Free The Ghost Before Christmas by Katherine John Page B

register before he plunged downwards into a black void that assuaged all thought – and pain.
    Christine stared down at Alun’s comatose, bloodied body. She could hear the clock tick. She even looked up at the face but the time didn’t register.
    She struggled to remember. She’s made a plan. But the man she’d been expecting hadn’t come to fetch her – the bastard!  She’d packed earlier before she’d opened the third bottle of wine. Her suitcase, coat, and travelling handbag were behind the door in the living room where they couldn’t be seen.
    Her hands suddenly felt wet. She looked down at them. They were covered in blood. Alun’s blood! She was still holding the cleaver. She dropped it. It fell to the tiles with a clatter. She went to the sink. Rinsed her hands, dried them on a tea towel and dropped it. She wouldn’t have to pick it up. In fact she wouldn’t have to do anything in this mausoleum of a house that had closed around her, constricting and stifling, ever again.
    It didn’t matter that the man she was expecting hadn’t come. She’d call a taxi. No! She couldn’t do that – Dewi and Elin would see it and ask where she was going.
    She’d drive. That was it. She wasn’t that drunk. She’d drive up to one of the holiday cottages, sleep for a few hours, then drive on in the morning. She didn’t have a key but she’d smash a window to get in. Tomorrow she’d go to an airport or a ferry. That was it – a ferry! She’d go to Ireland … stay there for a bit.
    She opened the drawer, took out another tea towel, and wiped Alun’s blood from her dress, shoes, and tights. Then she remembered the most important thing. Money!
    She went into the living room and picked up her handbag. There was room in it to pack the cash and things she’d hidden. She climbed the stairs. Usually she would have taken off her heels in case they marked the wood. But she was leaving – for good. What did she care about marks in a house that she would never see again?
    Deep in her hidey-hole, Nia tried to forget the shouts, cries, and screams, and the awful wail that had ended in a moan. There’d been a thud then silence. Not a good silence.
    Nia’s eyes were wet. She clutched Pengy closer, pressed his tummy so he would shed his light, huddled further into the blanket, and buried her head in the cushion. But she couldn’t block out the clatter of high-heeled footsteps overhead.
    Christine regarded the secret chamber as a blessing, albeit a filthy one. The day she’d moved into the house she’d begun photographing the antiques her mother-in-law had prized and Alun’s family had accumulated over centuries so she could check their value on the internet. Once she’d determined which would bring in the most money, she’d moved them to the hidden room.
    If Alun noticed their absence, he never commented on it. She usually gave each piece a month in hiding before arranging for it to be transported to a distant auction room.
    It had been an easy system to put in place once she barred Dewi and Elin from the house. Elin was observant, and what was worse, possessive over what she called “Dewi and Alun’s inheritance” as if she, as Alun’s wife, deserved nothing.  
    She walked along the long gallery, opened the secret door, reached for the torch she’d hidden there, and stepped inside. The foul acidic smell of droppings was overwhelming. She pulled a tissue from her pocket and covered her face. She turned to pick up the box … it had caught on something … she pulled it … there was a crash. The torch flickered and died.
    She tried and failed to move because something large and heavy was pinning her to the floor. The door swung shut closing out the last gleam of light from the gallery.
    She reached up, scrabbled with