by Norah Lofts
Something changed in his face, so that for a moment I feared that I had offended him. Then he took a lock of my hair between his fingers and twisted it, saying slowly,
‘You know, child, sooner or later you have to learn to do without people. It’s best to learn young.’
‘But why? If it is a question of expense I still have the broad gold piece my grandfather gave me.’
‘You’d only make it harder for yourself….’
Where the words, or the thought came from I do not know, but I heard myself saying,
‘My mother doesn’t want me at home, does she?’
‘She knows that you will do better here. And so for that matter, do I. Who else looks to go home?’
‘Alison, Alison Fortescue.’
‘Does she so? Well, for your ear alone, in that house Christmas is so meanly celebrated I’ll wager she’ll wish she’d stayed here. Many’s the Christmas I’ve spent there and believe me, even the plums in the pudding are counted out, one by one.’
I wanted to shout that it was no matter to me whether there was one plum in the pudding or a thousand. Most of all I wanted to go and cry somewhere, alone, by myself. But the truth was that at Beauclaire there was no place to cry alone; once you were part of it you lived a public life where every sigh or frown or tear was observed and remarked. At this moment, because my uncle had stopped me on my way out of the Hall there were Constance and Helen, Alison and Madge waiting for me.
I walked slowly to join them, thinking that when I had said that Mother didn’t want me home my uncle had not denied it. I remembered then, what I had forgotten, the face she had worn as she watched me ride away. Something within me hardened. I thought, Well, if she does not want me, I don’t want her. It wasn’t true at first, but thinking it over and over made it become true. I still yearned for the smallness and friendliness of the Old Vine, for the kitchen where I was welcomed and given gingerbread men, for the yard full of men like Jack who would call me ‘Little Mistress’ one minute and ‘Maude’ the next. But, over that Christmastime, I began to be weaned.
That I had not been expected to go home was made very clear by the arrival, two days before Christmas, of gifts for me. From my grandfather – or so I imagined, another broad gold piece, from my mother a blue velvet hood, lined and bordered with fur. With these gifts was a square of parchment, bordered all down the left side with leaves and berries painted in green and red, and with words written in the remaining space. The letters were very black, except for a few which were gaily coloured.
I held it out to Dame Margery and learned, to my surprise, that she could not read. But she knew what it was.
‘It is a Christmas Piece, to bring you good wishes. Carry it down to the Well Yard Room. Most like one of the young ladies can spell it out for you. If not you must ask the Chaplain.’
I was delighted to have a chance to go where I might see Melusine, for whom I still entertained a passion of gratitude and admiration. There was, rightly, a firm barrier fixed between the Children’s Dorter and the Well Yard Room and the Ladies’ Dorter, and I seldom saw her except at a distance. That morning I found her and she read me out what Walter had written. It said,
‘On this, the Birthday of Our Blessed Lord, I send Gretings to my Dear Sister and wish you Joy and God’s Blessing on you, from your Brother Walter Reed.’
Melusine read for me three times, so that I could get it by heart. Then she asked how old was Walter and when I told her that he was just my age she said,
‘He must be a clever scholar. It is nicely written and very even.’
The Christmas Piece, bringing home almost as much as Walter to mind, made me homesick again. The pretty furred hood seemed a mockery, and when I returned to the Children’s Dorter I gave it to Madge FitzHerbert who had received no gifts at all.
The Christmas Piece I carried about with me all through the Twelve Days – which were kept, as my uncle had promised, with every possible gaiety.
While I was showing it to my Uncle Godfrey I said,
‘I would dearly like to read and write, too.’
‘You would what?’
I said it again.
‘Then you must consult with Dame Margery.’
‘She cannot read. I had to ask the Lady Melusine to tell me the words.’
‘She has learning? Perhaps she could teach you. As I said, consult with your Dame.’
Dame Margery showed more sympathy with my desire than I had dared to expect.
‘You are to be a religious,’ she said thoughtfully, ‘and some learning might serve to advance you. I will speak to my Lady.’
The answer, when it came, was typical of Beauclaire where the most prodigal extravagance ran side by side with sparing economy over trivial things. It seemed a pity for Melusine to waste her time teaching one child to read; who else would like to learn? Everyone else showed the utmost horror for the notion; I went round, pleading with one after another, even poor Madge. I argued that writing might be the one thing she could do, how could she know till she had tried. But she just giggled. In the end it was Henry Rancon, the least likely of all who came to my aid. I thought of a good argument to use on him.
‘At Easter you will move out of the Children’s Dorter,’ I said, ‘and your life will be changed. So you would have only a few lessons, and meanwhile I would do anything you asked. I would be your liege man.’
Henry was always wanting somebody to be his faithful unquestioning servant and neither of the other boys was obliging,
‘All right,’ he said. ‘I’ll have lessons till Easter. Now you kneel down and put your hands between mine and swear to be my faithful liege and obey my every command.’
That I did most gladly; and though Dame Margery said,
‘Wonders will never cease,’ when Henry professed his desire to learn to read and write, by Candlemas the lessons were arranged.
Tucked away in that same long passage where the suits of armour occupied a whole room there was a small room in which some earlier Lord Astallon had gathered several books; there was a table, too, and a bench, and a slab of wood out of which sprouted three horns. One held the ink, the other the quills, and the third the sand for drying anything which was needed too hastily to permit the ink to dry itself.
And here, on three afternoons of the week, in the space between our play-time and supper, Henry and I and Melusine met. On the first day, when I thanked her most eagerly for agreeing to teach us, she said,
‘The saddle is on the other horse, Maude. To escape even for an hour from the everlasting chatter and bickering; to get out of that carp pond, delights me.’
Another time she said that it should be a law that every woman who was not a busy housewife should learn to read.
‘If they could find stories in books they would be less ready to make up tales about those they live amongst. And they would learn that their own small joys and troubles do not fill up the world.’
I learned fast, partly because I wanted to and partly to please Melusine. Henry was content to learn how to write his name. Page after page he filled with ‘Henry Rancon, Henry Rancon’, then ‘Sir Henry Rancon’, or ‘Henry Rancon, Knight’. He just lived for the moment when he should be a knight; he had the same feeling for my Uncle Godfrey – who was reckoned one of the best knights in England – as I had for Melusine; and I think one thing which resigned him to the tedium of the lessons was that, every now and then, and always unexpectedly, my uncle would look into the Book Room to see what progress I was making. My uncle, unlike most of his kind, spoke of learning with respect, and told Henry he was lucky to be taught.
‘I never had the chance,’ he said. ‘At your age I was never in one place long enough.’
‘I could teach you now, Sir Godfrey,’ Melusine said.
‘I am an old dog, too old for new tricks. But there are old tricks that I could teach you!’
‘Of that I have no doubt,’ she said, and laughed.
IV
It was towards
the end of that February month that Henry made one of his demands upon me, in keeping with my vow. There had been some days of continuing snow, during which our afternoon playtime had been spent indoors where tedium had led to squabbling and squabbling to punishment. Rheumy colds had afflicted us too, and my Cousin Ralph was still abed on one side of the screen, and Helen and Madge abed on the other side. Our Dame had her hands full and her temper was short.
On this day, however, the sun shone and the snow was melting fast, and as we came out of the Hall Henry said,
‘Come and play Hare and Hounds in the Maze.’
The Maze at Beauclaire was a singular oddity. It was part of the old Low Garden, at least it formed one of its boundaries, but it was said to be older than the garden, older even than the castle. It was an intricate puzzle of narrow paths, crossing and turning back on themselves, bordered by clipped yew hedges as tall as a mounted man. In its very centre stood a block of black stone on a mound of grey ones. There was a story that in the very far away past, when the people who lived in England were heathen, that stone was worshipped.
I had only penetrated deep into the Maze on one occasion; very soon after my arrival at Beauclaire Helen Beaufort had mentioned, in Dame Margery’s hearing, something about the Maze being the haunt of evil spirits and Dame Margery had said,
‘Rubbish. It is just a puzzle, laid out in the days when people could not walk far from the castle walls for fear of enemies, so they made the longest walk, and the most interesting on the smallest possible space.’ And to prove that she believed what she said she had taken the lot of us, on a sunny autumn afternoon, and we had gone in and lost ourselves, and run this way and that, and shouted, and laughed and in the end come breathless to the black stone in the centre, and Dame Margery had said,
‘You see. You have all lost your breath and wearied your legs as though you had run a mile. It is simply an exercise ground.’
Then what is the stone, Madam?’ Helen Beaufort asked.
‘To mark the centre, so that people could know that they had arrived.’
‘It’s a Rune Stone,’ Helen said in the stubborn way which she had mastered; not rude or ill-tempered, just a flat, unshakable way of stating something.
‘And what might that mean?’ Dame Margery asked.
‘I don’t know. I heard it spoken of as a Rune Stone.’
‘Meaning a marker, like a milestone,’ said Dame Margery. ‘Now, all take different paths and let’s see who can be out first’
That night, in the Children’s Dorter, after the light was out, Helen said to me,
‘A Rune Stone is not a marker, say what she may. Before I came to Beauclaire I lived at Greenwich and one was found there, and the priest had it hacked to pieces; he said it was evil.’
There was no need for Dame Margery to tell us girls not to play in the Maze, we avoided it; but the boys often played a game of Hare and Hounds there, and certainly seemed to suffer no harm.
On this afternoon I said,
‘Oh, Henry, it’s so cold and so sloppy underfoot.’
‘Running will warm you, and you can put on thick shoes. Besides … you promised.’
That was true, so I said meekly,
‘Can I be a Hound?’ Hounds could run in company, the Hare must go alone.
‘You are a Hound; with William. It is my turn to be Hare.’
‘I’ll get my cloak and my thick shoes.’
‘We’ll wait for you by the Maze,’ he said.
Alison and Madge were waiting for me and as we went up the stairs I said,
‘I am going to play Hare and Hounds with William and Henry in the Maze. You come too.’
‘God’s teeth,’ said Alison, who was fond of using grownup expressions, ‘on a day like this? A cold thaw. I thank you, no!’
When we reached our room I went and stood before our Dame and said,
‘I am going to play with Henry and William.’ I hoped that she, like Alison, might think a cold thaw a bad thing to brave. And that would let me out. But she only said that the fresh air would do me good, so long as I kept moving. So I fetched my cloak and looked for my thick shoes, and they had been taken away to be greased. So the bell must be rung and by the time it had been answered and the servant had been despatched for them, and had brought them, the brightness of the day had gone. In the Maze, I thought, it would soon be dusk.
However, I was sworn. So I ran out and joined the boys who were waiting impatiently.
The rules were that the Hare started first while the Hounds stood still and counted the fingers of both hands twice over. The Hare, as he ran, also counted twenty and when he had done cried,
‘Hee, hee, hee, you can’t catch me!’
The Hounds then replied, ‘Woof, Woof, Woof.’
Henry ran into the Maze and presently made his call. William and I ran in, crying ‘Woof’. It was already – for me – unpleasantly nearly dusk between the high hedges, so I stayed close to William; at one place where two paths met he said,
‘You take one, I’ll go the other way.’ But William was not, even in pretence, my liege lord, so I let him run along his path and then I followed. At intervals Henry made the Hare call and we responded. Henry’s voice seemed to come from a different direction each time.
Presently William, as he ran, drew away from me. I tried to keep up, and when I couldn’t, gasped out a shameless, breathless appeal,
‘Wait for me.’ He threw back over his shoulder,
‘We’re not supposed to stay together; it spoils the game.’
At the next turn I found that I had lost him, one path went left, one right, and so far as I could see along either he was not there. This was the moment that I had dreaded ever since Henry had issued his command. I stopped running and stood still. I needn’t play any more; I could always say that I had tried to find them and failed. Had I had any sense at all, I thought, I should have fallen behind and turned back minutes ago, before I was far into the Maze.
Just before I turned I heard Henry’s call far away to the left, and William’s answering cry, to the right it seemed. To show that I hadn’t given up too easily I cried ‘Woof, Woof, Woof,’ too, but there was something about the sound of my voice that I didn’t like, it sounded lost and frightened, less like a hound than a little bleating lamb.
I turned right about and began to walk, hoping that by going in that direction and keeping on long enough I must emerge at the entry. As I walked I could hear Henry and William calling and counter-calling; once Henry sounded close at hand and I hoped the next turn would reveal him. It did not. Nor the entry. And the dusk was deepening every second. To be alone in the Maze in the dark would be as bad as being in the Long Gallery at midnight on the sixth of November, when a long dead Anne Astallon whose husband had killed her in a fit of rage, said to walk, weeping and wringing her hands.
I stood still and shouted, with all my strength,
‘Henry! Henry!’ There was no answer, and I thought, of course, he wouldn’t answer, he’d think I was cheating in the game. One call though – if he heard it, he was bound to answer, being my liege lord, as I his man.
‘A moi, Rancon! Aide! Aide!’
When that brought no response I knew I was out of earshot. I began to whimper and run any way, without trying to stick to one direction, and presently I found myself at the intersection of four paths and there was the big black stone.
I crossed myself and said, ‘God between me and all harm.’ I remembered what Dame Margery had said and tried to believe that it was placed there only to mark the centre; but Helen’s words were much more powerful. It was still just light enough for me to see the chisel marks on the stone, deep in places, in others worn almost smooth.
I was extremely frightened, but with just sense enough left to know that what I feared was being alone in the dark, and that at such a place and such an hour even the most homely thing – a porridge bowl – could seem sinister. I didn’t even know what ‘Rune’ meant, so what happened next was not
due to my imagination.
First I went back away, into the mouth of the path by which I had come; and I found that I couldn’t move. It was like one of those horrid nightmares when something pursues you and your feet are too heavy to run. My eyes were fixed on the stone, and I stood as fixed as it was. Then, in it, just level with my eyes, a light appeared, as though a small window had opened, with candles in the room within. The golden glow was faint at first, but it strengthened as I stared; and then out of the lighted square a face looked at me.
I did not, at that time, know what a Cardinal looked like, the nearest I had been to one was when I listened to speculations about Helen’s paternity, so I did not know what I was seeing. It was the face of the man that held my attention, not from any remarkable feature, but because his eyes, dark under heavy brows, looked straight at me in a very compelling, forceful way, as though he were using his will to beat mine down. I had no glimmer of a notion what he wanted of me, but I knew that whatever it was it was important to me; I knew also that I must not give in. As I thought that the face disappeared, the square glowed faintly for a moment and was gone.
By this time I was beyond fright. I knew I was about to die. I couldn’t draw breath. It was as though an iron hand were clenched round my throat. Fighting against it, just to pull in breath once more took all my strength and I was failing, just about to die when the most beautiful sound in all the world reached my ears; a human voice, calling in its homely Sussex speech,
‘Stay right where you be, little Lady. I’m coming for ye.’
The iron hand fell away and I drew in breath with the sound of a cloth being ripped. I began to shake all over.
‘Could ye give us a call for a bit of a guide?’
I tried, but my tongue was dry flannel between my chattering teeth.
‘Now, now,’ the voice said, a trifle crossly, ‘’tis no use pretending, or hiding from me. The game’s over now. You give us a shout!’
I tried and had just enough breath to make a small mew, like a kitten.
‘Hi there! Can ye hear me?’