Last Rites

by Neil White

  ‘What about the salt pentagram on your floor?’ he continued. ‘The rosemary over the doorframe?’

  Abigail just shook her head.

  Rod sighed as he realised that he wasn't going to get anywhere. He reached out and took her hand. ‘Take care of yourself, Miss Hobbs,’ he said, and then stood as if to leave.

  Abigail kept hold of his hand. ‘Finish your tea,’ she said.

  Rod looked back at the cup, saw the black leaves swirling around. He paused, unsure, and then he reached down to drain it. When he'd finished, Abigail said, ‘Spin the leaves.’

  Rod looked at her, confused.

  ‘The cup,’ she said. ‘Rotate it three times, and then put it on the saucer, upside down.’

  He did as he was told, and then watched as Abigail reached for the cup. She concentrated, turning the cup back over, holding it up to her face, looking closely, starting with the rim and then looking further into the bowl.

  ‘Can you see that?’ she said eventually, holding the cup up to him.

  Rod leaned forward. All he could see were tea leaves scattered around the inside of a white china cup.

  ‘Near the handle,’ she continued. ‘Can you see the leaves are in a hammer shape?’

  Rod couldn't, but he nodded anyway, just out of politeness.

  ‘It means you will be rewarded for your hard work,’ she said, and then she smiled.

  Rod nodded slowly. ‘Thank you,’ he replied, although he was unsure what he was thanking her for.

  Chapter Forty-four

  I was driving too fast, but I knew I was late, the Triumph Stag skittering around corners. I checked my watch. The Court Welfare meeting was at three, and it was already quarter past. Our cottage was sometimes hard to find, tucked away on a quiet road in the hills around Turners Fold, so I hoped the visitor would be late.

  As I rounded the corner close to our house, I saw Laura's car parked outside, pulled onto the small patch of gravel at the front. In front of her car was another, a stranger's car. I cursed to myself and rushed inside.

  Laura looked up at me. She smiled, but I could see that it was forced.

  ‘I'm sorry I'm late. I got held up with work.’ I tried to show my regret and make it sound official, that there was nothing I could do, but I knew that Laura would know the truth, that I had become distracted.

  The woman on the sofa with Laura stood up to shake my hand. ‘You must be Jack,’ she said. ‘I'm Jenny.’

  I shook hands and tried to assess her like I knew she was assessing me. She looked like how I expected, cords and blazer and a short haircut. No rings. I guessed that she had no children herself. It was the earnest look in her eyes, that she knew best, which gave it away. People with children tend to be more forgiving.

  ‘I came a bit early. I'm sorry,’ Jenny said.

  To catch us how we really are, I thought, rather than as the package we would present.

  She smiled at me and sat down again.

  The rest of the meeting went in a whirl, just lots of talk about plans for us and plans for Bobby, about contact arrangements, schooling. All aspects of our life disclosed to a stranger so that she could recommend what should happen to Laura's child. But Laura had already made that decision, that he was best with us. Geoff was disputing it only because of me, as I was the intruder in the nest, although he hadn't been so protective when he had been unfaithful to Laura, and more than once.

  As I looked at Jenny, I wondered whether she would see through Geoff. I told myself that most families she saw would be riddled with more problems than our little unit. Maybe this visit was a break from the routine. Or maybe it was routine to her, the absent father making trouble for the new boyfriend.

  I answered her questions honestly, about our plans for Bobby's schooling, how our jobs interfered with looking after him. I stammered a bit when I was asked about marriage plans, but Laura stepped in with an explanation that we had none. Bobby was playing upstairs most of the time, I could hear him rattling his toys and talking to himself. Jenny asked if she could speak to him. Laura said it was okay, and as soon as Jenny's flat shoes disappeared around the bend in the stairs, I whispered, ‘I'm sorry I'm late. I got held up in the library, and then I went to see Sarah's parents. I just lost track.’

  ‘Were you with darling little Katie?’ she snapped at me.

  ‘What do you mean?’

  ‘I've seen photographs of a loving goodbye,’ she said.

  ‘Carson?’ I asked angrily.

  ‘Probably, but that's not the point.’

  ‘Nothing went on,’ I said. ‘You saw what she was like last night. It doesn't mean I responded.’

  Laura stared at me, clenching her jaw, and then she said, ‘Well, you were supposed to be here. Do you remember all that crap you keep saying, that this is our fight, not just mine? It didn't last long, did it?’

  ‘It wasn't like that,’ I protested.

  ‘Oh no? I might just decide I don't want the fight any more, and that will take me away from here. Will you fight then?’

  Before I had the chance to respond, Jenny came back downstairs, Bobby just behind her. When he came into the room, he sat right next to me. Jenny noticed that. I couldn't have scripted it better.

  We answered a few wrap-up questions, Laura's smile switched back on, although I still sensed the frost, and then Jenny grabbed her things. I let Laura show her out as Bobby ran back upstairs, his game not complete. When Laura didn't come back inside, I went to look for her, and found her at the end of the garden, on an old bench I'd bought from a reclamation yard, the wood gnarled and bent. I'd put it where we had a good view along the valley, the height of the wall cutting out the slate-grey of the town.

  She looked up, and I saw that she had been crying. I sat next to her and linked my fingers into hers.

  ‘So that's it then,’ she said quietly.

  ‘What do you mean?’

  ‘That woman will go and decide our future, and we just have to sit here and wait.’ She sniffled and wiped her eyes. ‘Do you know what was the strangest thing?’

  ‘No, go on, tell me.’

  ‘I found myself explaining for the first time why I had moved up here. No, that's not right, not explaining. Justifying. That's what I was doing. You wanted to come home to the north, you had something to come back for, but I just sort of followed, with dreams of a new start, all that romantic stuff.’

  ‘This conversation doesn't sound good,’ I said.

  ‘No, it is good,’ she said, ‘because I had to tell Jenny why I wanted to stay up here. The fields. The view. The job. Even the people. I loved London, still do, but it is nice to be out of it. I've slowed down a bit, and that has to be good. For the first time since I moved here, I had to convince someone else that it was not only good for me to be up here, but also that it was good for Bobby.’

  I kissed her on the cheek, and she put her arm around mine, rested her head on my shoulder. We stayed like that for a while, neither of us speaking, and then Laura broke the silence. ‘Tell me again, why were you late?’

  ‘Like I said, it was about work, and I'm sorry, but this Sarah Goode story has taken an interesting turn.’

  ‘Tell me.’

  I looked down the valley, away from Turners Fold and towards Pendle Hill, sprawled across the view. Its summit wasn't high, but it always seemed like the clouds were not too far away, as if the hill pulled them towards it.

  ‘Do you see that hill?’ I asked.

  ‘What, the long one?’ she queried.

  ‘That's the one,’ I said, and I knew what Laura meant. It didn't just rise up, it seemed to lie along the landscape, more barren than the green fields around it, the sides darker, bleaker somehow.

  ‘What about it?’

  ‘It's seen some strange things.’

  Laura shuddered. ‘I don't like it,’ she said. ‘It's strange, it spooks me.’

  ‘Pendle Hill,’ I said. ‘It's a landmark in these parts. Tales of witchcraft and dark deeds.’

>   Laura smiled at that. ‘Hubble, bubble, toil and trouble, and all that.’

  ‘You're not far off the mark with that,’ I said. ‘The Macbeth reference, I mean.’

  She looked up at me. ‘What are you talking about?’

  ‘Have you never heard of the Pendle witches?’

  She curled her lip. ‘I've sort of heard about them, in that I've heard the name, but I don't know anything about them.’

  ‘Well, let's go inside. It's nearly Halloween, and so it's a good time for some ghoulish local history.’

  Chapter Forty-five

  Sarah pulled her knees closer to her chest.

  She knew she had to escape. She wasn't going to be kept so that she could be used by him whenever his urges were too strong. Escape or die trying. But she needed to be strong, had to keep a clear mind. He was right, she had let hate distract her. The door had been open. She could have rushed for that. Instead, she had become consumed by hatred, wanting to kill him more than she had needed to get out.

  She needed to draw on some strength, some inner resource.

  Sarah stood up and began to walk backwards in the room, dragging her heel in the dirt, making a straight line, bold and clear, from one corner of the room to the centre of the opposing wall, and then back down to the other corner. Then she went across to another wall, dragging her heel still so that it became raw and started to bleed. But she carried on, knew she had to keep going, and so she went back across the room again, another line, before making her way back to the corner that she had started from.

  She looked back at what she had done. It wasn't perfect, but it was good enough.

  It was a pentagram, drawn into the dirt.

  Sarah knelt down in the middle of the pentagram, so that its five arms stretched out all around her. She closed her eyes, tried to conjure the images in her head that she needed. It was hard. The speakers beat out that steady heartbeat rhythm, so that she fought hard to banish it from her mind. Then she realised that it was easier if she went with the sounds, so she swayed with the rhythm, backwards and forwards, then to the side, her eyes closed, her lips closed in a half-smile.

  Then the right thoughts came. She thought she could feel the warm breeze in the room as she thought of it tugging at branches, or brushing the soft hairs on her arms. Her hair seemed to flutter over her shoulders.

  ‘Watch over me, Air,’ she said softly. ‘Guard me, guide me, protect me during whatever lies ahead. Blessed be.’

  Sarah felt stronger. She tried to think of a flame, swaying like the flickers of a roaring fire. She rubbed her arms, felt them become warm under her touch.

  ‘Watch over me, Fire. Guard me, guide me, protect me during whatever lies ahead. Blessed be.’

  Then it was a fast-flowing stream. She thought she could hear the ripples over the sound of the heartbeats, softening the sound.

  ‘Watch over me, Water. Guard me, guide me, protect me during whatever lies ahead. Blessed be.’

  Her voice was getting stronger as she swayed in time to the heartbeats.

  Sarah thrust her hand to the floor and grabbed a handful of dirt. Her nails felt broken, her fingers raw, but she held her hand aloft and let it fall over her.

  ‘Watch over me, Earth. Guard me, guide me, protect me during whatever lies ahead. Blessed be.’

  Sarah's voice grew louder, more strident, seemed to echo around the room, over the sound of the heartbeats coming from the speakers. She clenched her fists and felt tears roll down her cheeks. She held out her arms and looked upwards.

  ‘Lord and Lady, I call upon you to watch over me. Guard me, guide me, protect me during whatever lies ahead. Blessed be.’

  Sarah reached out with her right hand and began to draw a circle around herself, turning clockwise on her knees.

  ‘I make this circle as a place between the worlds,’ she shouted, turning still. ‘It will protect me. Blessed be.’

  As she overlapped the end of the circle over its beginning, she slumped forward, panting. All she could do now was wait.

  Chapter Forty-six

  As we checked that Bobby wasn't listening, I sat down at the table, my bag next to me.

  ‘That's why I was late,’ I said to Laura. ‘I was researching the Pendle witches.’

  Laura didn't look pleased by that. ‘You were late for the Court Welfare meeting because you were looking at some local history? You said it was about your story.’

  ‘No, I was late for the meeting because I was researching the Sarah Goode story. It's just that it's all about the Pendle witches.’

  Laura started to smile. ‘What, she's got herself a pointy hat?’

  I smiled back, my eyebrows raised. ‘It's much more interesting than that,’ I said. I checked Bobby again. He had eyes and ears only for the screen, SpongeBob keeping him quiet. ‘Sarah is descended from one of the Pendle witches.’

  Laura waggled her fingers and made her eyes wide, tried to cackle like the Wicked Witch of the West.

  ‘It's true,’ I said, laughing. ‘Anne Whittle. She was one of the witches, one of the main ones. Sarah is a direct descendant.’

  ‘So that's the angle of your story: murderer has witch blood?’ she said, sighing. ‘It's a bit Sunday Sport, isn't it? You're better than that.’

  ‘Do you remember the letters?’

  Laura nodded.

  ‘The wording is taken from the witch trials,’ I continued. ‘Made more modern, but undeniably the same.’

  Laura tugged at her lip. I went to the bag I had put on the table and pulled out some papers. I held them up. ‘Look at the language,’ I said. ‘Sarah Goode is sending confessions to murder, and using the words spoken four hundred years earlier by her direct ancestor.’

  Laura cast her eye over the letters. I pointed out the similarities to her, the ones I'd discovered with Katie earlier in the day.

  Laura wasn't smiling any more.

  ‘And Sarah isn't the first descendant of Anne Whittle to suffer tragedy,’ I continued. ‘There were two more that I know of.’

  ‘Who?’ Laura still didn't look convinced, although I wasn't sure if it was at the truth of what I was saying, or at her willingness to be dragged into the story.

  ‘Two more women have died,’ I said. ‘Both descendants of Anne Whittle.’

  ‘You said the story was four hundred years old. There are bound to be other deaths.’

  ‘These were in the last ten years.’

  Laura looked interested now.

  ‘The first one was called Mather,’ I continued. ‘April Mather. She killed herself ten years ago. A suicide. Hanging. The second one was Rebecca Nurse. She was killed and found dumped near a stream around eight years ago, just at the base of the hill.’

  Laura thought about that for a moment, but then she said, ‘The list of descendants will be huge. Four hundred years is a lot of generations. Of family-tree branches. They will have spread out like veins across your back. It could just be a coincidence?’

  I shook my head. ‘The family tree I saw wasn't that big.’

  ‘Where was it?’

  ‘At the home of Sarah's parents. And you know what: at the top it had some strange kind of symbol, maybe a symbol for the family, like a screaming face. Sarah had the same symbol on her wall, framed and prominent.’

  Laura looked intrigued. She went to the window and looked along the valley, towards Pendle Hill. I didn't interrupt her. Laura was strong-willed, and so I had to let her decide herself that it was an interesting story.

  ‘Who were these witches?’ she said eventually, turning to face me.

  ‘Four hundred years ago, eleven of them went to the gallows for witchcraft, and one died in prison,’ I said. ‘All local women, and it was all to do with King James and a quarrel between two local families.’

  ‘What, the Gunpowder Plot King James? The Bible King James?’

  ‘Witches sound silly to us, I know that, but not to King James,’ I said. ‘He didn't like them. No, more than that, he thought they were
a source of evil. He published a rant about witches even before he came to the throne, blamed them for some shipwreck. This was a man who had a downer on witches, and what do people do when their king doesn't like something? The answer is that they don't like it either.’

  ‘Emperor's new clothes?’

  ‘Something like that,’ I said. ‘So those people who wanted to impress the new king turned on witches to do so. Even Shakespeare.’

  ‘The Macbeth thing?’

  I nodded. ‘He wrote Macbeth just after King James came to the throne. From what I've read this afternoon, it was written as a tribute to the king. Banquo was an ancestor of King James, and in one of the scenes there is a parade of kings, like a chance to salute James and all of the great kings that went before him.’

  Laura sighed. ‘I don't know too much about Shakespeare, but I never took him for a royal toady?’

  ‘You pander to your crowd, I suppose,’ I replied. ‘The witches in Macbeth were the villains of the play, and so Shakespeare was just playing to the king's favourite subject. And do you think the people up here were any different to the people in the south? The local bigwigs could make a name for themselves by rooting out witches, gain a bit of local power.’

  ‘And that is what happened around here?’

  ‘Pretty much so,’ I said, nodding. ‘There were just four at the start, but then the two families got together to sort out a truce, to get their loved ones back, maybe even exact some revenge, the infamous Good Friday gathering at Malkin Tower. Unfortunately for them, the local Magistrate found out about the meeting and had them locked up as well. Four months later, they were all tried at Lancaster Castle. Most of them were found guilty, and most of them were executed.’

  ‘And the local Magistrate was made to look good before the king,’ Laura said, guessing the subtext.

  ‘That's about the size of it.’

  Laura rubbed her eyes. ‘I've had a stressful day, and this is too much.’ She sighed, ‘Go on, tell me where Sarah Goode fits into all of this?

  ‘That's what got me thinking.’

  ‘Uh oh,’ said Laura. ‘This is where I get worried.’