A Brief History of Montmaray

by Michelle Cooper

  I have put this down on paper in case I don’t come back.

  Signed, Sophia Margaret Elizabeth Jane Clementine FitzOsborne.

  I was praying like mad all the way down that it would be all right, and that seemed to work—perhaps Rebecca’s onto something after all, with all that kneeling and muttering in front of altars.

  Not that it began very well. I needed Carlos to go with me for protection (the troll had seemed wary of him), and Carlos was in the kitchen with everyone else.

  “Just going for a walk,” I said to them, dragging a very reluctant Carlos towards the door (he’d been drooling over the fish Rebecca was cutting up for stew).

  “Why?” said Henry, quite sensibly. The rain was still streaming down the windows, and the wind, when I opened the door, was icy.

  “I just need some… some fresh air,” I said as a blast of it threw me sideways into the doorframe.

  Rebecca snorted. Veronica looked up from the scribbles on Henry’s slate and narrowed her eyes.

  “You know, I think I’ll come with you,” Henry announced, scraping back her chair.

  “I think not,” said Veronica at once, “when you were confined to bed for more than a week not so long ago and still have five sums to finish.”

  And during the ensuing argument, I managed to slip out unnoticed.

  Carlos was quite happy to be outside once we got past the drawbridge and he remembered all the rabbits and puffins out there for the chasing. We headed for the village first, even though I suspected the men would be out exploring. I was right—we eventually came across them on the Green. The troll was wheeling a long stick with a disk on the end and calling out measurements to Herr Rahn, who was writing them down in his notebook.

  “Good morning, Your Highness!” cried Herr Rahn when he caught sight of me. Too late, I realized I’d forgotten the English-German dictionary.

  “Morning,” I said, because there really wasn’t much good about it. The rain was whipping back and forth, stinging my face, and my hands were frozen. “I was just … er, taking the dog for a walk.”

  The troll scowled at Carlos, then wheeled away towards the far end of the Green, his black oilskin flapping behind him. “How are you getting on?” I continued. “With your … ah, research?”

  “Oh,” said Herr Rahn, who had a nice smile. “Not so bad, thank you. But I was wanting to ask—what is that?” He pointed to the cross at South Head, shrouded today in a mist of sea spray and rain.

  “That’s the war memorial,” I said. “Um, monument aux morts. The Great War, you know. A hundred and fifty-seven Montmaray men died in a single day.” Massacred by Herr Rahn’s countrymen, I didn’t add. After all, it wasn’t his fault—he was too young to have been in the war.

  “Very sad,” he said. “That must have … er … This is why the village is …?” He gestured downhill at the desolate cottages.

  “Partly.” I nodded. “And also the influenza epidemic in 1918. La grippe.”

  “Ah, yes,” said Herr Rahn softly. “In Germany, too.”

  It was so terribly unfair, that epidemic. The soldiers who’d managed to survive the Great War, the wives who’d waited for them, the children who’d barely known their fathers—so many of them struck down by disease just as peace was declared. Veronica once told me that across the world, twice as many people died of the influenza as were killed in the Great War. And Montmaray, isolated as it sometimes seems, was nevertheless part of that world. The Great War demonstrated that to deadly effect, and so did the epidemic.

  I sighed heavily. “So, with most of the young men dead, a lot of the villagers went back to Cornwall. To find work.”

  He nodded slowly. Then the troll called out something and Herr Rahn wrote some numbers in his notebook. He saw my curious glance and gave another shy smile.

  “Geometry,” he explained. “A pity there is no sun, I hoped to measure the sun at dawn, but …” He shrugged. “May I ask, how did the village folk use this … this …?” He swept one arm around.

  “The Green?” I asked. “Oh, well, they used to have hurling matches once. It’s a bit like football—”

  His entire face lit up. “Yes, I know it! The silver ball is being thrown up, like the sun rising. And to touch the ball is good luck.”

  “That’s right,” I said, a little surprised. “We have the ball up in the castle now.”

  “And other celebrations?” he asked. “Midsummer?”

  “Yes, the bonfire is set up there,” I said, pointing to the middle of the Green. He gave a sigh of satisfaction. “But what does this have to do with your research?” I asked. “I thought you were studying French heretics?”

  “Ah!” he said, eyes sparkling, and I was reminded of Veronica preparing to launch into a complicated historical explanation. “The Cathars—the French heretics—knew Sacred Geometry. It is from the Druids. They worshipped the sun, and that is why the Church, the Roman Church, was against them. I have been in France and also Spain, Italy, Switzerland, Iceland—”

  “Iceland!” I exclaimed in wonder.

  “Yes, but mostly France, where there is … oh, it is difficult to explain in English! I wrote a book…”

  “Crusade Against the Grail,” I said before I could stop myself.

  He stared at me. “Have you read this? It is not in English.”

  “Er, no,” I said. “I’ve heard of it. So you are searching for the Grail? It isn’t here, you know.” I peered up into his eyes, anxious to make him understand this. “There’s no record of it ever being seen here, nor spoken of, nor even—”

  “Ah, the Grail,” he said, smiling. “What is the Grail? What do you think?”

  I frowned. “Well, in Tennyson, Sir Percivale said it was the cup that Christ drank from.”

  “Yes,” he said. “There is also, in medieval German, Parzival—have you heard of it? And the opera by Wagner, too. But they are not right; the Grail is before Christ. There was the legend of the Grail and then the Church tried to make it their own.”

  “Then what is it?”

  “The Grail of the Cathars, the Pure Ones?” he said. “Perhaps a perfect crystal to hold the sun. But I think it truly is Sophia. Wisdom.”

  “Wisdom?”

  “Do you not know what your name means?” he asked. “Wisdom. Sophia. What so many have searched for, so many years.”

  “Well, I should have been named something else, then,” I said. “I haven’t any wisdom.”

  “Are you sure?” he said, smiling. “Well, if not—then wisdom is there,” and he nodded towards the castle. “In books. The wisdom of others before, who see and think and write.”

  “Oh,” I breathed, picturing an infinite line of writers bent over papyrus and vellum and parchment, scribbling down the knowledge of the ages. But at that moment, the clouds above us cracked open and rain began to pelt down. The troll turned and squelched towards us, looking mutinous, and Herr Rahn regretfully folded up his notebook.

  “We must go… but you will join us? For tea?” he said.

  “Oh, no, no, I should be getting back,” I said, suddenly recalling the black gun Henry had seen. I tried unsuccessfully to hold back a shudder.

  “You are cold,” said Herr Rahn, observing this with a look of concern. “Are you sure you would not like hot tea or—”

  “No, no, I’m fine, thank you!” I cried. “Come on, Carlos!” And I ran all the way back to the castle, not even stopping to worry about the sea surging below my feet as I flew across the gaps in the drawbridge.

  Veronica had the big kettle boiling when I burst into the kitchen, and she sent me straight up to the bathroom with it.

  “You are an idiot,” she sighed, coming in ten minutes later with another jug of hot water. “I thought Henry was the one I had to worry about. What on earth were you thinking, going out in this weather?”

  I sneezed and wondered that myself. Veronica sat down on the wooden lid of the loo and gave me an expectant, exasperated look. I opened my mouth to recount
my conversation with Herr Rahn, then closed it again. After all, she’d just called me an idiot. Besides, I wanted to prove I could keep secrets just as well as she could.

  “Could you please pass me the towel,” I said instead.

  She tossed the towel at me and then folded her arms. Peering through damp clumps of my hair, I realized that she was prepared to sit there for as long as it took. This was Veronica, after all.

  “We talked about the war,” I said.

  “Really?” said Veronica, blinking. “Which one?”

  “Which … the Great War!” I said. “What else? Herr Rahn was wondering about the memorial cross.”

  “Ah,” she said. “And did you tell him what happened?”

  “I told him a hundred and fifty-seven Montmaray men died in a single day.”

  “A hundred and fifty-eight,” said Veronica.

  “A hundred and fifty-seven,” I said. “Don’t you recall that Toby and I counted all the names on the stone one summer?”

  “Don’t you recall that Aunt Charlotte refused to pay the engraver’s bill because Edwin Davy’s name was left off?”

  “Does it matter?” I burst out, tossing the towel back at her.

  “I expect it mattered a great deal to Edwin Davy’s widow,” said Veronica, hanging the towel neatly on its hook. “But as you point out, it’s doubtful a couple of Nazis would care much about a single dead enemy soldier. What matters to them is having access to the library. You did stress that they mustn’t come anywhere near here, didn’t you?”

  I pressed my lips together, grabbed my comb, and began to yank it through my hair, realizing only then that I’d failed to find out whether Simon had played any role in the Germans’ arrival. What if he had? And oh, I hadn’t asked Herr Rahn not to mention Simon to Veronica…

  Veronica crossed her arms. “Because I would have thought that any talk of the war would lead quite naturally to your explaining that Germans could never be welcome here.”

  I worked away at a stubborn knot, thoughts whirling furiously. Had I emphasized they mustn’t come near the castle? Well, I’d implied it. Herr Rahn seemed an intelligent and sensitive man. How else would he think we’d feel about Germany, given the long shadow cast by the memorial cross?

  “At least, I assume that was your purpose in wandering through the freezing rain to converse with a couple of Nazis,” continued Veronica relentlessly. “To warn them away.”

  I threw my comb down. “Herr Rahn is not a Nazi!” I shouted. “And it’s none of your damned business what the purpose of my conversation was!”

  Veronica raised nothing more than her eyebrows, and those only a fraction of an inch. “Really, Sophie. When we’re trying to encourage Henry to use more ladylike language.” She stood, straightened the bath mat with one foot, then strolled towards the door. “And if you insist on having rendezvous with Herr Rahn,” she said coolly over her shoulder, “at least try to conceal your departures from Henry. I spent the remainder of her lesson extracting another promise from her to stay away from those men.”

  The thought that Veronica was entirely correct—about Henry, about trying to avoid the Germans—did nothing to improve my temper. Why is she always calm and collected and correct? Why do I always do and say such stupid things? In attempting to avoid trouble for Simon and Montmaray, all I’ve managed to do is make things worse.

  Oh, how could Herr Rahn possibly call me wise?

  I am writing this sitting up in bed, in the hope that scribbling down all my unhappy thoughts will make them less worrying. I hate that Veronica and I are quarreling. I hate it even more that we’re at odds at the exact time we most need to support each other—for I have a very bad feeling about our German visitors. I can’t help liking Herr Rahn, but the other man—Hans—gives me a creeping, prickly sensation, as though … well, I suppose I can say it here privately, in this journal, knowing it won’t be subjected to a blast of Veronica’s withering logic. All right. He reminds me of my Isabella dream. Not the dream itself, just the feeling I get when I have it. There, I’ve said it. I know I’m being melodramatic and fanciful, but there it is.

  Dinner tonight was a watery imitation of Alice’s fish stew. Afterwards, we huddled around Vulcan with the door to Uncle John’s room open so Rebecca could keep an eye on him, and I read Tennyson aloud because it was the closest book at hand. I let Henry choose the poem to try to distract her from her increasingly wild plans for defending the castle. Naturally she decided on the poem that seemed most likely, in her view, to contain exciting battles: “The Passing of Arthur.” There certainly were plenty of bloodthirsty descriptions (she made me read the bit about “the crash of battle-axes on shattered helms” twice), but it made me uneasy for quite another reason. I’d never before noticed how strongly it related to our own King—I kept glancing at Uncle John’s doorway, hoping he wasn’t paying attention as I read about poor dying King Arthur saying,

  “… for on my heart hath fallen

  Confusion, till I know not what I am,

  Nor whence I am, nor whether I be King.

  Behold, I seem but King among the dead.”

  And then, even worse, was Bedivere’s lament,

  “The King is sick, and knows not what he does.”

  Even Rebecca looked up from her knitting at that and shook her head. Altogether, it was a very uncomfortable evening. And it will probably be an uncomfortable night, if only because now I’ve spooked myself into having a nightmare.

  Perhaps I should take a leaf out of Rebecca’s book and say a prayer. The Lord’s Prayer, or that old Cornish one:

  From ghoulies and ghosties and long-leggedy beasties,

  And things that go bump in the night,

  The good Lord deliver us.

  29th December 1936

  I need to write down what has just happened. I need to set down the truth. If I write lies or if I write nothing at all, this journal is worthless. I can do this. I must do this, in case… well, in case anything happens. Anything else happens.

  All right. This is what happened tonight, every single terrible thing that I can remember.

  I was dreaming, the Isabella dream, just as I’d feared. I hadn’t had it for weeks, not since George died. This time it was worse than ever, because when I leaned over the edge of the boat, my sleeve got tangled up in the unraveling shroud and it dragged me over, pulled me under. The water was black, wet cloth curled round my face, I couldn’t breathe…

  I thrashed so hard that I woke myself up. But I must have fallen asleep again, because suddenly I was King Bartholomew, running across the drawbridge, the sea monster lunging at me out of the Chasm, its mouth yawning like a cave, each sharp tooth a glittering sword … and then I was in the Great Hall with Toby and Veronica, all of us engaged in a frantic search for Benedict, which was missing from the chimneypiece. “This is all Rebecca’s fault!” snapped Veronica, and Toby knocked over the suit of armor, which slumped to the floor and groaned.

  I woke properly then, to find the room glowing in moonlight. The sea monster was glinting at me from the tapestry. Bartholomew, his sword dangling from one tiny fist, looked sad and helpless.

  Then I heard it again, the noise that had woken me. I struggled out of my tangle of blankets and stumbled across the room.

  “Veronica,” I whispered. “Veronica, wake up!” I shook her shoulder. She muttered and turned over. “There’s someone downstairs!” I said, louder than I’d intended.

  She sat up abruptly and pushed her hair off her face.

  “I heard a noise,” I said, although I wasn’t so certain now. Perhaps I’d still been dreaming. Then it came again, the clink of metal against stone. We stared at each other.

  “Check Henry’s all right,” said Veronica. While I was still fumbling for my dressing gown, she pulled her jersey over her nightgown and darted out the door.

  I couldn’t find my shoes, and I didn’t think to snatch up my candle until after I’d stepped into the moonless gallery. It was as though I’d fa
llen back into my dream, into the depths of the inky water. I groped my way along the wall, listening to my thudding heart and the harsh sound of my breathing.

  “Rebecca?” I whispered, pushing her door open when I finally reached it, but her bed was empty, her candlestick missing from its place on the bedside chest. Nothing unusual about that, though—she often sits up all night beside Uncle John’s bed.

  I padded over to the connecting door to Henry’s room and peered inside. Henry, I saw with a rush of relief, was flung across the width of her bed, one foot exposed to the cold, her tufted head half buried beneath the pillow. I crept forward and pulled the blankets straight. She stirred, grumbling a little, then was still again. Carlos, curled on the end of her bed, raised his head enquiringly, eyes gleaming silver.

  “It’s all right,” I whispered. His head sank back down onto his front paws, eyes already closing.

  Back in the gallery, I halted, biting my lip. Should I go back to my room to fetch a candle? Should I search the other rooms in case anyone was hiding there? But why was I thinking anyone? Because, of course, the intruders could only have been the German men. Except why would they be wandering around the castle in the middle of the night? Because Veronica warned them not to come here, said a voice in my head, and they were so very, very curious…

  I pictured the gun, gleaming black inside the open canvas bag, and I clenched my teeth to stop them chattering. That was when I heard voices spiraling up the tower stairs. Veronica! I thought. If they’ve hurt her—

  I whirled around, banging my elbow but too scared to cry out, and blundered towards the stairs. My body tight with cold and fear, I half fell down the final few steps. I glimpsed the flicker of a candle, the white slash of Rebecca’s face, and—oh God—a dark huddled mass on the floor … Then Veronica stepped in front of me, arms outstretched.

  “Don’t look,” she said, but I’d already seen. My hand jerked to my mouth.

  There was a person on the floor. No, a body—it was no longer a person. There were legs, an arm, a head turned away from me. The rest was hidden under the hearthrug, but even in the dim light, I could see the puddle seeping across the kitchen floor, darker than water, glistening and viscous.