The Mermaid's Call

by Katherine Stansfield

  ‘It’s a lid,’ Anna said.

  We took one end each. The plank lifted.

  That was when we found our light. Hidden inside the bench. A lantern, fixed on a long metal pole that had at its end a wicked-looking stake.

  Together we lifted out the lantern. It wasn’t as heavy as the parson’s, the one he used to keep the devils away.

  ‘It’s been used recently,’ Anna said. ‘See the mud on the stake. It’s been driven into the ground.’

  ‘Don’t touch it – it’s sharp!’

  ‘We need to take it outside,’ Anna said. ‘There’s too little room to see properly in here.’

  ‘Anna – wait. There’s something else.’

  I reached around her and grabbed the scrap I had seen at the bottom of the box. ‘It’s paper. But thickened. Can you move? You’re in my light.’

  ‘This is hopeless. Let’s get outside.’

  She took the glass end, I took the stake, but wrapped my skirt over it to be sure I didn’t cut myself. The lantern was like a rope, keeping us joined as the wind raged. Together we carried it back up to the cliff path and set it down by the thickety bush that grew around the hut.

  ‘Anna, look – the glass is dirty. I don’t think it can have been used for a goodly time, even with the mud.’

  We crouched beside the glass. I lifted the lantern’s box into my lap so Anna could see it better. She opened the door and poked her fingers inside, then gave a crow.

  ‘That’s not dirt, Shilly. It’s paint.’

  ‘Well, that’s a waste. No use to anyone, a painted lantern.’

  ‘Ah, but it’s useful if you only paint three sides. Look.’

  She turned the lantern’s box over, and I saw that one pane of glass was clearer than the others. Much clearer. It shone.

  ‘Whoever used this wanted to direct the light to a specific place. Where’s that paper you found? I have a feeling it’s—Yes. Just as I thought. It’s been painted. The same black as that used on the glass.’

  ‘But why?’

  ‘We need to find where it was used.’ She stood and looked about her.

  ‘It’s too heavy to move easily,’ I said, and she helped me to my feet. ‘I don’t see how this could have been a moving light.’

  ‘I agree, and it’s likely that whoever used it, they must have done so close by. Who would want to be dragging this around the cliffs in a storm?’

  Who indeed? That was still a question to answer.

  Now that we knew what we were looking for, we found the hole easily enough. It was on the first step down to the hut, looked like the hole of a rabbit until we knew better. Together we lowered the stake in, but the lantern wouldn’t stand up, kept pitching forward. I thought of the mast of a wrecked ship, leaning down to the rocks. I shook the thought away. You are on land, Shilly. No one’s ever going to make you go out to sea.

  ‘Strange,’ Anna said. ‘The hole is the right size, it’s in the right place to be the light that Mr Seldon saw.’

  She gave the pole a shake, and as she did so it turned, and the stake seemed to find purchase in the ground. The lantern stood straight. We took our hands away.

  ‘It’s like a lock and key,’ I said. ‘It’ll only face one way, and that’s towards … Oh.’

  We stood either side of the lantern and looked in the direction the clear pane looked. And there before us was the vicarage, and the Seldons’ farm.

  FORTY

  ‘We’ve been thinking of the light the wrong way,’ Anna said, ‘assuming it faced out to sea, and all the time it was pointing in land. Whoever used this lantern, their aim wasn’t to draw a ship onto the cliffs.’

  ‘I’d say it was the last thing they wanted, the glass painted like it is.’

  ‘The light might not have been moving along the cliff path, but I’d warrant it was flashing on and off, with this card the doing of it.’

  She held the painted card against the clear pane, then took it away. Did the same again. I thought of the light showing, not showing. ‘This light was used as a signal, Shilly, but for what?’

  ‘Calling to someone at the vicarage or the farm.’

  ‘It seems likely. And who was that, I wonder?’

  We put the lantern back where we had found it, and the plank to hide it. No sense letting anyone know what we’d discovered. Then the bench was a bench again. No one would know there was anything beneath it. Did the parson know? Was the lantern his? J and C for Jesus Christ. J and C for Joseph and Charlotte. Either seemed likely.

  Anna led the way back to the cliff path. ‘Even if the light wasn’t used to draw a ship, it’s still possible that Joseph Ians was killed because he saw something here that he wasn’t supposed to. He might simply have been an innocent casualty of some greater plan.’

  ‘And on a night when he just happened to be back in Morwenstow after all those years away?’ I said. ‘And the captain just happened to have a dream in which he saw his brother’s death? There must be some join between all these things, Anna. Whatever took place here, Joseph was part of it.’

  ‘But what was his part? Setting a light? Finding one? Or did lights play no part and it really was just the Lord’s plan all along?’

  ‘You don’t believe that for one moment,’ I said.

  She laughed. ‘You’re right. I don’t. But I do believe we’re right in going to see Mrs Grey. She has a stake in The Eliza. For that reason alone, we need to speak to her.’

  ‘And then?’

  She took my arm. ‘Then we might need to pray.’

  We had passed Mrs Grey’s house the day before, when we went to see Inchin Ben, but hadn’t known it. She lived in a fine house at the start of the straggle of cottages that was Coombe, the end nearer to Morwenstow, so we didn’t have to pass the coughing Sanders again. As Anna knocked on Mrs Grey’s door, I thought I heard the coughs on the wind. I would rather have heard the mermaid’s call than that.

  There was the sound of bolts drawn back, a few of them, and then a key turning. Mrs Grey’s door had been fastened tight against the world. The door opened, but only a crack. It was a girl standing there, and her apron told us that she did for Mrs Grey, that Mrs Grey was moneyed enough to have other people open her door.

  Anna gave our names and said we would like to make the acquaintance of the lady of the house. The girl turned back to the hall, as if there was someone else there, someone we couldn’t see. Then she turned to us again.

  ‘My mistress isn’t seeing callers today. She’s not been well. I’m to say that to strangers. That she’s not well enough to come down.’

  ‘I’m sorry to hear this,’ Anna said. ‘But I would hope my wife and I wouldn’t be thought strangers for too long, given that we are friends of Captain Ians. He has asked us to call on his dear friend Mrs Grey as he is indisposed at the present time. You may have heard—’

  ‘About his brother? Him being dead?’

  ‘A sad affair,’ Anna said. ‘But the captain—’

  Captain Ians must have been talked of regular in this house for he was like a key – the door opened and the girl said we should come in and wait in the parlour. Her mistress would come shortly. I felt in my pocket for the other key I carried with me. The one found inside Joseph Ians. We still didn’t know what door that opened.

  The house was not so large as the parson’s – not so many rooms, I guessed, and them smaller, the ceilings lower. But the rug in the parlour was deep enough for my boots to sink into it, and the covers on the chairs were very soft.

  ‘Mrs Grey doesn’t seem a poor widow,’ I murmured to Anna.

  She nodded and picked up a little creature with a long nose made of metal, a shiny yellow metal. ‘I shouldn’t wonder if this is gold.’

  The door opened then, and she quickly set the creature back in its place.

  ‘Good afternoon!’ said the lady.

  She was old in her bones but moved freely, with no stick to aid her. She was likely still fair, with thick hair caught up in bright pi
ns, and her eyes not so sunken that their blue was lost. Fair, were it not for the marks the pox had given her. All around her mouth they were, the red braggaty spots. But they were healing. I’d seen enough of the pox to know that.

  ‘Forgive us for calling without a formal introduction,’ Anna said, and held out her hand to Mrs Grey, as men do. I knew she wouldn’t want to, for fear of catching the pox, but I guessed the pay owed us by Captain Ians gave her the strength. ‘And when you have been so unwell.’

  Mrs Grey was wearing gloves. Indoors. Had the pox attacked her hands?

  ‘Any friend of dear Frederick’s is a friend of mine.’ Mrs Grey pressed my hand and the braggaty marks at her mouth moved with her smile. ‘Please, sit.’

  We did as she said, and there were a few heartbeats of silence, which were terrible sharp. I didn’t know what to say, and Anna didn’t seem to neither. Mrs Grey’s face was so wretched and yet she’d let us in and so we had to speak of it. I wouldn’t be the first, though.

  In the end, Anna and Mrs Grey spoke together.

  ‘You must forgive my appear—’

  ‘I’m so sorry to see—’

  And that did the job, for we all laughed a little and then I found that I could speak.

  ‘You’re not so bad as you were, I think?’

  ‘You know this affliction well, Mrs Williams. In truth, I am much recovered. My appetite has returned and I can get up and down the stairs without needing to lie down. If only my skin would follow suit and return to its usual ways.’ She fussed with the skirt of her dress – a lovely silk, still deep black. No browning crepe for her. ‘But perhaps my skin won’t go back to how it was,’ she said quietly to her knees. ‘This might be the way of things now.’

  I didn’t want to sadden her so I didn’t say what I knew to be true, that though the redness would fade, her skin would be always marked. It had been a bad poxing. I’d seen plenty. Instead I told her that we were guests at the vicarage, and Anna added that we were helping Captain Ians find an answer to a delicate matter.

  ‘It seems your household has heard the news about the man found dead beneath the parson’s hut,’ Anna said.

  Mrs Grey nodded sadly. ‘My little maid Sarah told me it was Joseph. I didn’t want to believe it. Is it true?’

  ‘I’m afraid so,’ Anna said. ‘That’s why Captain Ians hasn’t called on you since returning to Morwenstow. He is—’

  ‘Devastated, I should imagine,’ Mrs Grey said. ‘Poor Frederick. And poor Joseph too.’ She took a handkerchief from her sleeve and wiped her eyes. There were real tears there. I saw the shine of them.

  ‘Frederick sends you his very best wishes,’ Anna said. ‘He will call on you soon, but in the meantime he has asked us to convey his apologies.’

  She waved this away with her handkerchief. ‘There is no need for him to think of me at a time like this. He thinks too much of others. Always has. But that is his nature, and if you are helping him, then your souls must be as good as Frederick’s.’

  Or being paid.

  ‘You know the Ians family well?’ I said.

  ‘Yes, or rather … I used to. James – Frederick’s father – I knew since I was a girl, and his dear wife Suzanna became a good friend. We aren’t many in these parts, as I’m sure you’ll have gathered. To like one’s neighbours is fortunate. To love them is a blessing.’

  ‘James Ians remembered you in his will, I understand?’ Anna said.

  ‘He did, with The Eliza shares. Though he had no need. My husband left me well provided for. Ah, Sarah – thank you.’ The girl had brought in the tea things.

  So Mrs Grey really didn’t want for anything.

  ‘And you knew the Ians children?’ I said.

  ‘The boys—’ She laughed. ‘The men, I should say. They were both so young when they left that I still think of them as wearing short trousers. Frederick would always call on me when he was back in Morwenstow, though not so much of late. And Joseph, well …’ She took the cup Sarah held out to her. ‘In some ways, he has been dead for years. I’m sure that sounds dreadfully cruel.’

  ‘Not at all,’ Anna said. ‘He’s been gone a very long time. But Mrs Hawker – Charlotte – has remained here, of course. Do you see her often?’

  ‘Not as often as I’d like. The parson … You said you’re staying at the vicarage?’

  ‘We are,’ I said, and it was my turn to take a cup from Sarah. So thin, the china! The light seemed to shine through it. ‘He’s a strange creature.’

  Mrs Grey looked relieved by these words. ‘I try to visit Charlotte when he’s not at home. It makes things easier. One doesn’t like to be pressed.’

  ‘Pressed?’ Anna said.

  Mrs Grey shifted in her chair, as if all at once seeking to escape it. ‘I wouldn’t like to speak poorly of him. He’s a good man at heart.’ Sarah was heading for the door, was closing it behind her. Mrs Grey watched her go, then was all at once frank. ‘It is the money.’

  ‘Ah.’ Anna set down her teacup. ‘We have faced such entreaties ourselves.’

  ‘It is most difficult, because the man will not let the matter rest, even when it’s made clear to him that the subject is closed. I don’t know how Charlotte can bear the embarrassment.’

  ‘Because she loves him.’ The words were out of my mouth before I could stop them. I quickly drank some tea but that didn’t help for I slurped it with noise.

  ‘My wife is something of a romantic,’ Anna said, and I saw that she wasn’t cross with me. She was trying not to laugh.

  ‘Would that the world had more such people in it,’ Mrs Grey said.

  ‘Indeed!’ Anna said. ‘You’ve been to call on Mrs Hawker recently, I gather?’

  This question surprised me, and I wasn’t certain how Anna’s thoughts were moving. Mrs Grey was likewise surprised.

  ‘I’ve been too unwell to venture outside,’ she said.

  ‘Forgive me,’ Anna said. ‘I had heard that you were near the church, the night before Joseph Ians was discovered. I assumed that you were visiting the vicarage.’

  At this, Mrs Grey’s cup dropped from her gloved hand. It wasn’t that she dropped it. It was as if her whole body shrank from Anna’s words and the cup was left behind, in the air, and so it fell. The fine china smashed to pieces, the tea a puddle betwixt them.

  FORTY-ONE

  At once the girl Sarah was back in the room, as if she’d been waiting outside, expecting such a doing. She didn’t speak, didn’t ask her mistress if she was well, but fell straight to clearing up the broken cup. None of us said anything while this was happening. I felt, and I was sure Anna felt the same, that we should wait. That Mrs Grey needed this moment to find her words.

  Sarah stood and asked Mrs Grey if she’d like a fresh cup, and Mrs Grey said no thank you, that would be all for now. But between the old woman and the girl, something else was said, without words. Are you all right? Yes, for now. Don’t go far. And the girl left.

  ‘Forgive me for causing you distress,’ Anna said, ‘but several people have told us they saw a hooded figure at the church late that afternoon. The person’s face was covered. It was you, Mrs Grey, wasn’t it? You were hiding the marks of the pox.’

  She nodded but wouldn’t meet Anna’s eye.

  ‘Why were you at the church that afternoon?’ Anna asked.

  ‘I … I don’t know. Truly.’

  ‘But that makes no sense,’ Anna said. ‘How can you not know why you had gone somewhere of your own volition?’

  I could see the sense in it. The truth was there in Mrs Grey’s pallor, in the many locks at her door, in the girl’s care of her mistress. In the gloves.

  ‘You went to the cliff path because your feet were not your own,’ I said. Both turned to look at me, Mrs Grey’s eyes wide with surprise. ‘Because you were drawn from your chair, from your house. Set to walking when you didn’t wish to. Because your name was called.’

  ‘She calls you too?’ Mrs Grey whispered.

  I nodded a
nd gripped the underside of my chair. Speaking of her now might bring her. Would she take us both?

  I kept my gaze on Mrs Grey, but from the corner of my eye caught Anna looking between the pair of us. There was a time when she would have swiftly put an end to this kind of talk, or stopped me talking so in the first place. But not now. I had been right too often.

  ‘Do you know who she is?’ Mrs Grey said, her voice barely there. ‘What she is?’

  ‘I have an idea,’ I said.

  My words were a charm I didn’t know I’d cast, for they drew Mrs Grey flying towards me from across the room.

  ‘Please, you must tell me! Why does she come? What does she want from me?’ Mrs Grey clutched my shoulder and began to sob. ‘I cannot bear it any longer!’

  ‘My dear,’ I said to Anna, ‘I think it would be best if you left us ladies to talk.’

  Anna looked pleased by this. She thought she was escaping to the safe quiet of the hall. But I had work for her to do.

  ‘Come, kiss me before you leave.’

  Her hand was on the door. ‘I do not wish to intrude any further. I’ll just be—’

  ‘Kiss me!’

  She did as she was bid, which was no end of difficult, for Mrs Grey was pressed into my other side, sobbing into my dress. With the widow thus blinded I gave Anna the key I had carried since we’d found it in the ruin of Joseph Ians’ chest. As she bent to kiss me, I whispered to her.

  ‘Try every lock you can find.’

  Then I made Mrs Grey sit up for I had something she must hear. I told her to listen very carefully. I told her that my husband also knew of this woman who could draw people to her by calling their name, and that there were sometimes signs as to why some people were called, why some weren’t. I told her that my husband was to be given the run of the house to search for these signs, that it would help us understand what was happening.

  ‘Of course, of course,’ Mrs Grey said, and wiped her face on her sleeve. ‘Whatever you need, you must have it. I would do anything for answers.’