The Return of the Witch (10 page)

“Oh!” I recovered myself as quickly as I could, “no matter, sir. I had not noticed the time.”

“Come,” he offered me his hand, “let us not keep Cook waiting any longer. She has been preparing for your visit for hours.”

So saying, he helped me into the carriage and shut the door. As the driver flicked the reins, urging on the sleek bay horse, I could hear the incredulous mutterings of the group we left behind. It was not until we were safely out of their earshot that either of us spoke.

“Bess! I am astonished to find you here,” he told me, keeping his voice low so that our conversation might not be overheard by the driver. “Astonished and delighted,” he added. He had not yet released my hand and now he squeezed it tighter.

I smiled. “It is very good to see you again William,” I told him, and meant it, though I was uncertain how I was to explain my reappearance. There was so much he did not know; so much he could not possibly comprehend. Even without the constraints of my promise to Erasmus not to reveal any of the details of my Time Stepping, I could never begin to talk of having lived on for hundreds of years. If William ever believed that I was a real witch it was not something he could have admitted to himself or anyone else. These were times when magic was deeply feared. The only course open to me was to obfuscate.

“Had you thought me dead?” I asked bluntly.

He shook his head. “There were some said you were, but I would not believe it. After you escaped from the gaol, after you fled, there were all manner of theories. Some said you had died, dashed on the rocks jumping off the cliff at Batchcombe Point. Others said you drowned. There were those swore they saw you swim away. And some…” Here he hesitated.

“What? What did they say, William?”

“They said they saw you take flight. Saw you lift into the air and soar aloft like a bird born to life on the wing.” He looked at me, holding my gaze, but not searching for answers, not truly. Perhaps he feared the truth.

“My own memory of that night is hidden from me,” I told him. “It may be that I fell, that I swam, that I hit my head upon a rock, I cannot be sure. I was fortunate. I did not die, that is the fact of it.”

He grinned at me, and I saw again the boy I had grown up with. The boy I had loved. “Well, you are most certainly alive, Bess Hawksmith, and I am glad of it! Glad indeed. And now we are home, and we can sit together and you shall tell me all that has happened to you these long years.”

We had turned a corner in the lane and started up the long, straight drive to Batchcombe Hall. I peered out of the window of the carriage. The house was still magnificent, still able to impress with its size, its glowing red brick, its many windows and chimneys, set in its verdant landscape of lawns and trees, with a lovingly planted knot garden to the fore. I wondered how I would be received by William's family and servants. How many would recognize me? I quelled at the thought of how awkward it would be to face their questions.

“It is such a fine day,” I said quickly. “Let us not waste it by being indoors. I would rather we walk in your lovely gardens. I remember them fondly.”

“I should like that very much. Keanes!” He rapped on the ceiling of the carriage. “Stop here, if you please.”

As we stepped out onto the springy turf I looked up at the driver. I recalled Keanes as the groom who had worked for William's father for so many years. I was surprised to find him still alive, let alone working. He glanced in my direction and I saw a flicker of recognition pass over his craggy features. I was aware of Aloysius stirring and fidgeting in the bag at my waist, as if sensing the scrutiny I was under. Keanes did not speak, only turned away again and clicked his tongue at the horse. As the carriage followed the drive around the house William offered me his arm, and together we strolled through beneath the rose arbor. Here there were signs that all was not as it should be. From a distance the garden had seemed unchanged, but up close I saw the weeds running rampant, the untrimmed hedges, the ornamental fruit trees that were no longer held to espalier.

William sighed. “No one has time for flowers anymore, Bess.” He waved his arm at a desultory show of white roses. “What you see here is what will survive untended. Our energies are expended to the rear of the house, where you will find turnips and beans and all manner of produce.”

“I never saw you as a grower of vegetables, Will!”

“Nor I. Yet that is what I must do now. We must all do what we can to ease the terrible suffering this war has wrought.”

“And your wife, how does she fare with a gardener for a husband?” By the stricken look on Williams face I realized at once I had said the wrong thing. “Oh, I am so sorry!”

“You didn't know. How could you? She died two years ago. Smallpox. Such a pitiless disease. Many were lost to it.”

“Your father? And Hamilton?” I could have kicked myself for not asking after his brother and the rest of his family sooner.

“Bess, my father was an old man before you … when you still lived here. He died before the war started, and I count that a blessing. Hamilton, well, he could not stand by and see the king so threatened. He fought with the Royalists from the outset. Alas he paid the ultimate price for his loyalty.”

“My poor William.”

“I am better off than many. Noella and I had no children, so we did not have to witness their suffering. And I still have the Hall, for now at least. But come, enough of me, what compelled you to return to Batchcombe, Bess?”

“I come in search of someone.”

“Have a care, for these are dangerous times.”

“Were not they always so?”

“All trust is gone. This war … it has pitted master against master, brother against brother. Allegiances shift with the tides.”

“It sounds as if people have more important things to concern themselves with than me.”

“Do not depend upon it. They still seek a scapegoat for their ills. Many have lost loved ones. Some have lost their livelihoods, their homes. Some have died for want of bread, Bess. They know not how the world will turn next. For now the town holds for the king, but that will soon change. There are none here with the heart to fight longer. When Cromwell comes, and come he will, he will meet no resistance.”

“And when that happens, what will become of you, William?”

He paused, reaching out to touch a rose in full bloom, watching the petals fall to the ground at his gentle touch. “I will give up my house, surrender myself and my position. Others have done so and been permitted to stay.”

I put my hand on his arm. “It saddens me to see you so, to hear of how you have suffered. I am sorry we do not meet in happier circumstances. To lose everything…”

He looked up at the house that had been the home of his family for generations. “It is curious to note, but I care not where I live anymore. I have no heir. I am a man alone. In truth, I incline to Cromwell's principles, though the man himself I detest, for he is cruel and ruthless in his dealings with any who oppose him. But that is the way of war, is it not?” He gave a small smile. He looked now as if he had aged terribly. His face was etched with lines of sorrow. “But still you tell me nothing of yourself. Where have you been all these years? How has the world treated determined Bess who would be no man's possession?”

“Do you still wish that I had agreed to be your mistress, William? Do you truly believe we could have been happy in such an arrangement?”

He laughed lightly at this. “No! The Lord knows I would have come to rue the day I chained you to me in such a way. No, you are a creature suited only for freedom, Bess. A woman not born to live as others do.”

“How well you know me.”

“Then won't you tell me who it is you are searching for? Who causes you to risk cries of ‘witch' again in the place that already has you convicted as one?”

I took a breath. I hesitated, for I knew how my answer would strike William.

At last I said, “I come seeking Gideon.”

William gasped, a mixture of anger and jealousy instantly transforming his kind face. “Masters! That vile monster! Was it not he who brought you to ruin? I thought you good and done with him, Bess.”

“Do not misapprehend me, William. I search for him because he has taken someone dear to me. A young woman. I believe her to be in terrible danger.”

“Ha! If she is in his clutches you have the right of it! But why would he bring her here? He disappeared the same night as you vanished from our lives. There is nothing left for him here but an ill reputation, surely.”

“I do not know, not yet. But he is here, somewhere close. I'm certain I glimpsed him this morning in Batchcombe, but I was unable to follow him. And then … then I was recognized. If you hadn't happened upon me, well, it is a difficult task, seeking in secret.”

At that moment a figure emerged from the house and came toward us. I raised my hand to my eyes, squinting into the sun to try to make out who it was. By his fluid and energetic movement I could tell he was young.

“Ah!” William smiled broadly. “Here is Richard, come to see who my mysterious visitor is, no doubt.”

“You will not tell him…” I said quickly.

“Richard!” William called out to the youth, “come and meet an old friend. Mistress Carmichael, come to visit her brother at the mill.”

The youth bowed rather too expertly, as if it was something he had been practicing.

“Good day to you, Mistress Carmichael. I am always pleased to meet a friend of Sir William.”

I saw pride in William's face as he watched the boy.

“Richard is my excellent valet and my right-hand man. I could not do without him, isn't that so, Richard?”

He smiled and blushed under such praise. “Mary-Anne sent me to see if you had been successful in your hunt for sugar at the market today.”

“Alas, I was not.” He turned to me to explain. “My housekeeper had hoped to make marchpane as an indulgence for me. It is my birthday tomorrow.” He patted Richard on the shoulder. “I will send you with the disappointing news. It is a man's work indeed, facing Mary-Anne with words she will not want to hear. Hurry along now.”

We watched him go.

“Richard's family were tenant farmers on the estate. He lost his three brothers and his father to the war. His mother lost her own battle with illness last year. I took him in and, well, we … we do well.”

“You have become the good man I always believed you to be, William.”

“War forces us to be what we are.” He took my hand briefly in his. “I will assist you if I can, Bess. I can make enquiries. It would be easier for me to question people. Give me a description of the young woman. I will do whatever I can to help you, I promise.”

I left him then, after I had reluctantly agreed to allow him to help me and not to put myself at further risk unnecessarily. I wanted him to be at ease. I had no wish to add to his worries, but nor could I promise to stop searching for Gideon myself. I could not possibly sit by and wait for someone else to find Tegan; there was too much at stake. I trusted William, but I knew he would be no match for Gideon, and I was wary of putting him in danger. He offered me the carriage and Keanes to drive me home, but I explained I preferred to walk, for the exertion would allow me to clear my head and order my thoughts. Of course he knew my story regarding Erasmus to be false. William had known my only brother, and knew that he had died. The fact that he did not press me for a further, more plausible explanation only served to endear him to me more. Here, at least, was someone I could trust.

I released Aloysius from his traveling place and allowed him to make the rest of the journey back to the mill perched on my shoulder. The walk did indeed help me to review the worryingly scant progress I had made. The day was fast passing, and I felt no closer to Tegan. A glimpse of Gideon and a promise of assistance from William were not enough. I had to act! As I neared the location of the windmill I was struck by how quiet it was. There was no wind at all, so that the sails would not turn. In fact, the day had moved from warm to oppressively hot, with a heaviness in the air that suggested thunder. The only sounds I could discern as I approached the front door of the curious construction were muttered oaths. I stood on the threshold and watched Erasmus struggle to detach a metal hopper from one end of the workings of the mill. He was fighting with a wrench and having little success at freeing the corn bucket. He noticed my arrival and paused, wiping the back of his flour-covered hand across his damp brow. He looked hot, bothered, and faintly ridiculous.

“Ah, you are returned!” he declared somewhat unnecessarily. “I was growing concerned.”

“There was no need.”

“You have been gone some hours.”

“I went into Batchcombe. It seemed the obvious place to start looking.”

“Were you seen? Do you think it possible you were recognized?”

I had not planned to tell Erasmus of what took place outside the haberdashers. I knew he would rebuke me for showing my face, for risking all manner of unanswerable questions and challenges. I had thought to tell him about William but omit what had happened earlier. However, by asking such a direct question at once he caught me off guard, and my face gave away the truth of it.

“For pity's sake, madam, have a care!” he snapped.

“Credit me with some sense.” I frowned at him. “I took all possible care, and I was fortunate to be assisted by a friend.”

“Someone from your past? Is that wise?”

“William Gould is the owner of Batchcombe Hall, the very place I saw in the vision that directed me here. He has some influence and standing in the community. He will be able to ask questions on my behalf.”

“And what did you tell this friend regarding your new status as the widow Carmichael? If he knew you, it must have come as a surprise to him to find you have a brother he has never met.”