagement back on. He’ll accompany you.’

  Again, the arched eyebrow. Again, the expectation that she would do as he requested.

  She knew the Highmounts well, which C must be aware of. He must be aware, too, why it would be painful for her to attend this weekend.

  And then there was the house itself.

  Still, C must have a reason and so she must go.

  ‘It will be awkward. You must know that I was engaged, previously, to Reginald Highmount?’

  ‘I was aware of that. I am sure the island will hold certain associations for you and so on. I must ask you to overcome your reluctance. We must presume, if you were invited, that the Highmounts wish to see you. And, more to the point, I also wish you to be there. And for good reason.’

  She decided to make one last effort.

  ‘Aside from the Highmounts’ feelings, and my own feelings, my parents do not approve of Captain Miller-White.’

  C had picked up the photographed plans from the desk and was examining them.

  ‘Very sensible of them,’ he said, without looking up.

  Rolleston was not to everyone’s taste, of course. Nor, indeed, hers, as it had turned out.

  ‘What I meant to say is that if he comes with me there will probably be an awful row. Therefore, may I ask if there is a particular reason you wish me to accept the Highmounts’ invitation? And, if so, if it is essential that Captain Miller-White accompany me?’

  C’s eyes rose to meet her own. He blinked, then leant forward to hand her the photographs of the top-secret plans she had seen earlier.

  ‘Think back to your time with the Ordnance Department and tell me what you make of these.’

  She examined the first three photographs, noting that the original plans had been marked with the circular stamp of Highmount Industries.

  ‘They appear to be plans for an aerial torpedo.’

  C seemed impressed. ‘I wasn’t aware you were familiar with aerial torpedoes.’

  Impressing C pleased her more than she would have thought. But still.

  ‘I’m afraid I’m not. The legend refers to the LB4 Aerial Torpedo Mark 3.’

  C chuckled. ‘Very observant, Miss Cartwright. You’ll notice each plan is also categorised Top Secret but, as these plans were photographed by one of our agents in the Berlin headquarters of the Imperial German Flying Corps, it seems to be not as top secret as we might have hoped.’

  ‘I see,’ Kate said, presuming there must be some connection between the Germans’ possession of the plans and the need for her to go to Blackwater Abbey.

  ‘The guest list for the weekend is interesting. Have you come across Madame Feda or Count Orlov, by any chance? Those are their stage names. Both mediums, apparently, both closely associated with the Highmounts and both with rather indistinct backgrounds. And then there is Elizabeth Highmount, née von Griesinger, who is, shall we say, of more distinct extraction.’

  That Elizabeth Highmount was Austrian was not a surprise to Kate.

  ‘Sir, what is it you want from me?’ she said.

  ‘You have been vetted, are reliable and intelligent – or so Ewing tells me – and have specific knowledge of recent weapon development. We have reason to believe that whoever passed the plans on will be attending this spiritualist event. The situation is under control, but when your invitation came to light, it seemed a happy coincidence. One that I felt we should take advantage of.’

  ‘And why is Captain Miller-White required?’

  ‘Captain Miller-White is an asset to any gathering, I’m told,’ C said with a blank smile. ‘But his new manservant, on the other hand, is another thing again.’

  3. DONOVAN

  When she left, C sat down at his desk, bending the knee of his wooden leg so that his shoe rested on the floor. The shoe annoyed him. It was an expensive affectation, designed to spare other people’s feelings. Personally, he didn’t care if other people were upset that he’d lost his leg. He was more upset than they would ever be. And if he were to have an unadorned metal foot, surely that would reduce his shoe bills by a substantial amount.

  He rang the bell on his desk and his secretary came in.

  ‘Send him in, will you, Miss Wilkins.’

  C checked his watch. It was nearly four, which would do. He shouted after her to bring the drinks tray as well.

  He allowed his eyes to wander across the papers on his desk and sighed. If he had his way, he’d deal with the situation differently – more directly. He couldn’t help but think that Highmount was very far out of his depth with this business, but Highmount was a personal friend of the Prime Minister. And C was not.

  He glanced up to find Donovan standing in front of his desk and wondered how he had managed to enter without him hearing.

  ‘Take a seat. Miss Wilkins is bringing alcoholic sustenance. You’ll have a glass?’

  ‘Thank you.’

  C grunted. It would be preferable if Donovan showed some deference, but then again, if he were a man to show deference he would probably be less useful.

  ‘Cigarette?’ C slid the gold-banded box across the table.

  ‘I’ll smoke my own, if that’s all right. I prefer the French ones when I have them. Bit more body to them.’

  ‘Indeed. Tell me about Paris.’

  It was a sordid tale. A staff officer had become besotted with a Polish cabaret dancer at some burlesque theatre and been persuaded to pass on all manner of information.

  ‘It’s dealt with.’

  ‘Anything I need to know?’

  ‘I don’t think so. A tragic accident. A lesson in the dangers of faulty electrical wiring when water is present.’

  Wilkins came in with a silver tray on which sat two cut-glass tumblers, a decanter of whiskey and a jug of water. Not that C intended to add any of the latter. He didn’t believe in watering things down. And anyway, his missing leg was hurting him. Donovan poured some water into his, which interested C.

  ‘A shame, but just as well,’ C said, when Wilkins closed the door behind her. ‘Better for the family this way.’

  Although, as it happened, that was completely the opposite of what C really thought. The problem with corruption among the E
nglish upper classes wasn’t that it existed but that it wasn’t dealt with firmly and publicly. If he’d had his choice, he’d have hanged the culprit from the walls of the Tower of London. As an example.

  They sat contemplating each other.

  ‘It’s time we had a discussion,’ C said.

  Donovan nodded slowly.

  ‘Your secondment is coming to an end.’

  Donovan smiled but still said nothing.

  ‘Of course, we could send you back to the army.’

  ‘I’d rather you didn’t.’

  ‘And why is that?’

  ‘There are no odds in the trenches. You can be a thoroughbred or a pit pony – a high explosive shell will kill you just the same. I prefer the mathematics in this line of work.’

  ‘There’s always Ireland, of course.’

  Donovan’s smile was the merest glimmer. ‘Very difficult to tell which side I’d be on in Ireland. Me being Irish and all that. I’m better with the English and the Germans. I know where I stand with them.’

  There was an ambiguity in that statement that made C, not for the first time, pause for thought.

  ‘Anyway, I suspect you have something else in mind for me.’

  ‘And how do you deduce that?’

  ‘The girl in the waiting room.’

  ‘Did you speak with her?’

  ‘A word or two. I presumed that was the point.’

  C nodded approvingly. ‘Well then, what did you think?’

  Donovan’s mouth moved from side to side, as he considered.

  ‘One of yours, is she?’ he finally said.

  ‘Not exactly. Naval Intelligence. A codebreaker – although they and she pretend Miss Cartwright is only a secretary. I’m told she’s made two or three significant, if small, breakthroughs on the Germans’ new naval code. So she’s bright.’

  ‘I could tell that much.’

  Donovan wasn’t giving much away, but then that was to be expected.

  ‘Could you work with her, if needs be?’

  Donovan examined the lit end of his cigarette in the gloom of the office and nodded. ‘I think so. Strange thing, though. I knew her brother. Briefly. Before he got killed.’

  Which did not come as a surprise to C, who had considered the usefulness of this connection earlier that day. He’d known that Donovan would read more into it than there was.

  ‘Yes, I know. Might that be a problem, do you think?’

  ‘No,’ Donovan said. ‘On the contrary.’

  ‘Good. The thing is, she has some technical knowledge, which may be useful for this task I have in mind for you. In addition, it happens that her former fiancé – although he’s been temporarily reinstated for our purposes – is also involved in the matter, at least peripherally. You may recall a fellow officer by the name of Miller-White.’

  Donovan’s jaw might have clenched slightly, perhaps. But otherwise there was no evidence of animosity. C was impressed.

  ‘I recall Captain Miller-White,’ Donovan said, in a tone so neutral as to be anything but. ‘Although what a woman like Miss Cartwright is doing with a fellow like that, I have no idea.’

  ‘He is charming, handsome, ostensibly wealthy, alive and in London. Each of which is a considerable advantage after three years of war. And he was in the same regiment as her brother, which may have coloured her view of him.’

  ‘He’s also a scoundrel.’

  C chuckled. ‘That is certainly true. And possibly more of a scoundrel than even you might suspect. In any event, there is a little operation that we have running at present that may have some implications for a certain country house weekend to which Miss Cartwright and Captain Miller-White have been invited. And while Miller-White’s presence is desirable for one reason or another, strange as it may seem, the reason I’d like Miss Cartwright to be present is something else completely.’

  Donovan frowned.

  ‘I suppose I should start at the beginning,’ C said, reluctantly. ‘There are some other people you know involved as well. Most of them, like young Cartwright, dead. Which accounts for the weekend that Lord Highmount is arranging.

  And the presence of Madame Feda, a medium who I believe you came across recently in Paris?’

  Donovan nodded.

  ‘An associate of Major D’Aubigny, but then lots of people were. She had no involvement in his treachery, as far as we could establish.’

  ‘And yet here she turns up again. In any event, her presence and that of another medium by the name of Count Orlov mean that Miss Cartwright may be a very useful asset.’

  When he finished explaining the situation and Miss Cartwright’s unusual attributes, C was delighted to observe that, for once, Donovan appeared entirely dumbfounded.

  4. KATE

  The flat was on the second floor of a new mansion block, close to Sloane Square. It was of relatively modern design – possessing electric lights, hot water and heating from a shared boiler. Before the war, it had been the family’s London home and a busy, welcoming place. Now it was empty, more or less, except for Kate. It was the more or less which caused her to hesitate.

  She didn’t turn the light on at first. There had been a blackout in effect for some time but now, after the recent air raids, people took it seriously. She moved from room to room, closing the heavy curtains. When she had finished, the darkness was utter, and the air had a stillness that seemed to have its own weight.

  It was to be expected, she supposed – the sense that the place was empty in some way. She never entertained and her parents seldom came up to town these days, preferring to stay in Cambridge where her father still lectured – and where bombs had yet to fall. Jenny, the maid, had taken a job in an armaments factory in Woolwich and had been impossible to replace. Which meant that Kate was alone in the flat for weeks at a time.

  Except for the presence of her brother.

  She stood, listening to the sounds of the building and the city outside, and thinking about happier times. When she turned the light on, eventually, the place seemed unnaturally bright. And full, as always, of Arthur. A coat belonging to him still hung in the hallway and an umbrella with his initials still waited for him in the stand. His bedroom was as he had left it in April of the previous year, the last time he’d been home on leave. But those were only the physical objects; there were less substantial manifestations of his presence as well. His laughter still circled the piano, for example – entwined with a memory of him playing a song from the music halls. And his cigarette smoke still lingered in the dining room, detectable to no one but her. But he was only present in memories. The one spirit she wanted to see had yet to make his way to her. Not even through the mirror.

  The FitzAubrey glass. The mirror had been in her mother’s family, the FitzAubreys, for hundreds of years and only gave up its secrets to the women of the family – although not her mother. It stood at the end of the corridor, hidden behind a black silk curtain, one that she, the last remaining descendant of the FitzAubrey family with the ability to see its secrets, was reluctant to open.

  She went about things as she usually did, taking off her hat and gloves, carefully hanging her overcoat. She moved to the kitchen and put a pot on the stove to boil, then filled a bag to take to the laundry in the morning. Later she knew she would have to pack for Blackwater Abbey – and not only clothes. Her mother wanted her to bring the glass, of all things.

  The mirror was the source of all this, she supposed. Of her ability to see what should not be seen. Of her relationship with Reginald Highmount too – he had been fascinated by the possibility that he might be able to scientifically prove the existence of the afterlife. At first, she had been amused by his attempts to photograph the spirits, not least because, well, he could not see them and she could. She was never quite certain whether his interest was what had drawn her to him, or whether he had sensed her ability before it became very publicly apparent to him, and his family, over the course of a long, embarrassing weekend at Blackwater Abbey. It had cha
nged their relationship irretrievably. And not for the better. Perhaps Reginald had felt she had not trusted him. But she had.

  She ate a simple supper, in the company of a book propped up against her briefcase, wondering if she should look into the mirror before she departed for Devon. It was unreliable and required interpretation, but sometimes the mirror was surprisingly accurate. And that made it hard to resist.

  When she was ready, she walked slowly along the corridor to the black silk curtain, pulled it back and, while she was removing it from the wall, looked into the fogged depths of the FitzAubrey glass, the mirror that could tell the future and the past. Or a version of them, anyway.

  She looked for her lost brother, but once again, she did not find him.

  And what she did see could not possibly come to pass.

  5. KATE

  The train was slow, stopping at every small town along the way, but they had a first-class compartment to themselves, which was unexpected, given that the rest of the train was crowded. She supposed they had Miss Wilkins to thank for it. Kate looked out at the snow-crusted fields and found her thoughts falling into the same slow rhythm as the train. She was tired – sleep had eluded her yet again the night before. If she had been on her own, she might have allowed her eyes to close, but she was not. And so she read her book.

  Rolleston Miller-White, her companion, was unhappy. He found himself, against his will, attending Blackwater Abbey in the company of his former fiancée. As he seldom experienced inconvenience – she had observed that the world generally arranged itself around his needs – he was more than a little put out to be in the situation he found himself. And there was the small matter that he had broken off their engagement with her, without explanation, only five days previously. As it happened, this had not been a source of disappointment to Kate. But that did not mean she was not enjoying seeing him squirm.

  ‘It’s Christmas, after all,’ he said. ‘That I should be ordered, no less, to visit some damp pile in the middle of the Irish Sea – well, it’s a bit much. And then to have Smith sent to France? Nobody else’s batman has been sent there. Why mine?’