In his report to the magistrate, he wrote:
“As to the demise of Thomas Boothby, it must be concluded that Satan was Determined not to let His servant reveal the Magnitude of his Sins & so, making himself invisible to All except the Aforesaid, came into this Place in Person to Wring his Creature’s Neck.”
23
FOND, FOOLISH, WANTON
By the time her husband returned home, Lady Clarissa had recovered sufficiently to milk her indisposition for all it was worth. A prolonged course of purging and bleeding had left her somewhat wan and gaunt, which, granted, rather suited her. She had not yet recovered the power of speech, but she had been able to pull herself together, so that anyone entering her chamber was met with a most piteous sight: the Lady Clarissa in creamy low-cut satin, draped tastefully against the pillows in her own hair, which was allowed to cascade loosely to one side, drawing attention away from the double chin; skin pallid as snow, the mouth rouged so artfully that one hardly suspected paint; beckoning one to come closer, indicating with fluttering gestures that even if she could not converse, she would be happy—grateful, even—to hear what one had to say. It was a spectacle designed to move a man to tears; but of course her husband was a man difficult to move.
After receiving an account from his steward and the governess, Sir Edmund paid his ailing wife a visit. This was their conversation.
“So! How fare you, wife?”
The eyelids were lowered, then opened in wide helplessness.
“I am sure that you will mend in no time, no time at all.”
A brave little smile of reassurance trailed into a look of worried sympathy for him.
“No need to concern yourself. I know what I must do.”
Adoring gratitude, accompanied by a languid sweep of the leg.
“Not now, Clarissa. “
A pout.
“Heavens, woman! Where is your shame?”
The head was cocked to one side in defensive surprise.
“No really, Clarissa, really! ’S-truth. Are you really such a fool that you don’t even realize the havoc you have caused…?”
Wounded outrage.
“Don’t look at me like that. I am only stating the truth. If you hadn’t been so…Christ! And now it’s up to me to sort it out, isn’t it? Or we’ll have a full-scale witch hunt on our hands, and who knows where that may end!”
A sullen shrug.
“You have no idea, do you woman? You simply have no idea what kind of damage this can do. They already have that sister of yours locked up.”
She assented sadly.
“She has you to thank for it, has she not! And now you probably expect me to plead for her release! Well, there is nothing I can do to save her, I’m afraid. She is worse than you are—her mind is quite addled. I don’t know where you Steppys sisters get it from. She’s been screaming threats and insults and frightening the servants out of their wits. And quite frankly, I don’t even know if I should save her. No sane man would, in my place.” He slammed his fist on the table. “Do you know what that viper—” now his tone suddenly flipped, turning high-pitched, plaintive, “—that Gorgon has done? Stealing from us, on the sly! Selling the family furnishings, mirrors, silver and such, and pocketing the proceeds.”
He saw her struggling with the automatic reflex to console him, to apologize. “Your father’s man Tucker has provided us with a list. It’s been going on for years. Did you know about it? Bitch! I wouldn’t put it past you, to hide something like that from me!”
Furious, hurt denial.
He snorted loudly. “And what do you think our fine suitor is going to say about all this?”
Her hand went up to her mouth.
“Yes, your dear Captain Beaupree. We came down from London together. Forgotten about him, had you? A mind like a sieve, you have. I don’t know what to tell him. What would my lady tell him?”
A sad shake of the head.
“Oh, we are sorry now, aren’t we, when it is too late! You hadn’t considered, had you, what this scandal would do to our plans for Sarah. Let’s hope the captain is not easily daunted. Or that he is in serious need of money.”
Contrite now, his wife bowed her head in shame.
“But—Gad, Clarissa, I don’t see, I still don’t see, how you could have put yourself into the hands of one of the cooks—”
She shrugged.
“I am truly disappointed in your…judgment.”
His stern mirth was met by a blank gaze—like that of a naughty child given a dressing-down.
“Now this woman, this she-quack, ha! She’s the gel’s, er, I mean your niece’s nurse, isn’t that so?”
Clarissa remained icily uncommunicative.
“It was at your behest that she supplied you with the deadly nightshade. Do not deny it.”
Clarissa did not deny it.
“Your maid seems to think that you took too much, and poisoned yourself.”
Her nostrils flared slightly.
“Answer me!”
Clarissa now allowed herself a martyred sigh.
“Begad, woman! This is all your fault.” He rolled his eyes. “I should count my blessings, I suppose. I hope—yes, I pray to God that that tongue of yours has stopped wagging for good. Christ only knows how I’ve put up with your scolding all these years.”
Clarissa now turned her back on him. She lowered her head into her hands.
He snorted. “I don’t feel sorry for you, I really don’t, woman. Fie! I can read you like a book. Do you know that?” It was probably the first time in his married life that he could berate her without interruption, and it was beginning to excite him.
He moved around to the other side of the bed, planting himself squarely in his wife’s line of sight.
“Oh, Clarissa, stop your sniveling. Wehn, wehn, nah-nah na. You females are all alike, aren’t you. The old bishop was right about your sex, he nailed it right on the head…” Sprays of projectile spume landed on her averted cheek as he spat out as much as he could recall of his favorite sermon: “…fond, foolish, wanton, flibbergib, tattlers, triflers, wavering, witless, feeble, eavesdroppers, rumor-raisers, evil-tongued, worse-minded, and in every way doltified with the dregs of the devil’s dunghill!”
He had already started unbuckling his girdle.
Later Sir Edmund sent for the witch-finder, and the witch-finder came to Sir Edmund hat in hand. Sweat poured forth from the perimeter of his cheap wig, for he was anticipating a mighty row.
“I am afraid, sir,” Matthias ventured respectfully, “that we have too much evidence against the lady your sister to release her at present. There are some matters yet to be resolved, for there have been many accusations made against the dear lady, too numerous, unfortunately, for us to disregard…”
“I know, I know,” interrupted Edmund. “A face like hers could curdle all the milk in the county, couldn’t it!”
Matthias was not sure if Sir Edmund was jesting or not. Nor was he sure if a jest was appropriate at this point. “More serious allegations than that, sir. It seems she…”
“Spare me the allegations. I know you witch-finders never have any difficulty finding those.” He sent Matthias a condescending wink. “Yes, and then there’s a jolly hanging for the whole town to enjoy, and everyone’s happy. When’s the ‘trial’, man?”
Matthias replied with wounded dignity, “The magistrate has been sent for, sir. We expect him within the fortnight.”
“Well.” Sir Edmund’s tone became business-like. “Let us hope this shameful affair does not drag on too long. The sooner it’s over, the better. Now. As for the other case—Elizabeth Goose—we are withdrawing the charges against her. So that matter may be dropped.”
“Sir?”
“I mean you may release her. My wife has admitted that the belladonna was her own doing; she took too much of it. Therefore there is no further reason to persecute the woman.”
“But sir!” Matthias could hardly contain his disappointment. “Wi
th all due respect, the charge of witchcraft—we cannot simply turn a blind eye! We have been gathering evidence, and we were about to…”
“Mr. Boulderdash. Let us speak man to man here. Let us see how we may resolve this matter amicably. It means a great deal to a niece of mine, a lovely young lady—” he winked at Matthias—”to have this woman freed. She was the gel’s nurse, you see…”
Matthias nodded. He had expected Sir Edmund to object to the arraignment of his sister-in-law, but not to that of a mere servant. What came next, however, surprised him even more.
“If I and my family were to pledge not to lodge a protest in the matter of our sister’s indictment, nor appeal her conviction…might we then come to an understanding with you about this cook?”
“But sir —” stammered Matthias, confused and suspicious.
“And if I were to say that there was no need to keep her—I mean the lady our sister—here at the manor, and that you have my permission to conduct her to a place where your investigations may proceed apace, will that not make it less incumbent upon you to pursue your efforts with regard to this good woman Goose…?”
“You are too good, sir, but…”
“I give you my word upon it, as a gentleman and a knight,” Edmund said firmly. “And a gold piece for you, my good man, to seal our bargain.”
Matthias Boulderdash left clutching the gold sovereign in his fist.
Lucinda had been prowling about the gardens all afternoon despite the fierce chill. She wanted to make it easy for Henry, who was surely hoping to find her.
Returning from a stroll through the kitchen garden and around the back of the stables—the location of their first encounter—she spotted Mrs. Limpid, standing with her back to her in the box garden. She began to retreat, but then heard a peal of laughter.
A hundred paces or so beyond Mrs. Limpid, half-hidden by a hedge, stood Henry…with Sarah. He was pressing Sarah’s hand to his chest, as if to show her where his heart was beating, and she was giggling, struggling to free herself. Mrs. Limpid took one or two warning steps in their direction, and he dropped the hand with an apologetic smirk.
The smile froze on his face as he spotted the other maiden lurking by the yew hedge. Then he turned, and, offering Sarah his arm, led her through the wisteria arbor to the steps down to the stream.
Numbly, Lucinda sped back to the house.
24
DONKEY’S SKIN
Lucinda spent the rest of the afternoon soothing herself with plausible rationales. When they were finally alone together, Henry would mock her for her lack of faith in him. Of course he had to pretend to be wooing Sarah! How else to explain his presence at the manor?
By the time she sat down to supper with the others, she was able to face even the glowing Sarah with some composure.
Sarah was laying it on a bit thick, however.
“My poor loves,” she said, addressing her siblings, “will you miss me?”
“What do you mean, Sarah?” said Sebastian. “Going to meet your maker, are you?”
“She’s dying!” exclaimed Harry.
The others giggled, for they all knew about Sarah’s impending betrothal, but family dynamics dictated that if someone flaunted some piece of good fortune, you had to make them pay for it.
“Leave Dorset, yes,” said Sarah haughtily. “When I am married, I will live in London. If you are nice,” she added, “I may invite some of you to stay.”
“Oh, may I, may I?” asked Belinda breathlessly.
“You, and Catherine, and Robert, and Samuel, maybe,” said Sarah. “But not Harry, and not Sebastian.” She glared at them.
Lucinda was too used to being left out to take the omission to heart; she just swallowed, telling herself that the tables would soon be turned on her cousin. She was sure it wouldn’t be long now before Henry revealed his true intentions. She bit her lip, but could not suppress a little smile as she saw herself inviting Sarah to visit her, in London. She might even offer to help poor Sarah find a husband; wouldn’t that be a magnanimous thing to do!
“What’s she grinning about?” asked little Samuel.
They all looked at her. Lucinda concentrated on her soup.
At this moment Kitty burst into the nursery and tiptoed over to Mrs. Limpid. She whispered something in her ear.
Mrs. Limpid pursed her lips.
“Lucinda!” she ordered. “You may be excused. There’s someone wants to see you. But mind you return in time for prayers.”
Lucinda jumped up. Her spoon fell on the floor with a loud clang. Hastily she picked it up, blushing a bright red now, and ran out of the room after Kitty.
Kitty turned and hugged her in the corridor. “It’s wonderful, isn’t it!” she breathed. “She’s back!”
Lucinda was momentarily confused by the feminine pronoun. “Who?” she said.
“Why Bessie of course! She’s been released! She’s not a witch. I knew it all along, of course, we all knew it, but it’s ever such a relief, isn’t it? Hurry now, she wants to see you, she has been asking after you.”
Lucinda flew down the stairs. She felt very wicked for not having had Bessie uppermost in her thoughts. Bessie had been freed! She was not going to be hanged! Oh, but this meant that everything would come out all right after all! She was sure it was Henry’s doing.
She found Bessie sitting wrapped in a blanket before the fire. Not the old Bessie: not comfortable, plump, red-cheeked Bessie, but a gaunt, bruised, unpleasant-smelling, sore-covered, anguished old woman.
All she could say when Lucinda threw her arms around her was, “Oh my pet, oh, oh, oh, my pet!” over and over again.
“Bessie! Bessie! They’ve let you come back!” moaned Lucinda, “I was so afraid…”
“Pet, pet!” panted Bessie. “Thank the Lord, thank the Lord. But poor Thomas, he…”
“What happened?”
“Thomas is with the good Lord now.”
Lucinda’s legs started shaking, and she had to sit down. “Dead? Oh, Bessie,” she sobbed, “Thomas—dead? I should have…If only I had…Maybe I could have…”
“No, nothing,” Bessie said. “Lamb, there’s nothing you could have done.”
When Lucinda returned red-eyed from the kitchen she found one of the footmen waiting outside the door to the schoolroom.
“Miss!” he whispered.
“Yes?” she answered.
“For you!” and he thrust a piece of paper into her hand.
Her heart leapt out of her chest and landed at the base of her throat. It beat there, wildly. She tucked the note into the waistband of her apron; but when she saw that the room was empty—the others were already in the adjoining bedchamber—she took it out and quickly scanned the words.
The handwriting was sprawling, manly. It had been written in haste. “The library. Tonight. Midnight.”
She clenched her fists and looked up at the ceiling. “Oh thank you,” she breathed fervently.
So Henry had just been pretending to ignore her! It was as she had suspected. How could she have doubted him? The visit, the betrothal to Sarah—all a charade. He had arrived just in time to save Bessie; he would have saved Thomas too, if only she’d had the chance to tell him about Thomas. And now he was going to save her.
She stuck the paper carefully under a burning log in the hearth and watched it until it caught. Then, her face glowing, she joined the others in the next room for prayers.
In bed, she lay awake, rigid with excitement, her feet cold with tension, her torso taut with anticipation. Her mouth was dry and her feet were icy, but she dared not move in case she woke Sarah, Catherine or Belinda, who shared her bed.
The intervals between the chiming of the clock were endless. Every hour stretched to at least three. It was agonizing, experiencing time this way.
Then, at last, the twelve. One. Two. Three. Or was it four? Nine. Ten. Eleven. Twelve. Silence.
Casually, as if stirring in her sleep, she rolled over onto her stomach. Moving by
fractions, she drew her leg and hip away from Belinda’s sleeping side. Once she was free, she began inching her way over to the edge, where the blanket stopped and the cold night air began. Experimentally she lowered one leg over the side; lifted her head a fraction, and listened. There was no movement from the bed. The girls’ soft breathing was answered by grunts from the boys sleeping on the other side of the partition. In the alcove, Mrs. Limpid was snoring gutturally.
She slid down off the bed and onto the floor. For a minute or two she lay there, stifling the panting that accompanied her beating heart. No one stirred. On hands and knees, each movement deliberate and restrained, she crawled to the door and quietly, ever so quietly, let herself out of the room.
The hall was black as tar but her eyes were wide, wide open, drinking in the thick blackness, letting it sink deep into her eye sockets. Her arms were out in front, her fingers spread apart, like antennae feeling for obstacles. She stumbled forward, expecting at any moment to bump into something. But gradually the black turned to grey, and she began to perceive recognizable shapes.
Here was the cold stone of the staircase. She made her way down, feeling for each step with her bare toes before planting her foot. When she reached the bottom step she crept through the deserted outer drawing-room, which smelled faintly of mildew and wax. The carpets felt nice and soft to her cold feet. She was sorry it was too dark to make use of the looking glass over the mantel; she hoped she did not look too disheveled. At the far side of the room a set of doors led into a larger room, similarly furnished with ornate furniture stationed around the perimeter, the center open. And there, on the far side, were the doors to the library.
She touched the polished handles, hesitated a moment, then with silent resolve turned them and let herself in. Some candles were lit, and she gratefully felt the warmth of a fire. Too excited and flustered to look at him directly, she turned and carefully shut the doors behind her.
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