The Stranger in Our Home. Sophie Draper

       CHAPTER 3

      The M1 stretched out in front of me – endless tarmac, sweeping clouds, the trees bordering the roadside skeletal black. London was behind me. It hadn’t taken so long to leave.

      It should have surprised me, the ease with which I’d turned my back on so many years in London. Except it did not. Never mind Paul, it was as if I’d been waiting for an excuse, my sudden inheritance prodding my inertia. I’d been in London seven years – didn’t they say that life moves in cycles of seven years?

      It wasn’t like anyone was going to miss me. Not Paul at any rate. He and I were done and I certainly wasn’t going to miss him. I missed Harriet, though – I’d just started to get to know her. We’d met at my first public exhibition. She’d been loud and brash and I’d been quiet and shy. She’d made me laugh and she’d said my paintings made her cry. She’d been the voice of reason telling me to get out of there when things had gone so badly with Paul. Her generosity and kindness when I’d needed somewhere to go wasn’t something I was used to. I’d never told her about Larkstone.

      She’d been full of remorse over her job in Germany.

      ‘I can’t leave you like this,’ she’d said.

      ‘Yes, you can,’ I replied. ‘Absolutely, you can. I got out of there and I have a new life. You’ve been amazing, but now it’s your turn to follow your dreams.’

      Harriet had been offered a job in a gallery in Berlin, a chance to experience a new country, to take her own work in a different direction – how could she turn that down? Perhaps that was why the time was right. I had a few friends, work contacts, fellow artists I’d met like Harriet, but no one close. I liked it like that. In an odd sort of way, I was glad she was gone. It was easier keeping people at a distance. I completely understood why Steph had ended up in New York and had never wanted to go back to Derbyshire.

      But meeting and getting to know Harriet had made me think. She wasn’t afraid to start again. To brave a new life, to put the past behind her. Leaving the noise and traffic of London felt to me like a snake shedding its old dead skin. I’d packed up everything I had, handed in Harriet’s keys, and here I was, on my way to Derbyshire. I had a new commission to work on as well as the house clearance and, for the moment at least, it was to be my new home.

      I lifted my back, flicking on the windscreen wipers as sleet began to slap against the car windows.

      Eventually, I turned onto the dual carriageway that led into Derby. The sleet and rain had stopped and there was a break in the clouds through which the sun shone, lighting up the roofs of the houses. The city was a tangle of incomprehensible ring roads and roadworks, but twenty minutes later I was free of it, heading down country lanes, chasing the shadows of the growing dusk.

      The village of Larkstone was quiet, a few rainbow Christmas lights blinking on the street. I drove slowly, looking for the right turning back into the countryside. A couple of pedestrians dived across the road, heads bowed against the wind. It was even colder now that the brief sun was lower in the sky.

      Someone beeped from behind. A man in a muddy jeep. He was far too close. He beeped again. I touched the brake pedal, enough to trigger the lights. It had the desired effect. In the mirror, I saw his hands gripping the steering wheel, his face scowling. A woman on the street stopped as our two cars drove past. Her expression was fierce, it took me aback, until she broke into a smile, waving at the man in the jeep. I carried on. I felt a surge of satisfaction as the jeep was forced to follow me out of the village, tailing me for a couple of miles until I slowed for the house. The jeep growled up a gear, swerving around me as it accelerated away and down the lane.

      The house was at the end of a track, on a hill overlooking the valley. Tall chimneys stood proud against an unexpected blazing sunset sky. I peered through the windscreen, my teeth catching on my lower lip.

      It was a tall building, hewn from thick Derbyshire stone, part farmhouse, part fortified manor house. The second-floor windows were tucked in under the eaves and one small attic window peeped out from the tiles above. All the windows were an empty black, save for a glint of red at the top where the last rays of the sun reflected off the glass. A low wall enclosed the front courtyard and two semi-derelict outbuildings sheltered behind. I drove the car forward the last few metres, its wheels skidding over the gravel, spitting stones as it came to a halt.

      I sat in my seat, watching the last of the daylight playing on the colours in the stone. Already a picture was forming in my head: the house inked out in black lines on its hill, angry colours exploding in the background, windows like bullet holes peppering the walls. My fingers itched to draw. I felt a strange kind of lift. The house, its history, its memories, it was like I needed this. Elizabeth’s death was a fresh start, for me and Steph, and the house.

      I slammed the car door shut and searched in my handbag for the key the lawyers had sent.

      Something soft touched my ankles. I yelped in surprise. It was a cat, her head rubbing against my legs. I reached down and she seemed content to let me draw my fingers through her fur.

      ‘Hello there, Puss.’

      She was small and black, save for a single white sock on her front paw. Half-starved by the look of her. I made to pick her up but that was too much. She skittered away, jumping onto the wall to look at me reproachfully.

      ‘Okay, fair enough,’ I said, fingers finding the keys.

      I swung round towards the house. Water stained the front step and dripped from the leaves of the shrubbery around me. A security light bounced on as I stepped up to the door and the key turned smoothly in the lock. The house, it seemed, didn’t know whether I was friend or foe.

      It smelt stale as I entered. I snapped the switch on the wall. The hallway was instantly familiar, the smell, the clock, the objects around me. The walls were lined with paintings, scenes of rural Derbyshire, the crags at Mam Tor, a pheasant stalking a field; it was all as I remembered, except somehow different. There was a space on the wall marked by a dirty grey outline where a picture had once hung and the hall table with its two drawers was thick with dust – even the cut-glass bowl that sat on top was grimy with dirt. How long had it been like that? Longer than the six or seven weeks since Elizabeth’s death in the middle of October. The house mouldered in genteel neglect and I felt a prickle of unease; my stepmother had been fastidious in her housekeeping when I was younger.

      Two rooms led from each side of the hall and a wide staircase hugged the back elevation. A tall window overlooked the stairwell and my eyes were drawn to the banister above. Its richly polished wood curved up to the first and second floors. A patterned rug sprawled on the stone floor beneath, a rust-red stain at its centre. I felt my chest contract. Why hadn’t someone taken it away? It was a stark reminder of the manner of my stepmother’s death.

      I wondered how she’d fallen. With a piercing scream, or a silent thud? They’d said it had been an accident. Had it been a sleepless night blundering in the dark? No, hadn’t they said morning? I couldn’t imagine how someone could fall over a banister. They’d also said there’d been signs of excess alcohol in her system. When had Elizabeth started to drink? I tried to feel sympathy for her, gawping at the stain, fascination and horror holding me still, the rug a simple testament to Elizabeth’s death.

      I moved forwards, snapping on all the switches I could find, flooding the house with light, determined to chase away the ghosts.

      An hour later the Aga in the kitchen creaked as heat seeped into its old bones. A table dominated the room, perfect for painting. I slung my last box onto the wooden