Deadlight Hall (Nell West/Michael Flint #5)(7)

Hurst’s eyes flickered. ‘Did you see anyone?’

Impossible to say that all he had seen had been a shadow and a fall of old silk in an attic. ‘No,’ said Michael. ‘I did think there was someone up there, though – I heard a kind of thudding sound. It seemed to be in the attics.’

‘Pipes,’ said Hurst at once. ‘Water hammer – major airlock somewhere. It can be remarkably loud at times. We keep hearing it, and we’re trying to track it down, but in a place this size …’ He made a rueful gesture. ‘As for the children, well, I dare say it was just local kids. They get in here and think it’s a great place to play. Kids’ paradise, this place. I’ll take a good look round later.’


Michael did not think children had ever played in Deadlight Hall, but he said, ‘Thanks,’ and went back to his car.





THREE


Back in Oriel, Michael prowled around his study, and tried to read an essay from a promising second year on the influence of mental instability on Charles and Mary Lamb’s work.

But the image of the hunched figure he had seen in the attics and again in the hall would not leave him. Jack Hurst had said it would be a child or children, playing in the house, but Michael was not sure that what he had seen had been a child at all. And yet what else could it have been? And where had it – or they – gone? The impression he had received had been of fear. Fear of what? Of an eerie old house? That was very likely, of course. But what else might a child have feared so much that it ran away and hid itself – hiding so thoroughly it could not be found?

Jack Hurst had not seemed a likely candidate for the role of any kind of villain, but there had been that unmistakable flicker of unease when Michael had mentioned seeing a child in the house. And most villains must appear normal to the world for the majority of the time. They had to do ordinary things like the rest of the population; they had to go to the dentist and collect the dry-cleaning, and they had to earn a living – to pursue ordinary jobs.

After half an hour, he abandoned his attempt to read the second year’s essay, and phoned the local police, to ask if any children had been reported missing.

It seemed they had not. Was Dr Flint sure he had actually seen a child inside the house?

‘I’m not sure,’ said Michael. ‘And when I searched I didn’t find anything.’

‘You did say Deadlight Hall, sir?’

‘Yes.’

‘Ah. I see. Well, it’s an odd old place, that one,’ said the police sergeant. ‘You wouldn’t believe some of the reports we’ve had about that house. Myself, I put it down to peculiar bits of brickwork casting shadows.’

Shadows, thought Michael. But the shadow I saw moved.

‘We’ll take a look though,’ the sergeant went on. ‘And we’ll make a few discreet enquiries. Social workers and the like, you know. You can trust us to follow it up, but I don’t think you need worry, Dr Flint. We’d certainly know if any children were missing, and I’d hope we’d be aware of anything … well, anything wrong anywhere. Good of you to take the trouble to call us, though. Can’t be too careful. I’ll give you a reference number to quote if you need to come back to us. There’ll be a log of this call anyway.’

Michael wrote down the reference number, replaced the phone, and returned to his second year’s essay. This time his concentration was interrupted by the arrival of the head decorator into his room, who reported with indignation that Wilberforce, clearly still sulking from the attic incident, had dabbled his paws in a pot of paint which the decorators had left ready for the ceiling. He had then stomped white paw prints across most of Oriel’s stairways, and you never saw such a mess in your life – the decorator did not know how they were ever going to get it properly clean.

Michael pacified the aggrieved decorator, who was annoyed at having a twenty-litre can of paint ruined, managed not to point out that it would have been better not to leave the lid off in the first place, agreed to foot the bill for a fresh can of paint, together with what seemed like an unreasonably large amount of turpentine, tipped his scout to help them clean everything, then hauled Wilberforce off to the vet to have his paint-spattered paws dealt with.

‘Poor Wilberforce,’ said Nell that evening in Quire Court. ‘He’ll smell of turps for ages and his dignity will be severely damaged, never mind his street cred.’

‘If the Bursar finds out it’ll be Wilberforce who’ll be severely damaged,’ said Michael. ‘He’s already furious about having to get Wilberforce out of the attics.’

‘Yes, but I bet you get a chapter out of it for the new book.’

‘Well, I might.’ Michael had in fact already emailed his editor at the children’s book publishers about the idea as soon as he returned from the vet’s. He had received a cordial response, together with a reminder that they had a publication date of February and a first draft by the end of September would be greatly appreciated by the illustrator. She supposed that would not be a problem, however. There was not quite a question mark at the end of this last sentence, but Michael heard it anyway.

‘And,’ he said to Nell, ‘she apparently thinks it would be “rather fun” to have some publicity shots of the real Wilberforce for the new book and what do I think?’