Read The Taxidermist's Daughter Online
Authors: Kate Mosse
The Taxidermist's Daughter (32 page)
The Church of St Peter & St Mary
Fishbourne Marshes
Thursday 24
th
April 1913
Three o’clock.
In the graveyard of the church of St Peter & St Mary, women and men have gathered in the gentle sunshine. Watching, waiting.
Today, the sea is as still as the surface of the mill pond and the marshes are alive with spring flowers. Blue-green water, tipped white by a gentle breeze, glinting in the sunshine. The oaten reedmace like the underside of velvet ribbons. The blackthorn and the hawthorn shimmer with early white blossom. Red goosefoot and wild samphire and golden early celandine in the hedgerows.
It is a perfect spring afternoon.
*
Inside the church, soft green moss decorates every window, with bunches of wild primroses and bluebells, and purple southern marsh orchids. The wooden pews are newly polished. A smell of beeswax in the air. The tiles are washed. There is no evidence of the devastation left by last year’s storms, or of the violence and death that came to this peaceful, beautiful village.
Connie’s hand drifts from her side and touches Harry’s fingers. He turns and smiles, then faces front again.
The two little bridesmaids fidget and hop from foot to foot, holding their posies in front of them. White ribbons, pretty skirts of tulle and lace, their hair set in curls. Awake too early and allowed to get overexcited, now that their big moment has arrived, they are too tired to enjoy it.
‘Stand still, Maisie,’ Mary hisses.
The Rector smiles at the woman and the man standing before him. The groom’s face bears the scars of a life bowed down by grief, but his expression is composed and his eyes are clear. The bride, serene in her veil and lace, is radiant. This is not the first wedding the Rector has conducted in this charming village church, but it is the one that gives him the most pleasure so far.
He begins the service.
‘Beloved in the Lord, we are assembled here in the presence of God for the purpose of joining in marriage . . .’
There is no one in Fishbourne who does not know that several people died in the worst flood to hit the village in hundreds of years. Few were left unaffected. They are aware that something happened out on the sea wall close to Apuldram Woods.
But after a year, it is time to bring that story to a close.
Connie looks round the church and sees the smiling faces of those people she loves, and who love her. Davey, a good three inches taller now, uncomfortable in his jacket and starched collar, is standing with Sergeant Pennicott ready to make the guard of honour as they leave.
The wedding reception will be held at Blackthorn House, repaired and painted ready for its new life as a family home.
She glances, again, at Harry, knowing that he is thinking of his father and wishing he was here. He clearly feels her gaze on him, because he turns and smiles at her. Connie sighs. She knows he understands that she is thinking about poor, wronged Cassie. Wishing she could have been present too.
Of course, it is better they are not. What they did, their different crimes, speaks too loud. Even now, Connie cannot reconcile what she witnessed in Themis Cottage with the bright, vivid girl she remembers laughing and singing and dancing in the classroom. Only she and Harry know the true extent of what Cassie did. The cottage, so vulnerable at the water’s edge, was stripped to a shell by the flood. So although three bodies were found there, the feathers and the masks had been torn away and the bodies were so battered by the surge of the torrent that destroyed the downstairs of the house, it was hard to even identify them, let alone distinguish one injury from another.
Many people died that day – in Selsey, Pagham and Bosham, as well as in Fishbourne. The most well-known of them was Charles Crowther, owner of a large estate in Surrey and a weekend cottage in Fishbourne. His body was washed up at Dell Quay, but not found for days. By then, the crows – or so it was rumoured – had stripped the flesh from his bones and pecked at his eyes. A huge gathering of birds, so it was said, a black cloud over the water.
A murder of crows.
Connie read Cassie’s additions to her journal, and as she had promised, the explanation was there. A story of justice, not revenge. Connie still cannot accept how Cassie chose to seek retribution, but she understands why.
Blood will have blood.
Cassie’s death left Gifford devastated, but Connie destroyed the pages in her journal and spared him from knowing the worst. All through the summer and autumn, they talked late into the night. Sometimes with Harry too. Until finally, as another new year dawned, they had reconciled their memories.
At last, Cassie could rest in peace.
*
‘According to the laws of the state and the ordinances of the church of Christ . . .’
The Rector’s voice brings Connie back. She sighs. This is a day for happiness and new beginnings, not remembering the darkness.
‘I now pronounce you, Crowley and Jennifer, husband and wife, in the name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit. What therefore God has joined together let not anyone put asunder. Henceforth you go down life’s pathway together, and may the Father of all mercies, who of his grace has called you to this holy state of marriage, bind you together in true love and faithfulness and grant you his blessing.’
As Connie looks at her father’s shining face, his pride in his new bride on his arm, she feels tears come to her eyes.
‘May they live together many years, and in the hour of death may they part in the blessed hope of celebrating forever with all the saints of God the marriage of Christ and the church he loved.’
The congregation stands as the new Mr and Mrs Gifford walk down the aisle and out into the afternoon sunshine. The choir begins to sing, their enthusiasm making up for their lack of practice.
Connie turns round and sees, framed in the doorway of the church, a shower of white rice and pink confetti as the bells begin to ring.
*
Finally, the congregation is outside, the churchyard filled with well-wishers.
Connie looks to her father. There is one last surprise he has arranged for his new bride. She glances towards Davey, and gives him a sign. The boy disappears around the corner of the church, then comes sauntering back and puts his thumb up.
Two white birds are set free from the porch. Everyone claps and cheers, and Mrs Christie – Jennie, as Connie must try to call her – blushes with pleasure. Maisie and Polly shriek and let their flower baskets fall. This time, even Mary laughs.
Connie watches as the doves soar above the poplar trees, then higher into the air until they are out of sight. She feels Harry lift her hand to his lips and kiss it.
‘Shall we go home?’ he says.
She looks across the marshes. The spiked Star of Bethlehem is flowering early in the meadows this year. The hedgerows are filled with purple-eyed speedwell and bluebells. On the far side of Fishbourne Creek, Blackthorn House is magnificent in the sunshine.
Connie can think of no place in the world she would rather be.
This is a work of fiction. There was no sequence of grisly murders in 1912; Fishbourne has never flooded; and the sea wall (built later) never gave way. Blackthorn House, Slay Lodge, Themis Cottage and Apuldram Woods are all imaginary. Residents past and present will, I hope, forgive me for taking liberties with geography, topography and occasionally wildlife!
All errors and mistakes are mine.
There are, however, very many people who have given support and encouragement, and have helped in making this novel what it is.
At
LAW
, agents Araminta Whitley, Alice Saunders and agent-editor supremo Mark Lucas. Tireless and enthusiastic, you give tip-top and immediate support, and I appreciate everything you do for me (and all your other authors too).
At Orion, Susan Lamb (and in memory of those Tappit Hen days), Mark Rusher, Gaby Young, Sophie Painter; my publisher Jon Wood and editor Genevieve Pegg, for their superb, clever editing; Laura Gerrard; my copy-editor Jane Selley; Lucie Stericker, Sinem Erkas, Marissa Hussey (for transforming my digital world), Hannah Atkinson, Malcolm Edwards, David Young, Dallas Manderson and Jo Carpenter; and Preena Gadher, Anwen Hoosen, Lauren Ace and the fab Riot Team.
The novel was inspired by my long-term fascination with taxidermy, which started when I fell in love with Walter Potter’s Museum of Curiosities in Arundel in the 1970s. I am very grateful to taxidermist Jazmine Miles-Long and artist in taxidermy Rose Robson, both of whom let me pick their brains and answered my questions patiently – and Rose taught me how to skin a crow (and took over when I made a mess of things); the Guild of Taxidermists, who were kind in answering my rookie questions; John Cooper and the staff at the wonderful Booth Museum in Brighton, where we filmed, as well as the Horniman Museum in London.
I’d like to thank everyone at the West Sussex Record Office, not least of all Amanda Dalus and Corinne Burnand, but especially Katherine Slay, an invaluable – and always cheerful – guide to the archives, who found anything at a second’s notice and was extremely generous with her time. Several books were invaluable, most particularly Pat Morris’s
A History of Taxidermy: Art, Science and Bad Taste,
and
Walter Potter and his Museum of Curiosities
;
also, local reference books including
The Fishbourne Book
, edited by Mary Hand,
Chichester Harbour
by Liz Sagues,
Fishbourne: A Village History
by Rita Blakeney, and Phil Hewitt’s
Chichester Miscellany
.
Novelists are terrible friends (either too much there or vanishing towards the end of a book), and I am grateful to have such supportive friends and neighbours: in particular Jon Evans, Rachel Holmes, Peter Clayton, Tessa Ross, Clare Parsons, Tony Langham, Lucinda Montefiore, Robert Dye, Bob Pulley, Maria Pulley, Anthony Horowitz, Jill Green, Sandi Toksvig, Debbie Toksvig, Shami Chakrabati, Julie Pembery, Cath O’Hanlon, Patrick O’Hanlon, Lydia Conway, Paul Arnott, Alan Finch, Alison Finch, Dale Rooks, Jenny Ramsay, Janet Sandys-Renton, Mike Harrington, Harriet Hastings, Marzena Baran, Phil Hewitt, Amanda Ross. Thanks, too, to my parents’ old Fishbourne gang from the 1960s and 1970s, especially Jean and Ian Graham-Jones, Kate and Barry Goodchild, Helen and William Knott, Derek and Ann Annals.
For
The Taxidermist’s Daughter
, we auctioned a ‘goodie’ and a ‘baddie’ name in aid of the St Peter Project, to contribute towards the building of a new church hall in Fishbourne. A huge thank you to Jennie Christie and Greg Slay for their generosity, and to everyone who came to the charity event; especially Helen Frost, Alan Frost and Nik Westacott. Thanks, also, to the Reverend Moira Wickens, Rector of St Peter & St Mary, Fishbourne, for allowing me to play fast and loose with her graveyard.
Finally, my love and thanks to my family: my wonderful mother, Barbara Mosse – and my much-missed father, Richard Mosse – for creating such a wonderful home and always being so proud of us all; my sisters Beth Huxley and Caroline Matthews, who share the memories that inspired the novel – and also, Carrie, for the brilliant book with press-button bird song (invaluable) and advice on birdseed; my brothers and sisters-in-law, including Benjamin Graham, Mish Graham, Rachie Dunk, Mark Huxley and Chris Grainge. To my fabulous mother-in-law, Rosie, for the knitted crows and five o’clock restoratives; and massive thanks to artist Jack Penny, not only for his beautiful illustration, but also for the bird table that made the jackdaws, magpies, rooks and crows flock to our garden (sorry about that, Ma!).
In the end, though, I could do none of this without my beloved husband Greg – my first reader, my first editor, my first (and last) love – and our amazing grown-up children Martha and Felix: your enthusiasm, your help, your cooking, your support and tolerance of all the bird talk for months on end (not to mention help with #taxidermyselfies) make me the proudest – and luckiest – mother in the world.
Without you three, there’d be no point to any of it.
Kate Mosse
Chichester
May 2014