Ghosts of Oaklight Hall

Chapter 1The train emerged from the tunnel with a rattle and a burst of sunlight, waking me from the doze I had settled into since Birmingham. Shreds of smoke or steam from the train’s engine still clung about the window from where the tunnel had confined it. As it cleared, I caught the first glimpse of my destination. Rising above a line of trees was a single round tower, topped with a green dome ending in a metal spike. I knew the building to be Oaklight Hall, and as my destination from the Daguerreotypes I had seen. The tower looked slightly dilapidated. Its windows blank with grime; its stonework eroded and worn. Trails of creeper rose from its base as if seeking to pull the building down. Yet the tower stood, somehow defiant above the furthest reach of the strangling greenery. This concurred with what I had heard about the place and seemed to fit with the reasons I had been sent here. I strained my neck, trying to see the rest of the Hall, but the remainder lay hidden for now. Not far beyond the tower, I could see a gleam of water, which I knew to be the ornamental lake that belonged to the estate; Lake Shrivelwater. From my readings, I knew that where the lake now sat had been the site of the original hall, or rather an abbey, before the marshy ground on which it was built, plus a certain unsavoury reputation, had caused it to be rebuilt in its current location. That was before the Reformation, of course, when abbeys throughout the land were either demolished or transformed as Oaklight Hall had been by being converted into a house. The train began veering to the right, and my view was lost. Forewarned that my journey was now nearly complete, I rose and pulled my bowler hat and Gladstone bag, stamped with my name E. Grubb, and Truman Grubb Partners in gold lettering, out of the rack above me. The other occupants of the carriage jockeyed for position alongside, intending to do the same. One, a young woman, brushed against me when the train jumped across another set of points. The woman was wearing an enormous hat decorated with paper daisies and stuffed birds, painted white to look like doves, the kind I always get stuck behind at the music hall. She smiled at me; I smiled back, not wishing to appear impolite, turning my head just enough to see her companion glowering at me with a look that could have ignited cordite, not that I cared, of course. He had on a red guardsman’s uniform and extravagant handlebar moustache, which I thought likely to be a real hindrance if he ever got into a real fight with brawlers who didn’t give a fig for the Queensberry Rules. Frankly, not my type either, but I gave him a cheery wink anyway just to annoy and was gratified to see him turn as deep a scarlet as his tunic. Moments later, the train began to slow, belching yet more smoke as it pulled into a station. The windows were almost totally obscured, blanked white by steam. I peered uncertainly through the window, not remembering if it was this or the next stop where I needed to alight. Then a light breeze shredded the veil of mist, and I saw the sign for Weskdale in large green letters. I had arrived. Grabbing my Gladstone bag, I jumped down after the guardsman and his companion with the big hat onto the platform. Just in time, as I heard the train give a deep floooof as it gathered power and began to pull away from the platform once more. The station consisted of a single platform covered by a cast-iron awning in need of painting and a small, deserted waiting room. Seeing no exit sign, I followed my former travelling companions through a space I hadn’t spotted before, dimly noting the poster advertising one of those circus strongmen, due to make an appearance in the town. The woman and her companion were now a fair step ahead of me. The woman was being marched firmly away; her arm gripped with a determination that I thought it a pity she didn’t turn and black the fellow’s eye for his presumption. I would’ve gladly obliged her if she’d requested the service. The fellow made me think of happy brawls ashore with army lads back in my navy days. The woman, although in conversation with her companion, turned periodically as if to catch further glimpses of me. If I say so myself, and to my chagrin, it’s never been the ladies I’ve had trouble in attracting. Almost a pity, really, that I’ve never felt the same way about them. It certainly would have made my love life a lot less complicated and would have pleased my dear old mother no end. I left the station several paces behind the two lovers, just in time to see them climbing into the only hackney carriage there. The woman was bundled in first before the guardsman turned to give me an ape-like leer. I doffed my bowler to him, determined not to provide the fellow with the impression that he had me rattled. After the cab’s departure, the outside of the station felt a lonely and desolate place. Several roads led away from it, but there was no signpost to indicate where any of them went. I went back inside and found a small, wizened fellow in the ticket office who laughed when I asked for the use of a telephone. He assured me that all they had was the railway telegraph, adding with a frown above his half-moon spectacles that it was not for public use. Returning outside, I stood for a moment under the solitary gas lamp, as yet unlit, and pondered direction, wishing there were some magical means of calling for another cab. But other than sending up smoke signals, it seemed I had no alternative but to wait indefinitely or pick a direction and start walking. It is not in my nature to wait, so after receiving muddled directions from the man at the ticket office, I picked a route I thought most likely, heaved my Gladstone bag across my shoulder, and set off. After about an hour, I had seen little traffic and none that were prepared to stop in either direction. I began looking out for some likely farmhouse where I could ask directions or beg a roof for the night when the crack of a whip alerted me to another vehicle approaching from behind. A fellow driving a high-sided wagon pulled up alongside me. A smell of baked bread rose from its interior, making my stomach grumble. The light was beginning to fade, but I could read the rather elaborate lettering on its side well enough. Uriah Froot: Purveyors of bread, cakes, and pastries to the Quality. “Ho there, sir,” said the driver, pulling his horses to a halt. “Looks like we was both off wool-gathering there; I nearly ran you down.” Despite his censure, the chap had a pleasant-looking face with a broad grin. I judged him to be about thirty to thirty-five. He was wearing a striped collarless shirt, unbuttoned at the top. I couldn’t resist straining a little to peek down the front. Perhaps he saw. I tapped briefly on my right ear and said, “My apologies, friend, my hearing took a bit of a battering in the war like, I don’t always hear what comes up behind me.” The fellow’s smile darkened to a frown. “Aye, that were a bad ‘un. Lost a few friends in that one. And some came back with fewer limbs than they went out with. You a navy man?” The fellow was softly spoken, and the rattle of the horse’s traces drowned out most of his words. Fortunately, although my hearing was not what it was before the war, I had learned to compensate by reading a man’s lips provided there was enough light to see. With the sinking sun behind me, I could read him easily enough. “Aye,” I told him. “Gunner for five years on HMS Steadfast.” He nodded sadly in response. “Had friends on the Colossus. You know it?” I nodded in return. I had seen the Colossus go down with all hands. Though it shames me to say it as a gunner, the American guns were better than ours that day. There had been little time to grieve Colossus; two shells had hit Steadfast soon after, piercing her below the waterline. Another had then struck a glancing blow on our gun turret, smashing it to ruin, leaving me with bleeding eardrums and a dying comrade in my arms, until rising water had left me no choice but to leave him. “Makes you wonder what it was all about,” said the man, interrupting my train of thought as it threatened to become maudlin. “True enough. I guess they never forgave us for taking the side of the Confederacy in their civil war.” “Aye, I heard that,” he said, seeming keen to keep the conversation going. “I heard too that it was the Germans that saved the Royal Navy’s arse that day. Is that true?” As a navy man, I was embarrassed to admit it; but so it had been, turning up in the nick of time to turn the tide, just as they had done, decades before, at Waterloo. I nodded once more in response. “Where you headed then, friend?” Getting a bit late to be out for a stroll.” “Oaklight Hall,” I told him, grateful for the change of topic and hoping I could, at last, get some directions and find out how far my poor feet would have to trudge. The man’s grin returned broader than before. “Well, I’m heading that way for the last delivery of the day, pop up, and I’ll give you a lift.” Feeling my feet sigh with relief, I accepted his hand and climbed up beside him, his other hand clasping my bicep as I did so. Taking his instruction for my luggage, I swung my Gladstone bag over into the back. I was surprised to hear an unexpected thud as it knocked against a pile of loaves, the rebound nearly knocking the bag out of my hand. He gave me a knowing grin as he saw my puzzlement but settled beside me on the narrow seat. Narrow or not, he seemed to show no readiness to move away from me, and I could feel the heat of his leg through my trousers. He picked up the traces and called the horse to walk on. His eyes remained fixed on me. I had taken off my jacket when walking and now slung it over my bag behind me. “Tell you was a navy man, first off,” he said. Indicating the tattoos that could be seen on my forearms and through the fabric of my shirt. “Fair bit of muscle there too, I shouldn’t wonder!” he said, sparing one hand from the reins to give my bicep a playful pat. The touch was light and might have passed for simple friendliness, but I felt his fingers linger for just an instant too long for me not to observe his interest. “Some have said I have a very firm grip,” I said in response. I know it was lame, but it seemed to be all the encouragement he needed, as he then gave my right leg a similar squeeze. “Strapping thighs too,” he said, his voice quickening, and his touch, no longer playful, made his way to my groin. “Here, take the reins,” he said suddenly, if not unexpectedly. “Old Frooty will kill me if I’m back late.” Sitting back, I let the fellow continue. I wish I could say this happens to me all the time, but for some reason, I have never had half the offers at home that I had while at sea. After being invalided out of the navy and forced to take a job in the family firm, my s*x life had taken a distinct turn for the worse. Taking the reins as he suggested, I allowed him to proceed with unbuttoning my fly, then drop to give as good attention to my c**k as I could remember in a month of Sundays. The horse seemed to know its business as well as its driver and needed little guidance from me. It trotted along the lane at a steady pace, unconcerned as to what was happening behind. Our route seemed direct enough, and I needed to do no more than hold the reins in one hand with the other stroking the man’s coarse red hair as his head bobbed up and down. We were passing a line of poplars, their trunks ramrod straight and clear of branches. Although the sun was lowering in the sky, it remained bright and gave a flickering effect as we sped past them. After my new-found companion had finished his efforts to both our satisfaction, he sat up and licked his lips ostentatiously, his grin even broader than I had seen it before.