Gisela von Hohenems joins the teaching staff of an exclusive girls' school in upstate New York, where she befriends fellow newcomer Faustina Coyle. But a climate of fear surrounds Faustina, and after several strange incidents that defy rational explanation, she is forced to resign.
Gisela asks her fiancé, detective-psychologist Dr Basil Willing, to investigate in this highly acclaimed horror-mystery with shades of M. R. James.
Release date:
October 14, 2014
Publisher:
Orion Publishing Group
Print pages:
256
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Mrs Lightfoot was standing by the bay window. ‘Sit down, Miss Crayle. I’m afraid I have bad news.’
Faustina’s mouth held its usual mild expression, but a look of wariness flashed into her eyes. Only for a moment. Then the eyelids dropped. But that moment was disconcerting – as if
a tramp had looked suddenly from the upper windows of a house apparently empty and secure against invasion.
‘Yes, Mrs Lightfoot?’ Faustina’s voice was low-pitched, clear – the cultivated speech expected of all teachers at Brereton. She was tall for her sex and slender to the
point of fragility, with delicate wrists and ankles, narrow hands and feet. Everything about her suggested candour and gentleness – the long, oval face, sallow and earnest; the blurred, blue
eyes, studious, a little near-sighted; the unadorned hair, a thistledown halo of pale tan that stirred softly with each movement of her head. She seemed quite composed now as she crossed the study
to an armchair.
Mrs Lightfoot’s composure matched Faustina’s. Long ago she had learned to suppress the outward signs of embarrassment. At the moment her plump face was stolid with something of the
look of Queen Victoria about the petulant thrust of the lower lip and the light, round eyes protruding between white lashes. In dress she affected the Quaker colour – the traditional
‘drab’ that dressmakers called ‘taupe’ in the thirties and ‘eel-grey’ in the forties. She wore it in rough tweed or rich velvet, heavy silk or filmy voile
according to season and occasion, combining it every evening with her mother’s good pearls and old lace. Even her winter coat was moleskin – the one fur with that same blend of
dove-grey and plum-brown. This consistent preference for such a demure colour gave her an air of restraint that never failed to impress the parents of her pupils.
Faustina went on: ‘I’m not expecting bad news.’ A deprecating smile touched her lips. ‘I have no immediate family, you know.’
‘It’s nothing of that sort,’ Mrs Lightfoot answered. ‘To put it bluntly, Miss Crayle, I must ask you to leave Brereton. With six months’ pay, of course. Your
contract provides for that. But you will leave at once. Tomorrow, at the latest.’
‘I cannot tell you.’ Mrs Lightfoot sat down at her desk – rosewood, made over from a Colonial spinet. Beside the mauve blotter were copper ornaments and a bowl of ox-blood
porcelain filled with dark, sweet, English violets.
‘And I thought everything was going so beautifully!’ Faustina’s voice caught and broke. ‘Is it something I’ve done?’
‘It’s nothing for which you’re directly responsible.’ Mrs Lightfoot lifted her eyes again – colourless eyes bright as glass. Like glass, they seemed to shine by
reflection, as if there were no beam of living light within. ‘Shall we say that you do not quite blend with the essential spirit of Brereton?’
‘I’m afraid I must ask you to be more specific,’ ventured Faustina. ‘There must be something definite or you wouldn’t ask me to leave in mid-term. Has it something
to do with my character? Or my capability as a teacher?’
‘Neither has been questioned. It’s simply that – well, you do not fit into the Brereton pattern. You know how certain colours clash? A tomato-red with a wine-red? It’s
like that, Miss Crayle. You don’t belong here. That must not discourage you. In another sort of school, you may yet prove useful and happy. But this is not the place for you.’
‘How can you tell when I’ve only been here five weeks?’
‘Emotional conflicts develop rapidly in the hothouse atmosphere of a girls’ school.’ Opposition always lent a sharper edge to Mrs Lightfoot’s voice and this was
unexpected opposition, from one who had always seemed timid and submissive. ‘The thing is so subtle, I can hardly put it into words. But I must ask you to leave – for the good of the
school.’
Faustina was on her feet, racked and shaken with the futile anger of the powerless. ‘Do you realize how this will affect my whole future? People will think that I’ve done something
horrible! That I’m a kleptomaniac or a Lesbian!’
‘Really, Miss Crayle. Those are subjects we do not discuss at Brereton.’
‘They will be discussed at Brereton – if you ask a teacher to leave in the middle of the fall term without telling her why! Only a few days ago you said my classroom was “most
satisfactory”. Those were your very words. And now . . . Someone must be telling lies about me. Who is it? What did she say? I have a right to know if it’s going to cost me my
job!’
Something came into Mrs Lightfoot’s eyes that might have been compassion. ‘I am indeed sorry for you, Miss Crayle, but the one thing I cannot give you is an explanation. I’m
afraid I haven’t thought about this thing from your point of view – until now . . . You see, Brereton means a great deal to me. When I took the school over from Mrs Brereton, after her
death, it was dying, too. I breathed life into it. Now our girls come from every state in the Union, even from Europe since the war. We are not just another silly finishing school. We have a
tradition of scholarship. It has been said that cultivation is what you remember when you have forgotten your education. Brereton graduates remember more than girls from other schools. Two Brereton
girls who meet as strangers can usually recognize each other by the Brereton way of thinking and speaking. Since my husband’s death, this school has taken his place in my life. I am not
ordinarily a ruthless person but when I am faced with the possibility of your ruining Brereton, I can be completely ruthless.’
‘Ruining Brereton?’ repeated Faustina, wanly. ‘How could I possibly ruin Brereton?’
‘Let us say, by the atmosphere you create.’
‘I don’t know what you mean.’
Mrs Lightfoot’s glance strayed to the open window. Ivy grew outside, freckling the broad sill with patches of leafy shadow. Beyond, a late sun washed the faded grass of autumn with thin,
clear light. The afternoon of the day and the afternoon of the year seemed to meet in mutual farewell to warmth and brightness.
Mrs Lightfoot drew a deep breath. ‘Miss Crayle, are you quite sure you can’t – guess?’
There was a moment’s pause. Then Faustina rallied. ‘Of course I’m sure. Won’t you please tell me?’
‘I did not intend to tell you as much as I have. I shall say nothing more.’
Faustina recognized the note of finality. She went on in a slow, defeated voice, like an old woman. ‘I don’t suppose I can get another teaching job, so late in the school year. But
if I should get a post next year – can I refer a prospective employer to you? Would you be willing to tell the principal of some other school that I’m a competent art teacher? That it
really wasn’t my fault I left Brereton so abruptly?’
Mrs Lightfoot’s gaze became cold and steady, the gaze of a surgeon or an executioner. ‘I’m sorry, but I cannot possibly recommend you as a teacher to anyone else.’
Everything that was childish in Faustina came to the surface. Her pale tan lashes blinked away tears. Her vulnerable mouth trembled. But she made no further protest.
‘Tomorrow is Tuesday,’ said Mrs Lightfoot briskly. ‘You have only one class in the morning. That should give you time to pack. In the afternoon, I believe you are meeting the
Greek Play Committee at four o’clock. If you leave immediately afterward you may catch the six twenty-five to New York. At that hour, your departure will attract little attention. The girls
will be dressing for dinner. Next morning, in Assembly, I shall simply announce that you have gone. And that circumstances make it impossible for you to return – greatly to my regret. There
should be hardly any talk. That will be best for the school and for you.’
‘I understand.’ Half blinded by tears, Faustina stumbled toward the door.
Outside, in the wide hall, a shaft of sunlight slanted down from a stair window. Two little girls of fourteen were coming down the stairs – Meg Vining and Beth Chase. The masculine
severity of the Brereton uniform merely heightened Meg’s feminine prettiness – pink-and-white skin, silver-gilt curls, eyes misty bright as star sapphires. But the same uniform brought
out all that was plain in Beth – cropped, mouse-brown hair; sharp, white face; a comically capricious spattering of freckles.
At sight of Faustina, two little faces became bland as milk, while two light voices fluted in chorus: ‘Good afternoon, Miss Crayle!’
Faustina nodded mutely, as if she couldn’t trust her voice. Two pairs of eyes slid sideways, following her progress up the stair to the landing. Eyes wide, but not innocent. Rather,
curious and suspicious.
Faustina hurried. She reached the top, panting. There she paused to listen. Up the stairwell came a tiny giggle, treble as the hysteria of imps or mice.
Faustina moved away from the sound, almost running along the upper hall. A door on her right opened. A maid, in cap and apron, came out and turned to look through a window at the end of the
hall. Her sandy hair caught the last light of the sun with a gleam like tarnished brass.
Faustina managed to compose quivering lips. ‘Arlene, I’d like to speak to you.’
Arlene jerked violently and swung round, startled and hostile. ‘Not now, miss! I have my work to do!’
‘Oh . . . Very well. Later.’
As Faustina passed, Arlene shrank back, flattening herself against the wall.
The two little girls had looked after Faustina slyly, with mixed feelings. But this lumpy face was stamped with one master emotion – terror.
What adders came to shed their coats,
What coiled, obscene,
Small serpents with soft, stretching throats
Caressed Faustine?
Faustina entered the room Arlene had just left. There was a white fur rug on the caramel floor. White curtains framed the windows. The chest of drawers was painted daffodil
yellow. On the white mantelpiece stood brass candlesticks with crystal pendants and candles of aromatic green wax made from bayberries. Wing chair and window seat were covered with cream chintz
sprigged with violet flowers and green leaves. The colours were gay as a spring morning, but – the bed was unmade, the scrapbasket unemptied, the ashtray choked with ashes and
cigarette-butts.
Faustina closed the door and crossed the room to a window seat where a book lay open. She turned the pages in frantic haste. A tap fell on the door. She closed the book and thrust it down behind
a cushion, straightening the cushion so there was no sign that it had been disturbed.
‘Come in!’
The girl on the threshold looked as if she had stepped from an illuminated page of Kufic script, where Persian ladies, dead two thousand years, can still be seen riding mares as dark-eyed,
white-skinned, fleet, and slender as themselves. She could have worn their rose-and-gold brocade with grace. But the American climate and the twentieth century had put her into a trim grey-flannel
skirt and a pine-green sweater.
‘Faustina, those Greek costumes . . .’ She stopped. ‘What’s wrong?’
‘Please come in and sit down,’ said Faustina. ‘There’s something I want to ask you.’
The other girl obeyed silently, choosing the window seat instead of the armchair.
‘Cigarette?’
‘Thanks.’
Slowly, precisely, Faustina put the cigarette-box back on the table. ‘Gisela, what is the matter with me?’
Gisela answered cautiously. ‘What do you mean?’
‘You know perfectly well what I mean!’ Faustina spoke in a dry, cracked voice. ‘You must have heard gossip about me. What are they saying?’
Long black lashes are as convenient as a fan for screening the eyes. When Gisela lifted hers again her gaze was non-committal. One hand made a little gesture toward the cushion beside her,
trailing cigarette-smoke.
‘Sit down and be comfortable, Faustina. You don’t really suppose I have a chance to hear gossip, do you? I’m still a foreigner and I came here as a refugee. No one ever trusts
foreigners – especially refugees. Too many were maladjusted and ungrateful. I have no intimate friends here. The school tolerates me because my German is grammatical and my Viennese accent is
more pleasing to Americans than the speech of Berliners. But my name, Gisela von Hohenems, has unpleasant connotations so soon after the war. So . . .’ she shrugged, ‘I spend very
little time over teacups and cocktail glasses.’
‘You’re evading my question.’ Faustina sat down without relaxing. ‘Let me put it more directly: have you heard any gossip about me?’
The pretty line of Gisela’s mouth was distorted by that expression our friends call ‘character’ and our enemies, ‘stubbornness’. She answered curtly:
‘No.’
Faustina sighed. ‘I wish you had!’
‘Why? You want people to gossip about you?’
‘No. But since they are gossiping, I wish they had gossiped with you. For you are the only person I can ask about it. The only person who might tell me what is being said and who is saying
it. The only real friend I’ve made here.’ She flushed with sudden shyness. ‘I may call you my friend?’
‘Of course. I am your friend and I hope you’re mine. But I’m still at sea about this. What makes you think there is gossip about you?’
Carefully Faustina crushed her cigarette in the ashtray. ‘I’ve been – fired. Just like that.’
Gisela was taken aback. ‘But – why?’
‘I don’t know. Mrs Lightfoot wouldn’t explain. Unless you call a lot of woolly platitudes about my not fitting into the Brereton pattern an explanation. I’m leaving
tomorrow.’ Faustina choked on the last word.
Gisela leaned forward to touch her hand. That was a mistake. Faustina’s features twisted. Tears sprang into her eyes as if a cruel, invisible hand were squeezing them out of her eyeballs.
‘That’s not the worst.’
‘What is the worst?’
‘Something is going on all around me.’ Words tumbled from Faustina’s mouth as if she could not contain them a moment longer. ‘I’ve felt it for some time. But I
don’t know what it is. There are all sorts of indications. Little things.’
‘Such as?’
‘Look at this room!’ Faustina made a bitter gesture. ‘The maids don’t do things for me as they do for you and all the other teachers. My bed is never turned down for the
night. Half the time it isn’t even made. There’s never any ice water in my thermos carafe and my room is never dusted. I have to empty my scrapbasket and ashtray myself. Once the
windows were left wide open all day so the room was freezing cold when I went to bed.’
‘Why didn’t you complain to Mrs Lightfoot? Or the housekeeper?’
‘I thought of it, but – I was new here this term and the job meant a lot to me. And then I didn’t want to get Arlene into trouble. She’s the one who’s supposed to
do my room and I’ve always felt sorry for her. She’s such an awkward, tongue-tied girl. At last I spoke to her myself. It was like talking to a deaf person.’
‘She didn’t hear you?’
‘She heard all right, but she didn’t listen. There was something obstinate and resistant under her blank surface that I couldn’t reach.’ Faustina lighted another
cigarette, too self-absorbed to offer the box to Gisela. ‘Arlene wasn’t impudent or sullen, just – withdrawn. She mumbled something about not realizing my room had been neglected.
She promised to look after it in future and then – she didn’t. This afternoon she avoided me almost as if she were afraid of me. But, of course, that’s silly. Who would be afraid
of a bookworm like me?’
‘Is Arlene’s attitude all you have to go on?’
‘Oh, no! Everyone avoids me.’
‘I don’t.’
‘Gisela, honestly, you’re the only exception. If I ask any of the other teachers to tea in the village or to cocktails in New York, they refuse. Not just once or twice, but always.
Not just two or three teachers, but all of them – except you. And they refuse in a queer self-conscious way, as if there was something wrong with me. A week ago, in New York, I passed Alice
Aitchison on Fifth Avenue, opposite the Library. I started to smile, but she – she looked the other way, pretending she didn’t see me. Yet I know she did. It was quite obvious, really.
Then, there are the girls in my classes.’
‘Are they insubordinate?’
‘No. It’s not that. They do everything I tell them. They even ask me intelligent questions about their lessons. But . . .’
‘But what?’
‘Gisela, they watch me.’
Gisela laughed. ‘I wish my pupils would watch me – especially when I’m demonstrating something on the blackboard.’
‘It’s not just when I’m demonstrating something,’ explained Faustina. ‘They watch me all the time. In and out of the classroom, their eye. . .
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