The Honey and the Sting

by E C Fremantle

  It doesn’t take him long to gather that the younger sister is not quite right. It is not immediately apparent but lurks in the subtle air of distraction in her bearing and a gaze that skims the edges, avoiding directness. He has seen something like it in soldiers who have witnessed too much horror. They become loosed from their bindings, unpredictable, and are often the first to be killed in combat.

  ‘What happened to you? Is it painful?’ The mother indicates his injured arm and he responds with a vague explanation, assuring her it will not affect his ability to carry out his duty.

  ‘I didn’t mean that.’ Her brow is ruffled with what appears to be genuine concern. ‘If it’s still painful after so many months it must be infected. I can dress it for you. Make a compress to draw out any impurities.’

  ‘That’s very kind of you, madam, but …’ He hates her for her pity.

  ‘I won’t accept a refusal.’ Behind her smile there is a glint of steel. Felton is wary of becoming too familiar as it might impede his ability to fulfil his mission. However, she gives him no choice but to consent to her care and he has an inkling that she will be a more formidable adversary than she first appeared. ‘And please call me Hester.’

  She calls over the caretaker, a doddering creature, asking him to show Felton around the grounds. The man carries an old musket – the kind of inaccurate weapon that is more likely to dislocate your shoulder with its kick than meet its target.

  ‘Perhaps your son would like to join us.’ He might as well start by gaining the boy’s trust.

  ‘What a good idea. He’s so tired of the company of we women.’ She seems delighted by Felton’s suggestion.

  Felton wonders about the youth who greeted his arrival. Surely he has been male company for the child.

  ‘Are you a soldier?’ the boy asks. ‘Have you got a gun?’

  ‘I have.’ Felton opens his jerkin to reveal the pistol tucked inside.

  ‘Have you ever killed anyone?’

  Hester laughs uncomfortably, apologizing to Felton and telling her son that it is not the kind of question you are supposed to ask.

  Felton squats down to the boy’s level. ‘I see you have an enquiring mind. There is nothing wrong with that.’ He glances up at Hester, who returns his smile. ‘It’s a sign of intelligence.’

  He and the boy follow Gifford as he trudges around the perimeter fence at an agonizingly slow pace, pointing out where it needs mending, while Felton quizzes him on the daily routines. ‘I need to know everything if I am to keep them safe.’ The heat is stifling and Felton’s arm is beginning to twinge. The entire place has an air of dilapidation, as if it is on the brink of being engulfed by the forest that laps so close.

  ‘How often do you travel into town?’ he asks the old man.

  ‘I’d say about once a month. To take the eggs and cheese to market and fetch supplies. Won’t have need to go for a while yet. Was there to collect the ladies not long ago, see.’

  He hadn’t expected the lodge to be quite so isolated. He’d written to George, explaining he would be close to Ludlow and for him to send this Worley fellow to the inn there to wait for his word. He took the precaution of leaving a letter with the landlord at the Feathers giving instructions for Worley to lie low there, and also copied out detailed directions to the lodge for him in case of emergency. He realizes this safeguard is as good as useless. If he were to encounter problems and needed Worley’s help, he’d have no way of contacting the man. It had taken him the best part of a day to get here from the town.

  In the barn, it is mercifully a little cooler. They find Gifford’s blind granddaughter skulking in the gloom. Swallows dart about under the beams, flying in and out of a hole in the wall where the brickwork has crumbled away. Gifford is telling him about Lark’s gift with animals while Felton watches her pouring milk from a bucket into a larger churn, noticing how confident she seems with the task and that not a drop is spilled. She looks up suddenly, as if in response to his gaze, training her eyes directly on him.

  ‘How much can your granddaughter see?’ Felton asks, once they are out of earshot, unsettled by the look she gave him. ‘She seems to have some vision, at least.’

  ‘Nothing, nothing at all. She was born that way.’ Gifford doesn’t hesitate in his response but still Felton wonders if it is the truth.

  Rafe closes his eyes, holding his arms out in front of him, apparently trying to find out what it would be like to be blind, not getting very far before he trips over the puppy. ‘Daft boy,’ Gifford calls him.

  He can’t be aware that the child is the son of the Duke of Buckingham, thinks Felton, or he’d never have used such a familiar tone. Though there seems to be a complete absence of ceremony in this place. He is thinking of Hester’s bare feet and the women’s dirt-smeared dresses, loose like night-gowns, and her insistence on given names.

  Gifford points out a large henhouse, someone’s now dilapidated folly, where a few brood-fowl are pecking about. As they walk on, a black and white pony, a dappled grey horse and a decrepit mule watch them lethargically from a small parched meadow, where he notices at the far end that Melis is busying herself with some shabby bee skeps.

  At some point on their rounds, Rafe slips his hand into Felton’s. It is a strange gesture for a boy of his age but he supposes the child has been mollycoddled by the company of women. As they walk hand in hand, Felton is surprised to discover a tender feeling burgeoning in his chest.

  He has never fathered a child, has never thought about such things. He has always lived such a hand-to-mouth life, moving from one conflict to another, without feeling the need to settle, but this small gesture carves a window into how it might be to have a son of his own. The vision of a possible future rolls out in his mind, commanding an army, marrying, fathering children. A new life detached from his past, from the acts he is about to commit. He crushes his sentimentality.

  As they round the corner of the house a few rabbits scamper away as the puppy bounds towards them, barking. ‘I can show you how to set a rabbit trap sometime, if you’d like,’ Felton suggests to the boy. ‘We’d have to go out into the forest. What do you think?’

  ‘Mother wouldn’t let me. She says it’s too dangerous to leave the house and its grounds.’ His small shoulders are slouched in disappointment.

  ‘I’m sure I can persuade her.’ The boy brightens. Felton doesn’t think he’ll have much difficulty bringing the child to his side. He seems eager enough for adventure.

  At the back of the house a bovine woman is sitting outside the kitchen door, shelling peas. Gifford introduces her as his daughter, Margie. She asks him if he is hungry. He hasn’t thought about food since breakfast.

  Gifford points out the door that leads to his family’s quarters.

  ‘The three of you sleep in there, do you?’ Felton says. ‘I only ask as a matter of security. If I know where everyone tends to be at night, I can better protect the women and the child.’

  Gifford answers that they do indeed bed down there, ‘But if one of the animals is ailing, Lark likes to sleep in the barn.’

  He makes a mental note of everything. So many different things he must take into consideration, and attention to detail is what will make a success of this mission. He will need a little time to get the lie of the place and its occupants before he acts and must do his utmost to avoid the suspicions of the Giffords.

  ‘The sisters and the boy all sleep upstairs, I assume.’

  Margie nods. ‘Yes, at the top.’

  ‘There is a third sister, I believe, whom I have yet to meet. And what of the young man who greeted me? Where –’

  The old man interrupts him, laughing for no apparent reason, his peg-toothed mouth wide, breath sour.

  Margie puts her bowl of peas on table, giving a handful to Rafe. ‘That was Hope –’ she is also laughing – ‘in breeches. Had you fooled, didn’t she?’

  ‘That was the third sister?’ He is picturing the dark young man, handsome, smooth-skinned, remember
ing the stirring he’d felt, now refiguring the image in his mind as that of a girl. He feels as if he’s been duped. She is the one George described as a ‘weak link’.

  ‘That’s my aunt Hope,’ says Rafe.

  Felton forces out a chuckle, resenting the Giffords’ laughter, feeling ridiculed.

  Forcing his focus back to his mission, he indicates a low door in the corner of the kitchen. ‘Where does that lead?’

  ‘Down to the cellar. You won’t find much in there of interest. Just the food store, last year’s preserves, some fruit and beer, and my cheeses, of course.’ She seems very proud of them. ‘And eggs. We’ve more eggs than we know what to do with.’

  ‘I wouldn’t be doing my job properly if I didn’t take a look down there.’

  ‘You’ll need a lamp, then.’ She touches a rush-light to the embers under a cooking pot in which something is simmering. ‘And take care. Those steps are hazardous.’ She seems distracted. ‘I can’t find my sharp knife anywhere. Have you seen it?’ she asks her father, who is in the process of sitting down, with a long wheeze, and blotting the sweat from his face with a rumpled handkerchief. ‘This house likes to hide things from me.’

  Felton opens the cellar door, poking his head into the cool dark, the stench of old fruit and mildew assailing him. Holding out the light, he can vaguely see a steep flight of steps.

  Rafe follows him, saying he’s never been down to the cellar, his voice bristling with eagerness. Felton warns him to tread carefully. The last thing he needs is for any harm to come to the child on the stairs. Margie was right, they are uneven and treacherous, and George’s voice whispers through his mind: It’s imperative that it appears to be an accident.

  He stamps his feet hard several times when he gets to the bottom.

  ‘What are you doing?’ Rafe asks.

  ‘Scaring off the rats.’

  ‘Rats?’ Rafe repeats, his tone more fascinated than scared.

  Felton feels his way along the dank walls, searching for loose bricks, potential hiding places for the incriminating letters George has instructed him to find and destroy, but reasons that only a fool would stash paper in such a place, where the damp would eat away at it in no time.

  ‘How big are the rats?’

  ‘Some can grow as big as dogs.’

  The child’s eyes widen. ‘That big?’

  ‘No, little fellow. I’m only teasing.’ He cuffs the boy’s shoulder, drawing a giggle from him.

  There is a cobwebbed door in the far wall. Felton imagines finding a secret passage out into the forest. How convenient that would make his task. But he finds only a dusty, airless space, stacked with a few broken barrels, which must once have been used as a still room.

  Returning to the bottom of the steps, he calls up to Margie, ‘Do you need anything brought up?’

  ‘I could do with a jar of honey. On the shelf above the cheeses.’

  Felton makes a cursory search of the shelves, still finding no sign of the hidden correspondence, then picks up a pot of honey and takes it up to the kitchen.

  Margie takes over the tour of the interior, saying her father finds the stairs difficult. She leads them to a large hall and, before following her up the stairs, he returns to the front steps to pick up his bag, only to find, with a flicker of concern, that it is no longer where he left it.

  ‘’Spect one of the sisters took it up for you,’ says Margie, when he asks if she’s seen it. ‘Hope probably. She’s very efficient. Can’t stand to see anything out of its proper place … Unless the house has been misbehaving again.’ Clearly she is one of those country people with peculiar ideas. ‘They want you to sleep upstairs near them, I’m told. For safety,’ she explains, tapping her head. ‘Touch wood, they won’t need you.’

  The house is tall, with several suites of gloomy rooms on the middle floors that are unused. Felton continues to keep an eye open for possible hiding places where the letters might be. He hadn’t expected the place to be so large and they could be anywhere but he can’t risk leaving it until the other task is completed, as he might be obliged to leave in a hurry.

  A white cat slinks about in the shadows, watching them with its green gaze, a grey mouse in its jaws. The child stoops to stroke it and it lashes out, leaving a raised pink scratch on his hand. Rafe retaliates, kicking out at it. It is too quick for him and is gone.

  ‘Shouldn’t approach a cat when it has prey,’ says Margie. ‘They don’t like it.’

  Felton has never liked felines either, has the sense they can see through to his soul and read his sins.

  As they mount the final flight of stairs, they can hear the voices of the women and Rafe runs ahead. Felton stands for a moment, looking down the stairwell and pondering its unhindered view of the flagstones below. He collects his thoughts, the beginnings of a plan formulating.

  Margie points out the door to the women’s bedroom, then opens another beside it. ‘This is where you will bed down.’

  It is a small, sparsely furnished room, like a monk’s cell, with a high east-facing window. Felton is relieved to find his bag but dismayed to see that someone, the ‘efficient’ Hope, he supposes, has already unpacked his few belongings.

  He feels stripped naked and checks the lock of his small chest, thankful to find it has not been opened. It houses his journal, and the unopened folder containing his mother’s probate papers, either of which risk the exposure of his true identity. When he checks, he is relieved to find the key still tucked into the small hidden pocket of his bag and berates himself for having taken such a risk when he has been there barely an hour.

  ‘Everything as it should be?’ Margie has noticed his unease.

  ‘Yes, yes. This arm’s giving me bother, that’s all.’

  Margie seems to think it is a cue for her to ask how he was injured, and he tries to quash his irritation as he briefly recounts the circumstances.

  ‘I heard dreadful things about the siege,’ she says. ‘Gossip even reached Ludlow about all the dead. Is it true seven thousand men went and only two thousand returned?’

  ‘Something like that, I think.’ He knows the numbers only too well. Too many of his comrades were killed.

  ‘They say it’s the duke’s fault. I’m glad I don’t have a son to be drawn into one of that varlet’s needless wars.’ Her expression is tight and bitter. His fist clenches involuntarily, and he has to hold himself back from a spontaneous defence of George.

  ‘I see you have books.’ She is surprised, her eyebrows arched quizzically. He has often come across such a response. By the look of him no one would take him for a cultured man.

  ‘Yes,’ he says, pretending a friendly smile. ‘And Rafe, does he read?’

  ‘Of course I can read.’ Felton jumps, turning in surprise. He hadn’t been aware of Rafe entering the room, quiet as a thief.

  ‘I’m sure you can, young man.’ He collects his thoughts as they follow Margie back out onto the landing. ‘Can you write as well?’

  ‘Of course I can.’ The child is indignant.

  ‘I expect your mother has a writing box somewhere with paper and ink. Does she let you use it?’ He watches the child’s expression carefully.

  ‘I am forbidden to look inside it.’ Rafe’s eyes move involuntarily towards the closed door of the women’s bedchamber, telling Felton all he needs to know.

  ‘And, finally, the blue room.’ Margie opens the third door on the landing. ‘It’s where the mistress likes to sit.’

  Felton takes in all the detail: a pistol on the table, a clock above the hearth, a pan of old ashes. Someone has swept out the fireplace. He remembers the older sisters in their ash-smeared dresses, wonders if they might have been burning something. He touches a finger to the surround. It is cool.

  They step out onto the balcony where the three women are sitting. The old boards creak under his weight, riddled with worm. The whole place is neglected, its bricks so deeply dinted that birds could comfortably nest there. It’s a wonder that the house
is still standing. He glances over the edge at the stone steps far down in the yard. Now, if you were to fall from here …

  ‘Have you seen everything?’ Hester interrupts his thoughts. She is lounging back, feet tucked under her, in a chair that dwarfs her small frame. ‘You will find us very informal here …’ She continues asking questions about whether he has everything he needs, how his journey was – on and on. She is apparently the kind of woman who will talk just to fill a silence.

  Contrarily Melis gives him a silent, penetrating stare, with eyes pale as water in a white bowl, which makes him feel a little uneasy, as if she can see into him and read his thoughts. The third sister appears now, apologizing, saying they haven’t yet prepared the bed in his room, making to return inside. She is wearing a dress now, crisply starched and neatly laced, like a cats’ cradle, over her front.

  He moves into her path. ‘That won’t be necessary.’ She is close enough for him to smell her. Her scent is clean and brisk, her dark curls tamed into plaits, her mouth soft and generous. It is impossible now to imagine her as a boy. ‘I can do that myself.’ He doesn’t want her in his room again, not until he can hide the key to his chest properly.

  ‘It’s no trouble,’ she says, looking at her hands rather than at him.

  ‘I must insist.’ Felton is firm.

  ‘Leave him be, Hope,’ says Hester. ‘He doesn’t want you fussing over him.’

  He can see now why George had suggested the youngest of them might be useful to him. Willingness is spread all over her, a desire to help the stranger in their midst.

  Hester

  The interior of the henhouse is dry and smells of straw. When I feel in the nest boxes, each warm clutch of eggs is like treasure. I sit for a while on the floor, closing my eyes to absorb the peace punctuated only by the soft parp and chuckle of the hens and the rustle of their feathers. Even the cockerel is quiet. We have all been a little calmer since the arrival of the lieutenant yesterday, all but Melis, who has disappeared into her impenetrable world. I am afraid our spell in the priest-hole has roused her demons.