The Skeleton Tree

perfectly well they weren’t in that league.
The board belonged to a local firm of estate agents who had an office in the High Street. She searched their window display in vain for the house, but it was not on show. As she stood there, she could hear Bruce’s voice in her head. Her husband shared most people’s healthy scepticism when it came to estate agents. “‘Quaint” means old and poky, “spacious” means draughty and impossible to heat, “deceptively spacious”, on the other hand, means it looks small and it is, while “would suit first-time buyer” translates as no one who isn’t blind with love, or green as grass, is going to touch this with a barge pole.’
Since the house was not among those advertised in the window, she decided to go inside and enquire. There couldn’t be any harm in it. Half the people who go to view houses are just timewasters, satisfying their idle curiosity, she told herself.
The receptionist greeted her with a smile straight out of a toothpaste advert.
‘Good morning,’ Wendy said. ‘I want to enquire about viewing a house called The Ashes.’
The young woman smiled. ‘Of course,’ she said. She rose from her desk and crossed to the rear of the office, opening one of the filing cabinets and clicking through the dividers until she reached the section she wanted, then produced a single printed sheet, which she handed to Wendy.
A mature detached property set in a large garden in need of extensive renovation but offering a rare opportunity to provide a house of character.
‘We’re asking for offers in the region of twenty thousand pounds,’ the young woman said, as if twenty thousand pounds was well within anyone’s budget. ‘But prospective buyers need to bear in mind that the property will require at least another ten thousand spent on it, depending upon what is required.’
Some sort of reaction was evidently expected, so Wendy nodded and said, ‘Yes, of course,’ in a knowing sort of way, as if she had a sock full of fifty pound notes at home, which would make such a proposition even remotely possible. ‘What are the major things that require attention?’ It was surprisingly easy to keep up the pretence, she thought, once you’d embarked on this fantasy persona of a woman who could afford to acquire a mature detached house of character in need of extensive renovation. ‘Is it possible to make an appointment to see round the house?’
The woman smiled again. ‘The property has generated considerable interest, so we have decided to open it up for two general viewings this week, firstly on Thursday afternoon between one until four and then on Saturday morning from ten until twelve.’
‘So anyone can just turn up between those times?’
‘That’s right.’
For a woman who was only going to have a nose around a house she didn’t have a cat in hell’s chance of buying, Wendy felt ridiculously excited.
She waited until they were all sitting down to tea that evening before she announced, ‘You’ll never guess! That old house on Green Lane – you know, the one I’ve always liked – is up for sale. They’re holding some open viewings and there’s one on Saturday morning. Why don’t we all go and have a look?’
‘Whatever for?’ asked Bruce. ‘We couldn’t possibly afford to buy it.’
‘Just out of interest,’ Wendy said. ‘I’ve always wanted to see inside.’
‘What for?’ Bruce asked again. ‘Jamie, don’t reach across like that. Ask your sister to pass the sauce, if you want it.’
‘Didn’t some scary old woman used to live there?’ queried Tara.
‘What happened to the scary old woman?’ Katie wanted to know.
This stymied Wendy completely. She had taken it for granted that the elderly occupant had died. That was the usual reason for a long-neglected house suddenly appearing on the market, but she was reluctant to introduce that idea – she seemed to recall that Katie had already raised the possibility of ghosts and she badly wanted them all to like the house, even if there was no realistic prospect of it ever actually becoming theirs.
‘We don’t know anything about who lived there before,’ she said. ‘And anyway, that doesn’t matter. The great thing is that it’s a good chance to see inside the house. Once it’s sold there may never be another opportunity.’
‘I still don’t see the point,’ said Bruce. ‘It sounds like a complete waste of time to me.’
Wendy turned to Tara, hoping for some support but receiving none. ‘Yawnsville,’ her eldest said, theatrically patting her hand against her mouth.
‘Well, all right.’ Wendy laughed off their indifference. ‘I’ll go up there myself, on Thursday afternoon.’
Wendy spent Thursday morning busying herself with what Bruce jokingly referred to as her housewifely chores. At lunchtime she sat at the dining table for a solo lunch of crispbread and cottage cheese, and after that she went upstairs to exchange her jeans for a smart skirt, selecting a bag that matched her shoes. Somehow it felt important to dress the part of someone who could actually afford to buy The Ashes.
She was relieved to find Jasmine Close and Magnolia Road deserted. Friendly neighbours might ask where she was going, all dressed up on a weekday afternoon, and now that she was actually on her way it suddenly felt silly to have smartened herself up merely in order to go nosing around someone else’s house. Her own family clearly thought so. When she had mentioned the viewing to Bruce that morning as he left for work, he’d just laughed and warned her to look out for dodgy floorboards. ‘Otherwise, you might find yourself having an unexpected look around the cellar.’ Afterwards she’d wondered whether it was a roundabout way of letting her know that she was putting on weight, hence the cottage cheese lunch.
As soon as she turned into Green Lane, she could see what the woman in the estate agents’ office had meant by ‘considerable interest’: there were far more parked cars than was usual for the time of day, and before Wendy had