One Summer at Deer’s Leap. Elizabeth Elgin

I let out my breath in a noisy huff. ‘That’s it!’

      ‘You sound quite full up, Cassie.’

      ‘I am.’ So full up that I wished I had never accepted an invitation to that fancy dress party, nor ever seen Deer’s Leap nor got myself involved with long-ago lovers. ‘Never mind. I’ll just chalk it up to experience, Jeannie; grist to the mill.’

      ‘You won’t, you know! I mean, how do you know that Margaret Dacre hasn’t put her mark on you? Hadn’t you thought she might really want a child to be born in that house!’

      ‘But children will have been born there! Dammit, it’s against the law of averages for a house to stand more than four hundred years and never have a baby born in it!’

      ‘How do you know, Cassie? Didn’t we agree that’s how the plots of the Deer’s Leap books will be: a house cursed never to know children!’

      ‘But that’s fiction we’re talking about! And anyway, we don’t know that Margaret Dacre was a witch. It’s only local tittle-tattle!’

      ‘Interesting, for all that and Cassie!’ She grabbed the wheel. ‘For God’s sake, watch it!’

      ‘Look!’ I slammed into reverse gear, bumping over the grassy edges of the road. ‘He’s there! Look! Behind you!’

      The car went into a skid and I pulled hard out of it, all the time watching the man who stood at the side of the road, willing him, imploring him not to go!

      I turned the car, throwing up gravel and dust. Out of the corner of my eye I’d seen him on the other side of the road as I drove past. He was still there, looking straight ahead, not one bit bothered by screeching brakes and a car almost out of control.

      ‘Look at him, Jeannie! Now tell me he isn’t real!’ I inched forward, my heart thudding in my ears. ‘And don’t say a word! Leave it to me!’ I stopped the car, my eyes not leaving him for a second. What could I say to him? ‘Hullo and goodbye’?

      Jeannie had her hands over her eyes as if my performance had unnerved her. Or was it because she didn’t want to look at the airman?

      ‘Jeannie – please?’ Slowly, carefully I opened the door, got out, then quietly closed it. Jeannie took her hands from her face and stared at me, bewildered.

      ‘There’s no one here, Cas, but you and me …’ Her face was very white and she ran her tongue round her lips, turning slowly in her seat to look behind her. ‘No one at all!’

      ‘Jack,’ I said softly, so he would look at me. ‘Want a lift? Deer’s Leap, is it?’