The Witch of Willow Hall

by Hester Fox

  “Oh,” I say, too surprised to laugh. “Well, it worked.”

  He doesn’t ask if I mean on Snip or on his masters. “There,” he says instead. “You’ve managed a confession out of me. Fair is fair, your turn.”

  “You want me to confess to something?”

  “More than anything in the world.”

  His confession is endearing, a glimpse into the shy part of him I long to know more about. But what could I possibly say that wouldn’t make me look silly or childish in his eyes? Should I tell him that I’ve never worn the glove that he brought back to me so that I wouldn’t have to unfold what he had touched? That I still have his cravat from that first day we met, folded and kept under my pillow like a talisman? Or maybe that every night I look out my window toward his house behind the trees and try to imagine what he’s doing at that moment?

  But I don’t want the game to end, not yet. I rack my mind, and then before I can talk myself out of it, I blurt out, “I don’t know the first thing about birds.”

  He’s quiet for a beat, and then gives me a long, sly look. “I know.”

  “You do?”

  “That day when we were walking through the woods. You said you saw a golden thrush.” He flashes a mischievous grin. “Golden thrushes are only found in Australia.”

  I should be mortified, but I can’t help smiling. All those hours spent studying my natural history books and I’ve been found out anyway. “Why didn’t you say anything then?”

  “You looked so pleased with yourself. I hadn’t the heart to correct you.”

  On the way to Mr. Barrett’s the walk had seemed to take so long, but now it’s going by quickly, far too quickly. We’re almost at the bend that will take me back to Willow Hall and him to the mill. I would do anything to make the road stretch out for miles yet before we had to part.

  Maybe it’s the laughter we shared, or that he finally opened up to me. Or maybe it’s the cool autumn breeze that winds through the small space between us, making him move a little closer so that I’m not too cold, but I finally have found some courage. “Can...can I ask you something?”

  He looks down, a little surprised. “Of course, anything.”

  “Are you... That is, I heard you were engaged.” My words hang in the air, and even I can hear the desperate tinge in them.

  Mr. Barrett stops abruptly, the horse shaking the bridle in protest.

  “Engaged? Well,” he says with a frown, “that would certainly be news to me.” His look softens. “Where did you hear that?”

  “Mrs. Tidewell.” I feel like a tattling child, though my shame is tempered with a deep sense of relief.

  “Ah,” he says, picking up the pace again. “I’m not sure I would put so much stock in what Mrs. Tidewell says when it comes to other people’s business.”

  We walk a little farther in silence. There’s a tension in Mr. Barrett’s face like he wants to say something else but is battling himself. Finally he asks, “What else did Mrs. Tidewell tell you?”

  “Nothing,” I say a little too quickly. “Nothing at all. Just that.”

  We’ve reached the fork in the road. The horse swipes its tail at an invisible irritant and paws at the dirt, wondering why we’ve stopped. The air hangs heavy with expectancy, and I’m not ready to say goodbye yet. Still embarrassed and unable to meet Mr. Barrett’s eyes, I stroke the horse’s warm, downy nose, and direct my goodbyes to it instead.

  “Such a sweet horse,” I murmur. Our horses are carriage horses, not much interested in human company unless you have something sweet for them, and even then they merely offer a sideways glance while they munch away. Mr. Barrett’s horse is as gentle and sweet as a puppy.

  “Lydia,” he says after a moment. “Before you go, there’s something I’d like to ask you.”

  The horse bobs its head in blissful appreciation as I scratch behind its big, feathery ears. “Mmm?”

  “Perhaps now isn’t the right time.”

  Something in his tone snaps me back to attention, and for the first time since we stopped I realize that he hasn’t taken his eyes off me.

  “You can ask me now. You can ask me anything. What is it?” I say breathlessly.

  He looks around the country road as if to make sure we are truly alone, his gaze flitting from the golden treetops to the darkening clouds above. Then, so quickly and so gently that I hardly have time to register what’s happening, he takes my chin in his hand and tilts my face up, pressing his lips to mine. His body moves close to me and everything in me comes alive. I want to press myself against his chest, wrap my arms around him and feel the steady beat of his heart like I felt that night at the pond.

  My body explodes with warmth, an exhilarating sensation starting where his lips meet mine, running like a fuse down my spine and blossoming between my legs. My knees are weak, but he’s there, holding me upright to him like his life depended on it. It’s a long, slow kiss, expertly administered. When we pull away, I can barely breathe. Drowsily, I open my eyes. He’s flushed and sparkling. With one hand still cupped under my chin, he takes his other and gently as a breeze tucks a stray lock of hair behind my ear.

  “No,” he says more to himself than to me. “Not now, not like this.”

  Before I can even regain my balance, he’s swinging up into the saddle, and asks, “Are you sure you can get home all right from here?”

  Too breathless to speak, I nod.

  “Good,” he says, wheeling his horse around. “And if I call on Friday, will you be at home?”

  I nod again.

  He doesn’t start riding away though, instead he brings the horse right up next to me. I crane my neck up to see him, feeling every inch like a young maiden in a fairy tale, looking upon her golden prince, desperate and grateful for any little favor he might bestow.

  “I didn’t come the last time I promised you I would,” he says. He sits so well on the horse, so straight and composed, but his knuckles are white around the reins and when he swallows, it’s hard and fast.

  “Oh,” I say, surprised. “I know you were busy.” I think he could say anything in this moment and I would forgive him.

  When he speaks again it’s low and even. Determined. “It does matter. I’ll be back for you, Lydia. I swear it.”

  And with that, he touches his heels to his horse, taking off at a canter down the road. I hardly dare to breathe as I stand there, watching his straight back and broad shoulders grow smaller and smaller until the trees swallow him up.

  23

  THE WIND TUGS at my dress, and rain is starting to spit when I finally drag myself away from the fork in the road. I clutch my cloak tighter, shivering despite the lingering warmth in my stomach. The woods that were sparkling and magical when Mr. Barrett was here press around me, and the rain comes down harder, staining the lichen-splotched stone walls a dark, unhappy black. But there might be a thousand spirits glaring at me from the woods today, following my every movement, and I wouldn’t care. It doesn’t matter that my clothes are soaked through or that my toes are cold and gritty with mud. A flood could rise up from the river and sweep me away, and in this moment I would still be the most content I’ve ever been in my entire life.

  By the time Willow Hall rises before me the rain is coming down in heavy, unforgiving sheets. Ada and Joe are standing in the back doorway, Ada wiping floured hands on her apron and laughing at something Joe says as he smokes his pipe. When she sees me she breaks off midsentence and Joe turns around, silently running an eye up and down my sorry figure.

  I duck between them, the warm, yeasty smell of baking bread greeting me like an embrace. “I was caught in the rain,” I say, as if it weren’t perfectly obvious.

  They share a knowing look. Joe gives me a polite nod, taps out his pipe and leaves Ada to her fretting.

  “What were you thinking? You’ll catch your death of cold!” Taki
ng me by the arm, she drags me away from the door, her eyes widening at the trail of muddy footprints in my wake.

  “Your mother will have a fit,” she says, wasting no time in fetching the mop and getting to work on my mess. “And you ought to take off those wet things and get in front of a fire.”

  There’s a strange clattering noise, and it takes me a moment before I realize that it’s coming from me. My teeth are chattering so hard that I’m in danger of biting through my tongue. Obediently, I peel off my cloak and wring out my stockings, letting the snug warmth of the kitchen envelop me. It might be the only room in Willow Hall that feels cozy, thanks to Ada’s cooking and the fact that, unlike the rest of the house, it’s a bit messy. With flour still smeared across the wood-block table, and upturned bowls and pots full of simmering broths, it looks like someone actually lives here.

  “S-sorry,” I stammer as I warm my purple fingers by the kitchen fire. I should probably be helping Ada clean up my mess, but mopping floors and being sensible about wet clothes are part of a faraway world in which I’m not part of the moment. I’m living in a dream, or a novel, where handsome princes ride all night, thundering down a country road to save their lady’s honor. A place where my feet never touch the ground—let alone leave muddy tracks. A place where I’m wanted, needed, even loved.

  Ada stands up, stretching her back and casting a critical eye over the tile floor. “Did you have a good walk then?”

  “Hmm?” My fingers are finally starting to regain a more natural color as I stiffly flex them back into feeling.

  “You’re grinning like your head is fit to crack. It must have been a good walk.”

  “Oh,” I say, doing my best to straighten my face. I take the blanket that Ada holds out to me and wrap it around my shoulders. “Yes, the best walk I’ve ever had.”

  * * *

  Catherine puts down the ladies’ journal she was reading when I slip into her room. “Well?”

  She’s recovered from her tantrum, her face cleaned of streaked tears and her hair neatly pulled back. Cool and calm, she’s hardly the picture of a woman jilted by her lover. It seems like years ago that I left her crying on her bed to go to Barrett House, not a couple of hours.

  I shake my head. “He’s not coming back.”

  She doesn’t move or say anything, just studies my face for a moment as if there might be something else written there that I’m not telling her. “I see,” she says finally. “You were gone an awfully long time just to find out that he’s not coming back.”

  “It’s a long walk.”

  She turns back to her journal of colorfully dressed ladies with tiny waists, flipping the pages with studied nonchalance. “Well in that case, I guess it’s no use moping about. August Pierce can rot in hell.”

  “I’m sorry, Catherine,” I say with my hand on the doorknob. I want to go back to my room, cuddle up under my warm blankets and hibernate until Friday. If it weren’t for the promise of seeing Mr. Barrett in five days and the memory of his hand warm against my cheek, thinking about Catherine’s broken engagement and what it means for our family would chew me up from the inside.

  I’m about to make my escape when she says, “I think I’ll call on Mr. Barrett soon. It seems ages since we last spoke, and I really ought to thank him for everything he did for August and me, even if it didn’t work out as I’d hoped.”

  The door swings away from my grasp as I stop cold in my tracks. Swallowing, I quickly say, “I already thanked him on your behalf. I don’t think you need to bother.”

  “Oh, it’s not a bother.” She puts down the journal and stretches her arms above her head in a lazy show of casual indifference. “I want to.”

  My mouth is dry, and before I can tell her that Mr. Barrett won’t have anything to add to the subject, she asks, “Don’t you ever get bored here, Lyd?”

  “What do you mean?” I close the door and sit back down, my suspicion outweighing my desire to flee.

  “I mean we used to entertain all the time in Boston, and here there’s barely a handful of anyone you could call polite society. Now that Mr. Pierce is gone I would be hard-pressed to name another gentleman besides Mr. Barrett.”

  My stomach contracts into a hard pit. “Catherine, please don’t,” I whisper.

  She shrugs her delicate shoulders, the pearly blue of her dress setting off her ivory skin. I vaguely wonder when exactly she’ll start showing, when she’ll get fat.

  “I know you may find this hard to believe, but I consider Mr. Barrett a good friend, and we’ve enjoyed each other’s confidences in the past. Well don’t look so stricken,” she says, raising a brow. “You’ve told me yourself you don’t have any feelings for the man. I’m the eldest daughter of the wealthiest man in New Oldbury, and of Mr. Barrett’s business partner. It’s only natural that we should find ourselves thrown together.”

  “But you ignored him whenever Mr. Pierce was around!”

  Catherine’s face darkens and she snaps the journal shut. “Grow up, Lydia. You know the position I’m in. Do you really want to destroy Mother? Besides, you’re too young...too...” She trails off, as if mentally cataloging all the possible ways in which I’m lacking. She finally settles on, “Too serious. What could Mr. Barrett possibly want with you?”

  I don’t know what it is about my sister, but she has the power to cut me down like no one else. My insecurities come rushing back, winding their way up my bones like ivy. Maybe my memory is betraying me, making me think that the warmth in Mr. Barrett’s eyes was friendship and not admiration. Maybe his voice hadn’t caught when he said there was something he wanted to ask me. Maybe he came to his senses, and his visit on Friday will just be to tell me that he made a mistake in kissing me, that he didn’t mean to give me any ideas. Maybe Catherine is right.

  I chew my nail, refusing to rise to her bait. What could I say anyway that would convince her to leave him alone?

  “I think I’ll call on him Thursday,” she says with a cutting smile and returns to her journal as if I weren’t even there.

  A sharp prick of pain stabs at me, and looking down I realize I’ve bitten my nail down to the quick. There’s only one thing that I know for sure, and that is Catherine will stop at nothing to get what she wants.

  * * *

  I don’t fool myself into thinking that I could fall asleep even if I wanted to that night. Instead, I sit by the window, replaying every moment of my visit to Mr. Barrett’s house, from our laughter, to our kiss, and his promise to come on Friday for me. And then I remember Catherine’s veiled threats and my heart sinks. How can I compete with my beautiful sister if she chooses to throw herself at him?

  I’m wondering what tricks Catherine might have up her sleeve, when a movement catches my eye in the garden. The pale lady hasn’t made an appearance since that night in the summer, but now that I’ve stared the fleshless face of Mary Preston in the eye, the lady that roams the garden holds no terror for me.

  But then I peer closer out the window and catch my breath. It’s not the pale lady. It’s Emeline.

  Without even pausing to put my shoes on, I fly down to the garden.

  “Emeline!” I can’t help the excitement that bubbles up in me to see her. But as I draw nearer, my pace slows. Her face is bloated and her eyes cloudy. Something is hanging from the corner of her mouth, and my stomach flips when I see it wriggle. A maggot. I push down my revulsion. She’s my sister, I tell myself. But it’s wrong. No matter how I long to see her, she shouldn’t be here. And if what Mary Preston said was true, then it’s my fault.

  Coldness from the wet grass seeps up through my shoeless feet as I stop in front of her. The night is thick and murky, and Emeline is little more than a pale wisp in the darkness. She looks up at me, running her hand carelessly under her mouth and sending the maggot to the ground.

  “I’m lonely,” she says without preamble.

&nb
sp; I crouch in front of her, and give her a hesitant touch on her cold cheek. “I’m here now. What would you like to do? Shall we play a game?”

  She doesn’t respond, and I’m about to ask again when she says, “I’m tired. Too tired to play.”

  “I know, sweetheart. I’m so sorry. I wish I knew what to do to make things right.”

  Wordlessly, she taps at the locket around my neck.

  I hesitate, my fingers curling protectively around the locket. “If I give it to you, will you be able leave, to rest?” I don’t want to give up my last link to her; even as wretched as she is, I don’t want to think that I’ll never set eyes on her again.

  To my relief, she only gives a little shrug of her shoulders. “I don’t know. But I want to go home.” I know that she’s not talking about Willow Hall.

  She’s begun pacing the perimeter of the garden, and I fall into step beside her. I watch her out of the side of my eye. “I thought you didn’t want me to leave you. Are you sure that’s what you want?”

  Panic flashes across her face and her step falters. “I... I don’t want to. But I’m tired.”

  She looks as if she’s on the verge of tears, though whether a spirit can cry I have no idea. I have to remind myself that she’s just a child, that she’s scared and just as confused as I am about what’s happening to her.

  I stop beside her and stoop to drop a kiss on the top of her wet head. “I’ll figure something out,” I tell her. “I promise.”

  24

  Sunday

  I’M STANDING IN my little garden, trying to save what I can before the inevitable frost that will come creeping along any night now. Mother still doesn’t approve of my herb garden, but this morning she had said that if I was going to insist on cultivating one, then I had better at least have the decency to keep the beds neat and weeded. Now that I’m surrounded by the mingling scents of plants and damp earth, I’m glad for the distraction. I need something to do to keep me busy while I wait until Friday, or Catherine and I kill each other, whichever comes first.