Short Stories by Francesca Astraea

When estate agents tried to sell Laurel Cottage, they mentioned the six bedrooms, the floor-to-ceiling windows and surprisingly sustainable heating costs. And, of course, the irony of such an old, grand, gated house being called a cottage. They did not mention the garden.

When perspective buyers visited, encouraged by the relatively low price and desirable neighbourhood, they always stopped dead when they saw the garden. Not in a wow, this is a stunning vista! kind of way. More of a wow, that’s the catch kind of way.

Initially, nothing seemed amiss. A neat terraced patio lead down to a sweeping lawn, which was edged by an array of shrubs and trees that looked easy to maintain. It all felt rather lovely… until one noticed the brambles at the bottom of the garden.

Or rather, the wall of brambles at the bottom.

Squinting, and maybe standing on tiptoes for a better look, viewers would catch a glimpse of what stood behind the brambles.

‘Ah yes,’ the estate agent would say. ‘That’s… a feature.’

‘What… is it?’ Buyers would enquire tentatively.

‘It’s a statue. Been there longer than the cottage, according to our records.’

‘What’s the statue of?’

‘A Roman-style woman. It’s known the Romans settled in the area—are you local? This region has such a rich past, you’ll love living here if you’re interested in history, there’s a Saxon burial site a few miles up the road…’

By then most viewers were already halfway down the lawn, peering through the thicket. The mess of plants wasn’t just brambles, they realised, but nettles and ivy and ambiguous weeds, all wrapped around themselves as though knitted by a demonic gardener.

‘How come it’s so… overgrown? The rest of the garden has been kept beautifully by the current owners.’

The estate agent would laugh nervously. ‘Well, it’s a funny story. Peabody & Jennings Estate Agents has looked after Laurel Cottage for decades. If you’re local you’ll know that the larger houses in this area often find themselves without tenants due to the, er, second home nature of most properties. We maintain the house and garden when it’s between residents and add any costs onto our commission. It’s an unusual set up, but it was contracted to the agency when we first took it over.

‘The statue, well, we’ll cut back the plants around the statue one day and the next morning they’re fully grown again.’

This was usually where the perspective buyers exchanged looks. Sometimes the look said this estate agent is mad. Others said there is no way a five-foot cube of brambles can grow overnight.

Sometimes the more curious (or sceptical) buyers would ask for a demonstration, wait for the estate agent to dig a chainsaw and overalls out of the garage, watch as they hacked the brambles back to reveal a very nice classical statue, and come back the next day.

No matter how clear the area was when they left, no matter how visible the statue was—and they always agreed that it was very lifelike, with excellent craftsmanship—the next morning it was obscured by a thicket you’d expect to take years to grow.

This was the main reason Laurel Cottage went on the market at least once a decade.

That and the fact most residents swore that every time they cut the brambles back, the statue would move.

Emil Torres was in the housing business to help people put down roots, so he was more excited than his colleagues when his boss asked him to show a buyer around the cottage, which was for sale for the third time since Emil had joined the Peabody & Jennings. The current owners spent most of their year in the Caribbean and had recently begun shedding assets for tax purposes, so all communications were done over Skype, with Emil given permission to show Laurel Cottage to anyone who might be interested in buying for cash.

As he drove out to the cottage—really, it was absurd that these houses were half a mile apart, enjoyed unspoilt views of surrounding farmland and existed within the same borough as his own one bedroom flat—Emil wondered if he would see Hallucination Sad Lady while he was there.

Hallucination Sad Lady was legendary within the Peabody & Jennings office. Initially the agency had called her Sad Lady. Almost an office mascot, she could be seen lingering outside Laurel Cottage during most viewings. She never actually approached anyone; she just stood across the street watching estate agents show viewers though the door with the expression one usually saved for funerals.

It took multiple sales over several decades for the staff to realise that this thin, well dressed, Mediterranean-looking young woman hadn’t, in over fifty years, aged a day. It was then that they started calling her Hallucination Sad Lady.

Sure enough, when Emil pulled up to the house, Hallucination Sad Lady was on the doorstep. He’d never seen her go past the driveway before and decided to let her leave quietly while he chatted to the gardener, who had just finished tidying up the garden in preparation for a weekend of back-to-back viewings.

‘I did some of the brambles while I was there,’ Paul said cheerfully. ‘Thought it might be nice to let the viewers get a closer look without you risking that nice suit. Statue’s same as ever. Just like someone else I know. Has she ever come this far up the driveway before?’

Emil shrugged and hurried to the door. Up close, she looked young enough to be in her teens, which made the hairs on the back of Emil’s neck stand up.

‘Hello,’ he began. ‘I’m just about to show—’

‘You’re showing me Laurel Cottage,’ she smiled, and stuck out her hand. Her accent was cut glass English with a hint of something. Italian, maybe, or Greek.

‘You’re—you’re Silvia Benedict?’ Emil glanced at his folder to verify her details, his insides squirming and his neck hairs prickling uncomfortably. Emil decided it was time to admit that he believed in the supernatural a lot more than he let on.

‘That’s me. Are we going in?’

As Emil gave Silvia the tour, he wondered what the office would say when he told them Hallucination Sad Lady was very softly spoken and smelt a bit like chamomile.

‘And the living room opens out onto the garden, if you’d like to follow me down—’

‘I’d like to make an offer on the cottage.’

‘Al-already?’

‘Yes. I have this much money to offer you, in cash.’

Silvia opened a banking app on her phone and showed Emil the display.

‘See? It’s all there.’

‘That’s—that’s a substantial offer, ma’am, but lower than the asking price.’ Emil tried to conceal the fact he felt slightly faint at the number of digits on Silvia’s bank account balance.

‘Is it? Money just isn’t worth what it used to be. Well…’ Silvia gazed out at the garden. ‘How about I offer you that… and a story.’

‘A story?’ He did not think a story was worth several thousand pounds to his Caribbean couple, cash buyer or not.

‘A story about why that statue stays covered in brambles. Ah, now you’re interested. Shall we go down?’

Without another word, Silvia set off dawn the lawn. By the time Emil caught up with her, she was staring at the statue. Paul had made enough of a gap in the thicket that you could see it clearly without mistaking the cage-like nature of the brambles. The plants had done a spectacular job, Emil realised, of keeping the statue protected from the elements. If he hadn’t known that the statue was far older than the cottage, and that the cottage was far older than the town, he would have thought it new.

‘It’s lifelike, isn’t it?’ Silvia said.

‘You’ve seen it before?’

‘It’s possible I’ve found other ways of coming in than the front door,’ she acknowledged, still watching the statue.

Emil followed her gaze while he tried to think up a response. Well, it would have been odd if she hung around the place for decades but never went inside. The statue was quite lifelike: it was in the classical style, he supposed—lots of toga-esque clothing and long hair. Her face didn’t quite match the standard ‘pensive garden ornaments’ look, though. Her face was thin, her brows furrowed, her chin set. She looked, in fact, quite angry.

‘Would you like to hear the story out here?’ Silvia asked. ‘Or should we go inside?’

‘Out here,’ Emil decided. He took off his jacket, used it as a blanket and sat on the lawn. After a moment, Silvia joined him. She coughed a couple of times and, without taking her eyes off the statue, began talking.