A Year at the French Farmhouse(43)

‘It’s probably mice or something,’ Lily said sleepily.

‘That,’ said Emily, her face pale as a loud bang and thud combination made them both jump, ‘is not a frickin’ mouse.’

Her body protesting, Lily stood up and cocked her head to the side to hear. ‘It’s definitely something in the attic,’ she said, trying to stay calm, although the savage way she’d been woken up had done nothing for her blood pressure. ‘Maybe the neighbour’s cat has…’

‘If you think that’s just one animal,’ said Emily, ‘then you’re insane. There’s a whole zoo up there. Or some sort of poltergeist party.’

More thundering above their heads seemed to support the first hypothesis. ‘Oh,’ said Lily. ‘Well, maybe I could call someone in the morning, you know, to take a look.’

‘Are you actually mad? Look, I watched this documentary about poltergeists and there was a family in Norfolk who had an old house – not much different from this one – and they began to hear banging in the night. Over the course of a week it got worse, then crockery started flying through the air. One of the children got hit on the nose by a teacup! It was carnage.’

‘Emily, you don’t believe in ghosts, let alone poltergeists.’

‘Nor did they, Lily. Nor did they,’ Emily said darkly.

‘I’m sure we could…’

‘You know me,’ Emily said, ‘I don’t want to be melodramatic…’

‘God forbid.’

‘But I haven’t slept in two hours. And now, until I know exactly what we’re dealing with up there, I don’t think I’ll be able to settle at all.’

‘Right.’

‘So either we call someone now, or you investigate what’s up there, or we get the hell out of here and sleep in the car.’

‘In the car! It’s a Nissan Micra!’

‘He was hit on the nose, Lily. On the nose. With a teacup.’

‘Right.’ Lily knew better than to challenge Emily on zero sleep, a shed load of alcohol and what seemed to be the beginning of a nervous breakdown. Instead, the quickest route back to her much-needed rest seemed to be for her to poke her head through the hatch in the attic, confirm that they had mice or rats or birds or something else non paranormal, and put her friend’s mind at rest.

Not that the idea of sticking her actual head into a room full of rodents appealed in any sense. She’d watched enough I’m a Celebrity Get Me Out of Here! to know that rats, mice and other vermin had no qualms when it came to clambering over faces, or putting little claws into entry-points.

But her need to sleep seemed to override everything else. As she wearily pulled on her dressing gown she was reminded of nights with a younger version of Ty when she’d have to chase moths out of the window, or deal with a wayward wasp. The need to actually get her body back into bed overrode any fear she had herself.

It was similar now. Deal with the problem, back to bed. If a rat decided to perch on her head, so be it.

The main problem was the lack of furniture. She certainly didn’t have a ladder, and although there might be one inside the hatch of the loft, she had no way of getting to it without a chair to balance on or a pole to knock it open. Eventually, they dragged the end of the ancient (and probably haunted) iron bedstead out of the spare room, turning it on its side to fit through the doorway, and half wedged it on the landing. ‘That’ll be fine,’ Emily said. ‘You can use the struts as a kind of ladder! And you’ve got a torch on your phone, right?

‘I take it you’re not going to climb up and investigate?’

‘Er, no. I’ll one hundred per cent support you though,’ Emily said, giving her a thumbs up and sheepish grin combination.

‘Thought as much. Well, if I get murdered by a poltergeist, or eaten by some sort of giant rat, it’s entirely your fault.’

‘Agreed.’

Sighing, Lily clambered up the wobbling bedstead, pushed open the hatch, cautiously, and shone the torch light from her phone into the interior of the attic. The scrabbling stopped.

Raising her head into the gloom, she moved the light around and was suddenly met with a tiny pair of round black eyes. The animal froze in terror, then performed a sudden leap to the left, whisking what looked like an enormous feather duster behind it. Then all at once, it was as if the movement had provoked some sort of rodent riot, as several other small animals began darting around, their shadows looming large in the light from the torch. The tiny animals jumped and scratched and skittered and panicked around, and a fluffy tail whipped the side of Lily’s ear as one creature passed.

As the soft hair of the tail touched her, Lily let out a cry that was somewhere between a shout and a scream and drew her head sharply back through the opening, banging it for good measure and letting the wooden hatch fall back into place. The sudden movement caused the bedstead below her to wobble and she slipped and fell heavily onto the floor at Emily’s feet.





15





It was impossible to sleep.

Nothing was broken, they were fairly sure, but Lily ached from head to toe.

‘I’m so sorry,’ Emily had said. ‘I should have climbed up the fucking bedstead.’

‘No,’ Lily had replied. ‘Neither of us should have.’ Their eyes met briefly and they’d exchanged a smile. ‘But no harm done,’ she’d lied.