The Skeleton Tree by Diane Janes (reading women TXT) 📕

could check on his whereabouts by simply looking into his bedroom. Feeling rather stupid at the way this obvious solution had escaped her, she crept across the landing and pushed Jamie’s door until his pillow, complete with tousled, fair head, came into view.

As she turned away from his room, it was all she could do to stifle a scream. Bruce had appeared silently outside their bedroom door.

‘Is everything all right?’

‘Yes, fine. You startled me. I was just checking on Jamie.’

‘Why are you creeping about at this time of night? What were you doing in the attic?’

‘Nothing. I haven’t been in the attic.’

‘Then why is the door open and the light on?’ He reached in and snapped the switch off, turning to close the door.

‘I thought I heard someone up there. I thought it might have been Jamie.’

‘Jamie? At this time of night?’

‘Well … there were footsteps …’

‘Footsteps my eye. It’s these boards creaking. I often hear it. For goodness’ sake, come back to bed. Some of us have to be up for work in the morning.’

He was right, of course, Wendy thought. Old houses were full of funny noises. The wood expanding and contracting as the temperature changed, as if the house yawned and stretched at night, like a living thing, settling to sleep. It was a comforting thought.

The tree has haunted my dreams. One recurring sequence finds me approaching the tree in winter. The leaves are gone, but the branches are not empty. The finger bone twigs are painted gaudy colours and a strange assortment of small articles hang from them, like decorations placed among the branches in readiness for Christmas. I recognize some of the items. The belongings of the dead mock me.

EIGHT

November 1980

When Wendy arrived outside Joan’s bungalow to collect her for their trip to the county record office, she experienced an uncomfortable sense of déjà vu. She had spoken to Joan several times on the telephone but had not mentioned the outcome of the last occasion on which she had given Joan a lift. She was still waiting to receive a date for the case to be heard, but Bruce seemed to think it certain that she would receive a ban, at which point she knew that people would become aware of the episode, because she would have to explain why she wasn’t driving. Embarrassment flooded through her every time she thought of it.

Joan had evidently been looking out for her, because she emerged from the front door without Wendy needing to get out of the car.

‘Well, this is nice,’ Joan said, settling herself into the passenger seat and arranging her large handbag between her feet before clipping her seat belt in place. ‘It’s jolly good of you to give me a lift.’

‘It makes sense not to take two cars. It wasn’t a problem – I dropped Bruce at the office and I’ll pick him up again tonight. That way I get to use the car all day.’ (Actually, Bruce had tried to turn it into a problem, grumbling even though the arrangement made no real difference to him at all.)

‘I’ve been looking forward to this,’ Joan said. ‘It’s very intriguing, isn’t it, all this delving into the past? You know, I think after I’ve cut my teeth on this little project, learned the ropes as it were, I might have a go at my family history. There’s always been a rumour that we’re related to the Howards – the Norfolk Howards, that is – way back on my grandmother’s side.’

Wendy, who had no idea who the Norfolk Howards were, decided to gloss over the point. ‘I’m sorry it’s taken so long to get this trip organized,’ she said. ‘It’s just been one thing after another at home. Of course, Tara’s eighteenth took up a lot of time.’

‘Your daughter’s party – of course. How did that go?’

‘It was super. The food was a big success and everyone danced.’ Wendy smiled at the recollection of herself and Bruce joining the youngsters on the floor for ‘Oops Upside Your Head’, and later dancing close together when the DJ played Streisand’s ‘Woman in Love’. It had been such a happy evening, to which thankfully it did not seem to have occurred to Tara to invite either her newly discovered father and stepfamily, or the wretched John, about whom nothing further had been said since the apparently coincidental meeting at Darlington station. It only served to show that they were a happy, united family, Wendy decided. Everyone went through tricky patches, but underneath they were rock solid.

Like Joan, she had been looking forward to seeing the county archives, but on arrival her initial emotion was disappointment. She had anticipated the faded elegance of the central library in Middlesbrough, with its antique radiators, glass-fronted cabinets and inviting alcoves, but Durham’s archives were housed in the modern basement of County Hall, and instead of paper documents, she and Joan were faced with microfilm machines, which were fiddly to work and lacked the romance of the anticipated ancient volumes.

They shuffled two chairs in front of a single machine and, after several false starts, managed to load the film containing the 1851 census for Bishop Barnard. This revealed that The Ashes had been occupied by James Coates, aged thirty-two years, who described himself as being of independent means. He lived with his wife, Maria, and they had one daughter, Elizabeth, who was just a year old. The Coates family were outnumbered by their resident servants: a cook, a manservant and various maids, the youngest of whom, Mary Mason, was just thirteen years old.

‘Where the slaveys slept’ – the words returned to Wendy’s head unbidden. ‘Poor Mary Mason,’ she said aloud. ‘I hope they didn’t work her too hard.’

By the 1861 census, the Coates family had increased considerably. James, Maria and Elizabeth had been joined by young Ann Maria, George Frederick and six-year-old Matilda, and all the domestic personnel had been replaced by newcomers.

‘We could probably find baptisms for these Coates children in the