by Joan Smith
Nora, of course, didn’t know about it, or she would not have sent this replica to the public day. So Bulow had tricked her, thrown in the poison berries when her back was turned. If only Norman had recognized it, had said something. “This isn’t our plum cake, it’s Aunt Nora’s.” I doubt if he would have eaten it if he thought it was from home. He probably did know, and didn’t tell me. I used to nag him a little about being on closer terms with his immediate family. So he said nothing, and I had no reason to suspect the truth.
I was in a fever to get to the safety of Wyngate. Bulow might come at any moment, offering to take me for that drive. I would never be able to conceal my knowledge, and to know was to be in jeopardy.
“I’m leaving for Wyngate now, Mrs. Burns,” I said, jumping up from the table.
“You’ve not finished your tea. A fresh pot, and the Chinese squares are ever so good.”
“I’m in a hurry.”
“Will you be home for dinner, Lady Blythe?”
“I don’t know,” I answered distractedly, and went for my bonnet and wrap.
I ran all the way there, down the row of hedges, disliking the privacy, but I met no one. Soon the icehouse loomed up, the dovecot, and beyond the stables, with the silver-gray walls of the house proper soon before me. I was breathless when I reached the door. I entered the closest one, the kitchen. Mrs. Soper was busy making an apple tart for dinner, with a bowl of dried apple slices before her.
“Oh, Lady Blythe, you’re winded. I hope there’s nothing wrong at the dower house?”
“No, nothing. Sir Homer isn’t back yet?”
“Not yet. He left word he might not be back for dinner. Exeter is not just around the corner. That’s where he went. You’ll not mention it to Mr. Bulow if you happen to run into him,” she added with a knowing eye. She was Homer’s confidante. “Miss Millie and the others will be happy to see you. Why don’t you go on up, ma’am?”
“I will.”
I passed an endless day. Millie’s foolish prattle annoyed me. Jarvis asked me to drive into town with him, but I was in no mood for it. I spent some time with Thalassa, who was genuinely happy for my company.
“What has Mr. Dickens written to amuse you now?” I asked, as she had a book propped in front of her when I entered.
“Dickens? I’m tired of the man. I never will forgive him for killing off Nell. I’ve switched to Mr. Thackeray. He may kill off Miss Beckey Sharpe with my good wishes. Though she’s a lively rascal, no denying. Come and sit with me, Davinia. My son has gone rattling off somewhere or other.” As he had not confided in her, I had to watch my tongue.
‘It’s a beautiful day out,” I said, taking up a chair that gave me a view of the landscape.
“It was on such a day as this I got thrown from my horse. I little thought that morning, when I climbed up on Black Bob’s back, that it would be my last time. Life is short, and has many an odd twist in it, my dear. There is poor Norman, buried before he was thirty. What I am trying to say in a roundabout way is that you should relax and enjoy yourself. You look worried today. Is something the matter?”
“No,” I lied quietly.
“No, and nothing the matter with my Homer either, though he struck out of here at the crack of dawn with a face like a thunder cloud. The same last night. I expect the two of you are attempting to save my feelings, but I can tell you, not knowing what the deuce is going on is worse than anything. I have the direst Imaginings, you must know. Nothing to do all day long but worry. Now tell me, do—have you two had a quarrel?”
“No, not at all. I—I am very fond of Homer.”
“Well, that’s something at least. You don’t need me to tell you he feels more than fondness for you, Davinia. Wears his heart on his sleeve, like his papa. I knew within six months of Emily’s death that Roger was fond of me. We married shortly after the year’s mourning was up. A year is plenty long enough to give over to the dead,” she said pointedly.
“We don’t speak of marriage yet, Thalassa.”
“Hah, there’s speaking, and there is speaking. Much may be understood without words. I know Homer has been like a cat on coals since you came. But I’ll let him do his own courting. You shall tell me all about the public day instead. I hear Millie disgraced us all by appearing in her bloomers, after I went to the bother of making her a new skirt.”
We talked about the tenant farmers, she giving me some idea of their various backgrounds, almost it struck me, as though she was preparing me to assume her role as mistress of the place.
It was the most pleasant part of that long day, but she was still an invalid, and tired quickly, so that by four I had to leave her. There was still no sign of Homer returning, and if I was to get back to the dower house in time to have Mrs. Burns make me dinner, I knew I had to leave. I had no wish to traverse the park at twilight. The shortest route home was by the kitchen door, and that was the route I took, waving a farewell to cook as I went.
Chapter 21
I looked all around before starting my walk, to ensure Bulow was not loitering about on horseback or on foot. There was no access for a carriage along my path. The way was clear. Only the trees waved in the rising wind, the tall row of poplars silvering as the underside of their leaves was turned up; the sturdier beeches and elms were less distracted by the breeze. Sullen black clouds, long and lean, huddled on the horizon, but the westering sun shone, creating shafts of light between them so striking one would think it possible to climb on them to the sky, and slide down again on these cosmic rays.
Woodie hovered at the stable door, waved to me, but was much too important a person now to spend his days trailing at my skirts. Homer had invented a job for him in the stable, helping the grooms. He held a curry brush in one hand. I passed the dovecot, where the birds cooed and hummed, happy with their repaired home. Ahead was the icehouse, and a few hundred yards beyond that, the safety of my own dower house. I felt anxious to reach it. Some apprehension nagged at me, heightened by the menacing clouds, but of course generated by fear of Bulow. It seemed impossible, in broad light of day, that he could be so inhumanly evil as I imagined. I hastened my steps, past the squat icehouse, trying to ignore the frisson that scuttled up my spine. Once past it, the way home was clear, unimpeded.
The first warning that I was not going to reach clear ground was a moving shadow, its shape amorphous due to the angle of the sun. It gradually elongated, like a snake slithering along the grass, just at the far side of the icehouse. I stopped in my tracks, staring as the thing magically disappeared. I peeped my head around the corner of the wall and met Bulow’s wide-set green eyes, staring directly into mine. He was pinioned flat against the wall, with one hand raised.
There was no black glove on it this time. In the fraction of a second that I stood shocked into immobility, the hand flashed out and grabbed me around the neck, pulling me rudely against him. The fleeting look I had of his face showed no mercy, but only a determined hatred and resolution to have done with me. One arm was pulled tight against my neck, the other wrenching my own arms painfully behind my back.
“Walk,” he growled, pushing my stumbling legs forward with his own, around the corner of the icehouse. I noticed the door was unlatched, hanging open an inch. With the toe of his boot, he kicked it wide and shoved me inside, coming with me, still holding me. I was sick with dread, panicked into shocked obedience. I tried to speak, to shout, and felt the hand tighten around my neck. He must have used his other hand to close the door. I had only one glimpse of the interior of the icehouse, with square blocks of sawdust-laden ice piled high, with a space between the top of the ice and the V-shaped roof.
From the corner of my eye as I entered, I saw a very deadly set of ice tongs, with pointed hooks. There was a soft click as the door closed, then darkness fell. Total, utter, unrelieved darkness, as though the sun had died and plunged into oblivion. The cold air added to the illusion. I trembled in my cotton gown. And still I could not speak. Nor was it necessary. I knew what he was
going to do. What I did not know was how.
Bulow too was silent. I heard a rustling sound, but the one arm still yanked at my neck. He backed up, pulling me with him, and fumbled around on the wall, I thought, for something.
There reared up in my mind that vicious pair of ice tongs. I could almost feel its cold iron spikes enter my body, but that was imagination. What I did actually feel was a rough hemp rope slip over my head. The arm loosened from my neck, and he began pulling the rope tighter, tighter. He had stored that rope there, planning my execution.
When hope is lost, desperation takes over. I plunged towards the door and was pulled up short, like a dog on its leash. A cruel little chuckle, as chilling as the ice itself, was the only sound he made. I gasped, and put my hands to my throat. The line had slackened. In the covering blackness, I began easing it over my head. The madman was enjoying this prank, letting me get up hope, knowing he had the power.
“You’ll hardly feel a thing,” he said, his voice silken, almost purring. “Hanging is quick. The neck breaks in less than a minute.” I felt a little pull on the rope, and pulled back with my hands, to fool him it was still around my neck. I eased away as far as the length of my arms permitted, while my mind flew in search of a rescue. The door was the only exit. He stood between me and it. But there was the utter darkness on my side. And beside the door was the ice tongs.
“Widows and mothers who have lost their children are so terribly depressed,” he continued, in quite a conversational tone. “First Emily, now Davinia. The blighted brides of Blythe,” he said, and laughed. “I didn’t want to kill you, dear Davie. I would have preferred marrying you, if I could have been certain of your allegiance. But it was always Homer, wasn’t it? Quite a comedy, really, you thinking Homer had pushed you down the windmill stairs, and Homer wondering if you had murdered Norman. A pity Mama had to go sending my special sort of plum cakes to the public day party, to reveal my clever device. I couldn’t help overhear you and Homer discuss it last night on the verandah. When Mrs. Burns was kind enough to offer me tea this morning, I deduced you might have recognized them. Your elusiveness all day confirmed it.”
There was a harder tug on the rope at the end of his speech. I tugged back again, trying to gauge how many feet were between us. Had I time to get to the ice tongs? Could I lure him somehow away from the door?
“I fear Homer will be a trifle hard to convince, once he learns I was not at the horse auction at Exeter, but I have an alibi for today. I was in the village, and was seen by three neighbors on my way home—just before I jogged off to meet you here. Mama will verify I arrived home at the proper time. Mothers are very helpful in these matters. And in the worst case, if Homer becomes too troublesome, he can always have an accident. He is bound to require an occasional sleeping draught, in his remorse at having failed to protect you.”
I could almost feel the evil in that cold, dark space. It curled around me, a palpable miasma. “You are very quiet, my dear,” he said, a gloating sound as of near laughter. “Cat got your tongue?” There was another tug at the rope. I held my breath, and tugged back, not too hard, as though I were straining, but just enough to tell him he still had me. I heard him move, his feet coming a little closer, and I too advanced, towards the spot on the wall where I thought the ice tongs must be. So big, so heavy, so cumbersome... I reached my free hand out, and felt only the blank air. Where were the tongs? How far away was my chance of escape? He came another step, and I too advanced, with my arm outstretched. I felt the rough lumber of the wall, but no cold metal, just timber. I felt frantically, pulling harder on the rope. He pulled it back with a soft, “Tch tch.”
There wasn’t a single sound penetrating from outside. We were not so very far from the stable, but the icehouse had double walls for insulation. No one would hear if I shouted, but in the same way, no one advancing from outside was heard. The first realization that someone was out there was the long triangle of light when the door swung noiselessly open. It caught me in its shaft. Bulow saw my trick, saw my grasping fingers, only a foot from the wall, and rent the air with an accomplished curse. I hardly heard it. With the light at his back, Woodie’s face was not distinguishable, but there was no mistaking his little body, with the sun shining on his reddish blond hair. Oh God! Why couldn’t it have been Homer, or some fully grown, competent man?
“Miss?” he asked, looking towards me.
Like the flick of a lizard’s tongue, Bulow’s arm went out and grabbed him, pulled him into the darkness with us. At some point during the horrible interlude I must have dropped the rope, though I had no recollection of doing it. With the door ajar, there was enough light to see Bulow reel it in with one hand, and push it over Woodie’s innocent little head.
“Take one step and he’s dead,” Bulow said, fixing me with his gaze. It was so unreal, to be able to look out the open door and see sunlight, warmth, safety a few feet away, and to know I was unable to reach it. As if to reinforce his seriousness, he tightened the knot till the boy’s head jiggled and a strangled sound came from him.
He was going to kill us both. The only thing deterring him was deciding how to kill one without the other taking advantage of it. As I stood thinking what to do, I noticed his fingers tensing. He was strangling Woodie right then, that very instant, while trying to fool me he was not, to give me hope the boy might be allowed to go.
“Devil!” I screamed. The evil was in me, a part of me, possessed me, gave me strength to reach the weapon, and use it. There was an ice hook hanging there by the tongs. It had a flattened circle of steel for a handle. The working end was a curved hook, to grab the blocks of ice and move them.
When I moved, Bulow released Woodie and came after me. But a second was long enough. I curled my fingers around the flattened circle, raised the hook above my head, and struck with all my force. I felt the impact jar my wrist when it entered his shoulder. He winced with the pain, but it only slowed his progress as he grabbed futilely for me. The hook was imbedded in him. I screamed. I think I screamed—I seem to remember an echo reverberating as he wobbled towards me and I evaded him, grabbed Woodie’s hand, and ran. Ran through the door into sane sunlight, ran to the stable, ran till I fell in a heap in the dust and dirt, gasping and trembling and sick. I was unable to speak, to give voice to the unutterable thing I had done. Woodie too was beyond words. He stood making strangled guttural sounds, with the cords in his throat forming visible protuberances, as he swung his arms about wildly. I noticed the rope was still hanging from his neck,
There was a confused jumble of discussion from the stable hands. It sounded like a disturbed beehive. Two of the men ran out, with Woodie leading the way, and one stayed with me, bending over me helplessly, with a wild, frightened look on his weathered face.
Chapter 22
Many months have passed since that cowardly attack on a woman and a retarded boy. Bulow’s grave is covered with grass, and is decorated afresh with flowers at frequent intervals by his mother, the only person in the world who was not full of abhorrence for his actions. Homer says she should lie beside him in the ground for the witch she is. It seems there is no law against condoning crime, or none that she can be proved guilty of, for she claimed no knowledge of any of his history.
Not the poisoned plum cakes, made in her kitchen; not the alibi she was ready to supply if it should be necessary. After all, her greatest crime was a blindness to what went on around her. Love can do that. I, of all people, must agree. Love robbed me of clear vision in plumbing the depths of Norman’s condition. If only I had known... But regrets are futile. It is time to put past horrors behind me and go on with life, as Eglantine Crofft has done. She is engaged already to a wealthy merchant from Bridgeport.
Millie took my recovery in hand when I was carried raving like a Bedlamite from the stable to Wyngate. She dosed me with some sickeningly sweet stuff, which I was too weak to ward off. Her wiry arms held me down, her hands got my lips open and tilted the glass into my mouth. In my delirium, I
was sure she was finishing off the job her old friend Bulow had begun earlier. I objected and spluttered, but in the end I swallowed enough of the laudanum to knock me out like a light. What horrors invaded my dreams for the next twelve hours! It was a nightmare trip to the bowels of hell and back. And back—that is the magical phrase. I returned, while Bulow is to spend eternity there.
I awoke as dawn streaked the sky with crimson. After looking my fill at the dawning of a miraculous new day, I glanced at Millie, curled up in a chair in the corner like a fern about to unfurl. She wore her violet lace-edge bloomers, and had something about her shoulders. It looked like a gentleman’s jacket.
“Darling, are you awake?” The voice was closer to me than Millie’s chair. Turning my head, I saw Homer bending over me. He was haggard from his long vigil, and from worry. Lines were etched deep in his face, his cheeks shadowed with whiskers, his hair disheveled. And the eyes—what a tender love and concern were in them. It was not the proud and possessive, maniacal love of a Norman, but a new thing, an emotion so strong it almost spoke aloud. I noticed then that he held my hand in his. His other stroked my forehead, my hair, as gently as a sigh. “It’s over. It’s all over. You’re home safe with me.”
The nightmare was done. I sighed deeply, closed my eyes, and slept again without nightmare, not to awaken till the sun was high in the sky. Millie came to tend me. I was so unwilling to be alone that I let her stay while I bathed and dressed myself, a thing I would not normally wish an audience for. Since my clothing was at my own house, I borrowed a dressing gown from Thalassa. It was a pale blue one, the first color I had worn since Norman’s death. While I bathed and dressed, I questioned Millie.
