Ferney (35 page)

‘He’s not crazy.’

‘He is or I am, or . . .’ he was going to say ‘. . . or maybe you are,’ but that was something he had never said in all Gally’s agonies because it was too close to
his fears.

‘There’ll be an explanation.’ She was breathing hard, Spitting the words.

‘I’d like to hear it.’

‘Good, let’s go then.’

She towed him in her wake to Ferney’s house, caution overruled by the pressing need to be out of the jaws of this human nutcracker. Mike followed because there was nothing else for him to
do. Her mind seethed with warnings of dangerous outcomes, but they could not overcome her visceral resolve. It never occurred to her that Ferney might not be home, that he might have gone somewhere
else. She knew he was there. On the way to the front door Mike’s anger was barely enough to overcome his enormous reluctance. For a second he lagged behind her, but he felt conspicuous
standing out in the gaze of the blank windows of the other bungalows and, caught between two evils, came slowly to join her at the door. There was just a moment as Ferney’s indistinct shape,
broken into impressionistic strips by the front door’s fluted glass, moved to undo the latch when she knew that what she was doing was probably a huge mistake, then it was too late. The door
was open and he was standing there looking at her and past her to Mike with an expression that passed through surprise and apprehension to finish in a calmness that touched Gally and quietened her
too.

‘Come in,’ was all he said, and they followed him into the front room. Mike took refuge in looking at the books again. Ferney walked slowly to the fireplace, half-turned to look
quizzically at Mike, then back at Gally with a raised eyebrow. She was quite sure she knew what that look meant. Why are you taking this risk? Why can’t we keep it all separate?

‘I think we should all talk,’ she said by way of reply to the silent questions. ‘We
have
to talk. Mike is very concerned, aren’t you, Mike?’

Mike looked embarrassed, but was forced to turn away from the books. ‘Well, in a way.’

He seemed so childlike, eclipsed by Ferney. I can fit them both in, she thought – surely that can’t be so wrong.

‘Mike happened to see you in the woods just now, digging up a box,’ she said, speaking in a calm, paced way that showed she was just an intermediary, that there was no accusation
from her. ‘He heard that the police had been talking to you down by the road and he’s worried for my sake.’

Mike looked as if he wanted to disappear into the carpet.

‘He thinks you might be dangerous in some way to me, Ferney. I know you’re not, but we all know I’ve told him what you’ve said about you and me and the past,’ to
her acute surprise her voice started to choke on her, ‘and I’ve just got . . . got to the point where I can’t keep on . . . pretending everything’s . . .’

Both the men took a step towards her and each man, seeing the other move, instantly stopped so that they were frozen in a triangle, watching her as she breathed heavily and struggled for
control. Mike stayed where he was, but Ferney took another step and touched her gently on the shoulder. She got her balance back.

‘What do we do?’ she said.

‘We all sit down,’ said Ferney calmly, ‘at least you two do, and I’ll make a pot of tea.’

Mike looked glumly at the carpet after he’d gone out and Gally looked at Mike with a sudden depth of understanding.

‘I’m sorry to be putting you through this,’ she said quietly, but he looked blankly up at her then down again.

Ferney came back with a tray and put it down on the table. ‘How do you like it?’ he said to Mike.

‘Just milk . . . please.’

Ferney passed it to him, put milk and one sugar in Gally’s without asking and gave it to her. That was not lost on Mike. Gally, supersensitive to all that passed, almost said,
‘You’ve got a good memory’, but realized how absurd that would sound, so she just took it and smiled.

‘Now tell me,’ said Ferney. ‘What exactly did you think you saw?’

‘I wasn’t following you or anything – but I was walking along and I saw you dig up some sort of box. I stopped and then it all got a bit difficult because I didn’t want
you to think I was spying so I had to sort of keep still after that.’

Ferney just waited for him to go on and Mike, hanging on the hook of silence, had no real choice. ‘Look, it was only because of the police.’ He took a deep breath. ‘I saw you
bury another box, so after you went I dug it up and had a look.’

Ferney nodded, considering, then held up a placating hand.

‘All right. I understand. I know you’ve got Gally to think of. I’ll tell you about the boxes. I’m sure you’ll keep it to yourself?’

Mike nodded.

‘I put things aside – stuff that’s of no account now and likely to be worth a bit later. It’s a bit of fun, you could say. I just dug up an old one to have a look and
maybe to sell a thing or two and I put another one in its place. I do quite a lot of that.’

Mike wrestled with that. ‘But that stuff in it. I saw it . . .’

‘I hope you put it back properly.’

‘Phonecards? What’s the point of that?’

‘I suppose you undid the tape? I’d better get it up again and seal it, otherwise the damp gets in.’

‘The phonecards?’

‘I chose them carefully. People leave them in the boxes when they’ve run out. They’ve got all sorts of designs on some of them. They’ll be collected when their times
come.’

‘Yes, but not in your lifeti . . .’ Mike choked himself off. ‘Sorry, but you know what I mean. They’ll just be so much rubbish for years, surely.’

There it was, brought out into the open, the central issue flying under the false colours of a bunch of phonecards. The three of them all focused their gaze on the carpet at the centre of their
triangle for a long, silent moment.

‘Well, she’s told you, hasn’t she?’ said Ferney in the end. ‘I wasn’t planning on digging them up this time round.’

‘Oh so
that’s
it. It’s that business again is it? These lives of yours.’

‘I can’t hope that you can understand and it’s better just kept to those who can.’

‘Meaning you and Gally. That does shut me out a bit, doesn’t it? I mean if it’s always been the two of you, as you say.’

‘That’s just the way it is,’ said Ferney slowly. ‘We didn’t choose for it to be that way, but until now that is the way it’s always been.’

Gally was watching them both, letting Mike go on, aware that she’d started something that had to run its course. Mike looked hard at Ferney. ‘How far back are you saying you
go?’

‘A fair old bit.’

‘More than five hundred years?’

Ferney shrugged a vague nod.

‘More than a thousand?’

‘Maybe a bit more.’

Mike looked around the room. ‘I’m a logical person,’ he said, ‘I have to test things. Do you understand that?’

‘If that’s your way,’ said Ferney.

‘I’m a historian. You say you’re, well, history itself, I suppose. Maybe I could ask you some questions.’

‘You could, but it wouldn’t help.’

‘Why not?’

‘Everything you know came from a book, right?’

‘That’s putting it a bit too simply.’

‘It came from someone else’s knowledge. Doesn’t really matter if they wrote it down or they told you. You didn’t invent it.’

‘Your point is?’

‘You could ask me a question and if I give you the answer you want then you’d just think I’d read it too. Chances are, though, I wouldn’t give you the answer you want.
I’ve pretty much always been a countryman, mostly round here. A few times history came marching right through here, through the forest tracks. A lot of blood got spilt here. Sometimes it was
mine. Mostly, though, we only saw the small stuff of history. No one told us much. We heard rumours. People told tales. Maybe they were right, maybe they were wrong. When they were right maybe
that’s not the way history wrote it down, because we both know that depends on who’s telling the story. But that’s not the main point. Even if you asked me a hundred questions and
I gave you all the right answers it wouldn’t make any difference.’

‘Why do you say that?’

‘Because you
can’t
believe. You don’t
want
to believe. It’s not in your
interests
to believe.’

‘You’re right, I don’t believe this, I really don’t. You believe it if you want, but I need evidence.’

‘Mike,’ said Gally, ‘calm down.’

‘No, leave him be,’ said Ferney. ‘I can see how it must feel.’ He pondered. ‘You don’t want evidence. You’d just want more and more and if you ever did
believe it would be worse for you.’

‘I’m sorry,’ Mike said, ‘I know you’re by yourself. I’m sure all this makes you feel better, but it’s not all right by me, not at all. It’s
messing us around and you’ve got no right to do that.’

‘I’m not messing anyone around,’ said Ferney firmly. ‘I’m just saying what’s got to be said. You came here because she brought you here and you can’t
turn the clock back so it’s best you understand it. Anyway, she needs it. You must want her to be happy.’

‘Of course I do.’

‘Was she happy before she came here?’

‘That’s . . . that’s our business.’

Ferney snorted. ‘I know about nightmares. I know what lies at their roots. Now, come with me, I’ve got something to show you.’

‘What?’ said Mike, but Ferney just walked past him out of the room. Gally beckoned. ‘Come on,’ she said.

Mike turned on her. ‘Why do you do that? You’re just encouraging it.’

‘No, I’m not,’ she said, startled. ‘But surely you’re not going to stay here?’

‘Whatever he’s going to show us now,’ said Mike emphatically, ‘it won’t prove a damned thing.’

Ferney went in front of them down the corridor to the room of books at the end where the painting hung and pointed at it. ‘Have another look at that for a minute,’ he said.
‘Painted by a good painter, that was.’

He left them standing in front of it, Mike peering again at the dark, grimy surface.

‘Stand back,’ suggested Gally. ‘It’s easier.’ She could see that this time he was picking up the shapes and knew at least there would be no more argument about the
stone now that he’d seen a historical source of the sort he could understand. The picture’s importance came to her, direct and personal. It was the first proper image, the first time
there had been something to pass on down the years, the first window on their past that was more than memory. She tried to stare through the dirt at the dim outline of the couple by the door. It
was too hard for her in Mike’s presence and she could feel nothing. She thought perhaps that was all Ferney had brought them to see, but it was only meant to serve as a waiting-room. He came
back in through the door clutching a large cylindrical object shrouded in a piece of sheet and laid it carefully on the table.

‘You’ve got the ring still,’ he said to Gally, and she nodded. ‘I want you to have this, to look after it. Keep it to yourselves or there’ll be never-ending
questions. I’ve got nowhere for it to go for safety after I die.’ He looked at Mike. ‘Do you promise?’ Mike shrugged. ‘Do you?’ insisted Ferney and Mike nodded
curtly.

Ferney looked at Gally. ‘You described the drum, Monmouth’s drum. Do you remember?’

‘I think so.’ She shivered.

‘Don’t worry. I think I know what the rest of your fear is now. I can help you. Describe it again, just the way you see it in your head.’

‘Blue, dirty and damaged, with a gold lion and a unicorn.’

He pulled the sheet off and what was revealed had age encrusted on it in undeniable witness. It was a drum, once dark blue or black perhaps, with a red, yellow and gold crest, cut across, grimy
and partly worn away on one side. The skin on top was cracked and flaking and the hoops and clamps were tarnished silver, but the gold was recognizably royal – a rearing lion, a shield
surmounted by a crown and most of a unicorn, reduced by time’s damage to a mere horse, a dark, rubbed dent across where its horn had been.

It scared the hell out of Gally.

‘It’s Monmouth’s drum,’ Ferney said and Mike, instead of scoffing, gently put out a hand to it, recognizing a pedigree which would not allow disbelief.

‘How did you find it?’ he said.

‘I hid it in the first place. Gally and I. We put it up under the thatch.’

‘What thatch?’

‘The thatch that used to be on your house. Two hundred years ago. His Dutchman, the gun man, had been carrying it. They left it.’

‘The museum told us it was found there. They said there was armour too.’

‘The thatcher came when I wasn’t expecting him. I’d meant to move it first but he found it and I had to make out I hadn’t known it was there. I got it back in the
end.’

‘When was this?’

‘I don’t know quite. Gladstone had just quit being prime minister.’

‘Eighteen ninety-four,’ said Mike.

‘If you say so.’

‘A hundred and six years ago?’

Ferney nodded. Mike sighed. ‘Just explain, will you? You must have . . . well . . . died after that?’

‘In 1907. I was halfway through a book,
Kipps
it was, by H. G. Wells. I’ve never got round to finishing it.’

‘So what did you do with the drum?’

‘Put it back in my roof again.’

‘It was
your
house then?’

‘We’ve usually contrived to have it one way or another.’

‘So why isn’t it still yours?’

‘Lawyers. It all went a bit wrong. Next time round someone else was in it.’

‘How did you get the drum back?’

‘I got it out when I heard Effie Mullard was having it all slated. I went in when she wasn’t there.’

‘And now you want us to look after it and keep it quiet?’

Ferney’s look said it was Gally he’d had in mind but he just nodded.

‘Historians should be able to see this,’ said Mike forcefully. ‘I’m sure it’s unique. I don’t think it should be tucked away.’

‘One thing I’ve learnt,’ said Ferney. ‘You say too much and people start asking so many questions. There’s no end to them. If there’s something big at stake,
money or whatever, they’ll never leave it until they’ve unravelled you. Best to keep quiet. Mind you, I don’t listen to my own advice. If I’d kept quiet down at the road
when they found Gally’s bones, you wouldn’t . . .’