by K. M. Grant
Garth wrenched the lead-rope from his father and threw it at the dealer. ‘Take it back. There’s been a mistake. We don’t want it.’
The dealer did not catch the rope. Instead he jangled the bag triumphantly. ‘Well, sonny, me neither!’ He chuckled loudly and walked briskly off.
Surprised to find itself free, the colt walked swiftly after the man, and Charles had to run to catch it. There was a small tussle before it agreed to come back through the Hartslove gate, only to shy sharply first at Gryffed, who followed every move his master made, and then at the ‘for sale’ sign.
Despite Garth, and despite the animal being nothing like its advertisement – it was even the wrong colour, chestnut instead of bay – Charles’s eyes were sparkling again. If drink was Charles’s prop, racehorses were his drug, every fix bursting with promise. ‘This is The One, Garth,’ he burst out, holding tight to the rein. He really believed it. It was winter now, but as he smelled the sweet smell of the colt’s sweat and felt the strength of its will against his own, he could already see the Derby course bathed in early-summer sunshine and a jockey wearing the red de Granville silks punching the air in victory. His heart glowed.
Garth could not contain himself. He swore and swore again. He swore until he could think of no more swear words. ‘How many The Ones have there been already, Pa? Ten? Twenty? And how many have done anything for us except eat up money? You’re a . . . you’re a . . .’ He had used up all his bad words so he kicked the gate until it threatened to collapse completely.
His father paid no attention. He was too busy running his hands up and down the horse’s front legs and over its withers. ‘See here, Garth, he’s not much to look at but he’s by Rataplan out of Hybla and his half-sister won the Oaks in ’54. He’s got the makings of a star.’
‘He’s a horse – a hopeless, bloody great rubbish horse!’
Charles stood back. He was smiling, and that was when Garth finally exploded, attacking his father with fists and boots and roaring as loudly as the bear whose head and pelt lay outside their father’s room must have roared on the day it earned its title ‘The Cannibal’. Gryffed’s hackles rose. Had Charles given the word, he would have gone for Garth’s throat. No word came so he stayed sitting, though he shook and his upper lip curled above his teeth.
‘How dare you!’ howled Garth. ‘You’re the reason we’re having to leave here. You’re the reason the girls’ll have to go and live with Aunt Barbara. You’re the reason I’ll have to go into the army because where else is there for me? You’re the reason for the end of Hartslove. It’ll be as if our family never existed.’ He was furious to discover that he was crying. ‘Why don’t you just DIE?’
The horse, terrified, reared. Garth did not care, he pummelled and clobbered until, in final desperation, he blasted, ‘I suppose it was because she saw this coming that Ma went away.’
The words hit Charles far harder than any bang in the gut. He sagged, suddenly an old man. It was hard for Garth to keep pummelling after that and, despite himself, his punches died away, leaving him breathing in short, steamy puffs. Charles stood quietly for several minutes. Garth’s heart jerked. He felt quite empty. ‘Pa,’ he said. ‘Pa.’ He no longer wanted to punch. Instead he wanted, quite desperately, to turn the clock back, not just half an hour, but back to the days when his father had never sagged and he and Garth had wrestled in fun. How reassuringly solid Charles had felt then, for all his spiky frame, and how Garth had loved him. He had loved his mother too, but even when physically there, she had never actually seemed very present. ‘It’s like being hugged by a cobweb,’ Lily had once said, and the name had stuck. Indeed, after their mother had gone, the de Granville children wondered guiltily whether she had heard them calling her ‘the Cobweb’ and taken that as her cue to sweep herself away.
Garth swallowed. ‘Pa,’ he said again.
Charles swallowed too. ‘Garth.’
Neither seemed to know what to say next and the colt was restive. Eventually, with an apologetic murmur and a self-deprecatory shrug, Charles began to urge the creature up the stable drive. There was crunching on the gravel. Skelton was striding down. Charles greeted him and within moments was reciting the horse’s breeding. He already seemed to have forgotten about Garth.
The ‘for sale’ sign flapped and the boy’s temper surged again. How dare his father? How DARE he? Doubling over, he found a pebble. Taking careful aim, he threw it at the horse’s rump with all the force his anger could muster. It hit true. The horse grunted and spun round, whisking the rope through Charles’s hand. It galloped straight back down the drive, with only Garth between itself and the road.
Garth knew exactly what he was going to do. He was going to step smartly aside and let the animal gallop through the gate, right back to Liverpool and into the sea if it damned well wanted. What did it matter? Four hundred guineas were already lost. He forced himself to watch with steely unconcern as the reins swung between the colt’s front legs. ‘Trip over. Slip on the ice. Break a leg,’ he muttered, blocking his ears against his father’s shouted alarm and stepping out of the horse’s way as it swished past. ‘That’s right. Get lost.’
But at the gate, the animal hesitated. Which way to go? Two long chestnut ears flipped in different directions. Two smoky nostrils flared. A tremor shuddered down its back legs and Garth could see where the pebble had made a small cut in its ungainly hindquarters. It turned, and two large, childishly expectant eyes peeped through a straggly forelock. The ears reversed their flip, then reversed again. Before it could make up its mind as to its next move, Charles ran past and it was recaptured. ‘Thank God!’ Charles said, unable to disguise the reproach in his voice.
‘Too scared to catch him yourself, Master Garth?’ Skelton, following close behind, knew just how to rile. It was something he practised with pleasure. Garth growled, glared, then fled up the castle drive, over the drawbridge lying aross the old moat, under the archway, across the courtyard and through the antique doorway into the Hartslove hall, where he stopped in front of a boy as furious as himself. ‘I hate everyone! I hate everything!’ he cried, though he got no answer, the Furious Boy being one of many pale life-sized statues brought to Hartslove by a previous de Granville from a Grand Tour of Europe. Garth turned right and ran into the dining room. A trestle from the servants’ hall had taken the place of the original dining table, but the oak sideboard was still under the Landseer portrait of his mother and on it, between two stubby candles, was a bottle of brandy his father had left. With only the smallest hesitation Garth reached for it, pulled off the stopper and drank the contents. He gasped. The taste was vile, but a fire ignited in his belly. His eyes narrowed.
Nursing the fire, he lit a lamp and, skirting the wooden lift that plied a creaky trade between the dining room and the kitchen directly below, he ran down stone steps, past the kitchen door, then down another flight of steps until he reached the old dungeons, now used as larders. He shivered. Even in high summer it was corpse-cold down here, and during the winter it was colder than the ice house. Spectral light seeped through the tiny, crusted windows, as though some very old animal was blinking. He bumped his head on a dead hare hanging in stiff splendour from one of the many bloodstained hooks. His heart banged but the brandy kept him going.
At the far end of the dungeons was a small door with a huge key poking from the lock. The key was superfluous since the door was never fastened. Nevertheless, Garth had only been through the door once before; this was his father’s private territory. The door groaned open at Garth’s push. He stepped inside. The air was so thick his footsteps were smothered in the gloom. To his right he could just make out a stone slab. He held his lamp up. Fuzzily revealed was an Aladdin’s cave of bottles, all neatly laid between ancient round arches dating from the castle’s earliest days.
The door swung closed behind him and his lamp flickered, but Garth did not retreat. Instead, putting the lamp down, he went to the wine section first, pulled out a bottle and with sudde
n, furious force, hurled it against the wall. The glass split and the neck of the bottle, still corked, rolled sideways, coming to rest in a dent in the floor. The noise was duller than he expected. He took another bottle and threw it. Then another and another. The wine did not spray; it trickled slowly down the wall like blood, and the rolling bottle-necks unaccountably reminded Garth of French aristocrats being beheaded. He got into quite a rhythm as he hurled and hurled. The stain spread. The smell was sweet and sickly. The floor grew sticky. Shards of glass floated on a thick red sea. He had to take care not to slip.
He saved the brandy until last, and when he pulled out the final bottle he did not throw it at once, but uncorked it and took six or seven deep pulls. The fading fire in his belly reignited with astonishing vigour. It was a strange, not unpleasant feeling, and as the liquor crackled through his veins Garth felt an extraordinary lightening. He took another gulp and the empty hole in his heart filled with blurry exhilaration. Taking one last pull, he hurled the bottle with all his might. It was done. His father’s cellar was destroyed. He tried to pick up the lamp. His hand did not want to obey him. He found that very funny. Leaving the lamp, he squelched his way to the door and let himself out. His feet were wet, the sleeves of his shirt stained and soggy. The fumes buzzed around his head. He swayed slightly, thinking he would go upstairs and sit with the Furious Boy, but he only made it to the dead hare before he sank down, closed his eyes and let the brandy burn the last memory of the good times clean away.
2
Daisy found him. She had been sent by Mrs Snipper, the only indoor servant to remain at Hartslove, to fetch the hare which, so Mrs Snipper said in her curiously emphatic way, would Do For Supper. Daisy disliked going down to the larder, but she never refused Mrs Snipper, who, unasked, had taken over the kitchen when Cook had left. First, though, she had to find the crutches which, since her accident, had become as much a part of her as her hands and feet.
Other people felt sorry for Daisy, but Daisy had long since given up feeling sorry for herself. Certainly, crutches were a pest and callipers an inconvenience. Certainly, nobody would want to marry her. However, Daisy did not care about marriage. She more than did not care. Daisy never wanted to leave Hartslove, and her lameness bound her to the place in a very practical way: elsewhere, she would feel a burden; here, she was part of the furniture.
Also, her accident bound her particularly to Garth, for Garth had dragged her from under the weight of the fallen pony, and when she was recovered as much as she was ever going to, it was his teeth that had scarred their nanny’s buttocks when she had made Daisy cry, and it was his fists that had punished the grocer’s boy for imitating her hobbling gait. Daisy knew she had a special place in the corner of Garth’s eye and, in return, she loved him with unswerving devotion. This devotion had deepened since their mother left, particularly after Garth ticked Rose off for scoffing at Daisy’s habit of saying, ‘Goodnight, Ma,’ to a cobweb that hovered above her bed. ‘It’s a very good idea,’ Garth had insisted with such firmness that even Rose had not dared contradict him.
Daisy found her crutches at the bottom of the kitchen stairs, took a candle and clumped down to the larders. The acrid smell of alcohol hit her before she found Garth folded up on the floor. ‘What on earth?’ – she saw red stains on his sleeves. Horror seized her. She slammed down the candle, manoeuvred her legs to kneel and rolled him over, a scream gathering in the back of her throat. ‘Garth! Garth!’ Who had attacked him? Where were his wounds? She could see only hollow cheeks, dirty smudge marks and greenish skin.
Garth unwillingly opened his eyes and licked his lips. He had no idea how long he had been down there. His tongue was furred and thick and he could no longer feel his feet. When he tried to sit, he was like Clover’s rag doll. It was when he slumped again that Daisy noticed the amber-coloured footprints leading from the wine cellar. The scream died away. ‘No,’ she said loudly. ‘No, no, no.’ She let go of Garth, clambered up, opened the door wide and found herself slithering in a ruby, glass-encrusted sea. ‘Holy Moses!’ she cried, sliding back and slamming the door behind her. The dead hare swung in the draught. ‘Who did this?’
‘Did it on purpose.’
‘What?’
‘Pa shouldn’t drink. Now he can’t.’
Daisy stared. ‘You did that?’
Garth tried to sit up by himself. ‘Because of The One.’
Daisy paled. ‘What on earth do you mean?’
‘He’s bought another The One. He can have his horse or his drink. Not both.’ He smiled a brandy smile, a drink-on-the-breath smile, his father’s smile.
Daisy recognised it and shook Garth until his head rattled. ‘You’re drunk, Garth.’ She was appalled.
‘Drunk as drunk,’ Garth said gaily. ‘Ma’s gone off. Pa’s gone mad. I’ve gone drunk.’ He flapped his arms.
Daisy stood up. ‘I’m getting you some water. Holy Moses, Garth. Holy Moses.’
Garth tried to stand. The world capsized. He did not feel so good now. His teeth began to chatter. Daisy hooked his arm over her shoulder and they both struggled up the steps into the kitchen, where Garth collapsed on to a chair. The range was unlit, but Mrs Snipper had laid the fire and Daisy put a match to it. She felt Garth’s hand. It was as frozen as the hare. She forced him to drink some water but his teeth clattered so badly against the glass she was worried it might shatter. She wished she had not shaken him. There seemed nothing else to do except fetch more and more water until at last he sipped quietly. The blaze quickened. His clothes began to steam and his colour returned to something a little more normal. Daisy sat down opposite him. ‘You were joking when you said Pa had bought another The One,’ she said when she thought he could hear her properly. ‘I mean, he couldn’t have. We can’t even pay Mrs Snips or buy any groceries.’
This last did not appear to be true since there was a side of ham, a basket of vegetables and a large vanilla cake with a bite out of it on the kitchen table. However, although all the de Granvilles knew that none of this food was bought, they never enquired where it came from. Mrs Snipper never told them that she had a son, Snipe, who, despite his bird-name, had the pulse of a fox and the same thieving talents. It was not that Mrs Snipper was ashamed of Snipe. Far from it. It was just that Snipe was not sociable. His only expressions were watchful, murderous and blank and his only human emotion was worship of Lily, for whom he often left gifts, their intended recipient clear from the lily invariably attached. Mrs Snipper did not worry about Snipe being detected as he lurked round the castle: he could smell danger on a dandelion head and never used the front door, preferring to creep along the dank, earthy passage which led from the deep roots of a chestnut tree in the field at the front of the castle to the back of the kitchen range. The bite out of the cake carried his teeth-marks. It would never have occurred to him to cut it.
Garth glanced at the cake. His gorge rose. He tried to speak but the brandy’s skim was a foul coating on his teeth and his insides seemed filled with grease. He lurched to the sink and was violently sick. ‘He doesn’t care about Mrs Snips. He handed over four hundred guineas,’ he said, wiping his mouth, ‘and there’s a “for sale” sign at the bottom of the drive.’ Daisy gasped, dropped the glass and felt herself shattering. Garth knew as he spoke that he should have been more careful, but with the brandy gone he felt cold and even emptier than before. ‘At least if Pa goes on selling things, there won’t be much of anything left to move,’ he said in a vain attempt at humour.
‘It’s not true.’
‘It is true.’
Daisy sat down heavily.
‘I’m going to the Resting Place.’ Garth was suddenly short of air. He staggered out, his stained shirt sticking to the bones in his back. Daisy got up and began automatically to gather up the slivers of glass. She was giddy from the news and hardly noticed when she dropped the glass again. Tough she didn’t want to be a nuisance, she didn’t want to be alone. She left the glass, hobbled up the stairs and through the
hall, automatically grabbing a cloak for Garth. It was perishing outside and he would never take one for himself.
What the de Granvilles called the Resting Place was not a place so much as a tree. It was, indeed, the chestnut tree amongst whose roots Snipe’s tunnel began. The tree was so old it did not grow or spread; it simply was. Gnarled and twisted, its branches nothing more than sapless ropes, it nevertheless retained a mystical dignity, in part because around it, half buried and weathered into strange shapes, were three ancient tombstones. Set against the prevailing wind, parts of the stones’ inscriptions could still be felt by careful fingers. Nearby, and clearly part of the group, was a flat stone whose inscription had been worn away entirely apart from an H too deeply etched for even the harshest wind to obliterate. The de Granvilles had always been told, and had no reason to disbelieve, that the remains of their crusading ancestors were buried here, and Daisy knew instinctively that the flat stone belonged to a horse. She did not know how she knew, but this belief was reinforced by the shadows that occasionally flitted over the field even under a cloudless sky. Sometimes the shadows were armed men. Sometimes they were horses, snorting and whinnying on the edge of the wind. Sometimes they were girls dancing. There was no pattern.
Daisy found Garth leaning against the tree. She knelt and scraped the frost from the flat stone so that she could trace the H with her thumbnail. The feel of it steadied her. ‘Nobody will buy Hartslove,’ she said decidedly. ‘Why would anybody want a tattered old place that’s half falling down and so filled with us? And they’d have to have Mrs Snips! I mean, she’s nowhere else to go.’
A hard nut formed in Garth’s chest. ‘Don’t be silly, Daisy. Some rich mill owner’ll buy it, stick Mrs Snips in a workhouse in Manchester and hire retinues of cleaners to scrub us out. And when the place is pristine, they’ll clear all these stones and make a golf course. It’ll be as if we were never here.’
