The Witch From The Sea Part 8

And now they decided that she was a black witch and that she had sold herself to the Devil for these special powers, and Maggie Enfield was being dragged from her cottage by those who were determined on vengeance.

They would hang her on one of the trees.

I shivered. I would not go down Gibbet Lane for a long time. I remembered vividly the first time I had ridden down that grim thoroughfare. There were two trees there suitably shaped to form a scaffold. There could scarcely be a more terrifying sight than a body hanging helpless, lifeless, swaying on a tree.

And now the celebration of burning the Christmas decorations had been spoilt by the thought of old Maggie Enfield in the hands of her executioners.

My father was for going to join in the macabre proceeding but my mother stopped him.

"I will not go," she said quietly, "nor will you, Jake. What will our guests think?"

"They'll think that another of Satan's brew has met her just deserts."

"They are gentlefolk, remember. Such a spectacle will disgust them."

"Justice should disgust no one."

My mother looked impatient and she turned away from him. She went over to the Landors and told them that we should return to the house without delay or she feared that the meat which was turning before the spit would be burned to a cinder.

My father, amused, as he often was by my mother's defiance, refused to be done out of what he would consider a treat, and rode off in the opposite direction.

He was going to give his approval to the ceremony of hanging the witch.

The subject of witches came up over the meal and Father was vehement.

"The woman was guilty and had her just reward," he said. "Those marks on her face proved it. Her succubus visits her nightly. The marks were found all over her body."

"Oh come," said my mother, "they were warts. Many have them."

"Then tell me why she can cure them in others and not in herself."

"I am not skilled in these matters," retorted my mother.

"So it doth seem," replied my father. "Well, Mother Enfield has now joined her master. There she will rot in h.e.l.l."

"Why should she?" asked my mother. "If she has served her master well perhaps he will reward her."

"If I had my way this country would be purged of witches. I'd ferret them out. I'd have the gibbets busy."

Fennimore suggested that often innocent women were accused of witchcraft simply because they were old, lived alone, had a cat, a squint or a few warts.

"If they be innocent they must prove it," said my father vehemently.

"People are too ready to accuse others," commented my mother. "Perhaps they should look to their own shortcomings before being so ready to condemn them in others."

"By G.o.d, woman," said my father, "we are talking of witchcraft!"

He was a very intolerant man. He had a code and there was no diverging from it. He had been guilty of rape, I knew. There was Carlos to prove it-the result of a raid on the Spanish coast. What Colum Casvellyn had done to me was exactly the sort of trick he would have played on a woman; and yet he would be outraged because this had happened to his daughter. As my mother had said so often, there was no reasoning with him.

Now he talked fiercely about what he called the cult of Satan. My mother said that witchcraft had stayed with us; it belonged to the days before Christianity came to our land. It was a part of the religion of the ancients. It was anti-Christianity; it was worship of the Horned G.o.d whom Christians called the Devil.

She, who had studied the subject, was knowledgeable about it. She said that the Sabbats were in fact a kind of religious ceremony in which the Horned G.o.d was worshipped; and because there was a need to people the earth, the dances performed at the feet of the horned G.o.d were in fact fertility rites.

My father watched her sardonically as she talked-a mixture of pride and derision in his glance. Fennimore said that this was so and the way in which to wipe out witchcraft was not to torture and kill defenceless old women but to lure them from their beliefs in this old pagan religion and make Christians of them.

"Oh, you are a reformer," said my father with a laugh.

"Well, perhaps that is not such a bad thing to be," replied Fennimore.

"It is a very good thing to be," said my mother, smiling at him warmly. There was no doubt that she was very fond of Fennimore.

She managed to turn the subject back to the ever-interesting one of trade and the new project for it was clear that my father might become too dogmatic and introduce a discordant note.

And so the unfortunate incident of the witch's hanging was forgotten and the rest of the day pa.s.sed pleasantly.

In the morning the Landors left. Plans had been made; ships were being converted, the new enterprise was about to begin.

I was now certain, and as the fearful truth dawned on me that as a result of that extraordinary night I was going to have a child I felt as though the bars of a cage were forming round me.

I knew of course that I must tell my mother. My father had left on a short voyage and I chose the time while he was away. I asked her to come to my bedchamber as I had something very important to say to her.

I faced her there and blurted out: "Mother, I am with child."

She stared at me in disbelief and I saw the colour leave her face.

"Linnet. No!"

"I fear it is true."

"Fennimore ..." she began. "I am surprised ..."

"No, not Fennimore, Mother."

I was trying hard to find the right words and they would not come.

"Not ... Fennimore!" She was frankly bewildered.

Then the words started to tumble out. "It was that night. He ... he took me to Castle Paling. It was there ..."

"That man!" she cried.

I nodded. "You ... he ... You love him?" she demanded.

I shut my eyes and shook my head. I could hear his mocking laughter. Did I remember it from that night? Had it penetrated my drugged senses?

"He took me to his castle and there ... I don't know what happened. I was exhausted. He had a room made ready for me ... a room with a four-poster bed. He took me to a room where food was laid out. He said he was sending his servants to find you. I ate and drank ... and that is all. The next morning I awoke in the four-poster bed ... I was naked and different ... and he was there ..."

"My G.o.d," cried my mother. "Your father will kill him."

"So I feared."

"You told me nothing."

"I was unsure ..."

The horror had given way to love. She had taken me in her arms and was rocking me as though I were a baby. "My little Linnet," she said. "Don't fret. We will do something. I could kill him myself."

The burden had dropped away from me as I knew it would when I told her. She would find some answer. She always had. All my problems had been taken to her and when she knew them they had ceased to be insuperable.

She sat down on my bed, her arm about me.

"Linnet," she said, "what do you remember of that night?"

"I'm not sure. Sometimes I think I remember something ... sometimes I believe I have imagined it. I was at the table and he filled my goblet. He said I was exhausted and needed refreshment."

"The devil!" she cried. "Oh Linnet, sometimes I hate men." I knew she was thinking of my father. I knew a little of her stormy life and I believe that she had been ill-used. I knew that I had a brother Roberto who was somewhere in Spain, the son of her first strange marriage; I knew that my father had his b.a.s.t.a.r.d sons. And I wished I had confided in her long ago. "And then?" she prompted.

"Then? I drank and the haziness came over me ... Everything seemed to slip away. I was aware of him. I think I knew he lifted me up and carried me. Then I woke and it was morning and I knew what happened."

She was silent, and her arms tightened about me.

"I have been so frightened," I added.

"You should have told me before, Linnet. But never mind, I know now."

"What can I do?" I asked.

She stroked my hair. "Never fear, we'll find a way. When your father knows he will go to Castle Paling. It could be the end of one of them."

"Yet he ..." I began.

"Yes," she said. "Yet he. But men are illogical. What he will think an ordinary occurrence for himself is a violent outrage when performed by others. You are his beloved daughter; it is the daughters of others who may be ill-used." She laughed, a sad bitter little laugh; and she went on stroking my hair. "I wish you had told me before, dearest. I cannot bear to think of your keeping this to yourself. How was he ... this ... man in the morning?"

"He laughed at me. He said that I had not resisted him. He said I had joined him in a merry bed and it was as much my wishing as his."

"He is indeed a scoundrel. You must hate him."

"I do, and ..."

"I think I understand," she said. "Do you remember anything of what happened during that night?"

"I am not sure. Is it possible that I could not be sure?"

"I think it is. But that night is over. Nothing can alter what happened then. You are carrying his child. You are sure, Linnet?"

"I think so, Mother."

"We must make sure. But I would not have anyone know of this yet ... not even my physician. What we have to think of is what we can do. You are unmarried and pregnant, and the man who wishes to marry you is not the father. If only it had been Fennimore, but Fennimore would not have behaved so."

"He is quite different from Fennimore."

"That man," cried my mother. "His arrogance in the inn and everyone afraid of him. A plague on these men who think everyone in the world is put there to serve them. But let us think what must be done. That is of the utmost importance to us now, Linnet. There are herbs, of course. Maggie Enfield could have given them, but alas is hanging on her gibbet, poor soul. There are others but I fear that sort of thing, Linnet. It is not for you. Fennimore is a good man. He is a tolerant man and that is rare. I had set my heart on your marrying him."

"I cannot do that now."

"It is not impossible. What if we told him the truth?"

"You mean you would ask him to father another man's child?"

"If he loves you, he would."

"I could not ask him to do that."

"I could explain what had happened ..."

I shook my head. "It is impossible, Mother. Colum Casvellyn would know the child was his. On that morning he hinted that I might already be with child."

"The man is indeed a devil."

"He would not let it be forgotten. He lives too near. He might want the child ... if it were a son."

"That could be so," said my mother. "There seems to me but one thing. You must go to London. I will take you to my mother. She will care for you and the child can be born there. It can be said that you are a widow whose husband is recently dead. It's so far away none will be able to prove otherwise. My mother will be delighted to care for you and the child. You will be happy there."

"And leave you?"

"The time comes, Linnet, when mothers and daughters must part."

"And you wanted me to marry Fennimore that we might always be quite near."

"Not only that, Linnet. I wanted it because I felt that Fennimore is a good man who would be kind to you. I longed to hear you say that you were betrothed."

"So might we have been but for that night."

"Your father must not know. I fear that man. I feared him when he strode into the inn. I had an uneasy feeling that he was going to bring some evil to us. When we left the inn that morning I felt such an immense relief that it seemed out of all proportion to what had happened. Now I understand it. If we had only taken a different road."

"You can always say that of life, Mother. It is always a matter of taking the wrong or the right road."

"Now we must be sure to take the right one. I'm glad you have told me, Linnet. Together we will find the solution to this. But there must be little delay. No one here must know that you are pregnant. It is early yet." She calculated swiftly. "It is not yet two months. If we go to my mother we must do so within the next month."

"What will my father say?"

"We shall have to be very careful with him. He is expecting an announcement of your marriage to Fennimore. He will not understand this sudden desire to go to London and may well oppose it. That could delay us. You know his impatience. Now he has decided to throw in his lot with the Landors he wants you wedded and providing him with grandsons to continue with the business when they come of an age to do so. It is the best way, Linnet. In fact I think it is the only way. You might of course tell Fennimore. He would be discreet. No one can blame you. And who knows he might be ready to marry you."

"I couldn't, Mother, not with the child."

"You would grow used to the idea. Perhaps it would be best."

"Please do not tell him."