‘I can hear him but I can’t see him. I’m going down.’
He turned to pull on his jeans.
‘You’ll need sun protection. It’s baking out there.’
‘Slap it all over my skin, then, babe,’ he said with a wink.
‘Hang on, I’ll come with you. Just let me get dressed.’
Outside, she rubbed the sunscreen into his back and shoulders, reaching up to cover the back of his neck. They’d cut his hair in prison, and it was shorter than she was used to, a no-nonsense V finishing at the base of his skull. His jeans were slung across his hips and she was tempted to slide a hand down inside, to cup a tight, taut buttock.
A plaintive miaow put off such lascivious thoughts.
‘He’s over there somewhere. Bowyer! Come on. I’ve got a tin of tuna with your name on it.’ Jason walked through waist-high weeds, heading towards the sound.
It took them past the slab with the iron ring they had thought might lead to a cellar, but had been unable to open. On the far side of the kitchen, the back wall recessed, some disused reception rooms and a library lying behind the shuttered windows. But before that, there was a little alcove set into the brick, and this was where Bowyer could be found. He was sharpening his claws on something – a thick length of rope hanging from the rather high-set tap. Its end was mere shreds, either as the result of age or Bowyer’s antics, but attached to the top was something metallic and brassy that clanked against the rusty tap.
‘What is it?’ Jenna wondered, removing the rope from its hanging place. ‘Oh. Look.’
The clanking metal item appeared to be a combination lock, with four brass rings numbered 0 to 9 around their circumferences, and an iron hasp.
‘What does that open, I wonder?’ said Jason, peering over her shoulder with a disgruntled Bowyer fighting to leap out of his arms and go back to his claw-sharpening.
‘Do you think it’s anything to do with that iron ring in the ground? Do you think there really is a cellar, despite what Harville said?’
‘If Harville said there wasn’t, then there probably is. Ouch.’ Jason let Bowyer leap away into the long grass. ‘You don’t know of any other locked doors or cupboards in there?’
‘No. I’ve had a thorough poke around and everything else is accessible. I wonder …’
She went to find the iron ring. Mere pulling at it had done nothing, but perhaps there was another way. A closer look at the thing revealed a little bar near its base around which the hasp of the lock could fit quite snugly.
‘It seems made for it,’ she said in a low voice to Jason. ‘I wonder if it can unlock something?’
‘Well, perhaps, if you find the combination. But that might take forever. Come on, let’s get that tuna out for Bowyer.’
But she held up a hand, intent now on her course. She tried a few combinations without success, aware that she was unlikely to stumble upon the right number by accident. Giving up for the moment, she gazed up at the sun and saw, built into the chimney above, a brick with the date of the Hall’s construction on it. 1836.
Well, it was worth a try.
She clicked the numbers 1-8-3-6. There was an answering click, somewhere down inside the slab.
‘Jason,’ she cried, reaching up to grab his hand. ‘Something happened.’
‘What?’ He crouched down beside her.
‘It felt like something was unlocked. What if we pull the ring now?’
But nothing happened.
‘No, hang on,’ said Jason. ‘What if we try to turn it?’
He put both hands to the ring and tried to steer it anticlockwise. It moved. Not without a grinding stiffness, but it definitely moved.
‘Oh, God. Keep going,’ urged Jenna.
He had to strain every sinew to keep the ring turning, but eventually he got to the point where there seemed to be a movement, a freeing of something, a lock opening.
He looked at Jenna, panting, his forehead sheened with sweat.