The Sin Eater(7)

Nell said how appalling for an eight-year-old to lose both parents at once.

‘Well, the poor lamb seemed to come out of it unscathed, although in my experience, people are never entirely unscathed, are they? And Benedict can occasionally be a bit introverted. He sometimes seems to retreat mentally, if you know what I mean.’

Nell said she did.

‘I dare say you find that with your Oxford don,’ said Nina. ‘Academics often tend to be a bit other-worldly, don’t they? Ivory towers and all that.’ The words and tone were studiedly casual, but Nell had the feeling of being mentally pounced on.

She said, offhandedly, ‘Michael isn’t mine.’

‘Would he like to be, though? Would you like him to be? Because honestly, Nell, I know you were utterly torn to pieces when Brad died, but it’s been more than two years.’


Nell was not going to discuss Michael Flint with Nina Doyle; in fact she was not going to discuss him with anyone. Instead, she brought Nina back to the question of when she could see the Highbury house and inventory the contents. It appeared that Benedict had put forward 18th December as a suitable date, and Nell thought it would be worth braving the seething crowds of Christmas shoppers to see what was inside the house.

‘I haven’t been there since I was in my teens,’ said Nina. ‘I don’t think Benedict has, either. But he’s twenty-one in a few weeks, so everything can be sold. I don’t know what’s likely to be there, but I shouldn’t expect Dutch masters in the attics or Sèvres in the cellars.’

Nell was not expecting either of these things, but there might be a few nice pieces of furniture which she could display in her shop. Oxford had antique shops every twenty yards, but she was trying to make hers fairly distinctive. The setting helped: it was in Quire Court, near Turl Street, almost in the shadow of Brasenose College. There were several small businesses and shops in the court, but none was in direct competition with Nell’s so it had been easy to get planning permission for antiques. Her shop had a deep bow window, and she had recently sold a small Regency desk which she had displayed there, and had taken Beth to London for the day on the proceeds.

Beth, who was nine, had loved the Christmas lights in Oxford Street; there was a Victorian theme this year and she had stared at everything with solemn and silent delight as if she was storing it all up to relive later. She was wearing a brown velvet coat with a hood which had been a birthday present from Michael, and which gave her a slightly old-fashioned look. With tendrils of brown curls escaping from the hood and little fur boots and mittens, she might have been a child from the Victorian age herself. Nell watched her, smiling, and, as if sensing this, Beth looked round at her mother with a grin of happy conspiracy. A pang of sharp loneliness sliced through Nell, because Beth’s dead father used to look like that when something delighted him and he wanted to share it with her. For a moment, the pain of loss was so overwhelming, Nell almost started crying in the middle of Selfridges. That was the trouble with ghosts; just when you thought you had got them under reasonable control, they came boiling out of nowhere and reduced you to a jelly. It was not unreasonable of Brad’s ghost to still do this, more than two years after his death, but it was annoying that it should choose Selfridges during the Christmas rush.

As she sat in the train from Oxford to Paddington, she wondered if there were likely to be any ghosts in Holly Lodge. Michael would have said most old buildings had ghosts – the ghosts of the happinesses and sadnesses that had left imprints on the bricks and stones and timbers. Nell smiled, thinking how serious and absorbed Michael looked when his interest was caught.

It was nice to be part of the buzz and life of London again, although the noise and the crowds were slightly disconcerting after the relative calm of Oxford. In the jam-packed tube, Nell had a sudden reassuring image of Quire Court and its serene old stones, and the faint sound of chimes from one of Oxford’s many churches politely and unobtrusively marking the hours.

Benedict Doyle’s house was fairly near to the tube and the streets here were not quite so busy. Nell, following Nina’s directions, enjoyed the short walk; she liked speculating about the people who lived or worked here, and who shopped at the smart-looking boutiques or ate in the restaurants. She was interested in meeting Nina’s cousin, whose parents had been killed when he was the same age as Beth had been when Brad died.

Here was the road, and halfway along it was Holly Lodge. Clearly this had once been a fairly prosperous residential area, but only a few of the houses seemed to be still privately owned. Holly Lodge looked a bit forlorn, but Nina had said it had been empty for two years, so Nell supposed it was entitled to look forlorn. But as she went up the short driveway, she realized her skin was prickling with faint apprehension. This was absurd and also annoying. She had encountered more than one vaguely sinister old house in the course of her career, and if Holly Lodge seemed sinister it was only because most of the curtains were closed and the shrubbery at the front was overgrown, obscuring the downstairs windows.

Nell pushed back a wayward holly branch and thought if Michael were here he would start to weave improbable stories about the place for Beth, and the two of them would egg each other on, and end up with a fantastical modern-day version of Sleeping Beauty. But as far as Nell was concerned, this was nothing more than a large Victorian house, which might yield some useful and profitable things for her shop.

There was no response to her knock, but she was a bit early and Benedict Doyle might not have got here yet. Or he might be here working at the back of the house and not heard the door knocker. Nell made her way through an iron gate at the side and along a narrow path which had weeds growing through the cracks. She peered through the downstairs windows, then stepped back, shading her eyes to see the upper ones. Was there a movement up there? Yes. And he had seen her. Nell waved and he beckoned to her to come inside.