The Coffin Path_'The perfect ghost story'

by Katherine Clements

  Ellis’s eyes flash with dark fire. ‘What would you have me do with him?’

  With horror I realise he is asking for my permission. What would he do? How far would he go? Would he burn him and bury him beneath the White Ladies, alongside the slaughtered lambs? Would he do that for me?

  My racing heart stops my words.

  Ambrose comes running, face flushed. He pushes Ellis away from Henry and stands between the two of them. ‘Both of you, get your things and be gone from here.’

  Ellis wipes the blood that drools from his chin. He catches my eye but I look away.

  Henry makes a sound that might be protest.

  ‘I’ll hear no excuses,’ Ambrose says. ‘I’ll employ no man who acts the savage. Both of you, be gone by nightfall. I care not what becomes of you.’ It’s rare that Ambrose is moved to such outrage, but neither is he a man for idle threats.

  Henry groans, tries to pull himself up to sitting, but he cannot. I do not care. All I know is I want him gone. Any sympathy I might have felt, any shred of compassion I might once have persuaded myself was real, is dead. Let him spread his lies and be damned – I cannot stand to have him near me.

  I step forward and see Ambrose catch his breath as he takes in my torn shirt and breeches, the bruise I can feel swelling across my cheek. ‘No,’ I say. ‘Henry must go, but Ellis stays.’

  ‘You cannot condone this,’ Ambrose says, but I see he understands something of what has taken place.

  ‘Henry goes. Ellis stays,’ I repeat.

  ‘But, Mercy—’

  ‘I will not argue with you. Do as I say.’

  I turn and walk towards Scarcross Hall.

  I hear Henry appealing to me but I no longer have any pity for him and will not allow myself to be cowed by the shadow of his threats. Ambrose calls me back, begs me to reconsider, but I’ve made my choice. I am mistress here and Ambrose will do as I wish. Only Ellis is silent, but I know he watches me as I go. I can feel his eyes on my back.

  Chapter 24

  The first thing he notices upon waking is the smell: charred, acrid, pungent.

  Next is the light. It should be devil-dark in the barn but there is light – not the cold blue flood of the moon but hazy, golden, and flickering, like candles through mist.

  A weight presses on his chest.

  Is he dreaming?

  He props himself up on his elbow, blinking, confused.

  Then he tastes it: smoke.

  He’s on his feet in seconds and is lost in thick smog that suffocates him and stings his eyes. Flames crackle and leap at the far end of the barn. The fleeces are ablaze.

  His first thought: save them.

  He grabs his blanket and tries to beat the flames but the blaze is already too strong. The heat scorches his face and hands. The blanket begins to smoke, fire catching a corner, racing up the seams. He surrenders it to the flames, drops to the floor, coughing and hawking.

  ‘John!’ He crawls over to the bedroll where Bestwicke sleeps. ‘John! Wake up!’

  There is no response. He shakes the man, tugging him onto his back but he does not stir.

  There is a loud creak as the flames lick the underside of the hayloft, the wooden platform beginning to bend and blacken in response to the heat.

  He shakes Bestwicke hard. ‘John, wake up!’

  Still nothing. Is he alive? He cannot tell. He drags Bestwicke from his bed. The man is shrunken and wiry with age, but he’s a dead weight. He hooks an elbow under each armpit and drags him towards the door.

  The smoke is thickening, filling his chest and stifling his thundering heart. Charred wood mingles with the stench from the wool as the hayloft catches fire. Above, the hay is beginning to smoulder, releasing the familiar scent of hayricks and bonfires.

  He reaches the door. It is kept closed by night to protect the valuable fleeces from thieves and stop wild animals seeking shelter. He dumps Bestwicke on the floor and pulls back the big wooden bar that keeps it secure. He pushes against it. It will not move. He tries again, uncomprehending. It cannot be barred from the outside. He remembers shutting the door himself – the last thing he did before lying down and snuffing the lantern. He pushes again, puts his shoulder against it, panic rising. He begins to kick at it, shoves it with all his weight, but it’s stuck fast.

  There is another door at the rear of the barn, close to where the fleeces are stored, but he cannot see it through the smoke. Flames are licking upwards, drawn by the holes in the roof, the hayloft now consumed. That way out is lost to them.

  He begins to kick and hammer at the door, yelling for help. Surely the sound of the fire will rouse someone. Mercy. He knows she does not sleep well. He sees a light at her window more often than not, when he cannot sleep himself. Garrick keeps watch on the fell tonight, but even if he sees the flames, he’s too far away to help.

  He never thought he was afraid to die but he is afraid of the fire, afraid of the pain. He saw a soldier burned alive once, set alight by a misfiring musket. The man had run through the camp, heading for the river, but the flames were too fast. He had fallen not ten feet from Betsy’s tent and lain there, screaming and gurgling, as the flesh melted from his bones. He has never forgotten the sound of that suffering. The stink of roasting meat had hung over the camp and made Ellis’s belly rumble for days.

  He runs over to a pile of tools in the corner of the barn and fetches an axe. Each breath makes his throat sting and his eyes stream. He can barely see, bright points of light fizzing at the edges of his vision, his head spinning.

  He strikes the lower panels of the door. The barn is old, the wood made almost as solid as stone by years of weathering. The planks splinter and crack but he cannot get through.

  He keeps going, not daring to look behind. He can feel the heat on his back, hears the crack and groan of the old wood as the beams in the roof feel the lick and kiss of flames. If the roof falls, they will both die.

  Frantic now, he hacks at the door and at last it fractures. He kicks at the wood, smashing away two planks, then three, at the bottom. He crouches, squeezes through, ignoring the splinters scraping his shoulders, and falls, sprawling, coughing, into the night air. Quickly he’s on his feet again. He was right – the door has been secured from the outside, the wooden bar fixed in its holding. He tugs it back and pulls the door open. A great belch of smoke rushes forth, covering his face with smuts that blind him. The blaze flares bright, the far end of the barn now lost in flame.

  Half blind, he stumbles to where Bestwicke lies and drags him out of the barn by the ankles. He pulls him clear and stands, doubled over, retching, choking, panting hard.

  Then he remembers.

  There is no hesitation. The flames are taking the roof and he has only seconds. He takes a gulp of clean air and goes back inside. He fights, sightless, through the smoke, keeping low, the barn creaking and hissing around him. The heat sears like a furnace. He trips over a bedroll and casts about until he finds his pack and his crook. He snatches both and runs, lungs screaming, to the door.

  He hears her calling his name as he stumbles out.

  She is standing next to Bestwicke, a solitary bucket from the well slopping water at her feet.

  She sees him and runs forward. He thinks she will run into the barn, she will try to save that which cannot be saved, and as she reaches him he catches hold of her.

  ‘Let me go!’ she yells.

  ‘It’s too late.’

  She twists against his grip but he holds her tight.

  ‘Let me go!’ She kicks his shin, her face utter anguish.

  There is a great roar and a crash as the roof at the end of the barn collapses. They are showered in hot red sparks. He pulls her away, back to where Bestwicke lies.

  He puts his head to the man’s chest. There is a quiet, slow beating.

  ‘He’s alive,’ he
says, ‘He needs help.’ But she isn’t listening. She’s standing, watching in silent horror as the flames curl up through the gaping roof.

  Booth comes hobbling, dressed in his nightshirt, Agnes behind him, like a shadow. He can hear Bracken, barking wildly, shut in the stables, and the horses kicking at their stalls. They can sense the danger.

  ‘Quickly!’ Booth shouts. ‘Something must be done!’

  But there is nothing to be done.

  Next to him, Mercy drops to her knees. She does not scream or weep. She does not pray or call out to God. He sees in her eyes not disbelief, but pure, fathomless despair, as the future is reduced to ashes.

  Chapter 25

  ‘We go on as before. What choice have we?’

  There is a pause. All three men look at me, and in each one I read the questions I’m asking myself.

  ‘Without the income from the fleeces, there’ll not be enough to pay the workers,’ Ambrose says. ‘Harvest is almost upon us and it won’t be long before we need more help with the flock. Without John . . .’

  ‘We’ve had lean years before and have weathered them, have we not, Father?’

  Father is gripping the table edge, fixed on the misshapen lump of metal around which we sit like points of a compass.

  ‘Father?’

  He looks up and stares hard at Ellis. ‘The Booths have been through worse than this and survived.’

  ‘Then how will you pay wages?’ Ambrose says. Dority will urge him to stay loyal to Scarcross Hall, but he must feed his family and he cannot do so without coin.

  I have already decided what must be done. ‘We’ll have to sell the best of the lambs at the All Hallows fair. That will raise enough to keep us fed, if we are frugal, and perhaps leave a little for labour. I’ll do the rest of the work myself.’

  Ambrose snorts. ‘You can’t bring in the barley alone. Even you can’t do the work of ten men.’

  ‘Then I’ll do as much as I can.’

  ‘I’ll stay,’ Ellis says. He still has not washed, having kept vigil at Bestwicke’s bedside through the day, and his eyes are strangely white against cheeks still blackened by ashes and fire.

  ‘I can’t pay you what we promised,’ I say.

  ‘I’ll work for bed and board.’

  ‘Why would you do that?’ Father asks. ‘Is this the voice of your conscience? Seems to me only a guilty man would feel the need to make such an offer.’

  ‘Father . . .’ I put a hand on top of his to silence him but he ignores me, sitting forward and fixing Ellis with a condemning glare.

  ‘You say you were the one to bar the door from the inside. You say you snuffed the only candle, but how do we know that’s the truth?’

  Ellis leans back in his chair, expression grim.

  ‘Father, John Bestwicke would be dead if it were not for Ellis. We should be thanking him, not accusing him.’

  ‘We have only his word. Had you been drinking, Master Ferreby? Pastor Flynn tells me there is much drunkenness among the workers of this parish – indeed, among my own men. He tells me they’re to be found in the taverns, wasting their wages on liquor and wenches. Are you one of them?’

  ‘Ellis does not visit the tavern, Father.’

  ‘We shall see what John Bestwicke has to say when he wakes. Now, there is a good man. An old soldier like him knows the meaning of loyalty. He’ll tell the truth.’

  ‘I doubt even John will be able to answer this riddle,’ Ambrose says. ‘Mercy, did you see the door barred on the outside? I did not.’

  ‘No,’ I admit. ‘But I’ve no reason to doubt Ellis’s word. And I don’t wish to speak of it again. We cannot change what’s happened. We’re here to decide what’s best for all of us now.’

  ‘Then it’ll stay a mystery,’ Ambrose says, giving me a scathing look.

  Ellis is avoiding my gaze, but he must be thinking the same as Ambrose and I: there is only one man who has reason to seek such revenge. I cannot say his name aloud, not while Father is here, for he does not know the reason Henry Ravens left us. Does Ellis stay silent to save my shame?

  I know Henry Ravens to be a selfish, violent man but I never saw a killer in him. Despite the quarrels of recent weeks, I cannot believe he’d wish such harm upon us all. To set a blaze, to bar the door, knowing the catastrophe that would befall – that takes a cold, heartless calculation of which I’d never have thought him capable. I wonder if I’ve been mistaken all these years, blinded by lust and sin. I thought myself cannier than that, immune to such things. Surely I would see the signs of the Devil in a person.

  A picture comes to mind of Ellis, standing over Henry’s sprawled body, brimstone burning in his eyes, but I force it away and bury it beneath the weight of more pressing worries.

  It was the noise that woke me. I sleep lightly, these days, disturbed by the slightest sound. I ran out onto the gallery, where, through the big windows in the hall, I saw the orange glow of flame lighting the night sky. I know the signs. I’m bred to watch for them, to fear them. Fire can mean disaster – the end of everything.

  By the time I found Bestwicke, slumped and insensible on the grass, I knew it was too late to save the barn. When I saw Ellis emerging from the flames, like a demon from the depths of Hell, the useless pail of water I carried slipped from my hands.

  Afterwards, I realised he must have dragged John outside and gone back in. At the time I assumed he was trying to stop the spread of the flames, giving up only at the final moment, but now I’m not so sure. His pack and crook sit in the corner of the kitchen, the only things untouched by the fire. Why would he risk his life for these few belongings? And why is he so silent now? Why does he not defend himself?

  ‘I told you it was stolen,’ Father says, nodding towards the twisted lump of soot-stained metal in the centre of the table.

  ‘If it were stolen, why would the thief hide it among the fleeces?’ I say. ‘They would have sold it long since.’ But he has no answer. His brow is black and craggy as rain-slicked rocks on the moor top.

  It had been found by one of the men from the village – one of the meddlers and gossipmongers who’ve been trekking up the coffin path all day. The first arrived before dawn, from farmsteads and cottages, drawn by the horror of flames in the darkness, the rest, since then, lured by curiosity, the column of thick grey smoke rising from the embers, and the stench of burned fleece. They come to ogle our misfortune, pretending sympathy, but, I notice, once they see there are no goods to scavenge, no remains to be picked over, no bodies to mourn, they leave, sighing and shaking their heads, secretly glad it did not happen to them.

  But that one man, poking around the charred skeleton of the barn, found the molten metal in a pile of ashes that had once been our year’s yield of fleece. Seeing no value in it, he gave it to Ambrose. Its four legs are bent and crooked, the body of the thing smutted and dirty, the engraving run to nothing in the furnace of flames. The glass inkpot is gone, shattered in the heat, and the hinged cap is now welded into place, but it is unmistakably my father’s missing inkwell.

  Now, when he looks at me, his eyes are wet. ‘It’s all my fault,’ he says.

  There is a long silence. For one horrid moment I think he’s about to confess.

  ‘Why would you say that? It’s not your fault. How could it be?’

  His eyes are desperate, appealing to me, but I’ve no idea what he wants me to say.

  ‘It’s all my fault. All of it . . .’ He buries his head in his hands and suppresses a sob as tears drip from between his fingers to make dark spots on his breeches.

  I’m shocked. Where is the strong-willed, determined man I know my father to be – the man who would never show weakness or defeat in front of others?

  Ambrose and Ellis are staring, embarrassed, at the inkwell.

  ‘I’m so sorry, my child,’ he says, muffled through wet fingers. ‘I�
�ve brought this upon us all.’

  Tentatively I reach out a comforting hand to his shoulder but he shrugs me off. ‘It’s not your fault,’ I say. ‘Perhaps it was nobody’s fault. Perhaps it was an accident.’

  Ambrose huffs and rolls his eyes. I don’t blame him. I do not believe it myself.

  Father shakes his head. ‘I have prayed and I have fasted, just like Pastor Flynn said, and still I cannot find peace. What must I do, Mercy? What must I do?’

  ‘You must calm yourself, Father. Despair will not help us.’

  A shudder moves through him. He takes a deep breath and sighs it out slowly, recovering himself. ‘Yes, you’re right, of course. I must have courage. I must be patient. This is a test of faith. Forgive me. Forgive my moment of doubt.’

  I squeeze his hand and this time he does not pull away. He sits awhile, thinking, Ambrose and Ellis both silent and awkward in the face of his frailty.

  ‘Mercy is right. We will go on as before,’ he says eventually. ‘We will do the best we can and have faith that our Lord will provide.’ He turns to Ellis. ‘Master Ferreby, your offer of service is appreciated. If you wish to stay, then we will keep you. Mercy will see to it that you have berth in this house.’ And, to me, ‘The small room next to your own is not used. That would be suitable.’

  He pushes himself up to standing. I notice how it pains him. ‘You’ll forgive me but I must retire to pray.’ He splays his fingers atop the inkwell, lifts it, and leaves, taking the warped, ugly thing with him.

  Two weeks later, John Bestwicke leaves us. The smoke has poisoned his lungs. His breath is laboured and he coughs up thick, malodorous spew whenever he tries to speak.

  One of his sons comes with a cart to take him away. He’s said little about the night of the fire, speaking only to corroborate Ellis’s story and whisper his prayers, but once he’s seated in the cart, he takes hold of my hand. His fingers feel papery and withered, like autumn leaves. ‘Be ever wary of the Devil’s tricks,’ he says, eyes turned dull and watery with illness. ‘Don’t be alone, Mistress, remember. Don’t be alone or he’ll find you when you least expect it.’ Perhaps his malady has turned his mind as well as his body, but his words chill me. I wonder if he felt it too: that ill-omened presence, watching us as the fleeces burned. He lifts my hand to his lips and kisses it. ‘God be with you, Mistress. God be with you.’