by H C Turk
“Why, Edward, we must bring Eric down to meet London’s newest lady. Here’s a wonderful new peer to perhaps strengthen the friendship between our families that somehow has grown slack, which I’ve scant been able to comprehend.”
“Why, I…I don’t believe that Eric is in the household, Father,” Edward maintained while blanching.
“Oh, and of course he is. A moment past I saw him examining your hunting knives to the point—I say—of nearly losing a finger.”
“No…, I, I am certain he left thereafter,” Edward said, his voice unconvincing.
Failing again to comprehend, Andrew stepped to the doorway, ordering an unseen servant upstairs to retrieve Master Eric.
Further talking transpired, though none by Edward. Remain for tea, of course. I would love, but no, though the two youths’ meeting would be grand. Yes, a new generation of friendship in our families, even as with Franklin—God rest his soul—and Edward.
A young male soon entered, unescorted, a person as common as his father, but not nearly so apprehensive. As Eric and I shared a safe, average introduction—no kissing required by this youth, praise God—I managed some bland pleasantry that would have pleased my tutor. But my thoughts were with Edward, not his son. Rathel was the sinner most corrupted by drama, but Edward remained the most distraught. On this household stage, the sinners improvised lines they had to live, not learn, their composition having entrapped me. Unfortunately, in this current scene I was feeling, not thinking, and improvised my own composing poorly.
The youths were seated on the same divan, though between us was enough air for flying, Eric becoming nervous upon discovering that he was facing not a lady, but a girl. His first embarrassment was from Rathel, who commented on how manly he had grown. His next embarrassment was from the witch. As though tutored by Satan, I asked him:
“Are you the male I am to kill with love?”
How appropriate this question seemed in being humorous yet insane, for was madness not the nature of our households? Though misplaced and in consternation, had I not learned to relate like sinners?
The three Denton males reacted immediately to my words. Eric gained an uncertain countenance as he looked to me, then to his grandfather, who had burst into the loud, unfettered laughter heard before. Edward, the architect, was a building himself, static as a mortared wall and equally opaque, staring at me with no revealed emotion.
“A lass with your Alba’s appearance, Amanda, could surely kill with her love, so intense is her comeliness,” Lord Andrew laughed.
Rathel, whose smile was as false as Andrew’s was genuine, did not smell comical as she replied.
“Ah, London’s current youth, always with commentary to make themselves seem so important. We thus see that unimpeachable beauty must be more than artifice. But perhaps I know the greater factor weighing poorly against Alba’s behavior. The girl was reared on Man’s Isle away from true society. This might be the cause of her minor humor for which we both apologize. With further exposure to London’s superior etiquette, however, I am certain she will conversationally become the lady that she now appears.”
“With God’s grace and the influence of her new mistress,” Andrew replied, “no doubt this fine lass can only improve, though she should never lose her humor.”
I agreed. Understanding that we were now deeply immersed in theater, I began speaking with compositional fluency. Though my inner disposition was similar to silent Edward’s, our responses were disparate; for whereas Edward found himself in hiding, I found myself in battle.
“My truest apologies,” I offered, “to all the Messrs. Denton. But with Mistress Rathel’s expertise in demonology, I sometimes feel the witch myself.”
Mad humor remains humor. I remained somewhat mad from my foolish response, while Andrew remained sane as he responded with the perfect humor of his laugh. Edward then responded with words Rathel and I heard perfectly above the chuckling. He stared at me, having gained some controlled emotion I could not interpret, could not avoid, and displayed the passion allowing him to envision cathedrals.
“How fine your humor is, Alba, though you might ask your mistress to guide you toward an area less dangerous to womenfolk. Inquire of her colleague, London’s Magistrate Naylor, who has his own way with witches; for even as the lady’s is being aware of them, the magistrate’s is killing them.”
And the theater ended. With that final phrase, the play and playing became unacceptable to a witch most expert in stench, the unique odor of blackened family. After a pause to accept Edward’s ending words, I turned from the man and looked toward the floor, seeing no true ground of God’s, but deceptive planking precise yet sourced in destruction. I could smell his fear, and sensed danger within him, but the danger was not for me. This awareness saved me from fainting when thoughts of loved ones burned black filled me again; for I knew that Edward’s fear of death included no desire for my own demise, only a plea to God for any death to come other than his son’s.
Again the moderating mistress seemed to be aiding me in education.
“Certainly, Mr. Denton is correct, Alba, in that neither dying nor witches are comical matters with godly folk.”
Edward looked away after contemplating my wordless response, after examining my shame or sensitivity. Neither of us wished to view the deathly state between us, a theme to be reinforced if again we were to view each other. Being two persons whose preference was the living world, Edward and I looked away.
“Now, enough of dying and social chastisement,” Andrew ordered all present. “Let us speak of the fond future, not the unpleasant past.” And he chuckled mildly at his own, unaffected humor. He and Rathel then discussed my upbringing, schooling, church and social activities, and similar regarding Eric. Not a word in this conversation was emitted by Edward, who sat solidly behind his desk, chin lodged on his fist. Sane again, I said nothing. Eric, however, soon found his own cue for entering this evolving theater.
While glimpsing his betters, the boy spoke to me in a manner he considered surreptitious.
“You know of witches?” he asked, his tone of profound gravity.
Though I had seen sinners scarcely older than this person wed with children, the boy was so commonly youthful as to be enthusiastic about an unreal realm he considered dangerous. I then felt a lack of justice in my life for never having known a witch my age, for only having met sinning youths scarcely recognizable as human.
“I know sinners,” I said quietly. My reply was unkind because I inspired Eric to seek resolution of that mysterious word.
“We are all sinners in the eyes of God,” he stated, a comment that seemed a question, Eric wondering if he had grasped my meaning.
“And some are well appreciated in the eyes of Satan,” I told him.
“Such as witches,” he returned thoughtfully, “for they cause plagues and steal the breath from babes.”
“Cats in strange imagination cause the latter and rats in actuality the former,” I declared. “Your fantasies seem misarranged.”
Andrew and Amanda continued to chat in their social manner, Edward necessarily joining when asked to respond. Upon noting that the young persons were speaking between themselves, the architect stepped to a window to be near the youths, listening while looking elsewhere.
Seeking to draw more of my sinister familiarity by impressing me with his own, Eric announced, “Oh, of course, witches curse good folk with heinous potions.”
This pronouncement, however, was too aligned with true aspects of my life for me to respond facetiously.
“Clearly, sir, we have seen today that even good Londoners curse one another. What potion could be worse than hatred?”
From the certainty of my idea as well as my loud voice, the seniors in the chamber noted my comment, though Andrew and Amanda continued with their speaking. Edward’s reaction was to wander. Literally moved by my speaking, he sidled from one window to another. And though he settled, unseen, behind the children, the witch could smell his interest.
In reply to Eric’s concern that witches in their increasing influence might draw us from God with the raw intensity of their evil, I noted that such active passion was a product of politicians, and therefore endemic to the realm of parliament, not potions. Thereafter, the young sinner in his maleness began smelling as odd as he spoke, a mild version of that odor indigenous to his gender laid forth in the air between us along with equally undesirable words. Eric stated that I was not unpretty. On the subject of new smells and their inspirational pulchritude, I remained without response. Eric, however, received a most direct reply from his father, who ran to the boy as though attacking him, as though displaying the intensity required for a man to invent breathtaking cathedrals. He took his son’s breath by taking his body, snatching the lad of nearly adult size to his feet, hollering as he slapped the boy’s midsection with a punishing hand.
“Your foul thinking in your mother’s house!” Edward shouted, and slapped again at an odd projection of Eric’s clothing, as though the boy had dropped a stick into his pants front. The problem here was unfamiliar to me, and one I would not peruse. Then the child-man was forcefully removed from the room by a father revealing the strength required to procure from within himself the design of hard constructions able to soften even death-ridden hearts.
With the departure of these persons, Lady Amanda determined that our own exit was due, and here I had no argument. After an especially rich farewell between the older folk, Lord Andrew conveyed his sorrow for that regretful ending event, then turned to the young semi-lady to convey his pleasure at our meeting.
More moving than his words was his nature, Andrew’s consistent removal during histrionics from the play’s poorer aspects. Of all those amongst us, Lord Andrew had never emphasized pain by recognition, avoiding the emotion not from ignorance, but amity.
“…a superlative lass I am so proud to have met,” he remarked in ending. “I wish your life to be as fine as your appearance.”
His last remark was so clearly based on genuine goodwill that I could no longer be the firm witch set in her survival against sinners. I became the same human as he, providing Lord Andrew an emotional comment no less genuine than his own.
“God bless you, sir, and all your household that you might live happily as decent people deserve.”
“Exactly as they deserve,” Rathel concluded to Andrew with a smile, the lady as was her life’s insistence having the final idea.
Chapter 9
Protect Me With This Eternity
No especial concern had I for the male guest Lady Amanda was entertaining until he spoke of demons.
This sinner arrived days after I met my future victim. Equal to that shipboard scene of failed salvation and utter death, my introduction to Eric returned to me in dreams. The similarity I found in these events was unclear, though the outcome of each was intended murder; and to God I prayed fervidly that this latest pack of sinners variously presuming and planning death would meet failure in their foreboding. Somehow that failure must be my part. I knew I must save myself, but to abide by my own morality, I could not save myself alone.
Elsie answered the door as I crawled about my chamber, determining the damage from her latest covert bout of cleaning. While I was sighing on the roof, Elsie had obliterated my urine markings so small that no sinner should be sensitive enough to find them. And since my way with dusting was inadequate for the fastidious servant—in part because I used but a rag, the duster being the murderous makings of a slaughtered fowl—Elsie had also removed the accumulated dust from beneath my bed. At least she had not oiled there, leaving me a surface recognizable as wood. But was this failure from her lacking time—in that the irascible lass might return any instant—or from fond consideration? Perhaps the latter, for my sole natural friend, the spider, remained at peace in its corner. And it seemed that Elsie remained at peace in mine.
Upon hearing the word “demonic” from below, I ran to the balustrade, seeing Elsie guide a mature sinning man into the drawing room. His suit seemed more severe than usual for men of Rathel’s peerage, a dark, familiar jacket. Cursed with curiosity, I moved down the stairs to Elsie, who was proceeding with her chores when I accosted her.
“Elsie, who is the male with Rathel?”
Having been violently scraping away encrustations inside a decorative flower crock, perspiring Elsie looked up to me with personal astonishment, proceeding to condemn me for shaming her person.
“And you’re having the gall to be traipsing downstairs in your nightclothes and without brushing your hair, you thankless waif?”
Theodosia’s nearby presence precluded my free speaking. Though all the servants knew of my rejecting the state of ladydom, the less familiar pair rejected me outright because of that attitude. Only a mad person, they believed, required convincing to become superior in English society, the servants willing to sacrifice most any attribute shy of their immortal souls for the opportunity. Therefore, no intimate revelations did we share. Only Elsie received my deceitful rantings.
“No more sorrow in existence could I feel than to have so offended you, kind Elsie, and to my chamber I shall rush to overcome my shame if only you would comment as to the identity of the gentleman herewith arrived.”
Before Elsie could reply that Mistress Rathel’s guests were not my concern, I quickly closed that space between us to whisper, “I heard him say ‘demonic.’”
She ceased her scraping to look firmly toward me, then continued with her activity. Her smell was changed, as was her face, Elsie with an odor of concern, an expression of apprehension.
“And the gent is London’s chief magistrate, Sir Jacob Naylor, being the most important official of law in the City, sitting beside the Lord Mayor hisself.” Her tone had also changed, Elsie no longer comfortably scolding me as before. “’Tis an honor we’re having, child, for such a great man to visit our home. Now be up the stairs lest he’s seeing you disheveled like no lady of his city.”
Away I ran, Elsie seeing that my goal was not the upper story, but the great closet outside the drawing room. As I moved inside and to the far wall, Elsie wondered when I had learned this place the best for listening.
I could smell that the magistrate was being served tea a long walk beyond as polite persons travel, only paces away as the witch listens. Rathel had left the door to the drawing room open, in that a gentleman should not be privately met with a lady unless family, this another lesson learned by the witch though not considered sensical. And here was the subject to be discussed: not ladies, but witches. Within the closet by the wall with wainscoting on only the opposite side, I listened improperly, though not inappropriately, for the subject was me.
“I must presume, Lord Magistrate, that you’ve some exceptional cause for placing such questions to me.”
“Not so exceptional that you cannot call me Jacob, Amanda. In fact, one of our fine citizens is the cause.”
“Am I not one as well, Jacob?”
“One of London’s finest, and especially valued considering the aid you’ve oft given England by helping us rid her of demonic entities. Your ability to distinguish witches from common women is a unique, inestimable faculty.”
I could not smell this man, but his voice held neither especial warmth nor a brazen lack of decency. How Amanda was affected by him I remained uncertain, though it seemed that even her current firm position was being addressed to a peer, a sinner equal not only in society, but strength.
“I hope the time does not come that you doubt my motives regarding such malice because my aid to you is accompanied by a request for payment.”
“A tribute of currency would be understandable, but since you request naught but a mention to the city’s council or the king’s chancellery, I find your fee temperate. Perhaps certain people care not for my wielding influence toward you, but as long as I publicly acknowledge my ideas as having come from yourself, I remain proper not only for the written laws of England, but also the established rules of political
integrity.”
“Then why on this occasion are you doubting my own integrity? Why is it you accept the word of the architect instead of mine?”
“The architect has responsibility for London’s greatest new cathedral, and that is God’s jurisdiction. Considering the man’s position, he is due the benefit of my investigation.”
“But accusing—”
“I present queries, Amanda, not accusations. Further, you might ease my task by being forthright and cooperative, recalling how well we have partaken of mutual business in the past, a compatibility not yet changed, I trust.”
“It has not, Jacob, but you can understand my displeasure at being accused by a man who has caused my family such torment.”
“I am sorrowful for any torments in your life, Amanda, but disputes between households are not within my bounds. Demons in England, however, are. Therefore, allow me to ask my questions and thus satisfy both my office and Mr. Denton while imparting brevity to your distress.”
“You could have further questions, Lord Magistrate? The first to leave your mouth virtually named my adopted daughter as a witch.”
“The query was not quite so crass, Amanda. And reasonable it was of Mr. Denton considering your familiarity with witches. Since by nature, your profession deals with punishment, the possibility exists of your subjects’ seeking retribution. To gain such vengeance, even demons influence people more than the elements. Considering that you now house a person previously under Satan’s spell as per your own admission, Mr. Denton’s queries must be understandable even to yourself.”
“Understandable, but not agreeable, and presumably a type of vengeance of Denton’s own, for even humans can be wicked.”
“Please me, Amanda, by not being coy, not being defensive when no offense have you caused. To obviate Denton’s further distressing you via my office, answer me casually and quickly.”
“Quickly and officially, Jacob, my daughter Alba is possessed by great God alone, for truly she is as pious a child as any I have known.”