Running with the Pack
Page 57

“And so, here we have a ghost story! Like in all your country houses!” She put on a hushed voice. “Well, the ghost of Augustus von Merkens, who you see here, who died of a consumption, it is said he walks at midnight . . . but he never passes the turning to the stairs . . . and, you know why? . . . Well, look!”
Heads turned in unison towards a portrait at the top of the stairs: it depicted a grim, humourless, middle-aged woman.
“Well, you know who we have here? . . . It is, of course, Birgitta Lindhorst, his wife’s mother . . . And so, he is too frightened to go past the mother-in-law, and so, he goes back to bed!” The party laughed uproariously.
“I thought these Nordic folk were supposed to be liberated!” whispered Fraser.
“A concession, I would think, to the plebeian sense of humour! . . . They’re a lot more liberated actually!”
“So I’ve heard!” he said, grinning.
“I’ve told you! She’s too young for you!”
Relentlessly enthusiastic, Solvejg reached, finally, a portrait of a red-haired woman of uncertain age. An oddity about her face, with its high cheek bones and prognathous jaw, crimson lips half-smiling, was that it just stopped short of being ugly, yet resulting in a striking, if somewhat sinister, beauty. Her prominent grey eyes appeared to scrutinise the viewer with rapacious curiosity. Her cheeks and brow were pale, as if the paint were fading, her throat long and white. Furs draped her broad shoulders. Her garments were voluminous, the shade of ruby wine. The painting seemed to occupy more space than necessary, as if positioned where once two had hung.
“And here,” declared the guide, “we have the last of the line, Sophia von Merkens, who died in 1945. A very beautiful woman, who tempted men to their fates. It was said of her that even when she was coming as an angel, she was walking as a demon!”
“Aha!” laughed Fraser, “Very liberated! A femme fatale!”
“It’s a form of empowerment!” hissed Eloise.
The guide was elaborating on Sophia’s dubious charms. “She was a Swede,” she concluded, as if that explained many things.
“What about Anders von Merkens?” interrupted Eloise, somewhat haughtily. “He was here in the War? . . . That makes him last of the line, surely? . . . I’m talking about her husband.”
“Ah, yes!” The guide put on her professional smile. “She was married to Anders, her cousin, the Baron. His portrait, it is being restored in Oslo.”
“Leave it!” whispered Fraser, nudging her. “Don’t start accusing the Norwegians of war crimes! That’ll go down really well!”
Their companions, mostly elderly Americans, were regarding her impatiently, anxious to terminate the interminable tour. Eloise made to speak, then stopped. Solvejg’s smile remained impregnable.
“So, our tour, it is over. The upstairs rooms are private offices for the university. Thank you very much, ladies and gentlemen. Now we are going down to the restaurant for a cup of coffee. And, perhaps, a delicious cake of Norway?’
“Funny, that,” said Fraser, as they sat down with their espressos. “The name, I mean. Lindhorst?”
Eloise eyed him quizzically. “What?”
“Well, here’s an ancient rogue, banished in the seventeenth century by the family, and then the name comes back through intermarriage?”
“Yes,” replied Eloise, looking somewhat nonplussed. “But you know how it is with names! How many MacDonalds are there in Scotland?”
“Too many!”
They both laughed.
Eloise looked serious for a moment, as if to say something, then drained her cup. “I must find the curator, or whoever’s in charge. See if they can direct me to our friend. Finish your coffee.”
The minutes lengthened.
Fraser eventually located his daughter in the courtyard with a matronly woman, whose smart two-piece suit loudly proclaimed her custodian of the Barony. She appeared to be remonstrating, shaking her head, keen to terminate the conversation, his arrival prompting her departure.
“Meet our friendly curator,” said Eloise. “She didn’t seem keen on me meeting Nielsen. He lives in a cottage just on the other side of the park. I got the impression they’d like to see the back of him. He’s an alcoholic, by the way. It’s a problem here, you know? That’s why there’s so much tax on booze. Blame the long dark winter nights! And all the rain!”
“The more like Scotland, the more I hear!” groaned Fraser.
“Anyway,” Eloise continued, “I’m going to see if I can find him. We’ll meet up later.”
“No problem,” said Fraser, his spirits rising at the prospect of unalloyed solitude. “Let’s say back at the boat about five-thirty. We’re not sailing until nine.”
Fraser studied the map Solvejg had provided. The grounds were vast, rising to a narrowing valley, with high peaks beyond; much of it was pasture, with belts of woodland. The map was colour-coded, denoting public and private areas. Though the park and gardens, shown in green, were freely open, intriguing pathways tailed into the encircling forests—into the red zone. Fraser noticed a small church on the edge of the estate, separated from the house by a swath of red; it could not be far from where he now stood. Solvejg had mentioned the medieval stave church, St. Olaf’s, the oldest in Norway. The first priority, however, was botanical exploration.
The way to the lake led through a glade of rare trees, all neatly labelled in Latin. A bewildering profusion of flowering shrubs fringed its shores. There were sculptures and pergolas, a classical temple on an island. Fraser wandered randomly, defiantly treading the lawns, ignoring notices—Tr?kk ikke p? gresset—he could always say he didn’t know the language. No one was about, not even members of the tour party; the rose garden would be their limit.
Eventually he found himself on the threshold of a pine woods; a wooden gate marked the public boundary. He clambered over, into the red zone. The conifers thinned into a dreary glade, interspersed with scrub hazel and birch, like a recently felled area reclaimed by nature, rampant with nettles. The pines loomed, dark, dense, forbidding, their intoxicating resin scent suffocating in the airless wood. Sunshine flickered harshly through the dismal soughing trees, circled by restless fluttering rooks, their harsh caws unsettling. The place exuded a disquieting ambience, difficult to define, but dreadful . . .
Fraser was besieged by an unutterable desolation, an anxiety bordering on terror; a feeling, almost, of physical malaise. He glanced into the brooding gloom of the encroaching forest, imagining voracious eyes . . . What a terrible place to die! . . .
Rapidly, he retreated—out of the glade, over the gate, back to the sanctuary of the gardens. He found himself on an elevated path, lined by a laurel hedge. The path was veering right, away from the direction of the lake, back into the woods; the direction did not feel right. The red-circled notice confronting him was unambiguous: Adgang Forbudt!
The map confirmed matters: here the path entered the red zone; he should have been lower down. It looked quicker, though, to proceed now straight ahead, through the wood, and pick up an alternative track that would bring him to the front of the house, to its courtyard.
In less than a quarter of a mile the trees thinned. The way back to the house, however, was less obvious than the map suggested. To his right was an ascending path; ahead, on a natural elevation, partly obscured by bushes, was an intriguing structure. He hesitated, then curiosity triumphed over caution. Curving steps led up through straggling shrubbery to a high stone wall, inset by an ornate metal gate. Another sign confronted him: Gravelund. Privat! Adgang Forbudt!
Fraser stepped up towards the gate.
Two luxuriant shrubs, of an exquisitely ghastly beauty, overhung it, forcing him to stoop. They were of a species he could not identify. Twisting copper boles with striated bark rose up into olive-shaded evergreen foliage. The blossom was remarkable, as if illumined from within. The thickly-bunched outsize scarlet flowers had splayed-back petals and prominent stamens. The blooms were exotic, outré, almost horrible; they exuded a pungent aroma, swiftly transforming from the delightful to the disagreeable. Most disgusting were the strange appendages that hung from the lower branches, two on one shrub, one on the other, like cocoons of thickly-matted straw.
The graveyard, evidently a family burial ground, resembled nothing so much as a walled garden run to seed. Wisteria and ivy clambered riotously up the walls, choking bedraggled fruit trees. Most of the graves were flat slabs, tangled with briars, weathered, neglected. There was no funerary ornamentation, not even so much as a simple cross; doubtless, the Norwegians took all this business more soberly. Fraser perambulated idly, casting his eye over the inscriptions.
The graves were arranged in strict order of decease. The name Lindhorst, he noticed, featured on quite a few. Here at the very end of the line was the resting place of Sophia von Merkens: it, too, bore above her married title the name Lindhorst. Though his knowledge of the language was limited, he guessed the lengthy dedication on her stone outlined her lineage. Inscribed also was, presumably, her place of birth—somewhere in “Sverige;” the slab was badly chipped, the exact location obscure, except for the initial letter “R.”