Free The Silence by Sarah Rayne Page A

at it. And what about the stranger at the piano? Was it conceivable that the boy in that dazzle of sunlight could be a lingering fragment of Brad? A shard of memory still lodged in the house?
    I think there are a few strangers at the firesides of this house, thought Nell. But I don’t think I’d mind if they were a link with Brad.
    It was then she heard Beth scrambling up the stairs, shouting to her. She tumbled into the room, white-faced and clearly frightened, clutching at Nell’s hands.
    ‘Sweetheart what’s wrong?’
    ‘There’s someone outside.’ Beth’s voice was shaking, and fear jabbed at Nell.
    As calmly as possible, she said, ‘Are you sure? What did you see?’ She knelt down, holding Beth’s hands tightly. ‘Darling, you’re perfectly safe. Just tell me what you saw.’
    ‘I went back into the music room so I could sit in the window and read. Then I thought I’d have another go at that old piece of music. I thought Dad might have played it so I wanted to play it as well. And I got a bit more of it this time, which was pretty good, but then there was a kind of movement from the garden—’
    ‘Through the French windows?’
    ‘Yes. At first I thought it was just a bush or something blowing across the glass. Only,’ said Beth, on a sob, ‘when I looked, it wasn’t. It was a woman – Mum, she was standing right up against the window, pressing against the glass, and she had this thin,
thin
face, and hands that sort of scrabbled at the glass as if she was trying to get in . . .’
    ‘She can’t get in,’ said Nell, as Beth faltered. ‘Whoever she was, she couldn’t possibly get in. Everywhere’s locked up. We’re absolutely safe – we couldn’t be safer.’ But we’re not, she thought. I can feel that we’re not.
    Beth said, ‘I ’spect we could just tell her to go away, could we? Only she might come back. Like – when we’re in bed and it’s dark, and if she got into the house . . .’ She broke off, her small face crumpling.
    ‘That won’t happen,’ said Nell at once. She was listening for sounds from downstairs as she spoke, but there was nothing. ‘I’ll go downstairs now to sort it out,’ she said. ‘You stay here.’ She saw Beth’s scared expression, and she said, ‘Bethy, listen. This was the room Dad used to sleep in. So you sit at the desk – I’ll bet he often sat there – and I’ll be straight back and everything will be fine. It’ll be someone who’s lost and come up to the house to ask for directions or something like that.’
    But despite her words, Nell’s heart was thudding as she ran downstairs, and she was strongly aware of Stilter’s isolation and the non-existent phone signal. Probably there was no one out there. Yes, but you saw someone last night, said her mind. And Beth saw something just now, and she isn’t given to wild flights of imagination.
    It was growing dark and Stilter seemed to be sliding down into its semi-haunted twilight state. Nell cast a swift glance towards the music room door, then darted into the kitchen to collect one of the new torches. Back in the hall she thought something moved beyond one of the narrow panes of glass at the side of the front door – a faint shape that might be a human hand or might be a tree branch. There was the sound of rain pattering against the windows. Or was it rain? Mightn’t it be fingernails, tapping to see if anyone was at home . . .?
    Nell took a deep breath, reminded herself that the torch was heavy enough to use as a weapon if necessary, and went determinedly towards the music room. She stood warily in the doorway, shining the torch all round, every nerve tensed. But nothing moved and nothing seemed out of place. Bay window, chairs, tables, bookshelves, piano which was open with Esmond’s music still propped up on the stand. Gripping the torch more tightly, she turned its light onto the French windows. It sliced a triangle of sharp brilliance through the violet and indigo shadows, but