Read Online The Unquiet House by Alison Littlewood - Free Book Online Page B

need a couple of days; they said it’s fine.’
    ‘A couple of days? Charlie, I don’t—’
    ‘Well, you have them if you need them.’
    She paused, then said, ‘All right. Thank you. I really don’t know where I’d be if you hadn’t turned up.’
    ‘I do.’ He glanced towards the stairs and gave a rueful smile. ‘It’s not worth thinking about. Look, just relax. I’ll stick around for a bit, make sure you’re okay.’
    She took a deep breath. ‘You don’t have to – if you need to go, it’s fine. Something like that couldn’t happen twice, after all – anyway, I’ll make sure it doesn’t.’
    ‘I know.’ He spoke more softly. ‘But I
want
to, Emma. I don’t like to think about what might have happened if— but then, I suppose someone from work would have come looking for you.’
    ‘Maybe. They don’t even know I’ve moved, not yet. They will, of course.’
    ‘You’re staying here, then? Even after—’
    ‘Of course. It was just an accident. It could have happened anywhere.’ But it
hadn’t
happened anywhere. It had been here, in the house she loved. She frowned, thinking of the people who had drifted from her life, the ones who couldn’t come to help her any longer. She smiled back at Charlie. ‘Of course, it would be nice if you wanted to stay around a little longer. It’d be a pleasure to have you.’

CHAPTER TWELVE
    Emma stared at the place where she had seen the man standing, watching her in the night. She was no longer sure she’d seen anything but a shadow, but still, on some level, the thought of him was with her all of the time. She realised she had been skirting it like a bad memory, walking around that piece of floor as if there was something wrong with it, or as if the air had gone bad,
something
. There was no one there and yet look how carefully she had been avoiding that
no one
with her gaze. She hadn’t opened the cupboard door yet either. She was being fanciful and she didn’t care.
    Everything else was coming together, though, forming around her: dust and shadows were being replaced by smooth gleaming paint; the vision she’d had of the place was beginning to emerge. Everything she did looked as if it had meant to be that way, as if it
belonged
, and as she thought of the word it felt full of promise, drifting through her mind, bringing comfort as, somewhere, Charlie began to sing.
    She went to the window and looked out across the lawn and into the lane beyond. She had barely left the house since she’d moved in. She’d decided to take some time off work after all. She was so close to the rest of the world and yet she felt enclosedhere, safe. Peaceful. Then she looked down and saw the man standing in her garden.
    She froze. His back was turned but she knew it was him, the same man she’d seen in the night. He had found his suit. The greasy shine of the fabric was even more obvious in the daylight, as were the places it had worn thin. It looked a little too small, and he had one hand in his jacket pocket, stretching the fabric even more thinly across his back. In the other hand he held a thick black stick. As she watched, he raised it a couple of inches before banging it down again into the ground. He looked as if he was watching for someone coming down the lane, someone he didn’t like.
    For a moment she thought of Charlie, playing a practical joke maybe, then she heard his voice, so close she felt his warm breath on her ear: ‘Who’s that?’
    She jumped. ‘You see him?’
    ‘Of course I see him. What’s he doing on your lawn? Is he a neighbour or something?’
    ‘I don’t think so.’ Somehow she didn’t think that was it. The man was from here,
of
here. She could sense it.
    ‘I’ll go and ask him.’
    By the time she’d taken in the words and whirled around, Charlie had already gone. His footsteps were on the stairs and she went after him, half feeling as if she was chasing nothing but a dream, the ghost of a sound; that it was Charlie, after all,