Jonathan Broughton - The Russian White - A Victorian Thriller

Peggy stopped brushing and sat down on a small wooden stool beside the four poster bed. She needed a rest.

“I’m not as young as I was,” she grumbled.

The dancing candle flames flickered. Such pretty lights, and they made funny shadows that weaved across the walls and ceiling. They might almost be alive, if she had a fancy to believe. She tried to turn them into recognisable shapes; a horse, perhaps, with its long galloping legs; a beautiful maiden running away into the distance.

“Like my naughty little girly used to do,” she laughed gleefully. “Before we shared secrets.”

Wax dripped onto the carpet. “Tut, tut,” she admonished, but she let them drip. Nobody was there to see, nobody came to this room. And if they did, they couldn’t get in, because the door was locked and she had thrown the key out of the window. They were not to be disturbed, not her and her baby.

Her reverie was broken by the rattle and clank of the dumb waiter coming up from the kitchens. She yawned, stood up, and stretched. “Ooh, lovely food for my baby. What have they made for us today?”

She stepped across to the hole in the wall, pushing aside the soiled bed sheets that lay in a heap ready to be laundered.

Three platters with silver covers rose into view. Hot steam curled over the lip of the lift. Peggy sniffed. Savoury and sweet, just what her baby liked, and she lifted each lid to look; Casserole of Pheasant, Penny Royal Dumplings with Cabbage and Bacon, and Savoury Bread and Butter Pudding.

She lifted the platters out, one by one, and put them on the floor by the bed. Then she bundled up the sheets, pushed them onto the tiny lift, and pressed the brass button to alert the kitchens that the lift was ready to descend. It juddered and wobbled as it slid out of view.

She went back to her stool and took up her brush. Sylvia moaned and her eyelids flickered as she slept.

“What is it my lovely?” Peggy bent towards her mistress’s face. “Is it the “visions?” Sylvia rolled her head on the pillow.

“Where are you today? Tell your Peggy what’s happening?” Sylvia grunted and made snuffling noises.

Peggy cooed; “You want the magic smells, is that what you want? Which ones will it be today Mistress? Show Peggy the ones you want.”

Sylvia lifted one voluptuous arm, and balled her puffy fingers into an approximation of a fist. She pointed towards the silver bowls that hung on chains around the bed, and tapped three bowls with her long twisted fingernails.

“All right Mistress. Let Peggy heat them up for you.”

She scrabbled through the unwashed cutlery and dirty rags that littered the floor, and found a long white taper. She poked the end into one of the candles until it burned with a steady flame. Where was the oil lamp? She bent down and peered into the shadows under the bed. It was lying on its side.

“Tut tut,” she muttered. It must have got kicked over. That was how the glass cover broke so many years ago. Glass shards still glittered amongst the lumps of dust.

She shook the lamp and heard the oil sloshing around inside. Still plenty in there, that was good. The blackened wick ignited immediately and she turned up the flame.

“Let Peggy help you with the visions.” She angled the flame under the first pewter bowl. “Fish heads, for clearing the thoughts.” They were old, but as they warmed, the decayed stench confirmed that they were still potent.

“Now this one.” She held the flame under the second bowl. “Blood and chicken entrails, for proper understanding.”

The blood steamed, and a bubble burst and dribbled over the lip. Peggy scooped it up and wiped it on her dress.

“Then cinnamon for a safe return.” She heated up the third bowl, and the spicy aroma mingled with the smells of warm blood and decayed fish.

She blew out the lamp and sat down. “What are you seeing my lovely?”

Sylvia’s naked body shook and jolted, and the rolls of flesh trembled and heaved, like water sloshing up and down in a bath.

“Where are you my sweet? Tell your Peggy.” She perched on the edge of the stool, anxious with expectation. Sylvia’s mouth opened and closed as a fish does when it gulps for air. But the sounds that emerged had no meaning. Grunts and sighs and a clicking that she made with her tongue.

Peggy’s excitement evaporated. This was how it was now, strange noises that she couldn’t understand. Not like it used to be. Not the way that established their relationship.

One day, when Sylvia was eighteen, Peggy found her lying on the floor in a quivering heap. The gush of words exploded out of her.

“I’ve killed my cousin,” she whimpered. “I’ve killed Simon. I know I have.”

“Don’t talk nonsense my darling. How could you have? Cousin Simon left Parklands almost an hour ago. He’s far away now.”

“No—I was by the window, and I felt strange, and the next thing I knew, I was outside the window. Everything moved, as if the fiercest wind was blowing, and then I saw Simon and his father on horseback, and I was right beside them, but they couldn’t see me. Simon spoke, he said my name, and he laughed. It made me angry and I felt sick. My tummy turned over and I retched, and the air turned black, and a terrible bang of thunder made his horse rear. It panicked and threw him and Simon was trampled. I’ve killed him Peggy, I know I have.”

Her poor Mistress had been in such a terrible state, and Peggy’s soothing words had done nothing to console her. “Just a bad dream my lovely, that’s all.”

Then Simon’s father arrived back at Parklands, his dead son in his arms, and they both wondered at what had happened.

“Don’t tell a soul,” Peggy counselled. “It must be our secret. No one must know.”

Their bond deepened, because Simon’s death wasn’t the only incident. One morning, going to wake her, she found her Mistress sitting up in bed bubbling with excitement.

“It happened again Peggy,” she gushed. “With William.”

Peggy’s heart went cold. “What did you do?”

“I didn’t kill him, silly. You know his bedroom in the North Wing, and the narrow corridor that leads to it? Well I was nearly asleep, when suddenly I had that rushing feeling again, and I was floating above the corridor, and William was coming towards me carrying a candle. I swooped down and blew the candle out. You should have seen his face! He ran into his bedroom, slammed the door and locked it. It was so funny!”

And the “visions” kept coming. They happened most often when Sylvia was in bed. Peggy ruminated; this gift of her Mistress’s must be God-given. She possessed it for a reason. Time would make that reason clear. Why waste such a precious ability by conforming to the mundane affairs of everyday life; much better to concentrate on indulging her Mistress and helping her to understand and use her special powers.

So Sylvia took to her bed, and Peggy looked after her. She fed her, washed her, and combed her hair. Their world narrowed to the confines of the bedroom, but Peggy knew that Sylvia’s mind roamed with more freedom than she had ever enjoyed before; though the purpose of the “visions” remained elusive.

Peggy sighed as she came back to reality. She had done the best she could for her Mistress. If only Sylvia would speak. What had happened to her voice? She bent low over the cherubic face. “Tell Peggy what you see?”

Sylvia’s nostrils widened and narrowed and she snorted like a pig.

“Oh well,” she muttered. It troubled her that her Mistress had lost the power of speech, but not to worry, it was sure to come back. Perhaps the revelation of the “visions’” meanings were about to be understood, and this was a passing-through stage that Sylvia needed to complete before she was able to speak again and make everything clear.