Secrets in the Mist

by Anna Lee Huber

  I looked up at him sideways, forced to physically bite my tongue to keep from speaking. Even so, I knew I had not done a sufficient job of keeping the anger and loathing I felt toward him from burning in my eyes. That he could state it so bluntly…that he could not even offer me an apology for his part in placing me firmly on the shelf—marked unmarriageable.

  His brow furrowed in some semblance of an emotion that resembled guilt. He lifted his glass and downed the rest of its contents. “Yes, well,” he mumbled. His eyes darted toward my stew. “If you’re finished eating…”

  I waved him off, and he rose to beat a hasty retreat.

  I glared at the dull wood of the table—solid oak that had once gleamed in the candlelight. If my mother had still been alive, she would have been horrified that we had allowed the furniture to go unpolished for so long. But then again, maybe she would have understood.

  In that moment, I felt a sudden intense longing for her presence, as I hadn’t allowed myself to feel in years. I couldn’t help but think that she would have known what to do. And even if she hadn’t, at least she would have been here to tell me everything would be all right. Even if she had to lie to me.

  I pressed a hand to my forehead, reminding myself I could lie just as well. Hadn’t I been doing so for years? A cynical smile curled my lips.

  I glanced down at my still half-eaten meal and sighed. Sleep. I needed sleep. All of this would seem less troubling after a good night’s rest.

  Unfortunately, even the two trips I made back to the kitchen as I cleared the table, and the quarter of an hour I spent helping Mrs. Brittle wash and dry the dishes were not sufficient enough to untangle my nerves and bottle up the emotions that had been spilling out all day. So instead of making my way upstairs to my bedchamber, I carried a candle into the drawing room and set it down on the pianoforte. I lifted the lid and ran my fingers over the smooth ivory keys. Settling down on the bench, I stretched my fingers and began to play a Mozart sonata I knew from memory. The instrument hadn’t been tuned in years—since my nineteenth birthday, an unexpected gift from my father. He’d forgotten my twentieth and twenty-first.

  I shook the distracting thought aside and closed my eyes, trying to concentrate on the music, discordant as it was, but all I could think about was my mother. I suddenly remembered she had been the one to teach me this piece. My fingers stumbled to a halt, unwilling to finish.

  I wrapped my arms around my middle. I was trembling, whether from fatigue or pain I wasn’t sure. All I knew was that I had to escape this house, even if only for a moment. There were too many ghosts here tonight. Too many memories battering at the barriers I’d firmly placed between myself and the past. It had begun with my fear over Kate’s illness, and my exhaustion had only made my weakness worse.

  I retreated to the hall and set my extinguished candle on the bureau by the front door. The entry plunged into darkness, except for the firelight shining from beneath Father’s study door and another faint glow issuing from the direction of the kitchen at the end of the passage. I pulled my cloak down from its peg and carefully slipped out the front door, not wishing to alert Father or Mrs. Brittle to my exit. Not that there was much chance of either of them paying the least bit of attention. Mrs. Brittle had sought her bed the same time I should have gone to mine, and Father would be lounging before the fire in his favorite chair, possibly already insensible.

  I hesitated a moment on the front step, wondering if perhaps I was being foolish to leave the safety of the cottage, especially after everything that had happened the previous night. But the idea of retreating to my room to stare up at my shadowy bed curtains while the bittersweet memories of my youth played out before my eyes seemed torturous. So without another thought to any danger I might be placing myself in, I plunged into the night, turning right to circle the house. My skirts slapped against the overgrown grass as I stretched out my stride. I passed the kitchen garden surrounded by its weathered white fence and the lonely sycamore and headed straight for the once well-trodden path that led out through the marsh grasses to our boat dock.

  The water that lapped gently against the pier’s wood eventually flowed out of our little inlet and into the channels that fed into the River Yare and the River Chet. Here on the Broads, the labyrinth of waterways was only truly understood by the wherry men, and perhaps the smugglers, who were often one and the same. The wherry men made their living by plying through the shallow waters with their boats to deliver goods from the larger ports on the coast. I could remember a time when entire packets of supplies had been delivered to Penleaf in much the same manner. Now we purchased our supplies from Thurlton, and consequently the dock had fallen into disrepair, its wood warped and worn and in a few places starting to splinter. It was a long dock, as those in the marsh were required to be in order to stretch far enough out through the boggy beds of reeds and grasses into the open waterways to be accessible by boat. The support posts were also built tall, rising several feet out of the water into the air, so that when the marshes flooded, as they inevitably did, no unsuspecting boats or barges crashed into the submerged dock.

  My footfalls echoed off the wooden planks, sounding overloud to my ears in the silence of the surrounding fens. The wind was calm and I could hear little else but the soft cadence of insects and the occasional ripple of water as a bubble of marsh gas escaped to the surface or a passing fish stirred the water.

  I pressed a hand to the rough wood of one of the support posts and leaned against it, staring out over the dark expanse of marshes. The sky was clear and peaceful, the stars bright and twinkling. The events of the past twenty-four hours might never have happened. Except I knew that they had. I could feel it in the tingling watchfulness along my spine, the tightness in my shoulders.

  Wrapping my arm around the post to anchor me, I tried to force my thoughts away from wariness of my surroundings. I had taken the risk of venturing out here. The least I could do was enjoy it. Besides, the Lantern Men of myth did not walk on nights as clear as this, and the smugglers did not ply this stretch of the Broads. I had nothing to fear.

  I lifted my face to the sky, automatically searching for The Hunter, Orion, like Kate and I had done since we were young girls. We would slip out to the balcony that ran along the north side of Greenlaws and lean out over the balustrade to look up at the stars and confide our secret wishes. My mother had told me once it was easier to share confidences under starlight, and I was inclined to believe her, for it had certainly proved true for Kate and me.

  It had been on a night like this that I had told my best friend I was in love with her brother. That I hoped one day we would marry. And it had also been on a night like this that I had told her I was afraid my brother would never come back from the war. That I sometimes lay awake at night too consumed by worry to sleep.

  I closed my eyes tightly, trying to blunt the sting. I couldn’t see Orion anyway. It was too early in the year for the constellation to be seen. In another month or two he would be visible in the morning sky before dawn, but for now he was hidden from view. In any case, it seemed somehow traitorous just then to look for him without Kate. Perhaps she would feel well enough tomorrow evening for me to take her out to the balcony. We still wouldn’t be able to see The Hunter, but there were other constellations to look for.

  I would take my violin with me, as well. Kate enjoyed music. She told me she found it soothing. I doubted she would feel well enough to descend to the music room at Greenlaws, but I could certainly take my violin to her. And I could always sing. One of those outrageous folk tunes she was always humming, learned from an impertinent servant, no doubt. Or perhaps something calmer, something from the book of ballads Kate had given me last Christmas.

  One of those haunting tunes weaved through my mind and before I knew it I was softly singing the words.

  O fare you well, I must be gone

  And leave you for a while:

  But wherever I go, I will return,

  If I go ten thousand
mile, my dear,

  If I go ten thousand mile.

  Ten thousand miles it is so far

  To leave me here alone,

  Whilst I may lie, lament and cry,

  And you will not hear my moan, my dear,

  And you will not hear my moan.

  My voice trailed away, but the stillness of the night was shattered. I was no longer alone.

  I didn’t know how I knew it, but I could sense it in every fiber of my being. Every inch of my skin seemed to come alive, prickling at the realization that someone was standing behind me.

  I forced myself to inhale, and strained to see out of the corner of my eye without moving my head, but whomever it was stood too far behind me and the dock post was in my line of vision. I knew I would have to turn and look. It would be foolish to think that if I continued to ignore him he would simply disappear.

  I flexed my fingers where they gripped the post, just to feel that my muscles were still under my control. Then taking another deep breath, I braced to turn my neck, and that’s when I noticed the mist.

  It was the creeping kind that often developed across the surface of the water, like steam rising from a cup of tea. However instead of swirling up toward the sky it spread outward, a soft billowing cloud of smoke that coated everything in its path. How had it spread so quickly? It could not have begun to develop more than five minutes before, and it still stood barely more than an inch or two above the water, but it had already crawled up into the surrounding marsh grasses.

  I swallowed the nerves that seemed to climb up my throat and choke me, and forced myself to turn, knowing whom I would find behind me.

  He stood on the dock at the edge of the grasses, his feet braced wide, still draped in a voluminous black cloak from head to toe. His lantern sat at his feet, its light shuttered. I wondered how it was that I hadn’t heard his tread on the wooden boards, how I hadn’t sensed their vibration. Were his steps so stealthy?

  I sensed more than saw that he was looking at me; his eyes were too well hidden by the folds of his hood. But I could imagine them—their dark intensity, the way they narrowed upwards at the corners.

  “Who are you?” I managed to gasp, though it emerged as barely a whisper.

  He didn’t answer at once, just continued to stare at me, and I began to wonder if he could speak. Then the folds of his cloak shifted just the tiniest bit in the starlight.

  “Who do you think I am?”

  The voice was humored and deep. It throbbed along my nerves like the swell of a well-played cello. My breath caught at the sensation and my body urged me closer, wanting to hear more of the sound. I dug the fingers of my left hand into the wood of the post beside me, forbidding myself from taking those steps.

  “I…don’t know.”

  Those words seemed to make him smile, for I could hear it in his voice. “Don’t you?”

  I tensed as he took several steps closer to me. He was near enough now that I could see the gleam of his eyes, but the rest of his face remained in shadow. He seemed to be studying me much in the same way I studied him, though with the confidence of knowing that he was in no danger from me. He was very tall and broad of shoulder. I imagined it would not take him much effort to subdue me should he wish to.

  Had he been watching for me? Waiting for me to make such a stupid mistake as to return to the marshes at night?

  I couldn’t help but think about how I had been singing, and how everyone knew that nothing attracted the Lantern Men from the myth more. Why had I done that? Did I think to test my own resolve that he was human? Though, myth or not, singing in the marshes was a risk, for it would alert anyone nearby to my presence. And I had met the man before me in the marshes just the night before, for goodness’ sake, and almost been ambushed by his cohorts. How could I have been so careless?

  He seemed to sense my distress, for he tilted his head to the side in consideration, allowing me a glimpse of the right corner of his mouth and chin. There was a dusting of stubble across his jaw like any normal, red-blooded Englishman sported at this hour of night.

  Noticing my interest, the corner of his lip curled upward in a smile—one that was decidedly arrogant. “You shouldn’t be out in the marshes alone,” he told me, that resonate voice even more captivating at this proximity. “Especially not at night.”

  “W-why not?” I stammered, trying to understand what was happening.

  His dark eyes turned serious. “Because the next time, I might not be the one to find you.”

  My heart leapt in alarm. “Oh.”

  He nodded once and swaggered another step closer to loom over me, blocking out the moonlight so that all I could see was the barest outline of his features. I could have easily reached out and touched him, but I was too afraid that if I released my grip on the pole I would lose my balance, and never find it again.

  “And if I am the one to find you…” His words brushed against my skin as he leaned even closer.

  My breath caught in my chest as I felt the warmth of his breath on my lips. I tried to move my head, to turn away, but I couldn’t. My muscles simply wouldn’t work. It was as if some unseen force held me in place, and I began to tremble. I closed my eyes as the Lantern Man continued, his voice deeper still.

  “Well…I won’t be held responsible for my actions.”

  The cold night air swirled around me then, raising gooseflesh on my skin. I blinked open my eyes in surprise, only to find he’d vanished. I turned toward the path that led up towards Penleaf. I thought I could see some of the marsh grasses at its verge swaying, as if in the wake of something passing, but I couldn’t be certain it wasn’t only the breeze, or my mind making it so.

  I pressed a hand to my chest where my heart pounded, and I pivoted in a circle, surveying the marshes around me, but there was nothing. Nothing but the silence of the night, and the creeping mist. I pulled the edges of my worn cloak tighter around me and hurried back up the trail toward home, careful to move as silently and swiftly as possible. Even so, I saw nothing further to alarm me except the weathered boards of the cottage so badly in need of repair.

  But at the corner of the house, I turned to look behind me, and I could have sworn I felt his eyes tracking me. From where, I couldn’t say, but I knew he was there. As sure as I knew this was still my home, for however short of a time that remained true. What I didn’t know was whether he was stalking me or seeing to my safety. It had been so long since anyone had bothered about the latter that I couldn’t remember what that felt like. And if it was the former, well, I suddenly understood just how deeply in trouble I was.

  Chapter 5

  I

  woke early the next morning to the shuffle of Father’s footsteps in the corridor and the soft click of his bedroom door latch. I lay for a moment, staring up at the forest-green curtains over my bed, mulling over the strange mixture of emotions the sounds roused in me: gratitude that I would not be forced to wake him in his study and drag him up the stairs to his bedchamber so that the study could be cleaned and aired; irritation that once again he hadn’t made it up to his bed before passing out; but mostly sadness that I should even have to think of such things.

  I sighed as my gaze strayed to the pale sunlight spilling through the window where I had forgotten to pull the drapes the night before. The light was still milky and insubstantial, as if the sun had also not yet fully awakened. I considered closing my eyes and trying to go back to sleep, but then thoughts of Kate and her illness intruded, as well as memories of the night before, and I pushed myself up onto my elbows to reach for my dressing gown.

  Pulling the warm cloth around me, I tiptoed across the cold floor to prod at the embers of the fire in my hearth. Not so very long ago, I could have relied on a charwoman to do such a thing, but she had quit along with the rest of the staff when her wages had gone unpaid. I recalled Fanny’s cheery face, always grinning even when it was covered with soot and grime. She worked in the kitchens at Greenlaws now, but I never saw her, being perpetually
belowstairs as she was.

  Refusing to allow myself to dwell on such things, I completed my morning ablutions in the chill water left standing in the basin on my washstand, and dressed in an old but not unattractive gown of green sprig muslin. I stared into my tiny mirror and arranged my curls in their usual style before carefully pinning my mother’s mourning brooch to my dress. It was the last of her jewelry left to me, the rest of it having been sold to settle our debts. I reached for my warmest shawl when something outside the window caught my eye. I moved closer to peer out past the gnarled branches of the sycamore and its sparse greenery to the trail leading out to the boat dock. My heart leapt in my chest at the sight of a man’s silhouette striding out of the marsh grasses toward the cottage.

  I leaned closer to the window, trying to get a better look at the visitor. A sigh of relief shuddered through me at the realization it was only Robert. Why I had thought it was the Lantern Man come to pay me a visit in daylight I’m not sure, but it suddenly seemed the height of foolishness. I could only attribute it to my nerves over the previous night’s encounter, and the strange dreams that had plagued me during the night.

  Robert passed the sycamore and followed the fence line toward the creaking gate that led into the kitchen garden, but something made him hesitate with his hand on the latch. His eyes lifted to my window. I knew he had already seen me, but still I had to force my feet from retreating into the shadow of the curtains. It was simply too familiar a scene—as if the last four years hadn’t passed—especially when he grinned and touched the corner of his hat to me. I lifted my hand in acknowledgement, but no answering smile curled my lips, as it would have before.

  How many times had I watched for him from this very window, waiting for him to call? I had been so happy then, so certain of what life had in store for me. I could feel the ghost of that girl standing beside me, her jubilant emotions, her all-consuming love for the man standing below her.