‘I can’t really see,’ said Rupert. The knocking came again. ‘There’s two of them.’
Theodora swept the curtain back and looked down.
‘Is that Lio?’ asked Theodora, and Dot spotted the edges of him through the window, dishevelled, coughing into a hanky and, for some reason, sopping wet.
‘And,’ said Rupert, ‘an old man in a red coat.’
Dot let out a shriek.
She leaped from the armchair and bounded out of the living room and across the hallway and down the stairs. Theodora called after her. Dot hurried clumsily, slipping against the bottom step, and ran through the halls toward the side door that led to Ethel Avenue.
Dot pulled it open, and there he was beside Lio: scented of mothballs and menthol, in his patchy red coat, stocky in his old age with a clean face and white hair. The Walcott nose. Archie.
CHAPTERTHIRTY-FIVE
Dot and Archie hugged on the step until Theodora pulled the two of them inside and out of the cold.
‘You must be Theodora,’ said Archie to the witch, and he shook her hand. ‘Lio here has been ever so helpful to me, and he’s explained your predicament.’ Archie leaned in and whispered, ‘Lad’s being awfully hard on himself. You’ll be good to him, won’t you? Weren’t his fault he was tricked again.’
Lio stood on the street, his hands in his pockets, shivering.
‘Why are your clothes wet?’ asked Dot. She did not meet his gaze.
‘I cast portals to just about every trawler in the South Sea.’ His voice was apologetic, and she could feel his eyes boring into her.
‘I think he’s caught his death,’ said Archie. ‘Slipped off several of the trawlers and fell right into the ocean.’
Lio coughed pathetically into his handkerchief.
‘For heaven’s sake,’ said Theodora, casting a spell that dried and warmed his clothes at once. ‘Get in the house, Lio.’
The witch led Dot and Archie up to the kitchen. Along the way, the old man’s eyes darted hither and thither, catching on the picture frames and glass lampshades and spell books stacked beside the staircase. Dot watched him as he experienced the strange dichotomy that happens when one enters the home of a person they are extremely familiar with, but which is altogether unfamiliar to them.
His face lit up once again with wonderment as he came into the living room and saw Belchamber resting in the armchair beside the window. Archie chose for himself the seat by the fire – Dot’s favourite.
‘Hello there,’ said Archie to the spirit, ‘I’m Dot’s grandad.’
‘So you are,’ said Belchamber sleepily.
‘I hear you’ve been poorly.’
Theodora led Dot into the kitchen.
‘I can leave you two alone if you’d like?’ whispered the witch. ‘Take Belchamber upstairs?’
‘I’d rather you stay.’
And so, Theodora brewed them all tea (and a strong black coffee for herself) and they spoke long into the night. At one point, they spotted Rupert wandering past the living room and into the kitchen; a little while later, he trotted back out and down the stairs once more, his arms full of bread and ham and things for him to eat with Lio. Dot explained it all until her throat was sore. She leaned lethargically against the armchair and Archie took up her afflicted hand and kissed it.
‘Still beautiful,’ he said.
‘Grandad,’ Dot groaned.
‘Don’t youGrandadme, Dorothy Louise,’ said the old man. ‘You’ve had a bloody tough go of it and all the while I was out in the South Sea like a fool. All along, you needed me here.’
‘It’s not your fault,’ said Dot.
‘It is,’ said Archie. ‘Who else did you have? Willard was never easy on you and Celia’s always wrapped up in her reading and your mum and dad, well, I won’t talk ill of my family, you know that, but there’ve certainly been things I wouldn’t have done. I should have helped you, love.’
