She had been away for an uncustomarily long time. Never having treated herself to a proper holiday before, she thought she would go the whole hog this time. And two months is longer than you think, when away from hearth and home. To call it a Grand Tour would have been pushing it a bit far, but she had visited all the high spots of Renaissance Europe... Suitcases full of dirty underwear and suchlike hastily thrust into the back of a taxicab at Heathrow, she actually looked forward to returning to the upmarket terraced house in Hampstead, despite the eventual necessity to get her teeth back into earning a living, not least to get hand from plate to mouth...

 

It looked at first as if things hadn’t changed, as the taxi drew up outside the railings of her house. In fact, the doorknocker seemed just as sparkling as she’d left it. The road appeared narrower, but she put that down to having just been charcoal-sketching wide avenues and esplanades amid the artistic environs of what was now another world away. The people in the street who, only two months ago, she may well have recognised, were strangely scruffy, their faces swarthy, eyes piercing as they stared at her undignified scramble from the taxi.

 

“Oi, Miss, don’t forgit yer luggidge!” called the driver as she went up her front steps to unlock the door. She had expected him to get out and tote the cases from the boot up to the door. If he expects a tip, he’d better shake a leg, she vowed to herself.

 

The lock was well oiled, but the door itself was unseasonably stiff, for she had to put a shoulder to it, and she almost fell into the hall, dropping the flowery hat she’d purchased in Florence from her head in the process.

 

“Oi, Miss, don’ trip up over yer own foot!” The driver laughed as he came to the top of the steps, lugging baggage with one hand and holding out the other like a plate of meat.

 

“Thank you.” She hastily regained her composure, and sunk a foreign coin of high denomination into the pit of his palm.

 

He put his nose to it. “Oi, Miss, I can’t spend this ‘ere funny munny in the Dog ‘n Duck.”

 

“I’m afraid that’s all I’ve got till I change it back in the morning.”

 

“And I’m afraid I’ll ‘ave ter take yer all the way back to Heathrow where yer started off, unless yer give me proper goose for the gander.”

 

Flossie cringed. She wondered about going next door, where old Mr Phipps lived. He’d lend her a few shillings, no doubt.

 

“Hold on, while I arrange something,” she said, finger in the air, as if she was conducting somebody else’s argument.

 

Mr Phipps must have changed his curtains … and repainted his door! Two months is a long time after all, she mused. Even the echoing sound of the knocker upon the heel through the house was more reverberant, as if fabrics and furniture were depleted.

 

“Mr Phippsl Mr Phipps! Are you there?” she called through the letter-box, expecting to hear the soft pad of his carpet slippers as they took their customary shine along the parquet tiling in the hall. But no such welcome sounds. She shrugged and returned to the ever-patient taxi-man, who was stepping from foot to foot on the spot in an attempt to give the appearance of wasting time.

 

“I’m afriad you will have to take that coin today and come back tomorrow if you need it changed. I can assure you it’s probably worth far more than the actual fare you’re demanding.”

 

“I do not ‘demand’, lady, I get,” he said in a suddenly posher tone of voice.

 

“Well, whatever, please be reasonable.”

 

“Me, Ma’am? I’m the most reasonable man you’re ever likely to meet. Reason-a-bilitee, that’s my watchword.”

 

“In that case, can we call it a day?”

 

He looked up at the darkening sky.

 

“More like the night, Miss, much more like the night, I should say.”

 

She did not appreciate the humour, but decided not to antagonise him further. She pulled the luggage into the hall and slammed the door behind her.

 

***

 

She stood for a few minutes in the dimness at the foot of the steep stairs. Eventually, she heard the door of the taxi slam and drive off. Hopefully with that nasty creature inside it, she mused.

 

The stairs certainly seemed steeper than she remembered them, as she dragged the first case up to her bedroom at the back of the house. Uncharacteristically, she had forgotten to switch on the light at the bottom before she started the ascent. Come on, Flossie, old girl, get a grip on yourself! She gritted her teeth and after much sweat and labour, she arrived at the landing. She’d have to have a quick bath and change into... Damn! All her clothes were dirty, except for the oddments left in the tallboy in her bedroom. She very rarely cursed, but the taxi-driver had upset her.

 

The landing was even darker than the hallway. She had always thought it best to leave all connecting doors firmly shut, whilst away, in case of fire. That would account for the darkness. Still, she had very thick velvet curtains in the bedroom (on account of light early mornings), and she could not remember whether these had been left undrawn.

 

She stood for a few seconds, regaining her breath and, as she did so, she heard a vehicle drawing up outside. Surely, it wasn’t that taxi-driver returned for his damned money! But, no, it soon drove off again, without any sound of car doors. She sighed with relief.

 

Leaving the case where it was, she felt her way to the bedroom door ... which was no longer made of wood, but curtain-strings of black beads ... that rattled like a snake as she passed through them. In the room itself, the darkness was more of a yellow tinge than the usual black or grey ... a group of individuals were squatting where her bed used to be, sucking on long pipes that seemed to be giving off most of the darkness. One of them crooked a finger, as if beckoning her to join them. Flossie, in her turn, just stood and stared open-mouthed, not even daring to breathe. She closed her eyes, momentarily, and, on opening them, she was relieved to see that the bedroom, as she remembered it, had returned, the print curtains hanging at the window, in that red lacy material she’d always liked. A low sun across the Heath threatened to dip below the horizon leaving the sky streaked with a display more fitting for some of the places she’d just visited on holiday.

 

She smiled with relief. It must have been the strain. Travel was an hallucinant, she mused. Plumping down on the bed, she stared up at the ceiling, which was covered in cracks … more than she could remember. But, two months was a long time.

 

As she gradually dozed off, she heard underchatter from next door. Evidently, Mr Phipps had company ... strange, he never had people in before. The last thing she remembered were the vehicles drawing up outside, doors slamming...

 

(published ‘Winter Chills’ 1990)