Scarlet Widow (16 page)

‘I was looking for some fumitory,’ Doctor Merrydew told her. ‘Ah, yes, here it is – I thought I had some. We can burn it here in the children’s bedchamber and it should help their respiration. Quite apart from that, it will exorcize any evil spirits that might still be lurking.’

He took out a small cotton bag and shook out of it a handful of dry, wispy herbs which looked almost like smoke already. ‘Goody Buckley, would you be kind enough to bring me a plate for burning these in, and a lighted spill? And please tell your girl to wipe that unholy symbol off the wall. I can’t think what foul mixture has been used to paint it, but it smells like the Devil’s own excrement.’

Beatrice said, ‘Have you no lungwort, Doctor Merrydew?’

‘These children don’t need lungwort, Goody Scarlet. Lungwort will only make their breathing more laborious.’

‘My father always used to recommend lungwort for people who had fluid on their chests.’

‘I’m sure he did, my dear. But lungwort has no
spiritual
properties, does it, unlike fumitory? It is not only physical sickness that we have to clear from this room, but demonic mischief. You, as a pastor’s wife – you should know that better than most.’

While Goody Buckley went off to the kitchen to find a plate, Beatrice turned to Jonathan Shooks. He was staring at her just as he had stared at her before when he was taking tea with them at the parsonage. She couldn’t decide if he couldn’t take his eyes off her because he found her attractive, or if he were regarding her with caution, as if her presence threatened him in some way.

‘So, what brought
you
here this morning, Mr Shooks?’ she asked him. The boldness in her voice made him smile, but he didn’t look away.

‘I was on my way to the Penacook Inn, Goody Scarlet, which is where I am staying for the time being. I saw these good ladies in obvious distress, so I stopped and asked them if I could help them in any way. But they had already called for the doctor, so it was not for me to intervene.’

‘What would you have done, if it had been left to you?’

He looked down at the children again, and shrugged. ‘Well, I have seen similar symptoms many times on my travels. High fever, trouble with breathing. There are several different cures, depending on what manner of ill spirit has caused the symptoms, and why.’

‘So, in your experienced opinion, Mr Shooks, which particular “ill spirit” has made these children so poorly?’

‘It is not for me to contradict the good doctor, Goody Scarlet. Nor your reverend husband.’

Beatrice was about to tell Jonathan Shooks that if he had any idea what had infected Apphia and Tristram, and how to make them well, then he had a duty to tell them. But Francis frowned at her as if to suggest that he didn’t approve of her provoking him and that she should hold her peace. She could almost have believed that Francis was jealous.

At that moment Goody Buckley brought in a large copper bowl and a burning wax taper and handed them to Doctor Merrydew. He tipped the herbs into the bowl and set them alight. The bedchamber quickly filled with pungent blue smoke, which made everybody cough, including the children.

Meanwhile, Goody Buckley’s serving girl, Meg, came into the room with a wooden pail of sudsy water and a scrubbing brush and scrubbed the upside-down cross off the wall.

Jonathan Shooks stayed where he was, next to Apphia’s crib, saying nothing, although it was clear to Beatrice from the expression on his face that he had very little respect for Doctor Merrydew and his fumitory treatment.

‘You are going to
pray
for these children, Reverend Scarlet?’ he asked at last, flapping at the smoke with his hand.

‘Of course,’ said Francis. ‘That is why I came here.’

‘Well, I very much hope you know what it is that you are praying for. Or, rather, what you are praying
against
. The good doctor here obviously has no idea or he wouldn’t be choking us all with a herb that was commonly used to exorcize Old World demons, like Asmodeus and Pazuzu, but will have absolutely no effect on New World spirits.’

Francis glanced over at Beatrice, but Beatrice kept her eyes on Jonathan Shooks and said defiantly, ‘You have come here to pray for Apphia and Tristram, Francis. That’s all. It doesn’t matter what has caused their sickness. All that matters is that they recover. God will listen.’

Jonathan Shooks raised his eyebrows slightly, but didn’t say anything.

‘Please, Reverend Scarlet,’ pleaded Goody Buckley. ‘Please pray for them. I can’t bear to see them suffering like this.’

Francis bent his head and clasped his hands together and closed his eyes.

‘Dear Lord God, whatever unclean spirit has entered our children Apphia and Tristram, we beg Thee to cast it out and to make them well again. We humbly ask also for your protection against those who seek to intimidate us and to make us question our faith. Keep us safe, O Lord, and help us to remain steadfast. And deliver us from evil, amen.’

‘Amen,’ said everybody in the smoke-filled room, even Jonathan Shooks.

Doctor Merrydew closed his leather bag and said, ‘We should leave the children now for three or four hours. By early this evening they should be showing signs of recovery. I will call again before it grows dark.’

They all shuffled out of the room and outside on to the green. The fumitory smoke billowed out of the hallway after them and was caught in the shafts of sunlight that slanted down through the oak trees.

Goody Rust came up to Francis and said, ‘What about the Widow Belknap? You’re not going to let her go unpunished, are you? The Lord only knows what she might do next.’

‘We can’t be sure that it was Widow Belknap who made Apphia and Tristram sick,’ said Francis. ‘I have grave suspicions about her, certainly, but what proof do we have?’

‘Huh!’ said Goody Rust. ‘It’s a pity there’s no pond in this village! Otherwise we could duck her and see if she floats! That would be proof enough!’

Goody Buckley approached them, still coughing from the fumitory smoke. ‘Please, reverend – please make the Widow Belknap lift whatever curse she has put on them. I cannot think how grief-stricken Nicholas will be if he returns from Durham to find our dear twins dead.’

Beatrice looked across at Jonathan Shooks. He was standing by his calash now, one hand grasping the folded top as if he were ready to climb up into it and leave, and yet he was waiting and listening to what they were saying.

‘Reverend Scarlet!’ he called out, as Francis and Beatrice walked over to their own shay.

‘Yes, Mr Shooks?’ said Francis, without turning around.

‘As I told you, I am staying at the Penacook Inn. So, please, don’t hesitate to send word for me if you need me.’

Francis didn’t answer, but held out his hand so that he could help Beatrice to climb up into her seat.

They drove over to the north-east corner of the village green, to a ramshackle collection of smaller home-lots that belonged to artisans and smallholders and Sutton’s poorer residents. The green here was deeply rutted with cart tracks and pungent with horse manure, but the Widow Belknap’s house stood well back from it. Her triangular front yard was wildly overgrown with flowering weeds – yarrow and dame’s rocket and fleabane, with purple flowers and pink flowers and flowers that looked like enormous white daisies.

The house itself was five-sided and oddly proportioned, with a lean-to kitchen and dairy at the back. Its clapboards had been painted pale yellow but years of freezing winters and baking summers had cracked and faded them, and the window frames were rotten.

Francis said to Beatrice, ‘Wait here,’ and handed her Kingdom’s reins. As he was about to climb down from the shay, however, the front door opened and the Widow Belknap came outside, her left hand raised to shield her eyes from the sun.

‘Reverend Scarlet!’ she called out in a piercing voice. ‘Are you visiting your flock today? Have you come to bring me some unexpected news from God Almighty?’

She was quite a tall woman, very thin, and although she was a widow she was not yet forty years old and looked even younger. She was wearing a stiff black linen cap over her tangled blonde hair and a black ribbon around her neck. Her gown was black, too, but scooped very low, with a cameo attached to the front.

Beatrice thought that the Widow Belknap was beautiful, in a strange, almost unearthly way. Her face was perfectly oval, with a straight, thin nose. Her eyes, however, were huge and green and she always made Beatrice feel that she was being stared at by a very inquisitive cat.

Francis stepped down from the shay and took off his hat. ‘Good day, Widow Belknap. Are you keeping well?’

‘What do you want, Reverend Scarlet? Don’t tell me you’ve come to offer me a better seat for Sunday services, away from those wriggling children.’

‘I would, if only I could, Widow Belknap, but you know how crowded we are. No, I have come about Apphia and Tristram, the little Buckley twins.’

‘I have heard that they are ailing. Why come to me? Your wife knows more about medicinal remedies than I do.’

‘I haven’t come looking for a cure. To be quite open with you, I’ve come looking for whoever was responsible for making them so sick.’

The Widow Belknap stayed where she was, her hand still lifted to shade her eyes. She licked her thin pink lips, as if she had thought of something that irritated her but she was going to have the self-control to keep it to herself. The fragrance of her overgrown front yard reminded Beatrice of her father’s herb garden, especially since so many bees were droning from one flower to another.

She could almost hear her mother singing, ‘
Thou pretty herb of Venus’ tree, Thy true name it is Yarrow.
’

Francis said, ‘Several members of my congregation have reported that your behaviour has been less than sociable of late, to put it mildly.’

‘Several members of your congregation have been less than sociable to
me
, Reverend Scarlet, not to put it mildly at all!’

‘What do you mean by that?’

‘I mean that they have been gossiping behind my back, mostly accusing me of behaving waspishly with their menfolk. They call me witch and their children toss rocks at my windows. Harriet Mendum said that I should be locked up or exiled from the village altogether, and Judith Buckley said to my face that I should be taken out to the whipping-post and publicly whipped. But is it
my
fault, reverend, if I am a single woman, widowed by fate? Just because I am single, may I not converse in a friendly manner with some other woman’s husband? Must I speak only to my goat?’

‘There is a difference, Widow Belknap, between a friendly manner and flirtation.’

‘And you think I don’t know that? But they are all silly, vindictive women and I would have thought they had enough to do, baking their bread and pickling their pork and spinning their yarn, without wasting their time inventing vindictive rumours about an innocent and well-meaning neighbour!’

Francis said, ‘I’m sure you recall what Paul wrote in his epistle to the Ephesians.’

‘Not offhand, no. I have to admit that I don’t.’

‘He wrote, “Let all bitterness and wrath and anger and clamour and slander be put aside from you, along with all malice”.’

‘Well, perhaps you should remind the goodwives of Sutton of that,’ said the Widow Belknap. She came down her pathway, bending down as she did so and tearing up a bunch of weeds. She crossed over to the green and went up to Kingdom, patting his flank. He had been chewing at the rank, rutted grass, but when she offered him the weeds he lifted his head and ate them out of her hand.

‘There, you fine fellow,’ she said. ‘Those taste better, don’t they?’

Beatrice watched her for a while as she fed Kingdom more weeds. Then she said, ‘The Buckley twins are very ill, Widow Belknap. In fact, they look very close to death.’

Widow Belknap stared up at her with those green feline eyes. ‘Are you suggesting that
I
know what made them so sick?’

‘Well,
do
you? If you know of a cure, it could be for your own protection. I very much fear for your safety if they die.’

‘People can think whatever they like about me, Goody Scarlet. I don’t have to make excuses for myself or the way I lead my life. What are you going to do? Call for Constable Jewkes to arrest me? Apart from the fact that he’s always in his cups and wouldn’t be able to find me, what charge could he possibly bear against me?’

She paused for a moment, and then she said, ‘You should remember this, the two of you. It is just as dangerous to take the name of Satan in vain as it is to gainsay God.’

‘And what do you mean by that?’ Francis demanded. ‘Are you telling me that you would call on Satan to punish those who are backbiting you? That would be deserving of arrest!’

As he said that a scruffy-looking black bird appeared in the open doorway of the Widow Belknap’s house. It hopped along the path, uttering two plaintive cries as it did so. The Widow Belknap held out her left arm and the bird fluttered up and perched on it, cocking its head from side to side. Kingdom snuffled and took a nervous step sideways, away from it, but the bird itself didn’t seem to be at all daunted by Kingdom.

‘He’s a black parrot,’ said the Widow Belknap. ‘His name is Magic and he’s very tame. A seafaring friend of my late husband gave him to me. He said that he found him on some island in the Indian Ocean.’

Francis waited for her to answer his question, but all she did was coo to her parrot and stroke its head.

‘Do you know of the Devil’s Communion?’ he asked sharply.

‘I’ve heard of it. Isn’t that when Satan is supposed to take your soul with a piece of broken looking-glass instead of a communion wafer? Your own self-adoration ensnares you.’

‘Have my wife and I ever spoken ill of you, Widow Belknap, or done you harm?’

The Widow Belknap didn’t look at him but turned her eyes towards Beatrice and smiled. Her utter repose made Beatrice feel strangely vulnerable and unsettled, and she began to wish that they could just leave now and drive back home.