Page 48 of Mirrors of the Past

‘Ryan? Sorry, I missed your call — someone — someone was in the office, And, um, we had a — a — power cut — or something. And my computer went off. And, yeah. Sorry . . .’

‘No problem.’ His voice, he knew, was equally odd. He put it down to his own nerves and awkwardness and not being sure he’d one hundred per cent made the correct choice by calling her. But he had made the decision and had to carry it through. ‘There’s — there’s another document that’s turned up. About Viola. Well. I think it’s about her. It’s, like, a story.’ He frowned at the papers. They were carefully placed on the edge of his desk. He didn’t really want them too close. ‘I — I was just wondering if you knew anything that could help me fit the pieces together.’

‘Viola. Right. Of course . . .’ There was a beat. ‘Okay. What pieces do we need to fit together?’

‘Might she have been at a ball in Mayfair? Around about August 1911?’

‘I don’t know — possibly. She was a bridesmaid at Elsie’s wedding and the letter asking her to be bridesmaid is from November, isn’t it.’ There was some rustling. ‘Yes. November. The letter asking her to go and see the dress is December and we know she was around for the Halloween party.’

‘But we’ve got nothing to say she was in England before October?’

‘No. Not really.’

‘And guest lists or invitations to balls? Do you think they would have existed somewhere?’

‘They might have done. But if it was a ball at Mayfair, then I don’t think any of the families we deal with had houses there.’

‘Ah.’ He didn’t really know what to say.

‘I could ask Merryn?’ Tegan said. ‘She’ll maybe know a bit more about the family? Like — who Viola partnered with at Elsie’s wedding.’ There was a moment of silence. ‘I say that, because something turned up here as well.’

‘Anything exciting?’

‘Yeah. I think so. I found an article in an American magazine about the wedding. It names Viola as maid of honour.’

‘Seriously?’ That was pretty exciting, even to him.

‘Yes. But she wasn’t maid of honour. Just a bridesmaid,’ Tegan added hurriedly.

‘Typical press. Lie about everything,’ he said wryly.

‘I guess so. But, anyway, this article. It has photos. The computer crashed. But I can go back onto the site. I think.’ That nervous tone had returned. ‘If we don’t have another power cut.’

‘Do you — do you want to send me the link? And I can have a look as well.’

‘I think that might be a good idea,’ she replied. ‘In case . . . anything dodgy . . . happens here again.’

‘Okay, I’ll give you my email,’ said Ryan.

‘Thanks. I’ll send that on shortly. As far as I can remember, there were a couple of photos and they had full-length shots of Elsie so we could use those to help with the dress design.’

‘We can. I’ll have a look at our stuff as well to see if anything else comes up for Viola and that Mayfair ball. Tammy or Bryony might already have found something and filed it. I think there are some mirrors in storage. I might search them out and we can use them in the Snow Queen display. Reflecting back on stuff, kind of thing. I don’t know — that sounds a bit hipster and arty, doesn’t it?’

‘No, it actually sounds great.’ The relief in her voice was evident and again that seemed pretty weird. The Tegan he remembered from Glasgow could be irritating, but you had to give her points for her confidence.

‘Right. I’ll get on with it. We’ve got each other’s numbers now. Not sure if that’s a good thing or a bad thing, though, right?’ It was an attempt at humour and he was pleased to hear a nervous chuckle from the other end of the phone.

‘Right now, I think that’s a good thing. Um — thanks for calling. I actually needed to speak to a real, living person this afternoon.’

And Angelo wasn’t available? he wanted to ask, then thought better of it.

Then Ryan was going to make a joke about the Pencradoc ghosts, but remembering his wanderings earlier that day, he decided not to go there, even in jest.

‘No problem. I’ll let you go and we can pick this up another time.’

‘Yes. Talk soon, bye for now.’ said Tegan.

‘Goodbye,’ he replied, and they rang off.

The phone call hadn’t been as difficult as he’d anticipated, in the end. But, it had been a long day, strange things had happened and he was ready to call it quits.

But perhaps he’d just wait for that email to come through first.