‘I’ve managed to match up twenty-eight in the book,’ said Jemima.
‘Out of how many?’ asked Sara excitedly.
‘Fifty-four. There are loads of others as well that must have belonged to Lady Mattie, but they’re not in the book. Ma’s got a couple of the black ones down at the lodge, but I like Lady Christina’s dresses the best.’
‘I wonder what happened to the rest?’
‘I don’t know. Four are marked ‘Given to Alice’ so she probably just gave them away when she got fed up with them. That’s what Daisy thinks.’
‘Lucky Alice!’
The walk-in wardrobe smelled strongly of mothballs. The glittering dresses were hung on the rails on either side. The cloak had been wrapped in fresh tissue paper and hidden in one of the cupboards under Daisy’s careful direction.
Sara’s face lit up. ‘And lucky us! And oh, what misery if nothing fits!’
‘We should be able to make them fit. Lady Christina was about the same height as we are, and they’ve got tucks and darts all over the place that we should be able to let out. Do you want to see the book before you choose? I’ve racked them in order.’
Sara laughed. ‘No! I don’t want to see something completely gorgeous and then find it’s been thrown out.’
Jemima held a shining, emerald green gown against herself, fingering the layered silken skirts. ‘You can’t have this one. This is mine for next year. No negotiation.’
Sara gasped. ‘Do they all have necklines as low as that?’
Jemima grinned. ‘Some.’
‘I want one!’
They rummaged through the racks – Sara exclaiming in delight, Jemima muttering, ‘Not black, not purple, blue’s too boring. I don’t feel like gold, not silver either and brown’s horrid. So how about this?’
She bunched up her hair under a scarlet sequined headband and posed between the mirrors by the window with the matching red spangled dress draped over her front. ‘Yes!’
‘And this for me!’ sang Sara, holding up a low-necked silk gown. The embroidered purple bodice fitted tightly to the waist. The matching underskirt was overlaid with a jupe made entirely of chiffon diamond-shapes, hand-stitched together in alternating shining purple and coppery tan.
‘Let’s try them on,’ suggested Jemima.
They kicked off their slippers and ran into the bedroom to get changed in front of the fire. Jemima had more success in hooking herself into the more loosely fitting cocktail dress. Sara gasped and held her breath as they went back into the dressing room to look at themselves in the mirrors. She let go the hooks and laughed, her eyes watering. ‘I didn’t think I was so fat!’
‘That dress would have been worn over a tight corset,’ said Jemima, with the hindsight of many hours of studying her benefactress’s fashion habits.
‘What else did she wear with it?’
‘I think there was a matching shawl.’
‘Did you find it?’
‘No.’ Jemima opened the old photo album. Each of the pictures had been hand-tinted to show the colour and detail of the various formal ball and evening gowns, and a selection of more casual, but equally glittering, cocktail dresses.
‘Wow!’ Sara put her head on one side, studying the face of the woman looking out at them from every page. ‘She’s different from what I’d thought she’d look like.’
‘More elegant?’ asked Jemima.
‘As elegant, perhaps not so beautiful.’
‘That’s what I thought too.’
They found the picture of the gown. Sara shrugged. ‘Well, I’ll just have to manage without the corset and the shawl, as well as the head piece and the purple slippers.’
‘We’ll find something in the accessory shop in the town,’ said Jemima. ‘That’s what Ma and I did last year.’
They went back to the mirrors – two glittering figures shivering in the draught from the window, one in red with worn yellow socks, the other unhooked and splendid in sagging green socks.
‘Don’t we look amazing?’ giggled Jemima.
‘Perfect! The very last word in fashion, my dear.’ Sara pulled at her hair. ‘I’ll have this coloured to match the dress. That’ll be one up on Lady Christina.’ She examined the needlework in the opening at her waist. ‘We need scissors and a sewing machine.’
‘They’re all in the sewing room in the servants’ quarters!’ said Jemima, putting on her slippers.
‘Isn’t it locked?’
‘It wasn’t this morning. Come on!’
The turret stairwell felt bitterly cold after the comparative warmth of the gallery, which had been heated from the fire kept blazing in the main hall since they had the news of Daisy’s imminent return. The heavy door to the servants’ quarters was still unlocked. Giggling, the two girls crept into the deserted wing at the back of the house.
‘I’ve left my phone in the bedroom,’ whispered Sara. ‘Supposing we get locked in?’
‘Then we’ll just have to bang on the floor and shout.’
‘Why are we whispering?’
Jemima laughed. ‘I don’t know.’
On the right-hand side of a narrow central passage, two small rooms overlooked the sloping roof of the kitchen. The first doubled as a bedroom and a sewing room. The second, and smallest, had been converted into a bathroom. What had been originally the butler’s bed-sitting room at the end of the passage had a view over the vegetable garden and the orchard. On the left of the passage the little kitchen in the housekeeper’s flat commanded the same view, while the sitting room and the bedroom looked west over the old-fashioned herb garden to the enclosed yard at the rear of the stable block. A tantalising smell of slow-roasting chicken and bacon wafted out from under the door. In Daisy’s absence, the key had been left in the lock.
The girls looked at each other.
‘Do we dare?’ whispered Sara.
‘Why not?’
They slipped into a warm and welcoming little kitchen that was a perfect, miniature replica of the one downstairs, except that the range had been black-leaded and there was a coalscuttle beside the hearth. Jemima bent down and looked in the oven. She counted ten large potatoes baking on the tray on the shelf. A big chicken was roasting in a heavy cast-iron pot in the bottom of the oven, surrounded by what looked like a whole string of sausages wrapped in slices of bacon.
‘This is weird,’ she said. ‘There’s no chicken on the menu for today and we’ve already got the meat for tomorrow. Who’s going to eat it?’
Sara was examining the contents of the two cardboard boxes left on the table. ‘Look at this.’ She handed Jemima a note in John’s precisely crafted handwriting:
Dear Caz. I hope I got enough to last you for tonight. I’ll pick up extra supplies for tomorrow on my way back from the hospital. If you can think of anything more, leave me a note in the greenhouse and I'll see what I can sort out. John.
Jemima sorted through the boxes, counting the contents. There were six cans of soup, six cans of treacle pudding, four large loaves, two tubs of butter, four tubs of custard and one of cream, a bottle of tomato sauce, two bags of apples and a dozen oranges. The girls stared at each other in stunned silence.
‘It looks like he’s going to eat all this as well as the supper we’re cooking for him,’ said Sara incredulously.
Jemima’s face was white. ‘There’s something going on here that we’ve never been told about.’
Sara nodded. ‘I think you’re right. When you were away in Plymouth, Daisy told me something that really made me think. She said that those who get on here prove themselves by doing what they’re asked to do and keeping their mouths shut. I asked her if that’s what Caz does.’
‘And what did she say?’
Sara repeated Daisy’s exact words: ‘That and more, young Sara, believe me, that and more.’
It’s like Thunderslea, thought Jemima. Something else we’re not allowed to talk about, even among ourselves. But this is different. This is about Caz. Her chin came up. ‘Okay, that’s
what we’ll do too. We’ll keep our mouths shut, but not for them. We’ll do it for Caz, and we won’t tell anyone else, not even Ma.’
‘She might know already.’
Jemima shook her head. ‘She doesn’t. I know she doesn’t.’
‘But we have to tell Jas.’ Sara held up a warning hand as Jemima started to protest. ‘He has a right to know, Jem, and he should know. We’ll order pizza tonight and eat in, just the three of us together. We’ve said and done nothing about Caz for long enough.’
CHAPTER 78
The shield was ready for the second coat of paint. Bound around the edges by a solid ring of layered and beaten iron, the convex wooden body had been sealed with several layers of thick leather on both sides and stamped through the middle with a spiked iron boss. The sheath for the seaxe fitted exactly into the back under the strap.
Caz brushed the outline of the first of the Runes of the Deathless onto the leather, allowed the surface of the paint to set and then covered it over with an even layer of solid red. The message was clear. Whoever faced him would find no quarter given. There would be no mercy – only the endless dark of the void.
He rested the shield back on the stand to dry. The afternoon was passing. There was still time to walk the Medustig before sunset, and food in the Selerest if he was delayed. He collected the cloak and the spear. All the doors in the shadowed inner hall of the vault complex were shut. No light shone down the narrow stairs from the study, but he heard music playing and softslippered footsteps padding back and forth in front of the hearth.
Alan had been absent all morning but Caz knew he was nearby the moment he stepped into the tunnel. He had overridden the command for the lights so that the darkness was total when the door from the security room closed silently behind him. It would be a perfect test for his skill.
He was immediately aware of the impact of his own movements. What had seemed to be soundless in the forest, or in the house, echoed on all sides in this underground space, magnifying every eager footstep, each excited breath – even the creak of sinew and bone in his fingers gripping the spear. Alan was far ahead but the presence of his mortal life force lingered in the elusive scent of blood and breath. It was enough to track.
I’m like a kid with a new game, Caz thought ruefully. Concentrate, Caz Wylde, calm down and slow down. This could be a life or death situation, and that means your life and your death. Get a grip.
His senses sharpened with each step. He was aware of a continual shifting in the layers of stone and earth all around him – of rock grinding against rock, of water seeping and dripping, and sometimes a steady trickling where a hidden spring found a crack forced open by the ancient roots of trees or the frozen fingers of long forgotten, bitter winters. The spear was pulsing in his hand. The rune was glowing but faint. It shed no light into the dark space before him.
As the Medustig became steeper, the rocky floor became less even underfoot. He caught the aroma of hay and freshly drawn water, the oily reek of a lamp recently snuffed out and, beyond that, the scent of wood and cement, and new bricks and lime wash. The dim outline of the entrance to the Selerest opened up to his right. The heat still lingered over the hurricane lamp set down on the hearth beside the stove. He climbed the steps into the roof of the cave and put his shoulder to the trap door. It had been left unsealed. Alan was clearly intending to return the way he had come.
Caz lifted the trap a little further and peered through the slit into the thin afternoon light. The surrounding copse had been encouraged to revert to a rampantly overgrown state, camouflaging the entrance to the cave and the Medustig. There were no paths through the dense undergrowth.
This is going to be fun, he thought. It’s Al’s woodcraft against mine! I have to get right up to touching distance before he sees me. First I have to fool the dog.
He slipped outside and crouched down beneath the overhanging bank, checking for tracks. Here and there, Blue’s paw marks were clear in the soft, wet earth, but Alan habitually stepped through and over the undergrowth, leaving only the occasional broken twig or stem to show where he had passed.
He saw Blue first, lying down under a bush beside a tree. Alan was leaning against the wide bole of an old beech tree with a phone in his hand. He seemed to be arguing with someone. His voice was very low as though he had no intention of being overheard. Whatever they were talking about, Caz knew it was something to do with him.
Slowly and stealthily, Caz worked a wide semi-circle well clear of the dog, using every available bit of cover and praying that the conversation would not be over before he was within earshot. The phone was the real surprise. Alan had always been so vehemently against carrying any form of communication and was always so protective of his own privacy. It had to be a Guardian thing, which narrowed down the number of people he could be talking to. Caz crawled into the twilit shelter of the thick undergrowth, pulled at the cloak until it covered him completely, gritting himself to lie completely still while he listened.
Alan’s first words left no doubt who was on the other end of the line. He sounded dispirited, as though he was being obliged to continue an argument that had already been going on far too long.
‘I tell you it can’t be done, Charles. He’ll cotton on too quickly. I don’t want to do anything to lose his trust.’
There was a long pause. Caz could hear the tone of the other man’s voice, if not the words. He was obviously furiously angry.
Alan interrupted, ‘It’s too near Hag Night for this, Charles! There’s no time. I don’t forget the oath, any more than you do. But I’m having doubts about the Master and his intention. Every day I see how he’s going on and I don’t like what I’m seeing. I’ll never go back on the oath, but I swore it to the God, not the man. Any man can fail and then where does that leave us?’
There was a short pause, and then he said forcefully, ‘I don’t agree! Heresy’s going against the God and I don’t do that! I don’t deny the Master’s years of service but he was appointed by his grandfather, no one else.’
His shoulders sagged wearily as he listened to the protracted reply, letting Charles Fordham-Marshall have his say without interruption. Finally he said, ‘Yes, we’ll discuss this later. Yes, I will file a full report. Goodbye.’
He whistled to the dog. They left quickly, doubling back to the trapdoor. Blue barked once, catching Caz’s scent, but Alan was too preoccupied to pay attention.
Caz waited until he was sure they were well on the way back down the tunnel before he returned to the Selerest. He was satisfied with his woodcraft. He was not satisfied with Alan.
You have doubts, my brother, and so do I. You will be tested, very soon.
CHAPTER 79
Jasper and Sara pulled the sofa closer to the fire and Jemima sat in her usual place on the hearthrug in the sitting room at the lodge. The cats curled up beside her, their eyes gleaming and their noses twitching, watching her share out the pizza.
Jasper opened the proceedings. ‘So tell us what you know about bro, Sibyl. As I see it, this all started a couple of years ago, about the time of the midwinter fest when the boss popped his old eye out with the champagne cork.’
Jemima nodded. ‘That was the day we found Bryn dead in the stables, the morning after the eclipse of the moon.’
Jasper waggled his head. ‘Keep to the facts, Sib. No heebiejeebie stuff.’
‘But this is a fact because something weird happened in the yard while it was going on.’
‘I didn’t know you were up there.’
‘I wasn’t. I was down here, watching out of my bedroom window.’
‘You can’t see the yard from that window.’
‘Jas, please!’ Sara was not so inclined to dismiss Jemima’s intuitive perceptions out of hand. ‘Let her speak!’
He rolled his eyes. ‘Sorry, Sibyl. What did you see?’
‘I don’t know how to explain it without you going on at me and saying I’m stupid!’ exclaimed Jemima crossly.
‘
Try,’ said Sara.
Jemima sighed. ‘It was right in the middle of the eclipse when the moon went red. I know this sounds silly, but a thing like a big cloud of black mist came up over the hill and dropped down on the house and the yard. Everywhere else was all right. The sky was still clear. I could see the stars and the moon, but the whole house just disappeared. I couldn’t even see the chimneys. It was really scary, like the worst ghost story you’ve ever heard of, but for real, and worse because I knew Caz and Sir Jonas were up there alone and I was scared something bad was happening to the horses.’
Jasper and Sara exchanged looks.
‘So why didn’t you tell someone?’ he asked.
‘How could I? You had gone out and Ma was at work. I was all by myself and scared to death.’
‘How long did it last?’ asked Sara.
‘About ten minutes I think. I know you don’t believe me. I can tell by your faces.’
‘Why didn’t you say anything about it before?’ asked Jasper.
‘I did, to Caz the next morning.’
‘And what did he say?’
‘He got me by the throat, smacked me up against the wall in the barn and basically told me to shut up. So I did.’
Jasper nodded. ‘He was more upset that day than any of us had ever seen him before.’
‘And do you remember what happened when we buried her? He kept saying ‘I couldn’t save you, I couldn’t save you.’
‘From what?’ asked Sara.
Jasper took another slice of pizza. ‘The only candidate so far is an unlikely cloud of black mist that took out the house and the yard for ten minutes during a lunar eclipse. That’s not a lot to go on, Stat.’
‘What did Sir Jonas think had happened to her?’
‘He seemed satisfied she’d died of old age.’
‘What about the other horses?’
‘Freyja and Kyri were flat out asleep all day. We thought they were dead too, when we found them,’ said Jemima. ‘The others were fine. I rode Nanna and Caz took Rúna when we buried Bryn.’
‘Is it normal for horses to sleep like that?’
Second Night Page 35
