Silent, Alone In The Garden (2)

Two Years Earlier, Lucy
 
Silence now.  Sitting on the bench in the hut in the garden dedicated to the memory of her parents, she felt as if she was watching her life unfold. Her real mum grew up in York, along with the uncle who later adopted her - but not her dad, who spent his childhood in London. And although Dad shared the Harlesden surname and belonged to the Lancashire based clan, he only returned to the North occasionally. She herself was born in the West Country, in Cornwall.  
 
Idyllic at first. Once more, she tasted the Cornish sea air, fresh and salty, and saw the white cottage on the narrow twisting hill where she lived when she was three and four. Metal railings. Fishing boats. In the quay below, seagulls were bleating. Dad worked as a violin teacher and was conductor of a Youth Orchestra in Plymouth. Mum, too, studied operatic performance in London; that's where she'd met Dad  but had to give up her career after damaging her throat.
 
Next, an untidy garden in Devon where they moved to after Cornwall. Branches swaying in the wind. Autumn leaves covering the ground. Taking her by the hand, Mum led her through clumps of damp earth and sat her by the garden pond. They were moving, Mum said. To Dorset. To the coast.  A fresh start. Daddy was very tired, Mum explained to her. He needed rest. So they moved to a middle floor flat in an old three-storey house that stood back from the road overlooking the sea, but they were no longer happy as a family, even though the flat in Dorset was beautiful and spacious.  
 
One evening, she and Dad stood further up on the shore, near the foot of the cliffs, watching waves splash against the edges of the sand. Ahead of them, a coat of red tinged the horizon, promising a warm start in the morning. Dad was quiet, sighing. He sighed a lot these days  - so often, she wondered if he regretted the move there. Would he leave again? He'd left for a few months when she was three or four, only coming back once to visit her.  
 
He stirred. 'Your friend's here.'  
 
A Red Setter dashed towards them, skidding along the sand. The dog pushed its moist nose into her hand and regarded her with large sad eyes, as though it knew and understood her loneliness. She stroked the Setter's head and buried her face in its damp fur. Her friend. It had that lovely doggy smell. Solid and faithful. Eyes that resembled currants or sultanas. The dog was sighing, like Dad. If Dad left again, she would die. She massaged the dog's ears and wished they could go back to the cottage in Devon with the apple tree and the pond and the swing in the garden. The three of them had been happy there. The setter gave her a final glance and whined before sprinting to its master who patted its head.  
 
One afternoon, Mum didnt fetch her from school. Instead, Dad came to the school unexpectedly, explaining that he had an afternoon off teaching.
 
At home, a stranger in a dark suit sat by the fireplace, drinking tea. 'This is your dad's cousin Terence,' Mum told her. 'He lives in a nice market town in Yorkshire and he's come all the way down to see you.'
 
'Lancashire,' Terence Harlesden corrected, laughing. 'Get it right, lass. War of the Roses.'
 
Laughter or not, there was something frightening about Dad's cousin Terence, and she couldn't fail to notice how Mum's face tightened with anger at Terence's putdown. Noticing the shift in atmosphere, the undercurrents of tension, she clutched at Dad's warm hand and started to edge away.
 
'Don't be shy,' Dad said. 'Go on, say hello. Terence has driven a long way.'
 
Grinning, Terence Harlesden stood up. He was getting closer to her, laughing and speaking in a strange accent that scared her. 'What a big girl you've turned out to be, Lucy. You must be seven now.'
 
Terence, as it turned out, was nice, actually. He'd brought along sweets, chocolates and crayoning-in books.  He told jokes to her and pulled doggy faces, whimpering like the red setter on the beach. He talked about this big old house near the sea where he and his wife and his two little boys had stayed for a few weeks before moving to a big house in the country.  
 
They had buttered scones with jam for tea. 'Can Terence stay?' she said, in between mouthfuls of scone.
 
'Not tonight,' Dad said. 'But he'll be back soon.'
 
'Yes, 'Terence said, grinning. 'I'll be back very, very soon.'
 
He did come back. Three times.  Always with sweets and chocolates.  
And within a few months of meeting Terence, Mum and Dad moved up to Lyme House to take on new positions at the School, thanks to Terence. She often wished she'd trusted her instincts and warned Mum and Dad not to go.  If she had, they wouldn't have died in the fire.
 
****
Suddenly, she felt a peculiar sensation pass through her, prompting her to look up at the House.  On the top floor, the elderly former Principal of the School, Agnes Harlesden, stood silently by one of the windows, staring down at the hut in the Remembrance Garden, lips set in a tight line. Two o'clock in the morning and still awake. Their eyes met, and the Ogre gave her a curt but chilling nod before slipping away, out of view.  
 
She hurried back to the bungalow, away from the Ogre. What a stupid mistake. The Ogre could have stood there for ages, watching her from the top floor of the House. Watching her rest her head on the lad - Gavin's -shoulder. This was a disaster.  
 
When she returned to the bungalow, she found a printed note in an envelope pushed under the bedroom door, the note neatly folded in two:
 
I KNOW YOUR SECRET, LUCY.  BE CAREFUL