The India Fan (4 page)

I sped on my way. A feeling of intense excitement gripped me. The presence of Fabian thrilled me because I kept thinking of the way in which he had kidnapped me, and there I had been, living in the house for two weeks just as though I were a member of the family. I wanted to astonish him with the speed with which I carried out my task.

I reached the room. What if the Indian were there? What would I say to her? lease may I have the fan? We are playing a game and I am a slave.

She would smile, I guessed, and say earie dearie me,in that sing-song voice of hers. I was sure she would be amused and amenable, though I wondered about the old lady. But she would be in the adjoining room, sitting in the chair with the rug over her knees, crying because of the past which came back to her with the letters.

I had opened the door cautiously. I smelt the pungent sandalwood. All was quiet. And there on the mantel shelf was the fan.

I stood on tiptoe and reached it. I took it down and then ran out of the room back to Fabian.

He stared at me in amazement.

oue found it already?He laughed. never thought you would. How did you know where it was?

seen it before. It was when I was playing hide and seek with Lavinia. I went into that room by accident. I was lost.

id you see my great-aunt Lucille?

I nodded. He continued to stare at me.

ell done, slave,he said. ow you may fan me while I await my chalice of wine.

o you want to be fanned? It rather cold in here.

He looked towards the window from which came a faint draught. Raindrops trickled down the panes.

re you questioning my orders, slave?he asked.

As it was a game I replied, o, my lord.

hen do my bidding.

It was soon after that when Lavinia returned with the chalice. She gave me a venomous look because I had succeeded in my task before she had. I found I was enjoying the game.

Wine had to be found and the chalice filled. Fabian stretched himself out on a sofa. I stood behind him wielding the peacock-feather fan. Lavinia was kneeling proffering the chalice.

It was not long before trouble started. We heard raised voices and running footsteps. I recognized that of Ayesha.

Miss Etherton, followed by Miss York, burst into the room.

There was a dramatic moment. Others whom I had not seen before were there and they were all staring at me. There was a moment deep silence and then Miss York rushed at me.

hat have you done?she cried.

Ayesha saw me and gave a little cry. ou have it,she said. t is you. Dearie dearie me so it is you.

I realized then that they were referring to the fan.

ow could you?said Miss York. I looked bewildered and she went on, ou took the fan. Why?

t it was a game,I stammered.

game!said Miss Etherton. he fan Her voice was shaking with emotion.

sorry,I began.

Then Lady Harriet came in. She looked like an avenging goddess and my knees suddenly felt as though they would not hold me.

Fabian had risen from the sofa. hat a fuss!he said. he was my slave. I commanded her to bring me the fan.

I saw the relief in Miss Etherton face and I felt a spurt of laughter bubbling up. It might have been mildly hysterical, but it was laughter all the same.

Lady Harriet face had softened. h, Fabian!she murmured.

Ayesha said, ut the fan Miss Lucille fan

commanded her,repeated Fabian. he had no alternative but to obey. She is my slave.

Lady Harriet began to laugh. ell, now you understand, Ayesha. Take the fan back to Miss Lucille. No harm has been done to it and that is an end to the matter.She turned to Fabian. ady Goodman has written asking if you would care to visit Adrian for part of the summer holiday. How do you feel?

Fabian shrugged his shoulders nonchalantly.

hall we talk about it? Come along, dear boy. I think we should give a prompt reply.

Fabian, casting a rather scornful look at the company which had been so concerned over such a trivial matter as the borrowing of a fan, left with his mother.

The incident was, I thought, over. They had been so concerned and it seemed to me that there was something important about the fan, but Lady Harriet and Fabian between them had reduced it to a matter of no importance.

Ayesha had gone, carrying the fan as though it were very precious, and the two governesses had followed her. Lavinia and I were alone.

have to take the chalice back before they find we had that, too. I wonder they didn notice, but there was such a fuss over the fan. Youl have to come with me.

I was still feeling shocked, because I had been the one to take the fan, which was clearly a very important article since it had caused such a disturbance. I wondered what would have happened if Fabian had not been there to exonerate me from blame. I should probably have been banned from the house forevermore. I should have hated that, although I never felt welcome there. Still, the fascination was strong. All the people in it interested me even Lavinia, who was frequently rude and certainly never hospitable.

I thought how noble Fabian had looked pouring scorn on them all and taking the responsibility. Of course, it was his responsibility, and it was only right that he should take the blame. But he had made it seem that there was no blame, and that they were all rather foolish to make such a fuss.

Meekly I followed Lavinia to another part of the house, which I had never seen before.

reat-Aunt Lucille is in the west wing. This is the east,she told me. e are going to the Nun room. You had better watch out. The Nun doesn like strangers. I all right. I one of the family.

ell, why are you frightened to go alone?

not frightened. I just thought you like to see it. You haven got any ghosts in that old rectory, have you?

ho wants ghosts anyway? What good do they do?

great house always has them. They warn people.

hen if the Nun wouldn want me, Il leave you to go on your own.

o, no. Youe got to come, too.

uppose I won.

hen Il never let you come to this house again.

wouldn mind. Youe not very nice any of you.

h, how dare you! You are only the rector daughter and he owes the living to us.

I was afraid there might be something in that. Perhaps Lady Harriet could turn us out if she were displeased with me. I understood Lavinia. She wanted me with her because she was afraid to go to the Nun room alone.

We went along a corridor. She turned and took my hand. ome on,she whispered. t just along here.

She opened a door. We were in a small room that looked like a nun cell. Its walls were bare and there was a crucifix hanging over a narrow bed. There was just one table and chair. The atmosphere was one of austerity.

She put the chalice on the table and in great haste ran out of the room, followed by me. We sped along the corridors and then she turned to regard me with satisfaction. Her natural arrogance and composure had returned. She led the way back to the room where, a short time before, Fabian had sprawled on a sofa and I had fanned him with the peacock-feather fan.

ou see,said Lavinia, e have a lot of history in our family. We came over with the Conqueror. I reckon your family were serfs.

h no, we were not.

es, you were. Well, the Nun was one of our ancestresses. She fell in love with an unsuitable man I believe he was a curate or a rector. Those sort of people do not marry into families like ours.

hey would have been better educated than your people, I dare say.

e don have to worry about education. It is only people like you who have to do that. Miss Etherton says you know more than I do, though youe a year younger. I don care. I don have to be educated.

ducation is the greatest boon you can have,I said, quoting my father. ell me about the Nun.

e was so far below her that she couldn marry him. Her father forbade it and she went into a convent. But she couldn live without him, so she escaped and went to him. Her brother went after them and killed the lover. She was brought home and put in that room, which was like a cell. It has never been changed. She drank poison from the chalice and she is supposed to come back to that room and haunt it.

o you believe that?

f course I do.

ou must have been very frightened when you came in for the chalice.

t what you have to do when youe playing Fabian games. I thought that since Fabian had sent me the ghost wouldn hurt me.

ou seem to think your brother is some sort of god.

e is,she replied.

It did seem that he was regarded as such in that household.

When we walked home, Miss York said, y goodness, what a to-do about a fan. There would have been real trouble if Mr. Fabian hadn been behind it.

I was more and more fascinated by the House. I often thought of the nun who had drunk from the chalice and killed herself for love. I talked of this to Miss York, who had discovered from Miss Etherton that Miss Lucille had become quite ill when she discovered that the peacock-feather fan had been taken away.

o wonder,she said, hat there was all that fuss about it. Mr. Fabian should never have told you to take it. There was no way that you could know. Sheer mischief, I call it.

hy should a fan be so important?

h, there is something about peacocksfeathers. I have heard they are unlucky.

I wondered whether this theory might have something to do with Greek mythology and if it did my father would certainly know about it. I decided to risk a lecture session with him and ask.

ather,I said, iss Lucille at the House had a fan made of peacock feathers. There is something special about it. Is there any reason why there should be anything important about peacocksfeathers?

ell, Hera put the eyes of Argus into the peacock tail. Of course, you know the story.

Of course I did not, but I asked to hear it.

It turned out to be another of those about Zeus courting someone. This time it was the daughter of the King of Argos and Zeus wife, Hera, discovered this.

he shouldn have been surprised,I said. e was always courting someone he shouldn.

hat true. He turned the fair maiden into a white cow.

hat was a change. He usually transformed himself.

n this occasion it was otherwise. Hera was jealous.

not surprised with such a husband. But she should have grown used to his ways.

he set the monster Argus who had one hundred eyes to watch. Knowing this, Zeus sent Hermes to lull him to sleep with his lyre and when he was asleep to kill him. Hera was angry when she learned what had happened and placed the eyes of the dead monster in the tails of the peacocks.

s that why the feathers are unlucky?

re they? When I come to think of it, I fancy I have heard something of that nature.

So he could not tell me more than that. I thought to myself: It is because of the eyes. They are watching all the time as Argus failed to do. Why should Miss Lucille worry so much because the eyes are not there to watch for her?

The mystery deepened. What an amazing house it was, having a ghost in the form of a long-dead nun as well as a magic fan with eyes to watch out for its owner. Did it, I wondered, warn of impending disaster?

I felt that anything could happen in that house; there was so much to discover and, in spite of the fact that I was plain and only asked because there was no one else to be a companion to Lavinia, I wanted to go on visiting the house.

It was a week or so after the incident of the fan that I discovered I was being watched. When I rode in the paddock I was aware of an irresistible urge to look up at a certain window high in the wall and it was from this one that I felt I was being observed. A shadow at the window was there for a moment and then disappeared. Several times I thought I saw someone there. It was quite uncanny.

I said to Miss Etherton, hich part of the house is it that looks over the paddock?

hat is the west wing. It is not used very much. Miss Lucille is there. They always think of it as her part of the house.

I had guessed that might be so and now I was sure.

One day when I took my horse to the stable, Lavinia ran on ahead and, as I was about to return to the house, I saw Ayesha. She came swiftly towards me and, taking my hand, looked into my face.

She said, iss Drusilla, I have waited to find you alone. Miss Lucille wants very much to speak to you.

hat?I cried. ow?

es,she answered. his moment.

avinia will be waiting for me.

ever mind that one now.

I followed her into the house and up the staircase, along corridors to the room in the west wing where Miss Lucille was waiting for me.

She was seated in a chair near the window that looked down on the paddock and from which she had watched me.

ome here, child,she said.

I went to her. She took my hand and looked searchingly into my face. ring a chair, Ayesha,she said.

Ayesha brought one and it was placed very near Miss Lucille.

Ayesha then withdrew and I was alone with the old lady.

ell me what made you do it,she said. hat made you steal the fan?

I explained that Fabian was a great Roman and that Lavinia and I were his slaves. He was testing us and giving us difficult tasks. Mine was to bring a peacock fan to him, and I knew there was one in that room, so I came and took it.

o Fabian is involved in this. There are two of you. But you were the one who took it and that means that for a while it was in your possession yours. That will be remembered.

ho will remember?

ate, my dear child. I am sorry you took the fan. Anything else you might have taken for your game and no harm done, but there is something about a peacock feathers something mystic and menacing.

I shivered and looked around me. re they unlucky?I asked.

She looked mournful. ou are a nice little girl and I am sorry you touched it. You will have to be on your guard now.

hy?I asked excitedly.

ecause that fan brings tragedy.

ow can it?

do not know how. I only know it does.

f you think that, why do you keep it?