A Taste for Nightshade

by Martine Bailey

  ‘No. Not like this.’

  He grasped my waist and our mouths met, his tongue pushing past my lips, between my teeth. I felt as though a delicate film or bubble was about to burst, releasing I knew not what beauty or terror.

  I struggled, pushed him away, then kissed him quickly, a dry peck on the cheek, as he had once kissed me in the carriage after the fair. He looked up at me, blearily.

  ‘Goodnight, Michael.’ I pulled away. His head fell forward onto the table, and so I left him, as drunk as a lord.

  If he had not been so intoxicated I would have gone to him that night, for it was impossible to sleep. Listening to the creaks and crackings of the house, I forgot Old Dorcas and thought instead of Michael’s wet tongue and the rhythmic tug of his hands. At three o’clock I got up and reluctantly took a dose of Dr Sampson’s Mixture. Thereafter a sticky, treaclish sleep overcame me, broken by lurid, impure dreams.

  It was from one of these dreams that a great commotion woke me: of many footsteps running, the banging of doors and feminine cries of alarm. I jumped out of bed and, though my head was giddy from my medicine, I pulled a shawl about myself, lit a candle at the embers of my fire, and went off to investigate. The sound of anxious voices drew me to the Long Gallery, where Peg and the other kitchen servants stood at the open door to the lieutenant’s room.

  ‘What is all this?’ I demanded.

  Peg had taken charge and called me over. ‘Look, mistress.’ She had hesitated at the threshold because her light twinkled on an extraordinary scene; of broken glass and splintered wood cast all around the room. Maybe it was the effect of the drug, but the sight was scarcely credible.

  ‘What has happened? Has there been an intruder?’

  ‘I cannot say, Mrs Croxon.’

  ‘Mistress,’ started up Nan. ‘Old Dorcas. She’s done it; she’s still in a fury at young Mr Ashe. Look at what she’s done.’ Nan lifted a bony finger towards what remained of Moncrieff’s portrait. I physically shrank back from what I saw – a monstrous mutilated face staring down from the wall. Then I understood that someone – or something – had slashed at the canvas, tearing at the man’s eyes, hacking into his face.

  I took a step back. It was horrible. ‘Where’s the master?’ I asked Peg.

  ‘Out, mistress.’ Then in a low voice, murmured only to me. ‘I believe he got himself down to the George, where he’s no doubt sleeping it off.’

  Nan and the other women were gossiping in a little knot. It was all of ‘Old Dorcas’ and how she couldn’t sleep easy. ‘Give me your lamp, Peg, I’m going inside.’

  ‘Shall we not wait until morning?’

  I shook my head. ‘I want to see if there is a window open or some other means of escape. It has to be the work of an intruder. I won’t have this superstitious nonsense whipping everyone up.’

  ‘You cannot catch a phantom,’ Nan piped up, and I was obliged to tell her to be quiet.

  Peg was good enough to accompany me through the door, and so we picked our way through the debris by flickering candlelight. The curiosities were thrown about as if by a whirlwind – fossils, armour, ancient books, tossed higgledy-piggledy on the floor. It was the lieutenant’s mementos that had suffered most: his medals cast into the empty grate, his army citation ripped into spiteful shreds. The sword, I noticed, was broken in two. But it was the portrait that disturbed me most; its desecration of the lieutenant’s face was the work of a bedlamite, committed in a frenzy.

  I checked the windows, but they were all secure and gave no signs of having been opened.

  ‘What do you think?’ I asked Peg, out of the others’ hearing.

  She was in her night shift, her red hair swinging in a plait to her waist. ‘I wouldn’t generally give credit to Nan, but isn’t this more than a human might perform? This is a strange old place, mistress. I often hear steps in the night, but I don’t like to say.’

  It was tempting to agree with her and give ourselves a dose of the jitters. But I felt it my responsibility as the mistress of the house to defend reason against hocus pocus.

  I returned to the Long Gallery and addressed my little band. ‘There is nothing we can do now, in the darkness. It appears the intruder—’

  ‘Mistress, it in’t an intruder—’ Nan started up.

  ‘Nan. All of this needs to be looked at in clear rational daylight. Frightening ourselves in the cold like this will only give us agues. I suggest we all return to bed and try to get some sleep.’

  Nan, Joan and Bess looked sceptical at this, but I was rewarded by an approving smile from the widowed charwoman. Yet I was unnerved, as I returned to my own chamber, forced to wonder if a malevolent being – human or spirit – wandered the Hall that night.

  When Peg shook my arm the sun was bright at the window. ‘Mrs Croxon, there’s a woman asking after you downstairs. She says she’s Mrs Greenbeck.’

  I sat up in my bed, my head thick from only a little sleep and those few hours induced by a sedative. At once I recalled the destruction of Moncrieff’s room, and also Michael’s unsettling behaviour after dinner. And now Anne had arrived, without so much as a note to warn me.

  ‘It can’t be. She is not due for another week.’ I touched my pounding temples.

  ‘She is pressing to see you, else I wouldn’t have bothered coming up.’

  ‘Give her refreshments. I need half an hour.’

  ‘So she will be staying?’

  ‘Of course she is staying. Make up the white chamber.’ As she left I asked, ‘Is the master up yet?’

  ‘He isn’t back from the George yet.’

  ‘It’s maybe just as well, Peg.’ We shared a friendly glance, both of us relieved.

  My first moment with Anne dissolved all my apprehensions. At once she embraced me, pressing her soft cheek against mine. ‘Oh, Grace, I am so happy to see you.’ Then she pulled back, and looked at me very steadfastly with her round brown eyes. ‘You have been unwell, dear?’

  ‘It is only that – I became overwrought and had a fall. But I am mending now, especially at the sight of you.’ I laughed a little as I said this. Her dear face, so bright and kind, was a cheering sight; even her weather-worn travelling costume and battered black bonnet delighted me. I had a fleeting idea that Peg might not have been much impressed by such a dowdy, but that, too, seemed laughable now. Even the surprises of the night were slight events, all to be managed with calm and good sense.

  Anne sat down but did not let go of my hand as she asked in a hushed tone, ‘I wondered if … your illness heralds happy news?’

  ‘No. Not at all.’ She looked sorry at that, and squeezed my hand.

  ‘You will not wait long, I am sure of it.’

  To change the conversation’s direction I asked with some trepidation, ‘So what is this bad news you wrote of, Anne, which may affect our friendship?’

  She gathered herself with some effort. ‘First we must talk of your father. Has Michael told you yet?’

  I shook my head, at a loss.

  ‘He must want me to tell you. Grace, prepare yourself to be strong. Your father passed to God two weeks ago. I am afraid he died after an altercation in the street. For some time he, well – you know how he became excited, at times, about his beliefs?’

  I nodded, suddenly drained and horribly surprised. Anne handed me her handkerchief and I wept in silence. My poor father, an old warrior in a world of imaginary foes, had truly been his own worst enemy. ‘He had been drinking?’ I asked weakly. ‘Don’t say he was ranting about politics?’

  ‘I am afraid so. A group of foolish youths baited him – since the King of France was overthrown, feelings run high in Greaves against the radical cause. Even the Brabantist Meeting Hall has been attacked. In your father’s case, the coroner said there was no actual wound, but we all believe his heart was strained. He collapsed in Palatine House. Shortly afterwards he died in the small hours, with Mrs Cooper, the nurse, tending to him. Of course I wrote to you at once, but Michael advised you were not to be
told just yet, being laid up by an accident yourself. I am very sorry, Grace, but he was buried at St Stephen’s a week ago.’

  I bowed my head, lamenting all the good things about my father: his talent, his raw faith, his hopes for the rights of the common people. ‘I am glad he felt no pain,’ I said.

  Anne and Jacob had arranged his few affairs under Michael’s direction. Palatine House was now the property of my father-in-law and there was little else to do. She had packed up all his prints for me, for which I was most grateful. Then she tactfully left me, and I mourned my father alone, in my own way; resurrecting happier days when I had visited his print shop as a child, and the high days and holidays we had shared with my mother.

  That evening I could not face dinner with Michael and Anne. Michael came up to see me, but our conversation was not friendly. I was aggrieved at his not telling me about my father and told him so. As for the ransacking of the lieutenant’s room, he was irritatingly stoical. ‘All I can do is see that the place is padlocked up for good. That way, if anyone did climb in from the outside, they cannot gain access to the house. As for Moncrieff’s belongings, I truly don’t give a damn.’

  After he had left, I continued to torment myself about whether to tell Anne the true reason why I could not be with child, the dalliance I had witnessed, and Michael’s brazen requests for money. I heard Michael’s voice from below, and cringed to think of him conversing with Anne. He had never been respectful towards her, for he held all religion entirely in contempt, and such a modest woman as Anne had no place in his world. When Peg brought me some plain soup for supper, she also insisted I took another dose of Dr Sampson’s draught, so I might at least face the next day with more fortitude. Of the rest of that night I had only a foggy memory; of Anne wishing me goodnight, stroking my hair and saying a few prayerful words over me. After that my sleep was blessed and calm.

  Michael again left the house early, so it was with welcome ease that Anne and I retreated to the drawing room after breakfast. There was a good fire, and I huddled close to it, my new cashmere shawl draped around my chemisette, my sketchbook on my knee. It was then I learned Anne’s other news. Jacob had been appointed to a position as assistant chaplain. ‘It is a good position,’ she said. ‘But I am sorry to say we are going overseas. To New South Wales.’

  ‘Not to the convict colony at Botany Bay?’ It was beyond my imagining. All I knew of the place was the bold experiment to set up a colony for criminals, transporting them as great a distance as possible from the civilised world.

  ‘I am afraid so. We leave in one month, for that very place. I have so little time to prepare for the voyage. Grace, I wonder if I’m fit for such a great trial.’

  She uttered this with such an attempt at courage that my heart flew out to her.

  ‘You are, I know it.’

  She laid her hand gently on her stomach. ‘And I do have happier news. I have the good fortune to be blessed with a child, though God forgive me, the timing is not so good. And I have missed my dear friend and our confidences.’

  ‘Oh, Anne.’

  ‘I would have wished you might be godmother to my child. But now I face the prospect of being delivered somewhere far out on the wild ocean.’

  I was appalled. ‘Can you not change Jacob’s mind?’

  ‘He is quite ferocious in his zeal. You know how he speaks, secretly, in our own parlour? He believes Europe is doomed. He finds these modern times disappointing: the evil news from France; the unleashing of such wickedness, these accounts of people being butchered in the streets. It should not matter if they are lords or beggars – they are men and women, Grace. And all hopes for reform are now set back here in Britain, for the government will not hear of progress. Jacob has always prayed for a better life for the poor and wretched. He speaks of the colony as a new Eden, a chance to establish God’s kingdom on untainted soil.’

  ‘But are these not the most dangerous of criminals? Jacob is condemning you and your child to live amongst them.’

  ‘Jacob says it is a new land, free of class and distinction. It will serve them well.’

  Jacob be hanged, I thought. ‘Yes – but what is your opinion?’

  ‘I willingly made my vows to obey him,’ she said, with a tight little shake of her head. ‘I am learning the price of that now.’

  We talked on a little, of Greaves, of my plans for the Hall, of my father and his glory days. Soon, though, Anne returned to her departure from England. I understood she was frightened, and felt herself entirely ill-prepared for such a tumultuous change.

  As we talked, I made a portrait of her in pencil, as she sat very upright by the fireside in a drab wolsey gown, stitching an infant’s robe with an ever-dipping needle. I surmised that her pride in her needle no doubt hid the sorrier truth that a seamstress’s services were beyond her means. A new furrow of worry had formed between her eyes; and at intervals she adjusted a pair of ugly metal-rimmed spectacles to check the progress of her stitches.

  She looked up and smiled. ‘It would please me greatly if you could make a copy of your picture of me. A memento of my last days in England.’

  ‘You should see it first,’ I said, with a smile. ‘I am not convinced I have caught your expression.’

  ‘You mean I do not look so well, I suppose. That must be true, Grace, for I am under a dreadful strain. As for you, I should say illness suits you, if that does not sound perverse. You are paler, more delicate in some way.’ She studied me for a moment with her steady bright eyes. ‘In fact, I should say you look beautiful.’

  I laughed. ‘Don’t be ridiculous. Peg has taught me to curl my hair, that is all. And I am pale from being in bed too long.’

  ‘Peg? Is she that rather uppish servant of yours?’

  ‘Yes, Peg is my housekeeper.’

  Anne worked on for a few minutes, then said, ‘Michael is a very agreeable man.’

  I put down my pencil. ‘You think so? You do not know him.’

  ‘I believe he is.’ Her needle halted. ‘If there have been misunderstandings between you it scarcely surprises me, considering how little you were acquainted when you married. I will not say I told you so – but I have just done so, haven’t I?’

  I could not meet her eye, and stared into my lap, at the half-finished sketch.

  ‘Maybe he has created such an impression to fool you.’

  ‘You are low from your illness. At such times everything can seem darker than its true colour. I suppose you seek proof of his regard?’

  ‘That would be welcome.’

  ‘I have more news,’ Anne went on. ‘This next fortnight Jacob will be engaged with the clerical society at Bradford. There is so much for him to learn: medicine, mathematics, surveying and suchlike. So he has agreed I might go to York tomorrow, to equip myself for the voyage. Now dear, before you look so cast down, I have a notion.’ Her face lit bright with anticipation. ‘Come with me, Grace. I have spoken to Michael and he agrees it will revive your spirits to be amongst crowds and life and bustle. What do you say?’

  ‘Michael has agreed?’ I was astonished.

  ‘Yes, naturally he has. I understand you are still weak, but listen – it is all arranged. We will take your carriage and lodge in comfortable rooms. You can rest as often as you need to. I know you have always wanted to see the great Minster and the ancient city. What do you say? Please, Grace. It will make our parting so much easier if we share my last precious weeks.’

  I frowned, trying to comprehend my husband’s mazy thinking. A faint echo started up in my mind: that he wanted me out of his way.

  ‘What do you say? You cannot imagine how much I need you beside me.’

  I could not refuse. Indeed, a journey to York sounded better suited to restore me than a hundred doctors’ potions.

  ∗ ∗ ∗

  That evening, as I supervised the packing of my trunk, I at once detected Peg’s opposition to my leaving. From the first, Anne’s arrival had disrupted her, but now her departure with me d
isgruntled her even more. I found it rather comical, that Peg should be jealous of my friend – for that was how I interpreted her mood.

  ‘How long will you be away, mistress?’ she asked in a near wail of anguish, as I watched her pack my new costumes in silk bags.

  ‘Not so very long. Mrs Greenbeck is leaving the country, so it would be churlish to deny her my company. Yes, the purple silk too. I may even get the chance to wear it in York.’

  ‘Where is it she’s travelling off to?’ Peg stroked my new gown as if she might never see it again.

  ‘Don’t forget the jet beads with that.’ I hesitated, wondering why I should give an account of Anne’s troubles to a servant. That word Anne had used to describe Peg – ‘uppish’ – had worked its way into my mind like an irritating splinter. ‘She is not yet sure where her husband will be posted,’ I yawned. ‘Come up here and finish packing after dinner. Leave me now.’

  We had a last, grand dinner with Anne, at which I watched with astonishment as my husband behaved tolerably well. Peg’s dishes were remarkably good: an old-fashioned pulpatoon of pigeon, roast pork in breadcrumbs, and duck with peas. Anne had never before tasted such a genteel dish as Peg’s dessert in the shape of a hedgehog, with slivers of almonds bristling over it like spines. Michael watched us devour it in its pool of custard, and announced that just twenty-four hours in Anne’s company was certainly restoring me. When Anne and I rose for the drawing room he also stood, approached me, and chastely kissed my lips. I could see Anne smiling benignly behind his shoulder. What a charlatan he was. Nonetheless, to my alarm, another unwanted jolt ran through my body as his lips brushed mine. Remembering his mouth murmuring against my throat, unwelcome warmth spread over my face. Michael, it seemed, always possessed the power to agitate me. I said my goodnights and followed Anne upstairs, but after checking from the landing that Peg was busy in my chamber, I crept quietly back down to the kitchen.