Black Heather

by Virginia Coffman

  In part, Elspeth’s contemptuous disbelief answered for me.

  “Who is your best authority? That dreadful old crone his housekeeper?”

  A little ruffled by this cynicism, Mrs. Sedley explained to me, “Mrs. Hardwicke is a woman of discernment, Kathleen. You must pay no mind to dear Elspeth. She is shy about marriage and covers it by this unbecoming attitude. But we shall have her the Lady of Everett Hall before the year is out; mind that.”

  For the first time in our acquaintance, Elspeth gave me an almost friendly glance, a kind of shared amusement.

  “Why not marry off Kathleen to her precious murderer? She has taken a fancy to him. They are forever being seen together.”

  “A detestable, supercilious creature!” I said as positively as ever she had spoken. And as she gazed at me in disbelief, I went on, “But not, I think, a murderer!”

  “You would know, of course!” said Elspeth nastily.

  “Girls! Girls! That will do,” Mrs. Sedley interrupted us, genuinely alarmed at the turn our quarrel had taken. “Let there be no more whimsical talk of dear Nicky and murder. His only crime was that he was devoted to my poor Megan.”

  “Dear Nicky!” repeated Elspeth, rolling her eyes. It was the first human expression I had noted on this face of hers, which had been extolled for its soft, feminine beauty. Elspeth’s reaction, however, was contagious, and we both laughed at the preposterous notion of Sir Nicholas Everett’s freezing countenance if he were addressed in that fashion.

  Mrs. Sedley, naturally enough, did not see the humor of her own words. “I suppose I must allow Elspeth her little jesting moments during the last days of her maidenhood,” she said. “All that will be changed, once she has the responsibilities of Everett Hall at her fingertips.”

  “I don’t doubt it,” Elspeth agreed ruefully. “That is one reason why I’ve no notion of ...” She glanced at me and hastily ate her scone.

  I wondered if she thought her uncle Patrick was a more honest man, less dangerous. Even in my dislike of Sir Nicholas I could not believe he was less honest, though possibly he was more dangerous than the Irishman.

  I was startled when Patrick’s name was suddenly spoken in the room and for a minute was afraid Elspeth had forgotten her grandmother’s feelings toward him. But it was Mrs. Sedley who said with a new, deep note of bitterness, “The very least that can be spoken of Sir Nicholas Everett would scarcely be equal to the unspeakable villainy of that creature who has come back to Maidenmoor to murder some other defenseless and loyal woman.”

  “Grandmother!”

  “It is true, all the same. True that for twelve years your uncle has gone unpunished. But his time will come. He’ll die as my Megan did, in his blood!”

  “Not at breakfast, please,” said her granddaughter coldly.

  I was shocked, not so much by the expression of such violent passions—indeed, I have violent passions myself—but at the expression of them by fluttery, pretentious Mrs. Sedley. It also seemed pitiful to me that all her talk of Elspeth’s sweetness and feminine passivity were mere dreams of the older woman.

  When breakfast had deteriorated into a series of small forays between grandmother and granddaughter, the former returning to her polite, frilly ways, the latter sullen as I knew her, I excused myself with the remark that I wanted to make an inspection of any empty large houses in the area.

  Mrs. Sedley’s quick sparkle of hope made me feel quite sick with pity for her and anger at myself for having given her grounds to hope. She had enough problems without this new hope which might be blasted.

  “You sly puss! I believe you are considering the Hag’s Head after all.”

  “I fear it may be too large, ma’am. And it is always possible we cannot raise a sum sufficient to repair any of the damage which results when a house stands disused.”

  “Oh-ho!” Elspeth hooted, and I had a nasty suspicion that she guessed I had not originally had any idea of purchasing the dreadful, ghost-ridden old house.

  What with my secret intention of annoying Sir Nicholas Everett by pretending to consider the purchase of the inn, and now Mrs. Sedley’s dependence upon my making that very purchase, I realized there was nothing for it but to make good upon my visit to the Hag’s Head. I dressed for it this time, however, changing even my present clothing for a warm green wool gown, with long, narrow sleeves and a round neck just relieved from severity by a white frill. In case this should not be proof against another sudden storm, I put aside my shawls and decided to risk damage to my best coat, one of which I was inordinately proud. It was of the new mode, slim-skirted and high-waisted, with narrow sleeves. I was about to run out upon the moor without anything on my head until I remembered the stiff breeze I had felt earlier in the village, and I had to go back into my room to fetch my sturdy green bonnet. Its wide ribbons, as I tied them under my chin, already showed faint stains from an earlier rainstorm at home, though I had pressed the ribbons carefully afterward.

  “Dear child,” Mrs. Sedley called to me as I came out of my room, “Do be sure your feet are well shod. You will not wish to be walking into potholes and such.”

  I was familiar with potholes at home, and unlike yesterday, when I had run out after Timothy quite unprepared, I was snugly shod in shoes that were serviceable but not clumsy. I wished to walk about in the Hag’s Head as silently as possible, in the hope of discovering whatever natural phenomenon caused the odd sounds that had disturbed Timothy and me. If I must go to the dreadful old place, I should at least accomplish something by satisfying my curiosity about its “haunts.”

  “Come in; there’s a good child,” Mrs. Sedley urged.

  I was reluctant to join another quarrel with her granddaughter in the presence of the older lady, but fortunately for all of us, Elspeth had gone about whatever duties occupied her days, and I was able to step inside and receive Mrs. Sedley’s further instructions.

  “Now, my dear Kathleen, you mother had ever as keen an eye for a bargain as though she were Yorkshire-born and bred up. So I am persuaded you will not be behind her in such matters. You must note carefully the solid construction. The flagstone floors. Safety was the watchword when the Hag’s Head was put up. No storm could pierce those walls. No fire could—”

  “I understand, ma’am,” I said hastily. “I noticed how serviceable the floors were.” Then I remembered something for the first time since I had left the Hag’s Head. “That is, except for the objections the magistrate made to the place. Sir Nicholas thought the floors would go through.”

  She sat up straighter, puffing her pillows in an effort, I was sure, to hide her surprise and discomfiture.

  “Oh, he did, eh? Made objections to Megan’s house! Well, it’s not surprising. It was an unhappy place for poor Nicholas. He was much younger then ... when my Megan was alive. And each time that creature—that hateful, miserable Irishman—philandered with a different female, it cut Nicholas the more. He had not succeeded to the estate then, when my Megan was married, of course. Not until his older brother was lost two years later with his frigate off Cape Trafalgar, did Nicholas take the title. By then, it was too late for Megan.”

  I found all this extremely romantic and could not help asking, “Was she in love with Sir—with Nicholas Everett before her marriage to Mr. Kelleher?”

  Mrs. Sedley shrugged, a gesture that must have caused her some pain, for she grimaced.

  “There was some ... tendresse, as they say, between them, I believe. But it came to naught. At that time Nicholas was on leave from his regiment, a mere lieutenant, with no expectations. How could I know he would come into the title and lands, the richest man in the West Riding, in two short years?”

  And of course, I thought, you could never let poor Megan marry for love; so she married Patrick Kelleher—for what? A life of misery and perhaps even a bloody death at his hands.

  “Why ever did you let her marry Mr. Kelleher?” She looked out the windows, and I wondered if she was realizing at this moment her dreadful respo
nsibility for her daughter’s tragic life.

  “His lying tongue! What else was I to do? The Irishman came here with tales of his estate, the full half of County Meath, his fabulous ancestry. Well, in short, I was never more deceived.”

  No, I thought. You do not see your guilt in all this.

  “I trust the weather remains open,” Mrs. Sedley observed, gazing at the windswept sky. “I should prefer that you see the Hag’s Head at its best.”

  I very nearly laughed at her absurd idea that the Hag’s Head had its “best” side, but I agreed with her that I too hoped the weather remained fair. Bidding her good day, I left her.

  I was going through the lower floor passage, which was shadowed and drafty in the morning, when something soft darted across my ankles and I reached down, feeling around my feet. I would have been unpleasantly surprised to feel the sharp teeth of a rodent, but fortunately it was Timothy, who meowed, stood up, and clawed at my coat skirts.

  “Really, Tim,” I scolded severely; “you are not going to take me on some fantastic chase today! You are going to stay home and catch a fat mouse.” He wasn’t, though. He knew perfectly well, the way cats and dogs always know, that I would feel more comfortable with him in my arms; for if anything odd truly was in the Hag’s Head, no one would be more quickly sensitive to it than a cat.

  I stopped off and found Meg Markham in the downstairs parlor and asked for something to use as a lead for Timothy. She produced his own leather lead, and after I had attached it as securely as possible, Timmy and I walked out upon the cobblestones.

  Meg called after us, “Have a care, Miss. I couldn’t but hear you talkin’ of that dreadful place. It’s that awful, I’d not even set foot inside! No, not if I was to be put to the stocks, I wouldn’t.”

  I paused, turned back, and waited until she joined me.

  “Meg, tell me the truth. What is it everyone fears at the Hag’s Head?”

  “But mum, ain’t it known to you, about Miss Megan and all?”

  “Yes, yes. You told me before supper last night. But what am I to expect there now? What do people see, or think they see?”

  She looked over her shoulder as though she feared the ghostly visitants of the Hag’s Head even here in the village.

  “Well, then, it’s the sounds that come and go. Like you wasn’t alone. And the lights. Little flickers that seem to float right past the windows. But there’s nothing. No light. Not even a candle, Miss. The lights ain’t real.” She startled me by reaching out, clasping my shoulders by her strong, heavy hands, and shaking me. “They ain’t real, Miss! I seen ’em.”

  Bewildered, I ventured the question, “If they aren’t real, how can you see them? Have you been inside when these things were seen?”

  A woman passed us, going down the steep Maidenmoor Hill. She looked chilly with only a thin shawl over head and shoulders. For an instant I did not recognize her, until Meg let me go, curtsied, and said, “Shall I fetch a wrap for you, Miss Elspeth?”

  The girl shook her head and went on, past Sedley House.

  “That’s an odd thing, indeed! Miss Elspeth in her aunt’s shawl.”

  I looked after the girl with new interest. “You mean she is wearing Megan Kelleher’s shawl? Is the lady’s clothing in use at Sedley House?”

  “Never! It would be bad luck to the giver and perhaps the wearer as well. Besides,” she leaned toward me and whispered, “Miss Megan’s clothing was never moved from the Hag’s Head. Madam—Mrs. Sedley, that is—would as lief traipse into hell as into the Hag’s Head.”

  “But she told me there was no danger at the inn!”

  “That’s as may be,” she said, nodding wisely. “But facts is facts. And long afore old Madam was twisted up in the hands and shoulders, she would not so much as set a toe in the place.”

  The old she-rogue! I thought. And there she had been, hourly telling me of the inn’s fine qualities. Yet all the time she feared the place and looked upon it with the same superstitious terror as the veriest uneducated moorland dweller. However, so long as I had given my word, I intended, at the least, to have a look at the interior of the inn by broadest Yorkshire daylight. Just as Meg was going back into the house, I decided to verify my theory as to its location. I should be in fine case if I lost my way again on those endless moors.

  “The Hag’s Head is that prominence to the north and east, isn’t it?”

  “Aye! Cursed be the day!” Meg shaded her eyes and stared fixedly in the direction I had indicated. A part of the scramble of outbuildings was hidden by an intervening rise and fold in the moors, but I had been correct in my identification of the inn earlier this morning.

  When Meg went inside, poor Timmy ventured to follow her, but upon being rebuffed by her indifference, and at the same time half-strangled by his collar and the lead that I still held, he scrambled back to me.

  I saw Elspeth Sedley go into a narrow garden beyond the Owl of York and wondered if she intended to meet her uncle there.

  It occurred to me that if Elspeth was wearing her aunt’s black shawl and these garments were normally left at the Hag’s Head, then it stood to reason that Elspeth was not so reluctant to visit the inn as was her grandmother. I wondered if this had something to do with Elspeth’s reluctance, or seeming reluctance, to encourage me to buy the inn. However, it might be that Elspeth simply had not yet encountered those odd lights and noises which bothered everyone else. Or it might even be that she and Patrick Kelleher made it their rendezvous.

  I tugged on the lead to warn Timothy, and the two of stepped off the cobblestones and into one of those ubiquitous sheep tracks which had so confused me yesterday. Since we were both clothed for the crisp fall wind of Yorkshire, I suspect that Timmy enjoyed the invigorating walk as much as I did. Although he would have preferred to go his feline way, returning to me when he chose, something about the awesome expanse of the countryside, or perhaps his experience yesterday, made him stay rather close by me, even after he pulled the lead out of my hand at one point in our walk.

  We climbed a bit before reaching the level of the vast Heatherton Moor, and upon looking behind me I had a comprehensive view of the countryside in all its solemn, almost monotonous grandeur. The grandeur came, I think, from its sameness rather than from any single landmark of nature, just as the sea off my native Cornish coast derived its magnificence from its all-encompassing sameness, rather than from some occasional watersprout or other freak of nature. Heather still bloomed in places more sheltered from the wind, down nearer the bottomlands through which wandered the moorland becks, flowing now much faster and freer since yesterday’s storm. There were many dikes of York stone throughout these regions which, at first glance, looked so untouched by man. But as Timmy and I began to climb again, we left behind us more and more of the signs of humanity, rising to the blackened heather and to the bleak desolation of the heath itself, where nature had never yet bent to man.

  Although Father insisted that I would never be at home on this inland section of Yorkshire after a youth spent almost within sight of the ocean, Mama had known very well that I would find myself sympathetic to these serpentine hills, which were so like the gray-green waves of the sea; and the longer I walked, the more determined I became that if I should be fortunate enough to discover a house suitable to a young ladies’ school, even if it were in need of repairs, I would consider its purchase.

  Not that the Hag’s Head was one of the “possibles.” There would always be the problem of acclimatizing the giggly schoolgirls to the notion of sharing a house with ghosts of murdered ladies. Although I knew perfectly well that, whatever troubled the Hag’s Head, it was not the Other World, even I had found myself obsessed by an odd and heretofore unfamiliar fear during those first few minutes before the arrival of Sir Nicholas yesterday.

  After some time of walking, as we rounded the brow of a hillock on a muddy trail that must be impassible in winter, Timothy leaped back against my feet, nearly tripping me. As I recovered my balance, preparing
to scold him, I was silenced by the sight of the little cat’s hackles rising in a most significant way. I had not seen another human being on the sheep track since we left the village, and I had supposed until this moment that we were alone out in the very heart of the wilderness. But I was not one to deny the sinister evidence of Timmy’s highly developed senses.

  There was a steep decline in the trail beyond this point, and I could not see ahead of us, before the path plunged down. I did not have to wait more than a few seconds before the other solitary walker came lurching toward us with such an unsteady gait that I guessed he must be suffering from the effects of strong spirits. I pressed back against the hillside, making as much room for him as possible but dreading an encounter that was inevitable. Timothy crawled behind my ankles and sat there on his haunches, spitting at the queerly bundled fellow of about thirty-five or forty, who staggered past us as if blind to all but the necessity for getting on.

  CHAPTER SEVEN

  The drunken man was not as repulsive or as dirty as he had looked at first. Wearing a sheepman’s warm dun-colored garments with a cap and a black jacket, he appeared to have fallen among faded heather, dead leaves, and mud—which was not surprising, in his condition. From the glimpse I had of his troubled eyes as he passed me, I began to think now that he was less drunk than dazed or feverish. I moved out from the damp furze I had been crushed against and watched him.

  I was not surprised, though I winced, when he lurched hard to one side, his iron-shod boot slipped through a muddy patch in the trail, and he lost his precarious balance, weaved and swayed like a pathetic bundle of rags without flesh, and fell. He had dropped partially in the trail, with one arm and leg over the edge of the incline, and I was running to him before the dust settled on his coat. It is true there was a smell of spirits about him, and I suspected that it was the cheap Holland genever, or gin, which is called “blue ruin” where I come from. But yet I did not think it was the gin that had made him trip and fall. When I removed his cap and felt carefully over his skull to see if he had hurt himself in this latest fall, he groaned and his body jerked spasmodically.