The Memory of Midnight (2 page)

A movement behind Nell made her swing round with a gasp, but there was nothing there, and when she looked back, the cat had vanished, along with the shelves and the bed. It was all gone.

Puzzled, a little giddy, she stared at the desk, the ledger, the new wainscot on the walls. Everything was as it should be. She must have imagined it, Nell decided, but she felt jolted and on
edge until a crash and a screech from below snapped her firmly back to the present.

‘Tom Maskewe! You get out of my kitchen, you rascal! Them were my apples stewing for tonight!’

Fat Peg. Nell spared Tom a grimace of sympathy. He would be lucky if he escaped with a buffet to his ear. If he had any sense, he would slip out of the kitchen while he could, and that meant he
would soon be on his way upstairs.

Reminded of the game, Nell looked around the room. She would have to give up on the idea of the priest hole, she decided reluctantly, and find somewhere else to hide. But where?

Her eye fell on the kist. It would be too small for him, but she would be able to squeeze inside.
I give up.
She couldn’t wait to hear Tom say it. How sweet it would be! He would
grind his teeth and scowl, but he would have to say the words, and then she would spring out of the chest and he would have to admit that she, Nell Appleby, was cleverer than him.

It was too delightful a prospect to resist. Nell hauled up the lid of the chest. It was heavier than she had imagined, but when she peered inside, there were just a few papers at the bottom.

There was a moment of foreboding, a darkness flitting across her mind, but she pushed it aside as she climbed into the chest, and let the lid lower over her. It was dark inside the box, and the
smell of new wood was very strong. It was stoutly made, with hardly any chinks.

At first she was so pleased with herself for finding such a good hiding place that she didn’t mind the closeness, but it wasn’t long before she began to feel stifled. It was even
hotter than before. Nell shifted around in the chest, wriggling to ease the laces in her bodice. A pin from her sleeve had come loose and was sticking into her. She wished Tom would hurry up and
admit that he couldn’t find her.

Straining to listen, she heard him clatter up the stairs at last, and then the sharp chiding of the women. She smiled.
She
didn’t get caught. She wondered how long it would take
Tom to think to look in his father’s closet. He wouldn’t believe she would dare.

Footsteps nearby made her still, and she felt a flicker of pride in him for finding her so quickly. Perhaps he thought she was braver than she had imagined.

Brave? Foolish more like!
Tom would say, she knew. She could practically hear him saying it, picture his expression exactly. For all he was son to one of the wealthiest merchants in
York, Tom looked like an urchin, or so his mother was always telling him. He was scrawny and scrappy, but Nell liked his face, homely as it was. He had springy hair that never lay flat and bright
eyes that looked out on the world with such keen interest that it didn’t matter that he was less handsome than his older brother Ralph.

The footsteps paused, and for no reason Nell could put her finger on, her smile faded in the darkness. These footsteps were too stealthy. Tom didn’t move like that. Tom was eager and
noisy. He clattered and ran. He didn’t put his shoes carefully down on the rush matting, one after the other.

All at once, Nell wished she hadn’t got into the chest. She was hot and uncomfortable and bored of the game. What did it matter if Tom always won, after all? But she couldn’t get out
now until the owner of the footsteps had gone. If anyone other than Tom found out she had been in the closet, there would be trouble. Tom’s father was quick to beat him. Nell might not want
Tom to win, but she didn’t want him to suffer for her clever choice either.

She was still fretting when the whole chest jumped as a heavy weight was dumped on the lid without warning. Nell sucked in a breath of fright at the thump of it against the wood and without
thinking she pushed at the lid with the flat of her hands. It wouldn’t budge, and panic scuttled through her.

‘I’m in here!’ she shouted, careless of being found out now. She wanted to get out. She
needed
to get out, right now. ‘Let me out!’

There was no reply.

The weight on the lid was pressing the darkness around her face, pressing it onto her chest so that she couldn’t breathe. Dread blocked her throat.

‘Let me out!’ she tried again. ‘Help me!’ But her voice was thin and when she cried out, the sound was muffled by the box and the wainscot in the room beyond. The women
along the passage couldn’t hear her. Tom couldn’t hear her.

But surely whoever had put the weight on the chest could hear her?

‘Tom!’ Terror pushed a real scream from her throat now. ‘Tom, help me!’

Her fists beat frantically at the wooden lid. She had to get out or she would die in this box. If she died, she would never see Tom again. Never lift her face to the sky or run to her father to
rub her cheek against his whiskery beard. Never wake to the sound of the city or watch the sunlight ripple over the river or juggle a hot pie between her fingers. Nell normally scorned to weep but
now she was gasping and gulping as the tears came and she thrashed her head from side to side.

‘Please,’ she whimpered. ‘Please, please, please.’ But the darkness only tightened inexorably around her and soon she wasn’t thinking about pies or Tom, or anything
but the need to get out of the chest. Her hands were raw. She was suffocating, gulping for air, drumming her heels on the end of the box. It was a perfect-sized coffin for a seven-year-old girl.
They could bury her in it and save themselves the trouble of sewing her a shroud.

Oh, she would be good always if only someone would find her! She would say her prayers every day and sit still and not be pert. But first she had to breathe.

Nell was crying seriously now, so loudly that she didn’t hear the footsteps coming back, didn’t hear the weight being lifted from the lid. She was beside herself with terror.

‘Mamma!’ she cried, forgetting that her mother had been dead these two years.

‘Nell!’ Through the harsh labour of her breath, Nell heard Tom calling for her, but he was too far away. He wouldn’t have heard her.

‘Eleanor!’ It was her stepmother’s voice now, taut with impatience. ‘Eleanor, where are you?’

‘Here, here, I’m here!’ Nell was choking and gasping, too weak to scream.

Her stepmother was still complaining. ‘Where has that girl gone? God’s bodkin, that child is nothing but trouble.’

‘Wait, I heard something!’ That was Tom.

‘Tom, Tom!’ Feebly Nell banged against the lid, but she was barely whispering by then.

The next instant the lid was thrown open, and she arched out of the chest in search of air, an arrow released from a bow, dragging in a desperate, ragged breath, and then another, and another,
not even aware of the shocked exclamations, needing only the sweetness of air.

‘Eleanor!’ Her stepmother bustled forward. ‘You foolish child! What are you doing in that chest?’

Ungently she hauled Nell out of the kist, but Nell was still frantically gulping in air and didn’t care what happened as long as they let her breathe. She caught a glimpse of Tom’s
white, shocked face and that brought her back to herself more than her stepmother’s scolding.

‘Couldn’t . . . couldn’t get out . . .’ she stammered.

‘Why didn’t you just push the lid? It’s not that heavy.’

‘Somebody put something on it.’ Nell was bent over, gasping and choking still, but a quality in Tom’s silence made her look up. ‘Didn’t you see?’

‘There was nothing on the chest,’ he said at last.

‘But I heard him!’ Tears of frustration filled her eyes. She looked around the room and spied the heavy ledger on the desk. ‘That! He put that on the chest! He knew I was in
there, and he put it on so I couldn’t get out.’

Tom looked horrified. ‘Who did?’

‘I don’t know. I couldn’t see. But I heard him. I did!’

‘Nonsense!’ Her stepmother was brushing her down efficiently. ‘Who would do such a thing? You just frightened yourself, you beetle-headed child! I’m not surprised you
imagined things, stuck in a dark box.’

Was that all it had been? Nell looked at the ledger and tried to remember where it had been on the desk when she came in, but her mind hurt with the effort of it. It had moved, she was sure it
had, but how could she remember now when her breath was still coming in hoarse rasps and her heart was galloping in her chest? The more she tried to remember, the more her memory slipped and
slithered away. The truth was, she couldn’t be certain.

There was a splinter in her palm and her fingers stung where she had hammered at the lid.

‘What in the name of Our Lady were you thinking to get in there in the first place?’ Anne Appleby went on. Having satisfied herself that her stepdaughter was in one piece, her mind
was running on to how to explain to Henry Maskewe that his papers were crushed by Nell’s panic. Her husband had obligations to Mr Maskewe. They couldn’t afford to alienate him. Why else
would she be here, attending his wife in childbed on a day like this? She had business enough in her own home.

Anne’s mouth tightened as she looked at Nell in exasperation. The child was a hoyden and no amount of beating seemed to quench her spirit. Everything about her was unruly: the thick
coppery hair that curled out irrepressibly from under her cap, the freckles on her snub nose, the wilful gleam in her green eyes. Anne had done her best to teach her husband’s daughter to be
obedient and demure, but Eleanor seemed possessed by an unchristian energy. Get the child to sit still, but yet she simmered, ready to burst into action the moment she took her eyes off her. It was
very unrestful.

She had a good heart, Anne could see that, but this latest escapade would have to be punished. Her husband was inclined to be indulgent of his only daughter, but Anne had their future to think
of. They needed Mr Maskewe’s good opinion, and Nell’s friendship with Tom Maskewe could not be allowed to undo it.

‘We were playing,’ Nell answered hoarsely. Her throat was burning as she heaved in one delicious, agonizing breath after another.

‘You were told not to get into trouble.’ Anne clicked her tongue. ‘Why can you not play quietly like good children?’

Nell and Tom didn’t bother to answer this.

‘I’m sorry, Mother,’ Nell tried after a moment.

‘Sorry is as sorry does,’ Anne snapped back. She looked anxiously at the crushed rolled documents at the bottom of the chest. ‘Now what is to be done?’

‘Is there a problem?’

They all swung round to see Ralph Maskewe in the doorway. He was smiling, but Nell found herself shrinking from the sight of all those teeth. Instinctively, she drew towards Tom and slipped her
hand into his.

Her stepmother explained that the children had been playing a game. ‘I fear your father will not be pleased to hear that Eleanor came into his closet. She knows better, but you know what
children are . . .’

If she hoped Ralph would let the matter go, she was disappointed. The smile evaporated and he looked grave. ‘I will send for my father,’ he said.

Recalled from his warehouse, Tom’s father was in a black mood. ‘What’s this?’ he demanded, his gaze darting round the closet and his brows snapping together at the sight
of the open chest.

Nell and Tom had scrambled to their feet at his approach and were standing with their heads hung. It was Ralph who explained the situation this time.

‘By cock!’ Henry Maskewe roared at Tom when he was done. ‘Is there no end to the trouble you will put me to, boy?’ He pulled a switch from his doublet and tested it
against his hand. ‘Come here, Thomas.’

Nell quailed but she couldn’t let Tom take the blame. ‘It was not Tom’s fault,’ she protested, her voice quavering as she stepped forward. ‘You should punish me,
not him.’

‘No, Nell, it was my idea to play hide-and-seek,’ said Tom, stepping ahead of her and holding out his hand.

‘Tom, no, you didn’t come in here!’

‘Since you’re both so happy to share the punishment, I’m happy to oblige,’ growled Henry Maskewe.

‘But sir—’ Tom started to protest.

‘Enough!’ His father snarled at him. ‘How many times have you been told not to come into the closet? It is not a place for children, as this brat should know too. And as for
you, madam,’ he added with a glare at Anne Appleby, ‘I suggest you teach your daughter better manners than to go poking around in other people’s houses!’

‘Indeed, I am sorry for her behaviour.’ Anne swallowed her humiliation with a resentful glance at Nell. ‘She will be punished, you can be sure.’

‘I will punish her now since she is so ready for it. Step forward, girl.’

Exchanging a look with Tom, Nell lifted her chin and took a step towards Mr Maskewe, but her legs were not very long and she had to take three more before she stood before him.

‘Hold out your hand.’

She swallowed but did as he told her. Her palms were still torn and red from the chest, but she knew better than to resist.

Beside Mr Maskewe, Ralph stood alert. He was watching Nell avidly, his pale eyes gleaming, and she knew without being told that he was enjoying this. She looked away, taking her bottom lip
between her teeth as she braced herself. The pain that already clamoured in her hands was nothing compared to what was to come.

The switch sliced through the air with a rushing noise and lashed her palm. In spite of herself, her body jerked, but she wouldn’t let herself cry. That would be letting Tom down.

Swish, sting. Swish, sting. There were great red weals across her palm, and Nell’s face was screwed up with the effort of not whimpering at the pain of it.

Swish, sting. Swish, sting. Swish, sting.

Five strikes and it was done. Nell’s knees were unsteady as Mr Maskewe made a noise of disgust and waved her away.

Stepping back, she caught Ralph’s eye again and this time he smiled, showing those big, even teeth. Perhaps it was meant to be a smile of sympathy. To anyone watching, it might indeed seem
so, but that was not sympathy Nell saw in his eyes. She might only be seven but she knew pleasure, and excitement, when she saw it.