Witch from the Sea

by Philippa Carr

  “So she be safe,” she said. “I thank God for it.”

  “Of course Senara is safe,” I cried. “What did you think?”

  “It being Hallowe’en I did wonder. And her going off. Jennet said it reminded her …”

  “Jennet,” I said, “is always being reminded.”

  “She said it was such a day when the mistress went away.”

  “You mean …”

  Merry crossed herself. “I mean the mistress … she who is mistress now. She came on Hallowe’en and she went on Hallowe’en. You were but a baby at the time as it was years ago. And we thought that Mistress Senara, being her daughter and none knowing where she came from …”

  I was always uneasy when the servants talked of Senara’s background. I could never hear the word witchcraft when I did not fear for her. She was in a way to blame. There would always be mystery attached to her mother but Senara nourished it. Even on this occasion she had to get lost on Hallowe’en. It was almost as though she wanted to be accused of witchcraft. Did she not realize how dangerous this could be?

  My uneasiness stayed with me. I was longing to get through the night and be united with her. I wanted to hear how it was she had managed to get lost on Hallowe’en.

  I was up early in the morning and so was our guest. He had broken his fast with a goblet of home-brewed ale and meat and bread and told me that he wished to leave early. He was sure that his wife would realize that he had spent the night with us on account of the mist, but he would like to return to Leyden Hall as soon as possible for she might be anxious if he were late.

  I asked if I might ride with him. We could take two of our grooms and bring Senara back with us.

  He said his wife would be delighted and so it was arranged.

  It was a beautiful morning when we left. The mist had lifted and the air was balmy. We rode inland through lanes and across meadows and finally we came to Leyden Hall, a charming old house, built I should say at the beginning of Queen Elizabeth’s reign—about the same period as Lyon Court and very like it in style, with its vaulted roof and wings on either side.

  But how different was Leyden Hall from Lyon Court, with its ornamental gardens where peacocks strutted symbolically. My grandfather and his father had loved ostentation. It always seemed to me that everything at my grandfather’s home was meant to impress. I was immediately struck by the simplicity of Leyden Hall. I had been to this house when it belonged to Squire Northfield. What a different place it had become. There were no pictures on the walls, everything that was decorative had been taken away. I met the mistress of the house, Priscilla Deemster; her gown was of a simple calico material which came from Calicut in India—clean and neat without lace or ribbons. She greeted me with a show of friendship plainly expressed. I felt that I was in the kind of household I had never seen before.

  The Deemsters had two sons who were both married and lived with their wives at Leyden Hall. They were all dressed in the same simple manner. Among them Senara looked like one of the peacocks of Lyon Court in her blue riding habit. I had rarely seen her as lovely or as excited as she was then. Her beauty was as breathtaking as that of her mother.

  “We were so anxious about you,” I told her.

  “It was the mist,” she said and there was a lilt in her voice. “It has been a wonderful experience for me. I have been so comforted in this house.”

  Her voice had taken on a tone unusual with it and which somehow belied the sparkle in her eyes.

  “I am so sorry to have caused you anxiety,” she said. “Master Deemster out of the goodness of his heart so kindly offered to let you know.”

  “It was indeed kind,” I said.

  As it was nearly noon I was invited to dine with the family and I gratefully accepted this. I was very interested in this household and I particularly wanted to know why Senara was so pleased with her adventure.

  The table was set on trestles in the great hall which I remembered as being so grand in the time of the Northfields. The food on it was simple. It mainly comprised vegetables which were grown in the gardens—and there was salted pig. Here the whole of the household congregated—every man and woman in the household—and then I understood Senara’s elation, for seated at the table was Richard Gravel, Dickon, her one time music master.

  Senara looked at me mischievously.

  “You remember Dickon.”

  He smiled at me. He had changed as much as this house had. He had been rather dandified, delighting as he did in his music and dancing. Now he was dressed in a plain jerkin, short trunks of a brown material and his long hose were of the same shade. His hair which had been wonderfully curling was now cut short and flattened about his head as though he were ashamed of its beauty. He had been fun-loving and bold; now his eyes were downcast and there was an air of modesty about him which I could not entirely believe in.

  We sat down and grace was said. It seemed a long time before our host finished his exhortations to us to be grateful.

  The pork was not very appetising and I secretly was not all that grateful for it. We ate very well at home and always in the most tasteful manner, and there was invariably a variety of dishes to choose from.

  Dickon told me during that meal what he must already have told Senara.

  When he had been turned out of our house, “and rightly so,” he said in his new-found humility, “for I ill repaid my master, I knew not where to go. For two days I trudged the countryside and had but a crust all that time. I was wondering where I should find another bite to eat, and feeling faint and hungry I settled into a hedge and there awaited some evil fate to overtake me. As I lay there, unkempt and famished, a man came along the road. He too was without means of sustenance; hungry and footsore. He told me that he was going to call at Leyden Hall for the gentleman and lady who now lived there would never turn any away. I said I would perforce go with him and so I came.”

  Senara was watching him with an intentness she rarely displayed.

  “When I felt the goodness, the serenity of this household which was unlike anything I ever knew before, I asked if I might stay here in any capacity whatsoever,” went on Dickon.

  “You do not teach dancing and singing?”

  “Nay, nay. That is over. It is all part of my sinful past life. Such frivolities find no favour in the sight of heaven. I shall never sing and dance again.”

  “That’s a pity! You did them so well.”

  “Vanities,” he said. “Here I tend the gardens. The vegetables you are eating have been grown by me. I work with my hands for the good of the house.”

  “You see,” said Senara, “Dickon has become a good man.”

  It came to me to say that although attempting to seduce his master’s daughter might not find favour in the sight of Heaven, I did not believe there was anything wrong in singing and dancing. Did not the angels sing? But I made no comment. We had received excellent hospitality at the hands of this family; and our host had had the courtesy to ride over to us and inform us that Senara was safe with them. I did not wish therefore to say anything which might be hurtful to them.

  I could see that they believed firmly in their doctrines and such people could easily be hurt and possibly angered by those who disagreed with them.

  When we had eaten, Senara and I prepared to ride back. It was still only one o’clock for they did not sit over their meals as we were inclined to do. I gathered that eating here was not to be regarded as a pleasure but a necessity. Our horses, fresh for the ride back, were brought to us and with many thanks we left them.

  Senara and I rode together—two grooms ahead of us and two behind.

  “Now,” I said, “I should like an explanation of how that came about.”

  Senara opened her eyes very wide and smiled sideways. “I have told you. I was lost in the mist. I came to Leyden Hall and explained my predicament. I was made welcome and as I was not allowed to find my way home alone I stayed here. You know the rest.”

  “It seems to me a strange
coincidence that you should be lost near the house in which Dickon is a servant.”

  “Life,” said Senara demurely, “is full of strange coincidences.”

  When we reached the castle the servants looked at Senara with awe. I saw one of them cross herself when she thought we were not looking. This sort of thing disturbed me and filled me with a vague apprehension.

  Senara did everything to encourage it which I thought very reckless of her.

  “Why,” she cried to one gaping serving-girl, “did you think I’d flown off on my broomstick?” Then she went close to her and narrowed her eyes so that the girl grew pale. “Perhaps next Hallowe’en I might.”

  When we were alone in our bedchamber I admonished her, but she laughed at me. She was excited as I had rarely seen her.

  “Imagine Dickon a puritan!”

  “Is he sincere, do you think?”

  “Dickon is always sincere. He believes wholeheartedly in everything he does … at the moment. That is what I like in him. He made me feel that I could be a puritan too.”

  “You, Senara! You are a pagan, which is the very opposite.”

  “I could change,” she said, “perhaps. He talked to me about it. It is inspiring … in a way.”

  “Inspiring to you! I never knew anyone who loved finery as you do. One day you want to be a witch. The next a puritan!”

  “Dickon talked to me about the sect. They are very noble. The Deemsters are fond of him. They love converts. You see, when he went there he was such a beautiful young man, with his feet firmly planted on the road to hell. They have saved his soul. You know how attractive anything that you have saved is.”

  She had learned something about the puritans. The Deemsters came from Lincolnshire. Master Deemster’s mother had been Dutch and they had ties with Holland. “They believe that life should be simplicity,” she said, “and abhor all papist idols.”

  “As we do.”

  “For the puritans their religion is the most important event in their lives. They care for nothing but their simple goodness. They do not believe in the riches of this life. They believe we should live humbly, simply, and that all vanity is an offence to God. They would die for their beliefs.”

  “I pray God they do not have to. The King is against them and has sworn to harm them.”

  “They know that well.”

  “He believes that they are as the Scottish Presbytery, of which he has had some experience, and he has said that that agrees as well with a monarchy as God with the Devil.”

  Senara laughed as though this pleased her. I think she was enamoured of the puritans because by pursuing their brand of religion they courted danger.

  “Moreover,” I went on warningly, “the King has said at the Hampton Court Conference that he will harry the puritans out of land or else do worse. They must either conform or take the consequences.”

  “Oh yes, they know this and they care not for his threats. They are planning action. One thing they will never do is give up their religion.”

  I could see she was excited by her adventure and that this was in some measure due to the fact that the puritans were in danger.

  I was very disturbed indeed when I discovered that she had known Dickon was at Leyden Hall. One of the servants had found out that he was there and told her. She had staged her little adventure for Hallowe’en—what a fearless reckless girl she was!—and had pretended to be lost that she might see Dickon and talk with him.

  From then on she talked of him a good deal and often called at Leyden Hall. She began to learn a great deal about the puritans and their beliefs and aims, which was strange considering she was Senara.

  THE TURRET LIGHTS

  IT WAS CHRISTMAS DAY, my eighteenth birthday and Senara’s sixteenth. My stepmother had invited people to the castle. She seemed eager to find husbands for us both, and particularly for me perhaps because I was two years older.

  During the last weeks Senara liked to go off alone. I believed that she was riding to Leyden Hall. She was becoming more and more interested in the new sect who were called the puritans. It amused me because there could be no one less like a puritan than Senara.

  She had taken the feather out of her riding hat and wore it plain. She would put on a demure expression which ill-matched her brilliant long eyes with the mischief in them. Of course I had never been absolutely sure of Senara.

  She talked to me about the puritans and often she would become quite earnest.

  “They want to make it all as simple as possible, Tamsyn,” she said. “And religion should be simple, shouldn’t it? Do you think God wants all that ceremony? Of course He doesn’t. One should worship Him in the simplest possible way. The church is always ready to persecute those who don’t conform.”

  “You are really interested, Senara,” I said. “You’ve changed since you arranged to get lost near Leyden Hall.”

  “I arranged it, as you know,” she said. “I couldn’t believe Dickon had become a puritan. I had to go and see.”

  “Surely he is not making one of you?”

  “Can you imagine me … a puritan!”

  “That is something beyond my powers of imagination.”

  “No, I should never be a puritan at heart, but I admire them in a way. Think of Dickon.”

  “It seems to me you think of him a good deal.”

  “He is so beautiful … even now in his plain clothes and his curls pressed out he is still more handsome than any other man … even your Fenn—who has gone away without declaring his feelings—even he looks quite ugly compared with Dickon.”

  “You are bewitched by him.”

  “You forget I am the one who does the bewitching.”

  “So it is he who is bewitched by you.”

  “I think that in spite of his new puritan ideas, he is a little. For I am a very bewitching person, Tamsyn.”

  “In your own opinion, certainly.”

  “It is so interesting,” she said, “and so dangerous. It has been since the Hampton Court Conference.”

  “Keep away from religion that is dangerous.”

  “What a thing to say! Surely that is quite cynical. How can people help what they believe, and if you believe, shouldn’t you defend that belief with your life if need be?”

  “Our country and my family have been torn by religious beliefs. One of my ancestors lost his head in the reign of Henry VIII, another was burned at the stake in the reign of Mary. We don’t want any more religious conflict in the family.”

  “You’re a coward, Tamsyn.”

  “That may be but that is how I want it.”

  “They are talking of going away.”

  “Who, Dickon and the Deemsters?”

  “Yes, to Holland. They can worship there as they wish. Perhaps one day they will go far away and make a land of their own. They talk about it a good deal.”

  I laughed.

  “What amuses you?”

  “That you, Senara, of all people, should be caught up with puritans. Of course it is not the puritans, I know. Can it really be Dickon?”

  “How could it be? I would never be allowed to marry a man who was our music master and now grows vegetables and works for a family like the Deemsters.”

  “I cannot see you in the humble role of wife to a man in such a lowly position.”

  “Nay, nor could I. For I came from such nobility that is far beyond anything I have had here.”

  “Oh, how do you know this?”

  “My mother has told me. In Spain she moved in very noble circles—royal, in fact. So you are right when you say I could not marry Dickon.”

  “Don’t look sad. It’s the first day of Christmas. We shall make merry this night. You will dance and sing for the company and no one will be merrier than you.”

  “It will be a very different Christmas at Leyden Hall,” she said.

  “I can picture it. They will make of it a purely religious occasion. There will be no feasting, dancing and making merry, as we do, no King for the
Night, no blessing on the hall, no mummers, no carol singers. This is more to your taste, Senara.”

  “It is!” she cried; and that night she was beautiful in a blue velvet gown, her dark hair caught back in a gold band,

  I was not the only one who thought her the loveliest of all present. There were several young men who did and would doubtless in due course ask for her hand, which was what her mother wanted.

  There was Thomas Grenoble for one, who came from London and was connected with the Court. He was young, rich and good-looking. I knew he was one my stepmother had chosen for Senara. He could do the latest dances which she quickly mastered and I wondered whether as she danced with Thomas Grenoble she thought of Dickon. If she did she gave no sign of it.

  Melanie had been brought up by her mother to be a good housewife and I don’t think our household matters ever went so smoothly as they did that Christmas. Melanie was quite unobtrusive and gentle; Connell was inclined to ignore her and flirt with some of the young women guests, but Melanie remained unruffled. She reminded me very much of Fenn and how I wished that he were with us!

  I mentioned him to her and asked if she had heard from her mother when he was expected back.

  “It was not to be a long voyage,” she answered. “My mother thinks he will be back by the spring.”

  That gave me new hope. I was just waiting for the spring.

  I was still looking for my mother’s diary and when it seemed that I had looked in every possible place I began to think that it had never existed. Jennet was known to exaggerate, to romanticize, particularly now that she was getting older. Had she seen my mother writing once or twice and imagined she had been writing something which she wanted to hide? That seemed very likely.

  And my mother’s death? People did die suddenly when they were not very old. One heard of them now and then and no one was skilled enough in medicine to know the cause. If one was in Court circles and known to have enemies people thought of poison. I wondered how many men and women had been believed to be poisoned when they had died of natural causes.

  Then on some days my feelings would change and I would be certain that my mother had not died naturally. I could not forget the stone I had found on her grave. And who could have removed it from the cupboard in which I had placed it?