Thornyhold

by Mary Stewart

  20

  I straightened up to lean on the spade, and pushed the hair back out of my eyes with a blackberry-stained hand.

  ‘Why, hullo! How nice to see you. I – I thought you might come over. Did William ask you to come for the dog?’

  ‘Yes. It made a wonderful excuse.’

  ‘I beg your pardon?’

  He smiled at me, and I got the impression that the sun came out and all the birds suddenly burst out singing. I took some sort of control of my besotted thoughts, and said feebly: ‘Do come in. I was just finishing here.’

  ‘If I’d come a few minutes earlier, I’d have done that for you. I’m not as good a practical man as William, but I don’t mind deputising now and then. Give me the spade and I’ll clean it off.’

  I surrendered it. ‘Did you come through the wood?’

  ‘No, my car’s in the drive. Didn’t you hear it? From what William said, I reckoned it would be too far for the poor beast to walk. There. Do you want it put back in the toolshed?’ Then, as his eye fell on the empty pile of sacks in the corner, with real anxiety: ‘The dog? You weren’t burying the dog?’

  ‘No, no! Only some fruit that had to be thrown away. He’s fine.’

  ‘Thank goodness for that! I wouldn’t have dared go back without him.’

  ‘William didn’t come with you, then?’

  ‘No. He’s gone on his bicycle to Arnside to see if he can get a collar and lead and some dog food.’

  ‘It’s terribly good of you to help out like this. Do you mind? Or rather, do you really not mind? It’ll only be for a few days till, well, till things get sorted out here.’

  ‘Look, please don’t worry. Of course I don’t mind. William told me what happened, and we’ll be glad to do what we can. Where is he?’

  ‘Up in the attic. I was afraid they’d – afraid someone might see him if I kept him down here. I was just going up to see him, and put some stuff on that tail. Have you time to come in and have a cup of coffee? Or – heavens, I didn’t realise it was that time! – would you like some sherry? I found quite a store in the sideboard.’

  ‘Indeed yes. I know Miss Saxon’s sherry. Thank you.’

  He seemed to know where it was, too, and the glasses. While I washed my hands and put the jelly pan to rinse he found and brought sherry and glasses into the kitchen. He looked round appreciatively.

  ‘I always liked this house. I’m glad you’re letting it stay just the same.’

  ‘I love it. It felt like home from the very start. Shall we fetch Rags down now, and let him get used to you before he’s handed over?’

  ‘Good idea. He won’t have had much of a chance yet to trust people. Did you find out where he came from?’

  ‘Not yet. I don’t really want to, because one thing’s certain, I’m not handing him back. He’s here to stay. The attic stair’s this way, through the back kitchen.’

  ‘I know.’

  He followed me through and opened the staircase door for me.

  ‘You know the house pretty well,’ I said.

  ‘I came here quite a lot. I was very fond of your cousin.’

  As I opened the attic door I was met by a very different dog from the one that William and I had rescued. He came to meet me, and the whole of his tail was wagging. His body was still arched, tucked in over the shrunken belly, but the eyes were different, and they were eyes I knew, eager and loving. I knelt down to greet him, and held him while Mr Dryden made much of him. I left them together while I went to get grain for the birds.

  ‘You knew she kept pigeons, of course? Did you ever come up here?’

  ‘A couple of times.’ He was talking gently to the dog, which had tried to follow me, but allowed the man to hold him back. I saw Mr Dryden eyeing the birds as they flew down to the food. ‘Three of them?’

  ‘Yes. Did William tell you about the message?’

  ‘Yes, he did. I hope he was meant to? That is – you didn’t mean him not to?’

  ‘Oh, no. Was he still worried about it?’

  ‘I don’t think so. Puzzled, that’s all, but I explained.’

  He got to his feet as I dropped the grain scoop back into the crock. Rags came sidling up to me, ears flattened, ready for a caress, then went ahead of us down the first steep flight with a stumble and a rush, and stood waiting on the landing, almost the picture of a dog eager for a promised walk.

  ‘They recover fast, don’t they?’ said Mr Dryden. ‘I don’t think you need worry. By the time he comes back to you we’ll have him as fit as a fiddle.’

  ‘Can you manage the food, do you think? It’s not always easy for the cat, and I’ve never kept a dog.’

  ‘We’re living on a farm, remember. There’s plenty. In fact the corn you’re feeding to the pigeons was a gift from our hens.’

  ‘Really? I’m grateful yet again. What did you tell William?’

  He turned to shut the staircase door. ‘What about?’

  ‘The pigeon with the message. You said you “explained” to him.’

  ‘Oh. Well, I should have said, “explained as best I could”.’

  ‘Which was?’

  ‘I gather I said much the same as you did. The only way it could have happened is for someone to have taken a bird and released it just after you got here.’

  ‘Yes, but what really worried him was that she wrote the message herself, and this must have meant that she foresaw her own death.’

  ‘Not necessarily, surely? She may well have pictured herself coming back from hospital, with you ensconced here to share it with her?’

  I shook my head. ‘She knew. And she knew more than that; she foresaw my father’s death as well.’ I told him about the dated letter that had been lodged with the will, and what she had said to me that day by the river. ‘I told William that even if she did foresee her own death, such things weren’t so very uncommon, and in fact I knew Cousin Geillis would have been glad of the knowledge.’ I looked at him. ‘It would be nice to feel that way, but I’m not sure that I could. Could you?’

  He shook his head. ‘She was a tougher character than I could ever be. But it fits. It rings true. William accepted it, anyway.’

  ‘Then that’s all right. I asked Agnes who took the pigeons and she said it was someone called Masson who lives over your way. Do you know him?’

  ‘Yes, he’s Mr Yelland’s shepherd. Yelland is the farmer who owns Taggs Farm. It was once two farms, but it was joined into one when he married Bessie Corbett, so now the Yellands live at Black Cocks and I rent the other house.’

  ‘Boscobel.’

  He smiled. ‘It appealed more than Taggs Farm.’

  ‘And Mr Masson?’

  ‘He has a cottage a couple of miles away, at Tidworth.’

  ‘Do you suppose he could have released that bird on the date she gave him?’

  ‘I suppose he might. If the birds were all there with him, he must have done.’

  We were back in the kitchen, and Rags rushed forward to explore Hodge’s empty dinner-bowl. Hodge was on the table, washing. He spat once, a token hiss, as the dog came into the room, then went back to his washing.

  I laughed. ‘No trouble there. Well, the pigeon mystery can wait till I see Mr Masson myself. Do sit down.’

  He poured sherry and handed me a glass. ‘Does it worry you?’

  ‘Not a bit. Actually, I liked it. It was like her.’

  ‘Have there been other messages?’

  ‘Only one, and that was better still. It came like a blessing from the air.’

  He was silent, sensing perhaps that I wanted to say no more. We sat watching while the dog scoured the empty bowl, then came over to us for attention. The cat washed, attending to nobody but himself.

  I smoothed the dog’s head. ‘Do you know of a stone circle hereabouts?’

  He looked amused. ‘Well, there’s Stonehenge.’

  ‘Oh, heavens, I suppose there is! But not as big as that. A little one.’

  ‘Actually, Stonehenge isn�
��t as big as one imagines it from the pictures. Haven’t you ever seen it?’

  ‘No. I didn’t realise it was so near. I’m from the far north, remember? No, I did wonder if there was a small one, something like the one near Keswick, maybe not far from the quarry? The quarry where we met?’

  Even as I said it, something about the phrase stopped me short, confused. It was a lovers’ phrase, and it seemed to go ringing on and on between us.

  But he seemed to notice nothing. (And why indeed should he? You’re on your own in this, Geillis Ramsey.) He was saying: ‘There’s nothing like that hereabouts that I know of. Certainly nowhere near Boscobel or Black Cocks. But Stonehenge – you’ve really never seen it? Would you like to?’

  ‘Love to. Once summer comes again, and I’ve maybe got myself a car and some petrol to run it on—’

  ‘I have a car, and the tank is full, and the weather is gorgeous right now. How about this afternoon? It’s not far.’

  ‘I – why, I’d love to. But – are you sure? What about the book? I thought you were head down in that.’

  ‘For once it can take second place. I was going to ask you today, anyway, if you’d like to go out somewhere; coming for Rags just made the excuse. We can take him home and have a sandwich or something—’

  ‘I could give you something here, if you’d like it. An omelette? Thanks to you, I’m well off for eggs.’

  ‘Thank you, but no. William will be home by now, and he’ll be watching the road for you.’

  I laughed. ‘For Rags, don’t you mean?’

  ‘Of course. We’ll have a sandwich at Boscobel. Please say yes.’

  ‘Yes. It sounds lovely. Thank you, Mr Dryden. Will you have some more sherry while I go up and get the ointment for Rags, and collect a jacket for myself?’

  * * *

  The drive over to Boscobel began almost in silence. I remember the whisper of the car’s tyres on the moss of the drive, the dapple of sunlight sliding over us as we purred under the trees, the flash of blue as a jay fled low across the bonnet. My companion did not speak, and whether it was the effect of his close proximity, and the sudden feeling of intimacy given by a closed car, coupled with the too vivid knowledge of my own feelings, I found myself gripped by something of my old, crippling diffidence, and was glad of the dog’s presence as a bridge to the silence. Rags seemed nervous of the car at first, and I had to make much of him as I held him down under the dashboard till we were past the lodge.

  As the car threaded its way between the twin halves of the lodge I saw the curtains on our right – Agnes’s side – twitch ever so slightly, and fall straight again. And on the other side the shadow rocking to and fro, to and fro, in the solitude of the tiny house.

  We turned out into the sunlight of the road. Mr Dryden spoke at last. ‘They were there.’

  ‘Yes. I saw.’

  ‘Well, you can let him up now. Will he go on the back seat, do you think?’

  But when I tried to ease Rags back across the gearbox, he refused to go, so I kept him where he was, on my knee, and sat back as comfortably as I could.

  Mr Dryden glanced down. ‘Are you all right like that?’

  ‘I’m fine. He doesn’t weigh much, poor chap. He’ll settle down soon. Do you know, Mr Dryden, it must be years, literally, since I had a run out, like this, just for pleasure. It’s wonderful!’

  ‘I’m glad. And do you think you could make it Christopher? Or even Christopher John? That’s what I was always called when I was a boy, to distinguish me from my father. Whichever you like. Will you, please?’

  ‘I – yes, thank you. And you know mine.’

  The car gathered speed. The hedges streamed by. ‘William calls you Gilly. I understand you asked him to. Do you like that, or Geillis?’

  I smiled and echoed him. ‘Whichever you like.’

  ‘Geillis.’ He said it very softly, as if to himself, and a shiver went up my spine. I hugged Rags to me and put my head down to his. ‘Do you know,’ added Christopher John, ‘that it’s a real witch’s name?’

  My head came up with a jerk. ‘Good heavens, no! Is it? I used to ask my mother where the name came from, but she never told me. Cousin Geillis’s name, I mean. I was called after her.’

  ‘She was your godmother?’

  ‘Sponsor, she called it. She wasn’t – at least she made out that she wasn’t – on terms with God.’

  (The second message: Welcome to Thornyhold and God bless your sleep? Who had sent it? Who?)

  He was saying something about Edinburgh, and the witch trials there. ‘There was a Geillis Duncane. She’s mentioned in the Demonology. And so, incidentally, is one Agnes Sampson. And I seem to have seen that lamb-like name cropping up elsewhere in the chronicles of witchcraft – as well, that is, as our own Agnes, who works at it with the best of them.’

  ‘And I’ll bet she’s the prettiest witch in the coven.’ I said it lightly, more for something to say than for any other reason.

  ‘Pretty? Is she? I suppose she is.’

  Whether it was the indifference of his tone, the absent way he spoke as he steered carefully to overtake a couple of cyclists on that narrow road, but that was the moment at which the scales dropped from my eyes with a thud that I could actually hear, only it was the twisting thud of my heart.

  I saw it all – no, not all, but many things that I ought to have seen long before.

  Agnes Trapp had not drugged the blackberries. She had picked them because, quite simply, she did not want me to go over to the quarry again, and perhaps go up to Boscobel. And she had deliberately lied to me – or misled me – about Christopher John’s wife.

  The reason? So bemused and bedazzled had I been that I had not taken into account the fact that other women might be just as responsive to my homme fatal as I was. Like an arrow striking home, the simple truth thudded into my brain. Agnes was in love with him, too.

  William was waiting, hanging over the gate.

  As we approached he swung it wider, and we drove into the yard. I opened my door, and Rags jumped out. For a moment he stood looking doubtfully about him, ready, I think, to be afraid of another strange place, with its new sights and smells. Then the boy called, ‘Rags! Rags!’ and boy and dog flew together.

  We left them and went into the house.

  21

  We did see Stonehenge. In those days it stood unfenced, deserted, small in the middle of the great Plain, but as one left the road and walked to it across the grass the stones reared themselves to their awesome height, and the circle closed round with its own old magic.

  This was certainly not the stone circle of my dream. There were harebells in the grass, and the lichens on the tall stones were beautiful in the sunlight, green and amber and furry grey as chinchilla. The breeze in the long autumn grasses sounded like the ripple of a slow river. Late though the year was, an occasional bird-call echoed over the Plain. Above us the sky arched, enormous, wisps of cloud breaking and forming and flowing through the blue like the creaming of a quiet sea.

  There was no one else there. We walked slowly round between the massive menhirs, while Christopher John told me about the place. Nothing was known, he said, about its origins or the great men of our pre-history who had built it, but there was evidence to show where the stones had come from, and this, considering their size and the distances involved, was barely credible. Of course legends had arisen to explain the apparent miracle of the building. It had been erected in a night by Merlin, and King Uther Pendragon lay buried at its centre. The Druids had sacrificed their wretched victims there. Its builders had oriented it towards the rising sun of the summer solstice, and people still came sometimes to pray there, and watch for wonders. It was a calendar, a gigantic time-keeper of the years. It was a thousand-milestone on the path of some sky-haunting dragon …

  None of it, truth or legend, was needed to enhance the magic of the place. For me, that was there in the clean air and the breeze on the grasses and the singing of happiness.

&nbs
p; We had tea at Avebury, at an inn in the very centre of another circle so vast that the whole cannot be seen from any of its stones. Parts of it were lost in the fields round about, and a village with its roads and lanes cut here and there through the ring. We made no attempt to walk round it, but drove home instead by green byways, where Christopher John stopped the car once or twice to let me gather wild flowers and berries ‘to draw’, I told him. ‘I used to do a lot, but I had to let it go rather, and I’d like to start again now that I’ve got the house straight.’

  And all the time, we talked. That fit of shyness had passed as if it had never been, and the earlier ease had come back. I forget now all that we talked about, but at length, on the way home, I began to learn about him. We stopped beside the river bridge over the Arn, with the ruins of the old abbey beyond the trees catching the reddening rays of the sun, and he sat on the parapet and talked while I gathered bryony from the hedgerow, and glossy berries of honeysuckle, and a handful of the exquisite late harebells that look so fragile, but are as tough as wire.

  He had served through the war in the Western Desert: he said very little about that, except that he had known Sidney Keyes, the young poet who was killed in 1943, at the age of twenty, and who, had he lived, said Christopher John, would have been one of the greatest of our time.

  ‘In fact is, even so,’ he said. ‘Do you know his work?’

  ‘I don’t think so. I’m afraid I haven’t read poetry much at all lately. I used to love Walter de la Mare.’

  ‘“The sweetest singer, and one of the most profound thinkers of our age.”’ It sounded like a quotation, which it apparently was. ‘He was my wife’s favourite,’ he said. ‘She worked as poetry editor for the Aladdin Press. She and William stayed with her sister in Essex during the war, but she had to go up to London for a meeting, and there was a raid that night. She was killed, while I was sitting quite safely somewhere near Tobruk. William can just remember her.’ He went on then to tell me about her, Cecily, William’s mother, dead these six years. He spoke of her with love, but without grief. Six years, and whatever the loss, happiness steals back.