Elinor Carbury sat in her sitting room and tried to reread Chapter 31 of Rasselas.
‘That the dead are seen no more, said Imlac, I will not undertake to maintain against the concurrent and unvaried testimony of all ages, and of all nations. There is no people, rude or learned, among whom apparitions of the dead are not related and believed. This opinion, which, perhaps, prevails as far as human nature is diffused, could become universal only by its truth: those, that never heard of one another, would not have agreed in a tale which nothing but experience can make credible. That it is doubted by single cavillers can very little weaken the general evidence, and some who deny it with their tongues confess it by their fears.’
But her mind refused to concentrate on the words before her. Her eyes drifted over the distressingly formal garden to the dark green mass of the plane tree. She thought of John Holdsworth and wondered how he was at the mill. She had felt his absence at breakfast. There was nothing reprehensible or out of the ordinary about this, she assured herself, for in the last few days she had seen more society than she often saw in as many weeks. John Holdsworth had simply been part of that society; and as his hostess she had been obliged to see a good deal of him. Still, there was no denying that she felt flat and dull.
The sitting-room windows were open, and so were other windows in the Master’s Lodge. She became aware that Dr Carbury had a visitor in his book room below. The rumble of their voices, her husband’s and that of another gentleman, grew steadily louder. Their conversation was becoming heated.
She rang the bell. When at last Susan bustled into the room, Elinor asked who the visitor was.
‘Why, ma’am, ’tis Dr Jermyn from Barnwell.’
Elinor sent the girl away. Had she imagined an alteration in Susan’s manner? She had seemed strange for the last day or two – unnaturally cheerful but also watchful, almost wary.
In the circumstances, it was scarcely surprising that high words should pass between Dr Carbury and Dr Jermyn. Though Frank’s removal from the asylum had had nothing to do with her husband, Jermyn would naturally believe that at least some of the responsibility was his.
What did surprise Elinor, though, was what happened next. The gentlemen soon lowered their voices, so they appeared to have made peace. Some ten minutes after that, she heard the garden door opening below her. When she craned her head, in a most unladylike manner, she saw the foreshortened figures of Dr Carbury and his guest walking along the gravel path and through the gate that led to the service yard where the wash-house was.
The gentlemen were gone for perhaps five minutes, and when they returned, their heads were close together and they were deep in conversation. Shortly afterwards she heard Jermyn leaving.
It was most curious, Elinor thought, and she could not for the life of her think what they had been doing in the yard. Surely it could be nothing to do with what had happened there on Tuesday morning?
Susan and Ben snuffling and grunting like pigs in their sty.
On Thursday, Harry Archdale recovered slowly from his promotion to apostolic rank. He faced fines for missing chapel, breakfast and his morning lecture; and he would almost certainly be obliged to endure an unpleasant interview with Dr Richardson and possibly further punishments. He forced himself out of bed when he heard the bell ringing for dinner. But he could not bear to go down to the hall. He sat on the edge of his bed, his head in his hands, and moaned. He did not think it possible that he would ever want to eat another mouthful of food.
He dressed himself very gradually. The dinner was over by the time he had finished. His rooms were unbearably stuffy. He made his way downstairs, pausing at each step, moving his limbs as though they were made of glass and might be expected to shatter at the slightest shock.
In the court, the sun hurt his eyes with its brightness. Soresby passed him, wishing him good day, and the sound of his voice made Archdale moan.
Like a sick animal, he obeyed the promptings of instinct, not reason. He tottered through the arcade, past the chapel and into the gardens. He made his way down to the gate leading to the Fellows’ Garden where as a fellow-commoner he was entitled to walk. The gate was unlocked. He walked very slowly along the path beside the Long Pond. It was cool and shady here, and after a while he began to feel a little better. But even the slightest exertion seemed intolerably tiring. He came to a rustic bench and sat down heavily, wincing as the impact travelled up to his head.
He did not know how long he sat. No one disturbed him. The bench was secluded, surrounded by a large box-hedge on three sides. He closed his eyes and dozed uncomfortably, enclosed in a universe of pain.
The sound of voices roused him. He opened his eyes. The voices came from the other side of the pond, from the Master’s Garden. He yawned and rubbed his head. He glimpsed two black-clad figures crossing a gap between two hedges. First came the portly and unmistakable shape of Dr Carbury himself, lumbering along like a large, tired animal. After him came Tobias Soresby, tall and hunched, his limbs moving with ungainly rapidity. Their conversation continued, the words indistinguishable.
Archdale frowned. Everyone knew that Soresby was Richardson’s pet. That automatically meant that Carbury disliked Soresby, and anyway Carbury was no friend to poor undergraduates, as a class. So what was Soresby doing strolling in Carbury’s garden? It made no sense.
Archdale dozed again. Again, a voice jerked him awake.
‘Be damned to you,’ Carbury said loudly, then his voice became a mumble, swiftly diminishing into silence.
Archdale opened his eyes. No one was there. The Master’s Garden might have been empty. Perhaps he had dreamed it. He closed his eyes.
This time he slept more soundly and for longer. When he awoke with a start, the sun was lower in the sky, and the air cooler. He felt a hand on his shoulder.
‘Harry, I hope I find you well.’
Archdale turned his head and looked up. Philip Whichcote was beside the bench, smiling down at him. He looked offensively sober and healthy.
‘I am in very good spirits,’ Archdale said sourly. ‘Never better.’
Whichcote sat down and stretched out his legs. ‘I looked for you in your rooms but you were not there. Mepal said I might find you here. You look a little pale, I am afraid. I hope you have not been spending too much time poring over your books.’
‘Go away, Philip,’ Archdale said feebly. ‘I am not in the mood for your funning.’
‘You will be as fit as a fiddle in an hour or two, you may depend upon it. Well, your prowess last night was much admired by your fellow Apostles. The general vote was that rarely had a maid screamed louder.’
‘Where – where is she?’
‘The girl? How should I know? Gone back to London, I imagine. The reason I came was to see how you did, and to invite you to dine with me and a few of the others tomorrow. I thought we might run over to Newmarket.’
‘No,’ Archdale said, surprising even himself with his vehemence. ‘It – it would not be convenient.’
They sat in silence for a moment. Archdale privately resolved that from this moment forward, if God spared him, he would become a hard-reading man. Never had sober scholarship seemed so attractive. Never had gambling, whoring and drinking seemed so foolish, unpleasant, expensive and unhealthy.
Whichcote laughed. ‘I should have waited until later, my dear Harry. You must not get in such a taking. You will feel more yourself directly, and then I shall ask you again.’
‘And I’ll give you the same answer.’
‘You must tell Mulgrave to mix you one of his particular tonics. They would revive a corpse. Which reminds me, is he about somewhere? There is something I wish to say to him.’
‘Mulgrave? But you told me the other day he wasn’t to be trusted, and you’d discharged him.’
‘So I have. But I still need a word with him.’
‘Well he’s not here. And nor’s he likely to be.’
‘What do you mean?’ Whichcote said sharply. ‘He is alwa
ys about the place like a bad smell.’
‘He is looking after Frank.’
‘He’s gone to Barnwell?’
Archdale shook his head and winced. ‘Frank’s not there any more.’
‘What?’ Whichcote gripped Archdale’s shoulder. ‘Are you saying that Frank is cured?’
‘I don’t know about that.’ Archdale moved away from Whichcote. ‘He’s not at Barnwell, though. He’s with that man that Lady Anne sent. Holdsworth. And Mulgrave’s attending them.’
‘But where are they? Has Holdsworth taken Frank back to London?’
‘I don’t know.’ Archdale’s hangover spilled over into irritation. ‘And I don’t much care.’
In the evening Whichcote laid a coin at one end of the mantelpiece. At the other end of Mrs Phear’s mantelpiece stood a lighted candle, the only one in the room. It was still light outside, and a small creature rustled among the leaves of a pear tree espaliered against the rear wall of the garden. Whichcote laid another coin on the mantelpiece, an inch apart from the first. It had been a long day, and he felt flat and weary.
‘There will be more,’ he said. ‘This is merely an earnest of what is to come.’
‘Have you enough for your creditors?’ Mrs Phear asked.
‘There is never enough for those vultures, ma’am. But thank you.’
He laid another coin on the mantelpiece, this one on top of the first, and then placed a fourth on top of the second. Slowly the columns of gold grew taller. In total, the money amounted to a down payment of ten guineas. For Mrs Phear, he knew, such a sum could bridge the difference between genteel poverty and a genteel competence.
‘We have made up some lost ground,’ he said. ‘But there is more. Can we contrive another dinner before the end of term?’
‘It is always the girl that takes the time. The next committee meeting at the Magdalene Hospital is not until the end of the month. It would not be easy to arrange before then.’
‘It is a pity. They are ready for another one. Or most of them are. And young Chiddingley burns to be an Apostle, and for that we need a girl.’
‘There’s one way.’ Mrs Phear stared out of the window. ‘What if we use the same one? Only Mr Archdale saw her.’
‘But I thought we decided that the less they knew the better, and if we use one of them more than once –’
‘That is true as a general principle. In this case, however, there is much to recommend a relaxation of the rule. This girl is a discreet little chit, I fancy. She handled Mr Archdale very well last night.’
‘What was her name again?’
‘Molly Price. She’s no great beauty, I know, but she looks well enough for the part.’
‘A flower waiting to be plucked,’ Whichcote said drily.
‘Think of the convenience of the thing – there is always trouble and risk in recruiting a new one. Also, it takes time. But if it’s Price again, I can simply tell them at the Magdalene that I have hopes of another lady who’s in want of a girl to train up into service.’
‘Still, it increases the danger, does it not? If the Price girl talks –’
‘You may leave all that to me. I will answer for her discretion. Besides, there is nothing she can say that would be believed.’ Mrs Phear’s voice sharpened. ‘Pray, sir, pass me the money. I do not like to put temptation in the way of servants.’
He scraped the guineas into the palm of his left hand and brought them to her. ‘Very well,’ he said. ‘I will talk to the Apostles in the next day or two and give you a date.’
‘The sooner the better.’
‘That’s one difficulty disposed of, ma’am. But there’s another that may not prove so easy. I saw Harry Archdale this afternoon. He told me that Frank is no longer in the care of Dr Jermyn.’
‘What? Is he cured?’
‘He must be.’
‘Either that or Lady Anne wished him removed – to the care of another physician, perhaps, or even to her house in London.’
‘All I have been able to establish is that Frank has left Barnwell. Her ladyship’s agent in this seems to be the man Holdsworth, who has been staying at Jerusalem. He has gone too. Archdale said that Mulgrave is with them.’
‘The college servant?’
‘A gyp – his only loyalty is to himself. But he’s a shrewd fellow, unfortunately, and knows what he’s about.’
Mrs Phear stroked her plump little hands, one with the other, looking down at them with an expression of concern in her face, as though the hands were naked little animals in need of consolation. ‘We must wait and see,’ she said. ‘Even if Mr Frank is cured, it does not follow that what he says will be believed. A man whose wits have been disordered does not make a reliable witness. It all depends on his word, after all. And he must be sensible that you could make counter-accusations. He does not come out well from all this, however one looks at it.’ She smiled at Whichcote. ‘I cannot but think that his mother has acted foolishly in allowing him to leave Dr Jermyn’s. With a young man whose wits are so far astray, anything might happen. He might kill himself and those around him before he’s done.’
Whichcote sighed. He crossed the room to the window and stood by Mrs Phear’s chair. They were so close and the room was so quiet that they could hear each other’s breathing. They did not look at each other. They stared out of the window and watched the sky gradually darken above the pear tree.
25
At Whitebeach Mill, time slipped away like the river itself. Day followed day, each as formless as the next. The weather continued warm, often sunny, the air heavy.
After the first night, Frank Oldershaw spent much of his time asleep. So did they all. It was as if they were convalescing after a long, wasting fever and the only remedy was time and rest. The most lively creature in the household was the ginger cat, though that was not saying much.
They had arrived at the mill on the evening of Wednesday, 31 May. After the first day, Frank became quieter. Though the water was still very cold, he swam a good deal, to and fro across the millpond, propelling himself with long, leisurely strokes. ‘Quack, quack,’ he cried at intervals, but in other respects he showed no signs of mental disturbance while swimming. At first Holdsworth tried to dissuade him from going into the water on the grounds that there might be an accident, but he might have saved his breath. Frank ignored him. Short of restraining his charge physically, there was nothing that Holdsworth could do.
Frank refused to talk about his madness or about the ghost. He became passionately angry when Holdsworth raised the subject of Lady Anne. Apart from that, he did what he was told, more or less. He did not treat Holdsworth and Mulgrave with consideration, but he did not make unreasonable demands, either. Bearing in mind the immense difference between their stations in life, his manner might almost have been called condescending.
Mulgrave had brought a valise of Frank’s belongings from his rooms at Jerusalem. There was a chess set among them, also backgammon and draughts. On most evenings, Holdsworth would propose a game to Frank. When they played chess, Frank invariably won. There was nothing wrong with his powers of reasoning. He was good at draughts, too, but less successful at backgammon, where the element of luck made him rash.
Sometimes Holdsworth read aloud. He had brought Young’s Night Thoughts with him, and he found a battered copy of The Pilgrim’s Progress in his bedroom, where it had been used to prop a table leg on the uneven floor. Neither book was exactly cheerful in tone, but Frank appeared to find them soothing, often dozing off while Holdsworth was reading.
Mulgrave effaced himself whenever he could. He lived, worked and slept in the kitchen. He watched everything and said as little as possible.
On the evening of Monday, 5 June, he came to Holdsworth and murmured that their supply of food was running low. He could obtain bread, beer, milk, eggs and some vegetables from the farm, but he was obliged to go further afield for anything else.
‘Go to Cambridge tomorrow after breakfast,’ Holdsworth told him. ‘
I want you to take a letter to Dr Carbury and you can buy what we need while you’re there.’
‘It’s a long walk, sir. And there’s the matter of weight on the way back. Mr Frank said he wanted wine. And we need coals for the kitchen fire.’
‘You must call in at the farm in the morning and see what can be done,’ Holdsworth said. ‘If necessary, the carrier can bring the heavy items and leave them with Mr Smedley. But in all events you must come straight back, and you must keep your mouth shut, do you understand? You must not say where you are, or with whom. You may speak openly only to Dr and Mrs Carbury.’
‘Yes, sir.’
Holdsworth had a sense of foreboding. It was not so much that he distrusted Mulgrave, though he did not trust him either. It was more that, by leaving the mill, if only for a few hours, Mulgrave would destroy the illusion that the three of them were isolated from the outside world and its malign influences.
He slept badly that night. The mattress was lumpy. The box-bed enclosed him like a coffin. He was too hot and then, when he had flung back the covers, he was too cold. And all the while, he drifted in and out of dreams. There was a logic to the dreams that he could not grasp, though in their subjects they appeared completely unconnected. Once he woke with a start, believing that he was back in Bankside, and Georgie had woken in the night and was crying out that the drowned lighterman from Goat Stairs had come to drag him down to the bottom of the filthy river.
Now, wide awake, Holdsworth was by the steps, peering down into the water. But it wasn’t Georgie’s face he saw there: it was Maria’s. He saw quite clearly the bruise on her temple. The colour of a damson. The size of a penny piece.
But was it Maria? Or was it Sylvia Whichcote down there?
‘Wake up! Wake up!’
Holdsworth was suddenly, painfully, awake. He was fighting for air as though it were he who was drowning. He sat up sharply in bed. The grey half-light preceding dawn filled the room.
Frank was holding Holdsworth’s left arm and shaking it vigorously. ‘For God’s sake, man, what ails you?’ he demanded, for all the world like a young gentleman in perfect health berating an unfortunate servant. He stepped back and glared down at Holdsworth. ‘You woke us all with your damned noise.’
The Anatomy of Ghosts Page 21