Miss Ellerby and the Ferryman (38 page)

Then the presence
was gone.

‘Isa?
What is it?’

Isabel realised
that Eliza had been attempting to gain her attention for some
time.

‘I do
not know how it has come about,’ said Isabel slowly, ‘but I have
the name.’

The
Ferryman waited in the moonlit glade where he had deposited them so
short a time before. The boat had not quite come to rest upon the
ground; its hull, shrouded in roiling mist, floated some few feet
above the grass. The light of its lanterns illuminated the figure
of the Ferryman, pacing about beneath the grand sail.

He
looked up as they approached, his eyes skimming over Eliza, Sir
Guntifer, Tafferty and Tiltager before coming to rest upon Isabel
herself. She read a painful degree of hope in the imploring look he
gave her, and her heart twisted.

The
gangplank came down, and Isabel went up it at once. ‘I have your
name,’ she said, hoping that she spoke truly. For the possibility
that her unnamed and unknowable source had lied was prominent in
her mind. To first raise the Ferryman’s hopes and then dash them
would be far crueller, she felt, than if she had never endeavoured
to help him at all.

Worse, she had promised her aid to the mysterious presence,
whose identity and purpose she could only guess at — and her
guesses were dark indeed. If the information she had gained was
sufficient to free the Ferryman, then it was worth it; she felt
that instinctively.

But
if not…

The
Ferryman seized her hands and kissed each one in turn. ‘Ye
miraculous thing,’ he said fervently. He took a deep breath, his
fingers tightening on hers to an almost painful degree. ‘Let’s ‘ave
it, then.’

Isabel drew in a deep breath, too, momentarily afraid to
speak the name in case it proved to be the wrong one. ‘You are
Talthimandar.’

She
waited, watching for some sign that the curse had been dispelled —
a sound of some kind, a change in the air, anything. But nothing
happened.

The
Ferryman stared back at her with stark fear in his eyes. ‘Did it
work?’ he whispered. ‘I cannot tell. I feel… I feel the
same.’

Isabel’s apprehension turned into heart-pounding panic. ‘Oh,
no. Do you not recognise it? I am so sorry.’ She walked up and down
a little, trying to breathe slowly. Perhaps she had misheard the
name? It had been whispered to her in the midst of a great deal of
noise and activity. She concentrated, trying to remember more
clearly the precise contours of the name as it had reached her
ears.

‘It
is not familiar t' me,’ said the Ferryman in frustration. But his
eye fell upon the gangplank, still let down to the grass below, and
in a sudden motion which startled Isabel he leapt for it. ‘Only one
way t’ be sure,’ he said grimly, as he strode down to the ground.
‘In the ordinary way o’ things, I cannot step more’n nine paces
from the boat. I ‘ave tried, many times.’ He began to walk, watched
by Isabel from the boat above him and Eliza, Sir Guntifer, Tafferty
and Tiltager from below. He counted each step out loud as he
walked, and Isabel could tell from his posture and the high
carriage of his head that he held himself under strict control.
‘Eight…’ he said loudly, and then more quietly, ‘Nine.’ He paused,
took a breath, and then extended his leg for a tenth step. His
outstretched foot came down into the grass, and the other followed.
‘Ten.’

He
stood, rigid with surprise. Then he took another step. ‘Eleven.’ He
took three more, then began to run. All of Isabel’s fear left her
in an instant, and she laughed with delight and relief as she
watched Talthimandar run with wild abandon far away from the
ferry-boat Mirisane.

He
turned at last and began to run back. He tore off his
three-cornered hat and threw it high; it did not float, but flew up
and then came down in a rush. Talthimandar left it lying in the
grass. He threw himself onto his hands and flew about in a circle,
landing neatly upon his feet once more. This manoeuvre he repeated
over and over again until at last he fell in a heap in the grass,
and lay there laughing.

Isabel had by this time descended to the ground herself, and
she approached Talthimandar’s prone form with an unexpected
sensation of shyness. Ought she to interrupt his raptures? But
Eliza had no such qualms, nor did her other friends. They gathered
around him, offering tumultuous congratulation, and barely noticed
Isabel’s approach.

Until
Sir Guntifer turned to her, and offered a courtly bow. ‘Thou art
true in heart, gentle Isabel. It is a pleasure to know
thee.’

‘Aye,
that it is,’ said the Ferryman, as he bounded to his feet. Isabel
had not time to respond to either gentleman, for she was swept up
that moment in a vast embrace and swung about thrice in a circle.
Talthimandar kissed her soundly before setting her back upon her
feet, and then he bowed to her. ‘I should not ‘ave done that, o’
course,’ he said merrily, ‘but I am unrepentant. Ye ‘ave earned ten
thousand more such.’

‘I
beg you will not attempt to bestow them all at once,’ said Isabel,
laughing to cover her embarrassment. ‘And some few ought to be
given to my dear aunt, for she has been quite as much involved in
the business as I, I assure you.’

Talthimandar turned to Eliza, who laughed and backed two
steps away. ‘That will be unnecessary, sir,’ she said with a
smile.

He
satisfied himself with a bow, his eyes twinkling with merriment as
he straightened. ‘I’ll attempt t’ contain my exuberance,
ma’am.’

‘Talthimandar,’ said Isabel, upon which he turned his
attention back to her.

‘Ye
must call me Tal, I believe,’ he said promptly. ‘Tis a mighty
mouthful o’ sounds, is it not now?’

Isabel smiled. She could not consent to such an informal mode
of address, but time enough to argue that point later. ‘Have you…
that is, do you recall yourself? Have you remembered?’

The
merriment faded from his face, and he shook his head. ‘Nothin’ has
changed, in that respect.’

Isabel was disappointed. ‘Perhaps your memory will return in
time?’ she said hopefully.

‘Perhaps.’ He took one of her hands, raised it to his lips and
kissed it. ‘But I will not repine if I am not t’ regain any o’
that. Ye ‘ave given me freedom, an’ that is enough. More than
enough.’

Isabel basked in Talthimandar’s joy, radiant with the
happiness she had helped to win for him. But in the quiet of her
mind, her fears remained. Just who had she promised to help, and in
what way would she be required to assist? She decided at once, that
unless compelled, she would never dim Talthimandar’s joy by telling
him of the perilous bargain she had made. It was a burden she had
willingly shouldered for his sake, and the knowledge of it must be
hers alone.

Epilogue

The
story of Miss Ellerby and the flying boat proved a persistent one
in Tilby. It was talked of everywhere, and as is often the way with
stories, with each telling its proportions grew larger and more
fantastic. After a week, Isabel’s companions expanded to include
not just Mr. Balligumph, a leafling fae and a strange cat, but also
a gaggle of pixies, a trow fiddler and all the brownies of
Ferndeane. It later began to be said that the Piper’s Rade had
swept her away; even that Miss Ellerby had been a part of the
Piper’s band from the beginning, for had she not been present for
their first appearance?

Isabel herself
tried, with all the power of modest dignity and unassuming manners
at her disposal, to divert the wildest of the stories, and
steadfastly denied every part that did not perfectly coincide with
the truth. But she was universally credited with more modesty,
humility or perhaps secrecy than she possessed, and the stories
continued to circulate unimpeded.

Mr.
and Mrs. Ellerby knew not what to think of their daughter’s fame.
It was Charles’s opinion that the gossip would rather enhance, than
harm, his sister’s reputation both in Tilby and beyond. With this
theory Mrs. Ellerby could only vehemently disagree, and she was by
no means reticent with the expression of her vast disapproval for
all of Isabel’s actions.

In
truth, perhaps they were both right. There were some who considered
Miss Ellerby’s behaviour to be, at best, highly improper, and
ceased to consider her as a proper associate. Others sought her
acquaintance much more assiduously than they ever had before;
attracted, perhaps, by the romanticism of her supposed
exploits.

Isabel was pained by the former attitude and embarrassed by
the latter. Worse, she could not disagree with her mother’s view
that she had acted with gross impropriety, for she had. The only
point of real disagreement between them was upon the topic of
whether or not her behaviour had been either justified, or worth
the outcome. Isabel sometimes doubted whether it had; but whenever
she remembered Talthimandar’s excessive joy at his freedom, and
reflected that he was now free at last to pursue the life he
wanted, she could not repent.

She
often wondered what kind of life that might prove to be. He had
returned her to England aboard the Mirisane, though she believed it
had cost him sorely to climb back aboard his prison so soon after
his release. Once he had set her down, she had watched him fly away
back to Aylfenhame, unwilling to admit to herself the extent of her
regret at his departure. She would not be drawn on the subject by
anybody else — neither the curious gossips of Tilby who wished to
know all about the handsome Aylir with whom she had flown away, nor
even her aunt Eliza, who might more reasonably expect to be taken
into her niece’s confidence. It was a topic upon which Isabel
resolved to remain silent.

It
appeared for some days that the Thompsons, at least, had ceased to
consider Miss Ellerby or her family as deserving of their
acquaintance, for they departed Ferndeane upon the day following
the ball and nothing more was heard of them for almost a week. But
at the end of that period, the younger Mr. Thompson arrived at
Ferndeane in person, to beg the family’s pardon for their silence
and to seek an audience with Isabel.

‘I
come bearing an invitation to you all to visit us at Ashford,’ he
said as he made his bow to Mrs. Ellerby. ‘It was my mother’s
intention to send it sooner, but an illness in the family unhappily
prevented her from thinking of it until now.’

Mrs.
Ellerby was profuse in both her thanks and her evident relief at
such an explanation. She was likewise prompt in accepting his
request for a private interview with Isabel, without seeking her
daughter’s approval. Isabel sighed inwardly, unwilling to commit so
direct an act of rebellion as to refuse, but privately wishing that
the gossip had been as effective in lowering Mr. Thompson’s opinion
of her as it appeared to have been elsewhere.

That
realisation surprised her a little, for on the topic of his
proposal she had been as silent as the subject of Talthimandar —
with herself, as well as her family. She had not told her mother of
his offer, and she had scarcely thought about it. Her
disinclination, mild as it had been at the time of the ball, had
grown since, in spite of her refusal to contemplate the
idea.

It
was not, she thought, that she disliked him. There was nothing
about him to dislike, in particular. He led her to the parlour, all
quiet courtesy and neatness of dress, and she thought that she
might have grown to like him very well, had her attention not been
so diverted these past weeks. Eliza’s plan had been successful:
though Isabel remained uncomfortable with her Ayliri heritage, she
could no longer envisage herself as an English squire’s wife either
— even if that squire was as supportive of her unusual ancestry as
Mr. Thompson appeared to be. It was hard for her to move forward,
but she could never go back to the person she had been.

Mr.
Thompson watched her as she quietly took a seat. His expression was
quizzical, and his air uncertain; it took him some few moments to
gather his thoughts and begin. ‘If I judge your manner correctly, I
believe I may draw my own conclusions as to your answer to my
offer.’

‘I am
sorry,’ said Isabel simply. ‘I do not think we would
suit.’

He
bowed his head. ‘May I enquire as to your reasons?’

Isabel paused to consider. She could not precisely say why
her interest in him had cooled. In every respect he was perfectly
eligible and amiable, and if a little dullness was his worst flaw,
Isabel would be considered a lucky woman indeed. Was it because his
attitude towards her Aylir ancestry was not so much supportive, as
eager — even grasping? Did she wish to be sought merely for the
traits she might pass on to her children? That, she reminded
herself, was no worse than being sought for her wealth or her
beauty — both of which were common motives for marriage.

Talthimandar’s image flitted briefly through her mind, but
she ignored it.

‘You
do not love me,’ she said at last. ‘Nor am I in love with
you.’

‘You
are a romantic,’ he said, and she could not tell from his manner
whether he approved or condemned such an attitude. ‘It is not
unusual for couples to marry without love, I think? It is to be
hoped that we would in time come to feel all the affection for one
another that we might wish. For my part—’ and he smiled at her in a
way which, she could not deny, conveyed more than a little fondness
‘—I do not think I would find it difficult at all.’