As she turned her face toward me I gasped and felt my stomach drop like a stone.
It was Kristina, Hans’s former nurse.
‘Kristina,’ I said gently, trying not to frighten the woman who looked like she might have lost her wits, ‘it’s me, Veronica.’
She smelled of blood and salty sweat. I could see the glint of recognition as she opened her one good eye and tears streamed from it as she began shaking and sobbing.
‘Veronica,’ she mumbled and tried to get up on one elbow but failed.
I reached out for her and pulled her gently into my lap. She lay there as I stroked her charred hair that smelled strongly of sulphur.
‘It’s all right now, Kristina,’ I whispered and rocked her as I might a baby.
My tears fell down and joined hers, a symbol of our shared anguish.
‘Hans?’ she croaked, turning her face up to me in a panic.
‘He is safe,’ I told her. I hoped in my heart it was true.
KATHERINE
RENFREWSHIRE, SCOTLAND, 1697
On the 18 February in the year 1697 of our Lord, two little boys killed me. I did not know immediately but Reverend James Brisbane was not long with the news. I looked at my hands, blood still pulsing beneath the dirty parchment of skin. My little hands were so dried out and thin they were like a sparrow’s wings without the feathers, so scrawny I could see the blood. The crackled, painful breath still puffed in and out from my chest like bellows filled with sawdust. I was physically alive on the earth but I could feel the garrotting rope being tightened around my neck by the clergyman’s words.
‘Those boys have murdered me,’ I whispered hoarsely. ‘One with an eye that looks everywhere and nowhere at the same time and the other whose mother must have crossed paths with a hare during the belly-swelling time because he has teeth so prominent. Beggars, both of them, but with the power to take my life. Who would have thought?’
And with nothing more to say on the matter of the testimony of Thomas and James Lindsay, I began to laugh. It sounded like a child’s laugh, raw and naive.
The boys were the young cousins of Elizabeth Anderson, who had now been moved or released or burned, I knew not which. One morning they had just come and taken her away so that only the midwife, Margaret Lang, and I remained in that dank Tollbooth cell in the town of Paisley.
I wondered if my mind wasn’t beginning to become drunk with fear, inebriated with terror so that it began shuffling my thoughts in the wrong order and without the attendant feelings that should be attached to them.
I listened, half floating, half swimming in a dream, as Reverend Brisbane told me that the Lindsay boys, questioned separately from one another, had collaborated the facts, which was evidence of the undeniable truth of their accounts. Along with Elizabeth Anderson, the three admitted that their mutual grandmother, Jean Fulton, recently deceased, had introduced the children to a grim man with black clothes, a black hat and blue band. I thought back to my beloved John’s black beret and waistcoat. In secret he would wear the white Jacobite cockade but in public it was often a blue band he wore. James had told the commission that the man’s hand was cold to the touch and I smiled, remembering how my love was averse to the wearing of gloves and how he often remarked that his hands were always too busy to be buried in gloves.
It seemed not all that long ago that the girl, Elizabeth, had brought her cousins along to a crew meeting. The boys had sat and eaten apples in the grove paying little heed to the political intrigue that was discussed, the plans and plotting. The older boy, fourteen, made mention of a moor in the Kilmacolm Parish, Brisbane’s own territory, and swore on the Bible that present were Agnes Naismith, the old crone, Farmer Lindsay, and Margaret Lang, the midwife.
When Margaret heard this she began to wail and cry out, standing and pulling at her chains, her hair about her face, her eyes wild and her teeth gnashing. ‘It is not so,’ she growled, beast-like. ‘I am a woman of God more like a nun than most in a nunnery and I will not hear this blasphemy!’
I sat, my knees to my chest, and rocked, letting the man’s words wash over me like smoke. I heard that the boy spoke of the sinking of the Erskine ferry, which had occurred before I had joined the team. And then there was the inconceivable confession that these same folk had strangled the Park baby. In this part of the confession Reverend Brisbane leaned forward, his face churning with disgust at the smell of his prisoner, and he smiled like a weasel.
‘Here the boy told us of another meeting, where you attended with the man they called your beau, a John Stuart,’ he hissed. ‘Might our Katherine be wedded or bedded by a Stuart supporter? Is this what the stupid clod of a boy determined?’
I felt ill but my belly was so empty it simply groaned beneath my ribs. The clergyman was so close to it all but I kept telling myself that nothing would spill from my lips. I would not betray a one of them, not a one.
‘Again we have the boy, with his story strengthened by his smaller brother and older cousin, Elizabeth. The boy says he was flown through the sky like a bird to a meet in the Bargarran orchard with Agnes Naismith, John and James Lindsay, the Farmer Lindsay – no relation, Margaret Lang, and you, lassie, along with this mysterious beau of yours. Apparently there was dancing and singing and discussion of the possession of Christian Shaw.’
‘Why would the foolish children make up such lies?’ I said slowly. ‘It will only mean their own sorry deaths beside ours.’
‘Oh, you see,’ he smiled his cunning and lurid smile, ‘when your master, the devil, that cold grim man in black, offered you all a piece of unchristened bairn’s liver, all but the three children partook of it and they refused to eat it and become one of the devil’s followers.’
‘A bairn’s liver?’ shrieked Margaret Lang. ‘You disgust me. That is a vile accusation and you should hang, draw and quarter those sprites for making up such evil. I have never been to any midnight meeting.’
I shut my eyes as I recalled the Holy Communion wafers from the old faith that had been passed around at the last meeting, a gift from a priest of the true faith and quite possibly the kindly one who had secretly married John and I in the tiny chapel. Margaret Lang told the truth. She had never been to any of the meetings that I had attended.
‘It goes on and on in some detail,’ Brisbane told us. ‘All neatly fitting with the other testimonies. Elizabeth will be our star witness at the trial.’
I felt the darkness fully descend then. All my aches and pains rushed within at once. A trial with such maleficent testimony was going to be a book with a clear ending. Brisbane wanted his burnings, and he was going to get them with the forged, twisted confessions of a bunch of simpleton children with not a stick of learning between them. How tales could twist with a little encouragement and guidance from a skilled and subjective interrogator.
I was as good as dead and burned to ash. My shoulders slumped and I took a breath up over my chin and scratched at the irons on my hands. For a moment I felt lightened by something and wondered if it wasn’t a shimmer of relief that it would all soon be over.
Brisbane’s face loomed in front of mine, skin glimmering a pale sheen of green in the bad light. He looked reptilian and I wondered if he wasn’t a demon inhabiting a man’s body.
Margaret Lang lay in her own puddle of tears, tearing at her hair, wailing for her daughter, Martha.
A strange sense of melancholic calm rested on me and I began to sing. It was one of the Jacobite songs that John had taught me.
Shall ancient freedom be forgot
And the auld Stuart line?
Shall ancient freedom be forgot
And all for auld lang syne?
I sang the words so softly they could not be made out.
‘How does that go, Kat? I can’t hear what you are singing? A dirge, perhaps?’ Brisbane leaned in ever closer.
I looked directly into his f
ace and spat, my spittle most foul.
He stepped back as if stung and wiped his face before pressing his fingers into his eye sockets as if trying to pull out a headache.
My nostrils flared and my cracked lips smarted.
‘What’s that I smell?’ Reverend Brisbane asked. ‘Ah, it’s the hot smell of your flesh turning to pork crackling.’
And with that he left me to ponder my impending doom.
PAISLEY
BUNDANOON, AUSTRALIA, PRESENT DAY
The town meeting started at 7 p.m. in the hall, a wide space with long polished floorboards and a raised stage at the front beneath a faded, dated print of the Queen looking bored.
It is quite a turn out and I look around nervously seeing all the familiar Bundy faces: the baker, the doctor and the local flower-farm folk. Mrs Hooper, front row, back rigid, staring straight ahead. Her husband is beside her with the terrible comb-over, which fools no one. May Huon is on the stage talking to the council people who have come down from Moss Vale. Mrs Digby is here, glaring across at me like I’m a harpy who wants to steal her son. I’m pleased to see that Ben is not sitting with her. He is with his friends standing against the outer wall, near the open double-doors, all perched for an easy getaway or hugging the brick wall as if in a police line-up. Emily is with me and there are a few people who are notably absent – Isaiah Hooper and my mother. Also, Pete from the cafe and the publican who never shuts up shop for dull town meets – they remain on duty at their respective posts.
May, who sits on the local council, calls the chattering room to attention. Plastic chairs scrape and all eyes turn toward the stage where the happy, busy woman is adjusting a squealing microphone on a vertical stand.
‘We are here to discuss the committee for the proposed Winter Solstice Festival scheduled for Bundanoon in June and some other matters.’
A collective ripple runs through the assembled audience like a Mexican wave at a soccer match. Overhead the fluorescent lights pump out way too much light and pick up every spot and freckle on my skin. It’s so bright in the hall that it feels like a giant operating theatre.
Emily is still by my side as we make our way down the centre aisle looking for a couple of spare chairs and I am grateful for her company. Constable Amy comes up to me, out of uniform, and gives me a nod.
‘How are you going, Paise?’ she asks and clears her throat.
I give an awkward smile and a little shrug. She still hasn’t charged my mother with an actual crime. Investigations are continuing. The other accusations have fallen away, dismissed as hysteria. Really, at this stage, as Dad keeps saying, the whole thing is a stupid witch-hunt that doesn’t make a lot of sense.
Constable Amy, Emily and I squeeze into a row with vacant seats, over by the bathrooms, and I am pleased that the constable is sitting beside me. It feels like a vote of confidence for Mum although it might mean nothing at all other than it was the only vacant seat available. We give our attention to May.
‘So yes, people. We need a committee of four to keep this thing afloat,’ she says. ‘Let’s quickly get this order of business sorted because we have already invested a good deal of money into it and now three of the committee members have resigned, leaving only Kirsten McLeod on the board. We need three more volunteers and it’s a big job, but looking at the similar festival in the Blue Mountains that’s been running for decades, we are confident that it will bring a lot of tourist dollars to our little town. So, nominations? For the Winter Solstice Festival committee?’
I put my hand up and kind of half stand up, half hunch over. May nods at me.
‘I’d just like to say that I am here as a representative, um, sort of, for my mum and that because of … well … everything, I will be taking her place on the committee.’
Mum didn’t force this upon me. I offered. I know how important this inaugural festival is for her; she’s been trying to get it off the ground since we moved here. She is so close but the three others on the team dropped out when the accusations came out. Both of us thought if it was me at the helm the others might come back.
‘Excellent, Paisley.’ May smiles and gives a little clap.
I slink back into my chair with embarrassment and feel the burn of eyes against my skin.
‘Can we get three more volunteers? Anyone? Anyone?’ May casts it out to the crowd, turning her gaze to each and every one of them. ‘I’d do it but I’m far too busy. Come on, folks. It would be a shame to have to cancel it.’
More silence and uncomfortable shifting in chairs. I see Mrs Hooper turn her exorcist head around and smirk at me with her feline smile like someone has just given her a saucer of cream.
Emily puts up her hand and calls out. ‘I’ll be on the committee.’
I grip her elbow and squeeze. ‘Are you sure?’
‘I want to do it.’ She smiles and sits back down. ‘It’ll be fun. We’ll rock this thing. I don’t really know what it is, exactly, but we’ll rock it.’
‘Two more,’ May goes on like she’s running an auction. ‘Two more committee members.’
‘I’m in,’ comes a familiar voice.
I bob up looking across the sea of heads to see Ben Digby raise his hand, grinning at me, and my heart does a backflip.
‘Me too!’ yells Brent beside him.
Emily and I laugh into our hands. This is working out much better than I had anticipated. May nods, clearly pleased.
‘Alrighty then. New committee convened. I will meet with you wonderful young people after our meeting and we’ll sort things out.’
The next order of business she moves to is the disappearance of Isaiah Hooper. It has been four days since he vanished without a trace and every day that passes makes the whole town feel more nervous and less positive about a good outcome.
Mrs Hooper takes the small wooden stairs at the side of the stage and steps up to the microphone as May steps back to let her speak.
‘Someone out there must know something,’ she begins. ‘Please. My Isaiah has never just up and disappeared like this before. It is completely out of character. I know he doesn’t socialise with a lot of you … you … young people but if any of you know anything I want you to come forward. Of course we all know why he’s been so upset lately and I see that the person responsible for that has not had the stomach to front up to this meeting tonight and frankly that’s probably just as well because—’
‘No need to be the judge and jury, Annabel.’ Constable Amy stands up beside me with a squeal of her chair. ‘Don’t jeopardise the investigation. Just keep things neutral.’
Mrs Hooper glares at the off-duty policewoman and inhales, holds it, and then releases as if she has just dragged on an invisible cigarette.
‘But I think it’s in the community’s interest that I let them know that Kirsten McLeod has definitely hexed my son with her demonic magic. He goes missing now? Just like that? Poof. How awfully convenient for her.’
‘Annabel! Please stop!’ Constable Amy demands more forcefully.
‘Mark my words,’ Mrs Hooper continues, her tight, squat little body noticeably shaking with rage, her eyes fit to pop. ‘This magic festival will bring nothing but more sin and evil to this town. She, that woman, would see us all turned into Satan worshippers, wearing pentacles and fornicating in fields …’
May reaches across and takes the microphone from the stand and all but pushes the woman aside.
‘Thank you, Annabel, and I would like to tell you that the entire community of Bundanoon is praying for the safe return of your son.’
‘Except the devil-worshippers,’ Mrs Hooper mutters as she pads back to her seat, handbag forever cemented to her bent forearm.
Constable Amy gets up and gives a rundown of the emergency services response to the disappearance.
‘We’ve had police divers sweeping dams and creeks. We’ve done a ground search in a
radius of ten kilometres already and the local national parks have been visited as well as known danger zones investigated.’
She is talking but not being specific about the bottom of the cliff faces beneath the lookouts.
‘We hope that Isaiah is simply camping out somewhere or staying with persons unknown, to gather his thoughts. Any information at all would be of great help. Any one of you who has spoken to Isaiah in the last month or two, please come and see me for a chat.’
After the meeting draws to a close, May talks to Ben, Brent, Emily and me and outlines our new responsibilities.
‘Your mother has done most of the groundwork,’ May nods at me. ‘So I’m sure she’ll be able to guide you. But this envelope has most of the details and what is required is spelled out. We need sponsors and advertising and you’ll have to get together a minimum of thirty interesting stalls and a parade. It’s quite a big job. And all in less than two months. But I have faith in you four.’
We leave May and walk outside into the cool night.
‘They went to talk to the Hoopers today,’ Brent tells us. ‘After school. We saw them. A forensics van, and they were there with little suitcases and stuff. Full on.’
‘Where would a kid like Isaiah go to hide?’ I ask. ‘If he just wanted space or even to run away? If he had money he might have caught a train to Sydney and be homeless down there.’
‘Surely the cops would have checked CCTV cameras on the platform and on the trains,’ Ben says thoughtfully.
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