Because, of course, I couldn’t stop thinking about the third floor, and not just because of Mister Cat, either. And the more I walked around thinking about it, the heavier it weighed on me, literally. Norris took me scuba diving once, that Southampton summer—once, and never again, because I couldn’t handle it. The breathing-underwater part was fine; it was the weight, the mass, the whole bulge of the entire ocean, all of it, on my head—that was what I could not deal with. And the bulgy fact of the third floor was just like that, another ocean, except that this time I was going to have to cope. Sooner or later. I didn’t live in Long Island Sound. I lived at Stourhead Farm.
But there were all kinds of perfectly good reasons to put off dealing with anything. The boggart was minding his manners, and school was getting interesting (though I wasn’t about to admit it), and the weather was turning good for more than two days at a time, and Meena and Julian and I—and Tony, a couple of times— could have picnics on the downs. Once we picnicked in Julian’s Hundred-Acre Wood, but that wasn’t such a good idea, though nobody could ever say exactly why. It felt darker than it should have, even for an oak forest; maybe because it was so warm and bright just beyond the trees. Whatever, we packed up our picnic halfway through and moved out into the sunlight, and we never came back.
When I wasn’t in school, I helped out around the Manor, like everyone else, but I dodged fieldwork whenever I got the chance—and so did Tony, I noticed pretty quickly. The Lovells were putting up enough money that first year that Evan could hire as much help as he wanted, and not need to press Tony or Julian or me into service. The problem was Julian: He kept volunteering the two of us, every time, for everything, no matter how much I threatened his life. He’d give me the big gray eyes and say, “But it’s our home, Jenny!” That kid still has no idea how close he came, once or twice.
Mostly we weeded, whacking away with our hoes between the ridges of wheat and beans and peas and barley, sometimes even crawling to dig out stuff growing too close to the plants. We helped scatter fertilizer, too, either by hand or climbing on the back of the tractor to make sure the stuff was spreading evenly. Just as he’d told the Lovells, Evan was absolutely obsessed with getting nitrogen back into the soil—even Sally said there was only so much talking she could do about the nitrogen-fixing cycle. But he was finding out he was a farmer, which I don’t think he’d really known before. Maybe it happened like that with old Roger Willoughby.
I don’t remember the exact day that I finally went up to the third floor. You’d think I would, but I’m no good with dates—I can’t remember my own birthday, let alone anybody else’s. I know it was early in May, and I know it was a Tuesday afternoon, because Sally was in Dorchester with her two piano students—no, she’d picked up a third one by then. Julian had stayed in Sherborne after school for some cricket match. Evan was over at a neighbor’s farm, helping out with some drainage problem, and I think Tony was with him. Either that, or he’d stayed for the cricket match, too, I’m not sure now.
I was sitting under the chestnut tree out behind the dairy, writing a letter to Marta, when Mister Cat’s ghostly girlfriend trotted by. She looked different in broad daylight—fainter, for one thing, and definitely transparent, but more real, too, maybe because it was daylight. She got a few steps past me, and then she suddenly turned and looked at me.
I have never watched Lassie on TV. Not when I was little, not when I was thirteen—I’d watch game shows, which I hate, rather than watch Lassie. I’m making a big point about that, so it’ll be clear that I didn’t imagine for one minute that she was trying to get me to follow her. I got up and followed her just because I wanted to. Because I wanted to know what the hell ghost-cats do on a warm Tuesday afternoon in Dorset. That’s all. I may wonder about it now, sometimes, but it was my idea then.
The Persian never looked back. She cut straight past the dairy, past Evan’s workshop, that used to be the cider house, and right under the nose of Wilf’s pet billygoat (he had the temperament of a werewolf and a thing about Mister Cat, but he never saw her) into the Manor. I thought she’d just fade through the door, like a special effect, but she used the cat-flap Evan had put in, the same as Mister Cat. It twanged back and forth a couple of times after she’d passed in, just as though a real cat had been there.
I was right behind her, practically stepping on her tail, but she didn’t pay me any more heed than if I’d been a ghost myself. Straight up the stairs to the second floor, straight toward the east wing, swishing that feather-duster tail behind her like one of those fans slaves wave over emperors in movies. The house was so still that I could actually hear her feet padding on the hard old floors—or maybe I wasn’t hearing real footsteps but the ghost of footsteps, the shadow of footsteps. Hard to be sure, when you don’t know the rules.
I was following her so closely that I can’t say exactly when Mister Cat materialized beside me. He was just there, for once not scampering after his deceased Persian patootie, but stalking along at my heel, all dignity now, sort of convoying me like a tugboat, escorting me—where?
At the foot of the east-wing stair, she turned again, and her eyes were glowing green as pine needles in sunlight. Mister Cat did go to her then, and they stood nose to nose, not saying anything I could hear—just looking over at me together from time to time. It got on my nerves, so I finally said, “Enough already. Let’s do it.” And I started for the stairway.
They went up ahead of me. Once I’d pushed the boards and rubbish aside, those two shot past me and vanished into the darkest darkness I’d ever seen—a darkness that didn’t have a thing to do with the sun rising and setting. An old darkness that knew itself. When I started up, I felt it tasting me, licking at my neck and my face—daintily, carefully—the way Mister Cat will lick at something he isn’t sure he wants to eat. But I kept climbing, out of pure plain stubbornness. I’m not proud of the cranky way I still get sometimes, but I can tell you it has its uses. There’s a line in the Bible about perfect love casting out fear. That I don’t know about, but orneriness will definitely do it every time.
It was lighter on the third floor, because of the high window at the far end. I could see clouds and sky, and the top branches of that same tree I’d been sitting under. The cats were halfway down the hall, and I walked toward them, already feeling a sneeze coming on, because the dust was so thick everywhere. But a sneeze was fine, a sneeze was ordinary—nothing ghostly or spooky about a sneeze. The third floor was turning out to be a floor, that was all— closed doors and cold dust, a couple of tottery old cabinets, a few faded portraits hanging above curved sconces, candleholders. Dimness, not darkness.