Haunting, end

Chapter 5

Henry Tilney, Sr. looked haggard but very much alive. Behind him stood Henry's brother Frederick, looking weak or mortified.

“Sir,” Henry replied automatically as he felt his chest constricting. “What are you doing here? How did you find me?”

Henry Tilney, Sr. looked at his older son who only folded further in upon himself. “I have my ways,” he said, directing a deprecating smirk at Frederick.

Henry felt the betrayal like a physical blow. He had been a fool to confide anything to his brother.

Then Mr. Tilney looked again at Henry and any humor drained from his eyes. “You told everyone that I killed your mother.”

“You did kill her.” His voice was quiet. His lungs didn't have enough air to yell and in any case there was no one around to hear him.

“You wound me, Son,” his father said gravely. “You walked in on an admittedly disturbing scene and your first thought -- your first thought -- was that I had killed her. And then you told that absurd fantasy to others without once considering the dreadful nature of the suspicions you have entertained. What have you been judging from? Remember the country and the age in which we live. Remember that we are English. She was my wife, a part of me; I could no sooner hurt her than I could hurt myself. But you imagined something horrible, and you told anyone who would listen. And they believed you… for a while but not anymore. Now it's clear that you can't prove it and here I am, a free man. I think you owe me an apology, Son.”

“But I saw --”

“You don't know what you saw,” he spat. “You think very highly of yourself, Henry, but consult your own understanding, your own memories of what happened that night. You're not as smart as you think you are if you can imagine me capable of such a thing when I am constantly in the public eye, observed by my colleagues and neighbors. How could I have done anything without a witness?”

By the time Henry noticed how close the older man had gotten, there was no easy path around him. He took a step back and his boot squelched in the mud that ringed the pond. He tried to pull it out but for a moment he was held fast and he had a fleeting thought of Catherine dying violently in this same place and how her life was forgotten and her death erased, like she had never existed. The sun no longer felt warm and the land no longer felt vibrant, and Henry didn't want to be near the pond either. If he lived through this interview, he'd set up the ouija board again.

If he lived through this.

Mr. Tilney lunged at him. Frederick -- they had both forgotten about Frederick by then -- called out a warning but Henry's heel was still caught in the mud. Together, Henry and his father toppled into the water. Henry's breath was knocked out at the first impact and then his father was on top of him, holding his head under the surface of the water. It wasn't very deep but it was deep enough to drown in, deep enough to be murdered in.

Henry fought. He swung his arms, clawing at his father whose strength might have faded during his incarceration but whose determination was even more resolute. He thrashed and kicked, sinking further in the mud. His father kept both hands on Henry's throat until Henry's swings grew weaker.

He felt his consciousness fading at the edges and in a moment of clarity wondered if this was why he had formed a connection to Catherine: they were destined to share the same death.

Then the weight pinning Henry lifted and the grip on Henry's throat disappeared. Frederick Tilney had roughly shoved his father away from Henry when it became clear that the old man wasn't going to stop.

By then, Henry was barely conscious and too weak to rescue himself. It was up to Frederick. He prised Henry from the mud and blew air into his lungs until the pond water poured out. While Henry was puking and gasping, Frederick called for emergency services.

Only then did Frederick realize that their father was not also recovering on the edge of the pond. Henry Tilney, Sr. had always seemed like an indomitable pillar of strength to his children, and Frederick had never recalibrated his expectations. After shoving him off Henry, Frederick had left his father to founder while he completed his rescue. By the time Frederick could spare any thought for his father, the old man had needed to be saved as much as Henry had.

.o8o.

Henry was not like Catherine after all. He did not drown in the pond.

He was, however, hospitalized for nearly drowning. Then an infection set up residence in his lungs briefly -- something about pond water and bacteria. Luckily, he was young and healthy and had access to modern medical care.

His father was not so fortunate. Perhaps no more needed to be said on that topic other than the police pressed no charges against Frederick Tilney.

The detectives who investigated the incident had thought it was suspicious when Henry had remarked in a daze that this was the second life taken in that pond. “What other life?” they wanted to know, but Henry stuttered nonsense and then fell silent. He couldn't mention Catherine. His sanity couldn't afford the blow of hearing that he had imagined her all over again.

The day he checked out of the hospital, Frederick and Eleanor drove him back to the cottage. His brother only stayed for the day before leaving him exclusively to Eleanor’s care. They two settled into whatever this new phase of life was. It was a colorless, tasteless half-life that included far too much well-meaning pity and absolutely no ghosts. It lasted until the end of summer when Eleanor went back to school and Henry moved with her.

He didn't share a flat with her but it was tremendously comforting to be in the same city, to be able to meet for dinner and complain about the traffic. He still texted his brother occasionally but neither tried to call the other. He started using his mother's last name to avoid recognition and got a job. He even found a new therapist.

The court finally released his mother's money and Henry upgraded to a nicer flat. It was still within his means but it felt like life wasn't a continuous struggle, and that was a real luxury.

He got a text one day from Cousin David: Aunt Grace had died in her sleep. This was sad news but not entirely unexpected; the woman had only gotten older since the last time Henry had seen her. He called his cousin and the two reminisced for a while before David got to the heart of the matter: Aunt Grace had willed the cottage to Henry since he was the last family member to live in it.

“I couldn't possibly accept it,” Henry started to refuse.

“If you're worried that she might have been too forgetful to be of sound mind when she signed it, don't be,” said David. “A few of us cousins got together and decided that none of us wanted it. Mari and I both signed as witnesses. No one is going to challenge it.”

“But I don't want to live there,” Henry said. “If no one else in the family wants it, I'll probably just sell it.”

David laughed at his honesty. “I'm sure you aren't fond of the place, given what happened to you there,” his cousin continued, glossing over an attempted murder. “We don't expect you to move back but you don't need to get rid of it right away either,” David told him. “Those of us who live closest decided to try to rent it out after you had fixed it up and we had a tenant sign a one-year lease about five months ago. That should give you some time to decide what's next. And you'll also get a few pennies from the rent, after I deduct my maintenance fees.”

Henry protested that this was unnecessary but David stated that it was legally required and, besides, the rent was terribly modest. “Despite everything you did to the place, we couldn't charge much for it. It's remote and half of the rent is paid in labor, you know? Making sure the place doesn't fall into disrepair again. If she wasn't living there, we'd have to draw lots to see who had to drive out every weekend just to check on the place. Thank goodness for the Department of Rural Affairs!”

That felt like a non sequitur and Henry had to ask what his cousin meant by that.

“The tenant is working on a research project for the Department of Whatnot and Rural Affairs, counting migratory bird species in the area over a twelve month period. She almost rented a place 50 kilometers to the northeast but I let slip about your ghost and she was hooked.”

“You did what?” Henry was instantly defensive. “I never told you there was a ghost.”

“It was heavily implied,” David said, the eye roll audible. “And it worked out in the end. Honestly, I think it's silly, inventing paranormal explanations for the usual old-house noises and forgetting where you put things. But she’s a big fan of spooky stuff. She doesn't mind if the cottage has a ghost, says he moves stuff around on her, got cheeky once when she was taking a bath, but he's never tried to scare her. She claims he even played chess with her. She calls him Tom, short for phantom if you can believe it.”

Henry tried to laugh but merely wheezed. This woman was living with his ghost. It had been real after all.

“Well, she doesn't mind most of the time,” David said, warming to the subject. “She did call up once in the dead of night in a bit of a panic. She had been playing with tarot cards or something and was convinced that your father's spirit was trapped in the cottage.”

Henry felt an unnatural shock. “My father?”

“She must have googled famous deaths near me, when she moved in,” his cousin said dismissively. “She probably found a bunch of tabloid articles about Henry Senior, the murder investigation, and how he died after nearly drowning in the pond, and her subconscious finally connected some random dots. It took me a few minutes to calm her down, but eventually I told her that he'd never been inside the cottage and had died at the hospital miles away.”

Henry tried to make sense of this story. His own subconscious was trying to connect a few seemingly random dots.

“Anyway,” David continued after a pause, “the service is this weekend. Say you'll come?”

The question felt like another non sequitur and it took him a moment to gather his wits. “Of course!” he agreed at last. “Eleanor and I will both come.” He'd mention it to Frederick too but wouldn't insist on it.

“Wonderful! I'll text you the details. A lot of the family will be there, and everyone from the facility. And Cathy, of course.”

“Who's Cathy?” Henry asked, barely following along. His mind was still stuck on the ghost of Catherine Morland.

“She's your tenant,” David explained: “Cathy Morland.”

Henry didn't notice when his cousin had ended the call, he just stood there, blind and deaf while his mind rioted. He'd gotten it wrong after all. It had always been a haunting in reverse.

THE END

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Notes: That's all, folks!

If you've read this far, I hope you liked it.

LisaY, I hope you read Northanger Abbey after this. It's my fave.