For norah East,my more-than-godmother
Contents
Dimanche Diller woke up suddenly. Moonlight streamed in through her open window. Her bedroom was tucked under the eaves of Hilton Hall, directly below the attic, and she could feel the silence of the empty rooms all round her. She got up, leaned her elbows on the windowsill, and pushed her curly dark hair out of her eyes. Everything was still and quiet. Everything felt perfectly normal… or as normal as things do, by night.
Somewhere in Monks Wood a dog barked. Down in the village a door banged. The milk train clanked towards Rockford Market. These were the familiar night noises of the Hilton Valley and they had not woken Dimanche. No. Something quieter, something nearer, had crept into her sleeping mind and whispered danger.
Although she was only ten years old, Dimanche had already lived a more adventurous life than many people ever do. She had lost both her parents in a storm at sea when she was just a tiny baby, and had fallen into the hands of Valburga Vilemile, a woman who was both cruel and cunning. Valburga had done her best to make Dimanche’s early life unhappy. Once or twice, driven by greed for Dimanche’s inheritance, she had even tried to bring about her death.
Imprisoned in a dank dark cellar, trapped in a burning building, hypnotised and held to ransom, Dimanche had developed a sixth sense for danger. Although she had now lived for some time in happiness and safety, cared for by her aunt, Verity Victorine, that sixth sense never slumbered and it woke her now.
She pulled a dressing gown on over her nightie and crept onto the landing. From there she could see all along the corridor to the bottom of the attic stairs, and down the main staircase into the hall. No one was visible.
A puddle of silver spilled in from the fanlight over the large front door and lit each crack and cranny in the stone-flagged floor. Beyond, the old house dreamt in darkness. Dimanche tiptoed down the stairs. Everything was exactly as it ought to be. Except that the door to Verity Victorine’s study was open.
Perhaps you feel Dimanche should have gone back to bed at this point? Or at the very least, woken her aunt. You may be right, but she did neither. Instead, she took a deep breath. Pushed open the door, and walked in.
Although the little room was empty, Dimanche could tell that someone had been there only seconds earlier. A damp smell, rather like toadstools, tainted the air, and the window, which Verity usually closed before going to bed, was open. As Dimanche looked out at the moonlit garden, a dark shape caught her eye.
A tall, thin man was standing by the yew hedge. His head was bent, and his face was hidden in deep shadow, but somehow Dimanche knew that if she could have seen it, she would not have liked it.
As Dimanche watched, the man raised his head and stared straight at her.
She saw that she had been right about his face. You may have seen one like it, somewhere. It was the kind that says: Me first. You don’t matter. In fact, you don’t exist. It was the kind of face that can only belong to someone very, very selfish. Feeling suddenly afraid, Dimanche moved back until the curtain hid. her. She glanced over her shoulder to make sure there was nobody behind her.
When she looked back into the garden, the thin man had gone.
“Do you think you left the study window open last night?” Dimanche asked her aunt, the next morning.
“No, I’m sure I didn’t. Why?”
“I woke up and thought I heard a noise. I went downstairs to see if anyone was there, and found the study window open. There was a musty smell, like toadstools. And I thought I saw—”
“Dimanche! You shouldn’t have! Gone downstairs, I mean. You should have woken me!”
A loud thump, followed by an angry yowl from Cyclops, the Hilton Hall cat, announced the arrival of the morning post on the doormat.
“You’d think he’d know by now not to sit there, wouldn’t you?” Dimanche said, glad of a chance to change the subject. “Shall I fetch the post?”
“Do, Dimanche.”
Verity Victorine was a nun. She belonged to the Order of Sainte Gracieuse in Normandy, and had lived peacefully in a small French convent until the day she discovered that Dimanche needed her help. At once she left the convent and hurried back to Hilton Hall, but she still exchanged letters and small gifts with the sisters almost daily.
Verity Victorine loved getting letters. Who does not? But this particular post brought her no pleasure. Her forehead, usually calm and smooth