The Coffin Path_'The perfect ghost story'

by Katherine Clements

He looks surprised. ‘You don’t know?’

  I say nothing. I’ll give him no leverage.

  He scours the room, eyes alighting on a scrawny boy who lolls by the door, begging scraps from the tavern wench. ‘Boy! Come here!’

  The youth does as he’s told and comes to stand next to the table.

  ‘Do you know this woman?’ Owen asks.

  The boy shakes his head.

  ‘Why don’t you introduce yourself?’ Owen says to me.

  I don’t understand his game but suppose I must play along. ‘I’m Mercy Booth, mistress of Scarcross Hall.’

  The boy’s eyes go wide. He looks to Owen and back again. ‘Truly? Is she the one?’

  ‘You’ve heard of her?’

  ‘I’ve heard of Scarcross Hall.’

  ‘And what do you know of it?’

  ‘Everyone knows of it. That’s the house that’s cursed. They say the mistress is a witch.’ He stares at me, eyes popping with perverse fascination. ‘I thought she’d be ugly, like the old one.’

  Owen is clearly enjoying the exchange. ‘That’s enough boy. Away with you.’ He flips a penny. The boy catches it and sidles away, never taking his eyes from me. He whispers to the tavern wench, who shoots daggers of pure disgust in my direction, and runs to speak to the landlord.

  ‘So, you see, your lambs are bred under a curse, Mistress Booth. We all know the old stories. Word is you’re the Devil’s daughter. No one will buy a strand of wool or a stem of barley from you for fear of it. To think of the cunning – coming here on All Hallows Eve, hoping to witch us all. Do you think we’re so easily tricked?’ Again, he leers at me.

  Ambrose has flushed fury-red. ‘This is nothing but petty gossip and nonsense,’ he says. ‘And you know it.’

  ‘Oh, I don’t doubt that,’ Owen says, lowering his voice. ‘I’m not a superstitious man, Garrick, but I am a practical one. And if it suits my purpose for the rest of the world to believe in curses and witchcraft, then why should I put them right? So, you see, you’ll find no other man willing to take your cursed lambs, for two guineas or for anything at all.’

  Ambrose’s fists are clenched on the tabletop as he takes deep breaths. He’ll deny these tales. He’ll defend me and will believe what he says. But he doesn’t know the things I know. Scarcross Hall is not in his bones like it is in mine. He cannot begin to understand its secrets. He’s never lain in bed and listened to footsteps in the dark and the breath of spirits, has not felt the malevolent, watchful eye upon the house. He cannot know that some part of what Owen says is true.

  I see that Annie Ravens has had her revenge. My hope is shattered.

  ‘Two guineas it is, Master Owen,’ I say, quietly.

  ‘No,’ Ambrose starts, looking aghast. ‘Mercy, don’t do this.’

  I put out a hand to shake Owen’s. He reaches forward and puts his palm in mine. As he senses the resignation in me his gloating ceases. A flicker of doubt passes behind his eyes, fleeting but I catch it. He might think better and take his offer back. But then he releases my hand.

  ‘A pleasure to do business with you, Mistress Booth.’

  ‘They’re good lambs, Master Owen. I trust you’ll have no trouble with them.’

  ‘Mercy, this is madness,’ Ambrose says, but I cast him a glance that demands silence and he sits, brooding, while Owen counts out the coin. When he’s done he slides the little pile across the table. I gather it, measure the pitiful weight of it. Two score of our best lambs and I can hold their worth in one palm.

  A volley of shouting comes from the street. The boy, who’s returned to his post by the door, darts outside. Drinkers crane their necks to peer through soot-smeared leads. A woman is shouting, high-pitched and excited, a mess of men’s voices echoing. I register the familiar sound of Bracken and Flint, barking and pulling at their binds.

  I’m on my feet in seconds, stuffing the coin into a small leather pouch that hangs at my belt, Ambrose by my side.

  Outside, I find Agnes cowering against the wall of the tavern, next to the stake where the dogs are tied. She’s white-faced and shaking, her skirts spattered and filthy, as if she’s fallen in the muck of the street drain. The dogs are straining at their ties, teeth bared and snarling.

  The crowd surrounding them is not large – perhaps two dozen at most – but it’s vicious. In the narrow street, they seem to press from all sides. There are faces I know among them – labourers who’ve worked our land, farmers I’ve done business with, wives I’ve supped with. At the fore is one I thought I’d never see again. I recognise her mean, half-starved face, the hanks of dirt-hued hair straggling from her cap, her shabby clothes and the vacant-eyed brood about her feet: Joan Goffe, the vagrant woman, the cause of such disruption on that hot harvest day when Sam’s lamb was found dead.

  She’s screeching as if there’s a demon inside her. ‘How dare you bring your witch’s curse among these good people? We don’t want you here!’

  A clod of horse muck sails through the air and strikes Agnes’s shoulder. A cheer goes up. I push through the crowd to Agnes’s side, Ambrose close behind, and when Joan sees me, she lights up with fervour. ‘And here is the other one! As brazen as only the Devil could make her. Look at her in her fellow’s garb – unnatural creature!’

  I stand before Agnes, sheltering her. ‘Oh, Mercy! What’s happening? What have I done?’ she says, fighting back tears.

  ‘Nothing. That woman is mad.’ My heart is beating hard. I long to strike Joan down. If anyone lacks Christian feeling, if anyone has evil in her soul, it’s her.

  Joan speaks to the crowd. ‘I’ve seen their wickedness with my own eyes. I won’t stand by and let them spread their witchery here. We must cast them out! Will you join with me?’

  Again there’s a chorus of agreement. More muck is thrown from the back of the crowd. It hits me on the chest. The stink of rotting meat and the privy is pungent. I do not think it animal waste this time.

  Ambrose faces up to the crowd. ‘Don’t listen to this woman’s lies. She’s a firebrand, a troublemaker.’

  But no one is listening. There’s a scuffle to one side of the crowd and someone, though I do not see who, throws a rock. It arcs through the air and strikes Agnes on the temple. She puts a hand to her face, shocked, as blood trickles down her cheek.

  A gasp goes up from the crowd but Joan laughs. ‘Yes! Cast them out!’ she cries. ‘Stone the Devil’s creatures!’ The younger boys take up the call, scrabbling for handfuls of pebbles and grit. I see the lad from the tavern among them, grinning, wild-eyed and swept up, cattle stick in his hand.

  I whip round to face the crowd. ‘What kind of coward torments an old woman? Leave us be or I’ll set my dogs on you!’ I’m met with nothing but jeers.

  A second stone is loosed. This time it hits the leads of the tavern and the sound of splintering glass is met with an outraged roar from inside.

  Ambrose grabs my arm, pulling me behind him. ‘Enough!’ he bellows. ‘Enough of this!’ He raises his arms, addressing the crowd. ‘You have your way. We’re leaving and you’ll let us go without trouble. We’ve no fight with any of you and you need fear nothing from us. I know what you’ve heard. Well, hear this now. I swear it on the life of my children. These women are innocent. There is no witch at Scarcross Hall!’

  Someone spits at Ambrose’s feet but he ignores it, turning to set the dogs loose. Ever loyal, Bracken strains on her leash, snapping at the ankles of those nearby.

  ‘Hell’s hound,’ Joan says, glaring at me, eyes all spite and venom.

  I long to fight back, to say my piece, but Ambrose grips my arm and pulls me roughly away. I know he’s right. To vow vengeance now will only prove Joan Goffe right.

  So we leave her there, free to spread her lies. Free to turn the whole world against us. I look back just once and see Owen, watching from the tavern door. He tips his hat to me with
a mocking, self-satisfied smile.

  And as we go, avoiding the throng around the swine stalls, heading for Gibbet Lane, rain starts to fall. The twilit sky is heavy with roiling cloud: a storm is coming.

  Chapter 34

  The candle lantern stuttered out a hundred paces back. Ellis struggles to relight it, crouching in the corner of a sheepfold, trying to shelter the tinderbox beneath his coat. His hands are wet, the flint slippery in his fingers, and sparks fall on dampened charcloth. He curses as the tinder glows for a moment, hissing and fading as raindrops splash in the pan. He gives up and leaves the lantern leaning against the wall, the wind rattling its catches.

  He stumbles up the fell-side, ground sliding away beneath his feet, sinking in puddles and bog pits, trying to follow a ridge of heather that marks out solid ground. Every few minutes the sky burns with bright, crackling light and in those moments he casts about desperately, trying to find a bearing: there, the chasm of treetops that marks out the valley, and there, at his back, the stark chimneys of Scarcross Hall.

  He had set off along the coffin path, but somewhere, somehow, has lost the track. A storm like this can remake the moor, opening chasms filled with slick, oily water and causing the bog to rise. He knows the moor by night, the safe paths, crests and gullies mapped in his mind, but this weather turns the land to something else – a shifting, living thing, savage and hostile. A wrong step can wipe out all traces of a man.

  Another flash of lightning. The crossroads should be up ahead but he can see nothing in the dark, cannot gauge distances. He waits for the crash and rumble that follows, and when it fades he tries again, shouting into the wind: ‘Sam! Sam!’

  Dority had come to him, red-eyed and frantic, pawing at him like an animal, the baby mewling at her chest. ‘I know there’s something wrong,’ she said. ‘And Master Booth can’t help. Please, there’s no one else.’

  It’s true – the old man has retreated to his makeshift bed in the parlour and lies there, mad and moaning, muttering nonsense.

  But what does it matter to Ellis if the boy has run away? Why should he risk his own life to find him? ‘He’ll have gone home,’ he said. ‘Or found shelter somewhere. Only a fool would go out on a night like this.’

  But she is convinced. She’d checked the cottage earlier in the day, she said. No food was taken, Sam’s things were untouched, the animals had not been fed. She’s sure some terrible fate has befallen him. ‘The White Ladies,’ she said. ‘He might have gone to the White Ladies.’ Ellis knows why. She wrapped a shawl around her shoulders and threatened to search for him herself, trying to push the baby into his arms, but he refused to take it.

  ‘If you go out there now, you’ll likely not come back,’ he said.

  ‘But I must.’

  ‘Then you leave me no choice.’

  He labours on. The wind takes his hat and whirls it into the sky. He snatches for it but a gust takes it out of reach, the rain battering it back to earth and into the centre of a black patch of peat. He dare not step away from the ridge of heather so leaves it there, ignoring the icy rivers that begin to stream down his neck and inside his collar.

  At last he finds a sheep track – or what’s left of it – now ankle-deep in water as springs rise on the moor top, turning paths into streambeds. The way marker at the crossroads appears ahead – for a moment he mistakes the tall stone for a figure, waiting for him in the dark, and feels the familiar flare of unease.

  From here, he should be able to find the path that leads to the stone circle. The darkness is almost absolute. He’s made blind by the driving rain and has to wait for another flash of lightning before he can right himself once more. He sees a silvered streak of ground, winding away uphill through the heather, the path coursing with rainfall from springs further up the fell. If the ground has held, he can follow it to the moor top. He sets off, feeling the rush of water pulling at his ankles.

  He thinks back to that morning when he had slipped inside Booth’s study, as thin, grey light filtered through the panes. He had not been able to sleep but something made him wait until dawn, the night passing in long hours of listening: the scratch and patter of movement from empty chambers, the creak and sigh of the house.

  By day, the mess of red-stained papers seemed less sinister. He gathered them, ordered them, began to read: letters from men he does not know, an unpaid bill of account from the butcher in the village, rough-drawn maps and sketches of Scarcross Hall in a spidery hand.

  The burned scrap of paper that Booth rescued from the flames had disappeared. He suspects the old man has taken it. But what was it, he wondered, to cause Booth such distress? Nothing in these mundane fragments of life hints at anything suspicious. Perhaps it was the missing land deeds, proof of Booth’s ownership of Scarcross Hall, the loss of which might thwart his plan to sell. But who else knows of Booth’s addle-brained scheme? Who else would have reason to destroy them? There is Mercy, of course, but Mercy is not here.

  Ellis studied the murky smudges of red that spread across the papers as if a small, bleeding creature had ricocheted across the desk in its death throes. Here and there, the shape of a hand was distinct. He measured it against his own: not a grown man, then, but a child.

  If Sam is to blame, what reason could he have had? Standing there, Ellis thought of the boy, his quiet watchfulness, the fear and fury that seem to rise in tandem behind his eyes. He saw, once again, the blows of Booth’s cane upon the child’s head, the sticky scarlet trickle creeping from his nose.

  A chill ran through him. He felt a presence and turned, expecting to see Booth in the doorway, but no one was there. He dropped the papers back onto the desk, suddenly convinced that he should not be there and that someone was watching.

  He keeps his head down, feeling his way uphill. So long as his footing is sure, so long as he can feel the brush of heather against his calves, he will be safe, he will reach the moor top. He cannot think, yet, about how he will find his way back down.

  The rain is relentless. As he reaches higher ground it is all around him, buffeted slantwise, from east and then west. He cannot see more than a few feet ahead and feels the land close around him as if it will swallow him whole. He feels the ground give a little beneath his left foot and trips, tumbling over a tussock. He falls to his knees and gropes for the heather but cannot find it. He feels the gentle give beneath him – a sure sign of bog. He was so sure he was on the path, on firm ground. How can he have lost his way? He was so careful. He pauses and breathes, telling himself not to panic.

  Slowly he stretches, reaching for something solid, finding nothing but sodden bog grass. He feels the soft peat stir beneath him, the moment that the ground gives way and he begins to sink. He throws himself belly down and grasps for tufts of heather. He finds some, ignores the scratches as he buries his fingers into its roots and heaves himself forward, reaching a bed of the plant and draping himself over it, allowing the fear to rise and subside.

  He stays there, blood rushing. This is an act of madness. Where is the sense in sacrificing himself? The boy is nothing to him. Booth is to blame for this. He should be the one to right it. He feels a swell of anger towards the old man. What kind of person beats a child bloody? But he already knows the answer to that. He remembers how it feels when wood meets bone. He closes his eyes, fury fuelling determination. The rain, running in rivulets down his cheek and neck, feels as if it could be his own blood.

  Then the sky sparks and crackles and the world is lit once more. There, ahead of him, no more than fifty yards uphill, he sees the White Ladies.

  He reaches the nearest stone and flattens himself against it, sheltering from the worst of the wind. In its lea he wipes the rain from his eyes and breathes deep, lungs burning, bile rising to taint his tongue. He shouts Sam’s name, but there is no answer. The wind seems to snatch his words, shattering them against the stones. He waits for lightning, and when it comes, he mov
es to the next stone, then the next, intending to make his way around the circle. Up here there is less fear of the bog, but the rain has saturated the ground and he still does not trust it.

  He pauses at the next stone, fighting for breath. He thinks of Dority, imagines her pacing before the kitchen hearth, afraid that there will be two missing souls to account for by morning. Her words come back to him: Mercy cares for Sam a great deal. I thought that might mean something to you.

  It does. He’s doing this for her.

  He can still feel the way her hands pressed against his chest, see the look in her eyes: so bold and so certain. He wishes he could scour the image from his mind. Even with a quart of liquor inside him he cannot escape it. The Devil comes to him in dreams, shows him what would have happened had he not walked away. He wakes, hard and aching. It sickens him. Every time he thinks of that night he is tormented, and he can think of little else; that he should be the one to reject her, to cause her pain. But what choice has he?

  He has prayed for relief, but God has not answered. There is a battle inside him that faith alone cannot fight. The Devil’s grip is too fierce. He would rather face the raw, bodily pain of a pike wound, a musket shot, than this torturous anguish. There have been times, in these last days since she left, when he has taken the old flintlock pistol, and held it against his skull, imagining the sweet relief of pulling the trigger. But he will not be beaten. He will cast out these thoughts.

  He grips the stone with both hands and dashes his forehead against it. The pain in his temple is bright and hot, flaring behind his eyes, and for a moment all else fades. He does it again, and feels the skin break, the sting of wound upon wound. Once more, and he feels the scrape of bone against stone.

  There is nothing now except the pain and, when he opens his eyes, the black sky, rent with God’s fire.

  As the strike fades, something catches his eye: a pale shape atop the Slaying Stone. He makes out a figure – head, shoulders and thin white limbs – luminous before it fades, like the impression of a snuffed candle behind closed eyelids. He strains into the darkness, veins running cold. But when the light comes again there is nothing to see.