Paul Moorcraft - The Anchoress of Shere

Suddenly Marda dried up. “I feel such a fool, telling you all my problems; I’m sure you have lots to do…” And she stood up to leave.

Duval stood with her. “It’s good to talk. Confessions-or even informal chats like this-are often the first steps to resolving personal problems. Please call in again. If it helps, I am always ready to listen and provide whatever advice I can.”

He offered his hand, and she shook it warmly. The priest escorted her to the side entrance of the church, passing two old women bent under the weight of their years, praying in a small side chapel, too engrossed in worship to notice the striking young woman. It was dark when she left the church.

If she comes again, thought Duval, she has chosen. She has exercised her own free will. It is her choice.

Duval did not have to wait long. The next evening, after work, Marda rushed in from the rain to apologise for unburdening herself. This time the church was empty.

The priest led her into his room, and offered her tea again. She was very reluctant to stop, but he insisted. He calmed her by asking, “Did it help, opening yourself up a little? That’s all that matters; and, remember, it is my role in life to listen to people’s problems. Priests can sometimes be useful, you know.”

She drank her tea rapidly, trying to avoid any impression of imposing on this man whom she had so recently met.

“Michael…or should I call you ‘Father’ in church…?”

“Please call me ‘Michael,’ I insist.”

“Well, Michael , I do appreciate your listening and your advice, but I must be truthful, I’m not into formal religion at all…no offence meant, of course.” She laughed at her own clumsiness.

Michael laughed too. “None taken, I can assure you.”

Marda wanted to put her cup down, to indicate politely that she was about to leave. She tried to get up from her seat, but slumped back down. She spoke, but she found it hard to enunciate correctly. The priest stood and watched as Marda’s voice started to wind down to a quiet, slurring monotone. As her head slumped on to her chest and her empty cup and saucer fell to the floor and broke into pieces, Duval locked the door to his office.

When she awoke from her drugged sleep Marda was lying in complete darkness on what felt like a wooden bench.

Too groggy to explore her mind, let alone her new environment, she just turned to her side and was copiously sick. She lay back prone on the bench and opened and closed her eyes. It didn’t make any difference because it was completely black. She pinched herself to see if she was dreaming. For a moment she thought she was dead, until she heard herself croak: “Where the hell am I?”

Somehow that fragment of self-assertion made her feel a little better, although she had a pulsating headache. Her lips and mouth were bitter from a chemical taste and sour from the vomit. She desperately wanted to drink something. Anything. A part of her felt like falling asleep again, but her panic forced her to explore.

She stretched out her left hand to touch a cold stone wall to her side. Then she raised her right hand to just above her head and felt the same cold stone. She began to feel cold herself. What is this place? her mind screamed, terror welling up inside her. Some sort of burial vault in the church?

Her jacket had gone, so had her shoes. She tried to sit up, but the pain rushed to her head again and she lay back down. Slowly she felt her body with her hands, and realised that she was wearing just her bra and pants. For a second, indignation displaced some of the dread.

“The bastard,” she said aloud. “The bastard. He’s drugged me, locked me up somewhere in some cold dungeon or something…and he’s taken my clothes.” The thought suddenly took hold of her terrified mind that he could have raped her as well, and she began to sob uncontrollably. Then her common sense reasserted itself, and she realised that there was no bruising or pain between her legs. She would know if she had been violated.

“No. Not that. Thank God,” she mumbled.

She forced herself to sit up again, despite the pounding in her head, and then swung her legs off the bench. Remembering the vomit she put first one foot then another on to the floor, very gingerly, away from where she had been sick, but when she tried to stand she fell back on the bench.

For two or three minutes Marda breathed hard in and out. Then she tried again, supporting herself by holding on to the bench, which was about two-and-a-half feet from the stone floor. At the foot of the bench she touched a hard, flat wooden surface which she tapped and realised was some kind of door. In complete darkness she traced both hands across the door, finding a square metal lock with no handle. At the far end of the door, about two feet away, was the facing wall; she felt along it very carefully, afraid that it might hold something jagged, cutting, cruel. For roughly the same length as the bench she touched the wall with her fingertips. It was cold stone. Dry in most places, with a little damp here and there. No moss, no slime. Reaching the far end of the facing wall, she touched the corner and felt her way along the wall opposite the door. This time she stepped in her own vomit and, in disgust, she sat back on the bench.

The self-disgust began to invade her whole being. Then anger seemed to ride the helter-skelter of a mind in turmoil. Cold, numbing fear was the next passenger. Fear kept coming back, accompanied by terror and panic. Despair sometimes joined the black company: Marda even thought of killing herself before her kidnapper could violate and murder her.

She was slipping into hysteria. She had to talk to someone, even herself. “So a little bloody square cell,” she said aloud. It wasn’t exactly square, but the sound of her own swearing made her more confident. “I don’t care what they say about going nuts. I am going to talk to myself,” she said, although her confidence did not sound very real.

Her introspection was disrupted by a scratching noise. It sounded far off, then she thought it was quite near. She wondered whether it was somebody, or something.

She shouted, “Who’s that?” but then thought that she should remain quiet. She was panting with panic. Each breath, however, sounded to Marda like the chug of a steam train. Soon the scratching noise stopped. After a few minutes, with trembling hands, she wiped the cold sweat from her brow.

It was darker than all the darknesses she had ever experienced before. It was suffocating her. The darkness seemed so heavy that it was like a huge creature pressing down on her chest. Feeling herself drowning in the enveloping miasma, Marda wanted to strike out at her oppressor.

She began to mumble to herself. In the space of minutes-or was it hours? — she was catapulted through highs and lows. First, depression at the hopelessness of her situation. Then euphoria in the certainty that it would last but a short time. For a few seconds she could pretend that it was all a nightmare, but then came the crashing reality. She roller-coasted from terror to resignation, to rebellion, a sense of abandonment, fear, hope, despair, anger…the will to live, to fight. She found herself screaming and then forced herself to think.

She wondered what the time was. Without a watch she felt herself to be lost on a sea of time, completely out of sight of any land. There was no time, only eternity; and that eternity was standing still. How long had it been since she had been attacked by “Michael”?

“I bet that’s not his real name,” she said quite loudly. Maybe the cell was bugged. “I don’t care if you can hear me. You’re a bastard! Let me out of here,” she shouted.

Utterly desperate, she stood up and groped her way to the door and banged it with both her fists until they hurt. “Is there anybody out there?” she yelled hysterically. “Where am I? What do you want with me?” The clawing pains of extreme panic rippled through her stomach; she cried like a little girl for several minutes, then made a concerted effort to pull herself together.