Daughter of the House. Rosie Thomas

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.

      ‘He believes that you can help him to speak to Mrs Clare.’

      Nancy’s dry lips cracked and made her wince. ‘But Mrs Clare is dead. And Phyllis and Mr Clare and the little girl.’

      ‘Yes, very sadly that is true. Unfortunately, Mr Feather can’t reach his late sister on the other side or hear her messages himself, despite his skills. He believes that you will be able to do this for him. Under his control, that is.’

      There was a silence. Lawrence Feather’s eyes implored Nancy. She sank lower in her chair.

      Eliza asked, ‘Do you think you can do this, Nancy?’

      ‘No.’

      The monosyllable dropped into stillness. With a stage artist’s timing Eliza let the silence gather and deepen. At last she said, ‘There you are. You asked to be allowed to consult my daughter, and against my preference you have been able to do so. You have your answer, Mr Feather.’

      He started forwards in his chair. ‘Nancy, please listen to me. You and I both know …’

      Eliza cut him short. She stood again, ignoring the pains in her back. Her demeanour was so forbidding that the medium fell silent.

      ‘There’s nothing more to be discussed.’

      She crossed to the door and held it open.

      Only when she had seen him out of the house and watched him walking to the tram stop did she return to Nancy. The girl was hunched in her chair, her arms wrapped around herself. Eliza believed the child was telling the truth – she was too obedient to do otherwise – but the afternoon’s events were still troubling.

      ‘What nonsense. The poor man must be unbalanced by grief.’

      Nancy raised her head. ‘Perhaps,’ she said.

      Her gaze seemed clouded, no longer quite that of an innocent child.

      ‘I ask you one more time, Nancy. Are you quite sure that nothing untoward happened with that man? Did he touch or even speak to you in any way that was improper?’

      Nancy’s face flooded with colour.

      ‘No, not at all.’

      ‘Then why does his presence trouble you? It’s obvious that it does.’

      ‘I’m not denying it, Mama. He is strange, and to see him makes me think of the steamer and Phyllis.’

      It was an oblique version of the truth and Nancy reddened at even slightly misrepresenting herself to her mother.

      Eliza considered. Nancy wasn’t an actress, she couldn’t feign distress so convincingly. The Queen Mab had been a shocking experience for all three children, and it was natural for Nancy to be upset by the reminder. She put her arm around her daughter’s shoulders.

      ‘I understand.’

      Eliza and Devil had decided that they should not dwell on the circumstances of the tragedy. In their own experience the best way to deal with shocking events was to leave them in the past. She hugged Nancy briefly and then released her.

      ‘You will not have to meet that man again.’

      ‘Mama?’

      ‘What is it?’

      ‘Is there such a thing as psychism? Can the dead speak to us?’

      Eliza hesitated. It was a long time since she had been able to command the reverie. Long ago, by emptying her mind on an exhaled breath, she had been able to slip into a peaceful dimension of intense colours. She had been a rebellious child, and she had used the ability as a shield against adult wrath and a refuge from tedium. Later when she had taken employment as an artists’ model, she had made professional use of the reverie to hold her pose in the life-drawing class.

      The power had gradually deserted her at about the time she fell in love with Devil, and she supposed now that the condition had been connected with the physical and emotional changes of young womanhood. She had never heard voices from the other side, and she was sure that her innocent reverie was no channel to the supernatural.

      Devil had been the one who claimed that he saw ghosts. But then Devil had suffered such hardships and horrors during his childhood it was hardly surprising his imagination had turned macabre. Yet he too had grown out of his susceptibility. He had not spoken of his ghosts for many years now.

      Eliza considered herself to be a rational woman with modern ideas. Her scepticism was founded in years of exposure to the tricks and devices of stage illusionists.

      ‘No, the dead do not speak to us,’ she answered at length. ‘But as you already know there are some people who claim they do.’

      ‘Why do they do that?’

      She patted Nancy’s hand. The naivety of the question reassured her. It was time to finish this conversation and move on to healthier topics.

      ‘For money, or perhaps for public attention,’ she smiled. ‘Now, look at the time. You should go and dress, or we will be late at Aunt Faith’s.’

      Nancy went upstairs. Across the landing, in the larger front bedroom shared by Cornelius and Arthur, Arthur’s school trunk and boxes were packed and corded ready for the carrier. Tomorrow, Devil and Eliza would drive their son to Harrow School in the De Dion-Bouton. The motor car had been polished to a state of glittering perfection by old Gibb, the chauffeur-mechanic Devil had employed to look after it.

      In contrast to his brother’s success, Cornelius had recently become a clerk in a shipping office. Every day he carried sandwiches packed in a tin box to his place of work and he had described to Nancy how he sat on a bench in a nearby graveyard to eat them.

      ‘I like it. It’s peaceful.’

      He dismissed all questions about his colleagues or the actual work he performed,