Victoria Holt: The House of a Thousand Lanterns

I leaned towards her. “Know what, Mrs. Couch?”

“That there’d be such change.”

“Life’s always changing,” I reminded her.

“Everything had gone on here in the same way for years, as you’d expect it to go. We had our differences. Mr. Catterwick and I didn’t always get along, same as now. But it was different then.”

“What happens when he’s here?” I asked.

“Mr. Milner? Well, he’ll have friends to dinner. And they’ll go up to the Treasure Room like as not. Talking away. Talking business, I suppose, being in business. Well, it’s not what I expect, nor did Mr. Catterwick for that matter. I’m used to gentry and so is Mr. Catterwick.”

“You could always leave and go to a place where there’s a family which hasn’t gambled away its fortune,” I suggested.

“I like to settle, and I’ve settled here. I’ll put up with a bit… for he’s not here all the time.”

“Does he ever talk to you?”

She put her head on one side and then she said: “He was never one to come down to the kitchen and give me the menu as you’d expect with a family.”

“When his friends come to dinner…”

“Then I’d go to his sitting room and knock on his door bold as brass. ‘Now, what’s for dinner, Mr. Milner,’ I’ll say. And he’ll answer: ‘I’ll leave it to you, Mrs. Couch.’ And how am I to know whether these friends of his have any special likes or don’t-likes. He’s not like the Family I can tell you. He’s rich though, must be. He bought the place didn’t he. And he keeps us all here.”

“And is hardly ever here himself.”

“Oh he’ll be here between spells of travel.”

“When is he coming back, Mrs. Couch?”

“He’s not one to give you warning.”

“Perhaps he wants to come back suddenly and see what you’re all doing.”

“And I wouldn’t put that past him.”

And so we talked and I always contrived to lead Mrs. Couch from the Family to the present owner of Roland’s Croft.

On Christmas Day there was duckling followed by the Christmas pudding solemnly carried to the table by Mr. Catterwick himself and encircled by mystic brandy flames which were watched lovingly by Mrs. Couch. My mother sat at the head of one end of the big table and Mr. Catterwick at the other, and all the servants and their families were gathered there.

I had the sixpence from the pudding and the three wishes to which that entitled one. I wished that I should see Mr. Milner before I went back to school and then the Treasure Room and the third wish was that my mother and I should go on living at Roland’s Croft.

I thought that if only my father were there it would have been the best Christmas I had ever had, but of course had he been alive we shouldn’t have been there.

After dinner everyone had to do “a turn” except my mother and Mr. Catterwick whose dignity saved them and Mrs. Couch whose bulk excused her. There were songs, recitations, and even a dance; and one of the gardeners and his son played their violins. I recited The Wreck of the Hesperus which, Mrs. Couch whispered, I did so beautifully that it brought tears to her eyes.

During the evening my mother sent me upstairs for her shawl and as I came out of the servants’ hall and shut the door on the lights and gaiety I was suddenly aware of the quiet house closing round me. I went up the stairs and it was as though an eerie coldness touched me. It was almost like a premonition. That warm servants’ hall seemed a whole world away. In a sudden unaccountable panic I dashed up the stairs to my mother’s room, found the shawl and prepared to come down again. I stood at her window and peered out. The candle I had brought up with me showed me nothing but my own face reflected there. I could hear the wind in the trees and I knew that not far off was the forest which long long ago men had said was haunted by the ghosts of those who had suffered for it.

Desperately I wanted to go back to the comfort of the servants’ hall, and yet I had an irresistible urge to linger.

I thought then of the Treasure Room which was always locked. There is something about a locked room that is intriguing. I remembered a conversation I had had with Mrs. Couch. “They must be very precious things in there, to keep it locked,” I had said. “They must be.” “In a way it’s like Bluebeard. He had a wife who was too inquisitive. Has Mr. Sylvester got a wife?” “Oh, he’s a strange gentleman. He’s giving nothing away. There’s no wife here now.” “Unless she’s in the secret room. Perhaps she’s his treasure.” That had made Mrs. Couch laugh. “Wives have to eat,” she said, “and wouldn’t I be the first to know if there was someone being fed.” And that overwhelming curiosity which my father had always said should be curbed took possession of me and I longed to peep inside the Treasure Room.

I knew where it was. My mother had told me.

“Mr. Milner’s apartments are on the third floor, the whole of the third floor.”

I had made an excuse to go up there one afternoon when the house was quiet. I had tried all the doors, and peeped into the rooms—a bedroom, sitting room, a library; and there was one door which was locked.

And now clutching my mother’s shawl, deeply aware of the darkness and silence of this part of the stairs, I forced myself to mount to the third floor.

I held the candle high. My flickering shadow on the wall looked odd and menacing. Go back, said a voice within me. You’ve no right here. But something stronger urged me to go on and I walked straight up to that door which had been locked and turned the handle. My heart was thumping wildly. I was expecting the door to open and myself be caught and drawn into… I did not know what. To my immense relief the door was still locked. Grasping my candle firmly, I fled downstairs.

What a comfort to open the door of the servants’ hall, to hear Mr. Jeffers singing a ballad called Thara slightly out of key, to see my mother put her fingers to her lips warning me to wait till the song was finished. I stood there glad of the opportunity for my heart to stop its mad racing, laughing at my fancies, asking myself what I’d expected to find.

“You’ve been a long time, Jane,” said my mother. “Couldn’t you find the shawl?”

On the second day of the new year there took place a little incident which left a mark on my memory. Amy the housemaid was getting something from the top shelf of a cupboard and in doing so pulled down some holly.

I was in the kitchen at the time—just the two of us, and she said to me: “It’s been in the way ever since it was put up and so’s that on the dresser. It’s time it came down. You help me, Jane.”

So I held the chair while she climbed up, and when she had taken it down, I said: “It looks unfinished now. If that comes down all of it should.”

So we began to take it down and as we were doing so Mrs. Couch came in. She stared at us in horror.

“What are you doing?” she cried.

“The dratted stuff was in the way,” said Amy. “And Christmas has come and gone so it’s time it was down.”

“Time it was down. Don’t you know nothing, Amy Clint. Why, it’s not to come down till Twelfth Night. Don’t you know it brings terrible bad luck to take it down afore.”

Amy had turned white. I looked from one to the other. Mrs. Couch had lost her fat comfortable look; she was like a prophet of evil. Her eyes, never very big, had almost disappeared into her pudding of a face.

“Put it back quick,” she said. “It may not have been noticed.”

“Who might have noticed it?” I asked.

But she was too shaken to tell me.

Later when she was rocking in her chair I asked her why decorations must not come down before Twelfth Night. She said it was knowledge that was passed down from generation to generation except among the ignorant like that Amy Clint. Witches looked on it as an insult.