She crouched beside him and stared. ‘It looks like old brick.’
‘It is.’ He smiled up at her. ‘Well, tiles, actually. This house is supposed to have medieval foundations, and this is the old floor.’
She knelt to touch the red tiles. ‘I had no idea the house was that old. They are beautiful. Can we expose them and use them, do you think?’ She glanced up. ‘Do you mind my asking? Is it true that you have a degree?’
‘I have.’
‘Am I allowed to ask what in?’
‘History of Architecture.’ He frowned. She had touched on forbidden territory.
She retreated to more neutral ground. ‘So, you would know if we have to report it or anything?’
He relaxed. ‘Yes, I would know.’
Encouraged, she dared to ask the question she had been brooding on. ‘I am going to be nosy. Can I ask why, if you have an architecture degree, you are working on my kitchen?’
He shrugged. ‘It’s a job.’
‘Not a very academic one.’
‘I’m not an academic.’ He picked up the trowel with which he had been digging. ‘Did you mention a cup of tea?’
‘You know I did not.’ She smiled again. ‘But I can take a hint.’
It was half past two in the morning when she was awakened by the sound of shouting. Struggling up from an exhausted sleep, she stared round the room, disorientated. It was silent now, but she was sure the noise hadn’t been part of her dream. Climbing out of bed, she tiptoed to the door and listened. The cottage was completely silent. Outside the open window she heard the call of an owl hunting along the hedge behind the hollyhocks, then all was silent again as the smell of roses drifted up to her.
Pulling open the door as silently as she could, she stepped out onto the landing and crept on bare feet to the top of the stairs. The tiny hairs on her arms, she realised suddenly, were standing on end and she shivered in spite of the warmth of the night.
She could see the moonlight shining from the window of the dining room across the black chasm of the floor and out across the hall towards the staircase. The silence was suddenly oppressive. She took a deep breath and, plucking up courage, forced herself to go down. At the bottom she stopped again, staring into the room as she realised that there was an indistinct figure standing by the fireplace. She stared at it in astonishment.
‘Edwin?’ Her voice came out as a breathless croak.
The figure turned to face her and she was conscious of the pale, drawn face, gentle grey eyes and the worn brown jerkin. Then, as she watched, the figure seemed to fade and disappear. Not Edwin, but someone so like him.
For a moment, total silence still surrounded her, then she became aware of the usual cottage noises. The clock in the hall was ticking, she could hear a tap dripping from the kitchen and suddenly, from the window, came the pure delicate notes of a nightingale.
Abruptly, she sat down on the stairs and buried her face in her arms. She was shaking but it was, she realised, with shock rather than fear. There had been nothing at all frightening about him.
‘I’m dreaming.’ She spoke the words out loud. Taking a deep breath, she stood up and went to the door of the dining room. It was completely empty, the moonlight lying like a silver carpet over the dust and bricks and soil and scatter of tools. She took a few steps into the room, looking round. The figure had been standing in front of the fireplace, staring down into the earth in front of him. She looked down as well. There was nothing there.
When Edwin arrived next morning she was in her office on the telephone. She stood looking down at him as he walked up the path from his van, her concentration only half on what she was saying. Without realising it, she shivered.
When she finally went downstairs, half the floor had been uncovered.
‘Good morning.’ He smiled at her without stopping work.
‘Edwin.’ She hesitated. The face in her dream – if it was a dream – was still haunting her, but how could she admit to dreaming about someone who looked so like him?
‘How long do you think it will take?’ she finished lamely.
‘Not long.’
And with that she had to be content.
Three nights later she was woken up again by the sound of laughter and shouting from downstairs. She stared round in the darkness. There was no moon tonight and she could hear the gentle patter of rain on the roses below her window, filling her room with the sweet scent of wet earth. She lay still for a few seconds, her heart thumping with fear, then slowly and unwillingly she sat up, swinging her legs over the side of the bed.
At the door she paused and frowned. She could smell beer. The sound of talk and laughter grew louder and she could hear the clinking of glasses coming from the dining room.
Creeping downstairs, she tiptoed across the hall and, taking a deep breath, she pushed open the door.
The silence was immediate and total. The room was empty.
She stepped in and looked round. It was as Edwin had left it. The floor was finished and neatly swept, the walls stripped and the window frames repaired. All that remained to be done was to fix the chimney and paper the room before the arrival of the Aga and the sink and the old dresser she had found in the antique shop in the village.
Reaching for the light switch, she turned it on. The smell of beer had completely gone.
‘Do you think Fen Cottage was ever a pub?’ she asked Julie when she met her in the village shop that morning. Edwin had gone to fetch a load of bricks.
‘I’ve never heard it was. Why?’ Julie was stacking her purchases into a basket.
Roz shrugged. ‘Just something I heard.’
‘It was an inn, yes,’ Edwin said later. He sat back on his heels for a moment, a wedge of pale lime mortar on his trowel. ‘A couple of hundred years ago. Why?’ He looked at her hard.
She shrugged. ‘I just wondered.’
When she heard the sounds again that night she almost didn’t go down. She lay for five minutes, her head under the pillow, then reluctantly she climbed to her feet.
This time the noise did not stop as she pushed open the door. The room was full of people. She saw the smoke from the fire, and from the men’s clay pipes. She saw the bar and the plump red-faced woman pulling beer from a barrel set up behind it. She saw the pretty fair-haired barmaid sashaying between the drinkers, squealing as they flirted with her, slapping back their impertinent hands. And she saw the man she had seen before.
He was standing, his back to the wall near the roaring fire, his eyes fixed on the girl. As Roz watched, he slipped his hand into his pocket and brought something out. A small silver charm on a thin, filigree chain. She saw him catch the girl’s hand as she whisked past him and she saw him speak, his longing clear in every movement of his body as he shyly pressed the charm into her hand. As the girl glanced down at it she saw the love and hope in the young man’s eyes.
Then the girl laughed. She tossed her pretty curls and flounced her hips and tucked the charm back into his pocket.
He looked stunned. As Roz watched, he stepped away from the wall, his face scarlet with embarrassment as the jeers of the other drinkers told him they had missed nothing of the exchange. With one quick gesture he snatched the charm out of his pocket and threw it into the fire, then he turned and walked out of the door into the lane.
As the door banged shut, Roz found herself standing in the silent cottage staring into an empty room.
That evening, Bob dropped by to lend her a catalogue of light fittings and they went out onto the terrace to have a glass of wine. ‘I hear you were asking about the house’s history,’ he said. ‘You were right, it was a pub. And there is a story to go with it. One of the village men went away to London and made his fortune. He came back and fell in love with the barmaid here. She rejected him and the story goes he went out and hanged himself.’ He took a sip of wine and then caught sight of her face. ‘Sorry, Roz. Perhaps you would rather not have known.’
‘No.’ She turned away so he couldn’t see the tears in her eyes. ‘No, I’m glad you told me.’
The next morning she asked Edwin if he had heard the story. As he turned away from repointing the chimney, she watched his face intently. He stood still for a moment staring into the distance, then slowly he shrugged. ‘Yes, I think I might have heard it somewhere.’
And that was all.
