The Edge of Dark

by Pamela Hartshorne

‘You’re not as bad as Robert says,’ he informed her, slurring his words. ‘You’ve got a nice pair of titties on you.’ To prove his point, he kneaded them roughly with one hand, digging into his breeches with the other. ‘I’ve had worse.’

  To Jane, everything seemed to be happening at a distance. Her mind was sluggish, and when she tried to lift her hands to push him away they flailed limply. Now his yard sprang free of his breeches and he was burrowing beneath her skirts, pushing them up. She tried to scream, but her body wouldn’t obey her mind, and her eyes rolled back in horror. She was not dreaming, no. This was horribly real. It was as if she were floating above the bed looking down at her slack form and Thomas Parker, her husband’s friend, fondling himself as he grunted over her.

  Poison. The word swam through the blur in her head, the only thing that made terrifying sense. She had been poisoned. Desperately, Jane willed her hands to move, but they flopped uselessly, as if they belonged to someone else entirely.

  Below, the revelry was continuing in the hall as if nothing was happening, the babble of conversation barely drowned by the fiddling and drumming from the waits, the stamp of feet and the clapping of hands as the dancers circled. They were dancing while she was being violated in her own home, and there was nothing she could do. A tear trickled down Jane’s numb cheek and she struggled again to wrest control back over her limbs.

  ‘What is the meaning of this?’ Margaret’s voice cut sharply through her befuddlement, and Jane closed her eyes in relief. She had never been so glad to hear Robert’s mother. With an enormous effort, she rolled her head to one side to see Margaret looming by the bed. She looked strange from this angle, her head swollen, her mouth a red slash that opened and closed, her dark eyes glittering. ‘You, sir,’ she said to Thomas, ‘what do you do there with my son’s wife?’

  ‘It’s too soon,’ Thomas grumbled in an undertone. ‘I haven’t fucked her yet.’

  ‘Wha . . .? Whaa . . .?’ Jane’s tongue was thick and unwieldy, and her voice came out as slurred as Thomas’s, but her mind was clearing.

  This was planned. Margaret knew Thomas would be here. That was why she had sent Jane to the chamber to care for Geoffrey.

  And that meant Robert knew too. Let us drink to our son. Jane pictured him slipping the poison into her goblet, pouring more wine, lifting his own glass. Smiling. And she, thought Jane in disgust and despair, she had hoped that he was having a change of heart, that things might be different between them, simpleton that she was.

  On cue, boots stamped along the passage. ‘Ho, there!’ came Robert’s voice, and Margaret went to the door with a fine display of distress.

  ‘Oh my son, I cannot bear to let you see what is happening within!’

  ‘Stand aside, madam.’ Robert shouldered his way into the room.

  He had brought witnesses, of course. The three fine gentlemen he had introduced to Jane earlier, when he was playing the part of an attentive husband. Did they not wonder why they were being taken up to his wife’s chamber? Jane wondered in her strange detached state. Surely they must ask why they had been taken from the drinking and the dancing to surprise Robert’s wife?

  But when Robert gasped, ‘Thomas!’ and reeled back, they didn’t even blink at his blatantly false show of shock.

  They were part of the plan to shame her too.

  Thomas scrambled sulkily off Jane, tucking his yard away. ‘Indeed, I am sorry,’ he said, parroting the words from his script. ‘But your wife did entice me.’ They were poor players, Jane thought bitterly. They would have been booed off the stage by any other audience.

  There was a tiny pause, and then Thomas resumed at a nod of encouragement from Margaret. ‘She said you would not notice if we slipped away from the feast,’ he remembered.

  ‘No,’ Jane managed, desperation and outrage giving her the strength to speak, but her voice was still thick and blurry. It was like trying to talk with a blanket stuffed in her mouth.

  ‘Drunk,’ said Margaret in disgust. ‘Bah, what can you expect from a butcher’s brat? I thought she was in unexpected good looks, Robert, but never did I imagine your friend Sir Thomas had put the sparkle in her eyes or the roses in her cheeks.’

  Robert wore a heavy scowl. ‘You have made a cuckold out of me,’ he said to Thomas. ‘Now I am shamed before my friends.’ He turned to his companions. ‘You see how I am served? A wife who plays the strumpet, and with my dearest friend . . . oh, how shall I bear the pain of it?’

  ‘Come, sirs.’ Margaret moved smoothly forward to usher them towards the door, Thomas shuffling along with them, his part played. ‘I beg of you, do not blame my son. He will deal with his wife, I do assure you.’

  Closing the door behind them, she exchanged a look of smug complicity with Robert. ‘So it is done,’ she said with satisfaction.

  With a huge effort, Jane leant across so that she could be sick over the edge of the bed. Her vomit splattered sourly on the floorboards and Margaret grimaced with disgust and twitched her skirts clear of the mess. ‘Send for a servant to clear this up,’ she said to Robert. ‘I knew this rush matting was a mistake. Plain rushes are so much easier to deal with.’

  ‘You have poisoned me,’ Jane whispered, her head still spinning.

  ‘A little potion to make you sleepy, that is all,’ said Margaret dismissively. ‘We cannot poison you and keep your dowry.’ She put her face down to Jane’s and smiled a vicious smile. ‘Do not think we have not considered it, but your father, it seems, made provision. Perhaps he realized that no one else would want you. To hide our shame, we will send you back to the country, where you may stay out of our sight and grow old with our good wishes.’

  ‘Mistress?’ Annis appeared in the doorway, looking wary, holding a basin and some rags.

  ‘Clear that mess up!’ snapped Margaret, jerking her head towards Jane, who was retching again, and she swept out, her skirts swishing contemptuously.

  ‘What did they do to you?’ Annis asked in a low voice. She held the basin for Jane, who couldn’t stop vomiting and was shaking and sweating.

  ‘Something in the wine,’ Jane gasped.

  Annis cursed under her breath. ‘Here, keep that,’ she said, thrusting the basin into Jane’s hands. ‘I’ll go and get another.’

  It took more than an hour for Jane to stop retching. When she had finished, she lay exhausted in the bed and Annis wiped her forehead with a damp cloth. ‘Better out than in,’ she said. ‘Any idea what it was?’

  Jane shook her head. ‘Margaret said they didn’t want to kill me.’ Her throat was raw, her voice little more than a thread.

  ‘Kind of them,’ said Annis grimly.

  She was wearing the dress Jane had given her, the one Jane had worn to her betrothal. It made Jane ache for the innocent she had been then. Before she knew the depths to which her husband would sink to be rid of her.

  ‘I am sorry you had to leave the feast,’ she whispered. ‘Did you get a dance with Jack?’

  Annis’s expression softened. ‘Aye, one, before the message came that you needed me. But it were worth it.’ She smiled in a way Jane envied.

  Jane’s fingers crept around her maid’s. ‘Annis, what am I going to do? Margaret talks of banishing me to the country. How will I manage without you?’

  ‘I’ll come with you,’ said Annis. ‘I’m not staying to serve these scoundrel Holmwoods,’ she said stoutly.

  ‘But what about Jack?’

  Annis hesitated, but only for a moment. ‘He can come find me if he cares for me.’

  Jane tried to smile, but she was too weak, and to her shame her lips trembled and a tear slipped out of the corner of her eyes. ‘Come now,’ said Annis, patting her hand. ‘It will not be so bad. At least you won’t have to put up with their meannesses any more.’

  ‘If I could be sure they would let me take the babe, I would be content enough,’ said Jane, swallowing painfully. ‘I don’t care what tales they spread about me being of dishonest conversation with Thomas, but what if th
ey deny me Geoffrey? What will I do then?’

  ‘Perhaps they will not want to care for him?’ said Annis hopefully.

  But Margaret was triumphant, and in no mood to compromise. ‘The child stays here,’ she said when Jane was well enough to get out of bed. ‘We have been lenient with you. Already the whole city knows how you dishonoured my son, and they consider banishment an unseemly kindness.’

  Fury, cold and clear, flooded Jane. ‘When it is just the two of us, let us not pretend that we do not both know the truth,’ she said tightly. ‘Let us not pretend that I am the one whose honour has been called into question. It was not I who slipped a potion in my wine or staged a wooden play to shame me!’

  But Margaret was indifferent. ‘The ground is hard with frost. You should have no trouble travelling on the roads, and you cannot stay under this roof another day. You may take some servants for your household, but the babe you cannot take.’

  ‘Then I will not go,’ said Jane evenly. ‘Geoffrey is my son. I will not leave him to you.’

  Abruptly Margaret’s face flared with anger. ‘It is not your decision to make. It is you who are in disgrace. Go, and be grateful banishment is the only punishment we seek.’

  ‘Please.’ Jane was getting desperate. She knelt at Margaret’s feet. ‘I beg of you. You know what it is to care for a son. Geoffrey is mine. How would you feel if someone wanted to take Robert from you?’

  Margaret’s eyes blazed. ‘They never will!’

  ‘Then you will understand when I beg you to let me take my son with me.’

  ‘No. We need the boy here.’ A smile that chilled Jane’s blood swept over Margaret’s face. ‘I will look after him.’

  As she had looked after Robert? ‘No!’ said Jane, surging to her feet. ‘No, you will not have him to serve your depraved tastes!’

  ‘You forget yourself,’ said Margaret, her tone sharp as a slap. ‘Who are you, a butcher’s daughter, to talk so to me? Be glad we do not send you for trial. Now take your servants and begone.’

  ‘Begone . . .’ The sonorous voice was ringing in her ears, deeper than Margaret’s and more urgent. ‘Go now in peace, Jane.’

  Peace? What peace was there to be found knowing that she had broken yet another promise? ‘No,’ she mumbled, moving her head restlessly from side to side. ‘No, I will not go.’

  ‘We ask you to depart in peace,’ said the voice more firmly. ‘Now you must go.’

  She covered her face with her hands. What choice did she have? In the eyes of the law, Geoffrey was Robert’s son, and she was just his wife. She had no power, no possessions of her own. Nobody would believe her if she told them that Robert had deliberately arranged for his own cuckolding to be rid of her. No man would shame himself so, they would say.

  Her father would not stand by her. Her friends from St Andrewgate had been lost to her since her marriage. There was only Annis who believed her, and she was just a servant, even more powerless than Jane.

  For now she had little choice but to go. But somehow, Jane vowed, lowering her hands, somehow she would keep her promise.

  Drawing a deep breath, straightening her shoulders, she looked up, and blinked in confusion. Why was it so dark suddenly? A moment ago Margaret’s chamber had been ablaze with candles; now they were all snuffed except for seven flames in the middle of the table, leaping and guttering in the draught.

  She turned to look for Annis, but Annis had gone and in her place was a man who looked vaguely familiar and who was staring at her in fury. Uneasy, she glanced back at Margaret and found herself meeting the implacable gaze of a woman sitting across the table.

  ‘Roz, are you awake?’

  Another man was looking directly at her. He was speaking to her. Like a key turning in a well-oiled lock, understanding clicked into place. Roz. She was Roz.

  Her mouth was suddenly dry. She ran her tongue around her lips.

  ‘I see you’re back with us.’ Roz remembered his name now: Charles Denton, the psychic investigator she had booked so casually.

  ‘Yes.’ Her eyes flicked around the table. In the candlelight, everyone was watching her with a range of expressions from open curiosity (Lucy and Mark) to concern (Adrian) and ill-disguised impatience (Helen). Why did she think that Jeff was furious with her? Now his face was carefully blank. How much had she given away? Roz smiled nervously. ‘What did I miss?’

  ‘You were under the influence of a very powerful spirit,’ Charles told her.

  ‘It was really creepy,’ Lucy added. She rubbed her arms. ‘God, I can’t believe it happened. I never thought there would really be anything here!’

  ‘You were in a trance,’ Mark told Roz. ‘We couldn’t work out what was happening. You were trying to speak, and I think you were saying no but it was hard to tell. Your voice was all slurred.’

  ‘You were obviously in distress,’ said Adrian.

  Obviously putting it on, thought Helen, unimpressed. God, what a fuss!

  ‘I wanted to wake you up,’ Adrian was saying, ‘but Charles said it could be dangerous.’

  ‘It’s normally better to let someone come round naturally but Jane had such a strong hold on you that I had to intervene in the end and tell her to go, but she was very resistant.’

  ‘Jane?’ said Roz hesitantly.

  ‘I sensed her too,’ said Charles. ‘She is driven by the need to tell her story.’ Helen rolled her eyes but Charles ignored her. ‘You should be careful, Roz. Did you know that you were psychically sensitive?’

  Oh yes, of course Roz would be ‘psychically sensitive’! She couldn’t be like everyone else, could she? Tight-lipped, Helen drummed her fingers on the table until a worried look from Adrian made her stop. But honestly, couldn’t they all see that Roz was just a massive attention seeker? Look at her now, hugging her arms together as if she was scared and nervous!

  ‘I never used to believe in ghosts,’ Roz said.

  ‘And now?’

  She shivered and her eyes slid away from Charles’s without answering.

  Lucy leant forward eagerly. ‘Do you remember what happened?’

  ‘Not really,’ said Roz, but so carefully that even Helen could see that she was lying. There was something Roz wanted to have coaxed from her. Being Roz, she couldn’t just tell them. Oh no, everyone would have to keep looking at her and asking her questions and cajoling her into answers.

  Helen looked round the table. Sure enough, they were all hanging on Roz’s every word.

  All except Jeff, who was looking at Roz with a hard expression that Helen couldn’t identify but that brought her up short.

  She didn’t like Jeff. There was something downright creepy about him, although Sir Adrian couldn’t see it, of course. He thought Jeff was a ‘good chap’. Sir Adrian saw the good in everyone, Helen thought with fond exasperation. She was less trusting. She’d seen the way Jeff looked at Sir Adrian sometimes. Once or twice, Sir Adrian had spoken to him and then turned to go, and Helen had caught the naked contempt on Jeff’s face. What right had he to be contemptuous? Helen bridled at the very thought. She knew Jeff had been in a secure unit for youths before his release, but not why. It had to be something bad for a boy to be put away, though, didn’t it?

  Now Helen’s eyes sharpened with interest. It hadn’t occurred to her that Jeff might dislike Roz too. Well, well, well.

  The psychic was looking disappointed. ‘You don’t have a message for anyone here?’

  ‘A message?’ Roz echoed blankly.

  ‘There must be a reason this spirit cannot rest.’

  ‘But why would she have a message for someone here?’ asked Lucy.

  ‘Jane is not the only spirit here,’ said Charles. ‘This house is a vortex of hostile energy.’

  Only since Roz had arrived, Helen wanted to tell them. It wasn’t ghosts disrupting the atmosphere. It was Roz, coming here, distracting Adrian, spoiling everything.

  Adrian was looking delighted. ‘So Holmwood House really is haunted?’

 
‘Oh yes.’

  ‘How splendid!’

  Helen thought it was time to inject a note of practicality into the discussion. ‘How come nobody has seen these ghosts if the house is haunted?’

  ‘You don’t have to see a ghost to be aware of its presence.’ Charles was unfazed. ‘You tell me this house was only recently reconstructed. The spirits may have been waiting for just such an opportunity to return. Has anyone noticed themselves feeling different lately? Perhaps angrier or more hostile than they usually are without understanding why?’

  Helen’s mind flickered to the earring she had taken from Roz, to the button she had snipped from her coat. To the suffocating loathing that swept over her sometimes when she looked at Roz. But that wasn’t because of any ghost, and she certainly wasn’t going to encourage this so-called psychic by saying anything. There was no puzzle about why she hated Roz.

  Charles looked around the table and it seemed to Helen that his gaze stopped on her for an uncomfortably long while, but she lifted her chin and outstared him, and after another moment, he moved on.

  ‘Even so, I think it would be a good idea to set a healing process in motion,’ he said. ‘I can come back when I’m prepared and conduct another séance to ask these troubled spirits to depart.’

  ‘I don’t think that’s necessary,’ said Adrian, leaning forward. ‘The whole purpose of this exercise was to find evidence of some ghostly activity, and now we have, we have to admit it would be good for business to have a resident ghost or two.’

  Mark nodded eagerly. ‘It would be a big draw. It could make quite a difference to the number of visitors we get.’

  ‘I say we use this ghost.’ Adrian looked around for agreement. ‘Roz, can you really not remember anything about her? Charles says her name is Jane, but that doesn’t tell us much.’

  Roz was looking a bit sick. Helen was sure she could see sweat breaking out on her forehead. ‘I . . . don’t remember,’ she said.

  ‘I was sitting next to you. I thought I heard you say Geoffrey a couple of times,’ Jeff volunteered. It was his first contribution to the conversation. Helen’s eyes narrowed. She hadn’t heard Roz say anything of the kind, but of course Sir Adrian’s face lit up straight away.