by Mary Stewart
And I know it now, I added, but not aloud.
‘Where was your home?’ he asked.
‘My father was vicar of a colliery parish in the northeast. It was hideous, and the countryside was poor and scrubby. I was at school in the Lake District, and that was lovely, and I had a year at Durham University before my mother died, but I spent most of my time there working, and in any case I couldn’t have afforded to go far enough away at weekends to smell the country air. Then my mother died and I went back to look after Daddy, and it was pit heaps and graveyards again. So you see why Thornyhold is heaven for me. Some day I suppose I might begin to feel lonely, or bored, but just at present I love every minute of every day. It’s just enough to wake to the birds, and to go to sleep in the silence.’ I stopped, setting my empty mug down with a bit of a rattle. ‘I’m sorry. You’re too good a listener, and maybe when one lives alone, however much one likes it, one gets too talkative. Were you taking the air to clear the fog today, then? I thought you were the shepherd.’
‘Yes. I’d done my stint for the day.’
‘Then I’m not keeping you back from your work? I ought to go now, anyway. Thank you for the tea.’
‘Why must you? I assure you, I’ve come to one of those natural breaks in the book, where one can walk away and let things go on working in the subconscious. It’s true, don’t look so unbelieving. It means I can afford to tear myself away from my view of the pigsties, and go out on parole, as much as I like and you’ll put up with.’
He spoke convincingly, but the glint of laughter in his eyes brought my shyness back with a rush. I said uncertainly: ‘That’s very nice of you, but I really ought to be going. There are the brambles to pick over, and I’d like to start the jelly tonight. And there’s Hodge – the cat. He wasn’t in when I left, and I locked everything up, so he’ll be looking for his supper.’
‘You don’t need to lock your doors hereabouts, surely? I don’t think we ever do.’
‘I know, but … Oh, well, I suppose it’s a habit left over from home.’
He looked at me quickly. ‘You’ve had trouble?’
‘No, no. Not trouble. But … I believe you know Mrs Trapp? From the lodge.’
Some change in his expression. Indefinable, but like a ripple over still water. ‘Yes.’
‘She used to work for my cousin sometimes, and then the lawyers asked her to clean the house before I came here, so I suppose she does feel – I mean, she really does know the house better than I do.’
‘And she still thinks she can come and go as she pleases?’
‘Yes. But in the country people do, don’t they? Come in without knocking, and that sort of thing?’
‘To some extent, yes. She used to come here quite often, the same sort of thing, very kind and helpful, but of course I can’t do with interruptions at random, so I had to tell her so.’
I was thinking what William had told me. I decided to be as direct as he had been. ‘Do you like her?’
That faint touch again of what could be embarrassment. ‘Like? I hardly know. As I said, she’s very kind, but …’
‘Do you trust her?’
‘Oh, certainly. Ah, William’s been talking, has he? I told you he had too much imagination. Well, the truth is, she used to bring all sorts of dishes, and she’s a beautiful cook, but one couldn’t help remembering the gossip.’
‘Gossip?’
He hesitated, then looked up, smiling. ‘Yes, why not? You live here now, so you’ll hear it soon enough. Mrs Trapp is one of the local ladies who, as your cousin did, practise herbalism. A wise woman. A witch, if you like. I’m sure she would like you to think of her that way. Perfectly harmless, of course, but there are stories. She’s supposed to have given her mother some dose or other which stole the old lady’s wits away. Nobody blames her, in fact the general opinion is that Mrs Trapp was generous not to poison her mother outright; the old woman was a tartar. But now she’s as mild as a kitten, and happy with it. Spends all her time in her rocking-chair by the window looking out at nothing, or doing crochet work and singing to herself.’
‘I – I think I saw her. Behind the curtain in the little lodge on the right.’
‘That’s it. What I think really happens is that Mrs Trapp feeds her some sort of tranquilliser, and maybe exaggerates the dose a little … But the old lady is happy and comfortable, and very well fed, and Agnes and Jessamy have a bit of peace for a change.’ He laughed at my look. ‘But you see why I’m a bit wary now of her cakes and pies?’
‘Ye-es. But what would she want to do to you?’
‘I can’t imagine. Before I heard the tales about the old lady I used to eat them and be thankful. I really discouraged her because – I told you – I can’t do with interruptions, and she used to walk in at any time, with some dish, or some baking, that of course one had to stop and sample, and thank her for.’
‘Fudge,’ said William from the doorway, ‘and home-made toffee. It was smashing, too. Dad hardly ever eats sweets so he gave it all to me. Would you like to come and see Silkworm now?’
‘Is he all right?’
‘He’s fine.’
‘Well, do you mind if I look at him some other time?’ I got to my feet. ‘I really ought to go. Thank you for the tea and the first aid.’
‘You’re very welcome.’ My host had risen when I did. ‘William, take Miss Ramsey’s basket out and fix it on her bike, will you?’ Then, as the boy ran out: ‘Look, please don’t worry about Mrs Trapp. She was a great admirer of Miss Saxon, and she’ll wish you nothing but good, I’m sure. To answer your question properly, yes, she’s honest. Did your cousin leave an inventory?’
‘Yes. There was a copy of it along with the copy of her will. I never checked it. Should I?’
‘Only to set your mind at rest. You’ll find nothing has been touched. Our Agnes may be no great shakes as a witch, but she’s honest, of that I’m sure. Do you really have to go? I hope you’ll come again, any time, we’ll be happy to see you. Now William and I will set you on your way, and show you the road home.’
16
It was love at first sight, of course.
I say ‘of course’ because (and later I could see and prove how right I was) no woman who was more or less ordinarily impressionable could have come within his field without responding to it, the unexplainable and extraordinary pull, not of personality, for when that is too strong it can, and often does, repel; nor of sexuality, of which the same can be said; but of what I can only call sheer magnetism, spiced with a combination of both. He was one of those people born – sometimes to their – pleasure, more often to their bane – to be a lodestone, a bright particular star. Literature and fiction are full of femmes fatales, but there is also an homme fatal, an altogether rarer bird, and pity help the lonely and impressionable female who comes within range of him.
And when he asks her into his home, when his son takes to her and makes her free of his company, when he invites her to come and see him again any time she feels inclined …
Pity help poor lonely spinster Geillis Ramsey. I rode home through the gently darkening autumn evening, my feet pumping away at the pedals over the rough forest track, my head in the clouds of sweet imagination, my brain completely dormant.
Till the track dipped sharply to ford a muddy rill. I met it wrongly, splashed myself to the knees with black water, and came to, swearing.
As I pushed the bicycle up the next rutted incline, the brain took over once more. So I felt like swooning into his arms, his bed, anything? But he was married, with a ten-year-old son. He was a distinguished writer who had rented a lonely and uncomfortable house simply because he wanted solitude to write in. He had been polite to me because, mistaking my motives towards that silly, that ever-blessed sheep, he had startled me and been momentarily rude. Because he was grateful to me for taking William off his hands. He had a son, and he was married. Even if she had left him (how long ago? I must ask William) he was still married. And in my vicarage-written a
nd already old-fashioned book, that put the whole idea out of the ring. My bright particular star was way beyond my wildest and most enchanted flight.
His hair was thick and dark brown, with just the beginning of grey. He must be, what? About forty, late thirties perhaps? He would be in Who’s Who and I could look him up in the public library and get all his books to read. He was a couple of inches taller than me; just right; but he stooped a bit, probably with the hours spent over his desk. He liked solitude, and the countryside. He was content with the little that that rather bleak farmhouse offered. He was a loner, and so was I. He would be just as quiet, and a good deal more comfortable when he moved into Thornyhold with me …
He was married. Married. And even if Who’s Who says he was divorced, what makes you think he would ever look at you, Geillis Ramsey? So come down to earth. You may be a witch-elect, but it would take a stronger toil of grace than you could ever weave to catch and hold a man like Christopher Dryden.
The white wicket gate was open. I coasted through it, past the protective clump of rowan and elder, inside the bastion of the quickthorn hedge, to dismount at the shed. Hodge was sitting on the back windowsill, and rose to greet me, stretching his front paws luxuriously, and showing a wide pink yawn.
‘Anybody been around?’ I asked him, and had my answer in the cat’s unruffled demeanour. I let myself in, and he followed, purring. I fed him, then as soon as I had washed, and put fresh plasters on my hands, I started work on the blackberries.
At dusk, when they were simmering, there was a knock at the back door. Before I could get to it, I heard it open, so I knew who to expect.
‘You’re in, then,’ smiled Agnes Trapp.
‘Yes. Do come in. How are you?’
‘Fine, thanks.’ She came in, sniffing. ‘Brambles. You making jelly, then?’
‘Yes. I really enjoyed myself. I love picking brambles.’
‘You got your hands pretty badly scratched, didn’t you?’
‘I’m afraid so.’ I stirred the fruit. She settled herself at the table.
‘Who told you about the quarry?’ she asked.
‘William. How did you know I’d been at the quarry?’
She ignored that, merely replying: ‘Oh, yes. They live just over the hill from there. Did you know that?’
‘I didn’t know before today, but William’s father came on me when he was out for his afternoon walk, and we got talking. William had told him about my being here at Thornyhold. I’d cut one of my hands rather badly, and he asked me back to the farm to get it tied up.’
Silence. I stirred the fruit again.
‘It seems a very lonely place, doesn’t it,’ I asked her, ‘even for a writer? I mean, without anyone to look after the house?’
‘As to that, I used to give him a hand now and then, but it’s too far to go. There’s a woman goes in now twice a week to clean up. Bessie Yelland, the farmer’s wife from Black Cocks. Never sees him, she says. Writers are queer cattle, seemingly. Asked you in, did he?’
‘Yes. I gathered he’d come to a stopping-place in the book. Did you know his wife, Agnes? Or did she leave him before he came to live hereabouts?’
‘Leave him?’ She sounded surprised.
I bit my lip. ‘I – perhaps I shouldn’t have mentioned it. William told me. She left him, it must have been some time ago, surely. I don’t know if it was for another man. Was there a divorce? William didn’t say, and of course I couldn’t ask him.’
‘Yes, I knew. But it happened before he ever came here. I don’t know why it happened. I never heard tell of a divorce. Mr Dryden never talked about it.’
I went back to the fruit, stirring.
Another silence, quite a long one. Then, in a different tone, ‘Did you find the recipe?’ she asked.
‘What recipe?’ My mind had been a long way away.
‘Why, for the bramble jelly!’ She sounded impatient, almost to rudeness. I glanced at her. She was not looking at me; her gaze was sweeping the kitchen, taking in the orderliness, the shining glass, the spotless enamel, the clean curtains and cushions, the flowers on the windowsill. There was a glitter in her eyes, a sort of force to her that I had not seen before. For a moment I wondered if my strenuous cleaning efforts could have offended her, but she had helped me herself, and had shown no sign of offence, even over the scrubbing of the pigeon-loft.
‘You said you’d look out her recipe book for me,’ she said.
‘Oh, yes, of course, I remember you spoke of it, but I’m afraid I haven’t had time to look for it yet. I’m just making this lot in the usual way.’ I stirred the fruit again. ‘I think they’re about done. I’ll put them to strain now.’
‘Let me help you.’ Before I could protest, she was on her feet, and at the cupboard. ‘My, my, but you’ve been right through everything, haven’t you? The place looks really smart and nice. This’ll be the bowl, is it? No, let me.’
I let her. Together we spooned the pulp into the jelly bag, and together carried bowl and bag into the larder, and left the bag suspended to drip. She took in the scrubbed shelves, the clean racks, the food lying ready for supper.
‘Oh, you got yourself some fish. But you’d like some of my soup, wouldn’t you? I brought a can of my leek soup for you. It’ll heat up a treat.’
‘How very kind,’ I said, helplessly. ‘But you mustn’t spoil me, Agnes, really! I’ve got to learn to look after myself, you know!’
Back in the kitchen, she busied herself taking down a saucepan and tipping the contents of a blue enamel can into it. She gave me quick, smiling glance, as sharp as a bodkin. ‘Looks to me as if you can do all right now, Miss Ramsey. You got this place lovely.’
‘Well,’ I said, and was annoyed to hear the almost apologetic note in my voice, ‘you know how it is. The rooms you’d done were fine, but when my own things arrived I had to turn the place out, and one does like things arranged in one’s own way. And it is the best way to find out exactly what there is in the house.’
‘I’d have thought there’d be a list,’ she said, ‘along with the lawyer’s papers. First thing they did was to send the valuation people along to go through everything.’ Then, as I was silent: ‘Well, wasn’t there?’
‘Yes, I believe there was. I haven’t had time to look through it yet.’
She set the pan gently down on the stove, and turned. The tension, whatever it was, had vanished. Mr Dryden had been right, I thought, and I had been over-wary. The thought of an inventory did not worry her: the reverse; it appeared to have relieved her mind.
She said comfortably: ‘She always was a tidy kind of body, your aunty. What about that still-room of hers? You done that yet?’
‘Not yet. At least, not properly. I’ve done the room, but I haven’t checked the shelves yet. I really will look through those books tomorrow. It’s the likeliest place for her special recipes. In fact, there might be a list in the inventory, and if I find the book you want, I’ll bring it down for you straight away.’
‘I’ll take that kindly. Will you be going for more brambles for yourself?’
‘I hadn’t thought about it. But if you want some, I’d love to go over there again if this weather holds.’
She pushed the lid back on her can with a rap and picked her cardigan off the back of the chair.
‘Don’t bother. There’s a-plenty where we live. You’ve no call to go over there again. Enjoy your soup. It’s our own leeks, and cream added.’
And she went.
As the back door shut, Hodge came out from under the chair where he had been hiding, and went back to his saucer.
‘Are you right, Hodge, or is Mr Dryden? How, tell me this, did she know I’d been over to the quarry? And how did she know, because I’ll swear she knew already, that I’d been to the farmhouse? And why was she anxious to stop my going there again?’
Hodge made no reply, but lifted his chin from the saucer and watched me as I lifted the pan of soup from the stove. Watched me with interest and appare
nt approval, as I crossed to the sink and tipped the lovely-smelling soup down the drain. It was absurd, and after what I had been told today, it was probably plain stupid, but I was remembering the pie that had smelled equally delicious, and the night when, after eating it, I had dreamed an appalling dream. And now, in spite of what William’s father had meant as reassurance, I was recalling the old woman rocking, rocking, behind the lace curtains in the window of the tiny lodge. If our Agnes was a witch I would not trust any of her concoctions, and if she was ‘no great shakes as a witch’ I would trust them even less.
‘So that’s that,’ I said to Hodge, turning on the cold tap to wash the remains of the soup away. ‘And perhaps we’ll have a good night’s sleep tonight, and no nightmares.’
The moon was high, and the night a still-life of black and silver. I suppose it was tempting Providence to repeat my actions of that other night, but before getting into bed I crossed to the window to draw the curtains back, then opened the sash wide and leaned out to look at the night.
Hodge jumped to the sill beside me, and before I could stop myself I had taken hold of him, but tonight there was no magic in the air. No distant music, no wavering light. Only the rich moon of autumn, almost at the full, standing clear above the end of the forest ride, and laying a bright path across the river.
The owl hooted from somewhere near at hand. I looked that way. Nothing but the black mass of the forest trees, brushed here and there with the grey bloom of the moon.
For the new witch of Thornyhold, tonight was, blessedly, just an ordinary night. No light-edged vision. Nothing. And no sound now except the steady purring of an ordinary cat.
