The Coffin Path_'The perfect ghost story'

by Katherine Clements

  ‘Such is the way of the world,’ Garrick says.

  ‘So, she’s his only heir?’ Ellis asks.

  Garrick shrugs. ‘We’ve never known of other family. Booth is a private man. Keeps such cards close to his chest—’

  ‘Of course Mercy will inherit,’ Dority interrupts. ‘Scarcross is everything to her and the master knows it. He wouldn’t give it away to a stranger.’

  ‘It’s not always so simple,’ Garrick says. ‘If the law favours a male line, it might be entailed—’

  ‘There is no male line.’ She sits down again, clearly agitated.

  Garrick reaches out and pats her hand – the kitten again. ‘My wife is protective of her friend, as you can see.’

  Dority pulls her hand out from under his. ‘I just believe in what’s right. I know Mercy expects that Scarcross Hall will be hers some day and it’d be wrong to take it away from her, no matter what the law says. It’d break her heart.’

  ‘I fear the law has little sympathy for heartbreak,’ Garrick says.

  Dority glares at him, then turns her attention to Ellis. ‘But what about you, Master Ferreby? Has there never been a wife waiting for you?’

  He feels the usual flare of guilt. ‘I find this life is not favourable to keeping one.’

  ‘Many of the men manage it. John Bestwicke was married, though he’s a widower now, and Henry Ravens has a wife and two boys in the village.’

  Perhaps she does not know about Ravens, after all. ‘That may be, but I’ve not been so fortunate.’

  She smiles at him. ‘If you were to settle here, I’m sure Ambrose would see to it that you had regular work.’

  ‘It’s not the life for me.’

  ‘Well,’ she says, fixing him with those wily eyes, ‘that’s a sore shame.’

  ‘I’m sorry about my wife. She falls prey to gossip – the curse of all women.’

  With Dority gone to bed, Ellis has accepted Garrick’s offer of more ale to see him home. ‘We don’t get many strangers, and certainly not unwed ones, so you’re a fascination among the womenfolk. She’s been vexing me for weeks. I’d no rest till you’d agreed to come.’

  So, it was not Garrick’s idea, after all.

  ‘Women are so curious about the detail of things.’ Garrick continues. ‘She must seek out the why of everything. I’ve no patience for it. There are only a few questions that fill my mind: when will there be rain? How much can we pay the clippers this year? Should we wash early while this good weather holds?’

  Ellis smiles. ‘As it should be, then.’

  Garrick laughs, pauses, growing thoughtful. He takes a mouthful of ale and swirls it from cheek to cheek before swallowing. ‘There’s one question I would have answered. What was it killed those lambs you found?’

  There has been no discussion among the men, despite the presence of the pistol; as promised, Ellis has not mentioned the dead lambs to Bestwicke and he would not give Ravens the satisfaction of his confidence. He knows that Mercy told Garrick, showed him the bodies in the bloodstained sack, but this is the first that Garrick has acknowledged it to him. Darkness shadows the head shepherd’s brow.

  ‘Could it have been dogs?’ Garrick asks. ‘You found the carcasses. You must have some thoughts.’

  Ellis feels the weight of expectation, but he has no answers. ‘If there was a pack loose around here, we’d know about it.’

  Garrick rubs at his forehead as if it pains him. ‘There’s something I’ve not told anyone. Not even my wife. You don’t strike me as the superstitious sort, and I’d never have considered myself as such, but . . .’

  Ellis feels a swell of foreboding. Instinct tells him he doesn’t want to hear what Garrick is about to say.

  Garrick thinks for a while, fingers twisting his beard. ‘I’ve lived and worked this land my whole life. I’ve gone to church and said my prayers and never doubted my faith. I know there are stories about the moor, and about Scarcross Hall, but I never saw or heard anything amiss. At least, nothing that could not be explained. Then, a few months back – it must’ve been January, yes, a few weeks before you came – I was up at the White Ladies, looking for sheep caught in drifts, when something strange happened.’ He pauses, swallows. Ellis watches the constriction of his Adam’s apple. ‘I was sure someone was there – someone who wished me harm. I felt a sense of dread like I’d never felt before, in all my years, and I couldn’t shake it. It was a presence, a threat, like no earthly thing I’ve ever known. It didn’t leave me till I walked away and was safe inside this house.’ He leans back. ‘It plagued me for a time but I put it down to illness of mind – the winter can do that to a man, you know. And I almost forgot about it, till you found those lambs.’ Garrick refills both cups. ‘No doubt you’ve heard the story of the slayings by now.’

  ‘The family that died at Scarcross Hall?’

  ‘Before that. Before the Hall was built.’

  Ellis shakes his head.

  ‘Then you’ll wonder why the mistress is so insistent we keep this thing quiet. It’s said such killings are a sign that the Devil is walking the moor once again.’

  Ellis ignores the prickle that runs up his spine. ‘Once again?’

  Garrick’s smile does not reach his eyes. ‘I’ve not paid it much heed since I was a pup, but some of the old folk around here talk of a curse – a curse that goes back a long way.’ He gulps his ale. ‘There’s no one old enough to know the truth of it now, but these stories are told to us in our cribs. Some still won’t take the coffin path or go up to the Ladies for fear the place is tainted.

  ‘It’s said that some terrible wrong was done here, against the heathens that lived in these parts and practised their sorcery at the Ladies. Strangers came, tried to claim the land with violence and slaughter. In revenge, those that were left summoned up spirits of the dead and put a curse upon the land so that no man could ever tame it. They made sacrifices of their animals and placed the bodies about the moor as a warning.’

  Ellis thinks of the golden coin, its strange markings, with the look of something ancient and pagan, the unusual, deliberate injuries that killed the lambs.

  ‘It’s said that when sheep are found slain like that, and with no good reason, it’s a sure sign of their witchery at work again, a sign that the path down to Hell has been opened, that the dead will come back to claim any poor soul who dares try to tame the land here.’

  There is a distant, sad look in Garrick’s eyes. Ellis stays quiet, allows the ale to loosen Garrick’s tongue.

  ‘They say sheep were found slaughtered before that terrible winter when that poor family died at Scarcross Hall, and that wasn’t the first time neither. The man who built the Hall did so hoping to banish the past, because that spot has an ugly history.’

  Bestwicke had referred to such before he’d refused to go on. Ellis feels an uncomfortable mix of excitement and fear, but stays silent, willing Garrick to continue.

  ‘Before the Hall, there was an old farmhouse. One year, the family who dwelled there had lost near half their flock that way by autumn. Then, one night when the snows came, they were murdered in their beds, torn to pieces in the most gruesome way, as if all Hell’s demons had run amok. Those who found them said they had to walk over floors frozen with blood. Lord knows how much is truth, but when it happened again . . .’

  Garrick leans back, cradling his cup. ‘They’re just old stories, but you see why folk in these parts are easily afeared. You see why it’s best to keep word of these killings between ourselves.’

  ‘Do you believe these tales?’ Ellis asks.

  Garrick ponders. ‘That’s not the point. Many do. But I’ve known bad things happen at the White Ladies. Things that make a man ask questions of God. And now, since you found those lambs, I think perhaps I didn’t imagine it that day. Perhaps I did sense something, some kind of evil. I pray I did not.’


  Ellis thinks back to the day he found the small, mangled bodies. He had sensed it too, had walked steadily down the fell with the conviction that someone was watching him go. He had not looked back. He had not mentioned it to Mercy, and had certainly not spoken of it to the other men. They would have laughed at him, and rightly so. He had convinced himself that such fancy was weakness, brought on by the shock of his find and Bestwicke’s yarns.

  Garrick is watching him closely. ‘You’ve felt it too, haven’t you?’

  With the warm ale in his belly, he’s tempted to confess, but what would be the use? He’s witnessed it before – the hysteria that can spread like flames through a summer hayrick. Once, he wintered in a small village near the old north wall, where confinement and poverty bred resentments and bad blood. It had taken only a spark – one cry of witchcraft – to send the whole place into a frenzy of lies and retribution. He had left before the roads cleared, risking his life in the snowdrifts rather than be consumed by fear and fury. He will not be the one to encourage that kind of thinking here.

  ‘I’ve never felt aught amiss,’ he says.

  Garrick nods slowly. Ellis knows he doesn’t believe him.

  He senses it as soon as he leaves the warmth and smoke of the cottage: the weather is about to turn. The stars are cloud-covered. He can smell rain in the air.

  He feels the first drops as he reaches the crossroads and pauses by the signpost, compelled to turn towards the White Ladies, though the pale stones are shrouded in darkness.

  He thinks of Garrick’s admission. He had pressed for more. What bad things had Garrick witnessed? But at that Garrick had closed like a casket, and it became clear, soon after, that it was time for him to leave.

  He stands, feeling the rain on his cheeks, the earthy scent of the peat bog strong in his nostrils. He feels the presence of the stones, but will not countenance the fear that crawls upon his skin, like lice. He forces himself to walk the coffin path steadily. He will not hurry.

  By the time he peels off his breeches and climbs into his bedroll in the hayloft, he is soaked to the skin. He lies, staring up into the blackness of the eaves, listening to Henry Ravens’s snores, the lament of owls, and the sluice of water over the tiles.

  Chapter 17

  Despite the warm midsummer air, the brook, fed by a hundred tiny springs that rise on the moor top, is icicle-cold. The rain that has fallen for a week has finally ceased, but the deluge leaves the streams brimming with a current that both helps and hinders the task: the fast-running water carries away the filth but it’s harder to find sure footing, harder to stay upright with a thrashing, panicking sheep on your hands. He has already fallen more than once.

  Garrick came to the barn late last night to tell the men they would begin the washing today. Ellis was out with first light, ready to bring the flock from the fields, where they have been folded, down to the valley and into the large willow byres that have been built to hold them. It had taken hours but now the byres are crowded with jostling animals, all stinking of peat, excrement and fear, all unwilling to take their turn in the brisk, chilly flow. Ellis feels some sympathy for them.

  He collects another animal from Ravens, who has the task of checking each one – teeth, feet and fleece – before feeding them, one by one, into the brook.

  This one is strong, a big wether with a patchy, peat-stained fleece, and Ravens smiles as Ellis struggles to control it. He tugs its horns, keeping its head above water as it fights, sending spray across his face. Sam, waiting on the bank to collect any loose fleece, laughs as Ellis curses. The boy has been bursting with self-importance all day, glorying over the new lads who are older than him but given lesser tasks.

  They have two new boys, one working alongside Ravens and the other tending the washed sheep in the fold on the far bank. They remind Ellis of himself when he first worked the hills, reeking of poverty and a troubled, violent past. Brothers, come to find labouring wages, they have the tawny hair and blue eyes that betray their Irish blood. The eldest, Tom, carries the awkwardness that comes with the verge of manhood, and a marked protective instinct for his brother, Nat, but both are keen for the work, and for the coin. He envies their wiry bodies that do not seem to tire. His own is aching, legs numb from the cold water, back and shoulders nagging, fingers puckered and rubbed sore.

  Ellis manoeuvres the sheep to a shallow spot, where it can find a footing. It settles, allows him to tug away dags, burrs and dried grasses, and separate tangled loose strands of fleece that will find their way into Sam’s basket, and eventually to the looms of the poorest weavers, who come begging for scraps.

  As he works, he watches Mercy from the corner of his eye. How different this place seems now, a few months on, from the eerie, desolate spot where they first met. Today it’s full of noise and chatter: the banter of men, the din of complaining sheep, women come to keep company, their children to watch. The trees are heavy with greenery, foxgloves swaying on the slopes, rocks shining yellow with new moss, a carpet of tiny star-shaped flowers blooming in the hollows. The air is rich with sunshine and birdsong. Somewhere, far off, a woodpecker is at work.

  Lost in the hum of activity, he could almost forget the haunting sense of foreboding that has dogged him since he found the slaughtered lambs – increased since his conversation with Garrick – and the questions that keep him awake at night. True to his word, he’s not mentioned any of it again, but feels perversely glad of the shared secret, bound to Garrick, and to her, in unspoken collusion. The threat hanging over them draws her closer.

  When he’s sure the fleece is clean, he drags the sheep over to the far bank where Mercy waits.

  ‘Contrary creature, this one,’ he says, catching her eye. ‘It’ll bolt given a chance.’ He sees her surprise – they’ve exchanged no words all day.

  She nods and calls Bracken to her side, then takes hold of the sheep’s horns and hauls it clear of the water. The animal, glad to be on firm ground, calms at her touch. Mercy stands astride, gripping its head between her legs, fingers deftly plucking away the dirt that has been missed: the cleaner the fleece, the better the price.

  Earlier, he had watched her laugh with Dority, who came with Agnes to bring food for the workers and has stayed to keep an eye on Sam. The women had sat apart from the men while they ate, gossiping and laughing in the conspiratorial way that makes a man feel judged. Ravens had played up to it, had stripped off his shirt, swaggered and preened for them, slugging a pot of ale and competing with the boys, who turned cartwheels and threw themselves about like tumblers. Ellis noticed the way her eyes followed Ravens, but she did not smile at his show.

  Ellis prefers to watch her work. He admires her strength, which could match that of most men, and the way she handles each animal with firmness but care – her fastidious concentration returning several creatures to the brook for a second wash. She is unselfconscious, caring for nothing but the task. He has never known a woman work so like a man while seeming to have no need of one. He does not see the fickleness he’s witnessed in other women but, then, life has given him little comparison.

  Sapling, the whores had called him, green wood. Wherever they went he was petted and teased, persuaded to play his part in their bawdy tricks by a pretty smile, the cushion of a moon-white breast, a devious tear. He was pet of them all, and Betsy didn’t mind. She took pride in her boy. Then he grew tall and strong with a few straggling hairs upon his chest and chin.

  One of them – Gretchen – took him into her chamber and sat him down upon a straw mattress strewn with filthy blankets. She had hair the colour of honey and the skin of her large breasts was freckled, like eggshells. Pink nipples peeped above her low-cut stays. She stared hard at him while she undressed. He hadn’t known what was happening until it had happened. And afterwards she said: We drew straws.

  He was fourteen years old. At least, that was what he was told.

  A sudden shout from
Ravens draws his attention. Tom, whose task is to keep each sheep inside the narrow run until Ravens is ready, has let one slip through the gate. He makes a lunge for it, but too late. It cannons into the backside of the wether that Ravens is checking, sending it headlong into the barrier on the far side of the pen. Ravens struggles to stop both animals charging blindly into the water, while Tom looks on, panicked and helpless.

  Once the sheep are under control, Ravens is fuming. ‘Christ alive! If you can’t do your job, stay out of my way!’ He clips the boy’s head. Tom, caught off balance, stumbles backwards and falls, his head meeting a jutting rock.

  There is a moment when his face crumples, lip quivering, and Ellis sees the child that he still is – the mewling infant that resides beneath the bravado of youth.

  Then the boy gathers himself and sits, scowling at Ravens, one hand pressed to his skull. Dority rushes to him. ‘Are you hurt, Tom?’ She offers a hand, but the boy ignores her. He’s staring at his fingers, now slicked with scarlet.

  ‘Let me see,’ Dority says, trying to assess the wound.

  ‘No.’ He bats her away, climbing to his feet.

  ‘Tom, please . . . you’re hurt.’

  But he will not show distress in front of Ravens. He slopes off along the run towards Bestwicke.

  Dority watches him go, hands on hips. ‘That was cruel, Henry.’

  ‘Then he shouldn’t get in my way,’ Ravens says. ‘Besides, it might knock some sense into him. I don’t know why we’re giving work to their sort when there are boys in the village would welcome the wage. We don’t need them.’

  Garrick looks up from the sheep he is washing. ‘Hold your tongue, Henry, if you cannot hold your ale.’