Imogen Robertson - Island of Bones

Harriet said nothing, but continued to stroke the girl’s back, just as she did to calm her son when he was ill.

‘When my father came in, I thought he looked so handsome. He had me stand up and make my curtsey, then walked around me as if I were a horse for sale. He spoke to me in French, then English, and nodded and smiled at me. I was so glad. I thought I had done well for him. Then he opened the doors to the other room. They were great doors that fold back between rooms, to make two rooms into one. .’

Harriet nodded. ‘I know the sort you mean, my dear.’

‘It was darker in that room. There were men there, sat round a card table. Bottles everywhere and cards. Their waistcoats were all undone and the floor was filthy where they had dropped their meat. The pisspot was standing on the side. They must have been at play all night.’

She sighed. ‘I did not like the way they looked at me. They whistled and clapped as if I was at the theatre. My father pushed me forward and one of them tried to put his hand on me. I stepped away, and they all laughed. I looked at my father. He was laughing too.’ Harriet closed her eyes, while the voice continued, rather flat, like a child reciting a lesson learned. ‘They said, “Lucky Christoph! You have a Jungfrau for a daughter”.’

‘Virgin,’ said Harriet automatically.

‘They said, “A pretty virgin. You will get a thousand Florins for her”. I ran away then. I did not understand, but I knew it frightened me.’

‘My dear girl. .’

Sophia looked up into her face with her clear dark eyes. ‘You must not ask questions, if you do not like the answers, Mrs Westerman.’ Harriet looked away. ‘My father kept me in my room. Every evening I was brought down and made to stand in the doorway and they would stare at me and talk as if I was stupid and could understand nothing. Then, ten days after I arrived, my father came into my room and told me I need not come down that night. That instead I was to wait in my room, and a friend of his would come and see me, and I must be nice to this man and do whatever he said.’ The voice seemed remorseless now. Harriet could feel it pressing into her skull, leaving some trace there. ‘I fought. I bit him. He went away shouting.’

‘And your father?’

Sophia dropped her chin. ‘He beat me. Then he left me alone for a while. Then he came to tell me he was sorry for hurting me. When the bruises were healed he took me walking in the park. It was there I first met Herr von Bolsenheim. My father bought me a dress. These people we met outside were more polite. At night I was locked into my room.’

Harriet looked at her hands. Her own history seemed to her nothing but a series of lucky chances. A family that fed and cared for her, a husband who loved her and was lucky and talented enough to become rich, and now, even if some regarded her as an oddity, even if her actions raised the sculpted eyebrows of the haut ton from time to time, she was swaddled and shielded by the money he had earned.

Sophia suddenly put her hand on Harriet’s, and Harriet realised with shame that she was being comforted by the sufferer. ‘No one is unhappy all the time, Mrs Westerman,’ she said. ‘Though I was afraid. I thought maybe he was showing me off again, that before long there would be another “friend”. .’

‘But how came you from that life in Vienna to Keswick of all places?’ Harriet asked gently. ‘Did your father rethink his ways? Was this trip an attempt to atone?’

A look of disgust crossed Sophia’s face. She got up rather hurriedly and went towards the window, her long white hand resting on the frame. Harriet began to clamber to her feet and attempt to straighten her gown.

‘Who is that?’ Harriet saw that Sophia was standing very still and straight. She joined her at the window and looked out into the road. She recognised the figure just turning into the gateway of the vicarage.

‘That is Mr Sturgess, the magistrate whom we have mentioned,’ Harriet said, and pulled at her sleeves. ‘I am sorry, my dear, but he will most likely have questions for you, after all.’

Sophia turned to her. ‘I cannot answer anything else today. I am unwell. Tell him I shall not see him.’ She crossed towards the door very swiftly.

Harriet held out her hand. ‘Sophia, you have not yet told me. .’ the door closed behind the fleeing woman ‘. . how you came to be in Keswick,’ she finished to the empty room.

She sighed and thought of the party at Silverside, then pulled her watch into her hand. They had dined at five the day of their arrival, and it wanted only half an hour to that now. She had left poor Mrs Briggs with another corpse in her outhouse and only information of the servants to let her know what had passed. She would have to follow Miss Hurst’s story another time. The most pressing thing was to try and smooth over any offence she had caused at Silverside, and speak carefully to her son.

She met Mr Sturgess and Miss Scales in the hallway. On hearing that Fraulein Hurst wished to be left alone the rest of the day, Miss Scales was nothing but understanding. Mr Sturgess, however, seemed annoyed. His reply, though apparently polite, made it quite clear to Harriet that he was marking this inconvenience up as the first result of her meddling.

‘I am surprised you wish to speak to the girl, Mr Sturgess,’ Harriet said flatly. ‘You are so convinced that Casper is the guilty man. Have you taken him into custody?’ She heard Miss Scales draw in her breath. Mr Sturgess smoothed a hand over his forehead.

‘Casper was no longer at the stone circle when I arrived. The Constable is conducting a search. He will be found. I came here because I wished to express my condolences.’

Miss Scales replied in slightly clipped tones, ‘I shall carry them this evening to Sophia with her supper tray, Mr Sturgess.’

He was forced to bow and depart unsatisfied at that. As soon as the hall was free of him, Miss Scales turned to Harriet. Her face was a little pink, which made her scars look all the more angry.

‘Casper kill a man? Nonsense!’

Harriet replied mildly, ‘Perhaps Casper believed that Hurst attacked him?’

Miss Scales looked as if she were in danger of stamping her foot. ‘Why on earth should he think such a thing? In any case, Casper has dealt with that business in his own way, as you may have heard. And I know for a fact that you would never allow Stephen to keep company with Casper unless you were absolutely certain he had no part in this.’

Harriet blushed a little. ‘Miss Scales, I did not know that Stephen had gone to Casper again after he delivered the body to us.’ There was a pause.

‘I see.’ Her voice had become suddenly colder.

‘I hope, for Stephen’s sake, you do not think Casper might be guilty,’ Harriet said.

‘I cannot think it. I pray he is not — for the sake of our town, as well as for your son. The people trust in him and his abilities; he is part of the fabric of this place. There are other cunning-men and women in the area, but few use their influence with the care that Casper does. We have been friends of a sort since I was a child.’ Miss Scales put her hand out to touch the wallflowers cut and arranged on the side-table of the hall, and Harriet caught a breath of their fragrance.

‘Miss Scales, this walk through town to the Druid circle. What did Casper mean to achieve?’

Miss Scales continued to examine the flower blossoms for a moment before she replied. ‘He is playing Hamlet, Mrs Westerman. As the Prince with the play, so Casper with his march to the stone circle. He will have watched the reactions of the village, and he will have frightened those who hurt him into thinking the fair-folk will be after them for insulting their friend. Such is the power of a cunning-man.’ She tapped her foot. ‘Those men must have had a powerful motive for doing so bold-faced a thing. Most of all, I am distressed by Mr Sturgess’s hypocrisy in this matter.’