BooksBarbecue
Back The House of Whispers Save as PDF
Chapters (82)
  1. Cover
  2. Praise for The House of Whispers
  3. Title Page
  4. Note to Readers
  5. Transcript of interview with Mr Rohan Allerton, husband of Abigail Allerton: 20 December 2019
  6. One
  7. Two
  8. Three
  9. Four
  10. Five
  11. Six
  12. Transcript of interview with Mr Rohan Allerton, husband of Abigail Allerton: 20 December 2019
  13. Seven
  14. Eight
  15. Nine
  16. Ten
  17. Eleven
  18. Transcript of interview with Mr Rohan Allerton, husband of Abigail Allerton: 20 December 2019
  19. Twelve
  20. Transcript of interview with Mr Rohan Allerton, husband of Abigail Allerton: 20 December 2019
  21. Thirteen
  22. Fourteen
  23. Fifteen
  24. Transcript of interview with Mr Rohan Allerton, husband of Abigail Allerton: 20 December 2019
  25. Sixteen
  26. Seventeen
  27. Transcript of interview with Mr Rohan Allerton, husband of Abigail Allerton: 20 December 2019
  28. Eighteen
  29. Nineteen
  30. Twenty
  31. Transcript of interview with Mr Rohan Allerton, husband of Abigail Allerton: 20 December 2019
  32. Twenty-One
  33. Twenty-Two
  34. Twenty-Three
  35. Twenty-Four
  36. Transcript of interview with Mr Rohan Allerton, husband of Abigail Allerton: 20 December 2019
  37. Twenty-Five
  38. Transcript of interview with Mr Rohan Allerton, husband of Abigail Allerton: 20 December 2019
  39. Twenty-Six
  40. Twenty-Seven
  41. Twenty-Eight
  42. Twenty-Nine
  43. Thirty
  44. Thirty-One
  45. Thirty-Two
  46. Thirty-Three
  47. Transcript of interview with Mr Rohan Allerton, husband of Abigail Allerton: 20 December 2019
  48. Thirty-Four
  49. Thirty-Five
  50. Thirty-Six
  51. Thirty-Seven
  52. Thirty-Eight
  53. Transcript of interview with Mr Rohan Allerton, husband of Abigail Allerton: 20 December 2019
  54. Thirty-Nine
  55. Forty
  56. Forty-One
  57. Transcript of interview with Mr Rohan Allerton, husband of Abigail Allerton: 20 December 2019
  58. Forty-Two
  59. Transcript of interview with Mr Rohan Allerton, husband of Abigail Allerton: 20 December 2019
  60. Forty-Three
  61. Forty-Four
  62. Forty-Five
  63. Forty-Six
  64. Forty-Seven
  65. Transcript of interview with Mr Rohan Allerton, husband of Abigail Allerton: 20 December 2019
  66. Forty-Eight
  67. Transcript of interview with Mr Rohan Allerton, husband of Abigail Allerton: 20 December 2019
  68. Forty-Nine
  69. Fifty
  70. Fifty-One
  71. Fifty-Two
  72. Fifty-Three
  73. Fifty-Four
  74. Fifty-Five
  75. Fifty-Six
  76. Fifty-Seven
  77. Fifty-Eight
  78. Fifty-Nine
  79. Sixty
  80. Priory Hospital North London: 20 December 2019
  81. Acknowledgements
  82. About the Publisher

My head craned towards the opposite window, taking in quaint pubs, oast houses, big manor houses on impossibly green hills, cows, sheep and ponies standing, bored, in fields of homespun jumps. Against my will, I found myself scouring the landscape for familiar landmarks: that pub, the house on the corner, the scary grey house on the hill that I always thought looked haunted. Finally, the car entered the outskirts of a small country town, and I sat up straighter, peering at the familiar roads.

‘Could you just take a left here?’ I asked the driver, and he swung down the road I used to live in. It looked smaller, somehow, narrower than I remembered. The grass verge had gone, too, making the street look more built up than I pictured it in my head. My eyes fixed onto the house I was brought up in, its red and brown façade as familiar to me as the back of my hand. The front garden was paved over now, and there was a gate at the end of the driveway, an iron fence drawing a line around the perimeter of the garden. Keep Out, it said, and I was more than happy to. The house was something from another life; another me. Dad had moved out five years ago – gone up north to live near my aunt. There was nothing for me there; the whole thing tainted by what had happened.

‘Is that it?’ Grace asked, following my eyes. ‘Do you want to stop?’

‘Not here. You can turn around now,’ I said to the driver. ‘Sorry.’

He rejoined the main road and, within a few minutes, we entered a small picturesque village. Grace looked at the signpost and then pulled the stuffed dog out of her bag and waggled it at me, asking the question with a tilt of her head and a shrug. I leaned forwards, my heart a lump of stone.

‘You can stop here, thanks,’ I said.

The driver looked doubtfully at the postage stamp of muddy grass that counted as the village green. ‘Are you sure? Seems like the middle of nowhere.’

I double-checked the name: yes, I was sure. I paid the driver, and Grace and I got out by a row of village shops. I filled my lungs with the cold, fresh air of the countryside, my breath visible as a puff, and took in the green with its weather-worn benches, the red post box, the row of quaint shops – a quintessential village that seemed untouched by time. I couldn’t imagine people here doing anything that wasn’t wholesome and pure. My breath was sour with the taste of vomit.