The Hidden People

by Allison Littlewood

  I kept moving until I stood at her side, as if she had become the exhibit in some sorry show. I reached out and touched the covering, and in the next moment, I had reached out and drawn it back.

  I knew at once why the oilcloth had been chosen. Freed of its prison, the vile odour that had been trapped within spilled freely into the room, assaulting my senses so that at first I did not even see the monstrous thing beneath, thinking its darkness only more cloth. I staggered away from the mephitic onslaught, batting my hands against it as if it could be stopped. I choked, bending double and retching painfully, though I expelled only a thin fluid. Yes, here was reality in all its bitterness and pain, a surfeit of it.

  I straightened once more and I could not stop my eyes from stealing towards the horror that lay there: the charred, cracked skin; cheekbones gleaming through shreds of burned flesh and black cinders; rivers of crimson wending through their desolate landscape. The effect of each individual atrocity combined to render the features unrecognisable to my eye, and I was grateful for it. Not only the ravages of fire but those of time had made their assault upon this thing that had once been human, yet had been treated as so much less.

  The worst thing—the thing that would return to me night after night, making me sit bolt-upright in my bed, gasping for breath and staring wide-eyed into the dark—was the way the skin had shrunk back from the teeth, which were oddly perfect, even and white, forming a bright grin that stood out purely from the corruption all around.

  There came a sound—a high, sharp sound, from under the cloth that still covered much of the sorry object. I reached out and drew it back a little further and saw that a Bible had been placed on her breast, and upon that, a plate of what appeared to be salt. I was trying to imagine what relic of paganism had made them do such a thing—was it to keep evil spirits away?—when the source of the sound was released and a large black fly, fattened on who knew what, darted towards me.

  I tugged the cloth upward once more, no longer caring how the body was covered, only wishing that it was, but the oilcloth no longer fit. I let out some inarticulate sound, a child’s sob, and a distant voice called out—I do not know what it said, though it was full of concern. I tugged hard on the cloth, pulling it over the awful skull with its thin covering crusted and peeling, and I realised that a few scraps of hair remained; it was brittle, strands of it crumbling at my touch, and then I saw a flash of a finer, paler hue at the nape of the neck.

  The room darkened and I turned to see a shadow filling the doorway. Quicker than thought, I pulled a small knife from my pocket and cut a lock from the poor head of what had once been my cousin and slipped it out of sight once more before hands came to help me straighten the oilcloth. The landlord worked with his eyes narrowed, one sleeve pressed across his nose and mouth. Without ceremony, without even looking at her again, he grasped my elbow and pulled me towards the door with no more formality than if I were a horse. I did not object—I was glad to step into the light, though now I was being impelled away, I had to turn and look. I wish to the Lord who made me that I had not, for I saw that the Bible had slipped from her breast and was now lying half open upon the floor amidst a spill of salt, its pages crumpled, as if she herself had thrown it aside.

  I turned from the sight, already aware that—God forgive me—were a hundred Bibles thrown into the dust, they could not have tempted me to step for a second time into that terrible place.

  I leaned back against the wall of the wash house, trying not to think of the poor creature at my back, yet able to do nothing else. I felt the lowering sun on my face; I think I cried. After a time, the landlord assisted me inside the inn. His helper and her child were nowhere to be seen, and I did not recall when they took their leave of us. I found myself sitting at a table in the taproom, a glass of brandy and water at my elbow. He set meat before me, though I could not eat a morsel.

  I sat there whilst the windows darkened to indigo and then nothing but blackness. The settles around the walls of the room began to fill with labourers from the fields and I was soon surrounded by living chatter and gruff exclamations and laughter. Every so often, I looked up; was it my fancy that several eyes at once darted away from mine? I cared not.

  After a time, some wag started up a country tune. I could not see who began, as his rough voice was soon joined by others:

  As I walked out one sweet mornin’

  Across the fields so early

  O there I met with a bonny maid

  As bright as any fairy.

  “Where are you going, sweet maid?” said I

  As by the hand I caught her.

  “I’m going home, kind sir,” she said

  “I’m nowt but the weaver’s daughter.”

  I bestirred myself and saw through the throng my host, Widdop, at his customary place at the hatch, polishing a glass. He was accompanied now by a cherry-cheeked maid I assumed to be his daughter. The girl was about Linnet—Lizzie’s—age when we first met, and I found I could not look at her.

  In a moment, Widdop had set down his glass and was at my side. His expression was half of worry, half apology, as if he had been quite deliberate in the trouble he had caused; and it occurred to me that perhaps he had, that there might have been some mischief in it. After all, of warning of what I should find in their outhouse they had given me none.

  He spoke to me, his voice lowered so that it could not be heard by the boisterous crew. “Forgive t’ table,” he said. “We’d ’ave put you in t’ parlour, sir, only, well, this were nearer—”

  I waved his concern away; it was of no consequence. All I could see before me was that sad object, lying alone and cold in the wash house.

  “You’ll be wantin’ t’ keys, then, I suppose, sir?” he said. “To t’ cottage?”

  “Of course I shall not,” I replied at once. I hadn’t even thought of it. The question of the property, of what should happen to it or to whom it belonged, had never entered my mind—then it struck me, quite forcibly, that a great many things had not.

  He nodded as if it were what he had expected, his expression one of palpable relief. And yet he held in his hand a key. He held it out and I stared at it. After a moment, for want of any alternative, I took it.

  “I’m actin’ as agent for it, sir,” he said, “just at t’ minute. Rent’s paid up for a month in advance. ’E were doin’ all reet, were Jem Higgs. Harvest money, you see—lots of ’em buy new boots wi’ it.” He shook his head, as if he had realised something sad: “They’ll not see ’em now, I reckon.”

  I did not reply and after a little reflection he continued, “’E paid rent to t’ young squire, Edmund Calthorn, but after what ’appened—the old squire, ’e said it were best that key were kept near. Didn’t like t’ constable always callin’ for it. ’E isn’t in t’ best ’ealth, ’is wife’s taken up wi’ ’is care, an’ ’is son in’t up to much, if I may set it out plain, sir. So I said I’d take it forra bit.” He stared down at it now, much as I had a moment ago. “I don’t rightly know what to do wi’ it now, sir. No one’ll sort it, an’ it’s still full o’ their things, an’ no one knows if ’er ’usband—if ’e’s coming back again.”

  “I shall not require it, I am sure.”

  “A good thing, sir,” he said, stirring himself, although he did not take back the key. “It’s not a good ’ouse, or a lucky ’ouse, neither. Not even afore this. They say you can ’ear ’em up there on a night, dancin’, like, playin’ their unnatural music. That’s not a good thing to ’ear, sir. Not right it in’t, an’ that’s a fact.”

  I did not reply to this remarkable statement, but merely thanked him for his pains before making my retreat, hurrying up the narrow stair and along the corridor and thence gratefully into my room. I was glad to close the door behind me and to be alone once more, and was just drawing the curtains of my bed, ready to hide myself away inside them and think of nothing at all, when a breath of a sweet breeze caressed my cheek and I realised that the window was still open.


  I crossed to it, the steady creak of the floorboards mingling with the sounds of revelry penetrating the room from below, and I paused a moment, caught by the peace of the scene without. Everything was still; all was silent. The fields lay silvered under a sky brimming with stars. The sweetness of the air was indescribably lovely. I looked down and made out the dark hulk of the wash house, covering its awful secret—but this place was full of secrets, was it not? The thought of the man my cousin had married passed before me. I wondered what manner of creature he had been, and how he managed to conceal what he was—how had he persuaded her, an innocent, to join herself to him?

  I shook my head and, raising my eyes once more to the heavens, saw that a brilliant moon had risen. I bethought myself of the landlord’s warning and smiled for what felt like the first time in a long, dreary age. Whatever had happened here, Halfoak was beautiful—bright and beautiful, and the Lord God had, after all, made it all. I whispered the words of the hymn under my breath as I pulled the casement closed and turned from it, feeling a little clearer.

  I realised I was still holding the small silver key in my hand. I slipped it into my pocket, feeling for a moment the slightest touch of the pale hair I had placed there.

  He gave us eyes to see them

  And lips that we might tell . . .

  I could almost imagine a sweet voice joining my own, soaring effortlessly above it, as clear as mine was hoarse; as powerful as mine was whispered. The idea of it was a comfort. That was Lizzie; that had been my Linnet, alive and on the brink of her life, full of pureness and joy in having that life, and that thing—that thing I had seen in the outhouse, I suddenly knew, as surely as I knew the shape of my own hands, could not possibly ever have been my cousin.

  Chapter Five

  “She must be buried at once.” That was my first address to my host when I took a seat at breakfast upon the morrow. My appetite had returned, but I could not allow myself to think of freshly laid eggs before the matter was in some way settled. “What arrangements have been made for her?”

  His eyebrows performed their little dance. “Well, none yet, sir. I’d supposed t’ parish would ’ave ter bury ’er—”

  “The parish?” I interjected, “Nonsense. There must be someone she called her own who could take care of matters.”

  He frowned. “None, sir. ’Er mother’s gone, years back, and ’er father went afore ’er. She’d only got ’er ’usband, sir, an’ . . .”

  He had no need to finish his sentence.

  “She really had no one else?” I thought of my little Linnet with her dainty form and shy looks, cast alone into such a world, into such a fate. It was often said that city folk were all the poorer for not knowing their closest neighbour, whilst in the country everyone knew everybody, that they all helped one another. I shook my head. “None at all? Then I shall do it.” I had never before carried out such a task, but I knew my father could not be spared, even if he were willing to come to Halfoak. The idea was strange, taking such a thing upon my own shoulders, and my right hand strayed to the pocket wherein lay that lock of my poor cousin’s hair. “Yes, of course I shall. I must see about it at once.”

  Widdop nodded as if this was what he had hoped; I thought I detected relief in his features. No doubt he would be glad to have the use of his wash house once more. “Then you’ll be wantin’ t’ ca’penter, sir.”

  “The carpenter?”

  “For t’ coffin, an’ that.”

  “Ah. Of course.”

  “Now t’ crowner’s done wi’ ’er.”

  “The crown—The coroner. Yes.” Reality was crowding in once more. The idea of someone examining that blackened form, of placing it in a wooden box . . .

  I swallowed hard, no longer sure I felt hungry. “And, I suppose, I must see the undertaker.”

  “Undertaker’s t’ ca’penter, sir.”

  “I beg your pardon?”

  “Aye. Years now—says ’e does t’ box, mun as well do t’ rest of it an’ all.”

  “Ah—I see,” I said, though I didn’t, not really. I nodded my head in what I hoped was a knowing fashion.

  “Well, folk’ll be right glad on it, sir. An’ to think I thowt tha’d come from t’ papers—or from a waxwork or some such thing, come to take a likeness an’ make a show o’ what went on. I’m sorry for it.”

  I waved his words away. “Perhaps you could inform people in the village,” I said, “that the funeral will take place most urgently. There should be memorial cards, of course—though there can be no mask or photograph—and other such matters, all with due regard to degrees of kin, though I scarcely see how—”

  He shook his head, taking a moment to reply. “They’ll not fuss about none o’ that,” he said in a low voice, and he shifted his feet as though suddenly eager to be gone. He muttered something about bringing my breakfast.

  He returned in due course with a dish laden with eggs and bread and dripping and fried kidneys and I set to, famished once again, pausing only briefly to wonder why it was that he suddenly did not seem able to look me squarely in the eye.

  It was odd walking towards the sleeping church once more, thinking how soon it must be woken to ring the last knell for my poor cousin, and yet it was a relief to think of being rid of that black thing in the wash house. It was something I could barely connect with her at all; I longed for it to be gone, as the whole village must, so that I could think of her once again as rivalling the birds in their endless song of summer.

  My daze of yesterday had passed. I quickly settled matters with the carpenter, who promised to set about making arrangements to have the body measured before returning to his workshop to begin work forthwith. I had also sent a boy over to the next village with a telegram, informing my family that there were affairs to settle which might occupy me for several days yet. This was becoming a most perplexing situation, raising all manner of questions in my mind, but the most pressing thing was to give to my cousin the peace she deserved after all that she had suffered.

  The church door opened to my hand with a gentle creak. The wood had weathered to the utmost smoothness, and the smell of the interior of the church was all of comfort: dust and time and the pages of what must be the oldest book of all, along with the faintest hint of beeswax. All inside was quiet, save for an almost inaudible rustling that might have been the movement of mice. I passed through the porch, with its stone benches worn to a dip at their centre, and found the church quite empty. I cast my eyes over the double row of dark pews, imagining them darker still with the villagers all dressed in the colour of mourning, and realised there was someone here after all: a girl of fourteen or fifteen, her hair caught back under a cap, was on her hands and knees. A sudsy cloth in front of her revealed her purpose. She caught my eye and stood at once, dropping into an awkward curtsy, though she did not speak a word.

  I asked after the whereabouts of the parson, whereupon she gave an eager nod and led me back out of the church door, around to the side and through the graveyard with its greened and leaning stones. The peacefulness of it all was a salve to the heart. The idea of my cousin finding at last such a resting place comforted me—and then it served to remind me that we would also need the services of a gravedigger. Before I could start to fret over how long it should all take or speculate over whether that gentleman would also be the carpenter, the silent girl stopped in front of me and pointed towards a little wooden gate set into the farthest wall, from whence came the sound of somewhat forced whistling.

  I thanked her, approaching the gate and leaning over it prior to opening it only to find myself almost nose to nose with a white-haired fellow in spectacles, engaged in securing runner beans around a pole. He was in his shirt-sleeves and he blinked at me myopically, his lips still pursed, though now no sound emerged. I made my apologies, introduced myself and apprised him that I sought the parson, upon which his demeanour warmed.

  “Come in—do!” he said, hastening to open the gate, which he did with three sharp tug
s. I stepped from the graveyard directly into the garden, which I saw was half covered in some lush blossom foaming across the lawn; from the corner of my eye it appeared to be half in the thrall of winter, in spite of the heat of the day.

  He recovered his flat-topped felt hat from its place on the wall and mopped his forehead with a handkerchief as he led the way into the house, calling to the maid to bring us tea with bread and butter. This raised such a storm of a clatter I feared for his china, but, unconcerned, he led me into a small parlour with a view of a narrow lane bordered by a hedge liberally festooned with honeysuckle. He turned his back upon it and bade me to sit, before saying, “Forgive my appearance. It is an evil, you know, of such a small living.”

  I was uncertain what reply I should make, and so I merely nodded and had instead begun to tell him the purpose of my visit when he held up a hand to stem my words, nodding his head sagely, as if he knew everything already.

  “The day after tomorrow,” he pronounced.

  “Ah—sir, I had hoped that everything might be in readiness tomorrow,” I began. “The condition—the advanced state of—of decomposition, sir, is such—”

  “The day after tomorrow will be quite sufficient,” he intoned, “and will allow for all the necessary preparations.”

  I wondered whether the tone he used, which was somewhat grey and listless, was the same in which he would make his sermons. “The carpenter is already at work—”

  He nodded again as if he had heard it all once, twice, thrice before. “We must not progress with unseemly haste,” he said. “The young lady in question must have all due care paid her at this time.”

  “Of course she must—but she has lain there, in the wash house, for a week already. It’s—” It’s an abomination is what I wished to say, and yet I did not.

  There were more nods, as if he were in full agreement. “You will find Widdop, the landlord, most eager to assist in any way you require. The carpenter also. And Mary Gomersal, the widow of a local man, is quite able, in her small way; a little midwifery, as well as the laying out of the dead.”