Christie Dickason - The Memory Palace

Unhappily, Zeal examined the muddy track that the ox’s hoofs had churned up across the grass of the paddock.

By the third morning, the battle had lost all novelty for the estate residents. Also, a slow, depressing drizzle had begun to seep down from the sky. Wherever she was, however, Zeal could still hear Sir Harry shouting from his shelter under the rear portico, and the curses of his workmen out in the rain. She felt paralysed by his presence. Life on the estate was frozen so long as he was still here. More than anything, she now wanted him gone for good.

The rain stopped in mid-afternoon. A warm clammy wind blew down the river valley and tugged dying leaves from the trees.

‘Only two more to go,’ said Sir Harry as they left for yet another night at Ufton.

Fox said something under his breath.

Mid-morning the next day, shouts and splashing sent her running out to the ponds.

Only one nymph remained – Thetis, mother of heroes and nest guardian. The muddy berm where she stood, at the far end of the pike pond just above the weir, was too narrow to give the feet of the sheer legs a firm base. When the statue finally toppled, the leather loop holding the sling to the lifting rig snapped. She now lay on her back with an arm raised in mute protest, her right hand snapped off at the wrist.

Young Fox was searching among the lily pads, ducking his head under the surface, then lifting it to gasp and splutter.

‘Mind the pike!’ a boy warned. ‘They’ll bite your fingers off! They nearly ate my baby brother’s whole foot!’

‘Farewell at last?’ Zeal asked, in the early afternoon. ‘Or will you be back when you suddenly remember something else you want to give your new bride?’

‘Your manners have not improved with time.’ Harry swung up into his saddle, then leaned back down to her. ‘I have influence in London now, mistress, so don’t challenge me.’ He turned and kicked his horse so savagely that she had to jump back out of the way of its swinging rump. ‘And when you get around to draining the pond, I want that hand!’

Zeal resolved to have the fish man rescue it as soon as Harry had gone.

As his cart passed her, Fox made a sign against the evil eye.

When the last cart had gone, she went to the ponds and scuffed her foot on one of the bare mud patches on the banks. Hawkridge felt deserted. There was too much raw empty air around the ponds.

She watched the fish man groping in the mud of the pike pond.

The duck’s nest lay smashed on the side of the bank.

The day had chilled. The sky was turning a purplish-black.

There’s a storm coming, Zeal thought as she turned back towards the office, carrrying Thetis’ wet marble hand. If Nature weeps for the sorrows of men, the present sky must reflect my desire to give Harry a black eye. Nature was not usually so sympathetic nor obliging, no matter what the philosophers might say.

In her ignorance of what was to come, she found the thought entertaining.

The news reached Hawkridge long after dark. A short time later, Sir Richard came out of the night, looking both irascible and miserable. Zeal went to meet him.

‘Trust him to wreck a man’s sleep!’ he said as he handed over his horse. ‘Well, my dear. What a business! Best get it over and done with.’

Mistress Margaret had long ago gone to bed in Sir Richard’s house. The group which gathered solemnly in the bake house included Zeal, Rachel, Sir Richard, Tuddenham, a man named Herne, who was the current parish constable, another named Comer, who was a parish councilman, and Doctor Gifford, the parish minister. Fox and Pickford stood uneasily to one side, looking at the floor, while Zeal studied them in perplexed astonishment.

Sir Richard had just cleared his throat to begin when Wentworth, with his odd new taste for appearing, entered and set his rod beside the door.

‘What is this I hear?’

‘The self-satisfied pup has gone and got himself killed,’ said Sir Richard.

‘Harry’s dead,’ said Zeal. ‘And these two here say I did it.’

‘Smashed his head like it was a ripe melon,’ said Fox. ‘On a rock.’

‘Speak when I ask you.’ Sir Richard flipped his coattail over a stool and sat down at the bake house table. ‘You stand there.’ He waved Fox forward. ‘Now, then.’

Given the late hour, he had decided to hold his preliminary inquiry in the Hawkridge bake house rather than shift the entire company back to his little courtroom at High House. Zeal found a half dozen precious beeswax candles to lend dignity to the background of dough bowls and ovens. The air was warm from the banked fires and fragrant with the scent of the day’s baking. Pale cloth-covered loaves sat in orderly rows on shelves behind Sir Richard’s head.

‘I’m sure we’re all grateful to be brought the news in such unparalleled haste,’ said Sir Richard. ‘But I’m still not certain why you feel the matter is so urgent it can’t wait till morning.’

‘Murder seemed urgent to us, sir,’ said Fox. ‘And Sir Harry was murdered.’

‘By his horse?’ asked Sir Richard. ‘I was told you arrived saying Sir Harry’s horse had thrown him. You’re not under oath yet, but take care.’

‘It threw him because she charmed it.’ With averted eyes, Fox tilted his head at Zeal, who had perched on a stool at the far end of the table.

Sir Richard glanced to his left at Doctor Gifford, fierce-eyed and eager to sit in judgement, even at this hour. He glanced to his right at Geoffrey Comer, who had the misfortune to be the nearest parish councillor, and sighed. ‘When I was dragged from my bed, I expected an urgent legal matter. If this case has any substance at all, the issue is witchcraft, and it should go to the church courts. Or else the whole thing might be a load of buffle.’ He regarded Fox through his eyebrows as he had studied Harry earlier. ‘I hope for your sake that you’re not wasting my time.’ He raised a hand to quell an urgent movement from Doctor Gifford, the minister. ‘You’ll get your turn, sir.’ Sir Richard turned back to Fox. ‘Are you formally accusing our young mistress here of causing Sir Harry’s death by witchcraft?’

Fox hesitated.

Herne, the constable, began to stare at Zeal with an open mouth.

‘Or by any other means?’ asked Sir Richard.

‘More like raising the possibility, sir. We thought you might…’

‘Oh, just the “possibility”…’ Sir Richard rocked back meditatively on his stool then slammed the front legs down again. ‘Why?’

‘Sir?’

‘Why rouse a magistrate, a minister and a parish councillor in order to “raise a possibility”?’

‘Justice, your honour. And also, we’ve already been away from London much longer than we contracted for. So, if we are to be witnesses at the inquest on Sir Harry…’

‘Don’t think for a moment you will be,’ said Sir Richard.

Pickford had been breathing audibly. Now he stepped forward. ‘Please, your honour. That woman threatened to kill Sir Harry. “I’ll kill you,” she said. Everyone heard her. And all the time we were here, she showed herself to be a wild and dangerous woman…’

‘Dear me.’ Sir Richard turned his head to gaze at Zeal. ‘Did you know you were dangerous, my dear?’

She shook her head dumbly. These men and their accusation were absurd. On the other hand, if you were angry enough, perhaps your rage might shape itself into an independent being, a spirit, like a ghost, and act on your behalf without your permission.

I was very angry with Harry. Is it possible that I did somehow will his death?

‘You may laugh, sir,’ said Pickford. ‘But we know she set the evil eye on us when all we did was obey Sir Harry’s orders to remove the statues. Call the others and ask them. We all felt it.’