by Joan Smith
“Ignorant as swans,” Lewis scoffed with a condemning look at his family. “It is about sin, and expiation, and ... and shrieving the soul. It is all an allegory, you see. The albatross is a symbol. I wonder if there is an allegory in Knagg. I shall speak to Mr. Wainwright. It seems to me Knagg—”
“Do gag him, for God’s sake,” Lady Merton said with an appealing look at her elder son.
“Put a damper on it. You are giving Mama the megrims.”
“Very well, I shan’t bother you mental commoners with poetical things. But it will be jolly good sport hunting ghosts.”
Merton rose. “We have work to do, Lewis. An estate of ten thousand acres does not run itself. It is time you learned the ropes. If you cannot profit from a higher education, then you must learn to farm, to be ready to take over your own place when you reach your maturity. I have enough to do with the Hall. In the spring I can use another pair of hands. Take a run over to the east meadow. Wallins is shearing the sheep today. See if he needs any of the fellows to help him. And you might see that the storage barn has been cleaned up to take the new wool. I shall be in my office.”
Lewis assumed a pained expression and quoted, “ ‘Happy the man who ... works his ancestral acres with oxen of his own breeding,’ eh, John? I envy you your simple pleasures.”
“You omitted the best part of Horace’s lines. ‘Free from usury.’ And as you seem unaware of the fact, I might add it is sheep I breed, not oxen.”
“What is the difference? They are all smelly quadrupeds.”
“One does not shear oxen.”
Lewis was happy enough once he reached the outdoors. So long as he could perform his duties astride his mount, he had no real complaints. Even a poet needed a sound mind in a sound body. How was a fellow to keep a sound body if he was forever bent over a book? He took his gun with him, to hunt a few rabbits before dinner.
Lady Merton sat on alone, worrying. She knew John did not take her fears seriously, but they were genuine fears. Her past was enough to frighten anyone. And now her nemesis had come back to haunt her. She should never have done what she did to Meg. The vicar said this was her chance to undo her sins before she had to meet her maker. That was the way to look at it, as an opportunity to rectify the past.
Chapter Two
The Wainwrights arrived in Eastleigh late in the afternoon, with plenty of time to make a reconnaissance trip to view the exterior of Keefer Hall. It was all that a ghost hunter could wish. In the distance a Gothic heap rose against a dull gray sky. Mr. Wainwright gazed contentedly at pointed windows, finials, gargoyles, and a steeply canted roof.
“There are the ravens,” he said, pointing to six bumps on the roof line. “At Longleat the departure of the swans will foretell the end of the family line. Here at Keefer Hall there is a legend that the ravens circle the house to foretell good luck.”
The birds sat immobile as statues for as long as Charity looked at them. The surrounding park featured dank yews and dripping elms that cast long shadows on the grass. She feared the chimneys in such an old house would smoke; the rooms would be dark and dreary, and the inhabitants would discuss nothing but ghosts and gout.
“I shouldn’t be surprised if they have an oubliette, complete with skeletons and clanking chains,” she said.
“Such appurtenances are not necessary to a haunting,” her papa replied. “Though they do add a certain atmosphere, of course. We shall return to Eastleigh, have a stroll around the town to stretch our limbs, then hire a room to change into evening-wear. After dinner we shall return to Keefer Hall.”
At the inn after their stroll, Charity washed away the dust of travel and changed into her blue silk evening gown, trimmed with Belgian lace around the skirt and bodice. She would have preferred a lighter color in spring. The blue was not the blue of a summer sky, but a deep Wedgwood blue that matched her eyes. Papa liked her to look somber, to add to the atmosphere. She had put her foot down at wearing black, however. She was neither a witch nor a widow, after all.
Mr. Wainwright was rigged out in his ghost-hunting outfit of black evening clothes, satin-lined cape, and silver-headed ebony walking stick. He cut quite a dash when the black carriage, pulled by four jet-black horses, thundered up to the door of Keefer Hall.
Lewis, who darted out to greet them, was immensely impressed. Now here was a gentleman with a sense of style! Wainwright brought a whiff of brimstone with him, with that swirling cape and those slashes of black eyebrow. The daughter was not the clumsy, snorting sort of female he had feared either. Quite pretty, actually, and a little older, just as he liked. She was in her early twenties, he judged, by no means hagged—and with a dandy figure. Wouldn’t the fellows at Cambridge stare to hear he was intimate with an older lady!
“Welcome to Keefer Hall!” he said, ushering them in.
Wainwright introduced himself and his daughter. “Lady Merton is expecting me, I think,” he said.
“We are all waiting for you. If you would like to remove your cape ...”
“I shall keep it, thank you. Ghosts bring a chilly air with them.”
“Ah!” Lewis grinned his approval of this bit of arcane lore. “Come into the saloon and have a glass of something wet before we begin work.”
“Excellent! A glass of claret sharpens the senses. And there is no hurry. Midnight is the best hour for communing with the beyond.”
Lewis hung on his every word, already envisaging himself in a cape of similar design (though perhaps a red lining would be more dramatic), banishing ghosts from damsels’ castles and taking his reward in the ladies’ boudoirs. The Wainwrights were soon being introduced to an elegant, pretty, but troubled lady of middle years who was clutching a lace-edged handkerchief.
Wainwright bowed over her bejewelled fingers and said in a low voice, “Fear not, Lady Merton, we shall clear up that past transgression that is troubling you. It was not entirely your fault.”
She gasped in wonder and said, “I am so glad you are here, Mr. Wainwright.”
Lord Merton heard her incredulous gasp and shot a narrow-eyed glance at the callers. He saw his mother staring fatuously at the man. What had the scoundrel said to Mama?
Charity saw his annoyance. Oh, dear! It was to be one of those visits, where the man of the house disapproved of them. She was at pains to distract him.
“What an interesting house, Lord Merton,” she said. “The façade is very old, I think?” She was relieved to observe that the interior had been modernized. No smoke emanated from the blazing grate of an Adam fireplace. Fine mahogany furnishings gleamed from a recent application of beeswax and turpentine. A pair of striped sofas were arranged by the grate. Around them stretched a vast room, done up in a style suitable to a noble home.
Merton did the decent thing and behaved civilly to his mama’s guests. “Yes, the front and parts of the west wing survive from the fifteenth century. The place was pretty well destroyed by the Ironsides. We had Cromwell’s troopers billeted here in the 1600s. The Dechastelaines were Royalists.”
“You are fortunate anything was left standing.”
“We have the restoration of Charles II to thank for that. Our so-called ghost, Knagg, was one of the Cavaliers who was killed here, defending Keefer Hall. In the Armaments Room we have a yellow jerkin and a helmet allegedly belonging to the fellow who killed him. I daresay it was Knagg’s violent end that accounts for these ghost stories. That is what you folks hold to account for ghosts, is it not?”
“Violent or tragic,” she said, noticing but not commenting on his many evasions: “so-called ghost,” “allegedly,” “I daresay,” “what you folks hold to account.” All this told her that Lord Merton was not a believer. “Papa will tell you the exact nature of his passing.”
Merton shot her a look not a shade short of outright derision.
Charity did not foam up in anger. It was not her way, but she did not back down either. “I take it our invitation does not have your approval, milord?”
“If it
amuses Mama ...” The old fool Wainwright, rigged up like a satellite of Satan in a morality play, could say what he liked without fear of contradiction as there was no proof to counter his story. “I personally place no credence in ghosts,” he said bluntly. “I have lived at Keefer Hall for thirty years without seeing any spirits or hearing the singing nun.”
“Some are insensitive in that respect,” she replied, refusing to take offense, and immediately changed the subject. “I assume there was a priory hereabouts at one time, as you speak of the ghost of a nun.”
“Yes, an offshoot of the monastery, as the priories usually were in the old days, I believe. Keefer Hall stands on the remains of an old Cistercian monastery. The cloisters still stand. The chapel, unfortunately, was looted by Cromwell. It is considered an excellent example of its sort. Whitewashed walls, the stained glass taken out, a plain black cross. We do not use it.”
Lewis was bored with this sort of chat. Just like John to go talking history when he had this rare opportunity to broaden his horizons with some really interesting conversation. “Tell us some of your ghost experiences, Miss Wainwright. I find it fascinating,” he said.
“One hardly knows where to begin.” She wished Lord Winton had chosen some other subject as the master of the house was looking at her with a jaundiced eye, ready to poke holes in any claims she made. “Monks and nuns appear in a greater proportion than their actual numbers warrant. The Society believes it was their harsh treatment by Henry VIII that accounts for it.”
“What society is that?” Lewis asked.
“The Society for the Study of Discarnate Beings,” she replied. “Papa is a founding member of it.”
Merton snorted openly.
“How would a fellow go about joining it?” Lewis asked.
Merton said, “Let us hope the society’s rules are more lenient than Cambridge’s or you will not last long.”
Charity looked a question at him. Before either could speak, Lewis cleared his throat and said, “We shall speak of it another time. Do you ride, Miss Wainwright?”
“Yes, indeed, but I did not bring my riding habit.”
“Daresay Mama may have one to fit you.”
As his mama was six inches shorter and the same measure wider than Miss Wainwright, she stared to hear this.
“Don’t be an ass, Lewis,” his brother said. “In any event, the Wainwrights will soon find our ghosts and leave. They are not here to ride—or to shanghai members for Mr. Wainwright’s ghost society.”
Charity knew how to handle the brusque manner of a nonbeliever. “Just so,” she said demurely. “Actually, membership is severely restricted. There is a waiting list of over a hundred applicants.”
They finished their claret and Mr. Wainwright rose. “Let the hunting begin,” he announced in dramatic accents.
“I shall accompany you!” Lewis said, jumping up at once.
Lady Merton also rose and began to lead the way. Lord Merton stood, looking after them with an expression not much short of a sneer on his chiseled face. He did not move as the party walked to the door. Charity looked over her shoulder, not an invitation but merely a curious look. Merton’s cool glance measured her lithe form and the nest of curls atop her head. The eyes were rather good.... It might be amusing to see how that poseur of a Wainwright conned the ladies. He set down his glass and followed the little group into the hallway.
Lewis put a possessive hand on Charity’s elbow and began to ask her how he should apply for membership in the Society.
At the foot of the stairs Mr. Wainwright stopped. His body assumed the rigid posture of a pointer on the scent of its quarry. He lifted his silver-knobbed cane in a dramatic gesture and pointed it down the hall. His satin-lined cape swirled with the motion of his arm.
“A very strong presence in that direction. A young male—angry about something. Can you not feel the cold blast?”
“I feel it! A regular Arctic blast,” Lewis said. Charity had intimated a sensitivity to spirits was highly regarded in the Society.
“That is where Knagg lives, in the Armaments Room!” Lady Merton exclaimed. “Fancy your feeling him from this far away, Mr. Wainwright.”
Merton’s gaze turned to the doorway, where a breeze stiff enough to ruffle a muffler Lewis had tossed on a chair blew in from the ill-fitting door.
“I must have that door rehung,” he murmured.
Lady Merton led the party up the grand staircase to her bedchamber. At the top of the stairs Wainwright again stopped, listened, raised his silver-knobbed cane, and this time pointed it west. “A young woman,” he said. “It is an affair of the heart.”
Lady Merton gasped, then frowned. “But my bedchamber with the ghost is to the east, Mr. Wainwright.”
Lord Merton pinched his lips between his teeth to squelch his laugh of triumph. He cast a quick glance at Miss Wainwright, who smiled softly, undismayed and unoffended.
“If Papa says there is a female ghost in the west wing, milord, you will find there is such a specter there,” she said.
Lewis was unhappy to lose Miss Wainwright’s attention. “John could not find an elephant in a closet, where ghosts are concerned,” he said.
“Odd this specter has never troubled me. I sleep in the west wing,” Merton replied.
“I have seen her a dozen times,” Lewis said. “A gray lady slipping along the corridor.”
“Miss Monteith, no doubt,” his brother replied. “Shall we continue on to Mama’s room—despite Mr. Wainwright’s having failed to sense any disturbance there?”
“Indeed. We shall return to the young lady and Knagg anon,” Wainwright agreed, and they continued eastward.
Charity, knowing she would not sense any ghostly apparition, looked at Lady Merton’s bedchamber with a clear eye. She saw an extremely elegant room with handpainted wallpaper featuring bluebirds and roses. The same pattern appeared on the creamy carpet. The furnishings were dainty French pieces, the chaise lounge upholstered in the same shade of blue as the birds on the walls. On a table beside it rested a decanter of wine and a novel. A blue lustring bed canopy and pelmetted window drapes added a little too much blue to the chamber to please her, although it was elegant. The toilet table boasted a host of cosmetic bottles, their chased silver lids matching the dresser set. The air was heavy with the cloying scent from two large bouquets of pink roses.
Wainwright looked around, frowning. He went to the suspect window, glanced out, shook his head, and turned to the clothespress. He opened the door, looked in, then shook his head again. “You have no ghost here, milady.”
Lady Merton’s pretty face puckered in annoyance. “Nonsense! I know a ghost when I see one. She came right out of that clothespress two nights ago,” she said, pointing to it. “Sometimes she comes to my window.”
Wainwright smiled condescendingly. “As you have experienced these apparitions, then I can only assume your ghost has left. They do leave eventually, you must know—though it is strange there should be no lingering trace so soon after an apparition. They usually dwindle, becoming weaker, finally leaving entirely. I sense no trace whatsoever here.”
“Try my sitting room,” she said, and led the way into it. “Oh, you are here, Miss Monteith!” she exclaimed.
A tall, angular female of middle years rose at their entrance and regarded them with a saurian eye. Her graying hair was bound tightly and covered with a cap. Her plain dove-gray gown suggested she was a higher class of servant.
“I was just fixing the hem on your skirt, milady,” she said with a brief curtsy.
“This is my companion, Miss Monteith,” Lady Merton said. “This is the gentleman I have invited to look into the ghost, Miss Monteith. And his daughter, Miss Wainwright.”
While the introduction was being acknowledged, Mr. Wainwright stared hard at Miss Monteith. He said nothing, but as soon as they left, he said to Lady Merton, “How long has that woman been with you?”
“Why, forever. She was here when I married Lord Merton thirty-
five years ago.”
“Ah. I had thought her arrival to be of more recent date. I would advise you to get rid of her. She is not good for you.”
“I could not do that!” Lady Merton exclaimed. “Miss Monteith is an old and trusted servant.”
“Banish her to some other part of the house at least.”
“You are on the wrong track, Mr. Wainwright,” Lady Merton said stiffly. “I invited you to find my ghost and help me be rid of her, not to rearrange my household.”
Lord Merton liked the notion of getting rid of Miss Monteith. He noticed his mama was always disturbed after being closeted with the woman. As he hoped Wainwright might yet prove helpful, he said in a pleasant way, “Shall we go along and visit Knagg now?”
“Go ahead,” Lady Merton said. “I shall retire. Thank you for coming, Mr. Wainwright. It was kind of you to undertake the trip.” She moved a step closer and added in a lowered voice, “We shall speak again tomorrow about ... what you said earlier.”
“Indeed we shall.” He bowed ceremoniously and left.
The group did not proceed immediately to visit Knagg.
“While we are abovestairs, I must have just a little look at that west corridor where the emanation is so strong,” Wainwright said.
Merton pinched his lips together and led the way. When they were halfway down the corridor, Wainwright stopped. “Yes, the presence is overwhelming here. Can you not feel the bone-chilling wind?” He drew his cape around him, flinging one corner over his shoulder in a manner to reveal its satin lining.
“No, I cannot say that I do,” Merton replied.
Charity was uncertain. It was chillier, but as they had just left Lady Merton’s room, where the grate was blazing, that might account for it.
“I am frozen to the marrow,” Lewis said, turning up his collar.
“This is the old part of the house,” Merton explained. “Odd you mention a female presence, sir.”
“A nun. Definitely a young nun,” Wainwright said.