Sarah stood gobsmacked, her head turning left and right, staring at Peg, then at the empty door.
‘What did you do to her?’ she asked, flummoxed.
Peg bounded from the chair and grabbed the veneer box.
‘Give me that,’ she fumbled, ‘and make sure she takes a decent cloak with her, not that useless cape Desmond gave her.’ She pushed Sarah forward. ‘Get out, go on.’ Then, slamming the door, she blocked Merriment’s way, popped open a secret drawer in the box and drew out five pounds.
‘Bring her to the Brazen Head.’ She stuffed the wad of money into Merriment’s hand. ‘She can hole up there for tonight. I have a friend in London. She can get a boat over tomorrow.’
‘You’re helping her?’ Merriment felt befuddled. ‘But . . .’
Peg tugged a pencil from the box and scribbled an address on a small scrap of notepaper.
‘She’s one of my girls,’ she explained hurriedly. ‘A conniving little wench, but still, one of my girls.’
She shoved the address into Merriment’s hand and lunged through the door, glancing quickly back.
‘You can’t lumber me with this,’ Merriment insisted.
Peg coolly patted her sore scalp.
‘You’re involved whether you like it or not, Merriment. Now, I have to go. When Rochford comes I’ll tell him Rosie fled. And for pity’s sake, don’t believe everything Rosie tells you.’
‘Wait,’ Merriment called, ‘is Lord Beresford—?’ but Peg was gone. She disappeared down the stairs and rushed into her dressing room, leaving Merriment staring at the crumpled money clutched in her hands.
She met Rosie on the stairs dragging a battered chest and wearing a short velvet cape.
‘You won’t be warm enough,’ Merriment told her.
Rosie sniffed and shrugged.
‘I’m on my own now, aren’t I? I can wear what I like.’
She dragged her chest noisily down a few steps.
‘We can’t go through the party,’ Merriment sighed, swooping down to help her. She lifted the rope handle of the pine wood chest and pointed to the service door. ‘Go that way. Take us out back.’
Rosie slammed her shoulder into the door that led to the servants’ passageway and brought them down a dank stairwell into a cold, dark hall where a single lantern burned feebly on an iron hook.
‘Will ye take me to your house?’ Rosie asked, taking the lantern and pushing into a cold room where pheasants and wild game hung from ceiling hooks, their meat tenderising in the cool air.
‘Yes,’ Merriment told her. She had already decided not to risk the longer trip to the Brazen Head at this late hour, and she was also anxious to get back to Janey. ‘You’ll be safe there. Tomorrow you can go to England.’
Rosie nodded forlornly as she looked back at Merriment, her face painfully young. She was only a few years older than Janey Mack.
They plunged out into the backyard, through a steel door, the freezing night air slicing into their skin as they stepped into the shadowy darkness. Rosie knew where she was going. Merriment could discern a high back wall and the rooftops of the carriage house and adjoining stables. When she glanced back, every room was illuminated. Through the elegant windows she could see crowds of party-goers chatting and laughing, drink glistening in their glasses, the sound of music and chatter seeping through the thick walls and drifting up into the clouds. For a moment she thought she saw Beresford and her heart jolted. She wanted to talk to him, but she couldn’t go back, there was no time. She looked away, tugged her cloak tighter and tried walking abreast of Rosie, both of them moving cautiously across the cobbles, Rosie’s neat heels clicking on the dry ground. The air smelled of wood smoke and burning coal. She could hear the sound of horses whickering and coachmen coughing and spitting. In the distance, echoing over the chimneys, came the familiar heavy rattle and jaunty clipping of a coach and four.
‘There’s a gate here somewhere,’ Rosie whispered, holding the lantern aloft and peering into the darkness. Merriment gazed at the soft grey tones shifting in the blackness before her. She could distinguish the outline of nearby trees. There was a pillar.
‘Straight ahead,’ she said, and Rosie started to whimper and shiver.
‘I’m cast out into the street,’ she snivelled. ‘I hate the dark. And the Dolocher is out here. The heartless bitch, sending us to die.’
The lantern glistened off the bars of a thick iron gate. Rosie unlocked it and Merriment followed her through into a narrow alleyway littered with dead leaves. She could see Rosie’s breath issuing in swift white waves from her lips. But beyond Rosie’s face she could see nothing. A wall of darkness lay dead ahead. To the right and left of her, high up, lone candles burned in occasional windows. And all she could hear as she walked was Rosie’s thin heels clicking and her own boots pattering with every footfall.
‘We’ve to cross the river.’ The darkness forced Merriment to whisper.
‘But the Dolocher is over there,’ Rosie moaned.
‘It’s where I live.’ Before Rosie could protest, Merriment continued. ‘I don’t think it’s curfew yet. Can you bring us out of this alley onto a street?’
‘I don’t mind being arrested. I’ll feel safer being arrested than going near the Dolocher’s patch.’
Rosie stifled a sob, pausing a moment to gaze into the gloom, holding the lantern high.
‘If you’re arrested, Rochford will catch you,’ Merriment whispered. Rosie’s face crumpled.
‘Peggy’s flung us out to die,’ she wept, appalled. ‘And me with child and all.’
Merriment grabbed the lantern and inspected the prickling darkness. A stray snowflake tumbled slowly before her, followed by another and another. Somewhere in the distance she heard a commanding shout and the trot of several horses.
‘Damn,’ she cursed. ‘Curfew might be about to start. Come on.’
They moved through the alley, following its twisting course as it snaked past the back walls of fine mansions. Merriment pinched her lips tight; she wanted her gun. Rosie cried uselessly, stumbling forward, complaining.
‘Be quiet,’ Merriment told her, ‘and carry this.’
She gave Rosie back the lantern, unholstered her pistol and walked with the hammer snapped back and poised above the flashpan, ready, should she need to let off a shot. The slightest sound made her jump. A cat slinking under the ivy, a rat skidding through a hole, a pebble loosely rattling. The darkness was thick and seething, the air quivering with dense shadows confused by intermittent snow showers. Why did she ever? How could she? The thoughts came quickly and half formed. The images of goat-headed demons fused with the blurred recollection of what she had seen the night before swam before her eyes. Her whole body seemed to empty out, she began to feel weightless, light and incorporeal, moving like a mist through the shifting blackness, her feet barely touching the ground, as though she was flying. The woodcut of witches sitting on brooms flashed in her mind. Merriment stopped, taking a second to catch her breath.
‘What is it?’ Rosie panicked, halting. ‘Did ye see something?’
‘Where are we?’ Merriment asked.
‘I think we go straight on. We should come out by the river,’ Rosie muttered, her voice snagging on darts of terror.
Merriment dragged on the chest, pulling Rosie forward as she peered through the soft blur of snow, only able to see two feet ahead of her.
‘It’s snowing,’ Rosie sobbed, then muttering more to herself than to Merriment she repeated over and over, like a doleful prayer, ‘I’ll never get into heaven. I’ll never get into heaven.’
They picked their way through the detritus and the darkness and came surprisingly and suddenly out of the alley onto a wide footpath and an empty road, lit by intermittent braziers that made the adjacent river gleam like dark pewter. The snow eased into a faint powdery haze and because there was a light dusting of white on the roads and along the quayside walls the route to Fishamble Street was partially lit by the sparkling ground.
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‘This way.’ Merriment pointed to Essex Bridge. The bells of Christ Church Cathedral rang out mournfully, seven long chimes, and Rosie muffled a terrified whelp, pulling the edge of her decorative cape to her mouth.
‘Come on.’ Merriment glanced behind her, searching the roads that spanned towards the river for mounted guards or pairs of foot soldiers. The city was eerily deserted. Nothing moved. All was quiet. Seeing that the coast was clear, and relieved to be out of the confines of the alleyway, Merriment strode along Bachelors Walk and headed down the river towards Ormond Quay.
She rushed them both across Essex Bridge, calculating the best way home. She couldn’t go the main streets that were well lit and patrolled by soldiers and she couldn’t go by the darkest alleyways. It was like threading a needle. Merriment tugged the chest to one side, dragging Rosie left at Smock Alley away from the wide comforting expanse of the quays, back into a constricted street that felt oppressively narrow in the pallid light. Empty buildings swooped up either side of them but the smattering of snow helped. A meagre brazier pierced the gloom, casting out a greyish-yellow circle before them.
‘Not far now,’ Merriment whispered, trotting a little. She was five minutes away from opening the shop door.
Christ, she thought. Stella.
Merriment was beside the edge of a building, its brickwork slatted with snow. She saw a lump of rubbish poking up from the gutter, frosted and glistening. The darkness moved, thickened. Burst open. Merriment reeled backwards. Rosie shrieked. He surged from the shadows, his snout dripping. Billows of white stinking breath puffed out from his spiked teeth. His black cloak fluttered wide, exposing a balding cape of bluish-grey decomposing flesh pitted with black hairs. He lurched at Merriment, slamming into her, heavy as a work horse, knocking the wind out of her, flattening her to the ground. She couldn’t scream. He straddled her, pushing his knees into her pelvis, crushing her beneath him.
She couldn’t breathe. She couldn’t breathe.
The Dolocher’s hands wound around her neck, squeezing like a vice. The last shreds of air scraped up her throat. The Dolocher’s jaws loosely dangled; pared white teeth, lustrously sharp, glimmered from his black upper palate. His dark, oily snout dripped moisture. Wafts of stale breath issued white from his savage jaws. His remote, unforgettable eyes glistened from a depressed bony darkness, glaring out at her from deep, hollowed sockets. He grunted with exertion, pushing Merriment into the ground as she scratched at his wet, slippery flesh, feeling his skin tear away in her hands. She heaved, kicking and thrashing. He weighed on top of her like a collapsing building. Crushing her. Pushing her down into the earth. Beyond. She fought back. His long, hard nails pushed into her side and a burning rush of pain flared through her body. She scrabbled for the Answerer, fumbling with the trigger. The pan flashed; a white litmus glare illuminated the quivering snout. The sound of the musket erupted with a deafening snap. The Dolocher flinched and gave a dull moan as his iron fist came down hard and heavy on Merriment’s head.
The world turned white.
21
The Wound
Merriment plunged upwards out of a deep, sore darkness and gasped for air, her eyes dancing wildly.
‘It’s all right. You’re home.’ Solomon sat on the bed beside her, his arms gently enfolding her, drawing her to him until she exhaled.
‘Oh my God,’ she muttered, her throat raw and sore. She folded into him, her whole being releasing into his embrace, giving in, glad to be encircled, to be held. Solomon squeezed her so tight she could feel his forearms warmly keeping her together, preventing her from breaking apart. She stayed a long time resting her head on his shoulder, her eyes closed, sinking into a soporific stillness filled with the sound of heartbeats and the gentle ebb and flow of breathing.
‘The Dolocher,’ she whispered at last, the words rasping up her throat, tearing at her crushed and bruised oesophagus, cutting the tender lining of her vocal chords. It hurt to speak.
‘I know,’ Solomon replied. ‘I thought you were dead.’ His lips quivered, his brow furrowing. ‘When I saw you, lying in the snow, bleeding, the lantern at your head . . . I thought you were dead.’
‘You found me?’ Merriment was confused. She sank back into the pillows away from his arms. Solomon stroked her fingers and gazed into her face.
‘I found you,’ he nodded. ‘Brought you back home.’
Merriment examined his features, searching for something, her mouth half open.
‘I . . .’ she began, meaning to thank him. Instead she tried to sit up, only to discover she was sore and sick and hurting.
‘Jesus.’ She grabbed her side.
‘You were cut.’ Solomon fetched her some more pillows and propped them behind her back. ‘We cleaned the wound, put a bandage on it.’
‘He cut me?’ Merriment frowned. ‘I didn’t feel . . . I didn’t know . . . I thought he’d set my side on fire, that his touch was sulphurous.’
Merriment frowned and lifted the pale eiderdown. She was still wearing her breeches. She gently folded back her shirt and saw the bloody edges of a bandage.
‘It’s not so deep.’ Solomon sat on the edge of the bed, one hand over Merriment’s covered legs. ‘A flesh wound. Janey put some kind of powder on it and cobwebs to staunch the bleeding.’
‘Janey?’ Merriment searched the empty cushions before the fireplace.
‘She’s asleep in my room, with Stella.’ Solomon tapped her arm reassuringly. ‘She’s fine. The little thing was hysterical. We had a hard time calming her down.’
Merriment stared around the room. A single candle burned on her bedside table, next to a decanter of sweet sherry and a small cut glass. The fire was lit, the flames dancing, making the light jump. The shutters were closed. She was warm, cocooned in soft light and familiar shadows.
‘I – I,’ she stammered, ‘I didn’t see him . . . It was so dark. He came at me from nowhere. Out of the walls.’
Solomon nodded, his face clouded by concern and empathy.
‘And his mouth . . .’ Merriment swallowed, wincing as her throat throbbed.
‘I know . . .’ Solomon stood up to fetch her a glass of sherry.‘I mean . . .’ He couldn’t find the words. Merriment watched his every move. The way he drew the cork out of the decanter, the arch of his shoulders stooping as he poured honey-gold sherry into the small engraved glass, strands of his blond hair falling forward along his jaw line. He seemed broader than she remembered: his shirt was loose fitting, his waistcoat open. When he turned to look at her, his eyes were filled with a brilliance that showed his fear. He brought her the glass, sitting down close to her. A tortured expression flickered over his face and without warning he suddenly leaned in and softly kissed her. His lips gently met hers, brushing her mouth with the barest of touches, lingering sensitively, saying everything he could not find the words for. When he pulled away, he could not leave her completely; his face hovered close to hers, their breath mingling as he inhaled the scent of her skin, drinking in the subtle heat of her body. For a long time he kept his head close to hers, afraid that if he retreated she would vanish into some independent quarter of her being. He wanted her to know, wanted her to feel that she was something he could not do without.
At last he sat back, his face flushed, his eyes troubled, his brow crinkled as he tried to figure out where to start, how to begin.
It was Merriment who broke the silence.
‘He followed you.’
Solomon’s shoulders slumped under the weight of the accusation. He turned away, his jaw tightening, his cheeks compressing, highlighting his cheekbones so that they glimmered sharply in the candlelight. He balled his hands into fists, his sore knuckles breaking a little under the pressure. Had he truly brought this darkness to her door?
Merriment’s eyes glistened, her mind hot and searching, the thoughts lashing like snapped rigging, her reason buckling under the strain of her recollection.
‘He followed me.’
Her eyes s
himmered, tears lensing over her irises, magnifying the sheer blue quality of their colour, making her look vulnerable.
‘Solomon.’ She gripped her throat, pressing her hand against it to try and ease the raw, aching pain in her gullet, and swallowing with difficulty, she said, ‘The Dolocher wants . . . intends . . .’
The words hoarsely burst from her being as she desperately tried to grasp what had happened to her.
‘I don’t know. I kept clawing at him,’ she rasped, the effort of speaking stinging her throat. ‘Tried to push him away. I kept scratching at him and his dead flesh came apart in my hands.’
She gazed at her wide-spread fingers as though slivers of the Dolocher’s skin might still somehow be visible beneath her nails.
‘When I touched him, bits of him vanished, turned to slop in my hands, cold and wet like disintegrating flesh.’
Solomon wanted her to stop. He reached for her hand, holding it, stroking it, but Merriment retracted.
‘He reeked. The stench of his corpse. I mean, I couldn’t breathe.’ Her eyes flitted past Solomon’s shoulders, worryingly unfocused, dancing into the corners of the room. ‘His tongue had been gouged out.’ Merriment’s breath became quick and shallow. ‘His eyes were far in, way inside his head. And I saw Olocher staring out at me, living, like he was trapped, staring out at me, trying to kill me.’
‘Stop,’ Solomon whispered softly. ‘Stop. You need to drink, Merri. You’ve had a dreadful shock.’
Merriment craned forward and urgently hissed, ‘But what will we do?’ She clutched at his fingers. ‘What will we do now that demons exist?’
The flaming panic written on her face pulled on all of Solomon’s inner resolve. He did not want her to be broken, but something in her expression, the glitter of her eyes, the unsettling disturbance of her fear, filled him with dread. He gently lifted the glass to her lips and encouraged her to sip.
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