The Serial Garden: The Complete Armitage Family Stories

by Joan Aiken

  "If I were you,” said Mrs. Holdernesse, “I'd put the mask into this bag and forget about it."

  From a cupboard she took a hand-woven bag, fastened at the mouth by drawstrings. She passed it to Harriet. Very reluctantly Harriet slid the mask into the bag and pulled the cords to gather the neck together. Then she thought about the mask in the bag, cut off from daylight, as it had been for so long in that sodden lump of greasy sheeps’ wool.

  It was a sad, suffocating, creepy feeling. The mask wanted, badly, to be back in daylight. She knew it did.

  "I think it is time you went home, Harriet,” said Mrs. Holdernesse, looking at Harriet very straightly. “And I think it would be a good thing if you left the mask in this house."

  "Oh, no. I want to show it to Mark."

  Harriet picked up the bag with the mask in it.

  "It would be much better if you left it here,” said Mrs. Holdernesse.

  For a mad moment Harriet wondered if Mrs. Holdernesse wanted to wear the mask herself. But no, that was impossible. She had said so. What did she want to do with it? Bury it in her garden? Or would she carry it up to the top of Coldharbour Mount and drop it in the dew pond?

  "Harriet,” said Mrs. Holdernesse, “whatever you do, don't put on that mask!"

  "Thank you for the lovely spinning lesson, Mrs. Holdernesse,” Harriet said politely. “And I'll see you on Wednesday week."

  She walked out of Mrs. Holdernesse's house, carrying the woven bag.

  An early, foggy dusk had fallen. There was going to be a sharp frost. Harriet thought about the highway robber, Kitty Sickle-claws, wearing a black cloak, riding a black horse, going softly up the deep chalk lane that led through woods up to the top of Coldharbour Mount. Her silver mask, under the black hood of her cloak, would gleam faintly in the misty light. Did she ever take the mask off? Or was little Jemmy accustomed to a silver, cat-faced mother?

  Mark was at home, in the work-room he shared with Harriet, solving something on his computer.

  "Look what I found,” said Harriet. She undid the strings of the bag and pulled out the mask, which she laid on Mark's work table.

  Two things happened. Mark's computer went wild, throwing jags and flashes all over the screen. And Walrus, the elderly cat, who was sitting by the fire, let out a frightful hiss and catapulted out of the window, which, luckily, was open.

  "Blimey!” said Mark. “What a nasty thing! Wherever did you get it?"

  Harriet told him its story. Mark said,

  "Mrs. Holdernesse is a sensible old bird. If I were you, I'd take her advice. Look at how poor old Walrus acted."

  "Well—I'll see how I feel about it tomorrow."

  "I am sure Dad would say get rid of it."

  The Armitage parents were spending the evening at a London theatre.

  Harriet said, “I would so like to put it on. Just for a moment, to see how it feels."

  "You'd be crazy."

  "I suppose so,” said Harriet halfheartedly.

  They had supper while the mask watched them from the kitchen dresser. Harriet had leaned it against a bowl of tomatoes. Its eyes were red.

  Mark tried to persuade Walrus to come into the house, but he wouldn't be persuaded, despite the fact that it was growing colder and colder.

  "Tell you what,” said Mark. “How about putting the mask into Father's safe for the night. It's obviously very valuable. And just in case you had a sudden mad impulse to put it on—you know you never can remember the combination number. And there's nothing in the safe that can come to harm—only Ma's diamond earrings."

  "She probably wore them to London."

  Harriet was not overenthusiastic about Mark's plan, but she finally allowed him to put the mask back in its bag, and the bag in the safe, which was in Mr. Armitage's study. Then Mark and Harriet locked up the house and went to bed.

  Harriet had great trouble getting to sleep. She lay thrashing about her bed, longing for the mask. Her head, and particularly her face, felt hot as fire. She imagined how cool the silver shell would feel against her blazing cheeks.

  At last she fell into a heavy, feverish slumber. And she began to dream. She dreamed that they were all waiting for her. Who? They were lined up on both sides of the temple—rows and rows of them, all in white, with pleated head-dresses. They were holding torches that poured smoke and flame and gave off a hot, resinous smell.

  "I shall be late!” Harriet said. “I shall be late!"

  She hurried out of bed, threw on clothes, pattered downstairs...

  She went into Mr. Armitage's study, easily dialed the correct combination, opened the safe, took out the hand-woven bag. Then she slipped the mask from the bag and put it on, tying the two strands of wool in a knot behind her head. Without pausing for a moment she unlocked the front door, went out, crossed the garden, and took the lane that led up to Coldharbour Mount.

  The night was thick, icy-cold, and starless. Frost scrunched under her feet. Owls flew silently overhead, then let out harsh wailing cries. Foxes yapped in the woods beside the track.

  It was a forty-minute run up to the great oak. Harriet never slowed down.

  "I'll be late, they are waiting, I'll be late,” she kept muttering.

  When she came to the big oak tree she hesitated for the first time, and it was there that Mark, panting, caught up with her. He grabbed her arm.

  "Harriet! Harriet! What on earth do you think you're doing?"

  Then he saw that she was fast asleep. Her eyes were open but unfocused. Ignoring him, she started trying to climb the oak tree.

  "Harriet! Wake up! WAKE UP!"

  He gripped her wrist and shouted in her ear.

  Silently, she wrestled with him.

  "Oh, please wake up, Harriet!"

  Mrs. Holdernesse came hurrying forward from behind the oak tree.

  "Ah, Mark! I was afraid that something like this might happen. Could you, very kindly, fetch my spinning wheel and stool out of my car. While you do that, I will hold Harriet."

  "Shall you be able to?” he said doubtfully. “She's very strong. Extra strong!"

  "I will hold her like this."

  Mrs. Holdernesse grabbed a bunch of Harriet's hair, which was loose, as she had left it when she went to bed. A bunch of hair came out, which Mrs. Holdernesse carefully laid at the foot of the oak tree—but she kept a firm hold on the rest.

  Harriet was obliged to stand still, with tears streaming out from under the silver mask.

  "Poor girl,” said Mrs. Holdernesse. Her tone was full of sympathy. “Finding that mask was a shocking piece of bad luck. But we are trying to help you. Like this!” She took a little pointed quill from a pouch at her belt and suddenly and sharply jabbed it into Harriet's wrist. Harriet let out a cry of indignation, and her eyes flew open.

  Mark had come back with the spinning wheel and stool.

  "Mark, can you take the mask off your sister's face?"

  "It won't come,” said Mark, panting, after a few minutes’ struggle. “Feels as if it was glued on."

  Mrs. Holdernesse had settled on her stool and started the spinning wheel on its swift circuit. She said,

  "Look at the wheel, Harriet, watch the wheel. Keep watching. See how it goes round and round—like the world, like the sun, in a circle. Think of circles.” She sang, suddenly, in a thin, clear voice, “Cross Patch, Draw the latch, sit by the fire and spin—spin—spin—spin—spin my lady's wolsey, weave my lady's web—"

  The wheel spun and spun. Harriet's eyes, fixed on it, flickered and flickered. Suddenly, with a long, heart-rending sigh, she lifted up her hand and removed the mask from her face. It came away without the least difficulty.

  "Take it, Mark,” ordered Mrs. Holdernesse, “and drop it in the dew pond."

  Mark did so. The mask felt hot, like a plate that has been in the oven. Without it, Harriet looked lost, bewildered.

  "Good,” said Mrs. Holdernesse. “Now you go and sit in the car while Mark and I pack the stool and wheel into the boot."

>   As they did so, Mrs. Holdernesse muttered to Mark, “I shouldn't talk about this to Harriet at all. Just let her go back to bed. Don't mention it tomorrow. It has been like an infection that she caught."

  "Okay,” said Mark.

  "You're a good boy...."

  Mrs. Holdernesse drove them rather slowly down the bumpy chalk track and left them at their door. Mark wondered how long she had been up there on Coldharbour Mount waiting for Harriet to arrive.

  At the front door they found the cat Walrus, impatient to be let into the house. As soon as Harriet was in bed he jumped up beside her and spread his large black shape across three-quarters of the bed-space.

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  Goblin Music

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  * * * *

  The Armitage family had been to Cornwall for a week at the end of April. They did this every year, for April 30 was old Miss Thunderhurst's birthday. Miss Thunderhurst lived next door to the Armitages and the celebrations of her birthday grew louder and wilder every year. This year was her hundredth birthday and, as Mr. Armitage said, staying at home through the festivities was not to be thought of. So the Armitages went off to their usual rented seaside cottage in the little port of Gwendreavy where, if you wanted to buy a loaf of bread, you had to row across the estuary to South-the-Water on the other side. There was a wonderful secondhand bookshop in South-the-Water; when they were sent across for the bread, Mark and Harriet put in a lot of time browsing there and came back with battered copies of treasures such as What Katie Knew, The Herr of Poynton, Eric or Little Women, More About Rebecca of Manderley Farm, and Simple Peter Rabbit. The family took their cat, Walrus, along with them on these holidays, and he had a fine time catching fish.

  So it was decidedly puzzling, when the family returned home after a five-hour drive, arriving in the middle of the night, to find a line of muddy cat footprints on the white paint of the front door, leading straight upwards, from the doorstep to the lintel.

  "Cats don't walk up vertical walls,” said Mr. Armitage indignantly, rummaging for the front door key.

  "Here it is,” said his wife, getting it out of her handbag. And she added, “I have seen Walrus bounce upwards off a wall when the jump to the top was a bit more than he reckoned he could manage."

  "Granted, but not walk up the whole wall."

  Walrus was sniffing suspiciously at the lowest of the footprints, and he let out a loud and disapproving noise between a hiss and a growl.

  "Let's go in,” said Mrs. Armitage hastily in case Walrus's challenge received an answer. “They are only kitten prints. And I'm dying for a cup of tea and bed."

  "I'm surprised to see that marquee still there,” grumbled her husband, carrying bags into the house.

  Since Miss Thunderhurst's party had been planned for an extra big one this year, she had rented a marquee for the occasion, and got permission to put it in Farmer Beezeley's field across the road. The car's headlights had caught the great gray-white canvas shape as the Armitages turned into their own driveway.

  "So we still have all that nuisance ahead, poles clanking and trucks blocking the road while they take it down,” growled Mr. Armitage, as ruffled as Walrus.

  "Oh, I expect they do that tomorrow while we're still getting unpacked,” said his wife. “Here's your tea, dear. I'm going up."

  But when Mrs. Armitage was halfway up the stairs, the most amazing noise started up outside the house. It seemed to be piano music played by giants. It was a fugue—the same tune played again and again, overlapping like tiles on a roof, in different keys, some high, some low.

  "It's rather terrific,” said Mark, impressed in spite of himself.

  "Terrific? It's the most ear-splitting racket I ever heard! At three minutes to one a.m.? Are they out of their flagrant minds? I'm going across to give them what-for!"

  "Oh, Gilbert! Do you think that's neighbourly? We don't want to be on bad terms with Miss Thunderhurst."

  "How long does she expect her birthday to last? It's the fourth of May, dammit."

  Mr. Armitage strode out of the front door, down the steps, across the road, and Mark followed him, curious to see what instruments produced that astonishing sound.

  The door-flaps of the marquee were folded back. A dim glow inside was just enough to show that the big tent was completely packed with people—far more, surely, than even Miss Thunderhurst would have invited to her birthday celebrations—and Miss Thunderhurst knew every soul in the village.

  "Where is Miss Thunderhurst? I want to speak to her,” Mr. Armitage said to a shortish, stoutish person who met him in the entrance.

  "Miss Thunderhurst has long since departed to her own place of residence."

  "Oh, indeed!—well, who's in charge here? You are making a devilish rumpus and it has to stop. At once!"

  "Oh, no, sir. That is not quite possible."

  "Not possible? I should just about think it is possible! You are making an ear-splitting row. It has to stop. At once!"

  "No, sir. To make music is our right."

  "Right? Who the deuce do you think you are?"

  "We are the Niffel people. Our own place of residence—Niffelheim-under-Lyme—has been rendered unfit for occupation. They set light to an opencast coal mine on top of our cave habitation, and the roof collapsed. Luckily there was no loss of life, but many were injured. Much damage. So we appealed to the County Council and they have found us this dwelling for the time. We are sadly cramped but it must serve until we find a more suitable home."

  "Oh! I see! Very well. If the council settled you here, that's different.—I suppose you don't know how long you'll be here? ... But you must, immediately, stop making that atrocious row. People need to sleep."

  "No, sir. To make the music is our right. Is our need."

  "Not at this time of night, dammit!"

  "Sir, we are nocturnal people. Earthfolk. Gloam-goblins. Our work is done at night time. By day we sleep. Dark is our day. Day is our dark. Music is our stay."

  "Who is in charge here? Who is your president—or whatever you have? Your head person?"

  "I am the Spokesman. My name is Albrick,” the small man said with dignity. “Our First Lady—our Sovereign—is the Lady Holdargh."

  "Well, let me speak to her."

  "She is not here at this time. She travels. She seeks a place for us."

  "Oh. Well—won't you, in the meantime, please stop making this hideous din!"

  "No, sir. That we cannot do. It is our must.” And as Mr. Armitage looked at him in incredulous outrage, he repeated with dignity, “It is our must."

  "Come on, Dad.” Mark plucked his father's arm. “We can't make a fuss if they are here by permission of the Council. I'll lend you a pair of earplugs."

  Very unwillingly and reluctantly Mr. Armitage allowed himself to be led back across the road to his own house. There he was supplied with earplugs by Mark (who used them when practising with his Group) and a sleeping-pill by his wife.

  Harriet, during this interval, had opened a tin of sardines for Walrus, who was upset and nervous at the traces of an intruder around his home. Mark and his father came back just as she was about to go out in search of them. Mr. Armitage stomped off gloomily upstairs, muttering, “Niffel people indeed!"

  "What's going on?” Harriet asked Mark. “Couldn't Dad get them to stop?"

  "No, he couldn't. They aren't Miss Thunderhurst's guests at all. They are goblins—displaced goblins."

  "Goblins? I've never met a goblin. Who displaced them?"

  "A burning coal mine. Coal is burned underground these days to make gas. The goblins were obliged to shift. They didn't seem unfriendly. Their spokesman was quite reasonable. They are nocturnal. They work at night. And they need music to work."

  "I wonder what sort of work they do? Could you see? Were they doing it?"

  "No, I couldn't see. There were a whole lot of them in the tent—several hundred at least. All crammed together in a very dim light."

  "Well
!” said Harriet. “Fancy having a group of hardworking goblins across the road. I can't wait to see what they make. I'll go across after breakfast."

  "They'll all be asleep,” her brother pointed out.

  "Bother! So they will. But I suppose they start to get active after sunset, about half past seven. I'll go and call on them then. Now I'm off to bed. Come on, Walrus."

  But Walrus was going out, to watch for goblin cats, and, if necessary, beat them up.

  The full moon had just worked its way round the corner of the house, and was blazing in at Harriet's bedroom window, throwing a great square of white light across her bedroom wall.—Harriet had once sat in a train opposite two women who were evidently sisters in some religious order. They wore black habits and white wimples. They were laughing a great deal and talking to each other nonstop in some foreign language that was full of s's and k's. Harriet could not at all understand what they were saying, but she somehow took a great liking to them and, when she got home, drew a picture of them from memory and hung it up on her bedroom wall. Two or three months later she noticed an interesting phenomenon: when the moon shone on her picture, she could see the two women's hands move about and sometimes catch a little of what they were saying. Now, too, she could partly understand the language, but one of the two women, the spectacled one, had a bad stammer, and Harriet only caught a word here and a word there.

  "Refugees—immigrants—l-l-look after them somehow—p-p-poor d-d-dears—"

  Tonight the moonlight was fully on the picture, and the two women were deeply engrossed in what they were saying.

  "Hardworking—industrious—deserving."

  "No place for them here—"

  "Only l-l-lead to t-t-trouble—"

  Harriet went and stood in front of the picture. “Excuse me—” she began politely. Then she realised that she was blocking off the moonlight from the picture and the ladies stopped talking and moving their hands.

  "I'm so sorry, I didn't mean to interrupt,” said Harriet, and stepped to one side. But now a cloud had drifted across the moon and the ladies remained silent. Harriet waited for ten minutes, but by the time the cloud had floated away, the moon had moved also, and no longer shone in at the window.