Voices in a Haunted Room

“Is that the only place where you have heard this voice?”

I nodded.

“Come on,” he said. “We’re going to look.”

We went into all the rooms, up to the next floor and the attics. Then we went down through the hall to the kitchens. It was as I guessed it would be-empty.

We were the only ones in the house.

“Where are you?” shouted Jonathan. “You of the idiot voice. Come out and show yourself.”

His voice gave back a faint echo. Then the house was quiet. Not a sound. I looked up at the vaulted ceiling, at the stone walls, at the gallery.

“There’s nobody here,” said Jonathan.

“It’s haunted,” I insisted. “It’s something horrible ... something from the past.”

”You don’t believe that really. There must be some explanation, a logical one.”

“What?”

“Someone is here ... was here ... someone playing a trick.”

“Someone who knows-about us.”

He admitted solemnly: “Yes, someone who knows about us. Or,” he added, “you imagined you heard the voice.”

“I heard it distinctly.”

“You don’t take this lightly, do you?”

“Take it lightly! No, I do not. But you do, Jonathan. That’s what I am beginning to understand.”

“Claudine, you are the most important thing in the world to me.”

I shook my head.

“You are a very conventional lady,” he said. “Brought up in that formal society, eh? It has always amused me, the rigorous formality of the French and the exploits they indulge in ... in secret, of course. However, they brought you up that way, and now your conscience worries you. I am beginning to think that it was that which you heard.”

“In other words, you believe I imagined I heard voices.”

“Perhaps you did, Claudine.”

“I did not.”

“Then who? We’ve been round the house. No one is here but us. Who could have got in? You let yourself in with the key and shut the door. Is there any other key?”

I said suddenly: “The window. Of course. David and I looked round once. I told you about it. And we can* through a window.”

“Where?”

“It was somewhere in the hall.” I crossed the stone floor with speed.

I said: “This is it. Look! The latch is broken. Anyone who knew could get in through it. It’s simple.”

He stood looking at me in dismay.

“So you think someone was in the house when you came in. But how could that person talk to you in that room? You would have heard whoever it was running down the stairs and out through the window wouldn’t you?”

“I should think so.”

“Claudine, you imagined it. That’s the only answer. You imagined it.”

“No. I know the duTerence between imagination and reality.”

“Sometimes we all have fancies.”

”I heard that voice,” I said firmly. “Do you realize what it means? Someone knows ... about us.”

He shrugged his shoulders. “You’re working yourself up, Claudine. Forget it. We’re here, aren’t we? I had the devil of a job to elude them.”

“Millicent clung, I daresay.”

“With a certain tenacity, I admit. But I was determined to be with you, so I escaped.”

“Jonathan, I want to go.”

“Go! Why, we’ve only just come.”

“I came to tell you that it has to stop.”

He raised his eyebrows and looked at me with that expression of mock exasperation.

“I can’t go on deceiving David. I’ve got to stop it. I’m going to try to forget that it ever happened. You must too.”

“Never,” he said. “Forget the most wonderful experience of my life! You are asking too much. Come, my dearest. There is not much time, you know.”

“No,” I insisted. “I can’t. I must go.”

He drew me to him, but this time I felt stronger. I kept seeing David’s face and remembering how much I loved him.

I said: “I’m going back to Eversleigh. I should never have come. Jonathan, I couldn’t bear it if ever David discovered. I want everything to stay as it was between us.”

“It’s a little late for that now, isn’t it?”

“I don’t know. I can’t think. I only know that more than anything at the moment I want to get away from this house.”

“That silly old voice has unnerved you.”

“It has frightened me, Jonathan, and it has made me fully realize what I have done ... to myself, to David and to you. I have betrayed my husband. You have betrayed your brother.”

“Darling Claudine, let’s drop the histrionics, shall we? I love you. I want you.

I want you more than anything. Isn’t that good enough?”

“How can it be when I am your brother’s wife?”

“There you go again! I want you. You want me. We’ve had some wonderful times together.

You’re a passionate woman, remember. You’ve wakened up. But you have this conscience that is bothering you. Everything is all right as long as we are careful.”

I could detect the faint irritation in his attitude. He had come to indulge his sexual desires and I was baulking him. I saw him then more clearly than I ever had and a terrible desolation swept over me. I had destroyed my marriage for a brief sensational excitement. I had mistaken the shadow for the substance.

Desperately I wanted to go back; but how can one ever do that?

I turned and ran out of the house.

He came after me calling my name.

We stood outside together and I locked the door with trembling hands. I felt that I had locked out that part of my life.