‘Not a mouse shall disturb this house’

Martin parked his car behind the Commercial Hotel. The backdoor to the pub was closed. So was the entrance at the front. Perhaps they would be open later. It did not matter. He walked into the familiar street where he had so often walked before. That was a long time ago, yet everything seemed the same. There were the shops he remembered, the church, standing back from the road, there was the street leading up to the school. And there was the stone bridge over the brook that divided the small town in a north and south side.

He stopped for a moment on the middle of the bridge, peering down over the side. In winter and spring this could be a fast moving watershed. Now it was as he liked it best: water slowly trickling over the rocky bedding. He could distinguish some small fish. Fishing had been one of the pleasures he had indulged in as a boy.
Martin straightened himself and quickened his step. Not far now. Just around the corner. He stood still. Puzzled. Did his memory fail him? Or was it further on? No, on the opposite side of the street was the lawyers office. Martin looked at the empty space in front of him. He could not be mistaken. This was the place where the house had stood. All he saw was an empty space.
Looking up and down the street he saw an elderly woman coming his way. She walked with a stick. Surely she would be able to tell him what had happened with the house, why it had been demolished. ‘‘Excuse me,’’ Martin said. The woman stopped. She looked up at him. Friendly.
‘‘I wonder if you could tell me what has happened with the house.’’
‘‘Which house?’’ she inquired. Martin thought he recognised something in the voice.
‘‘There was a house here. I wonder why it has been demolished.’’
‘‘I remember,’’ she said. ‘‘But that was a long time ago. There was nothing else they could do, was there?’’
Martin hazarded a guess.
‘‘Are you by any chance Miss Healy?’’
Her hair was different, her face much older and he remembered her as a tall upright woman.
‘‘I am. You must be one of my former pupils.’’
‘‘Martin Hamilton.’’
The woman studied his face for a while.
‘‘I am sorry,’’ she said. ‘‘It doesn’t ring a bell. I have had so many pupils. You must have been an exemplary student. I remember the nasty ones better.’’ She chuckled.
‘‘Of course,’’ Martin said, disappointed. ‘‘But the house..’’
‘‘That was long before your time, young man. It was in the war. The only bomb that hid our town fell on it. Killed everyone inside. A family of seven. Tragic. Maybe that is why no-one has ever built a house on that spot again.’’
‘‘But they have,’’ Martin said.
Miss Healy stiffened.
‘‘You are mistaken. I don’t believe you were a pupil of mine at all. Perhaps you are not even from this town. Good day, Sir.’’
Martin looked after her while she walked away, the stick stumping angrily on the pavement. He knew about the house that had been destroyed in the war. And it was true that some people resented his father building a new house on the spot. He recalled being teased about it. But his father had been an influential man as the manager of the local bank. The small businessmen and farmers with all their loans where at his mercy. And these unpleasantries had soon faded.
Once more Martin looked at the empty space. There was no fence or sign indicating that it was private property. He walked onto the grass. Towards the back of the plot stood a giant oak. He recognised the heavy branch where the swing had been. From there the ground sloped down towards the brook. There was the large stone that provided such a good fishing place.
He surveyed the ground. There was not a single stone lying around, no indication that there ever had been a house. What on earth had happened?
‘‘Oy.’’
Martin looked up at the sudden shout. Two men were standing on the pavement. One motioning with his arm. ‘‘You, come off there.’’
Martin felt a sudden anger rise. There was no call for this behaviour. Slowly he walked back. ‘‘Private property,’’ shouted the man.
‘‘Most certainly not yours,’’ Martin said. ‘‘Besides, how am I supposed to know that, Jimmy Walters?’’ The mentioning of his name started the man. He even stepped back, out of immediate reach of Martin. ‘‘How do you know my name,’’ he demanded.
‘‘We were classmates. Not for very long. You doubled, didn’t you Jimmy.’’
‘‘Don’t know you,’’ the man grumbled, uncertain of his ground.
‘‘Well, I know you. And you, Fat Nat. Still carrying a lot of pork with you. Still, you had your uses.’’ ‘‘Who the hell are you,’’ the man, by Martin addressed as Fat Nat, demanded.
‘‘Martin Hamilton.’’
‘‘Never heard of him.’’
‘‘Me neither,’’ added Jimmy. ‘‘Not that I care. This is private property and you are to keep off it. You’re warned now.’’
‘‘Anything else?’’ Martin asked. This trip down memory lane was not a great success, he contemplated. Nobody seemed to remember him. Of course, twenty-five years was a long time. Longer than he had lived here. But the house. What had happened to it? Should he ask these sulky men, who were ostentatiously waiting for him to remove himself?
Well, why not. That is, removing himself. The pub might be open by now. Perhaps there was someone with a shred of intelligence.
‘‘Good day, gentlemen,’’ he said after the habit of Miss Healy.
This time he did not stop at the bridge, nor did he look back. He wondered. Could he have been mistaken after all? No. The tree, the fishing stone.
Martin went in through the front door of the Commercial Hotel that now stood invitingly open. Finding the lounge empty he walked on to the public bar. He knew his way around here. A few men were sitting at the bar that had the same dark brown colour he remembered. On the floor the same yellowish linoleum, behind the bar not the proprietor he remembered so well but a pretty young girl.
Martin greeted the customers and got a muffled reply. He ordered a whisky. ‘‘Will you join me in a drink, gentleman,’’ he asked. They were all too eager. Three of them there were. Old age pensioners. They would have been grown-ups when he was a child. He saw nothing familiar in their features.
Having been provided with their free drinks, the men felt that some civil action was expected of them. ‘‘Fine day,’’ one of them said.
‘‘Would that be your car at the back,’’ the second inquired.
‘‘It is,’’ Martin said. ‘‘I am passing through. I found this place closed when I arrived so I walked about for a bit.’’
‘‘Sensible thing to do,’’ offered the third man.
‘‘I suppose you are all locals.’’ Martin had decided on a different track. ‘‘I was told by a housing agent in Edinburgh that there was an interesting house for sale here. Opposite the lawyers office. Thought I have a look but I could not find it.’’
‘‘No house for sale up there,’’ one of them said.
‘‘Perhaps I misunderstood him. He might have meant the open space. A building plot perhaps?’’
The men shook their head.
‘‘People ask about that all the time,’’ the girl suddenly said. ‘‘As far as I know it is not for sale and never has been.’’
Did the men gave her a warning look? She walked away and started polishing glasses.
‘‘But there used to be a house there,’’ Martin persisted. ‘‘A friend of mine told me that. He came from here. Martin Hamilton.’’
‘‘Doesn’t ring a bell.’’
‘‘Never heard the name.’’
‘‘His father was the bank manager, some thirty years ago, or so I was told.’’
‘‘Wouldn’t know. But here is George. He was the bank manager for many a year.’’
A man had just stepped in. Without asking him the girl poured him a dram.
‘‘Talking about me, are you?’’ he said pleasantly.
‘‘Man says he knows someone says his father was bank manager here.’’
The man, known to the others as George, looked at Martin who felt more exasperated by the minute. Was he dreaming?
‘‘This friend of mine, Martin Hamilton, said he grew up here and that his father was the bank manager, twenty-five, thirty years ago. I mentioned it, because I believe he lived in the house opposite the lawyers office.’’
‘‘There is no house opposite the lawyers office. And I was the bank manager in the years you indicated.’’ Martin looked at the man. ‘No, you were not’, he thought. ‘My father was. I know who you are. You were his fucking chief clerk. What the hell is going on here.’ He said something completely different. ‘‘Memories play strange tricks on people.’’
George ordered another drink, including the three men and Martin.
‘‘That they do,’’ he answered Martin’s remark. ‘‘There was never a house there since that tragic accident in the war. We were children then, but none of us has forgotten that.’’
‘‘I was having a look round,’’ Martin said, ‘‘when Jim.. when I was ordered off by some angry men. Rather rude they were.’’
‘‘I am sure they meant no harm,’’ George said.
‘‘It’s kind of a sacred place,’’ one of the man said. ‘‘Everyone around here knows that. Even the youngest. Isn’t that so Jenny.’’
The girl looked op. ‘‘Aye. We never played there. Though the tree would have been marvellous for a swing.’’
Martin looked hard at her, then from one man to another. The girl had looked away, the men pretended not to notice his stare.
He gulped down the whisky, banged the glass on the table and left without a word. Soon the men in the pub heard his car start and drive off fast.
‘‘A nasty lot, these Hamilton’s,’’ George said. ‘‘Coming here as if they were Gods great gift to mankind. What you think will happen now?’’
‘‘Hangs himself on the oak tree,’’ the first man said.
‘‘Drowns himself in the brook,’’ the second volunteered.
‘‘Shoots himself,’’ the third one said, unable to think of another option.
‘‘Let’s hope it sticks to that,’’ the girl said. ‘‘In this mood he might cause an accident and carry someone else into the grave as well.’’
The sound of screeching tyres, splintering glass and crumpling metal did not penetrate the thick walls of the public bar. Not much later Jimmy and Nat came in.
‘‘Fancy that,’’ Jimmy spoke, hoisting his body on a stool. ‘‘Some stranger crashed into the bridge.’’ ‘‘Is it serious?”, Jenny asked with anxiety in her voice. She was tender hearted and after all, to her it was a memory of a past she had never experienced.
‘‘No,’’ said Nat. ‘‘The bridge is still there.’’