A Shroud of Leaves

by Rebecca Alexander

  ‘They blamed me at school for “inappropriate behaviour” with a pony,’ he said, following her. ‘I didn’t even hurt it, really. But they expelled me, and my dad beat me. He made me work on the land; he said he would kill me if I touched our horses so I never did. Not our own animals.’

  Had the animal abuse started at school, with this lonely, rage-filled boy? Sage’s reaction must have shown in her face because he reached for her, his face twisted into something like madness. He was between her and the car; instinctively Sage flinched away from him and bolted. His arm lashed out to grab her, his hand looking enormous as the fingers brushed her coat. She dropped her bag and ran back, away from Chorleigh in the front garden, stumbling instead between the trees, along what might have been a rabbit path. God, where is the path to the barrows?

  She could get out onto the field, across to the farm. She was younger, faster. She could hear him shouting behind her, bellowing her name. She felt in her coat pocket for her phone but almost stumbled. There, through a veil of brambles, the path that had been widened to the stable. She scrambled through almost as Chorleigh started crashing through the trees behind her. The clear grass helped her lengthen her pace down the track. Surely she could outrun an alcoholic fifteen years her senior. She took the left-hand path that bypassed the stable, those poor, dead horses, and headed for the taller of the two features, the possible well head, close to the fence.

  It had started raining while they were indoors, now water dripped from the branches. A pheasant burst from the long grass, screeching his warning, making her slip on the wet ground. A hand to a sapling was the only thing that stopped her falling over. She took a moment to listen for Chorleigh. She couldn’t hear him, but he knew the grounds better than she did. There was a strange light in the woodland, the sun shining through thin cloud. Looking over her shoulder she could just see the house through the trees. For a moment it looked derelict, every window black. She pushed past a bush that had thorns everywhere, a few spiking her sleeve, then letting go as she jogged towards the barrows.

  A snapped branch behind her was close, too close. The stab wounds on the necks of the horses leapt into her mind, as well as the memory of a kitchen knife held by Elliott as he threatened to cut her baby. The thought gave her a last burst of desperate energy as she gasped for breath, staggering into the clearing in front of the barrows. Had Alistair chased Lara up here, had she had the same idea of getting away?

  She couldn’t hear Chorleigh now, and dragged her phone out. No signal, but she knew it had worked before on top of the half-barrow. If Alistair did appear she was right next to the boundary and could get through the rusty wire and away. She lurched up the slope, tripping on the long grass and brambles that seemed to have sprung back since they left the site.

  The sounds were different now, the dripping intense; the birdsong seemed to have stopped. She could feel something building inside her, a feeling that she was being watched. She whirled around but the only sound was her own shortened breathing and the water spilling into the pond. A few drops of rain spattered her face. She could just see the top of the stable roof. There was a creepy atmosphere around the remains of the building; even though taking the doors off had collapsed the whole front, the rest of it was held up by the bushes growing through it.

  She looked at her phone, seeing one bar coming and going. I just need one minute, Sage thought, spinning around, trying to get a good signal. She dialled 999 anyway. ‘Hello? Hello…’ The signal cut out and she dialled again. She spun around on the grass, and Chorleigh was there, next to the other barrow, looking up at her.

  She waved the phone. ‘I’ve called the police, OK? You can’t chase me like that. You’re scaring me for nothing.’

  ‘You’ll tell them about the horses and Lara.’

  ‘I don’t know anything, Alistair,’ she shouted. ‘I believe you don’t know what happened to Lara.’ She took a step back, onto the flat stone that slightly overhung the dripping cut edge of the well head. The hard surface was slippery and she stumbled to one knee, dropping her phone. It just missed falling off the edge into the deep puddle. The water was filthy. This didn’t fill Lara’s camera case, she realised, the irrelevant thought cutting through her terror. She could see dark foliage spilling from the stone box, bursting out of the slot between them like gushing green water. The roof across the top projected out about a foot. She snatched her phone up and scrambled back to her feet as he walked to the bottom of the slope.

  ‘Alistair, you have to stop this, you’re scaring me!’ She dialled again, 999. The operator answered promptly, just as Sage got both feet squarely on the capstone and shouted into the phone. ‘This is Sage Westfield, I need the police at Chor—’ before the phone beeped again and she was cut off.

  His face was distorted, hostile. ‘I didn’t want to hurt you, I liked you. But you can’t tell anybody about the horses.’ He began stomping up the barrow, struggling with the incline and the weeds. He was fatter, older and out of condition. Sage backed up along the stone until one of her heels just slid an inch over the edge.

  She glanced down at the drop behind her. She could see where algae ran down the line between the two upright stones, and had assumed it leaked out. But the join between the stones was tight, and packed with foliage, so water ran out of the top.

  The plants were long strands of moss and lichens drooping into the muddy pool. From this angle she could see where the water poured out like a crystal sheet through the plants. Clean water with moss spores…

  The wind blew her hood over the back of her head and a few heavy drops hit her waterproof jacket. ‘Stop!’ she shouted at Chorleigh, holding out her hand. Miraculously, he did. He was five metres away, maybe six, his arms out to stop her getting past, as if he was corralling her to the top.

  Sage looked around. The fence seemed close; maybe if she took a run and jumped off the barrow she could clear the barbed wire. She took a step onto the middle of the stone to get a run up, trying to estimate the distance. Too far, and you’ll hit the fence and then he’ll be there…

  She felt something move, jerk a few millimetres, before the slab she was standing on leaned abruptly. She staggered back, the stone tipping up a few inches, and dropped her phone at her feet. While she flailed about, trying to get her balance, the whole lid of the barrow flipped up. She dropped onto her back and slid feet first into a void, cutting off her view of Alistair Chorleigh. As she fell, arms fighting to catch the edge, she caught the back of her head and saw stars. The centre of the stone must have been pivoted somehow, the edges had had a few millimetres clearance all round. She’d never stepped on the centre before. She cracked one elbow on the edge but the other hand couldn’t reach the opposite side – as she dropped into darkness.

  34

  ‘Many kistvaens are to be found on Dartmoor, in Devon, England. No doubt many lie undisturbed beneath the undulating scrub and pasture, remains of ancient man inhumed within.’ [Is this a kist? EM]

  The Reliquary and Illustrated Archaeologist, Volume 1, by J C Cox and J Romilly Allen, quoted in margin of Edwin Masters’ Journal, 12th July 1913

  Yesterday I was looking through the many pottery fragments we have, trying to collect together pieces that might come from the same large pot, perhaps another funerary urn. I was allowed to use the breakfast table, it was late afternoon. The French doors were open to the garden and now and then a bumblebee would fly in, intoxicated by the roses outside whose scent drifted around the room. I suddenly noticed Molly, leaning against the door. I thought, as I stood back, how pretty she looked, her summer dress so covered in flowers I was surprised the bees didn’t follow her. I said something like it, just joking.

  ‘I’m glad you like it.’ She didn’t smile.

  ‘What is it, Molls?’ I asked, quite like a brother. ‘You seem a little worried. Is it all the silly teasing?’ For her cousin Hilda and that spiteful Trixie were always joking her.

  ‘No. No, it’s not that.’ She stared at me. Her eyes
are blue, like Peter’s, although I fancy hers are a little more grey. They both have a brown ring around the edge of the iris. Her hair is fairer than his, just a little, and although short, the curls frame her face.

  ‘Well, can I help? I know I’m not a proper brother like Peter, but I would like to help.’ Should I have guessed? I think so, yet when she spoke I was taken aback.

  ‘I don’t want you to be my brother.’ She took a step into the room. ‘You haven’t spoken to me about last night, in the storm.’ She stood in front of me, her hands folded before her as if she expected a scolding.

  ‘You were upset.’ I saw it even as I spoke. ‘I can’t hold you to anything you did when so distressed.’

  ‘I was. But you kissed me.’ She managed a small smile. ‘I waited for you to say something. All day. I thought you liked me.’

  ‘I do like you!’ I was blurting things out. ‘I just – I didn’t know what to say.’

  ‘Didn’t you like kissing me?’

  I looked at her, but anything of that thrill was gone. ‘Of course. But I can’t offer you anything, I have no prospects. I shouldn’t have taken advantage of your distress.’

  She stepped very close. I could see her eyelashes, shading her cheekbones. ‘I’m not distressed now.’

  Her lips were so pink, her cheeks too. Something stopped me leaning down to them. ‘I like you, of course I like you, Molly. But I think of you as my friend.’

  She put a hand on my chest, the fingers splayed against my shirt. ‘What about now?’

  I felt miserable; I didn’t know what to say. Why didn’t I love this beautiful creature, so much my friend? The excitement in the dark, in the storm, had gone.

  ‘I’m sorry, Molly. I’m afraid I’m not really a ladies’ man.’

  She dropped her hand to her side, her face bright red, tears in her eyes. ‘I suppose you think I’m too young.’

  ‘Yes. Yes! You are too young. Molly, you shouldn’t be thinking about chaps, you should be looking at a future. Go to university, take a degree, meet lots of new people. You’ll soon see how old and stuffy I am.’

  She wiped away a tear. ‘You’re five years older than me. I don’t think that’s very old.’

  ‘But our lives have been so different. Molly, I haven’t lived like you, I don’t live in the same world. My mother and I have four rooms in Colchester, every penny we had spare went on my education. Now I will have to earn enough money to support both of us. I couldn’t even think about getting married.’

  ‘I wasn’t thinking about getting married!’ She gulped down her tears, her face red with anger now. ‘I just thought you liked me. But I understand.’

  I was mortified. I had hurt her, all without trying. I could see the pain on her face, and I had caused it. ‘Molly, I’m sorry.’ I took a breath. ‘It’s just that I think it would be dishonest to lead a girl on.’

  ‘You really are a fossil, aren’t you?’ She had backed up to the doorway. ‘My father warned me away from you.’

  ‘Did he? I’m sure he was trying to be helpful.’

  There was a long silence when we just looked at each other. I couldn’t look away, and she was fighting tears.

  She stared at me as if she could suddenly see something new. ‘It’s true, isn’t it? Men falling in love with men.’

  I stood, shaking my head. ‘I don’t know what you mean.’

  ‘Peter’s friend in the village, the chemist. He left a picture of Peter.’

  I was puzzled. ‘What do you mean?’

  She had something in her hand and held it out. Tears were spilling onto her cheekbones. ‘Peter didn’t write back to him, so he sent it to me. He says he’ll send more to father or the police if Peter doesn’t meet him.’

  I glanced at the shadowy, grainy image. Two young men, certainly, lying together in an embrace. I felt a shiver run through my chest. I understood then that Goodrich was a blackmailer.

  ‘You have to understand, Peter was very young and this Goodrich took advantage of him. He must have set up a camera and staged the shot.’

  The curve of a chin, laughing eyes under a shock of fair hair looking back over his shoulder into the camera. The other boy’s face was hidden, his hand resting casually at Peter’s waist. I was filled with dark emotion, some anger, something else. Shameful jealousy.

  I struggled with my fears. ‘There must be an explanation for this photograph. Swimming in the river, perhaps, you can see they were outside.’ Peter must have been very young and ignorant to allow these photographs.

  Molly dashed away a tear. ‘And that’s why you don’t like me. You and Peter—’

  ‘Are friends and no more, I swear to you.’ I stepped forward, took the picture from her. ‘Molly, there are men who are a little cold-blooded, who don’t fall in love easily.’ I felt like I was scolding her so I moderated my tone. ‘I do care for you, and am terribly upset to know I have hurt you.’ I stood before her, and held out my hands. ‘Come, can’t we be friends?’

  She put her cold little fingers in mine for a moment. ‘I’m sorry,’ she whispered.

  ‘And so am I,’ I said. But when she left, turned and fled from me to run upstairs, I was left in turmoil. I looked at the picture, grainy and underexposed as it was. Beautiful in his youthful nakedness, it was unmistakably Peter. I slipped it into my journal and packed up the last of the pottery in the boxes. I had thought my feelings might have turned to Molly naturally, but he was my ideal companion, cheerful enough to pull me out of my darker moments. He shared my greatest interests. My father described how, under fire in the war, he had formed his closest friendships. In fact, one of his friends was now the patron who had secured my place at university. But that photograph burned something dark and arousing into my brain. I knew, in that instant, that I wanted Peter.

  I half walked, half ran onto the terrace and around the tennis court. I don’t know what it was that I meant to do, just speak to him, say something that wouldn’t repulse him completely. The light was fading, the sky a deep blue. The first stars were out as I ran through the long grass on the lawn; it had been too wet to mow after the storm. When I came out of the woodland onto the flank of the barrow, I could see the fields beyond, and shadows under the trees along the hedge. Peter was standing beside the fence in his shirtsleeves, and he turned as I approached. He didn’t say anything, just reached out a hand, the pale fingers in my brown palm, and he smiled.

  ‘Here,’ he whispered, so close to my ear that he brushed my hair. ‘Lie down so they don’t see you.’ He pointed to the side of the barrow.

  So I laid down, my heart almost bursting with love for him, and we waited for our eyes to adjust to the dusk as he released my hand. He pointed and my gaze followed the line of his finger. There, a branched head was lifted, as if to scent the air, on the other side of the field. Then another, his ears flicking back against the sky at the edge of the field, where it sloped up to a small rise. I rolled onto my side, listening to his breathing. It was then that I heard him rustle as he moved closer, felt his warmth as he brushed my face with his hair.

  ‘Ed?’ He didn’t say anything else, just leaned over me. I felt his breath on my face as he came close. I froze, shut my eyes. Then he kissed me.

  * * *

  What else can I say? We talked, laid in each other’s arms, occasionally pointing out a new constellation, freezing at any sounds. The grass was still wet from the storm, so he laid a jacket on the ground for us and for a while, we were happy. Then he lay on his back and lit a cigarette, I could see it blowing above his head.

  After a time, he grew quiet and tense.

  ‘Come on, old chap,’ I said. ‘You can tell me anything. Anything, you know that. What’s troubling you?’

  He looked at me, hesitated for a long moment. ‘It’s nothing, really.’

  ‘It’s Goodrich, isn’t it? I know.’

  I knew I had hit the mark by the way he sighed. ‘He has some pictures of me. He took them years ago when we were just boys.’ He look
ed away. ‘I don’t want my father to find out.’

  I knew how Mr Chorleigh felt about men who loved men. ‘What does Goodrich want?’

  ‘He’s asking for money, but if I give him some he’ll keep coming back for more. I was stupid.’

  ‘You were too young to know what he might do, maybe, but if this Goodrich is holding them over you, can’t you go to the police? That’s blackmail, surely—’

  ‘God, no!’ Peter leaned in and hissed at me. ‘Ed, do I have to spell it out? Those pictures are evidence of a crime.’

  Some intense emotion I didn’t recognise swept through me. ‘I have one of the prints.’

  ‘What?’

  I turned onto my stomach on the sloping grass. ‘Goodrich sent one to Molly, who showed me. She was worried for you. I have it in my journal.’

  Peter looked down and pressed his lips together for a moment. ‘Poor girl.’ He looked up at me, his face tense. ‘I suppose that conversation at breakfast made her think about Goodrich and me. Oh, God, what if she tells someone else?’

  ‘But Goodrich—’

  ‘Damn Goodrich!’ Peter turned towards me with such anger I started back, reminded of his father for a second. ‘I’ll deal with him. It’s Molly I’m worried about.’

  I waited in the dark, hearing his breathing slow down again. ‘How did it start?’

  ‘I always knew I liked other men; I fell in love with boys at school. I have always liked girls of course, Trixie is tremendous fun, but I have never wanted to kiss her. She thinks I am frightfully old-fashioned, poor girl. I have never even tried to put my hand on her knee, let alone seduce her away for a secret weekend.’

  ‘But your family thinks you will marry her.’

  ‘I suppose I will one day.’ He sounded sad. ‘I thought I would start to see things as other men do, over time.’ He ran his hand over my bare chest, tangling his fingers in the curls there, making me shiver. ‘But I haven’t changed at all, in fact, the opposite.’ He found his way to my lips for another kiss, making me groan, whether with passion or despair I’m not sure. Both, perhaps.