Tale of Raw Head and Bloody Bones (9781101614631) (3 page)

By the Summer of forty-four I was still in my Mind very much a Boy, but I had grown and altered much. Gone, almost forgotten, was the small, rounded Puppy I had been. Now I was a gangling, bony Youth; tall and angular with large Hands and long, narrow Fingers. It would have been difficult for the Rector Ravenscroft now to have said that my Soule was bound to the Devil, for I was Word perfect in all my Religious Observances. But what the Rector did not suspect was that my Soule belonged to a rational God.

I could no more give Credence to the terrifying Mystery of Scripture and Pulpit than I could have turned Water into Wine. Mine was a God of knowable Purpose, a God whose Principles might be discovered, tested, and found comprehensible by Human Reason. The World was as an open Bible; the Challenge was in learning how to read it.

I went to the Philosophers; to Descartes, to Harvey, to Baglivi, to Hook. I began to comprehend how the intire World was built according to the Principles of Number, Weight, and Measure, and to see clearly how these applied to the Operation of the Human Body. Whatever the Condition of the Soule within, the Human Body was a Machine, susceptible of Damage, Illness and Decay – but also of Repair.

These Thinkers became my Comfort, in those dark Houres after Church, when my Senses reeled. When my Father dies and Shirelands Hall is mine, I thought, I will construct a great Laboratory
in the eastern Wing, where I shall pass every one of my waking Houres in Experimentation. No mere Surgeon, I will become a Giant of Natural Philosophy, teazing apart the intimate Bonds of the Flesh to discover the Workings of the Machine underneath. I will be the Prophet of a new World, where Logick and Reason will Rule where once Superstition held all Sway. So sweet a Taste, I said to My Self, hath the Electuary of Reason, more effective than any Theriac. Knowledge could heal all Ills. It would be my Mind’s Solvent, my Soule’s Salvation. I should study all the Processes of Life, from the most insignificant to the most profound. I would measure and circumscribe Pain itself.

I told no one of mine Ambition. None would have understood.

In the early Autumn of forty-five, when I was approaching the Age of fifteen, it was decided that I should have yet another Tutor. By this Age, I had been under the Tutelage of perhaps six of these Masters, and each Episode had ended in the same Way. “His Wits are too sharp,” each had said to my Father; “Latin and Euclid are too easy for him; with Respect, Mr Hart, you must pay for a learned Scholar from Oxford or London to undertake your Son’s Instruction.” And on each Occasion my Father had sighed, and another poor Curate or struggling Student had been engaged.

This Time, however, he took on a Protestant Scotsman by the Name of Robert Simmins, who had been several Yeares an Officer in the Army before taking up the Position of Master at St Paul’s School—of which Place he had recently, and hurriedly it seemed, been acquitted. I suspected that some Scandal lay at the Bottom of this, which had almost certainly to do with Drink, but I never found it out. Colonel Simmins’ Prejudice against me, which became plain to me very early in our Association, was founded, I now conceive, in nothing more than that intellectual Laziness of a certain
Breed of ordinary Man, which fancies to discern a Threat in everything and everyone considered clever; and which, rather than striving to comprehend it, habitually contemns. He was not, verily, a bad Man, and his own Faults naught but common, venial Weaknesses for which he should perhaps be envied rather than despised. However, at the impatient Age of fifteen, despise him I did, and I could not perceive how I could learn aught usefull from a Tutor whose primary Aim in mine Education was to cure me of Cleverness.

This Tutor had a Son of his own going by the Name of Isaac, who was several Yeares my junior; and to mine Astonishment and Disgust it was decided that this Son should be allowed to receive Education alongside me, like a Flea riding upon an Hound. He was eleven Yeares of Age, and he turned out to be a light built, girlish little Scrap with shaggy brown Hair, large dark brown Eyes, and Eyebrows of surprizing thickness and excitability. I disliked him immediately on Account of his Father, but it quickly became apparent that Simmins did not return mine Antipathy, but rather liked me very much; and I found that he was perfectly willing to act the Part of Servant and Scapegoat both within the school Room and without it. If the Father set me a tedious and pointless Sum, the Son would solve it; if I was supposed to be working hard upon a Translation of Tacitus, when I would far rather read Ovid, he would cover up mine Inattention by drawing the Tutor’s Anger to some Wrongdoing of his own; moreover, he carried my Books for me, shone my Shoes, and was perfectly happy to assist me to dress. This servile Devotion, which did indeed inspire much reluctant Affection within my selfish Breast, began to seem all the more remarkable when I learned something of Simmins’ Parentage, for his Mother had been the only Niece of a minor Baronet, and his
Station could have been something akin to mine had his Father been rich. But upon such Infelicities the World doth spin.

On Saturdaye, the fourth Daye of December, seventeen forty-five, Charles the Pretender, who had been Months causing Trouble in the North, captured Derby. These Tidings, which reached first Collerton, and then Shirelands later that Evening, filled our Household with Dread; and tho’ Mrs H. instructed the Servants to hide both this Anxiety, and, more significantly, its Cause, from us, she was not successful. Opinion among them held that it could be only a few Houres before Charles presst South to London, and rustick as Shirelands’ Location was, if he decided to take Oxford first, he would come dangerously near. The Spectre of War terrified me more horribly than the Fable of Raw-Head-and-Bloody-Bones had ever done; I found it impossible that Night to sleep.

At half-past four in the Morn I gave up the Assay, and left my bed Chamber to creep silent thro’ the slumbering House to that of little Isaac Simmins, who would, I conceived, listen to my Worries with an attentive and sympathetic Ear, despite the Earliness of the Houre. I knocked more than once upon Simmins’ Door, but he, who plainly was not suffering the Agonies I was, did not answer. I tried the Handle, and when to my Surprize I found the Door unlocked, I slippt quietly within and went to stand at Simmins’ Bedside.

Isaac Simmins was indeed quite fast asleep. His Mouth was open, and his white Nightcap, which was too large for his young Head, was pulled down so low that it covered Eyes, Ears, and much of his Face, like a gallows Hood.

“Simmins,” I whispered. “Isaac.”

He did not move. I reached out, and gently pulled back the Cloth from his Face. It had initially been mine Intent, in doing so, to wake him, but in the Event I had not the Stomach to spoil so pretty and tender a
Picture as that presented by the Sleeper. I stood back, and regarded Simmins with an almost proprietary Pride, as if we had been in Rome, and I an Emperor gazing fondly on his favourite Slave.

A disturbing Notion quickened then within my Mind, its Seed surely consisting in that horrible Anxiety which had forced me to rise out of my Bed. Suppose, I thought, a Stranger had crept into Simmins’ Chamber instead of My Self; one of Charles Stuart’s Rebels, a Spy, a Murderer; and suppose that it was he, not I, who stood here, looking silently and grimly down upon the Boy’s defenseless Form. Would not he bend forwards, as I imagined My Self doing now, and close one Hand fast over Simmins’ Mouth, thus, and his other hard upon his Throat, and press down remorselessly until the Boy’s small Candle was snuffed out, and there was no Power on this Earth, scientific or otherwise, that could rekindle it?

The Notion terrified me, both in its Essence and in the Fact that it had been mine Imagination that gave it Birth. I backed violently away from Simmins, upon whose Body, really, I had not laid even the lightest Fingertip, and fled swift from his Chamber to hide behind the locked Door of mine own, where I cowered abed the Remainder of the Night in a trembling Sweat, my Senses all agog for any Whisper that might herald the Enemy’s Advance, and the Horrour of my Phantasy becoming real.

*   *   *

By Mondaye Morning, after I had passt that Night, then one Daye and then another Night in this fearfully agitated State, mine Head was aching, and my Vision appeared darkly clouded, as if for me the Sunne had never risen, but hovered the whole Morn just below the Horizon. I struggled to concentrate in my Lessons, and the Time crawled.

Colonel Simmins began the Morning with a Focus upon the multiplication Table, in which I, usually, was fully fluent. Todaye, however, I struggled, and this, of Course, brought his Wrath down upon mine Head.

“Have you no Mind?” he demanded angrily. “To study todaye? Mayhap your Wits are not as sharp as you would have us believe. Dunderhead! Begin the Table over!”

I did so, and failed again to compleat the Task.

“Your Pride, Master Hart, verily hath come before a Fall,” my Tutor remarked, with considerable Satisfaction.

“Egad!” I protested, stung. “How can I be expected to concentrate with Threat of War upon me?”

Colonel Simmins’ Lip curled. “You have been forbidden, with good Reason, from listening to Servants’ Gossip,” he said. He had a Chill in his Voice that made me all at once to shudder, tho’ I had no Idea why it should. My Tutor and I had not seen Eye-to-Eye about anything since the sorry Houre upon which we had met, and it was not unusual for him to address me coldly. “Speak impertinently of such vile Nonsense again, and I shall thrash you, Boy, and soundly.”

After that, he set both his Son and My Self about the close Translation of a very long Passage from Suetonius on the Twelve Caesars, which he said must serve to recollect my wandering Wits, and forbade me say aught else, on any Topic, for the Remainder of the Daye.

So we sate in Silence until five o’ the Clock, at which Point a curious Expression stole over the Visage of the Tutor, and without Explanation he departed from the school Room. I flung down my Quill and hurried to the narrow Window, where I peered out into the Black.

“Wh-at are you d-oing, Master Hart?” Simmins inquired of me timidly, after a Moment or more during which I neither moved nor spoke.

“I am looking for the Scots,” I said.

“But—” Simmins ventured, in a Tone of mild Remonstration. “The Pretender’s Army is M-iles away, Sir, and if my Father c-atches you away from your S-eat, he will be furious.”

“Dost think,” I said, turning about to stare at him, “your Father’s Anger frightens me? The Scots are close, and you are a Fool if you don’t believe they will be here Tonight. When they come, Simmins, their Displeasure will make your Father’s a mere Sneeze by Comparison. As shall mine, an you question me again.”

Simmins hung his Head. “’Sdeath, Isaac,” I said, with a Sigh. “You are still a Puppy. Come here, I shall pat you on your Head.”

Simmins left his Chair and came towards me, Head bowed, and knelt at my Feet. I smiled, remembering, for the nonce without any sinister Implication, the pretty Picture he had presented to me two Nights before, and I put mine Hand atop his shaggy Crown, ruffling his Hair. “Sweet as a sugar Plum,” I said. “’Tis to be hoped the Rebels spare you.”

I had said this joking, tho’ cruelly; but as the Words left my Lips they seemed to fill the Aire like a Curse. My Terrour rushed back. Would the Scots spare Simmins? Would they spare me? Would the Intruder stand beside my Bed, and put his smothering Palm over my Mouth? I kept mine Hand on Simmins’ Head, and turned mine Attention quickly back to the shrouded Dark beyond the window Pane. The Enemy was close; I could feel his encroaching Circle like a Noose about my Neck, drawing ever tighter. The Tutor had been a military Man, I thought. Surely, he must know the Foe was present? Surely, he did not underestimate the Danger?

A faint Sound echoed across the Distance: a low Drumming.

Drumming, Drumming.

Suddenly, I felt Simmins spring away; the school room Door opened, and Simmins’ Father, mine erstwhile Tutor, stumbled into the Room, followed close at Hand by the Stench of Port Wine. At Sight of me, standing seemingly unoccupied beside the undraped Window, my Translation of Suetonius abandoned and mine open ink Pot drying out, he let out an infuriated Roar that put me in Mind of the Rector, and lurched forwards. “Get to your Work, Boy!”

I dodged out of the Way of his flailing Arm, and sate down in my Place as quick as Light, protesting that I had only been about the shortest of Pauses. The Tutor, glowering and sweating profusely underneath his heavy serge frock Coat, strode across the school Room to where I was sitting. Placing his meaty Hands full-square upon my Translation, he leaned forwards across the Desk and pushed his Face so close to mine own that I could see the tiny red Capillaries throbbing in his Eyeballs.

“You, Mr Hart, are a Disgrace,” he spat. “A lazy, shiftless Wastrel of a Boy! How long have you been about this Suetonius? Young Isaac here—a mere Child of Eleven—he hath finished it! I doubt you have even read as far as Caligula! There will be no Supper for you tonight! You will stay seated, and you will work!”

The Drumming became suddenly much louder. I started, and upon an Instinct turned once more toward the approaching Danger, as doth a Coney when it heareth Hounds.

“What?” cried my Tutor. “Do you shrug, Sir?”

Seizing my Shoulders, he forced me roughly about, so that I was forced to face him.

“No,” I protested. “’Tis—”

The Drumming became deafening; I marvelled that Colonel
Simmins did not appear to hear it. Then the Notion struck me that perhaps he could; perhaps that was why he was shouting, why little Flecks of Spittle were collecting on his Chin, and why his Adam’s Apple was straining against his thick white linen Stock. He was struggling to make himself heard above the Drumming.

“They are here!” I shouted.

“What, Sir?” Could not he hear me?

“The Scots!”

The Tutor appeared, for a Moment, quite confounded. Then a peculiar Expression, in mine Estimation sly, crosst his Face. Narrowing his Eyes, he said: “There are no Rebels here, Mr Hart.”

This Assertion, which as far as I could tell was outright Lie, and the contemptuous Manner in which it was spoke, frightened me in my very Bowels. I suddenly perceived a very good Reason why Colonel Robert Simmins, Scotsman that he was, might not appear to care about, nay, even to hear the Drumming, which was now so forceful that the Walls about me vibrated upon every Beat. What Proof had I—indeed, what Proof had any of us that he was, verily, loyal to our King George? My Father, as far as I was aware, had taken him on after only the most cursory Inquiry into his History. He must be, I thought, an Enemy; a Spy in the Employ of Charles Stuart; or something much, much worse, and I dreaded what that could be.