The Willing Game

by Issy Brooke

  If Marianne could convince Phoebe, that was.

  Of course I can, she thought crossly. But honestly – do I need her? I’ve always coped.

  She tossed her head to no one in particular, and set out at a very brisk pace in the opposite direction to the way Phoebe had gone.

  Simeon, naturally, was horrified when Marianne arrived alone, and told him what was happening.

  “That’s it!” he said. He stood in the middle of his workshop, dressed in the sober black and white of a middle-ranking house servant, and flung his hat dramatically across the room. It landed on a cage and made a bird flutter and squawk in protest. “The séance is cancelled. It cannot go on tonight.”

  “Nonsense,” said Marianne. “Look, we still bought the tambourine.” She shook it at him. “I shall dress as Mrs Carter. I watched what Emilia did to make Phoebe look older. Anyway, it will be dark! Even you could play the part, Simeon.”

  “And who will hide and perform the tricks? I am to wait at the door; I’m the loyal servant.”

  “I can perform the tricks as well. It does not take two. Look, this is just how the fakers do it, isn’t it? I can slip off my shoes – watch.” She sat down and pulled off her shoe, and tried to pick up the tambourine from the floor. Her stockings prevented her toes from curling around the edge. “Well, you can see how it would work if I divest myself of a few more layers,” she said, and shoved her shoe back onto her foot. “The tambourine is only for atmosphere, anyway. I can tip the table a little, moan, that sort of thing. If you are inside the room, and we have the room completely dark, you can do a little too. Aren’t you the expert in cunning? Treat it like a stage show. Let us make a wax hand!”

  “He will meet you in the light, first, and he will not be convinced by your disguise.”

  “Hush. Where is the black gown that Phoebe wore? Ah, I see it.” She picked it up from the back of a chair and slipped into the workshop’s other room. She continued to talk as she struggled out of her own clothes and into the plain and dusty cotton and linen that “Mrs Carter” had worn.

  “Anyway, this is just like it is at Woodfurlong. Everyone thinks that Phoebe is essential to the running of things. She gathers all the praise at dinner parties for being the most excellent hostess. But it is I who manages things. Oh, she chooses the menu with Mrs Cogwell, and she meets with the housekeeper every day, but who is it that the servants come to when there is a problem? Who knows more about the children – she, or I? I do. You shall see, Simeon, that I can cope with anything, and I keep things running just so. Ah! Here we are. Thank goodness this fastens at the front. I will need a shawl this time, I think...”

  She re-emerged into the main workshop again, and Simeon started to laugh, with a slither of panic running through his giggles. “You need more than a shawl. I have a burlap sack you might use. For your face.”

  She pulled at the badly-closed front of the gown. “Nonsense. This is fine. It will not show. Alas, I am taller than my cousin.”

  “And stouter.”

  “I think not! Now, on to the face paint. A white base, and then powder, greyish, for the creases and the shadows. I will need a looking-glass.”

  He sighed and brought a large mirror on a swinging stand, setting it on a table opposite a chair. He folded his arms and stepped back, and watched her.

  “You are waiting for me to fail,” she said, keeping up her litany to stave away her doubts. She perched on the edge of the chair and looked at herself in the mirror, but took care not to meet her own eyes. “I can feel it rolling off you. You think I cannot do this.” She stabbed a sponge into a small jar and smeared the sticky stuff over her cheeks. “Do you have a cloth? I might have put a little too much on for the first layer. Emilia has such a light hand.”

  Wordlessly, he threw a rag over to her, and she caught it. She dabbed at her cheeks, and then started to apply some powder. “I can even do her voice,” she said. “I have known her all my life. She is easy enough to copy. Why, once, when we were children, I hid in a corner of the library and when I spoke, pretending to be her, even her own father was convinced!”

  “All children sound the same,” Simeon said at last. “And all women look different. Oh, Marianne.”

  She pressed a little more powder into the crease of her eyelids, and sat back. “I shall also wear a veil. I can make up some excuse as to why. Come on. Let us get to the rooms, and get set up.”

  THE ROOM WAS READY. They were planning to keep the whole event very simple. They knew that Wade was there to contact his dead friend. And he was a fervent believer in the spiritual world, so they didn’t need the bells and whistles to convince him. There was no need for a show, just a few standard events to reassure him that he was still in the presence of a true medium.

  Marianne sat at the table, and spread her fingers over the polished top. It had a thick central pillar and by pressing down at certain places, she could cause it to rock and shift. With her bare foot, she practised picking up the tambourine. “We are early in our preparations,” she said. “We still have at least two hours to wait yet.” She shook the tambourine and it tumbled from her foot, hitting the floor with a thump. “Oh, the spirits are clumsy. Perhaps I can say a child has thrown it.”

  “Why? He is not here about a child.”

  “I could have a child controlling me, a child spirit.”

  He stared at her.

  She had run out of things to say.

  She slid her foot back into her shoe.

  “I am noticeably taller than Phoebe, aren’t I?” she said in an unhappy voice.

  He nodded.

  “And my voice must be very different as an adult.”

  He nodded again, sadly.

  She put her face into her hands, and spent a moment decidedly refusing to cry. This was all a terrible mess, but it could still, yet, be redeemed.

  “Why am I sitting here when my best friend of all time is at home, distraught and upset about her marriage?” she cried at last, feeling sick and ashamed. She jumped up. Her right foot, stockingless in the shoe, was cold. Her whole body was hot, then freezing.

  “We can cancel it. I will stay here, and tell him that you were taken ill, suddenly, but we can reschedule the séance. I will send a note,” Simeon said.

  “No, wait. Don’t send a note. I have time to get to Woodfurlong and bring her back. I will! But yes, if we are not back before he arrives, then tell him of Mrs Carter’s sudden illness.”

  She ran out of the room, holding onto her shawl with one hand, ignoring her horribly cold ankle, and headed for the nearest railway station.

  SHE KNEW THAT SHE LOOKED quite a sight as she fled down the street. Her painted face would look dreadful out in the fading afternoon light, and her rough black dress would mark her as some kind of poor widow. She resolutely did not look at anyone, though she could feel the curious eyes of onlookers on her.

  She did not look behind herself, either. She had the feeling, as usual, that she was being followed, but she was almost used to it, now. If it were Monahan, up to some nefarious purpose that he’d only ever half-tell her, she didn’t care. She knew that he would not harm her. If it were Anna, then good luck to her if she wanted to take a shot at Marianne in public. Anna was a clever woman and Marianne did not think that she’d risk her freedom in such a way. Did she not say she loved London? She would find a way to stay, Marianne thought. She couldn’t do that if she were swinging from the end of a rope.

  The Prussian woman’s urge for revenge would surely abate in time.

  Marianne shouldered a young woman out of the way and muttered an apology as she passed, shocked at her own actions, but she had no time to lose and certainly no time for social niceties. She joined a queue at the ticket office, jumping from foot to foot in frustration as every single person in front of her seemed to have a complicated travel query. She took the time, here, to look around, hunting for the familiar faces of Anna or Monahan in the crowds in the ticket office, or through the glass doors into the wait
ing rooms.

  There was one person looking towards her, intently, but it was a thickset man who ducked immediately behind a pillar. It was not either of the people she expected to see.

  No doubt he was simply startled by her flight through the town, and her rough, scruffy mode of dress. She bought a third-class ticket, and flung herself into the carriage.

  She would be at Woodfurlong within twenty minutes, if she ran when she reached the other end, and then she’d have to convince Phoebe that it had all been a dreadful misunderstanding.

  Marianne let her head hang, and it bobbed with the motion of the coach over the track, jumping the points and clattering along the rails. Marianne believed that she could do anything she set her mind to.

  But this was going to be a challenge indeed.

  MARIANNE SLID INTO the hallway of the house very carefully. She had caught sight of herself in the train windows when it passed by some dark houses, and she now realised why Simeon had been so horrified. She could not explain herself to Mr Barrington or anyone else who might be lurking in the public spaces downstairs. She pressed herself behind a large fern in a Chinese vase that stood nearly as high as she did, and when she caught a glimpse of Emilia passing along the back corridor, she shot out and waylaid her by the green baize door.

  Emilia took two seconds to recognise her. “Oh my!”

  “Hush. Let us go somewhere private.”

  Emilia pulled her through the door and into a storeroom near to the housekeeper’s day room. She stayed by the door, and Marianne kept her voice low. “First of all, has your mistress come home?”

  “Yes, and she is locked in her bedroom, crying. I have been unable to gain entry. What has happened? I was on my way to speak to Mrs Kenwigs about what to do.”

  “Don’t trouble the housekeeper with this. What about Mr Claverdon? Is he at home?”

  “No, miss. He has not been seen since mid-afternoon. After you and Mrs Claverdon left, he put his outside coat on, and went into town himself.”

  “Who else has seen Mrs Claverdon come home?”

  “I don’t know. Possibly only me. What is the matter with her? What can we do?”

  “Just leave it to me,” Marianne said. “I can tell you that she is not hurt, and that Mr Claverdon is definitely not having an affair. Come on, let’s go up to her room. Go ahead of me. I cannot be seen like this.”

  “Why are you like this? You are wearing her fake outfit.”

  “I was trying to copy your art of disguise.”

  “Oh! Oh,” Emilia said. “Oh dear.”

  They made it to the corridor of bedrooms without incident. Marianne rattled the door handle. “Phoebe! Let me in. I will tell you everything, and I have proof, too!”

  Something hit the back of the door and broke.

  “Phoebe! Please. You will understand, I promise...”

  Something else hit the door, with a dull thud this time.

  “I shall come in regardless,” she warned.

  A glass shattered.

  “Right. Watch the corridor, Emilia.” Marianne fished the lock-picking set out of her bag, and pulled out a ring of skeleton keys. Emilia’s mouth dropped open.

  “But how?”

  “Oh, that’s easy. Domestic doors don’t need to be very complicated, as they are more for privacy than security. So they use warded locks, which are the easiest to pick. As long as my master key has the right shape at the very end, it will open. No, not this one. Nor this. Ah! You see? There are only so many shapes it could be.”

  “No, I meant, how do you know how to do this?”

  “Ah. Simeon taught me.” Marianne stood up and put the keys back into her bag. She knocked again, and said loudly, “Phoebe, I have picked your lock and I’m coming in – please don’t throw anything sharp or heavy at my head.”

  She inched the door open and was smacked, instead, by a satin-covered bolster. Marianne fended it off with her forearms. “All right! Yes, I deserve a beating, but hold your fire for a few minutes...”

  Phoebe was sitting on her bed, clutching another pillow. Her face was stained and streaked with tears. “How could you?”

  “He is not having an affair. He is not.”

  “Why did you lie to me?”

  “I ... didn’t want to hurt you.”

  “Well done. What an excellent job you have made of it.”

  “Oh, Phoebe.” Marianne approached her carefully, like she was a nervous young horse. “I will start at the beginning and tell you absolutely everything, although it won’t paint your husband ... sorry, Price ... in a very good light. He has been foolish, and easily led, but he has not been unfaithful. And I will have to speak quickly so we can get back and do the séance.”

  Phoebe snorted, but she did at least listen to everything that Marianne had to say. Her face crumpled when Marianne first mentioned his weakness in giving business secrets to Anna, and she cried when she heard about the blackmail.

  But she had dried her face and was sitting upright by the time that Marianne had finished.

  “So, doesn’t that sound more like the Price Claverdon that you know and love?” Marianne said.

  “Have you a shred of proof for any of this?”

  “Yes. Come to my room and I’ll show you my notebooks.”

  “You could have doctored them and amended the dates.”

  Marianne sighed. “Come and see.”

  When confronted with the handwritten notes that Marianne had made over the past few weeks, Phoebe’s acceptance grew.

  Their final stop was Claverdon’s study. They looked at the ledger on his desk. Neither of them could understand most of it, written as it was in abbreviations and shorthand. But some payments stood out – the ones made to “AJ”.

  “Anna Jones,” Marianne said. “You see? And she was linked to George Bartholomew, too, and now she has vowed revenge upon me.”

  Phoebe looked around the room. “This has always been a secret, private sanctuary for Price,” she said. “I feel like I ought not to be here. But ... look. He has been drinking.”

  “Is that not what men do in their studies?” But Marianne understood Phoebe’s concern. There were half a dozen empty bottles of whisky and brandy, and torn-up papers, and broken cigars strewn over the table by the dead fire. Books were piled haphazardly on the floor. This was not the calm, peaceful abode of a man happy with his lot.

  “This is the room of a man who is having trouble with his business,” Marianne said firmly. “It is certainly not the room of a man having an affair.”

  Phoebe nodded. “I could never really believe it,” she said. “And I do not know if I can ever truly forgive you for lying.”

  “You have half-forgiven me,” Marianne said, “for you have stopped throwing things at me. And I can accept a half-forgiveness. I don’t deserve a full one.”

  “No, you don’t. Right. You look terrible. Do we have time to get back to the rooms where Simeon is waiting for us?”

  “We might. It will be down to the luck of the trains. Shall we try it?”

  “Let’s.”

  They ran. Marianne felt more confident with Phoebe by her side. They leaped onto a train, and Phoebe muscled them into first class, in spite of Marianne’s poor state. “Let a woman mourn!” Phoebe snapped at a man who looked askance at them, and he scurried away, shame-faced.

  Then it was a mad dash at the other end, through the streets of London, and Marianne looked behind only once.

  A small, stout man turned away and she did not see his face.

  Twenty-five

  Simeon met them in the hallway, alerted by the clatter of the door. He hustled them upstairs and said, “He will be here within fifteen minutes! And he was early last time.”

  “Then leave the room so that we might change,” Phoebe instructed.

  His face flushed red, and he left. Marianne ripped a seam in her efforts to get out of the dress, and then realised she had forgotten to bring the plain white dress to wear in the cupboard. She only had
her own gown to get back into, which was pale pink and done about with ribbons, one of Emilia’s indulgences. “This will be ruined when I get into the cupboard!”

  “Then you will have to buy a new dress. Hurry! Can you do my face? I mean to say – can you do it better than you have done your own?”

  “Yes, for now I have had practise.”

  Marianne made a reasonable job of it, but not as expertly as Emilia had done. “We should have asked her,” she grumbled.

  “I have exposed her to compromise once, but that is well enough,” Phoebe said. “Let me see.” Marianne passed her a glass. “Oh. Well, I shall say that I have had the influenza.”

  “Was that a knock?”

  They froze.

  Simeon rapped on the door and called through, “He is here. Are you ready?”

  “We are.”

  “To your places! I shall bring him up directly.”

  Marianne squeezed into the sideboard. She had to fold herself down, and shuffle in backwards. The voluminous dresses and skirts hampered her, and she had to drag in the fabric bit by bit. She did not wear the huge bustle favoured by fashionable ladies, but she was surprised at how much she had to fold around herself. “I should take this off and squat here in my underclothes,” she muttered.

  “You will do no such thing!” Phoebe said in horror as she took her place at the table. “What would people say?”

  “Because hiding in a cupboard is perfectly fine as long as you are dressed correctly?”

  “Close the door behind you.”

  Marianne did. She sank into the fusty darkness, and stuck her tongue out in the direction of Phoebe.

  “I know that you are pulling faces at me, even if I cannot see you.”

  Marianne did not dare to mutter a reply back. She could hear the distant voices of Simeon and Wade – who, in her head, was still Edgar Bartholomew. He would remain so, she thought, until they had actual clear proof. There was still a chance this was all a dreadful mistake. Dyed grey hair and a mad son dead of oysters – it could be so.