The Shadow in the Glass JJA Harwood (book recommendations for young adults txt) 📖

He topped up her glass again. ‘With you, nothing ever is.’

She drank, if only to hide her blushing. Now that she was used to the bubbles, she was starting to enjoy it. She took another sip, and was shocked to find her glass was empty. But not for long; Charles was already pouring her another.

‘Do sit down if you like.’

‘I’ll stay here, thank you. I’m a little cold.’

He set down his glass at once and shrugged off his jacket. ‘How remiss of me! I do apologize. Here, take – no, I insist, Eleanor.’

He draped the jacket over her shoulders. It was warm, and smelled of cigar smoke and something slightly spiced. He smoothed the sleeves down her arms, and even through the fabric Eleanor shivered.

Then, they heard a creak.

‘Hide!’

Eleanor darted behind the sofa as Charles unlocked the door. ‘I say, who’s – oh, Mrs Fielding. I didn’t think you were still up.’

Eleanor tried to make herself smaller. If Mrs Fielding saw her now – hiding behind a chair, wearing her nightdress and Charles’s jacket – she would be dismissed. She should be afraid, but with champagne crackling through her veins all she wanted to do was laugh.

‘Master Charles! Was that you I heard earlier? I thought we’d be murdered in our beds!’

He laughed. ‘Nothing so dramatic! I was only having a drink. I do hope I didn’t alarm you.’

‘You can always ring if you need any—’

‘At this time of night? I wouldn’t dream of it! Do go back to sleep, Mrs F. I’ll be quite all right up here.’

‘Well … all right. Goodnight, sir.’

‘Goodnight.’

Eleanor heard the door shut. There were a few seconds of silence, and then she heard a distant door close. She uncurled herself like a woodlouse and bit back the urge to laugh.

Charles helped her out from behind the sofa, his eyes twinkling. ‘Another drink?’

All Hallows’ Eve drew closer, and brought darkness rolling in with it. Aoife said the two were linked. She crossed herself, even though Mrs Fielding scolded her for it, and put her stockings on inside-out on purpose. For luck, she said. So far, all she’d got were blisters, and a lot of teasing from Daisy.

Eleanor wasn’t sure what to make of all Aoife’s superstitions. It was difficult to imagine ghouls and ghosts could be real when she was scrubbing a floor. But Granborough House was so cold, and so dark. Sometimes the air was so still and damp it tasted dead. Sometimes, Eleanor would linger in the kitchen as the maids got ready for bed, and listen to Aoife whisper about the sluagh – a horde of soul-eating revenants that flew on dark wings – and then Eleanor would run upstairs, two at a time, and flinch at every pigeon flapping outside.

Mrs Fielding tried to scrub it out of existence.

The carpets were not beaten, but thrashed. Fresh coal was ordered in and every spare bit of paper went for kindling. The walls were cleaned, the hallway was mopped, and every inanimate object in the house was dusted and polished to Mrs Fielding’s satisfaction. With all the work it was easy for Eleanor to ignore her fears. But when it stopped, she and Daisy would huddle by the range and listen to Aoife’s stories. No matter how many times she told herself she was jumping at shadows, Eleanor kept expecting Aoife’s next tale to be about a woman with all-black eyes.

Eleanor shifted closer.

‘You’ve to be careful by windows facing west,’ Aoife whispered, ‘that’s where they come in. Don’t open them.’

Eleanor glanced up at the kitchen window. It was already dark outside.

‘You’re not serious, Aoife,’ said Daisy, with a smile. ‘Besides, who’s going to open a window in this weather?’

‘You’re not to open them,’ Aoife repeated. ‘You’ll invite them in, and it’s bad luck besides. The good Lord knows we’ve had enough of that.’

Something flashed past the window. Eleanor flinched back before she realized it was only a rat. Aoife started away from the range with a shriek and Daisy laughed.

‘The pair of you!’ Daisy said, getting to her feet and stretching. ‘Take it from someone older and wiser: there’s no such thing.’

‘You’re only nineteen,’ Aoife snapped. ‘Besides, everyone’s scared of something.’

‘My pa’s a sailor,’ said Daisy, brushing her fingers against Aoife’s hair as she passed. ‘I know a tall tale when I hear it.’

Eleanor shifted closer to the range. ‘I’m sure Daisy’s right. Besides, the sluagh wouldn’t come after us, would they?’

Daisy shook out the straw pallets and laid them on the floor. She laid them very close together. Aoife watched her work.

‘They come for sinners,’ Aoife said, a strange look on her face.

Eleanor saw her expression, and the two pallets laid so close together, and understood. She remembered Daisy watching Aoife’s hair and felt the weight of her loneliness anew. Aoife and Daisy had a secret they would never tell her, but it was one they made together. Eleanor’s secret was too great, too terrible to be shared.

On All Hallows’ Eve, London was a haze of fog. When Eleanor left Granborough House she stepped into a grey void. Walk through it, and the street revealed itself in flashes: horses, coffee-sellers, pamphlets thrust at her by disembodied hands, a fur trader who she was sure was selling gloves lined with cat. Eleanor shuffled along, her arms full of bed-hangings. The costermongers’ unseen cries sounded like ghosts calling through the mist. She shouldn’t have listened to Aoife’s stories. Granborough House had enough ghosts of its own.

By the time Eleanor got back she was cold, muddy and had a fine layer of moisture coating her dress, slightly black and sticky from the coal smuts. She spread out the hangings to air over an upstairs banister and crept into the library. The cold had oozed into her. Snatching up a travelogue of Asia – she was rarely in the mood for fairy tales now, and all their hateful wishes – she crouched beside the fire and began to read, desperate to try and imagine herself warm.