Hiding From the Light (49 page)

‘I’m so sorry, Sarah.’ Anthony Bennett looked down at his daughter gravely. It was only a few days since she had been released but she had lost so much weight in recent weeks, and now her thin face was ravaged with pain and fear as well and he was about to compound her misery. ‘They were hanged yesterday at Chelmsford. There was nothing more that could be done to save them.’ He glanced at John Pepper, who was standing beside him, his eyes lowered respectfully. ‘John was there. He was able to speak to her briefly and pray with her.’

Sarah stared at John Pepper. Her lips had tightened into a thin white line as she struggled to hold back her tears. He did not look at her. She knew her father was lying about John. There would have been no comfort. No prayers. There would have been nothing but terror and confusion as they tied the old lady’s wrists and put the noose around her thin neck and pulled the knot tight under her chin. Four of them had died that day, all from the Manningtree area.

‘Thank you for telling me, Papa.’ Somehow she managed to keep her face calm; somehow she managed to hide her rage, her misery, her tears, until she had left the room and walked slowly up the staircase towards the nurseries where she had been a child. The nurseries where her children would have played.

She pushed open the door and stood there, seeing the sunbeams slanting in through the small mullioned windows, seeing the carved rocking horse, the wooden cradle, the rag dolls. Seeing Liza, as a young pretty nursemaid as she must have been when she looked after Sarah’s own mother; seeing her as a strong clever woman as she was when Sarah was a child. Seeing her as an old gentle nurse, her knotted swollen fingers chopping herbs, blending creams and lotions, tending the sick with gentle kindness. And then she saw the gallows, the four bodies jerking on the end of their ropes, the lifeless stillness as one by one they died in agony. She heard the jeers and torments of the crowds and then the silence as they grew bored and dispersed, leaving only the crows and kites to tend the dead.

‘Sweet Liza, tell me what to do.’

She didn’t realise she had spoken out loud.

But of course she already knew. She would kill Matthew Hopkins. She would see him swim or sink, his limbs tied, see his body contorted in agony, see him walk until he hallucinated and screamed his own guilt, and then she would see him die in an agony of choking. Slowly she walked out into the middle of the room, feeling the warmth of the sunbeams stroking through the layers of petticoats and skirts which swathed her legs. ‘I swear to you, Liza. On the lives of my children yet unborn, I will avenge you.’ Slowly she turned round, drinking in the sweet silence of the room. ‘I will pursue him until I have revenge. He will not make me afraid. He will not hunt me again. My anger is too great. And my power, from the Lord Lucifer, too strong.’

She smiled wryly to herself. She had sworn on her children yet unborn and she was a widow; a widow who had borne no children.

But already she could see them. See the man who would be her second husband, see the man who with the aid of Liza’s spells she would lure to her bed, who would father her children, who would live with her here in this house one day and watch with her their children play in this very room.

But first there was business to attend to. A man must be punished for the evil he had done and she would not rest until his soul was frying in the fires of Hell.

‘Where have you been?’ Alex was in the hall when Paula unlocked the door and came in. She looked exhausted. ‘What the hell is going on?’

‘I went to see some of the ladies in the prayer circle.’ Paula pushed past him into the kitchen. ‘You know Judith Sadler is dead, I suppose.’

Alex stared at her. ‘No, I didn’t know. I don’t know anything! I have been stuck here all day with a sick child.’

‘A sick –?’ Paula stared at him. ‘Oh God, not Jamie again?’

Alex nodded.

‘What’s wrong with him?’ Already she was in the hall, heading for the stairs.

‘I don’t know. He’s feverish. I put him to bed.’

‘Bed?’ She turned halfway up the stairs and looked at him ‘Has he eaten anything?’

‘No.’

‘Oh God, I shouldn’t have gone out and left him.’ She was running upstairs now, two at a time.

Jamie’s bedroom was dimly lit by a small bedside light. He was lying in bed, half asleep, tossing his head from side to side.

‘Sweetheart?’ Paula sat down on the bed. ‘What is it? What’s wrong?’

He didn’t answer.

A small figure had appeared in the doorway behind them. Sophie was sucking her thumb. ‘It’s Lyn,’ she said. ‘She’s cross with you, Mummy. She said she could make Jamie sick, just like that!’ She raised her hand in an imitation of the gesture Lyn had made when they had met her in Barker’s shop. Her little fingers couldn’t make the clicking noise and she tried again.

Paula stared at her in horror. ‘It’s Lyndsey’s revenge,’ she muttered. ‘She’s fighting us. She’s going to destroy us. She has just killed Judith and now she’s going to hurt me through my children!’

‘Now, just a minute!’ Alex put his hand on her shoulder. ‘That’s nonsense, Paula, and you know it. Don’t even think such things.’

She was pushing the hair back off Jamie’s face with small agitated movements of her hand. The little boy’s head was drenched with sweat. ‘He’s got a high temperature, Alex. You’d better ring the doctor. We’ve got to cool him down.’

She stood up and headed for the bathroom. ‘Go on, call Dr Good.’ She was ringing out a facecloth under the cold tap. ‘That bitch. I’ll see she pays for this. She can’t attack my children and get away with it. You wait till I tell the group.’ Her voice was shaking with anger.

Sophie began to cry. ‘Am I bewitched too, Mummy?’ She ran to Paula, clinging to her arm.

Paula looked at Alex. ‘You see what you’ve done?’

‘What
I’ve
done?’ Alex frowned. ‘Stop frightening them, Paula, for God’s sake. Jamie’s picked up a bug of some kind, that’s all. Nothing more than that.’ He headed for the stairs. ‘I’ll ring Dr Good.’

Paula went back into the bedroom and began to sponge Jamie’s face and hands, feeling the heat soaking into the washcloth, soothing the little boy’s restlessness. She called Sophie to her. ‘Come over here, darling. We have to pray. We have to pray that a great big angel will come down and take Lyn away. She’s become a bad person.’ Her hands were shaking.

The phone was ringing in their bedroom. She ignored it. She was praying under her breath as Sophie ran backwards and forwards to the bathroom with fresh, cold facecloths.

When Alex reappeared he was panting slightly from the stairs. ‘I’ve spoken to Dr Good. He says Jamie will be fine. Give him some Calpol and let him sleep. Bring him into the surgery tomorrow if you are still worried.’

‘He said what?’ Paula’s eyes narrowed. ‘Did you tell him how ill the poor little boy is?’

‘Of course.’

‘Did you tell him what is wrong with him?’ Paula shook her head. ‘Of course not. You’re too bloody diffident, Alex! Go on, out of my way. You look after him and I’ll speak to the doctor.’

Alex and Sophie heard her shrieking down the phone in the distance. ‘My child is bewitched, Doctor! Bewitched! You have to get here now!’ She slammed down the phone. Seconds later she had reappeared. ‘He’ll come,’ she said grimly. ‘In the meantime we are doing the right thing to keep him cool.’ She looked up at Alex. ‘The phone rang. Who was it?’

‘Piers. He said Emma is in a terrible state. He was up there this morning and he had to leave her. He’s worried.’ He didn’t mention that Lyndsey had been there too, apparently.

‘Is he.’ Paula pursed her lips. ‘Tough. We want nothing to do with Emma. I hope you didn’t say you’d go on one of your little mercy jaunts up there.’ She turned and looked at him. ‘You did, didn’t you?’

‘No, of course I didn’t.’

‘No. And you’re not going to.’ Paula was growing rapidly more agitated. ‘That woman is part of it, Alex. She and her cats. They have bewitched your child, she and Lyndsey. They are evil. Vicious. They are murderers.’ Her voice was rising hysterically. ‘They killed Judith, for God’s sake!’

‘Paula.’ Alex put his hand on her shoulder and squeezed it hard. ‘
Pas devant les enfants!
Don’t say things like that. Just don’t.’ He was looking very cross.

She sighed loudly. ‘You’re a fool, Alex. A complete fool. Can’t you see it? Perhaps they have bewitched you, too. Jesus Christ! You should hear the others in the group. They want to go out now and do something about this. They want to get Lyndsey! Pray! Pray your son lives. Pray your daughter isn’t struck down. Pray you’re not!’ She grabbed another cold cloth from Sophie who was standing watching her brother with huge frightened eyes. ‘You don’t realise how powerful she is, Alex. That’s the trouble. She has had everyone fooled. Everyone!’ She bent to kiss Jamie’s forehead.

‘Is he better, Mummy?’ Sophie’s face was wet with tears.

‘Yes, darling. I think he’s a little better.’ Paula reached out and hugged her. ‘And the doctor will soon be here. He’ll know what to do.’

‘If you ask me,’ Alex put in, ‘this is more Mike Sinclair’s department.’ He turned at the sound of the doorbell. ‘That’ll be the doctor. I’ll let him in.’

James Good had dropped everything at the surgery to come, leaving two indignant patients waiting. He was far more worried by Paula’s hysteria than by the description of Jamie’s illness.

‘That bitch, Lyndsey Clark, has put a spell on him. She’s a witch. A Satanist. Please, Doctor, you’ve got to help us.’ Paula dragged him to Jamie’s bedside. As he sat down and reached into his case for thermometer and stethoscope she was pulling at his sleeve. ‘You know it was Lyndsey who killed Judith Sadler? She bewitched her too. It was a spell.’

James Good looked up at Paula over his glasses. ‘Mrs West, I can’t believe I’m hearing all this nonsense from you.’ His voice was so stern it silenced her for a moment. ‘Poor Miss Sadler died from massive haemorrhaging as a result of a reaction to some medication she had been given. I assure you, she was neither murdered nor bewitched. Now, if you would please be quiet, perhaps I can listen to your son’s chest!’

Paula watched in silence as the doctor examined Jamie. Only when he put his stethoscope away did she burst out again, her words tumbling over themselves in her anxiety. ‘How is he? What is wrong with him? It is a spell, isn’t it?’

‘It is not a spell, Mrs West.’ He stood up. He glanced at Sophie and beckoned her over, putting a practised hand on her forehead. ‘Now, I want you to keep an eye on this young lady for a bit, because this virus is quite infectious, but blessedly short. Jamie will be fine. You’ve done all the right things. Dozens of kids in the area have caught this – quite a few grown ups too, so you may get it yourselves. Rest. Lots of fluids and Calpol for the fever. OK?’

Paula followed him out of the room. ‘It may be a virus, but she made it happen, you know. I saw her do it. She clicked her fingers over Jamie’s head and cursed him. Ask Sophie. She saw it, too.’

‘Mrs West.’ Sighing, James Good turned to face her. ‘Please, this is simply not true and you know it.’

‘She’s in it with Emma Dickson. She’s part of the coven.’ Paula was not listening.

‘Lyndsey is with Emma now,’ Alex put in quietly. ‘It sounds as if Emma is in a terrible state. Scared. Hysterical even, so her friend Piers said. You couldn’t drop by, could you, Doctor? You can see how everyone is wound up.’ He glanced at his wife.

‘Oh, great!’ Paula gave a bitter laugh. ‘That’s it. Lots of tender loving care for the witches. It would be better if they both caught something and died! Then they’d have a taste of their own medicine!’

‘Paula!’ Alex was shocked.

James Good looked concerned. ‘Emma was hysterical, too?’ He was talking to Alex.

‘So Piers said. I’d have gone up there myself, but you see how things are here.’ His gesture, aimed at his son’s bedroom, took in his wife at the same time.

James Good nodded. ‘Well, maybe I’ll look in on her if I’m up that way later. This weekend I’m the only one on duty and I left a couple of patients at the surgery to come here. I don’t normally see people on a Sunday, but this week seems to be exceptional all round.’ He didn’t sound reproachful. Just tired. He headed towards the door. ‘Please try and calm down, Mrs West. Your children are fine. Nobody has been murdered and Lyndsey Clark is a harmless eccentric. This is all a storm in a teacup, I assure you.’