Gabe wasn't sure what to do. His instinct was to get the hell out of there, lock and barricade the cellar door and call the police. But he couldn't be sure there was someone there. Maybe the quiet scuffling he heard was nothing more than dirt falling from the cellar wall or ceiling, the house itself settling. Maybe the intruder was no more than a mouse or a rat. Yet, just as he'd felt eyes on him minutes before, he could feel a presence lurking there, hidden in the darkness. And it wasn't a mouse or a rat. This was something bigger. He was certain of that too.
His mouth felt dry and adrenaline pounded through his body. 'Okay,' he muttered to himself, talking up his courage, 'let's see what you got to offer.'
He half crouched, his muscles tensed, fists clenched, and prepared to rush the shadows and drag out whoever was there. He felt the energy surge.
'Right!' he yelled, but just as he lunged forward a fierce light came on from behind him.
'Gabe!' It was Eve's voice. 'What are you doing?'
Almost thrown off balance, he wheeled round. He raised a hand to shield his eyes against the bright glare and waited for his heart to stop pounding.
'Gabe, why are you down here?' Her voice was full of concern, bewilderment too.
'Eve,' he managed to utter, 'shine the light through the doorway.' Gabe pointed as he half turned away from her.
'What?' She was even more bewildered.
'Quick, shine it through the doorway!'
She did as she was told, even though mystified. 'What's the matter with you, Gabe? There's nothing there.'
Gabe snatched the torch from her and crossed to the opening. The beam lit up the next-door room, revealing the boiler and generator, the old mangle and blade sharpener, the pile of logs and the coal heap, odd pieces of junk that littered the dusty floor; but no one hid here, it was plain to see.
He finally let go of his breath.
45: THURSDAY
It was morning and Gabe sat at the kitchen table, on his second cup of coffee after breakfast and wishing he hadn't given up smoking. Loren had left for school and Cally was at the table with him, enthusiastically crayoning in a horse he had sketched for her (being an engineer, his version of the animal was more mechanical than it was graceful), telling her it was the horse he used to ride in his cowboy days. Cally was colouring it a bright shade of purple.
Eve tapped on the window to get the attention of Percy, who was working outside on one of the garden's flowerbeds, hood pulled up over his cap against the steady downbeat of rain. The gardener straightened and looked her way. She mimed drinking a cup of tea and he gave her a thumbs-up before making his way to the kitchen door.
Gabe was hunched over his coffee, both hands wrapped round the mug as if for warmth, and he appraised Percy silently as the old man stamped his wet boots on the doormat. Shrugging back his hood and removing the flat cap, the gardener nodded respectfully at him.
'Hey, Percy,' Gabe greeted in a low but friendly growl.
'Yup,' Percy replied.
He immediately seemed to sense the frosty atmosphere between Gabe and Eve, taking them both in as he stood awkwardly on the rough mat.
'Sit down, Percy, and I'll bring your tea over,' Eve told him and the old man mumbled something incoherent as he pulled out a chair from the table. 'Would you like some toast?' she pressed him.
'No, missus, I'm all right.' Orlroit. He smiled at Cally and touched the top of her head gently, but she was more interested in giving her purple horse a yellow mane. Eve put the cup and saucer before him on the table.
'Nasty weather, huh?' said Gabe by way of making conversation. He and Eve had barely spoken a word to each other that morning and had not even mentioned his excursion into the cellar last night. Down there, he had explained that he had followed a 'white shadow' and she had seemed to take some satisfaction in the fact that at last he was treating the strange phenomena in Crickley Hall seriously. As for something hiding in the boiler room, he himself had eventually surmised it had probably been a small animal, a rodent, whose scuffling was made louder and more sinister by the bare brick walls and concrete floor and ceiling. Eve had told him something had disturbed her sleep—a noise, instinct, she didn't know what—and when she had gone out onto the landing she had seen the light from the open cellar door below. She had gone next door to rouse Gabe and, on seeing the bed was empty, had assumed it was he who was downstairs. She had grabbed the flashlight from their bedroom and followed.
They had both returned to their separate beds, too weary—the comedown after the high adrenaline flow—to discuss whether Crickley Hall was truly haunted, should they stay or leave, and what did it all mean. Neither of them slept much that night.
'Folks is gettin' fretful,' said Percy in response to Gabe's remark on the weather.
'Oh?' The engineer's thoughts had already drifted.
'Worried 'bout what the rain's doin' to the moors.'
'Has there been a flood warning?' Eve asked anxiously.
'No, not yet there ain't.'
'But they've taken precautions should it ever happen again, haven't they, Percy? I read about it in a book I got from the village store. A flood could never do the same damage as last time.'
'So they reckons, missus. Sometimes, though, nature has its own ideas.'
Gabe didn't like the subject; there were more immediate things to worry about. 'Percy,' he said more casually than he felt, 'tell us a little about the guy who owns Crickley Hall. You said Temple or something like that was his name.'
'Templeton. Mr Templeton.'
'Okay. You told us he was never happy here…?' It ended as a question.
'No, he never were. S'why they up and left. But I think that were more to do with his wife, Mary, than anythin' else.'
'Yeah?'
'Had no kiddies, there were jus' the two of 'em an' Crickley Hall's too big for jus' a couple on their own. Needs a family, like yours.'
Percy blew into his teacup, then sipped from it, the saucer held below to catch any drips as usual. He looked directly at the American.
'What makes yer ask, Mr Caleigh?'
Somehow Gabe knew it wasn't an idle question. But it was Eve who replied.
'We wondered why the Templetons no longer used Crickley Hall themselves nowadays. Is there a reason?'
Percy placed the cup back into its saucer and then both on the table.
'Mr Templeton's wife became poorly almost as soon as they moved in all them years ago. She never took to the place, an' I think he didn't either 'cause of her.'
'D'you know why she didn't like it here?' asked Gabe, more than interested.
Percy gave it some thought. 'Mr Templeton, he told me his wife felt there was a bad atmosphere 'bout the house an' it made her depressed, like. She'd heard the rumours, y'see, 'bout Crickley Hall bein' haunted an' all, an' mebbe she took it too serious. Anyways, 't'weren't long afore she took to her bed. Small things at first—colds, headaches, backaches, them sort of problems. Then they discovered she had cancer, bad cancer—if there's any of the good kind.'
'What happened?'
'They left. Moved out. Mr Templeton took his wife to London for specialist treatment, but she died anyways, only weeks later, we heard. An' Mr Templeton, well he never came back 'cept fer one day months later. Wouldn't sell the place though.'
'Oh?' said Gabe. 'Why was that?'
'I asked him that very same question the day he returned to sort out things with the estate agent who he wanted to take charge of the prop'ty. After his good lady died, that were.' Percy nodded to himself as if remembering that very day. 'I were workin' in the garden as usual an' Mr Templeton, he came out to see me, mostly to let me know I were bein' kep' on as gardener an' maintenance even though he wouldn't be livin' here no more, but also 'cause he often like to jus' stop an' chat with me awhile. Always had done, said it took his mind off other worries jus' chattin' 'bout the garden an' what needed doin', 'bout the weather or local people, any old thing that weren't important like. When he told me he weren't comin' back to Crickley Hall no more an' that the estate agent feller—a Mr Cardew it were at that time—he had instructions to let the prop'ty whenever there were any interest, I says to him, why don't you sell up an' forget 'bout the place. I knew him an' his wife had never been happy here, y'see, so I were wonderin' why he didn't just get shot of it.'