The House on the Strand

CHAPTER SIX

THIS TIME, SITTING motionless with my back against the hedge and my eyes shut, I would try to pin-point the moment of transition. On the previous occasions I had been walking, the first time across fields, the second up the churchyard path, when the vision altered. Now it would surely happen otherwise, because I was concentrating on the moment of impact. The sense of well-being would come, like a burden being lifted, and with it the sensation of lightness as feeling went from my body. No panic today, and no dismal falling rain. It was even warm, and the sun must be breaking through the clouds — I could sense the brightness through my closed eyelids. I took a last pull at the fag-end of my cigarette and let it drop.

If this drowsy content lasted much longer I might even fall asleep. Even the birds were rejoicing in the burst of sunshine; I could hear a blackbird singing in the hedge somewhere behind me, and more delightfully still a cuckoo called from the valley, distant at first, then near at hand. I listened to the call, a favourite sound, connected in my mind with every sort of carefree boyhood ramble thirty years ago. There, he called again, immediately overhead.

I opened my eyes and watched him wing his strange, unsteady flight across the sky, and as he did so I remembered that it was late July. The cuckoo's brief English summer ceased in June, along with the blackbird's song, and the primroses that were blooming in the bank beside me would have withered by mid-May. This warmth and brightness belonged to another world, an earlier spring. It had happened, despite concentration, in a moment of time that had not registered in my brain. All the sharp green colour of that first day was spread about me on the sloping hill below, and the valley with its tapestry of birch and willow lay submerged beneath a sheet of water, part of a great winding estuary that cut into the land, bordered by sandbanks where the water shallowed. I stood up, and saw how the river narrowed to mingle with the tumbling mill-stream below Treesmill, the farmhouse altered in shape, narrow, thatched, the hills opposite thickly forested with oak, the foliage young and tender because of spring. Immediately beneath me, where the field had shelved precipitously to the railway cutting, the ground took on a gentler slope, in the midst of which a broad track ran to the estuary, the track terminating in a quay beside which boats were anchored, the channel there being deep, forming a natural pool. A larger vessel was moored in mid-stream, her sail partly stowed. I could hear the voices of the men aboard her singing, and as I watched a smaller boat alongside pushed off to ferry someone ashore, and the voices were suddenly hushed, as the passenger in the small boat lifted his hand for silence. Now I looked around me, and the hedge had gone, the hill behind me was thickly wooded like the hills opposite, and to my left, where there had been scrub and gorse, a long stone wall encircled a dwelling-house; I could see the roof-top above the surrounding trees. The path from the quay led straight uphill to the house.

I drew nearer, watching the man below descend from the boat at the quay, then proceed to climb the road towards me. As he did so the cuckoo called again, flying overhead, and the man looked up to watch it, pausing for breath as he climbed, his action so ordinary, so natural, that it endeared him to me for no reason except that he lived, and I was a ghost in time. A time, moreover, that was not constant, for yesterday it had been Martinmas, and now, by the cuckoo's call and the Primroses in flower, it must be spring. He came close, breasting the hill, and as I recognised him, though his expression was graver, more solemn than that of the preceding day, the analogy came to me that these faces were like the diamonds, hearts and spades in some well-thumbed pack of cards shuffled by a patience-player; however they were sorted, they still formed themselves into a combination that the player could not guess at. I did not know, nor they, how the game would go. It was Otto Bodrugan climbing the hill, followed by his son Henry, and, when he raised his hand in greeting, so instinctive was the gesture that I raised mine in answer, and even smiled; but I should have known the futility of my action, for father and son brushed past me towards the entrance gate of the house, and Roger the steward came forward to greet them. He must have been standing there watching them approach, but I had not seen him. Gone was the festive air of yesterday, the mocking smile of the would-be go-between; he wore a dark tunic, as did Bodrugan and his son, and his manner was as grave as theirs.

"What news?" asked Bodrugan.

Roger shook his head. "He is sinking fast," he said. "There is little hope for him. My lady Joanna is within, and all the family. Sir William Ferrers is already come from Bere, accompanied by the lady Matilda. Sir Henry does not suffer, we have seen to that — or, to speak more plainly, Brother Jean has done so, for he has been at the bedside night and day."

"And the cause?"

"Nothing but the general weakness of which you know, and a sudden chill with that late frost we had. He wanders in his mind, speaking of his grievous faults and asking pardon. The parish priest heard his confession, but, not content with that, he begged to be shriven by Brother Jean as well, and has received the last rites." Roger stood aside to let Bodrugan and his son pass through the entrance gates, and now the extent of the building came into view, stone-walled with tiled roof fronting upon a court, an outside staircase leading to an upper chamber, the steps similar to those serving a farmhouse granary today. There were stables at the rear, and beyond the walls the track wound uphill towards Tywardreath, the thatched cottages of the serfs who tilled the surrounding lands scattered on either side of it. Dogs ran barking across the court at our approach, crouching low, ears flat, as Roger shouted at them, and a scared-faced servant emerged from a corner of the building to drive them off. Bodrugan and his son Henry crossed the threshold, with Roger in attendance, and I his shadow close behind. We had entered a long, narrow hall, extending the full width of the house, small casement windows giving upon the court on the eastern side and looking down to the estuary on the west. There was an open hearth at the far end, the banked turf barely smoking, and across the width of the room was a trestle table, with benches alongside. The hall was dark, partly because of the small windows and the smoke that lingered in the atmosphere, partly because the walls were plastered a deep vermilion, giving the whole a rich and sombre air. There were three youngsters straddling the benches, two boys and a girl, their sprawling attitude of dejection suggesting a numb bewilderment at the approach of death rather than actual sorrow. I recognised the eldest, William Champernoune, who had been presented to the Bishop; he was the first to rise now and come forward to greet his uncle and cousin, while the younger two, after momentary hesitation, followed his example. Otto Bodrugan bent to embrace all three, and then, as children will at the sudden entrance of adults in a moment of stress, they seized the opportunity to escape from the room, taking their cousin Henry with them.

Now I had leisure to observe the other occupants of the room. Two of them I had not seen before — a man and a woman, the man light-haired, bearded, the woman stout, with a sharp expression which boded ill for those who crossed her. She was already dressed in black, ready for calamity when it came, her white coif contrasting with her dark gown. This must be Sir William Ferrers, who, so Roger had said, had come post-haste from Devon, and his wife Matilda. The third occupant of the room, who was sitting on a low stool, was no stranger; it was my girl Isolda. She had made her own gesture to impending mourning by wearing lilac; but the silver sheen of the dress glistened, and a lilac ribbon, looping her braided hair away from her face, had been placed there with care. The prevailing mood seemed to be one of tension, and Matilda Ferrers wore an expression of high dudgeon which spoke of trouble. "We expected you long since," was her immediate reproof to the new arrival, Otto Bodrugan, as he advanced towards her chair. "Does it take so many hours to sail across the bay, or did you delay purposely that your men might amuse themselves fishing?"

He kissed her hand, ignoring the reproach, and exchanged a glance with the man behind her chair. "How are you, William?" he said. "One hour from my anchorage to this, which was fair going, with the wind abeam. It would have taken longer had we ridden."

William nodded, with an imperceptible shrug, used to his lady's temper. "I thought as much," he murmured. "You could not have come sooner, and in any event there is nothing you can do."

"Nothing he can do?" echoed Matilda. "Except support us all when the moment comes, and add his voice to ours. Dismiss the French monk from the bedside and that drunken parish priest from the kitchen. If he cannot use a brother's authority and persuade Joanna to listen to reason, nobody can."

Bodrugan turned to Isolda. He barely brushed her hand in greeting, nor did she look up at him and smile. The constraint between them surely was due to caution: one word of too great intimacy would draw comment. November… May… Six months must have passed, in my leap through time, since the reception at the Priory for the Bishop's visitation.

"Where is Joanna?" asked Bodrugan.

"In the chamber above," replied William, and now I saw the family likeness to Isolda. This was William Ferrers, her brother, but at least ten, perhaps fifteen, years older, his face lined, his light hair turning grey. "You are aware of the trouble," he continued. "Henry will have no one near him but the French monk Jean, receives no treatment but from his hands, and refuses the surgeon who came with us from Devon and stands in high repute. Now, the treatment having failed, he is fallen into a coma and the end is near, probably within a few hours."

"If such is Henry's wish and he is not suffering, what is there to complain of?" asked Bodrugan.

"Because it is ill done!" exclaimed Matilda. "Henry has even expressed a wish to be buried in the Priory chapel, which should be withstood on every account. We all know the reputation of the Priory, the lax behaviour of the Prior, the lack of discipline amongst the monks. Such a resting-place for someone of Henry's standing would make fools of all of us in the eyes of the world."

"Whose world?" asked Bodrugan. "Does yours embrace the whole of England or only Devon?"

Matilda crimsoned. "We know well enough where your allegiance lay seven years past", she said, "supporting an adulterous Queen against her son, the lawful King. Doubtless all things French have your attachment, from invading forces, should they cross the Channel, to dissolute monks serving a foreign Order."

Her husband William laid a restraining hand upon her shoulder. "We gain nothing by opening old wounds," he said. "Otto's part in that rebellion does not concern us now. However…" he glanced at Bodrugan, "Matilda has a point. It might not be politic for a Champernoune to be interred amongst French monks. It would be more fitting if you would let him lie at Bodrugan, seeing that Joanna holds much of your manor fee as her marriage portion. Or I should be most happy for him to be buried at Bere, where we are rebuilding the church at the present time. After all, Henry is my cousin: the connection is almost as close as your own."

"Oh, for the love of God," Isolda broke in impatiently, "let Henry lie where he will. Must we conduct ourselves like butchers haggling over a sheep's carcase before the beast is slain?"

It was the first time I had heard her voice. She spoke in French, like the rest, with the same nasal intonation, but perhaps because she was younger than they, and I was prejudiced, I found the quality more musical, holding a ring of clarity theirs did not possess. Matilda at once burst into tears, to the consternation of her husband, while Bodrugan strode over to the window and stared moodily at the view beyond. As for Isolda, who had caused the commotion, she tapped her foot impatiently, an expression of disdain upon her face.

I glanced at Roger standing beside me. He was making a supreme effort to conceal a smile. Then he stepped forward, his attitude one of respect towards all present, and observed to no one in particular, but I suspected to catch Isolda's eye, "If you wish, I will tell my lady of Sir Otto's arrival."

Nobody answered, and Roger, taking silence for acquiescence, bowed and withdrew. He climbed the stairway to the upper chamber, I following close upon his heels as if some thread bound us together. He entered without knocking, pushing aside the heavy hangings that masked the entrance to the room, which was half the size of the hall beneath, most of the space taken up by a draped bed at the further end. The small, pane-less windows gave little light, the aperture tight closed by oiled parchment, while the lighted candles standing on the trestle table at the bed's foot threw monstrous shadows on ochre-coloured walls. There were three people in the room, Joanna, a monk, and the dying man. Henry de Champernoune was propped up in the bed by a great bolster that thrust him forward, forcing his chin upon his breast, and a white cloth was bound round his head turban fashion, giving him an incongruous likeness to an Arab sheik. His eyes were closed, and judging by the pallor of his face he was on the point of death. The monk was bending to stir something in a bowl on the trestle table, and he lifted his head as we entered. It was the young man with the brilliant eyes who had served the Prior as secretary or clerk on my first visit to the Priory. He said nothing but continued stirring, and Roger turned to Joanna, who was seated at the other end of the room. She was perfectly composed, without a sign of grief on her face, and was engaged in drawing threads of coloured silk through a frame to form a pattern.

"Are they all here?" she asked, without turning her eyes from the frame.

"Those who were bidden," answered the steward, "and already at odds with one another. Lady Ferrers first scolded the children for speaking too loud, and has now fallen out with Sir Otto, while Lady Carminowe, by her looks, wishes herself elsewhere. Sir John has not yet come."

"Nor likely to," replied Joanna. "I left the matter to his discretion. If he is premature in condolence it might be thought over-zealous on his part, and his sister Lady Ferrers will be the first to make mischief out of it."

"She is making mischief already," replied the steward.

"I'm aware of it. The sooner the business is over the better for all of us."

Roger crossed to the foot of the bed and looked down upon the helpless occupant. "How long now?" he asked the monk.

"He will not wake again. You may touch him if you will, he cannot feel it. We are only waiting for the heart to cease, and then my lady can announce his death."

Roger shifted his gaze from the bed to the small bowls on the trestle table. "What did you give him?"

"The same as before, meconium, the juice of the whole plant, in equal parts with henbane to the strength of a dram."

Roger looked at Joanna. "It would be as well if I removed these, lest there should be discussion as to the treatment. Lady Ferrers spoke of her own surgeon. They hardly dare go against your wishes, but there could be trouble."

Joanna, still employing herself with her skeins of silk, shrugged her shoulders.

"Take the ingredients if you will," she said, "though we have disposed of the liquids down the drain. The vessels you may remove if you consider it safer, but I hardly think Brother Jean has anything to fear. His discretion has been absolute."

She smiled at the young monk, who responded with one glance from his expressive eyes, and I wondered if he too, like the absent Sir John, had found favour during the weeks of her husband's illness. Between them, Roger and the monk, they made a package of the bowls, wrapping them in sacking, and all the while I could hear the murmur of voices from the hall below, suggesting that Lady Ferrers had recovered from her fit of crying and was in full spate again.

"How is my brother Otto taking it?" asked Joanna.

"He made no comment when Sir William suggested that interment in Bodrugan chapel would be preferable to the Priory. I think he is hardly likely to interfere. Sir William proposed his own church at Bere as an alternative."

"To what purpose?"

"For self-aggrandisement, perhaps — who knows? I would not recommend it. Once they had Sir Henry's body in their hands there could be meddling. Whereas in the Priory Chapel—"

"All would be well. Sir Henry's wishes observed, and ourselves at peace. I look to you to see there is no trouble with the tenants, Roger. The people have no great love of the Priory."

"There'll be no trouble if they are treated well at the funeral feast," he answered. "A promise of mitigation of fines at the next court and a pardon for all misdemeanours. That should content them."

"Let us hope so." She pushed aside her frame and, rising from her chair, went to the bed. "Is he living still?" she asked. The monk took the lifeless wrist in his hand and felt the pulse, then lowered his head to listen to his patient's heart.

"Barely," he answered. "You may light the candles if you will, and by the time the family has been summoned he will have gone."

They might have been talking of some wornout piece of furniture that had lost its use, instead of a woman's husband on the point of death. Joanna returned to her chair, took up a piece of black veiling, and began to drape it round her head and shoulders. Then she seized a looking-glass made of silver from the table near at hand.

"Should I wear it thus", she asked the steward, "or covering my face?"

"More fitting to be covered," he told her, "unless you can weep at will."

"I have not wept since my wedding-day," she answered. The monk Jean crossed the dying man's hands upon his breast and fastened a linen bandage about his jaw. He stood back to observe his work, and as a finishing touch placed a crucifix between the folded hands. Meanwhile Roger was rearranging the trestle table. "How many candles do you require?" he asked.

"Five on the day of death," replied the monk," in honour of the five wounds of Our Lord Jesus Christ. Have you a black coverlet for the bed?"

"In the chest yonder," said Joanna, and while monk and steward draped the bed with its black pall she looked in the mirror for the last time, before covering her face with the veil.

"If I may presume," murmured the monk, "it would make the better impression if my lady knelt beside the bed and I stationed myself at the foot. Then when the family comes into the chamber I can recite the Prayers for the Dead. Unless you prefer the parish priest to do so?"

"He is too drunk to mount the stairs," said Roger. "If Lady Ferrers has one glimpse of him it will be his finish."

"Then leave him alone," said Joanna, "and let us proceed. Roger, will you descend and summon them? William first, for he is the heir." She knelt beside the bed, head bowed in grief, but raised it before we left the room, saying over her shoulder to the steward, "It cost my brother Sir Otto near on fifty marks at Bodrugan when my father died, not counting the beasts that were slaughtered for the funeral feast. We must not be out-done. Spare no expense."

Roger drew aside the hangings by the door, and I followed him on to the steps outside. The contrast between the bright day without and the murky atmosphere within must have struck him as forcibly as it did me, for he paused at the top of the steps and looked down over the surrounding walls to the gleaming waters of the estuary below. The sails of Bodrugan's ship were furled loosely on the yard as she lay at anchor, and a fellow in a small boat astern skulled to and fro in search of fish. The youngsters from the house had wandered down the hillside to stare at their uncle's boat. Henry, Bodrugan's son, was pointing out something to his cousin William, and the dogs leapt about them, barking once again.

I realised at that moment, more strongly than hitherto, how fantastic, even macabre, was my presence amongst them, unseen, unborn, a freak in time, witness to events that had happened centuries past, unremembered, unrecorded; and I wondered how it was that standing here on the steps, watching yet invisible, I could so feel myself involved, troubled, by these loves and deaths. The man who was dying might have been a relative from my own lost world of youth — my father, even, who had died in spring when I was about the age of young William down there in the field. The cable from the Far East — he had been killed fighting the Japanese — arrived just as my mother and I had finished lunch, staying in an hotel in Wales for the Easter holidays. She went up to her bedroom and shut the door, and I hung about the hotel drive, aware of loss but unable to cry, dreading the sympathetic glance of the girl at the reception desk if I went indoors.

Roger, carrying the piece of sacking containing the bowls stained by herb-juices, descended to the court, and went through an archway at the further end leading to a stable-yard. What servants made up the household seemed to be gathered there, but at the steward's approach they broke up their gossip and scattered, all but one lad whom I had seen that first day and recognised, by his likeness to the horseman, as Roger's brother. Roger summoned him to his side with a jerk of his head.

"It is over," he said. "Ride to the Priory at once and inform the Prior, that he may give orders for tolling the bell. Work will cease when the men hear the summons, and they will start to come in from the fields, and assemble on the green. Directly you have delivered your message to the Prior ride on home and place this package in the cellar, then wait for my return. I have much to do, and may not be back tonight." The boy nodded, and disappeared into the stables. Roger passed through the archway into the court once more. Otto Bodrugan was standing at the entrance to the house. Roger hesitated a moment, then crossed the court to him.

"My lady asks you to go to her," he said, "with Sir William and Lady Ferrers and the lady Isolda. I will call William and the children."

"Is Sir Henry worse?" asked Bodrugan.

"He is dead, Sir Otto. Not five minutes since, without recovering consciousness, peacefully, in his sleep."

"I am sorry," said Bodrugan, "but it is better so. I pray God we may both go as peacefully when our time comes, though undeservedly." Both men crossed themselves. Automatically I did the same. "I will tell the others," he continued. "Lady Ferrers may go into hysterics, but no matter. How is my sister?"

"Calm, Sir Otto."

"I expected it."

Bodrugan paused before turning into the house. "You are aware", he said, and there was something hesitant in his manner, "that William, being a minor, will forfeit his lands to the King until he attains his majority?"

"I am, Sir Otto."

"The confiscation would be little more than a formality in ordinary circumstances," Bodrugan went on. "As William's uncle by marriage, and therefore his legal guardian, I should be empowered to administer his estates, with the King as overlord. But the circumstances are not ordinary, owing to the part I took in the so-called rebellion." The steward maintained discreet silence, his face inscrutable. "Therefore", said Bodrugan, "the escheator acting for the minor and the King is likely to be one held in greater esteem than myself — his cousin Sir John Carminowe, in all probability. In that event, I don't doubt he will arrange matters smoothiy for my sister." The irony in his voice was unmistakable.

Roger inclined his head without replying, and Bodrugan went into the house. The steward's slow smile of satisfaction was instantly suppressed as the young Champernounes, with their cousin Henry, entered the court, laughing and chatting, having momentarily forgotten the imminence of death. Henry, the eldest of the party, was the first to sense, intuitively, what must have happened. He called the younger pair to silence, and motioned William to come forward. I saw the expression on the boy's face change from carefree laughter to apprehension, and I guessed how sudden dread must have turned his stomach sick. "Is it my father?" he asked.

Roger nodded. "Take your brother and sister with you", he said, "and go to your mother. Remember, you are the eldest; she will look to you for support in the days to come."

The boy clutched at the steward's arm. "You will remain with us, will you not?" he asked. "And my uncle Otto too?"

"We shall see," answered Roger. "But you are the head of the family now." William made a supreme effort at self-control. He turned and faced his younger brother and sister and said, "Our father is dead. Please follow me," and walked into the house, head erect, but very pale. The children, startled, did as they were told, taking their cousin Henry's hand, and glancing at Roger I saw, for the first time, something of compassion on his face, and pride as well; the boy he must have known from cradle days had not disgraced himself. He waited a few moments, then followed them.

The hall appeared deserted. A tapestry hanging at the far end near the hearth had been drawn aside, showing a small stairway to the upper room, by which Otto Bodrugan and the Ferrers must have ascended, and the children too. I could hear the shuffle of feet overhead, then silence, followed by the low murmur of the monk's voice, Requiem aeternam dona eis, Domine, et lux perpetua luceat eis.

I said the hall appeared deserted, and so it was, but for the slender figure in lilac: Isolda was the only member of the group who had not gone to the room above. At sight of her Roger paused on the threshold, before moving forward with deference.

"Lady Carminowe does not wish to pay tribute with the rest of the family?" he asked.

Isolda had not noticed him standing there by the entrance, but now she turned her head and looked at him direct, and there was so much coldness in her eyes that standing where I was, beside the steward, they seemed to sweep me with the same contempt as they did him.

"It is not my practice to make a mockery of death," she said.

If Roger was surprised he gave no sign of it, but made the same deferential gesture as before. "Sir Henry would be grateful for your prayers," he said.

"He has had them with regularity for many years," she answered, "and with increasing fervour these past weeks."

The edge in her voice was evident to me, and must have been doubly so to the steward. "Sir Henry has ailed ever since making the pilgrimage to Campostella," he replied. "They say Sir Ralph de Beaupr+® suffers today from the same sickness. It is a wasting fever, there is no cure for it. Sir Henry had so little regard for his own person that it was hard to treat him. I can assure you that everything possible was done."

"I understand Sir Ralph Beaupr+® retains full possession of his faculties despite his fever," Isolda replied. "My cousin did not. He recognised none of us for a month or more, yet his brow was cool, the fever was not high."

"No two men are alike in sickness," Roger answered. "What will save the one will trouble the other. If Sir Henry wandered in his mind it was his misfortune."

"Made the more effective by the potions given him," she said. "My grandmother, Isolda de Cardinham, had a treatise on herbs, written by a learned doctor who went to the Crusades, and she bequeathed it to me when she died, because I was her namesake. I am no stranger to the seeds of the black poppy and the white, water hemlock, mandragora, and the sleep they can induce."

Roger, startled out of his attitude of deference, did not answer her at once. Then he said, "These herbs are used by all apothecaries for easing pain. The monk, Jean de Meral, was trained in the parent-house at Angers and is especially skilled. Sir Henry himself had implicit faith in him."

"I don't doubt Sir Henry's faith, the monk's skill, or his zeal in employing that skill, but a healing plant can turn malign if the dose is increased," replied Isolda.

She had made her challenge, and he knew it. I remembered that trestle table at the foot of the bed, and the bowls upon it, now carefully wrapped in sacking and carried away.

"This is a house of mourning," said Roger, "and will continue so for several days. I advise you to speak of this matter to my lady, not to me. It is none of my business."

"Nor mine either," replied Isolda. "I speak through attachment to my cousin, and because I am not easily fooled. You might remember it."

One of the children started crying overhead, and there was a sudden lull in the murmur of prayers, the sound of movement, and the scurrying of footsteps down the stairs. The daughter of the house — she could not have been more than ten — came running into the room, and flung herself into Isolda's arms.

"They say he is dead", she said, "yet he opened his eyes and looked at me, just once, before closing them again. No one else saw, they were too busy with their prayers. Did he mean that I must follow him to the grave?"

Isolda held the child to her protectively, staring over her shoulder at Roger all the while, and suddenly she said, "If anything evil has been done this day or yesterday, you will be held responsible, with others, when the time comes. Not in this world, where we lack proof but in the next, before God."

Roger moved forward, with some impulse, I think, to silence her or take the child from her, and I stepped into his path to prevent him, but stumbled, catching my foot in a loose stone. And there was nothing about me but great mounds of earth and hillocks of grass, gorse-bushes and the root of a dead tree, and behind me a large pit, circular in shape like a quarry, full of old tins and fallen slate. I caught hold of a twisted stem of withered gorse, retching violently, and in the distance I could hear the hoot of a diesel engine as it rattled below me in the valley.