Daughter of the House

‘Was that a comfort to you?’

He nodded. ‘Yes. Oh yes, it was the greatest comfort. But that was all she said, even though I stood for hours in the same place, waiting and hoping. Since that night there has been nothing. No word and no sign – except for one significant thing.’

The calculating glance he gave her was at odds with his grieving demeanour and her sympathy faded.

‘What is that?’

‘I was invited at the last moment to attend the Schools Match by my godson, the child of an old friend, a young man thoughtful in his efforts to lift me out of my sorrow. I almost didn’t go, but I didn’t want to reject a kindness.’

‘You introduced us.’ Eliza recalled the plump boy’s merriment.

‘I did. And there at Lord’s I saw your daughter again. Mrs Wix, I could only interpret such a coincidence as no coincidence at all, but a sign from Helena.’

‘My daughter?’

‘Yes. You know that Nancy has unusual psychic powers?’

This must stop immediately, Eliza thought. She stood up, stretching to her full height.

‘To encounter people by chance at a public-school cricket match is not a sign of any kind. My daughter is thirteen years old. She has no powers. I don’t want you to speak of her in relation to your beliefs. I would like you to leave my house now, and never to come here again.’

A spasm of pain darted from the small of her back and travelled down her thighs and into her calves, making her gasp. She held on to the back of her chair for support. Lawrence Feather gazed into her face as if he knew and understood what she felt.

He murmured, ‘Thirteen is a crucial age for a young girl. The senses are newly awakened, and the powers are as sharp and subtle as they ever will be. Nancy is a clairvoyant and precognisant, I knew it the instant I saw her in the saloon of the hotel.’

Eliza straightened as the pain released her.

‘What tripe.’

‘No, Mrs Wix. Truth. I am certain that Helena intends Nancy to be our channel. I have come here to ask you – to beg you – to let me be your daughter’s control. She could be a great medium some day.’

‘This is impertinent nonsense. Please go now or I shall have to call for help.’

‘You won’t allow me to consult Nancy herself?’

‘Most definitely I will not.’

Downstairs the front door slammed.

Cornelius was at his new place of work, Devil was at the theatre and Arthur was spending the day with a friend. The arrival could only be Nancy herself. Eliza had sent her to the draper’s shop at the far end of the Essex Road to buy a length of tweed for a new winter coat. Eliza had given her some other commissions to attend to on the way back, and she had only let Lawrence Feather into the house in the expectation that he would be long gone by the time Nancy returned.

‘Stay here,’ she ordered, hoping to intercept her daughter and send her straight to her room. But she was too late. Pink-cheeked from the brisk walk, Nancy appeared in the doorway carrying a brown paper parcel tied with string.

‘I have the tweed but Ransom’s is closed today for family reasons, the notice in the window says. Oh.’

‘Good afternoon, Nancy,’ Lawrence Feather said.

Nancy’s stricken expression convinced Eliza that something significant had already taken place between her daughter and the medium. Unwelcome speculations raced through her mind. Nancy’s childhood had been sheltered and – by her parents’ standards – privileged, and she was as innocent as a much younger girl. That was what Eliza and Devil had intended for her, and they had schemed and struggled to make it happen.

Eliza thought quickly. If she dismissed the man now, he would not give up. She imagined him lying in wait for Nancy, watching her movements from a niche across the canal and springing out to seize her by the arm in some deserted street. In her own youth she had suffered a similar attack and the memory of it would never leave her.

It would be better to confront this business. She wished Devil were here, but then Devil’s response would certainly be aggressive and Lawrence Feather might be better handled with greater cunning. Eliza took her seat again. She seemed to consider and then reach a decision.

‘Please join us, Nancy. Mr Feather and I were talking about his sad loss and then a little about his psychic theories.’

She spoke neutrally, as if the theories related to nothing more controversial than gardening or dog breeding.

Nancy obediently sat behind the shelter of the tea table. She glanced from her mother to the visitor.

Feather didn’t hesitate.

‘You will recall what happened on that terrible morning, Nancy, when I found you on the beach?’

Nancy pressed her lips between her teeth. ‘Yes.’

‘I was explaining to your mother that I had already recognised you as one of our number. It is one of my best-developed skills, and a source of particular satisfaction to me, to adopt and encourage new practitioners in the psychic arts.’

Eliza almost smiled. The man was preeningly vain, and his absurdity immediately made him seem less alarming. Nancy was young, but she would surely see that he was ridiculous.

‘That morning we shared a psychic experience, did we not? I told you that you are a seer, and you should not be afraid of your gift.’

‘Is this what happened, Nancy?’

Nancy gave the smallest possible nod. She felt as if she were being goaded into an awkward place between the rock of her mother’s hostility and the chasm of Mr Feather’s horrible powers. Then it came to her, with a surge of rebellion, that neither of them could really know about the Uncanny. Mr Feather might have tipped her deeper into it, with his heavy hand on her head, but he didn’t see inside her. He hadn’t glimpsed the mud and the trees and the shattered men, nor had her mother.

The Uncanny was hers alone. The privacy of it seemed suddenly to be her strength as much as a weakness. At the Lord’s match, she had even established some control over it. She didn’t know what the gift really was or why it had been granted to her, but maybe the man was right. There would be a use for it.

‘What else?’ Eliza asked.

Nancy slowly shook her head.

‘Nothing.’

‘I know you will tell me the truth, Nancy.’

Eliza expected nothing less than absolute candour.

‘There is nothing, Mama.’

Feather put in, ‘Mrs Wix, this is not the place to discuss such matters but I assure you …’

Eliza held up her hand.

‘The psychic arts.’ Her tone was wintry, with mockery in it keen as a blade. ‘Mr Feather has a theory, Nancy. He believes that there are voices from beyond the grave, and it is his work, or profession – he tells me that he is a professional medium – to channel them, as he calls it. It’s in relation to this work that Mr Feather has called today to ask a favour of you.’

‘Of me?’

Eliza was confident now. She had all the ammunition she needed.