took a glass from beside the sink and poured in a slug of vodka. Topped it up with Coke, swallowed a long gulp and sighed.
Once she had changed out of her muddy clothes and spread out on the comfortable double bed, she began to relax. This wasn’t too bad. A few more gulps. She checked her phone, watched the buffering circle slowly rotate on her screen. Still no signal. Then she spotted a white card on the bedside table with the wifi code.
When WhatsApp loaded up, she sent a message to her mum and Lori.
I made it! The place is perfect. No phone reception, but that suits me. Looking forward to lots of long walks and feeling better already.
Obviously neither of them wanted to speak to her anyway, but at least they couldn’t complain that she’d left them worrying.
Her phone dinged with a message. Henry Laughton.
I hope you have arrived safely at The Guesthouse and had a good journey. A hearty welcome from all of us at Preserve the Past.
Do contact me with any problems or queries and I’ll arrange for someone to deal with them.
You should find toiletries and tea/coffee etc in your room, but there are further supplies in the kitchen. Take whatever you need.
Enjoy your stay.
She swallowed the rest of her vodka and tapped out a reply. Aimed for the right passive-aggressive tone. She had been very surprised about the lack of road access to the property and felt this should have been made clearer on the website. Her clothes and shoes were ruined. There was nothing to be done about it, of course, but she thought it might help to have some feedback for future guests. She hit send.
For the first time in ages she was hungry, so she pulled on thick socks and looked out into the corridor. Hesitated for a minute or two, listening. Not a sound, except her own breathing and the gentle ticking of a clock somewhere. Then she forced herself along to the top of the stairs and leaned over the balustrade to peer into the hall below. Next to the main door someone had left some wellies and a pair of walking boots. Other guests must have arrived, because she could hear the comforting hum of voices downstairs.
She padded down. Put a smile on her face, pulled out a stick of gum from her pocket to mask the smell of booze. She had chewed a lot of the stuff recently, whenever she was at home. The voices were coming from a big door at the back and to the right of the stairs. A dark tapestry, showing some kind of hunting scene, hung on the wall beside it. Pushing it open she found herself in a huge country kitchen.
Seated at the massive oak table, fiddling with a phone, was a guy who looked about her own age. Behind his black-rimmed glasses, his eyes gleamed as he flashed a white smile.
‘Hello. Good to see you. Come in, come in.’ He stood and held out his hand. ‘I’m Mohammad – Mo – and that’s my dad, Sandeep.’
He nodded to an elderly man standing in the corner. Hannah took Mo’s hand and tried not to think about the awkward handshake at the end of her most recent disaster of an interview.
When Sandeep also stretched out his hand she could see the likeness. But while Mo was smiling, his father looked unhappy, angry even. He was holding a cloth and seemed to be cleaning the warm Aga.
‘So, you’re not the hosts?’ Hannah asked.
Mo laughed. ‘I wish. No, my dad’s just a cleaning fanatic.’ He turned to Sandeep. ‘Come on, Dad, give it a rest. This is meant to be a holiday.’ But his father ignored him.
‘How long have you been here?’ Hannah thought of the shadow at the window when she first arrived.
‘About half an hour. And you?’
‘An hour or so I think.’ So it couldn’t have been them. ‘Had a proper nightmare walking all the way from the road.’
Hannah went to the fridge. Milk, cheese, butter. Some cold meats, lots of vegetables, orange and apple juice. But no wine. She sighed. ‘I’m surprised the host didn’t warn us about the trek across that bog. My new trainers are ruined.’
Mo looked down at her socks. ‘Me and Dad like to walk, but yeah, it was a long way.’
An old-fashioned coffee maker started to steam on the Aga. Sandeep filled two mugs with coffee and pushed them towards her without a word. His eyes were clouded. With annoyance, anger, or something else, she couldn’t guess. She sat beside Mo and passed him a coffee, all the time aware of Sandeep stooped in the corner, wiping the worktops, fussing with the Aga again.
Mo blew on the mug and took a sip. ‘For a while we thought we might be the only guests, stuck out here on our own. It’s nice to have company.’
He smiled at her across the table. It was a shy smile, but very warm. ‘So what brings you all the way out here?’
It was too direct, although he couldn’t possibly know that. She paused, not wanting to mention Ben, but struggling to think of a plausible lie. In the end the truth just seemed to come out.
‘My father …’ She swallowed. ‘He used to live in this part of Ireland. He died five years ago.’ Hannah could feel her jaw tightening. She never talked about him. What was she doing telling a complete stranger?
‘So you’ve been here before?’ Sandeep had turned to face her, his voice loud in the silence.
‘Dad?’ Mo glanced at Sandeep then leaned across the table. ‘Don’t mind him, he doesn’t want to be here.’ Mo had a strange accent that Hannah couldn’t place. London certainly, but something else too.
She glanced at Sandeep and sipped her coffee. ‘No, my parents separated when I was young and then my dad died. I never had a chance to get to know him properly.’ She turned the mug around in her hands. ‘When I saw this place on Cloud BNB, I thought it would be nice to see where he lived. I guess I wanted to find out a bit more about him.’ It was the truth as far as it went.
Sandeep turned towards her. ‘You came on your own?’ Once more that disapproving tone. And Hannah saw a flash of Ben laughing, shaking back his fair hair and leaning in to kiss her. Come on, you know you want to go. Can’t keep putting it off. We’ll have a great time.
She heard Mo mutter something under his breath. It could have been, ‘Sorry,’ but she was damned if she was going to let a moody old man get to her.
She looked at Sandeep. ‘I’m interested in the house. I studied architecture and used to work at an architectural practice.’ That was all he was going to get. ‘What about you guys? Why did you decide to come here?’
‘I didn’t. It was his idea.’ Sandeep turned away and continued to scrub the kitchen surfaces. ‘This place is filthy. It’s going to take me all evening to get it clean. And my clothes are still soaking wet from the walk.’
Hannah looked away and wondered why someone would be so unhappy about their holiday. Mo moved around the table to sit beside her and put his phone between them, pushing his glasses further up his nose with one finger. ‘I’m interested in the house too, but the history. I’ve just finished my master’s in history. Have you read about this place? There’s some cool stuff on Preserve the Past website.’
Without waiting for an answer, he tapped his phone and held it up for her to read.
