House of Echoes

by Barbara Erskine

  Joss stared at her, then she nodded. Without a word she retraced her steps up into the hall. Staring at the dead flowers on the oak table she shuddered violently and almost without realising it her fingers went to the small cross at her throat.

  * * *

  ‘No, I can’t stand it. I’m not staying away!’ Luke had found a crowbar in the coach house. ‘For God’s sake, Joss! If it’s dangerous do you think I’d let you go down there? Either I come or neither of us goes.’

  ‘You could stay here with me, Luke.’ Jimbo was wiping his hands on an oily rag. ‘If Nat says you shouldn’t be there, you shouldn’t. She knows what she’s talking about.’

  ‘I’m sure she does, but it’s my house and what goes on in it is my business.’

  ‘It might be woman’s business, Luke.’ Jimbo shifted uncomfortably.

  ‘Then they wouldn’t want David.’ Luke hefted the crowbar into one hand and brought the handle down with a smack onto the palm of the other. ‘You come or stay, whichever you like, but I’m going down there now.’

  David and Joss exchanged glances and Joss gave a rueful shrug. ‘OK. Come on. Let’s see what Natalie says.’

  Natalie was standing where Joss had left her when they trooped silently back down the stairs. She didn’t look round. ‘Joss, you wear a crucifix. Give it to Luke. Put it round his neck.’

  The other three looked at one another. Natalie had not taken her eyes off the wall; the cross was hidden beneath Joss’s clothes. As far as Joss knew Natalie had not seen it at any time since she had arrived. Reaching up obediently she unclasped the chain. To her surprise Luke made no fuss when she put it round his neck and she thought she knew why; the atmosphere in the cellar had thickened perceptibly.

  Without a word David took the crowbar out of Luke’s hand and stepped forward. ‘What do you want me to do,’ he whispered.

  ‘Here. I think it’s here.’ Natalie pointed. ‘See if you can loosen this stone.’

  Cautiously David inserted the end of the crowbar. ‘It’s old lime mortar. Look. It’s very soft.’ He wiggled it back and forth, pushing the wedge-shaped point further in. ‘There. It’s coming. Everything is so crumbly down here.’ Panting with exertion he gave one last push and levered the stone out. It fell with a loud crash onto the flags.

  There was a long silence as, putting down the crowbar, David felt in his pocket for the torch he had picked up from the dresser as they left the kitchen. He shone it into the cavity. ‘There’s quite a hole in here.’

  ‘You’d better give it to me.’ Natalie’s voice was husky. She could feel waves of emotion coming out of the wall at her; sour, malevolent tides of anger and hatred and spite as, reluctantly she took the torch from David’s hand. She glanced at the others. ‘You all all right?’

  They could all feel it to some degree, she could see, even Luke. Joss’s face was grey and drawn with pain.

  Stepping forward she shone the torch into the hole.

  At first she thought there was nothing there then as her hand steadied the shaking beam she slowly began to make out the shapes in the cavity behind the wall. It was far smaller than she had expected, perhaps three feet by two. No room for the body or bodies she had half expected to find immured there. With an inward sigh of relief she shone the light round the dark space again and only then did she notice, lying amongst the rubble in what was little more than a hidden cupboard, the small wrapped package.

  ‘That’s it.’ She was talking to herself, although she spoke out loud. ‘That’s where the energy is coming from.’

  Her skin crawling with revulsion she reached into the hole and picked the packet up with her finger tips.

  ‘What is it?’ Joss breathed. They were all staring down at the object on Natalie’s palm. It was about three inches long, perhaps a little less wide, covered in dust and cobwebs and crumbs of mortar.

  ‘It’s wrapped in some kind of material,’ David said slowly. He reached out to touch it, then changed his mind and drew back. He looked at Natalie’s face. ‘What is it?’

  Slowly she shook her head.

  ‘We have to look.’ It was Luke. He took a deep breath. ‘Do you want me to open it?’

  ‘No.’ Natalie shook her head again. ‘I think we need to be very careful with this.’ She could feel the power in it, the weight, the cold. With a shudder she had to restrain herself from hurling it as far away from her as she could. ‘I think we should take it upstairs – outside.’ She had begun to feel sick. Her fear and distaste were gripping her with a violence she couldn’t control. Her hand was beginning to shake.

  ‘Natalie – ’

  ‘Out of my way.’ Gritting her teeth she closed her fingers over the object in her hand and headed for the stairs. She had to get outside. Now. Quickly. Before the evil closed over them all.

  42

  ‘Ego te baptizo – ’

  She stopped suddenly and held her breath, the only sound in the darkened church the beating of her own heart. Above her head the sanctuary lamp flickered wildly and she heard the squeak of the chains on which it hung.

  ‘Ego te baptizo in nomine Patris, et Filii, et Spiritus Sancti –’ she started again.

  ‘Edward –’ Her fingers traced the sign of the cross over the little wax figure in her hand.

  ‘Edward of York, King of England – ’

  She smiled, stroking the doll’s head with its little roughly shaped crown of wire. Her finger tip moved down across its shoulders, down the chest and rested for a moment at the top of its legs where a small lump depicted its manhood.

  Setting the doll down on the altar she reached into the tasselled purse hanging at her girdle for a second doll as crude as the first, meant, from the small swellings on its chest, to be a woman.

  ‘I baptise thee, Katherine …’

  Katherine!

  The name reverberated through the shadows of the church.

  ‘And now,’ she breathed, ‘I bring you together, together here in the house of your God!’

  Holding both figures up before the crucifix high above the altar she smiled and slowly she pressed them together, feeling the beeswax grow soft in the heat of her hand. The sweet stickiness of honey was all around her as she bound the two little dolls face to face with a scarlet thread of silk.

  ‘In the name of God, I pronounce you man and wife.’ She smiled. ‘Not in the porch but here before the altar of God, and now the act of union will be sanctified by the holy mass itself.’

  She glanced over her shoulder, uncertain of the shadows, never sure that eyes weren’t watching, that the priest might not be there, somewhere behind the carved screen.

  Lifting the embroidered altar cloth in an act which was somehow as indecent as the act she had perpetrated on the dolls she tucked them out of sight and then with a smile she let the cloth fall. Soon the priest would come to celebrate the mass and the union of the dolls, sanctified by his act, would be complete. Indissoluble for all eternity.

  She wiped her hands on the heavy brocade of her skirts and stepped away from the altar.

  Only then did she smile.

  Edward and Katherine.

  Nothing now could keep them apart and nothing could prevent Katherine from conceiving a child.

  Nothing.

  ‘Bring it out here. Put it on the table.’ They were outside on the terrace in the wind and rain, standing round the grey, lichen encrusted garden table.

  Joss put her hand on Natalie’s shoulder. ‘Are you OK?’

  Natalie nodded. She felt better now they were outside; the oppression and the anger were less. The rain was growing heavier and she raised her face to it, feeling it fresh and clean, sweeping back across her face and into her hair. Taking a deep breath she laid her hand on the table palm up and opened her fingers.

  ‘Wait, I’ll put up the umbrella.’ Luke had grabbed it as they went out.

  ‘No.’ Natalie shook her head. ‘Let it get wet.’

  The wrapping was silk – old and grey and fragmented, di
sintegrating beneath her fingers in the rain. As she cautiously peeled it back they stared down at what lay within.

  Two pale sausage-shaped objects, pressed close together, with fragments of nearly black thread around the middle lay before them on the wet table.

  ‘What is it?’ Joss breathed.

  ‘I think you’ll find it’s what are they.’ Natalie stood back, looking down as the rain battered down on the object on the table.

  ‘It’s wax.’ David had bent close. ‘Two wax dolls.’ He glanced up at Natalie. ‘They’re witch dolls!’

  She nodded. ‘I think so.’

  ‘Shit.’ He shook his head. ‘The real thing. Who do you think they’re supposed to be?’

  Natalie shrugged. ‘Look at that one’s head.’

  ‘A crown?’ He glanced at Joss. ‘It’s Edward, isn’t it; King Edward.’ He reached out.

  ‘Don’t touch,’ Natalie cried sharply. ‘Whoever made those dolls was evil. Those dolls spelled disaster: disaster for the two people concerned, disaster for their child and their descendants and disaster for this house!’

  The rain was growing heavier. Standing round the table the four looked down at the pathetic little figures of melded wax as a pool of rainwater formed around them on the grey oak soaking the wood until it turned black.

  ‘Their child?’ Joss echoed. She looked up from the dolls. The rain was plastering her hair round her face. ‘You think they had a child?’

  Natalie nodded.

  ‘He was called Edward,’ David put in. ‘I found it in the records. The house was inherited by Edward de Vere after the death of Katherine’s father in 1496. She had no brothers, and no other more distant relations who would fit. Her husband as far as we can tell was called Richard and his inheritance went to his brother so my guess is that Edward de Vere was the son of Edward IV – the pregnancy that the marriage to Richard was designed to legitimise.’

  Natalie was watching Joss’s face. ‘That boy was your ancestor, Joss. The last man to inherit Belheddon.’

  ‘And he died at eighteen, as soon as he had a daughter.’ David’s voice was awe-struck.

  They were all staring down at the table. Joss’s face had drained of colour.

  ‘I think we’re looking at the beginning of the curse.’ Natalie studied the dolls sadly.

  ‘So, what do we do with them?’ Joss’s voice was husky.

  Natalie shook her head.

  ‘Do we separate them?’

  ‘I don’t know. I don’t know.’ Natalie turned away in anguish and looked up at the sky, feeling the rain on her face. ‘We have to help them; we have to release them. Both Edward and the girl.’

  The girl.

  Katherine.

  They were all watching her. Natalie could feel their eyes first on her shoulder blades, then on the poor misshapen dolls and then back to her again. She had set herself up as some sort of expert and they were relying on her to save them; to save Joss’s two children and to save Luke.

  The rain was running down her face, dripping off her short hair into her collar. It was cold and clean and fresh.

  She couldn’t do it. Not on her own. She couldn’t fight Margaret’s spell by herself.

  Slowly she turned. They were still watching her, the two men uncertain, David understanding the implications of what they were dealing with and a little afraid, Luke self mocking, practical, still not letting himself believe that the small two-headed lump of wax on the table could threaten the lives of his two sons, even his own.

  And why did it threaten them? It was a love charm, one of the commonest objects a witch was asked to produce, a piece of child-like sympathetic magic, meant to bring a man and a woman together. So why did it give off such evil vibes? And why did it threaten Joss, or the women of the house; the women who were wooed by a king?

  No one said anything; they were all watching her, waiting for her to tell them what to do.

  And suddenly she knew.

  ‘Joss –’ Her hands had gone clammy. ‘How strong are you?’

  Joss looked away, first into the distance towards the lake and then down to the figures on the table. Her face was white and very strained but her eyes when she raised them at last to Natalie’s face were steady. ‘Strong enough.’

  Natalie nodded. ‘Luke, I want you and David to go away. Right away from the house. Go to the little boys and stay with them. We’ll tell you when you can come back.’

  ‘I’m not leaving Joss.’ Luke caught his wife’s hand.

  ‘Please Luke, I’m not asking lightly.’ Natalie glanced at David, sensing an ally.

  He picked up the cue. ‘Come on old chap. I have a feeling this is women’s work.’

  Natalie’s face relaxed into a smile. ‘That’s exactly what it is.’

  ‘I’ll be all right, Luke.’ Joss stepped closer to him and reaching up kissed him on the cheek. ‘Please, go with David.’ He wrapped his arms around her and for a moment they clung together then reluctantly she pushed him away. ‘Go on.’

  ‘You’re sure?’

  ‘I’m sure.’

  She and Natalie stood where they were in the rain and watched as the two men walked slowly back to the gate. As David pushed it open Luke looked back. Joss raised a hand and blew him a kiss then she turned away. When seconds later she glanced back the two men had gone.

  Natalie was watching absent-mindedly. The illusion of reality was slipping away, withdrawing to the periphery of her vision as she reached down towards her intuition. ‘Are you ready?’ She frowned. ‘This is going to be hard.’ She hesitated. ‘Joss, you do know you’re pregnant.’

  Joss stared at her. ‘Don’t be silly; I can’t be.’

  Natalie nodded. ‘It’s because you are carrying a little girl that we can do this, and it’s because it’s a girl that we have to do it soon.’ She took Joss’s hands in her own wet cold ones. ‘In a minute we’re going into the church with these,’ she nodded towards the dolls, ‘and we’re going to separate them.’

  ‘What about that stuff we saw in there?’ Joss’s mind was spinning, beating against the blackness, grappling with Natalie’s certainty. ‘I’m not pregnant you know. I can’t be. Luke and I – well we took precautions. It’s too soon after Ned. We didn’t want any more children – ’

  Natalie frowned. ‘Just for now believe me, please. We have to be together in this, Joss. David was right, this is women’s work and there are some things that women know.’ She hesitated, wondering how she could explain. ‘The spell was cast by someone who knew what they were doing. It worked. These two people,’ she gestured at the wax dolls, ‘were tied together by magic –’ she smiled uncertainly, used to people’s raised eyebrows when she used the word ‘ – magic that was powerful – a force of nature, harnessed and directed so well that it lasted beyond death for the people who were bound together.’

  ‘Edward and Katherine,’ Joss murmured.

  ‘Edward and Katherine.’

  ‘But what went wrong? Why are they so angry? Why are they hurting people? Was that part of Margaret’s intention?’

  Natalie shrugged. ‘They’re trapped here. Perhaps that is all the reason they need. Perhaps there is more. Perhaps the king is still searching for her. Perhaps he’s lost her somehow; perhaps he wants something else.’ She glanced at Joss. ‘A human lover.’

  Joss shook her head vehemently, her mind trapped, cannoning against the black wall inside her head, refusing to focus, but Natalie nodded. ‘Face it. You have to face the truth.’

  ‘There isn’t any truth to face. All he’s done to us –’ she paused. The cellar. The eyes. The arms, drawing her against him. Black velvet and then nakedness. ‘No,’ she shook her head again. ‘No, all he has done, perhaps, is bring me roses.’ She shuddered. The black wall was back in place. There was a long pause. She could feel Natalie’s eyes on her face and resolutely she refused to meet them.

  Eventually Natalie spoke. ‘Well,’ she cleared her throat. ‘Come on. We’d better get on with it.’ She f
ished a blue scarf out of her pocket – silk, Joss noticed – and carefully she picked up the dolls and wrapped them in it, then she walked towards the gate.

  The lights were still on in the church. Standing just inside the door they paused. Resolutely Joss shut it behind them. The sound of the heavy latch dropping echoed round them and then it died away. She held her breath and stood watching as slowly Natalie began to walk up the aisle towards the altar. After a few steps she stopped. ‘Joss? Come with me.’

  Joss forced herself to move. Her legs were trembling violently and it was all she could do to follow.

  ‘Pull back the rug.’ Natalie was standing to one side of it, between the choir stalls.

  Reluctantly Joss did as she was bid. Before them on the floor the brass glinted in the lights which were tucked out of sight behind the roof beams. An eerie cold seemed to radiate up from the ornate figure depicted before them. ‘See.’ Natalie pointed with her toe. She was speaking very softly. ‘The symbols of her art are there. The cross is upside down. You don’t notice it until you realise which way up she is. And are those cabalistic signs? We’d have to look them up.’

  ‘She really was a magician – a real witch, then, not just a poor old woman playing at magic,’ Joss murmured.

  ‘Oh yes. She was a real witch all right. And I guess she was a very clever one. She may have been under suspicion, but she was never caught at it. How else would she have been buried here?’

  ‘The king trusted her – ’

  ‘I don’t think so.’ Natalie was unwrapping the blue silk scarf. Her hands, Joss noticed, were trembling violently. ‘He was wearing armour, remember?’

  Not always. Sometimes he wore velvet.

  The cold was growing more intense.

  ‘Do you know what to do?’ Joss said softly. Her eyes were riveted to the wax figures as the silk fell to the floor.

  ‘I’m going to bless them, then I’m going to separate them, then I’m going to melt them – ’

  ‘No!’ Joss clutched at Natalie’s arm. ‘No, you mustn’t do that.’