RETURN TO THE DARK HOUSE OF SECRETS.

The house seemed the same. The trees surrounding were larger; spread more wildly. Sophia stood; gazed at the door that had been painted black; seemed like a gate to some hell of her childhood. This was her Uncle William’s house; she remembered staying here during the war when her father was in Egypt; her mother away in hospital; just one of her frequent visits there for nerves. Now her cousin Godfrey owned this place; was beginning to put his own mark on it; it showed by the dark door that greeted her. The taxi that brought her from the station drove off. She was alone. Once more, she mused. She pulled the bell rope that hung beside the door and waited. A pale-faced woman opened; gestured for Sophia to enter; showed her into the cold morning room has it had once been called. The woman spoke. Mr Godfrey would be down soon; his wife was in the garden; would she mind waiting or would she rather go to the room set aside for her, the woman asked, looking at Sophia, her dark eyes scrutinizing her; her hands held across her stomach. Sophia decided to go to the room; the woman gestured for Sophia to follow her without bothering to take her overnight bag; climbed the stairs like one walking to Calvary. Sophia remembered the room. Here she had stayed as a girl. Things had changed; the wallpaper had gone; the curtains were dull yellow; the floor had been carpeted covering the stained wood she remembered. She sat down on the chair by the window; stared out at the garden quite expecting to see Uncle William in his bed of dahlias. A woman was there weeding where the dahlias had once been. Now roses grew. Godfrey’s wife Nina, Sophia suspected. The room seemed warmer now; not cold, as it was in the years she was here before. She recalled coming here after Uncle William had smacked her bottom for pulling off his dahlia heads and sobbed for what seemed for hours wanting her father and mother, but they never came; no one spoke of that or hinted at it days afterwards. None knew, except Uncle and her. A secret that was kept; a darkness over the room where he kept his books, gramophone and the 78s he played seemingly day in and out. She sighed. Godfrey had been at boarding school then, a spoilt boy who hated his father and smothered his mother with kisses and cuddles. He came home for holidays; didn’t say much to her being a girl; pinched her slyly on the arm; told tales on her; told on her and the dahlia heads.  She unpacked; then walked along the corridor to the room that had been her Uncle’s study. Silence. No one was about. She knocked the door stiffly. She expected her Uncle’s voice to bellow out, but none came. She turned the doorknob and entered the room. All the books had gone. The gramophone and 78s were no more. The room had been gutted. Nothing of those years remained. It was now a bedroom. Cosy. Adorned with modern furniture and the best of that too. She stood looking, trying to remember where things had been. It was here that Uncle had taken her; here that he and she had touched on hell; he did the things he did; she was sworn to secrecy. Gone now. Except in her mind where it festered like a foul wound. Godfrey’s voice was behind her now.  Sophia turned and he was there. He was all apologies; all kindness; all soft words. He closed the door of the room and spoke of her journey; asked how she was; how things were with her mother. Sophia replied, all the time taking in his changed manner, his grey hair, his wrinkled brow. In the garden, she met Nina his wife. Nina was tall like Aunt Gwen; thin like one starved. Her thin hands were brown with earth; green from weed. The dahlia bed was gone. The roses she tendered, were her pride and joy. The heads proud like children in fancy dress. They spoke; Sophia answered. They showed her the garden; she tried to remember where time had gone. They walked ahead, turning occasionally; their hands were joined; their voices like excited children at play. Aunt Gwen had stood here once; spoke of Sophia’s mother’s illness that she would not be back for a while. There was the garden shed that her uncle kept his tools, where he took her for secret things. She stopped; looked away; tried to think of better things, better times. Godfrey spoke of his mother’s death. Cancer took her. Died here, he said, amongst the things she loved. He said nothing of his father until Sophia asked. Fell downstairs, he had said, disinterestedly. Sophia nodded. Relieved, yet angered, she was silent now; she moved behind them to the house on the hill. However, she thought she saw her uncle by the shed door, standing and waving; his ginger hair and glittery eyes ablaze with fond desire and long kept secrets; his droning voice carried on the wind of long ago from this garden of evil and the dark house on the hill.