The Grove of Eagles

  “I don’t know.”

  “I heard Ink-horn say he knows of tests so that you can tell if she has sold herself to the Devil. What sort of tests?”

  “If you stick pins in her and she does not bleed,” I said; “ if you throw her in the river and she floats; if you tie her thumbs and her toes crosswise and she sheds no tears; if you shave her head …”

  “But is that not like torture?”

  “If she’s a witch it will drive out Satan from her and make her confess …”

  “And what if she confesses?”

  “I suppose they will hang her.”

  “What do you hope they will do to her?”

  “It’s for them to decide.”

  Soon after that we must both have fallen asleep, but I did not sleep long and wakened in utter terror, the way one can from a dream, with the belief that I was in a coffin and the lid was coming down. I sat up in bed and could see no light and breathe no air. The feel of the bed curtains only convinced me it was a shroud. I crawled to the foot of the bed and nearly fell out, then groped towards the window. It was not until I heard the familiar sound of water gurgling off the roof and saw a single light of a fishing boat that it came to me I was in my own room, looking from my own window and that John still slept undisturbed in the darkness.

  It took minutes standing there by the window while the dream fell slowly away like slime dripping off after crawling out of a bog. It took more minutes standing there before I began to pull on my breeches and hose and jerkin and a pair of shoes …

  The passage outside was no lighter than the bedroom; from the opposite room came Parson Merther’s snores. In the great hall a few gaunt shadows lurked, fathered by a flickering log; dogs stirred and grumbled. I picked up the poker that lay on the andiron in the hearth.

  I had to stand on a chair to unfasten the iron bolt, and when the door came open a gust of damp air wafted in from outside. I did not shut the door again but left it swinging, and I could hear the stirring of the rushes on the floor as the wind moved over them.

  It was lighter out here, and the warm night cloyed. There was only one light to be seen in the whole house, where Kate Penruddock sat up with Mrs Killigrew.

  The door leading to the cellar of the Gate Tower was in the right hand wall and was not locked. I went down the ten steps and came to the cellar door and knocked. There was at once a stirring inside.

  “Who is it?”

  “… Maugan Killigrew.”

  “Ah, Maugan, I looked for you today when I came. Were you hiding from me?”

  I looked at the door. Last year a man had been put there, a beggar, who was not worth a place in the castle, and the same stout padlock had been used then as now.

  “Or did you suggest they should send for me in the first place?”

  “No!”

  “Ah, well, it is good to have a friend. Have you water? I’m thirsty.”

  I slid the end of the poker through the padlock and began to pull.

  I heard her laugh. “It’s hard to be an apothecary if you be a woman. And it is hard to do good by savin’ one life because then you are rough treated because you did not save two.”

  The poker slipped and I slipped with it, so that the metal clanged.

  “You trying to release me? Well, that’s a kindly act, and I exempt you from all the curses I’ve been mutterin’ these past hours. Ignorance is a sorry thing, my dear.”

  I was sweating so that my hands could hardly grip, as if I was still part of a nightmare. I felt I wasn’t doing this just because I wanted to but because she was making me. She had awakened me in my room and brought me here.

  Although I was so thin I was always very strong, even in those days, and I could feel the poker beginning to bend. I stopped and then noticed that while the padlock was not giving, the staples let into the wall were. Another heave and the staples gave way and the door swung free.

  She came out. Her face was an unnatural white in the darkness.

  “You’re a true friend, Maugan Killigrew.”

  “I had to come.”

  “That’s how it should be.”

  I could not tell whether her vivid smile was loving or wolfish.

  I said: “You must not go home across the fields. The hounds would be on you.”

  “I have no fear of dogs.”

  “They would raise the house. It’s safer to go through this gate if we can get it unbarred.”

  “And then?”

  “This leads direct to the jetty. Behind the jetty on the stones you’ll find a small boat. You can row round the point and beach it down the river below our land.”

  “How far is it round the point? I could swim.”

  I thought of witches who never sank. “Take the boat. There will be a strong outgoing current.”

  “You’ll not come with me to bring the boat back?”

  “It will be found in the morning. I have left all the doors open behind me.”

  “Come here, Maugan. You’re not afraid of me?”

  I did not answer, but when she moved closer I could not step away. She kissed me on the mouth.

  “If that’s a witch’s kiss, then you’re accursed, no doubt. If it is a woman’s, then you’ll come to no harm because of it. Time will show.”

  Chapter Six

  “Well,” said my father, “ she was left to go by someone in the house, there’s no doubt of that. She could not have forced the lock from the outside and bent a poker in so doing, and then left by sea, bolting the gates after her.”

  “Anything is possible,” said Parson Merther, “ if you have Satan on your side.”

  “Oh, stuff and nonsense, man … I do not believe every woman who bows twice to the moon has all the power of evil at her beck. I doubt if this Katherine what’s-her-name is likely to know any magic beyond mixing a brew or two.”

  “Your son died under her hand, sir, and you saw his face.”

  “Mrs Killigrew thinks she did no ill, but rather good in delivering her when no one else could.”

  “Mrs Killigrew, sir, if I may make so bold, has so generous and Christian a nature that she seeks only the good in the darkest deed.”

  “Well, since you mentor us, or should do, in the faith yourself, perhaps you should pick a leaf from her book.”

  Parson Merther blew his nose and lapsed into offended silence.

  Mr Killigrew said: “It has been an ill time for you all while I have been away: Paul dead and Clara and Basset and Wilson too; and now this. But you can’t visit all the blame on this woman who came in only yesterday. I’d say, leave her be—but for one thing. I don’t relish a traitor in my house. Whether it was right to detain this woman overnight or no, it was done. That being so, the justice of the case was left to me. Follow? Property to me. Someone who will let a prisoner out can on another day creep down to let the enemy in!”

  “Send some men for the woman,” said Henry Knyvett. “She cannot have gone far. Bring her in and we can question her.”

  “I’ll think it over,” said my father coddling his moustache. “I’ve much on my mind today. She’ll be at the mill, never fear; women like that don’t run far. No, I’ll ride over myself tomorrow or the next day and question her there.”

  “Suppose she will not say?”

  “She’ll say.”

  For the next week I lived in an agony of fear lest Mr Killigrew should put his threat into practice; but for a week he did not leave the grounds. He was in one of his feckless, indolent, agreeable moods. Always when he came back after some venery with a woman he would show a more lively affection for his wife and children—though I did not perceive the connection until I was older.

  Also, perhaps almost to his own surprise, his other affairs had prospered. Money had come into Arwenack through the visit of Elliot; and while in London he had received some private assurance that there would be a blockage in the inquiries into the boarded fishing vessel.

  In spite of his extravagances on Lady Betty he was in funds.
Uncle Sir Henry had lent him money, and the son of a wealthy draper called Henry Lok had taken over a substantial number of his bonds. This to Mr Killigrew was almost the same as being given money; the problems of repayment were too far ahead to trouble his mind. He was loud in the praises of both men, and Sir Henry and his lady were to spend Christmas at Arwenack. It was to be a great occasion.

  Mrs Killigrew had no setbacks after her ordeal and in two weeks was about again. The fever dragged on until mid-December with one or two new cases: and several slow convalescents, but no one else died.

  One day at the beginning of December my father rode out with his men, but it was only collecting rents, or so Belemus who rode with him told me. I asked Belemus, trying to be casual, wether they had stopped to collect a rent from Katherine Footmarker, but he only grinned and said no. Then followed a week of good weather when Mr Killigrew was out hawking and hunting every day. He would be away by eight and back at dusk, so the house hardly saw him and the daylight hours were each day a long lull of sunny quietness between the shouts and clatter and bustle of morning and the clamour of late afternoon. I knew at such a time Katherine Footmarker was safe unless she got right in his tracks.

  On the 15th December, which was a Friday, he said he was riding on business to Trerice to see Mrs Gertrude Arundell, and said would I ride with him. Though I had several times been to Fowey and once to Penzance by sea, this was the farthest I had been on land. My father had a younger sister called Katherine, who after being a widow for three years had just married Sir Henry Billingsley of Tomes. My father and Katherine quarrelled incessantly; they never wrote unless they were disputing over something, and this visit to Trerice was over property held in coparcenary, as it is called, with Aunt Katherine, in which Mrs Arundell had an interest. That is the way of the Cornish gentry: by threads of property, marriage and inheritance they are for ever intertwined.

  We left with five servants riding with us, crossed near the old mill, which to my relief showed no life, dropped into Penryn and then skirted the wooded valleys up which the creeks of the river run. We forded one narrow neck of the river and crossed Carnon Bridge which is the limit to which the Carnon stream is navigable at low water. Farther up you could see the tinners working, and the stream under the bridge was a muddy yellow. My father told me the river was silting up and that there was now no more than four fathoms at low water at Daniel Point. It was on account, he said, of all the trees being cut down and the soil washing away into the valleys.

  We passed through Truro and up the steep hill at the other side, with the horses falling to a slow walk, bits and stirrups clinking, hooves slipping in the mud; my father said we were first calling at Treworgan, for he had business there.

  “Do you mean where the Farnabys live?”

  “Yes.” He looked across at me suspiciously. “ Do you know them?”

  “I met their daughter, Susanna Farnaby, at Tolverne in May.”

  “Ah. I follow.” His horse shook its muzzle and snorted; the air from its nostrils rose like steam in the crisp sunshine. “Well, they were there but are there no longer.”

  “Where have they gone?”

  “Gone? How should I know? To live with some sister of hers better circumstanced, I believe. He was a shiftless fellow from whom I could get no rent.”

  “Do you mean he was—they were turned out?”

  “He’d put me off long enough with this or that excuse. A man’s a fool who thinks to pay the same rent today as fifteen years back. Prices have flown up everywhere. When you were born you could buy a dozen yards of cloth for £4, now you cannot buy the half of that. Wheat was £1 a quarter, now it’s £3. You could get an ox for £5; now it’s £12. It is his own fault; he can sell his produce higher. Why, the farmers are the lucky ones! It’s sloth has put him out.”

  We were nearly there before I said: “He was ill, I think. Sue mentioned it when I met her in May.”

  “Who? Oh, the Farnabys, you’re still chewing the cud over them. Yes, he’s been ill; everyone’s ill sometime. It did not excuse me from my obligations when I had an ulcer on my leg. The world’s no place for lent-lilies, boy.”

  It was a pleasant house with mullioned windows. At the gate, to my surprise, one of our own servants met us, and there were two more at the door. My father dismounted and went in. I stared about, fancying that in spite of what I had heard Sue might come running from one of the outbuildings. I suddenly noticed that there was no front door; then I saw it propped against the wall of the house.

  Penruddock was one of those who had ridden with us and I said to him: “What has happened to the front door?”

  “Twas took off last week, Master Maugan.”

  “But why?”

  He rubbed his thumb through his beard. “Mr Killigrew ordered it. Mrs Farnaby was not for moving; ye see, she says Mr Farnaby is too ill to be moved. Mr Killigrew had been over once afore but the rent was not paid, so we was ordered to take all the doors off, and Mr Killigrew puts an hour-glass on a pole and says if they’re not out by the time the sand is run we’re to go in and put ’em out.”

  There were two white doves cooing in a cote.

  “Have our servants been left here since you came last?”

  “Aye. The house and furniture has been seized in non-payment and will all be sold. If we’d have left it unguarded news would have got around, and other debtors wouid’ve stepped in and claimed a share.”

  I walked slowly into the house. My father was in what must have been the big parlour. With him was a clerkly man with a book.

  “Tis all down, Mr Killigrew,” he was saying, giving a little bow now and then as he spoke. “One Turkey carpet, £3, Two window cushions, 10s., Two looking glasses, £1 3s 4d., Nine pieces of hangings, which rightly belong in the dining-chamber, £3 10s., Twenty-nine pewter dishes, twelve saucers and a candlestick, £2 16s. 8d. Tis all down in the greatest detail.”

  My father grunted. “Nevertheless kindly walk with me through the house. I want to have a fair idea of the total value.”

  “The total value, Mr Killigrew, the total value …” They disappeared through the farther door, the little clerk trotting behind Mr Killigrew like an eager puppy.

  I went back into the hall. Behind the door was a cloak and a hat with a feather. Had they not even been allowed time to take their personal things? I thought of slender, pretty Sue as I had seen her last laughing among the trees at Tolverne.

  I went upstairs and opened one or two of the doors. In the second room there was a faint perfume: I think it is sandalwood, for to this day if that scent comes to my nostrils I am back in that empty house walking hesitantly into Sue’s chamber.

  I never for a moment doubted that it was hers. The long narrow bed with the taffeta curtains, the floor covering of a once bright yellow, now much faded and worn. The canvas sheets were still on the bed. On a table beside the window was a sugar box, a cup of mother of pearl, a candle snuffer; By the table was a pair of worn slippers of blue velvet. A looking glass lay face downwards on a chair, as if dropped in haste.

  I picked up the slippers and thrust them inside my jerkin and ran out of the house.

  We were expected at Trerice, and Jack Arundell came out to meet us, with his mother, younger brother and sisters not far behind. I liked Jack as much as any boy I knew, and little realised what the years would bring. He was staunch, opinionated, frank, and had a great belly-laugh which his new-found deep voice made the more startling. His father had died when he was four and he had been under the wardship of Sir Richard Grenville until Sir Richard was killed.

  Trerice was a new house, enlarged and rebuilt by Jack’s father, and was handsome and ornately gabled though not so large as ours. Mrs Arundell was good looking and, being a second wife, much younger than her late husband; and I was a little startled to see my father suddenly begin paying court to her. No doubt it was all done expertly and with breeding, but to me, being so young, it seemed maladroit and was greatly embarrassing. He invited them to spend
Christmas with us, and Mrs Arundell, blushing, thanked him and said she would try to make the necessary arrangements. “Do not try, Gertrude, just make ’em and come.” “ Well John, I have four stepdaughters to consider, two of them yet unmarried, aside from my own family.” “ Bring them all. We shall be very jolly this Christmas, so the more the merrier.”

  I slept in the same bed with Jack, in a square dark room black panelled to the ceiling, and we talked long after the lights were snuffed. Jack said he knew where the Farnabys would be, her sister’s husband was called Maris and owned a farm on the high ground behind the river.

  Jack had just returned from Exeter College, Oxford, and next year after he had matriculated was to read law at Lincoln’s Inn. He told me of his life at Oxford, the 16s. 8d. a year he paid for his chamber, of dicing at the inns, of long talking late into the night and arguing all the problems of the universe with like minds, of disguising himself in a workman’s smock to go and see the plays in St Mary’s Church, of the cold after Cornwall and the load of wood he had ordered for when he returned on the 8th of January, of the logic he read, of the laws against beards and long hair, of the lectures on rhetoric and theology.

  After a while he fell silent, and then said: “ What do you think of the Arundells of Tolverne, Maugan?”

  “I have not been since my—the dispute I had with Thomas. Why?”

  “I esteem Jonathan myself. But like you I am not very inclinable to Thomas who is something of a cot-queen and will rule them all before long. Did you know Jonathan is to wed Gertrude Carew next month?”

  “No. She’s very young.”

  “It will be a good match. Even his father favours it.”

  “Why ‘ even his father’?”

  “Because Sir Anthony, I believe, is getting addled in his age and does not know his own mind two days together. Have you any hankering after the old faith, Maugan?”

  “The old faith?” I said, astonished. “ No. I am a Protestant, as we all are.”

  “As we all should be. Catholic is, another way of spelling Traitor these days. How many of them are in the pay of Spain no one knows. But we Arundells are a mixed bag. Our cousins—”