by Julie Mayhew
Like before, Viola chose her moment to step forward.
‘I could have told you so,’ she said coolly, as she entered the circle of stones.
The girls’ arms drooped, swallowed by the folds of their voluminous nightdresses.
‘You were punished, I suppose,’ she went on.
They looked at their feet.
‘Why did you listen to that piece of shit?’ Viola watched the insult ripple through them. ‘In the end, he’s just a man. In the end they’re all like that, they let you down.’
She choked on these too-grown-up words, the emotion catching her unexpectedly. She was talking about Saul, she thought, but it was her dad she meant, and Seb. Their dying felt like a deliberate desertion, the worst betrayal ever.
Britta turned to the other two, that unspoken language passing between them, and they rejoined their hands, reforming their circle of just three, whispering one of their old incantations.
Clean we are, pure we be
Our minds fall open and we can see
Take the dark, turn it to light
Wash this away before the night.
They went back to the start, murmuring the verse again, faster, faster, Viola watching, thinking, I’ve lost them, I’ve lost the ones I love to Benjamin fucking Hailey.
But she would not be like Saul. She would not give up. She could still be the hero.
‘Speak to me!’ Viola begged.
The chanting stopped, the circle broke. They lined up to face her.
The coldness of their gaze was so unbearably painful.
‘You’ve been causing trouble,’ said Britta.
‘What?’ Viola didn’t understand.
‘You’ve been meddling in Mr Hailey’s business,’ said Jade-Marie.
Anna nodded, the final verdict. ‘And he told us that we are never to trust you again.’
FRIDAY THE 13TH – APRIL 2018
They stand outside the bedroom and wait, impatiently. They will kick down the door if they must.
It has been done before and can be done again, explains the woman on the stairs whose name is Hannah Pass. She has done it herself, without any help from the gardeners, without even a change of her neat buckled shoes. She directs Viola’s attention to the scars in the wood, says the door will never be the same again, which is a shame because much of the interiors are original … different handles but, you know?
‘Sorry,’ Hannah added, ‘I talk too much when I’m anxious.’
She calls out with matronly authority, mouth close to the jamb, ‘Lord Catherbridge! I am asking you very nicely to please open up!’ She turns to Viola then, speaking quietly, ‘Did you actually bring matches?’
Viola looks at her, confused.
‘To burn the place down…’
‘Oh!’ Viola shakes her head. ‘No.’
Hannah tuts, disappointed, and speaks again to the door.
‘Lord Catherbridge! I’m going to give you a count of three and then we’ll break it down like before, do you understand?’
There is a harrumph from within, not a human one, the sound of bedding being moved perhaps, a towel dropping or the pushing over of a pile of clothes.
‘One!’ calls Hannah and, in her head, Viola instinctively adds the requisite -elephant.
Viola had not needed to threaten a fire; mentioning the Eldest Girls was enough.
‘Calm down,’ was Hannah’s response to Viola’s demands on the stairs. She spoke with the kind of sternness that made you feel safe. ‘No one is going to be burning down anything. Well, not yet.’ She had taken hold of Viola by the upper arms, a settling gesture. ‘I am a member of the St Rita’s “Easter Committee”,’ she’d said then.
‘Two!’ Hannah bellows, and there is, perhaps, the shuffling of feet on boards.
‘Easter Committee’ was obviously supposed to mean something – Hannah had emphasised the words, given a pop of the eyes – but Viola didn’t understand the reference.
‘The unusual suspects, they call us,’ Hannah went on. ‘A left-bencher?’
Still, Viola could only blink.
‘I have a daughter, for Pete’s sake!’ She’d thrown her arms wide. ‘She’s in the Fourth Year seniors! Just two years from being sixteen!’
Viola knew then that the woman was on her side.
‘Three!’ All is silence behind that bedroom door.
‘Time’s up!’ calls Hannah, and turns sideways, putting a shoulder to the wood, encouraging Viola to take the same stance, and she does, though after her run across the island she seriously doubts that she has the strength left to break down a door.
‘Put the weight on the back foot,’ Hannah coaches, ‘and then after three we’ll –’
There is a loud scrape – a bolt being drawn back. Hannah and Viola relax their combat poses. The brass handle rotates. In the dark gap appears a reedy man, grey-haired and surprisingly bright-eyed, but the skin beneath those eyes slides down his face like candle wax.
Viola feels the disappointment viscerally, in her gut.
This is the Earl?
This the man who might save them, seize back authority, overrule the Council, expose its abuse of power and stand up for those at the mercy of impossible causes? He is nothing but a feeble old man in a dressing gown. Viola had expected to wake a sleeping giant, one capable of biting chunks from cliffs and pushing islands out to sea.
Hannah speaks to the man cheerfully, efficiently, as if the pantomime outside the door had never taken place, or as if it was entirely normal.
‘Ah, Lord Catherbridge!’ she trills.
‘What is it?’ he bumbles, those bright eyes making a swift assessment of Viola.
‘There’s something very important that you need to do.’ Hannah’s tone drops low, becomes urgent, her faith in Viola’s plan seemingly still strong, so Viola gathers herself, summons all residual hope.
‘You’re needed on the Council, sir,’ says Hannah, setting it all in motion. ‘It’s a matter of life or death.’
MARCH 2018
It was true that she had meddled in Mr Hailey’s business, but she had done it for them.
Faced with that firing line at the stones – their three reproachful faces – Viola held back her desire to wail After everything I’ve done for you! She knew that shouldn’t matter, and it didn’t. She had never expected gratitude, any kind of payment. But their acceptance, their friendship – she’d considered that hers, immutable.
Britta tossed a dark gaze to Anna, then Jade-Marie, getting their nods of permission to go on. ‘Mr Hailey’s getting us out of here,’ she said.
Viola’s throat tightened. ‘What?’
‘The project isn’t the play.’ Britta spoke from beneath the fall of her hair. There was a sense of apology to this explanation, but also condescension. Did Viola really believe they were relying absolutely on spells and chants and the reassurances of a red-haired coycrock? A play was not enough to solve everything. ‘Mr Hailey is preparing a document about us.’
‘A dossier,’ Jade-Marie put in, pleased with the word, one clearly gifted by Benjamin Hailey. ‘We’ve given him statements, had our photos taken. He’s going to hand it in to the authorities on the mainland.’ She was perversely excited about this.
‘We’re going to take it.’ Anna jumped in with the clarification. ‘Mr Hailey’s going to take us with him.’
‘On… On the April ship?’ Viola stammered.
Britta shook her head. ‘The August ship. He’s going to finish one whole school year so as not to…’ She paused, searching it seemed for another of the man’s expressions. ‘So as not to arouse suspicion.’
‘What… Mr Hailey’s really a policeman?’ Viola was a girl in a rabbit hole, a child tumbling down a well. ‘So… he’s… he’s working undercover or…’
‘No, he’s just a teacher,’ said Jade-Marie. ‘Just a man.’ Quickly adding, ‘But he does care about us.’
‘You’re going to leave your mums behind, your dads?’ said Viola. She t
urned to Anna. ‘Your little brother?’ The true cry within her was: What about me? What about me? ‘What about the girls here who are about to turn sixteen?’
‘That’s all been sorted.’ Jade-Marie beamed with evangelical fervour. ‘We’ll send for them once we get there, once we’ve got it all settled.’
‘But that makes no sense,’ said Viola. She wasn’t angry anymore, nor confused, because this was clearly madness; it wasn’t real.
‘You don’t understand,’ Anna cut in with her voice of all reasonableness. ‘Everything’s been worked out, it’s –’
‘No!’ Viola yelled, ‘No!’
There came that hum again, that singing of the earth, the sensation of it vibrating through them – an undiscovered chord. All four girls stood and listened as the tremor receded.
Then Viola asked calmly, ‘What’s the difference between speaking out over there and speaking out here?’ Jade-Marie inhaled, her response ready, but Viola wouldn’t hear it. ‘You think things will be different if you cross a huge stretch of sea? Well, believe me, they won’t be.’ Viola knew this. They knew this. ‘You’re worried about the payback if you tell, just think what will happen to the people you leave behind if you speak out somewhere else. How will they suffer for you doing this? Will there be more losses?’
Britta folded her arms. ‘Now you’re just being dramatic.’
‘Am I?’ Viola told them a story then, one that they had told her. ‘Ten men head out in the middle of the night on a fishing boat meant for five … That’s even stranger when you consider that most of the men on board are not fishermen.’
‘Shh!’ Jade-Marie covered her ears and closed her eyes, unable to bear it.
Viola continued, ‘In the weeks before they leave, these men talk about revolt, even murder, but no, they decide to do things the right way, get proper justice. Others had gone over to the mainland and been ignored, but no one could ignore the voices of ten men who had crossed an unforgiving ocean to reveal the truth, could they?’
‘Okay,’ said Britta, ‘you can stop now.’
Viola refused; she would make them see. ‘They didn’t even tell their wives about their mercy mission, for the women’s own safety. Just left them to their doubts. Left them forever it turned out. Because that boat never reached the mainland and it never came back. The storms got them. Or… what if that boat was scuppered on purpose?’
‘The inscription on the cross at the harbour says it was an accident,’ whispered Jade-Marie, tears falling.
‘Yeah,’ said Viola, ‘but you don’t believe that, do you?’
Their silence was answer enough.
‘It’s all we have, Viola,’ Anna said – a gentle lament. ‘It’s all there is. We can’t rely on nails in hearts, we need something more… something…’ She tailed off; she hung her head.
‘The heart worked!’ Viola cried out. Her faith in this was still strong. Peter Cedars had died because of them! If they could only harness this power, control it… But the girls were looking at their feet, not willing to agree. So, Viola spoke cruelly, only to be kind. ‘Mr Hailey isn’t going to take you with him on the August ship.’
Britta sighed. ‘He said you would do this.’
‘I bet he did,’ said Viola. She laughed; that got their attention.
‘Go on,’ said Jade-Marie.
‘He can’t take you with him on the August ship because he’s leaving on the April one! Friday the thirteenth. He’s got Leah Cedars pregnant and they don’t want to have the baby here.’ Viola watched their faces fall, drain of colour. ‘They’re probably worried about what will happen if it turns out to be a girl.’
Britta’s jaw was working, building up to a refusal. Viola got in first. ‘I heard them, Britta! Saul Cooper did too. Out here in the woods. Ask Mr Hailey yourself. Ask Miss Cedars. Though I’m not sure they’d tell you the truth.’
The girls looked at one another, eyes widening. The sea swilled and churned somewhere beneath them. The wind chased furrows through the long grass at their feet.
‘Shit!’ This was Anna. ‘Fuck! Shit! Fuck! Shit! Fuck!’ She alternated the only bad words she knew, looking for a release and getting none, angry tears drenching her face. ‘Oh, god!’ she cried. ‘Oh, god! Bethany Reid had the right idea!’ She directed this viciously at the others. ‘That’s the only way out of this fucking place!’ Then she turned, in a great swirl of white nightdress, and stamped away, out of the circle.
It was Jade-Marie who realised it first, that Anna wasn’t heading back through the woods; she was making towards the cliff edge.
‘Anna, no!’
They sprinted after her, yelling for her to stop, telling her she didn’t mean it, but her stride was certain, fast.
Jade-Marie snatched hold of her friend, trying to halt her with the restraint of a hug, but Anna broke free, she carried on; she howled: ‘I’m doing this for all of you!’
‘It won’t do us any good to have you gone!’ Britta pleaded, moving with her, the wind clipping her words as they drew nearer to where the edge was, or where it might be; the gloom made it impossible to see. Each step could be their last.
The sea crashed louder, closer, it warned them; they were on the brink. The group staggered to a halt. Anna’s teeth were chattering. Britta and Jade-Marie clung to a hand each, the wind making sails of their nightdresses.
‘This will get their attention,’ Anna said. Her eyes were already dead, her voice a flat line. ‘It will bring the mainland authorities here, like when Bethany killed herself, but I’ve got you to tell them it was no accident. You can tell them why I did it.’ She began to mutter a prayer in the same voice they had used for their spells. ‘O Almighty God, King of all Kings and governor of all things, whose power no creature is able to resist …’ These were her last rites.
Viola stood behind them, breathless, watching their swaying outline, three girls as one body, lurching towards the tow of the black sea beyond, heels driven into mud, inches from the edge. She knew she should step forward, help wrench the girl back, but she was gripped by something – the truth of what Anna had said.
‘But why does it have to be you?’
At Viola’s voice, Anna’s supplications petered out, the words dropping like shingle from the ledge. Her head turned, her pull slackened. Jade-Marie seized the moment, enveloping her shivering friend, if only for one last embrace.
‘Greater love has no one than this, that someone lay down his life for his friends,’ incanted Anna.
‘Yes, there should be a sacrifice,’ said Viola. ‘But why should that sacrifice be you?’
Viola stepped towards them, the circle forming without her asking. They breathed as one: earth, fire, air and water; north, south, east, west; black, blonde, brown, red. Their heads touched, and a strange light, at once imagined yet real, formed itself between them, glowing brighter, gathering into an enthralling shape.
‘It’s not a sacrifice,’ said Jade-Marie, ‘unless you offer up something that matters.’
‘Yes,’ said Viola. Then she corrected that note, ever so slightly, making the harmony ring true. ‘But why,’ she asked, ‘must it matter to us?’
THE BOOK OF LEAH
We are Lark. The island is its people. We are its future.
You can believe but not practise.
You can find out how to be a better person, a different person, one the island deserves.
You can put one foot in the water, hold one foot on land and feel the difference, but you will never really know until you wade in, cross over.
You can make a bed, you can lie in it and accept the consequences.
‘I’m moving back to the harbour cottage,’ I told my mother over breakfast. ‘So I can prepare to leave on the April ship.’
She paused in the sipping of her tea, that was all.
‘I’m going because –’
‘I know why you’re going,’ she cut in.
I nodded, wondering if she really did. This was how we got to be the community
that we were, how we arrived in this miserable position, because we were never willing to listen. We always assumed, always believed we knew the answer before we’d heard it, before we’d even asked for it.
‘So,’ I went on, ‘do you want to come with me?’
‘To the harbour cottage,’ she replied plainly, spreading marmalade on her toast, ‘or to the mainland?’
I’d thought she would leap from her stool, immediately pack a bag; that she might have one already filled, the mainland in mind. How often had she baited Dad with the seditious idea of a holiday, a cruise, the possibility of visiting Paul…
‘I think we should go to the well,’ she said ‘take something of Dad’s to trade for the “absolute truth”. He can help me to decide what to do.’
I chanced a smile; she was obviously joking. Her voice was as playful as the one she used on the little children at chapel – the one she’d no doubt used on me while I was growing up – a furnishing of the trivial and the fantastic with a business-like seriousness.
‘Now, what did your father hold dearer than anything else?’ she asked, chewing toast, casting her eyes around the room, which was empty of everything apart from our day-to-day essentials. Still we waited for the eviction that would inevitably come.
It crept up on me, slowly; she was speaking in earnest
‘You, Mum,’ I told her. ‘Dad held you dearer than anything else.’
She looked at me levelly, shook her head.
‘No,’ she said. ‘It was you. Always you.’
Of course, I thought, I am Leah, a mistress of betrayal right from the start. A child created in love that stole all the love for herself.
‘Do you want to throw me down the well, then?’ I laughed nervously.