John Halkin - Squelch

In reality they were only half-sisters, but as children they had been so close, it was unbelievable. Their mother had been twice married: first to Lesley’s father who was killed in a climbing accident a few months after the wedding, then to a faintly-remembered solicitor who lasted just long enough to sire Ginny before being discarded. His considerable trust fund had made it possible for her to buy the cottage, but the man himself had died of lung cancer years earlier. Ginny had never met him. Now her mother had moved to Australia, she scarcely ever saw her either.

‘I’m not saying I believe it but —’

‘I should hope not!’ Lesley retorted.

‘ — that’s just the effect those moths had on me. You didn’t see them.’

‘I wish I had.’

‘They were really massive. I never thought moths existed that size. And so many! You know how small the garden is — well, there must have been a hundred at least crowded in there. Great shadowy forms fluttering about in the dark. And that squealing! I thought at first they were bats.’

‘It’s understandable you were scared,’ her sister conceded.

‘But I wasn’t, that’s what is so strange. Then I remembered old Mrs Beerston had died only a few weeks ago and it was her cottage. That made some sort of sense. The souls of the dead — why not? A village is a community after all, and here am I, the intruder…’

‘Moths are arthropods, Ginny,’ Lesley instructed her in a flat, down to earth manner. ‘Not spirits or ghosts or devils out of hell. Simply arthropods.’

Ginny laughed. ‘I don’t even know what that means.’

‘It means they are living animals. Oh — like lobsters or prawns, with a hard skeleton on the outside. But alive . Can you imagine old Mrs Beerston coming back as a flying prawn?’

‘I never met her. And a lot of people do believe in reincarnation. Buddhists do.’

‘Old Mrs Beerston didn’t, you can be sure of that. Ask the vicar, he knew her better than anyone. In her young days she used to go stomping around the country preaching atheism and the like. One of Bertrand Russell’s early lays, he says, though I think that’s just his dirty mind. Anyway, she’d be the last to want to come back haunting people.’

‘Oh, you’re obviously right,’ Ginny admitted, tiring of the argument. ‘It’s common sense. But can’t you feel the mystery of it? No, I don’t suppose you can.’

‘You were hungry, that’s all. You hadn’t eaten anything all day, I’ll bet.’

‘I had!’

‘What? Two nuts and a yoghurt? You picked up some lousy habits in that television job. Don’t think I don’t know, sister mine.’ She shook her head, disapproving. ‘Now Ginny, if I bring some books of pictures, d’you think you could remember the markings on the wings well enough to identify those moths? Because they do sound unusual.’

‘Isn’t that what I was trying to tell you?’

A peal of laughter. ‘Ginny, you’re impossible! Can’t you be serious even for one minute?’

Perhaps she should never have brought the subject up, Ginny thought ruefully. The experience of watching those moths from her bedroom window on that first evening in the cottage now seemed like a moment of sheer poetry which she had no wish to destroy. Lesley would trample over it if Ginny let her, and not even understand what she was doing.

And it was odd how Jack had also encountered the moths on his drive back. ‘Obviously seeing you off the premises,’ she had teased when he described it to her. Much to her annoyance he had turned up on her doorstep days before she’d expected him. ‘I think they’re watching over me,’ she’d added. ‘Protecting me from predatory males.’

In a strange way she had meant it, too.

With her sister Lesley creepie-crawlies had always been something of a passion. As a girl — much to Ginny’s horror — she had collected caterpillars in empty matchboxes. Later, at London University, she had chosen to study zoology, aiming for a career in science until the day came when she found herself pregnant and gave it all up to marry the medical research student responsible.

Of course everybody told her she was stupid to throw away her career like that, but the truth was — she’d confessed to Ginny — she had begun to hate the whole business of slicing up living creatures to discover how they functioned. What she loved was observing them alive, unharmed, in natural surroundings.

She was also in love.

Head-over-heels.

So hopelessly in love, it was impossible to get any sense out of her.

After the wedding, her husband Bernie left his university research project and took over his father’s general practice in the village. Old Mrs Beerston had been one of his patients: well over ninety and seemingly destined to live for ever. She might have succeeded too if one day, some six years later, she hadn’t developed bronchitis after pottering in her garden too long in the rain. Within twenty-four hours Lesley was phoning Ginny to say the cottage could be hers if she moved fast.

Which she did.

Before the local estate agent had even realised what was going on, she had spoken to the old woman’s solicitor — he played golf with Bernie — and clinched the deal, cash on the table.

‘I’ll hunt out a couple of books then,’ Lesley said, preparing to leave. ‘Moths have never really been my subject, but it would be interesting to know what you’ve seen. This squealing you mentioned should narrow down the possibilities.’

‘I never knew before that moths could make that kind of sound.’

‘Some do. The Death’s Head Hawk moth for one — though they are very rare. Oh, don’t worry!’ she laughed, obviously seeing the dismay on Ginny’s face. ‘They’re quite harmless! I know who you should talk to — the Reverend Davidson! Why didn’t I think of him? He’s scatty about moths.’

‘Who is he?’

‘Vicar of St Botolph’s — that’s about fifteen miles away. Not far to drive. They say he even preaches moths in his sermons. Not that his congregation objects. I’m told he only ever gets two old ladies and they’re both deaf. That’s one thing about being a doctor’s wife in the country — you do learn what goes on!’

‘But does he really know anything about them?’

‘Moths? He breeds them! Anyway, I’ve got to rush to collect Frankie from school. Why don’t you drop in for Sunday lunch? The children would love to see you.’

‘I might.’ She accompanied Lesley out to her Mini.

‘It’ll be roast lamb with potatoes and veg from our own garden. Apple pie to follow. Our apples. You look like you need feeding up!’

Ginny found St Botolph’s on the map and drove there that same afternoon. The church was tucked away among the trees, a simple barn-like structure with a square tower and a remarkable Norman doorway. The community it served was not so much a village as a scattering of isolated houses, the most impressive of them being the vicarage, a mature Georgian building in brick. She rang the bell but there was no answer, so she investigated the back of the house and found the vicar working in the garden.

He was a thin, frail man of medium height with a scholarly stoop and an untidy fringe of grey hair around his otherwise bald head. Well over seventy, Ginny judged.

‘Ah yes, I know Dr Rendell!’ he exclaimed enthusiastically when she had introduced herself. ‘And his lovely wife! So you are her sister? Well, well. You’d like to see the church, I expect. A fine building!’

‘I’ve really come to ask about some moths I saw.’ She tried briefly to describe them. ‘Nobody else seems to know what they are.’

‘Are you sure about the size?’

‘Oh yes. The first one that came into the room was as close as I am to you. And they whistled like bats.’