The thermostat didn’t respond to my nudging, but the heat was at least minimally on, I would guess to keep pipes from freezing. I was sceptical that the tap water was potable, but there were two long-dry glasses in the sink, so I took a chance that I wasn’t the first to drink it. The pantry had a few long-life foods. It was obvious Lesley stayed here only occasionally, probably to monitor progress on the outbuildings or as a pied-à-terre. Telephone service was not yet connected.
My right foot started to swell. It too must have been hurt, but, in comparison to the horrid pain on the left, I hadn’t felt it. I wrapped myself in a coarse blanket folded near the door; it was probably meant as a mat for wiping muddy feet when the place was occupied. I only needed, I was sure, to get through the night.
The utilitarian gates were convincing evidence that Dovecote was not yet finished. The rain would stop and the builders would return. Surely.
The stone floor in the kitchen would only chill me worse, so I crawled out into the hall beyond. I reached up to press the button on the switchplate by the door. A lamp hanging from a bulky chain glowed a sallow yellow in response. I pressed the second button. The room beyond suddenly dazzled-hundreds of pinpoint stars shone from the ceiling onto a wooden table near twenty feet long.
I shuffled into the dining room on my knees, staring up. Even with the enormous table, the room felt vast. There were no chairs yet, no sideboards. Just space. I leaned back against a wood-panelled wall to marvel. Had she put in constellations? Or was the patterning random: space observed from another galaxy entirely?
The door to the hall fell shut, crack! My arms flung out in surprise, to steady myself. And my left hand recoiled from a sharp point.
More than a dozen sets of antlers were piled in this corner, some of them huge, and my disturbance sent them toppling toward me. One pair of spirals fell into my lap. They were monstrous up close.
Marks high on the walls showed where they all had once been displayed. Of course Lesley would have taken them down. She’d never tolerate anything along the lines of hunting or taxidermy.
I pushed them away, with a horrible clatter, and backed toward the now-closed door, sliding on my bum. Obviously, I’d nudged the door when I’d entered, that’s all. For some reason I needed to open it again. It seemed important to confirm that the hall was still on the other side of it.
There it was: hall, stairs, yellow light from the hanging lamp.
A tiny marble rolled out from under the tangle of antlers, past me and out the door.
There must be a stuffed creature there too, now one-eyed. I didn’t check.
There was no rug, but the floor here was wood, an improvement over cold stone. I crawled underneath the banquet table, as if it were a tent. Caught up in a figment of camping, and reduced even in my fantasies to mere expedience, I wished for a rock on which to lay my head.
I spread the blanket from the kitchen over me, and stacked my hands to form a pillow. The fibre-optic stars above twinkled mechanically, alternating between blue and white. In my mind, one-eyed owls hooted from antler-sprouting trees. I slept.
I woke the next day hungover. Rain streaked the tall, bare windows, adding a further filter to the daylight which was having enough trouble getting through the persistent layer of cloud. I could still make out the ceiling stars, but they had little effect without the contrast of full darkness. The aggregate of antlers was, of course, in exactly the messy pile in which I’d left it. My relief that they hadn’t organised themselves overnight was absurd.
I tested my legs. Useless. I couldn’t scale the fence now. I couldn’t ride my bike.
I waited.
No one came. Even if the wet weather stopped, there was a good chance it would be too muddy for the builders to come the next day either, and then there was the weekend.
I crawled back to the kitchen and punched in the security code to set the alarm. Then I opened the door.
The siren sang at an unbearable volume. Its source was in the kitchen, twinned with another I could hear whining on the other side of the house. Sticking my head out the door, I could tell there was also an exterior siren. But in the wind it wasn’t nearly as loud as I’d hoped.
I huddled on the step and covered my ears. After about twenty minutes, it all stopped.
Without phone service, there would be no connection to the police.
The driveway was a half-mile long, putting the road beyond the sound.
There were gardens and fields behind the house-perhaps she let someone graze their animals there?
I waited an hour. I ate Weetabix out of the box. No one came.
At first I resisted making any kind of settlement. That would be too much an admission of failure. I explored, using a lone golf club upside down as a cane. I’d found it in the pantry miscellany.
Most of the rooms were empty, punctuated only by occasional swatches and colour samples. One held rolled-up rugs stacked like a log pile.
Some doors were open and some I had to push. I did so with little expectation, just dogged thoroughness. I was mentally cataloguing the place: the rug room, the green room, the room with the ugly lamp. The wonder behind this panelled door rocked me back.
The fabric wallpaper, long tasselled curtains, and upholstery were all dizzyingly patterned, and accented with shiny gold thread. Framed prints of horses leaned against the skirting boards, presumably testing where Lesley wanted to hang them. Several were already up, and the idea that she’d add the dozen more of them cracked a smile in my face. She was poking sly fun at her own house.
This must be where she spent her time here.
The down-filled cushions got flat underneath me in no time; I fell into a light sleep that must have filled hours. When I woke up, it was getting darkish outside. I thought I was hallucinating. The old-fashioned room, its colour faded in the dim light… I thought I’d woken up in Gretchen’s eyes.
I shot up, startled.
I had to prepare for another night, or more. It was time to set up camp.
A red wagon was parked next to the fireplace. It held a box of matches and bits of wood chip, but no logs. I used it to drag in a cache of food from the pantry. A wheel caught on the threshold of the lounge as I reentered, and I stumbled to the floor. I tried using the golf club to help me get up, but my hand was too stiff to hold on to it anymore. I set it alongside the couch, for later when my hand had rested.
I shuffled on my knees back to the kitchen, to fill a couple of large empty Coke bottles with water. I briefly considered dragging back a large cooking pot too, but I swore to myself that it wouldn’t come to that. There was a toilet near enough, just down the corridor.
Reentering the lounge, my left ankle smacked into the doorframe. I lay flat-out down on the floor, biting my sleeve, until the blast of pain subsided.
When I opened my eyes, the view from the floor revealed boxes lined up behind the couch. I retrieved the water bottles from where they’d rolled, and crawled over to look inside the cartons.
Books.
For a moment I revelled. Books and privacy and time are a heady mix. I rummaged through, pulling them out and scanning the titles, separating them into two stacks. I piled the Terry Pratchetts and Feynman lectures within reach from the couch.
Then my situation came back to me. I pulled the box with the rest of its contents over to the fireplace.
I picked up two paperbacks I didn’t recognise. The pages resisted, but they were not in charge. I tore and crumpled, and tossed them in on top of the ashes that were already there. I opened the flue, and set the pages alight using the matches from the red wagon.
Maybe someone would see the smoke and worry about squatters. Even if Lesley’s unpredictability would comfort any observers into assuming it was she herself randomly come home, at least I’d be warm. Briefly.
I grabbed more books and got into a tearing rhythm. I didn’t burn the covers. I started a deck of them, facedown, as a little book graveyard by the hearth. A batch of thick romances added lurid embraces to the pile. I stopped short at a blonde holding a champagne glass. I knew her: Linda Paul’s Susan Maud Madison. I set that one aside, on top of the Pratchetts. I continued to tear and crumple and aimed paper snowballs between the andirons.