‘This is perfect. It doesn’t need moving.’ She could set up her easels with the pictures from the dig behind, and there was plenty of room for finds.
‘There you are!’ Lady George bustled in, and to Sage’s surprise, gave her a hug. ‘Isn’t this exciting? Olivia thinks this will really help us promote the manor.’
‘Oh. Good.’ She stepped back, and nodded at Olivia, who had followed Lady George in.
‘We’ve got some things to show you.’ Lady George was almost jumping with excitement, rising on her toes. ‘Come up to the solar.’
The broad black stairs creaked in a hierarchy of satisfying old-house groans and scrapes. On the first floor Lady George walked to a pair of carved doors, and theatrically pushed them open.
The solar’s walls were lined with linenfold carved panelling, with moulded and carved plasterwork on the ceiling. The room smelled of centuries of beeswax, woodsmoke and dog. The fireplace had a few smouldering logs in it on a heap of ash, and the oak had darkened so much the walls were almost black.
‘Wow!’ Even Sage, who had limited architectural knowledge, could appreciate the warmth and character of the room. One wall was lined with a block of nine narrow mullioned windows, some with stained-glass panels. The ceiling was decorated too, although the design was simple square panels with rose bosses.
‘It’s gorgeous, isn’t it? We usually end the tours here.’ Lady George was beaming, and waved her to an old sofa by the fireplace, which had an elaborate fire screen pulled to one side. Olivia sat next to her, holding something wrapped in a cloth.
‘We – that is, Lady George and I – have something really exciting to show you.’ Olivia unwrapped the parcel carefully. ‘We wondered if it was of Lord Anthonie, the third baron. But something we read in Vincent Garland’s ledgers suggests this is Solomon Seabourne. It may have been a wedding gift to Viola.’
The portrait of a young man with black curly hair was flat-faced and poorly executed, but had a strong chin and deep-set eyes that immediately drew Sage in. There were words written around the face, a motto: caeca invidia est, and a date.
‘What makes you think it’s Solomon?’ She turned the case over in her hands. Paint and debris from the vellum had flaked off inside the glass cover, making it difficult to see clearly.
‘An entry for Viola’s wedding, that described some yards of red silk and a miniature portrait.’
‘He was a good-looking man.’ Sage handed it back to Olivia. ‘And caeca invidia est, that’s from Livy, the Roman historian, isn’t it? “Something is blind.”’
‘Jealousy.’ Olivia smiled slightly. ‘Jealousy is blind.’
* * *
‘Sheshe, when’s your ferry?’
Yana had made dinner when she got back home, and Sage hugged her, wishing for a moment that she wouldn’t go.
‘Seven thirty, seven forty-five, I forget. Ages yet.’ Yana ran her hand under her daughter’s chin, and lifted it. ‘I come back whenever you need me. Whenever you want me.’
‘I know.’ Sage managed a watery smile. ‘I’m just tired.’
‘Now, eat food. I made quiche.’ Yana helped herself to some salad. ‘What did you do today?’
‘I was up at the manor. Oh, something else happened, I found this in my car yesterday.’ She rummaged in her bag, retrieving the doll, which she had put in a specimen bag. ‘I forgot about it; it’s a sick joke, maybe.’
Her mother pushed her chair away from the table. ‘Is cursed. You must get rid of it.’
‘It’s just a doll.’ Sage hesitated, however; it did seem to have an evil stare. ‘I was going to show a picture of it to the anthropology professor, Felix. He’s looking at some carvings in the well for me. Folk beliefs are his specialism.’
‘I wrap it up.’ Yana collected a thick marker pen from the desk, took a piece of paper from Sage’s printer and started writing in Cyrillic Kazakh. ‘At least stop curse, yes?’
Sage was bemused. ‘Mum! Let me get some pictures to show Felix.’ She snapped a few shots with her phone. ‘I don’t believe in curses.’
‘I do believe, we know of these back in Kazakhstan. Make Sheshe happy, at least.’ She wrapped the doll in the paper firmly, like a fish. ‘Now put in bag, then get rid of it. Burn it.’
‘I think we’re being overcautious.’ Sage stretched her shoulders, feeling her neck crack. ‘It’s just a toy. That man I told you about, at the cottage? He’s been going back and forth to the hospice with his wife. They have a daughter, a nine-year-old. She’s been playing up.’ She hesitated whether to bother Felix, but something in the deep eye sockets, the split belly stuffed with red cloth, made her press ‘send’.
‘You have baby, of course you’re sad, dealing with bones all day. And you are upset about the doll, iye?’
‘It was just a shock.’
‘You show this to your professor, but then – burn.’
‘I’ve sent him the pictures.’ Sage sat down and took a big bite of quiche. ‘But I’m mostly worried about the owners of the house,’ she mumbled.
‘The sick man and his wife?’
‘And Chloe, the daughter.’ Sage felt a squirm of disquiet run down the muscles of her back. ‘She’s fascinated with my baby, for a start.’ She looked at her mother, seeing new lines, new grey hairs. I’m going to look just like that in twenty years. ‘I’ve been thinking about it. I think maybe she planted her doll in my car. A sort of gift. Perhaps the cloth is some representation of the baby.’
Yana shrugged. ‘Not something a normal child would do, no. By the way, were you ever going to tell me about your new friend? Nick the vicar?’
Sage almost dropped her fork. ‘How did you—?’
‘He leaves message on phone, I hear. That’s all.’
‘He’s just… he’s the vicar of Banstock, he’s helping the family who live in the cottage.’
‘And he enjoyed seeing you, apparently.’
Sage sat back in her chair, seeing a hint of frustration in Yana’s expression. ‘Sheshe, I really wasn’t keeping him a secret, we’re just friends.’
‘OK.’ Yana rose. ‘I’m going to pack the last things.’ She turned and said, over her shoulder, ‘I think you should listen to message.’
Yana left in a flurry of bags, hugs and promises. Yes, Sage would eat properly; she would tell her mother if anything – anything at all – happened with the baby; she would get rid of the doll; and most important of all, she would listen to the message from Nick.
Just as Sage shut the door behind her mother, her mobile rang. Her chest lurched with the thought that it might be Nick.
‘Sage? Felix Guichard.’
‘Oh, Felix. Thank you for getting back to me so quickly.’ She curled up on the sofa.
‘I was a bit concerned about those pictures you sent me.’ He seemed to be rustling papers.
‘Well, the nine-year-old daughter of the family has been acting oddly. I wondered if she mutilated her doll and put it in my car.’
Felix paused for a moment. ‘Listen. What you have in that doll is a physical expression of a wish that is intended to affect you. And your baby. I doubt it was made by a nine-year-old.’
‘But it’s just a creepy doll. What threat can it be?’
‘It’s been made to look very like you. What worries me are the cuts in the body.’ He tapped something at his end. ‘This was put together by someone with a knowledge of curses. It’s fairly well researched. These pictures would be recognised across the communities that believe in witchcraft all across the world. Can you see if there’s something personal linking you to the doll? Like hair or fingernails?’
‘My mother wrapped it in paper,’ Sage said, feeling uneasy at the thought of unwrapping it. ‘She wrote something in case it was cursed. Dolls like this were known in her community where she grew up in Kazakhstan.’
‘Just unwrap it. Leave it on the paper if it makes you feel better.’
‘This is daft. It’s a kid’s toy, I should be—’ Sage’s voice go
t caught somewhere in her chest when she unwrapped the paper and looked at the thing up close. The eyes were blackened sockets and the mouth had been coloured with dark red pen, disturbingly the colour of blood. There was a pen line around the throat – no, she realised something was tightly wound around the neck. She picked at it, and it started to unwind. ‘There’s a hair tied around the neck – dark, almost black.’
‘Could it be one of yours?’
Sage removed the hair and laid it on the paper then pulled out one of her own. They were about the same length, colour and thickness. ‘It could be.’
‘Now look at the body of the doll. What is that inside it?’
Sage fished in a drawer for her tool kit. ‘I don’t really want to touch it again.’ She found forceps and grasped the edge of the red cloth, tugging it free. It was quite large, compressed into the waist of the figure. She spread it out on the paper, flakes of something red spitting onto the surface. ‘There’s a cut down the body, with some fabric packed inside. It looks like part of a scarf. It’s silk and has a faint pattern of birds, I think.’ It had an unpleasant odour, and she bent forward to sniff it. ‘It smells a bit rank.’
‘This is important. Is there anything of anyone else in there? Like nail clippings, hairs, even bloodstains?’
Slowly, the truth coalesced in Sage’s brain. She pushed herself up from the chair and backed halfway across the room. ‘Oh, God, Felix, it was soaked in blood. There’s dry blood everywhere. Why? I don’t understand.’
‘You need to take it to the police. If someone is using blood to charge a curse they mean you harm.’
She was holding the phone in one hand, the other pressed against her mouth. It was a few seconds before she could speak. ‘I don’t think they have a witchcraft squad. Bloody hell, Felix, what’s going on?’
‘It’s a traditional spell, the sort of thing your sixteenth-century people would have understood. I don’t think it puts you in any danger, but someone’s going to some lengths to intimidate you.’ He paused. ‘These things can… I have seen some evidence that they might have some negative effects, if only because they distract and stress the recipient. I’ll come over to the Island and have a closer look at it for you. I want to see your carvings in the well in person anyway.’
Sage could feel a bubble of laughter building inside her. ‘You could lift the curse, you mean?’ She took a deep breath to centre herself. ‘I’m fine, it’s just a shock. I don’t believe in magic.’
‘Maybe the person who made the doll does. They certainly intended to upset you.’ Felix’s voice was full of concern. ‘Actually, there are different methods used in making poppets – that’s what they’re often called. I want to see what book – or horror film – the doll’s maker was drawing on. And like I said, I also want to see the well for myself. The symbols were designed to control a specific entity or influence.’
‘You can’t believe that a few carvings—’
‘I know it sounds extraordinary, but somehow two people ended up in the well, which you have said is incredibly rare. Is it just coincidence that the symbols in the well suggest a kind of psychic trap?’
Sage looked at the doll. It glowered back. ‘Now you’re scaring me.’ She was only half joking.
‘I’ll come to the Island tomorrow, if that works for you.’
Sage stepped away from the doll, feeling foolish that she felt safer. ‘That would be great. But I’m running a public meeting tomorrow afternoon for the locals, with one of my students. We’re interpreting the well finds to the village.’
‘Where? I’ll try and get there. Keep the doll for me.’
Sage gave him directions, then rang off. The doll lay next to the stained cloth, and she got latex gloves from under the sink to scoop the whole lot into the paper and back into the specimen bag. She took it down to the outside store where she kept her bike. Tucked onto a shelf with a box of tools, it seemed less threatening.
She finally pressed the answerphone for Nick’s message.
‘Hi, Sage. It’s Nick – Nick the vicar. I… I don’t really know how to say this. I had a great time at Francesco’s. A really great time. It’s just… even seeing you. Oh, for goodness’ sake, I should just spit it out.’ There was a long silence with a few frustrated breaths. ‘I don’t really want to be just friends. Can we leave the possibility of more out there? See how things go. Call me back and put me out of my misery, will you?’
She smiled as she picked up the phone.
36
25th September 1580
Four linnets in a cage as a gift to your lordship’s daughter Viola upon her betrothal twelve shillings
Accounts of Banstock Manor, 1576–1582
The boys who raised the alarm about witches in Banstock, when summoned, have already been chastised by their father and are no doubt still smarting from his efforts. They come before me: one Tom Brewster, eleven years old, and his brother Harry, not yet ten, with their father.
‘So, tell me. What business did you have trespassing on the abbey lands?’ I say, as sternly as I can manage. The younger snivels, but the elder looks up.
‘We saw a light there, two nights ago,’ he says. ‘I thought they might be gypsies come to Banstock. We went to spy on them, no more, and warn my father that they are back.’
It was well known in Banstock that the last time vagrants camped they brought with them disease and left with two stolen lambs.
‘And you did not immediately tell your father but went instead spreading rumours?’
The boy shuffles his feet and winces. ‘I beg pardon, your honour.’
‘Well, sirrah, since you did trespass, you had better tell me what you saw.’
They tell a simple tale of the cell that I have seen, which they marvelled at, and then they climbed through a ruined window of the chapel. There, they claim, lies an altar soaked in blood whereon lies a crucified animal, turned upside down in a terrible parody.
The story makes me shiver, as we had thought to hang or exile all the witches on the Island years ago. Wise women live among us, yes, but no one who practises those darkest of heresies. It makes me uneasy about the doll found in Agness’s chest.
I tell the boys someone has played a terrible jest upon us all, and we will clean up such a nasty mess. Meanwhile, I suggest that they keep their silly tales to themselves.
As they file out, their father lifts a hand. ‘Please, your honour, a word?’
‘Of course.’
‘It was just a bit of tittle-tattle, I didn’t like to repeat it. But there’s a rumour that the Frenchwoman has been seen at the abbey, taking flowers and whatnot in some evenings. In the spring, this was.’
‘I see. Yes, she did go there, but not for witchcraft.’
‘It’s just…’ he looks away. ‘They say witches use flowers in their potions. And sacrifice animals.’
‘I have spoken to Mistress Duchamp, and I know why she was at the abbey. Nothing to do with witchcraft, I assure you.’
He seems to struggle with his conscience. ‘There are those that say witches do consort with the Devil, your honour, and half the village is talking about how the seamstress is with his child.’
I think through what he has said. ‘Then start another rumour, Master Brewster, that the woman is a lightskirt, not a witch, and she laid with her lover at the abbey. She is no more a witch than you or I, but a sinner. A few days ago, the world thought she was a papist, for goodness’ sake, and now thinks she worships Satan? The woman is a woman, like others, and fell prey to carnal sin. That is all.’
He looks relieved when he leaves, but I am left wondering who has brought such disquiet to our corner of the Island. I suspect the woman Agness, and resolve again to get her removed from the estate.
Vincent Garland, Steward to Lord Banstock, His Memoir
37
Sunday 14th April
Sage arrived at Banstock Manor to find that Lady George had polished the oak table in the great hall. She ran her hands over the
scarred, blackened surface, arranging the information boards and boxes of specimens.
‘Thank you again, Lady George, Lord Banstock. This is very helpful of you.’
The manor’s owners were already looking into the plastic boxes. Lady George lifted out a tub of corroded metal fragments. ‘What are these? Buttons?’
‘There are a couple of coins that we can tentatively date to the 1560s. We can’t be more accurate, because coins remained in circulation for decades. There’s a belt buckle and a few household nails and pins, too. That all fits with the cottage being built in the 1550s.’
Sage smiled at the first few villagers arriving, then checked her watch. She wished Steph had arrived, but the student was dependent on the ferries. ‘I hope you don’t mind, but I’ve invited an expert to listen in. He’s a professor of social anthropology from the University of Exeter.’
‘Oh, how exciting.’ Lady George looked at her husband and then at Sage. ‘What does he do? I mean, what is social—?’
‘Social anthropology studies the history and influence of culture. His special area is folk beliefs, local mythologies, that sort of thing.’
Two familiar figures entered the great hall: the care assistant Nathan pushing Maeve Rowland in a wheelchair covered in a brightly coloured blanket. Sage waved them over.
‘Nathan, Maeve. I’m so glad you could make it. It’s lovely to see you.’
Maeve smiled with the mobile side of her face. ‘Can’t wait. I even got this wastrel out to something educational.’ Nathan rolled his eyes.
The tall figure of Felix Guichard appeared at the door, looking upwards before joining Sage and the others. ‘Hi, Sage. That ceiling is beautiful. Is it original?’
‘Mid 1500s, apparently. Let me introduce you to Lord and Lady Banstock; they can tell you more. Professor Felix Guichard, Lady George, Lord Banstock. And this is Maeve Rowland, former owner of Bramble Cottage, and her helper Nathan.’
Felix shook hands with everyone, then lowered his voice as he spoke to Sage.
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