The Retreat(89)

There was a space behind the wall, just over two feet wide. A crawl space. Easily large enough for an average-sized person to crouch in. And the plaster was so thin, a voice would be audible through the wall, helped also by a little vent just above the skirting board.

‘They’ve been moving around behind the walls,’ Julia said, shuddering.

‘But how did they get in there?’

We pulled away more of the wall until there was a hole large enough to enter. I peered in. To the left was a dead end, but the hollow space stretched away to the right, beyond the boundaries of this room. Julia produced her phone, switching on the flashlight, and crawled inside before I could offer to go first.

‘Be careful,’ I said.

She went off on her hands and knees, calling back after a minute. ‘It runs alongside Room One.’ That was the room where Suzi had slept. It gave me the creeps, the idea of someone hiding in the walls, listening. But how did they get in?

Julia came crawling back and stuck her head out through the hole. There were specks of plaster in her hair, and a cobweb clung to her shoulder.

‘There are steps leading down to the middle floor,’ she said.

‘You had no idea any of this was here?’

‘No, of course not. The police didn’t find it either when they searched the house after Lily vanished.’

I was about to accuse the police of incompetence, but why would they have found these hidden spaces if they weren’t looking for them?

‘I’m going down.’ Julia turned back around.

‘Wait. Let me go.’

‘No. It’s my house. I want to do it.’ She crawled back through the secret space. As soon as she was out of sight, I ran out of the room and down the stairs to the middle floor, where my room and Lily’s old bedroom were located. I could hear movement inside the walls, as Julia descended the hidden steps. I went into Lily’s room and waited.

Julia tapped on the wall and I placed a palm against the paintwork, knowing she was on the other side.

‘Can you hear me?’ she asked.

Her voice was a little muffled but easy to make out. This must have been where the singing I’d heard came from.

‘It stops here,’ she said. ‘Oh, hang on. There’s a hatch.’

‘A hatch?’

I heard a grunt of exertion, then she called, ‘I’m going down.’

Again, I hurried down the stairs to the ground floor. I stood in the main hallway, by the front door. Lily’s room was, I was sure, above my head. I could no longer hear Julia. Where the hell was she? I called her name but got no response. Then I heard knocking. It was coming from the Thomas Room.

‘Julia?’ I called again.

Two knocks on the ceiling. She was above my head. It didn’t make sense. But then I stepped back into the doorway and looked into the hallway, then back to the Thomas Room. I had never noticed before, but the ceiling in the Thomas Room was considerably lower.

‘Can you hear me?’ I shouted.

Her voice came back, but it was too faint to make out what she was saying. And then I heard a thump from the far end of the room. It came from behind the bookcases. I hurried over.

‘Hello?’

There was no reply.

My heartbeat accelerated. ‘Julia? Hello? Are you all right?’

I was about to run upstairs to enter the crawl space, convinced someone had attacked her, when she spoke and relief flooded my body.

‘There’s a room,’ she called. ‘A tiny room. Where am I exactly?’

‘Behind the bookcases in the Thomas Room.’

‘Jesus Christ. Listen, there are more steps. I’m going down.’

‘Julia, are you sure?’ This felt bizarre, talking to her through a bookcase. ‘Is there anything in the room?’

‘There’s a glass. A tumbler.’

Someone had been in that little room, with a glass pressed against the wall, listening.

‘I’m going down the steps now!’ she called. ‘Come down to the basement!’

‘No, Julia, wait there!’ I raised my voice. ‘There has to be an exit from the passageway into the house.’ I felt along the bookcase, looking for a loose panel.

Then I remembered something. Karen had reported seeing a new guest in the dining room. We thought she’d imagined it – but what if she really had seen someone?

I asked Julia to give me a minute, then went into the dining room. There was a cupboard against the wall where the Roberts Room – the dining room – was joined to the Thomas Room, at about waist height. I crouched and opened the cupboard. Apart from a few ancient phone directories, it was empty. On my hands and knees, I reached through to the back of the cupboard. There was a handle. I pulled it and the back of the cupboard came away.

‘I knew it,’ I said aloud.

I slithered through on my belly and found Julia staring at me. Her face was smeared with dirt and she was breathing heavily. I entered the little room behind the bookcases, which was too small for me to stretch out my arms, and got to my feet. It was dusty and claustrophobic, the walls furry with ancient cobwebs.

‘Let me go first,’ I said, pushing past her and going down the steps before she could protest. I had my phone out now as well, filling the space with weak light. Julia followed.

I found myself in a narrow passageway, tall enough to stand in, with bare brick walls on both sides. I tapped the wall to my right. ‘This must be the basement. The den.’