Chapter 2 of Inventing Emily

INVENTING EMILY

CHAPTER 2

What did I do to to earn a daughter like Julia? Even as a child everyone used to call her Miss Bossy Boots.
     If you tell Julia something, it's wrong. But if you don't tell her, then she gets on her high horse and start huffing that no one ever tells her anything. Either way, you're going to get slagged off.
     I should have known better than to mention the ghost. It was intended to be lighthearted, something that we could both laugh about, something to defuse the situation. But as usual Julia never listened and jumped to the wrong conclusion. She assumed I was trying to tell her the house was haunted, but nothing could be further from the truth.
     Emily wasn't a real ghost - I invented her. And like so many things, it seemed a good idea at the time.

*
When I was first persuaded to view Carleon House I had no intention of buying it. From the estate agency's spec anyone could tell it was a dump. The only thing going for it was its location.
     I had always dreamed of retiring to the Lizard peninsula in Cornwall. But that dream had usually included a whitewashed cottage in a picturesque fishing village like Cadgwith, or one of those late-Victorian bungalows set high up on the headlands where you could imagine the literary lions of yesteryear gathering on camomile lawns to watch the great square-riggers rounding Lizard Point. My dream had certainly not included a rundown old farmhouse like Carleon House.
     The estate agents car had turned off the Lizard road, heading east parallel with the coast. Shortly after Ruan Minor it turned off again, following the narrow road that led down into Poltesco. Near the bottom was the old mill and the few cottages that made up the hamlet, as tranquil and picturesque as I remembered.
     But then the car had left the road and turned up a bumpy lane behind the wood that overlooked the cottages. There was no trace of tarmac, just twin ruts for the wheels and a grassy strip in the middle which was threatening to remove the car's exhaust. It was a depressing start.
     'The property is at quite tucked away really! Nice and private!' the estate agent said brightly. But that meant nothing. Estate agents never spoke any other way.
     'So who owns this lane?' I said briskly, intent on showing I wasn't a complete idiot. 'Who's responsible for the upkeep? It's going to be very expensive to maintain.'
     But you can never faze an estate agent. 'Oh, it could well be shared,' he said airily. 'There are some fields at the top to which the lane gives access. You may find the local farmer takes care of it as a matter of course.'
     Oh yeah? Since when had farmers taken to doing things for free? They didn't get out of bed unless they got a subsidy.
     'That's National Trust property,' confided the estate agent as the car traversed around behind the wood. He spoke as if he was letting me into a state secret. 'Actually there's a path through it from the house down to Poltesco. Rather pretty in fact. It will be full of wild flowers in spring.'
     No doubt. And a mud-slide in the winter. I knew all about pretty paths.
     Then the house had come into view, located to one side of the lane which continued up the hill. There was a gate set in a high stone Cornish hedge. The gate was chained shut, fastened with a shiny new padlock completely at variance with the rusting junk that could be seen in the courtyard beyond.
     An old pram. A broken fridge. A metal bed end that someone had once used to train tomatoes, now just withered stalks. And it was full of muck and leaves that no one had ever thought about sweeping up. The courtyard was going to be a mud-bath when it rained.
     The house was surrounded by trees. Scrubby trees, with bleached dead branches at the tops where rooks had made their nests.
     'Do rooks cause any damage? They seem very close to the house.'
     The estate agent's reply was as glib as usual.
     'Oh, they could well be beneficial. I believe they eat grubs and such like.' He gave a little laugh. 'Not of course that I'm an expert on such matters.'
     That was understandable. The only rooks he would know anything about was how to rook people into buying old monsters like Carleon House.
     In its day it would have been quite impressive, but that day was long past. The front door would have been quite elegant once, but now the paint was peeling and where the wood had been exposed it had acquired that grey, dead look. The only thing you can do with timber like that is burn it.
     There were sash windows on both sides of the door and three more on the first floor, all in a similar shabby condition. The panes of glass were small, six to a sash, and the glazing bars had that narrow, delicate appearance that indicated the house might have been built in the Georgian period. It seemed criminal that the place had been allowed to get into such a state.
     Julia always maintains that I allow my imagination to run away with me, but be that as it may, as I stood looking up at the frontage of Carleon House I found myself speculating, wondering, where all logic told me the house was a non starter. I could imagine the house done up. It would look quite impressive, a sort of late-eighteenth-century gentleman-farmer's residence. The courtyard would look very grand, especially if it was laid to fresh gravel. A couple of planters, one on each side of the front door. Stone ones, of course. With geraniums. And perhaps some honeysuckle on that wall where it caught the sun...
     The estate agent must have had a radar antenna that could sense a client's moods.
     'The house isn't actually listed,' he said confidentially as he opened the front door. 'Surprising really for a period property of this quality.'
     The inside of the house had a damp, musty smell and there was a mound of junk mail on the hall floor. It was limp and soggy-looking. Obviously we were the first visitors for a very long time. But that came as no surprise.
     The estate agent gathered up the mail and put it in a niche set into the hall wall. Some of the postmarks were very old indeed, and the addressees had long gone. But that's modern immortality - Readers Digest will still be writing to you when you're dead.
     It was difficult to be objective. Just how damp was the house? The musty smell was nothing. That was due to the house not having been aired recently - open the windows and it would be gone in a few days. There was mould on some of the walls as well, but that was caused by the same thing - condensation during the damp Cornish winter. Anybody who lived in Cornwall had to be used to dealing with that.
     The rooms were cold and unwelcoming, but they were well proportioned and in keeping with the Georgian period. They would look quite smart with a lick of paint. Although the peeling wallpaper and a distinctive mushroomy smell at the rear of the house indicate that something more substantial than paint would be required.
     But I couldn't help thinking that perhaps Carleon House shouldn't be rejected out of hand. For the price that was being asked, it was a very spacious house. Upstairs there were five bedrooms and a bathroom, while downstairs there were three separate reception rooms and a large kitchen, plus all the outbuildings. And I had to consider the fact that if I wanted to live on the Lizard there wasn't an awful lot for sale, especially close to the sea.
     It was possible to see how the house had changed over the years. The room that was now a rather squalid dining room had clearly once been a farmhouse-style kitchen, the sort in which you would see polished flagstones and a kitchen range and a big old-fashioned dresser in stripped pine full of those blue country-style plates. And the room that was now the kitchen would originally have been the scullery - with a tin bath hanging on the wall no doubt. But it was well proportioned. It would obviously need a complete refit if it was to be retained as a kitchen. In traditional style, of course. Antique oak, perhaps. With Terracotta tiles from Fired Earth. And one of those Belfast sinks that everybody seemed to be putting back in these days...
     But there was one problem that needed more than cosmetic attention. There was a corner where something had been removed, leaving a mess of pipes and broken tiles and plaster.
     The estate agent's radar must have been on full alert. 'If you're wondering about those pipes, it was probably an Aga,' he said quickly with one of his brightest smiles. 'It's quite usual, you know. People find themselves in financial trouble and they start selling things off. You can get a lot for a second- hand Aga.'
     Then he changed tack, digging himself out of the hole he had just made for himself.
     'Mind you! If you did decide to go ahead, I know someone in the business who should be able to find you a reasonably priced replacement. There's nothing like an Aga for that country feeling!'
     An Aga... I had never considered owning Aga before. It would certainly suit the room. In brick red possibly. Julia would probably like an Aga... Once she got used to the way things were done in the country, she might enjoy coming down to Cornwall...
     On the other side of the hall were the other two reception rooms. The one at the back was quite small, possibly it had originally been a maid's room or something like that, but the one at the front was light and airy with sunbeams streaming through the window. The window surrounds were panelled, with shutters folded back into the angles of a shallow bay, and the sunlight reflected in a golden haze from the white paint of the panelling.
     The room was quite impressive, but it didn't seem appropriate to appear keen.
     'That would be south, I assume.'
     The estate agent looked towards the window. 'Yes, almost due south, I would say.'
     'So there won't be any sun at the back of the house then.'
     But the estate agent was not the sort to be easily intimidated.
     'Oh, I'm sure it will get some in the morning!' He waved a hand towards the window. 'And of course the courtyard at the front will be an absolute suntrap during the afternoon! Ideal to sit out in! And it's so private up here you could even use it for barbecues!' He waved his hand again towards the window. 'And as you can see, you've got a magnificent view!'
     He was right about that. The view from the window was commanding. It looked out across the courtyard and through the gates into the lane where the start of the footpath to Poltesco was visible. The footpath headed straight down through the woods towards the Poltesco valley, becoming lost to sight as the ground fell away. Further out, well clear of the tops of the trees growing in the valley, the high ground on the other side could be seen. The path became visible again, now merging with the coastal path that followed the line of the cliffs up towards the headland of Enys Head. That would look magnificent in silhouette when the sun went down.
     Perhaps it would have been better if I hadn't lingered over that view. I almost certainly would have never bought Carleon House. But I didn't move and my speculations took over.
     The light in Cornwall can be crystal clear. You don't get any of that summer haze that hangs around the plains of central England. The weather comes straight off the sea, and when there's a break in the clouds the sunlight shines through and you can see for miles. I could see the coastal path on the other side of the valley as clearly as if it was only a short distance away. Anyone with good eyesight would be able to recognize a person they knew walking along that path. Perhaps once upon a time somebody had stood at that window, gazing out as they waited for someone to come into view over Enys Head, watching as the person strolled along the coastal path, to disappear for a while into the Poltesco valley, then to reappear once again as they climbed up the footpath through the wood, heading towards the house...
     I could sense the estate agent was getting impatient, but I couldn't drag myself away from the window.
     I imagined what it would be like to be there in the evening when the sun went down, Enys Head turning into a jet-black silhouette against the silvery sea. Perhaps there would be a light, someone with a torch coming into view along the coastal path. Perhaps once, long ago, someone had waited at this window expecting to see a light. Scanning the headland. Waiting. Hoping... Perhaps even today someone had been standing at the window as the estate agent's car had driven up, and been disappointed at who it was...
     The estate was clearing his throat pointedly. Clients who stood gawking out of windows admiring the view weren't taking in all those plus-points he wanted to get across.
     'Now let's have a look outside!' he said briskly. 'There's some very useful outbuildings. And did I tell you there was a well?'
     I dragged myself out of my reverie.
     A well? No, nobody had mentioned that.

*
I could understand why when I saw it. Technically it was a well, although one didn't usually expect to find them in an outhouse with a concrete floor. Nor would one expect it to be enclosed by the type of manhole cover normally associated with drains.
     I peered down into the depths. It was undoubtedly a well. Lined with stones set in a herring-bone pattern. Circular. With water at the bottom. But it was hardly the quaint old cottage well with its bucket and chain and little pitched roof that childhood stories led one to anticipate. No one was going to dance around this singing Ding dong dell, Pussy's in the well - although it might not be a bad idea to have it checked.
     No, this was just a hole with water in it and a rusty iron cover on the top. Quite what good it was was difficult to see.
     Unless...
     'It's been modernised of course,' the estate agent broke in hastily. 'I understand there's now an electric pump. You'll probably only have to operate it for a short time each day.'
     He drew in a hasty breath. 'Let me explain how it works. You see there's a storage tank up there on the roof of that outbuilding which provides the pressure for the taps. All you have to do is keep it topped up with water from the well.'
     For an instant the estate agent's expression became positively glassy, but he managed to end on his usual positive note. 'There's nothing to beat a private water supply, that's what I always say!'
     I stared up at the rusting water tank. I had noticed it before but had assumed it was something to do with agriculture, after all this had once been a working farmhouse before the land had been sold off. Surely the guy didn't mean I was supposed to drink the stuff coming out of that? This house didn't have a water supply - it had a private E-coli farm.
     Once again the estate agent's radar was working overtime.
     'Of course it would be quite easy to have it replaced,' he said glibly. 'They are usually made of plastic these days. And you could probably have it repositioned in the loft space, which would make it much more discreet.'
     Yes, just another small cost to add to all the other costs which would be the ruination of anyone who bought Carleon House.
     And the guy was missing the point. No one in their right mind would rely on water from an old well these days. There was all that contamination from fertilisers and pesticides washing into the soil. And of course all the animal effluent and any other crap that farmers spread around. This was the Twenty-first Century, for Christ's sake! What was I supposed to live on, Evian water?
     But the estate agent wasn't going to linger on a problem area. He waved his hand airily. 'Now, let me show you the rest of the outbuildings!'
     I stumbled after him through a muddy yard. High up in the trees one of the rooks gave off a sarcastic caw - or at least that was the way it sounded at the time.
     Inspecting the other outbuildings seemed quite pointless now. I was never going to buy this place. And anyway what on earth would I do with all the outbuildings? They were all delapidated - it was just going to be another expense. One of them was as big as a barn - in fact from the litter of old sacks that were now busy rotting into the earth floor, it had been a barn. My solitary lawnmower would look ridiculous in a building that could hold enough tools for a market garden.
     'This one would be ideal as a garage!' said the estate agent beaming. 'You would just need to widen the doors!'
     Yes, garage. I hadn't thought about a garage. Because there wasn't a garage, was there? Just an old barn where I would have to widen the doors, and of course - although the estate agent hadn't actually mentioned this - replace the roof. You could see straight through it - slap in a telescope and you could use this barn as an observatory.
     'I'm sure a roofer could easily sort out those loose slates!' said the estate agent happily. 'Now why don't you have a wander around by yourself for a while! There's nothing like getting the feel of a place!'

*
I wandered about dejectedly. I knew I should be trying to be objective, scrutinising the slates on the roof, assessing the guttering, asking clever questions about the drains, considering all those things you should do when looking at a house, but there seemed little point. After all, why ask questions about the drains? I could make a good guess what they would be like. For a while I had actually begun to like the house, but it was out of the question when I considered the costs of repairs and the problem of the primitive water supply.
     I ended up back inside. Wasn't it a shame? That dining room would have looked great put back as a farmhouse kitchen. Take up this old lino, and lay down some bright new quarry tiles. And get rid of those cheap cracked tiles around the fireplace. That just cried out for something more traditional like Delft...
     And then I was entering the reception room with the view out to Enys Head.
     For an instant I had an impression that somebody was in the room. My eyes were drawn instinctively towards the window, but as the door swung fully open I saw that I had been mistaken. There was nobody there, just dust motes floating in the rays of the afternoon sun.
     It was obviously my imagination. A trick of the light that must have triggered off something in my subconscious.
     And yet it was strange - most people would have been startled if they had entered a room they knew to be empty and then unexpectedly had the feeling that someone else was there. There would have been that little rush of adrenalin as they responded to the potential threat of an intruder. A moment of suspense when they caught their breath.
     But I hadn't reacted like that. A column of golden dust motes had been playing in a stream of sunbeams and I had walked towards them knowing I had nothing at all to fear.
     Behind me I could hear the estate agents enthusiastic voice.
     'So! - any thoughts?