The Ghost Tree: Gripping historical fiction from the Sunday Times Bestseller

7

Timothy’s sister, April, was waiting for him in the White Hart, a glass of shandy before her on the table, a bottle of lager for him. She looked up as he walked in. ‘Did you get in?’

‘Nope! She’s changed the locks.’

‘I told you she would. You should have taken everything while you had the chance.’

He sat down opposite her and reached for the bottle, twisting off the cap. Taking a large gulp, he wiped the foam from his lip with his sleeve. ‘We’ve got most of the valuable stuff anyway. Do you want to get me another one?’

‘Not particularly.’ She was very like him to look at; the same skin, the same colour of hair, but while his eyes were brown hers were hazel. She studied his face closely. ‘You look rattled.’

‘There was someone else there. A big bloke. Some kind of minder.’

She scowled. ‘Never mind. You don’t need to go there again. We got what we came for: the old man’s cash, jewellery, silver. Now you can sit back and wait for the house to fall into your lap.’ She took a sip from her glass.

He noticed the packet of crisps at her elbow and reached across for it. ‘But she’s obviously gone to the solicitor.’

‘Of course she has. He will have contacted her the moment he received the new will.’

‘Doesn’t it worry you?’

‘No. It’s your word against hers. She hasn’t seen her father for years.’

‘What about the DNA?’

She gave a grim smile. ‘You got it, didn’t you? The swab from the old man’s mouth.’

Timothy grimaced. ‘Disgusting.’

‘Proof!’ She smiled at him. ‘Just don’t lose it.’

She reached into her pocket. ‘I’ve been going through some of the stuff you brought back.’ She brought out a small cotton bag and tipped half a dozen rings into the palm of her hand.

‘Don’t!’ Timothy let out a cry of alarm. ‘For God’s sake, April. Someone will see.’

‘Shut up, you numpty. You’re just drawing attention to us.’ She rattled her two hands together then opened them with a smile of triumph as if she had produced the rings out of thin air. ‘These are nice. Gold, rubies, diamonds. Victorian, I should say. Not worth a lot these days, but better than a slap in the face. Eighteen carat. They’ll melt down well if nothing else.’

They both looked down at her hands. She reached for one of the rings and slid it onto her little finger. It wouldn’t go over her knuckle. ‘They must have had tiny hands in those days,’ she said critically. She shivered suddenly and plucked the ring off. ‘It doesn’t feel right. Been on a dead person, I reckon. That’s why I hate second-hand stuff.’ She tipped the rings back in the bag and pulled the cord round its neck to tighten it. ‘Best move these on as soon as.’

Timothy frowned. ‘We can’t risk it. Not yet. Ruth might be able to identify it. Just sit on it for a bit. All of it.’ He helped himself to a handful of crisps. ‘What is it? What’s wrong?’ She was staring down at her hand, lying on the bag.

She shuddered visibly. ‘I told you. Someone walked on my grave.’

He laughed. ‘Stupid mare. I tell you, if you want something spooky, it’s that house. It gave me the creeps, there on my own with that old boy. He talked to people I couldn’t see. He thought his wife was there with him. He told me she didn’t like me. He told me to go away. Then he thought there was someone else there. Her grandfather or someone. He was scared of him. Terrified. He kept saying he was sorry. What?’ He realised April was staring at him, her eyes wide with horror.

‘I’m not handling these.’ She pushed the bag of rings away from her. ‘There’s something bad going on with these. I reckon we should bail. Go somewhere else. I do not want to be landed with a haunted house.’

‘Stupid!’ Timothy glared at her witheringly. ‘Not after all the trouble I’ve been to. We’ve done the hard bit now. As you say, we’ve just got to wait.’ He reached out for the bag and stuffed it into his pocket. ‘I need a proper drink.’ He climbed to his feet and went over to the bar. ‘Two large gins,’ he said to the girl behind the till, ‘and two hot pies when you’re ready.’

Ruth stood looking up at the great crown steeple of St Giles’ cathedral. It had been so vivid in her dream, the silhouette against the stormy evening sky, the small boy alone in the crowded street. She shivered. It had been uncannily real.

Number 26 was claustrophobic now, and lonely without her father there. Or Fin or Hattie. She hadn’t been able to stand it this morning when she woke. A walk had seemed a good idea, especially now the locks had been changed and she wasn’t afraid Timothy would sneak in behind her. She hadn’t planned to come here to the Royal Mile, but that was where she ended up, standing staring at the place where Thomas had seen a murder. And a ghost. And it was her Thomas, her five-times great-grandfather, she was sure of that now. The names fitted, the names she had heard shouted out in her other dream, the dream of three excited, happy boys on holiday.

She looked round. This iconic street, stretching along Edinburgh’s spine, from the castle to Holyrood Palace, was similar to her fleeting memory, but the booths had gone now of course; the images in her dream were like old photographic negatives, the buildings taller, more crowded, the people wearing darker clothes, the women in long skirts and shawls, carts, horses. The parliament building, and the Old Tolbooth near it, shadowy backdrops to the drama in the street.

Slowly she walked on. Thomas had lived at the top of a lofty tenement in somewhere called South Gray’s Close. She glanced at the address on the piece of paper in her hand. She had looked it up on the Internet that morning. It was next to the Museum of Childhood. The actual building in which he had lived had long ago disappeared, it seemed, but there had been a plaque there once, marking the place where Tom and his brother Henry had been born. She came to a halt outside the entrance to the close. There was the rounded archway. Did she remember that from her dream? She thought so, but more than that, she wasn’t sure. Everything had been dark then, save for the warm rooms briefly lit by the setting sun before the black rain clouds had swept in. There was graffiti now where, presumably, the plaque had once been. The memory of Thomas and his family in Gray’s Close had vanished with her dream.

On her return to Number 26 Ruth went back to her slim file of notes and the Internet. She moved the cursor across to the portrait of Thomas and studied it carefully. He had short wavy dark hair and deep-set piercing eyes. The reproduction was poor; it was dark and hard to make out the detail. She clicked on it. The picture had been painted by Thomas Lawrence in 1802, when Thomas was fifty-two years old.

Sitting back in her chair she thought for a moment, then she rummaged in the zipped pocket of her bag for the portrait miniature. Was it him? The face staring out at her was very different to the arrogant, powerful, quite modern face on the screen. For a start the man in the miniature was wearing an old-fashioned white powdered wig; he was half smiling and he appeared to be very young. She narrowed her eyes, holding it under the light. The glass reflected badly and the picture was, she realised now, very crude in its execution. She dipped back into her bag to bring out the locket. The lock of hair could have belonged to anyone. A woman? Someone from another family altogether? She ran her finger across the glass. She badly wanted to touch the hair. The small oval of glass which held it in place felt loose. She squinted at it, angling it this way and that under the light. Could she prise it off? And if she did, would the hair reveal in some mysterious way the identity of its owner?

She picked up the miniature again, wondering why she assumed everything she had found was to do with that one man, as if he was the only ancestor her mother had. But that was her father’s fault, she realised. He was the one with the obsession. It was as if the name, the title, had got under his skin as a personal insult.

Whoever the lock of hair and the miniature had belonged to they had been very precious. With a shiver she dropped them on the table. The thought that the touch of that hair might directly link her to the person from whose head it had been taken felt suddenly like witchcraft.

8

James Reid showed Ruth into his office and pulled out the chair for her. ‘I have news for you,’ he said as he sat down opposite her. ‘I am pretty sure your Mr Bradford is a fake.’ He smiled triumphantly. ‘I called the firm who appeared to have drawn up your father’s new will. Cautiously, you understand. There’s a certain procedure to be followed here. The name at the bottom of the will is that of a genuine solicitor and I asked to speak to her. It turns out she’s away on maternity leave. She wasn’t working when the will was drawn up and when contacted she had never heard of Timothy Bradford or your father, and neither, incidentally, had the young man who is filling in for her.’

‘Oh, thank goodness!’ Ruth couldn’t hold back her exclamation of relief. James Reid’s phone call that morning had filled her with foreboding.

He took off his spectacles and rubbed them thoughtfully with a handkerchief. ‘That would seem to be the end of your problem, but it leaves one or two unanswered questions. Firstly, is it possible that Bradford actually is your father’s son? And secondly, whether he is or not, if he has stolen property from your father’s house you would want it back.’ He put his glasses back on. ‘In the case of the first problem, you would probably be quite happy if he disappeared and was never seen again, thereby proving he is a liar. In the second, I’m sure you would prefer to retrieve your mother’s possessions if it’s at all possible before he disappears forever. Either way, he is almost certainly a thief and you are entitled to call in the police.’

Ruth slumped back in her chair. ‘How would we find him?’

‘There’s an address on the will. I doubt if it’s real, but it must provide some way of contacting him about his supposed inheritance.’ He looked down at the papers in front of him. ‘It’s my belief that we’re dealing here with a man of fairly limited intelligence. He must have realised that we would find out the will was a fake almost at once.’

‘But he didn’t know there was anyone to query it,’ Ruth pointed out.

‘That’s true,’ James said slowly. ‘So, what would you like me to do?’

‘How long have we got before he gets suspicious?’ Ruth leaned forward, her brow furrowed. ‘I want him to go away; I want him to leave me alone; but I don’t want to spook him into destroying anything he might have taken. To be honest, I really don’t know if he’s taken anything at all; that’s the problem. I remember my mother mentioning pictures and portraits and silver, and there’s nothing like that in the house. But it could have been my father who got rid of them.’ She looked at him helplessly.

‘But from what you told me, you suspect your father didn’t get rid of anything.’ His voice was gentle; thoughtful. ‘Not permanently. He merely locked it all away.’

She bit her lip sadly. ‘Mummy had a jewel box she kept on her dressing table. She never wore anything out of it, or opened it at all, as far as I know, except when I was very little. When Daddy was out, she sometimes let me try on her rings and bangles. There’s no sign of the box in the house.’

He made a note.

‘Where is it he says he lives? He did mention once that he had a sister. It could be her house.’

‘If I tell you, you won’t go there, will you? I don’t want you getting hurt.’ James reached for the file.

She smiled. ‘No, I won’t go there. I don’t want to spook him, as I said.’

He studied the letter in front of him. ‘He gives a mobile telephone number as his contact and an address in Muirhouse.’

‘Where’s that?’

‘North Edinburgh. Parts of it are pretty rough.’

‘As I said, I don’t plan on going there. So, what do I do now?’

‘That’s up to you. If our suspicions are correct, he’s committed – at the very least – fraud, forgery and theft. I think we should inform the police as soon as possible. They can then search his house.’

‘Can I think about it?’

He nodded. ‘Don’t take too long.’

The sound of the doorbell pealing through the empty house nearly gave Ruth heart failure. Sally Laidlaw was standing on the step, an umbrella open above her head. Rain was bouncing off it and splashing down onto the doorstep. ‘I wondered if you would like to come over and have a cup of tea. This house must be sorely cold and drear.’ Sally hesitated. ‘It’s warmer next door, and I’ve been baking.’ She peered past Ruth. ‘Has Timothy gone?’

The difference in the two houses was unimaginable. Sally’s was bright and warm and full of colour and in the background Ruth could hear a radio playing. Shedding her raincoat in the hall, she followed her hostess into the kitchen. It had the same high ceiling as Number 26, the same windows looking out onto a narrow garden, but there the similarity ended. The room was lined with pale blue fitments with granite tops; it was immaculate, the small central table adorned with an oilcloth covered with cornflowers and in the middle a jug full of Michaelmas daisies. ‘Sit you down.’ Sally indicated one of the two chairs by the table. She turned off the radio and switched on the kettle. ‘You’ll have a piece?’ She produced a sticky gingerbread loaf with a pat of butter, closely followed by a pot of tea. ‘I’m thinking your house must be very sad,’ she said at last as she sat down opposite Ruth. She glanced up. ‘Were you planning to keep it when the will is sorted?’

‘I don’t think so. You’re right: it is too sad. It needs someone new to do it up and bring some happiness back there,’ Ruth sighed.

‘Is Timothy coming back?’

‘I hope not.’ Ruth gave a tentative smile.

‘I didn’t take to him,’ Sally said succinctly.

‘No, neither did I. Can I ask you,’ Ruth leaned forward anxiously, ‘how long was he here, do you remember?’

‘Ages. He visited your father regularly, once a week or so to start with, then twice, then one day he moved in. I asked your father if he was happy with the arrangement and he said yes.’ She tightened her lips in obvious disapproval. ‘I don’t know if you remember, but I was good friends with your darling mother. I had no truck with the way your father treated her, I don’t mind telling you, but after she died I kept an eye on him, you know? For her sake.’

Ruth took a deep breath. ‘He barely recognised me when I arrived.’ She gave a sad little smile. ‘I don’t know if he told you anything about Timothy,’ she went on, ‘but a will has turned up claiming my father left him the house and everything in it.’ She scanned the other woman’s face, waiting for a reaction, and was reassured to see first disbelief then anger there.

‘He would have wanted no such thing.’ Sally scowled. ‘If he signed that will, he didn’t know what he was doing. It is my opinion the man forged his signature. He had enough time to practise!’

‘My solicitor thinks it’s a forgery, but of course he has to take it seriously until we can prove otherwise. Timothy is claiming,’ Ruth rushed on, ‘to be my father’s son.’

Sally stared at her in blank astonishment. ‘No.’ She repeated firmly, ‘No, absolutely not.’

‘Dad never mentioned that he had a by-blow somewhere?’

‘No. Your father worshipped your mother in his own way, Ruth. She was his first and only love. He was a bully and controlling and even cruel without realising it himself, but he would never have had another woman. If he had, he would have confessed to your mother on his knees and she would have told me, I am certain of it.’ She paused for several seconds, as if questioning her own statement. ‘Yes, she would. She talked to me often, Ruth. She had no one else to confide in.’ She leaned forward anxiously. ‘I’m not criticising you, dear, by saying that. I understand perfectly why you didn’t want to come here.’

Ruth said nothing.

‘Your mother and I were quite close,’ Sally went on at last. ‘I used to tell her to leave him but of course she wouldn’t. She loved him.’

‘You knew about his problems with her family background?’ Ruth said cautiously.

‘Oh yes.’ Sally laughed. ‘Most people are afraid of reds under the bed; in your father’s case it was the lords he found in her pedigree. It was ludicrous! They were so far back, she told me, and I met her parents, your grandparents, and they were lovely, I don’t have to tell you that. They were simple, kind folk. I liked them so much when they came to see Lucy. Anyone more unassuming you couldn’t find. But then he didn’t like their faith either; he had no time for God and your grandfather being a vicar and English was too much for him.’ She laughed. ‘It was all so illogical. The Erskines are a Scots family, obviously, but here was his wife, sounding as English as they come, from down south. But she was descended from this man who was Lord Chancellor. He pictured the man in the great wig, draped in golden robes, and he had him down in his head as a rampant Tory, though Lucy told me he was a Whig.’ She looked worried suddenly. ‘She had the second sight. You knew that about your mother, didn’t you?’

Ruth looked doubtful. ‘I knew she liked crystals and things. We didn’t talk about it much. Childish and naive and self-deluding were the words Daddy used when I was a child.’

‘He was afraid.’ Sally clamped her lips shut and there was a moment’s silence.

‘Do you believe in it all?’ Ruth asked cautiously.

‘I have never seen anything myself, but I believe she did. And his being scornful of her did nothing to stop it happening to her. She told me she used to summon the spirits when she was a child; she used to encourage all the things that happened to her. Then when she met your father she realised it wasn’t normal and she became terribly upset. She was torn in two.’

Ruth glanced across at her miserably. ‘I didn’t help. I didn’t understand what was happening, then when I was older I just began to hate him because he made her life a misery. I left home as soon as I could.’

‘Don’t feel guilty. It was a complex relationship. As a child, you couldn’t have hoped to understand what was happening.’

‘Can I ask you something?’ Ruth found she liked this woman and she trusted her. ‘In spite of all his threats, Daddy kept all my mother’s things. He locked them upstairs in the spare room cupboards. Her clothes and family items, which I thought he’d made her get rid of. I thought he’d burnt them all. That’s what he told me, but he hadn’t.’ She hesitated. ‘Timothy appears to have gone through it all pretty thoroughly. I think he has taken some of it away.’