A Taste for Nightshade (24 page)

Hearing Peg return across the stone flags, I waited with the torn cloth in my hand. ‘So what is this?' I demanded. ‘Explain yourself.'

The shock written on her face was so great, it was upsetting to behold. She reached for a stool to support herself and then cast her pitiable face up at me. ‘Honest to God, mistress,' she said, her voice wavering with unshed tears, ‘I was going to tell you. I just need to save up the last few shillings to pay you the five guineas back.'

‘What happened to it?'

‘That feckless washerwoman dropped it in the yard. She never even noticed it was missing till a she-cat had mauled it to tatters. Look,' she lifted a handful of torn silk. ‘Such creatures do this to make nests when they bear kittens.'

‘It doesn't look very dirty,' I protested.

‘I know, thanks be to God it was a dry day. I did have a go at trying to mend it but it's too far gone. So I've asked Mrs Gillies to make you another just the same. I've only another ten shillings to save and she'll get it started.'

I shook my head, impatient with the lot of them – Peg, the washerwoman, the nuisance of a cat. ‘For goodness' sake, Peg. I don't want another gown like that. But I will hold your wages back, mind you. You must pay for half of it, for I left you entirely in charge here. And the washerwoman, fine her a week's wages.'

‘She's already gone, mistress. I replaced her at once.'

‘Very well,' I concluded, my grievance running more and more lukewarm with each passing moment. ‘Peg, I trust you never to allow such carelessness again.' She shook her head, as meek as a lamb.

‘So, what mixture have you got there?'

Still vexed at myself for discovering the gown, I took possession of a little blue bottle with ‘Poppy Drops' handwritten on the label.

Michael and I went up to my room together. Before I could prepare the draught, he approached me, lifting my hand from the glass.

‘Grace,' he said, ‘not so fast. I'll drink it later.' Roughly, he began to unlace my gown.

As I responded to my husband's caresses, Peg's coupling with Jack intruded in my mind. As Michael lifted my shift, I was fearful of embarrassing myself – for I longed to tell him that he was my darling, my lover – and I envied Peg's freedom to exchange her lover's vows. While Michael clung to me like a man in an agony of torture, I pictured Peg tenderly cradled against her lover's chest. It was true; Michael was peculiarly absent from our pleasure; transported to some other place.

In the bed I felt a sticky warmth against my fingers; the long scratches on his thigh, a legacy of Dancer's throw, had re-opened, oozing blood. Michael was upon me, within me, hand in glove, one flesh. I forgot Peg Blissett. I forgot everything of the real world, and loosed myself on a sea of pounding nerves. I drew him within me; I bit my own knuckle hard. Again I felt my body grow tense with a painful sweetness. I arched my neck, I whimpered. At his own moment of crisis Michael made a choking sound, then sank his damp face into my neck. It was over. We were breathing fast together and at peace.

I lay on my side, pressed against Michael, the candle burning low. He still sat up, leaning against the bolster, having at last taken the sleeping draught. I was dozing, enjoying the glow ebbing from my core, when a notion occurred to me.

‘Do you think it may have been this “Regulator” who broke in and ransacked the lieutenant's room?'

‘No. I know who did that,' he said with a grim laugh. I hauled myself upright. I looked at my husband's face, animated in the red glow of the fire.

‘So not Old Dorcas?' I said with some mockery.

‘Not in the sense that those gullible women mean it – no. What do you know of Ashe Moncrieff?'

I recalled to him the bare bones of Nan's tale.

‘And still you haven't guessed where Miss Hannah got to?'

‘As far away from here as she could get, I hope.'

‘Sadly, not.'

Michael's eyes were hugely black from the soporific draught, but he was not sleepy yet. ‘If I were to tell you something about myself – something rather startling – would you try to understand? It is something I cannot help.'

I felt a pricking of fear on my neck. ‘If I can, I will.'

‘My mother chose this house for us. As she no doubt told you, she knew the Hall from her girlhood. She is always telling anyone who will listen how she is related to titled people.'

I waited as he rubbed his forehead, as if trying to shift some inner pain. I reassured myself that all this had happened so long ago it could not affect us now.

‘My mother was only seventeen. She and Moncrieff – they fell in love. They met in secret without his aunt knowing. “Silence was their very god” and all that sort of nonsense.'

For an instant an image of Mrs Croxon as a girl of seventeen flashed before me, as fair and radiant as her sons. I appreciated that before middle-age had coarsened her, she must have been a singularly lovely woman.

‘Your poor mother. And then Moncrieff died. Did the child survive?' I pictured his mother's child – Michael's sibling – fostered somewhere here in the country, perhaps in a cottage with a local family.

‘Of course he did, Grace,' he said shortly. ‘The child was me.'

‘Oh.' My heart thumped uncomfortably.

‘I was still ignorant of most of this when I first came here. Then I discovered the rest of the story and – it all makes sense, far more sense than the claptrap I've been peddled since I was a child. The parish records at Greaves give Croxon as my father, but I've always been the misfit of the family. When Peter was born, it was made perfectly clear who their great favourite was. That termagant, my great-aunt, cut Moncrieff and any of his issue out of her will, so it's not as if I have any rights to this place. But when Mother discovered that the land by the river was owned by you, she thought it the perfect scheme to install me here. As I said, she has something of a passion for the place. Croxon will not allow her to visit, though. That would be insupportable to him.'

At each word of Michael's, I felt myself shrinking, until finally I understood that I was nothing but a tiny link in a chain of his family's forging. As for Michael's paternity, I was alarmed. Michael was no longer who I thought he was. I had not married the elder son of our landlord, Mr Croxon of Greaves. The word
deception
sprang to mind, but I pushed it away.

‘What did you think of your mother's scheme?'

‘I needed to get away from them, to try a new venture – and prove myself. My plan is to free myself of the Croxons altogether. I need to make a fortune independent of them all. Peter can sponge from them. I will not.'

‘But the lieutenant's room? If it wasn't Old Dorcas?' I couldn't bring myself to say Moncrieff's – his father's – name.

‘I had just discovered my life had been a lie. I was desperate to find something, anything, which acknowledged my existence in that hypocritical shrine. I went to that room dead drunk and I lost my head. How could Moncrieff be so stupid and die like that? How dare he desert my mother and leave us in that backwater? And abandon me with nothing, nothing at all, not even a name to call my own? I wanted to destroy his memory.'

I recalled the crackle of broken glass underfoot, the medals hurled about, the portrait hacked and torn in shreds. For a moment I glimpsed through the door into Michael's private misery and then slammed it shut. An icy revulsion crept over me. So these were the hidden thoughts of the man I had married. I couldn't look at him; fearful of betraying my dismay.

‘There's nothing for me here. Even when I first came here, I was uneasy.' He rubbed his eyes, struggling to stay awake. ‘I am so unhappy. I feel so confused all the time. I don't know what to do.'

‘Michael, let's leave here straight away.'

Alarm creased his face. ‘Not straight away. Soon.'

I reached for his hand. ‘I will help you be strong, Michael.' I would have to abandon my plans for Delafosse, but the compensations would be great. In a lively town our marriage might still flourish. The shame of it was, so much of my capital was gone, but perhaps we might live on what was left until he recovered himself. Also, leaving would spare him the temptation of meeting that woman at the tower again.

Michael lay down, staring glassily at the ceiling. His speech was growing incoherent. ‘When I think of leaving – impossible. Yet to stay – only so much I can bear. To be a slave to other people's wills. Where does my happiness lie?'

Your happiness lies with me, I wanted to say. Can you not see it? Instead I kept silent and tried to comfort him.

‘I am so ashamed of myself,' he exclaimed, flinching and shaking me off.

As a bell chimed one o'clock, Michael curled up on his side. I held him gently, feeling his breath grow easy in sleep. Almost at once he kicked out as if dreaming of flight. Poor, poor Michael, I crooned silently as I stroked his disarrayed hair. But what of me? His family had deceived me; they had manoeuvred me into marrying their – I scrabbled for the kindest word – natural-gotten son. He was, I finally admitted to myself, not merely capricious, or even melancholic. Michael's destruction of the lieutenant's room convinced me he was not healthy in his mind. I had to be fearless, I told myself. If we moved away quickly, he might leave these morbid preoccupations behind. True, we would be horribly alone, beleaguered by hostile forces if we attempted to complete the mill; and lacking even the Croxons' money and support. He needed me and my money more than ever, just as I – and I could scarcely admit it even to myself – detected a distinct loosening of the bond of affection between myself and him. I shivered to think of the two of us alone, adrift, chasing Michael's dreams of riches, sinking in debt, tainted by failure.

If I thought of Peg at all, that sleepless night, it was with regret that we might soon be forced to dismiss her. At such a time you do not wonder what your servant is thinking, down those narrow stairs in a locked room far away in the basement, distilling and boiling and mixing receipts, laying down stores in preparation of never, ever leaving.

 

 

Peg's cleaver banged and cracked on the rutted butcher's block as she shattered beef bones to extract the marrow. Something had changed at Delafosse Hall, Peg decided, as she aimed a well-judged blow towards the bloody leg-bones. ‘Seize the reins,' had always been Charlie's byword, and that's what she had done, right from the day she arrived. But, by her calculations, matters were drifting. The whole rigmarole had to be tightened up.

Mrs Croxon had not behaved as she had predicted. That rumpus over the green gown had almost dumbfounded her. A bloody cat was all she'd been able to muster. And all those cold-eyed questions about her voyage, for instance. For the first time, she'd detected something as hard as flint in her mistress's backbone. Then there was that other peculiar change: she had stopped spending money on the house. That very morning, she had been leading the charwomen into the library when the mistress stopped her.

‘That won't be necessary,' she said. ‘There will be no more improvements at present.'

‘But mistress,' Peg answered, ‘what about those library bookcases in the pattern book? I thought you was ordering them.'

‘No,' Mrs Croxon had said to her, all hoity-toity, in front of the chars. ‘You forget – it is my money you are so quick to spend. If you don't need these women for any other purpose, send them home.'

The chars had grumbled at a wasted journey, while she herself had raged like a she-bear. She had been looking forward to seeing those smart shelves filled with the leather books from York. Something was going on.

She flung down the cleaver and threw the bones to one side. She had thought of making a rich marrow pudding, with brandy and eggs, to a receipt of Janey's from
Mother Eve's Secrets
. But, stow it, she felt like a dog stuck in a wheel, turning the meat-spit but never advancing. The master was out at Whitelow all day. There was only the mistress for dinner. What did she care? She could have hard cheese and bread and butter. She could try short rations for a change.

Leaving Nan with orders to roast the marrow bones instead, she returned to her quarters. Then, wrapped in a woollen cloak and hood – thinking all the while that Mrs Croxon's nip-waisted redingote didn't half look elegant, as well as warm – she headed off to the glade. Outside, the air was white and damp; the cold pinched her nose as she headed down narrow paths of slithery brown leaves. Damn, the glade was dismal at this time of year; the trees that had once recalled the island were naked and spiky-fingered. She tried to settle on the hollow tree trunk, but was fearful of the damp. Raising the flute to her lips she couldn't conjure Jack at all. She should never have spoiled it by talking of him to Mrs Croxon. She tried again to raise a tune, and this time a mournful hoarseness emerged. With fingers as cold as the grave she repeated the refrain Jack had taught her. Raising the flute like a church wafer to her lips, she recollected Jack and the terrible secret of his end.

At first they had talked of rescue from the black beach, and spent each day watching the ocean for ships. But as the weeks passed, and the ocean stayed forever empty, she no longer cared to leave. Instead, she fancied they were the only two persons alive in the world, stranded on that beach in some long ago time. Though her clothes were rags, she strung jangling shells about her neck, and fashioned a sun-hat of leaves and feathers. The beachcombing life was the happiest she had ever known.

Jack taught her how to forage, and boil each type of victual, and chew only little titbits, to be sure they wouldn't be poisoned. They discovered sea spinach and a sort of watercress, and meat in abundance. The easiest to catch was a witless wandering bird that couldn't fly, that she christened a Warbling Hen. They had shellfish for the picking, and fat eels to be walloped and roasted. Each night they feasted under the stars, as Jack spun yarns and sang ballads, and they tried to count the great multitude of stars in the Pacific sky. That was when he taught her how to play his flute, sitting her on his lap and directing her fingers with his. Afterwards, she'd trace the dark tattoos on his body: the Union Jack on the bulge of his arm, the chain and key that circled his wrist. In Sydney Cove he'd gained a kangaroo, along with all his lag-ship crew, which looked like a leaping fox. The finest to her eyes was the hangman's rope that had been inked with a sharpened bone around his neck. They were both scapegallows together, both breathing borrowed air that tasted all the sweeter.

One day he asked her about the personation racket. ‘I see you doing it, changing your voice, your manner. It's like you're someone else, Mary. I never seen anyone do it as good as you, not even on the stage.' They were sitting on the cliff top, resting on a foray for bird's eggs. Below them was the ocean, every day different, a patchwork of shadows and silver, rising in white-spumed breakers towards the shore.

If they had been any other place, she'd never have talked. Now, with her hands clasped around her knees and nothing before her but the blue Pacific, restless and unending, a thousand miles from England, her tongue loosened. ‘What someone such as me is born to – hard labour, being kicked about, with nothing ever fine or good in prospect – it's not fair, Jack. I found out the trick as a girl, there's a knack to the game. If you can only puff yourself up into someone else, everyone believes you.'

‘You got to have almighty pluck, I reckon.'

‘Aye. You got to keep your mettle, like you're going into war. There's life or death to your personation in every eye that remarks you. Mostly, mind, you need only climb the ladder of other folks' stupidity. I know how weak-headed most folk are. Rich folk are the stupidest, as soft as muck. The right gown, a few clever words, and they swallow it.'

Jack shifted and stole a side glance at her. ‘So you reckon we're all gulls but for you?'

She turned to him, clear-eyed. ‘Aye. How else can I do it if I don't believe that? And there's a wildness to it, a thrill in your blood. Like a gambler tossing the dice between fortune and famine. Most folk are sheep, Jack.'

‘And you're a she-wolf?' he said sourly.

‘No. A vixen, perhaps. Proud and alone.'

‘Not so lonely now. And beautiful, by God.' He reached for her and they tumbled back onto the grass.

‘And true to you, Jack.'

‘And me to you.'

Gradually the cold had crept up on them. The nights grew perishing, and they had to sleep inside bigger heaps of ferns. The days grew shorter, and rain fell in bucket-loads. They crouched under dripping branches, the ground sinking like a swamp.

They decided to move up-country, until the rains stopped. The next dry day they started out, following the river, struggling through tangled bush. It was slow going, for their feet were wrapped only in leaves, their shoes long since destroyed. By noon the path reached a dead end, where the river dropped into a gorge of foaming white. They were all set to head back again when Jack sighted a path above them in the tangled scrub. She could just see it; a zigzag over the rocks, and a gap where it entered the trees.

The track led into a sort of tunnel made of forest. They left daylight behind, a thousand leaves hemming them into dusky shade. As she traipsed behind Jack's torn blue jacket, he squinted into the foliage, hearkening to every cracking twig or bird-chirrup. After what seemed an age, they came out into blessed sunshine again. They were in a clearing, their ears filled with a thundering wind, the air itself trembling. A few paces further they came upon the source: above them, a waterfall tumbled from a clifftop as high as a church steeple. The water fell in milky blue strands, shooting spray in the air that danced in rainbows of gold, pink and blue. At their feet was a deep and inviting lagoon. It fair took her breath away.

Jack crouched to look at the pool's edge, where a mud bank was scrabbled with marks.

‘We should go back,' he said. ‘Something drinks here.'

She didn't care. She was spellbound. ‘Look, a cave!' Across the lagoon stood a dark entrance hung with pretty mosses, like a fairy grotto.

‘Just one peep,' she whispered, for there was something powerful and secret about the place. ‘Then we can go back.'

But Jack was still peering at the tracks around the water's edge.

‘Whatever drinks here, it's not here now. I dare you, Jack. A quick look around the cave and then we'll be on our way.' She had a notion, from some story or other, that caves were places where treasure was hidden; she reckoned pirates might have left jewels and plunder behind long ago.

‘It's the end of the rainbow,' she laughed. ‘Let's find our crock of gold.'

Jack hung back as they reached the cave mouth. ‘I don't like it here.' He grasped her arm and looked about the place. The water crashed endlessly beside them, so he had to shout. ‘I been thinking. That track was too narrow for a deer, or suchlike.'

That excited her even more. There would be treasure, she was sure of it. She strode into the cave mouth, and the sudden chill made the hairs on her bare arms rise. Further in, it was pitchy dark, with no glinting gold to guide her way.

‘Wait.' Jack pulled out their fire basket that held an ember inside dry fungus. After Jack had fashioned a rough torch, they both entered the cave. Disappointment met her, for it was as bare as a tomb.

She pushed on deeper inside, more from vexation than any great hope. Jack followed her, his bush fire wavering and smoking.

‘That's enough now,' he kept saying. But still he followed her as she sallied on, silent and furious with disappointment. Finally she saw something against a far wall. Dark fruits they were; wrinkled globes, with fibrous leaves sprouting from their tops.

‘It's a fruit store,' she cried, happy at least to have discovered some new-fangled food. She grasped one, but it was that leathery to the touch she knew at once it wouldn't make good eating. Jack approached her with the spluttering torch and held it up close. Her fingers had already probed its bumpy skin, and what she fancied were hard seeds growing from the bottom. Jack's torch flared and shone on her find.

It was a small, leathery head. A human head, with hard teeth, and a tuft of dry black hair. In front of them were dozens more; shrunken heads that bore savage patterns inked upon them, row on row of ungodly faces. The torch in Jack's hand sizzled and died. She screamed like a stuck pig and dropped the shrivelled head on the floor. It thudded like a leather ball, then rolled a short way in the dust.

‘Quiet!' Jack cried, pulling her away. ‘Stow it, let's go.' Like two blind men they groped their way back the way they had come, fearing to touch the walls, desperate for the light.

They stumbled out of the cave mouth, blinking at the shining lagoon. On the other side of the water was the path back to their beach camp. And there, standing on the far side of the lagoon, stood three large and terrifying savages. Jack saw them first. He clapped a hand on her shoulder and shoved her back down, trying to push her back to the cave. An instant later a spear vibrated in the dust beside them.

‘Get in the water. Make for the path,' Jack hissed. ‘Keep low!' Another spear whistled above them – two of the savages were pelting towards them. She gaped at them. The black spirals covering their naked brown skin put her in mind of monstrous man-shaped lizards.

‘Bolt!' Jack pushed her. She slithered out into the sunlight. On her belly she wriggled toward the water's edge. At the sound of a war-like shriek she tumbled into the lagoon, landing in water and weed. Righting herself, she raised her eyes above the rushes. A spear-shaft trembled where she had lain a moment before.

Jack was standing courageously at the cave mouth, his short knife raised in his hand. The two warriors were almost upon him, swinging polished stone cudgels.

‘Go!' Jack shouted over his shoulder. But she was transfixed. A primitive emotion hammered in her veins. She, whose one rule was her own survival, could not leave Jack to die alone.

Grasping the spear impaled in the riverbank, she hauled herself back onto dry land. The two attackers had slowed down a few paces from Jack. They made a recognisable sound: deep-throated, scornful laughter. Grasping the advantage, Jack bull-charged the larger man, driving his knife hard into his naked chest. Entirely surprised, the man rolled his eyes at the knife handle standing in his chest, staggered drunkenly, and fell like a logged tree to the ground. Jack's second attacker gaped with surprise, then turned to Jack. She watched in disbelief as the savage lifted his club and swung it down hard onto Jack's head. There was a sickening crack, and her precious Jack dropped to his knees. She ran to him, she couldn't help herself. As he sank to the ground she threw herself onto him, trying to staunch the head wound that spurted warm crimson over her hands. His blue eyes blinked slowly, then fixed on the dust. In a moment they grew hazy as his life departed him. Her sweetheart, her true love, was dead.