The Unseen

2

2011

Leah read the soldier’s letter, a frown creasing the skin between her brows. Ryan stretched out his hand, smoothed the line away with his thumb, making her jump.

‘Don’t!’ she gasped, snatching her head away from him.

‘Touchy,’ Ryan sighed. He smiled as he leant away, but Leah could tell he was annoyed. She felt a quick flash of triumph, and was instantly irritated with herself.

‘But this can’t be the original?’ she asked.

‘Of course not – it’s been transcribed. The original paper is incredibly fragile. Where water has got in – and there wasn’t much, he did a great job of sealing the tin – it’s destroyed the envelope. In other words, the name of the person it was addressed to. Our mysterious soldier.’

‘And she calls him “Dear sir”. Not very helpful,’ Leah murmured.

‘No, but then I wouldn’t need you if she’d given us his name.’ Leah raised her gaze at his choice of words. ‘Intriguing though, isn’t it?’ Ryan said.

‘That it is,’ she agreed. ‘How had he sealed the tin?’

‘With candle wax, it looks like. Melted and rubbed smooth all the way around.’

‘So, would that have been easy to do? Something he would do every day, or did he only take the letter out to read once in a while?’

‘Who can say? I think it was a thorough job, probably quite time consuming. I don’t think he would have opened and resealed it every day.’ Ryan shrugged.

‘So it was special, this letter?’

‘I would say so, yes. Read it out, so I can hear it again,’ he suggested.

The Rectory,

Cold Ash Holt

Dear sir,

I scarcely know how to begin this letter, since I have sent so many, and received so little answer to any of them prior to now. So little, I say – when I should say none at all. I can’t imagine the situation in which you now find yourself, and can only assume that, when I had thought such would be impossible, it is indeed worse than the situation you left behind. The thought of your constant peril is most dreadful – you and your comrades. Please do try to keep yourself safe, if safe is a word that has any meaning on the battlefield. I discovered your departure to the front only recently, and only by chance – the casual mentioning by an acquaintance of the deployment of men such as yourself. I know that you and I parted on strange terms, and our time together was not the easiest; but even though you did not reply to any of my letters when you were relatively close by, I still feel worse knowing that you are no longer on English soil.

So, what can I write? What can I write that I have not written already? I do not understand. I live in fear. I am wretched and ignorant and you are my only hope of coming out of this fog. But you cannot or will not help me, nor break your silence. What can I do? I am but a woman. Such a feeble statement but, alone, I have neither the strength nor the courage to effect a change of any kind. I am quite trapped. How pathetic I must sound, to you who have been through so much since we parted, and who has had to endure things I can’t imagine.

My son thrives. This, then, is some good news I can impart. He thrives. He will soon be three years old – where has the time gone? Close to four dark years have passed, and Thomas the only ray of light in all of it. He runs around the house and garden like a little dervish. He is not tall for his age, I am told, but his legs and body are sturdy, and his constitution good. He has yet to suffer seriously from any infection or childhood affliction. He has brown hair that curls a little, and brown eyes. Light brown eyes. I let his hair grow too long because I love brushing it so! My sister says he is too old for the style, and people will take him for a little girl, but I intend to leave it a while yet. He has started counting, and can memorise songs and rhymes in an instant – his mind is quick, quicker than mine, I dare say. I hope it gladdens you, to hear about Thomas.

I can’t think what else to write. Everything has been so strange and dark since that summer. I wish I could make better sense of it, but then I think I would be too afraid to do anything if my suspicions were confirmed to be true. Too afraid to stay in my home another second, and where would that leave me? My sister might have me for a while, I know. But she could not have me for ever – she and her husband have four children now, and there simply isn’t the room for Thomas and I. Will you please write to me? Tell me what you know about what happened that summer – I beg of you! Even if you think your answers will not bring me ease, I must know. To live in fear and suspicion is intolerable, though I have borne it these four years. I have written to you before of what I found, in the library that morning. The things I found. I am sure I wrote of them to you, although my mind was badly shaken at the time. It was all like the worst kind of dream. I would wake, in the days afterwards, and be happy for two heartbeats, but then I would remember it all, and it seemed as though the very sun grew dimmer. Does hiding what I found make me complicit in the crime? I fear it does, but I’m sure there are few who would have done differently. Perhaps this is not true. Perhaps I am weak and fearful and lacking in moral courage. What then of you, and your silence? Write to me, I beg you. Do not leave me here with only guesses and secrets, dogging my very steps each day.

With warm regards,

H. Canning

They were sitting in a restaurant in the village of Watou, a fair drive from Poperinge where Leah was staying, and Ryan was based. It’s worth the trip, he’d said, to her questioning glance as they drove out of town. He was right. The food was delicious, the ambience quiet but with a low buzz of chatter from a steady stream of locals turning up for their evening meal. Outside, rain pounded the deserted road, fizzing in the flooded gutters, scattering the street light across the window pane.

‘Don’t you just long for summer?’ Leah sighed, staring out at it.

‘I like it like this, remember? I like the dark months,’ Ryan replied, pouring more red wine into her glass.

‘That’s right. I’d forgotten.’

‘Forgetting me already.’ Ryan shook his head. Leah said nothing. They both knew that would be impossible. To forget. She looked up at him, face lit by the candle on the table between them. What was it inside her that pulled her towards him? Something inexorable, like gravity. It would be so much easier to give in to it, in much the same way, she told herself firmly, as it would be easier to let go and fall off a cliff than it would be to haul oneself back onto solid ground. So much easier. The wine was warming her blood, she felt it colour her cheeks. ‘You look half cut,’ Ryan said. His smile mocked her gently, familiarity and tenderness softening his expression, blurring away the bad memories.

‘Wasn’t that your intention?’ Leah asked. Ryan shook his head.

‘You’ve always known your own mind. I’ve never relied on alcohol to change it for me.’

‘Liar.’ She smiled; and Ryan grinned.

‘It’s really good to see you, Leah. I don’t think I got around to telling you that yet.’ He put out a hand, fiddled with the wax drips on the candle shaft, frowning slightly as if gripped by deep and troubling thoughts. Oh, you were always good at this game, Leah thought. Always good at making her come forward, making her take a closer look.

‘I’m not going to sleep with you,’ she said, flatly; more abruptly than she’d intended.

Ryan snatched his hand back from the candle as if he’d been burnt. ‘I don’t remember asking you to,’ he countered, seemingly unruffled.

They talked as their plates were cleared and they ordered dessert; but the more they spoke, the more obvious it became that there were things they could not speak about, and they drifted into silence, odd and uncomfortable.

‘I wonder why he kept that letter? She says she wrote him lots, before he came over to the continent. Why that one in particular? It’s not much of a love letter after all,’ Leah said at last. The waiter brought their desserts – profiteroles, drenched in a slick of glossy Suchard sauce. He put the bowls down with a flourish, turning each one just so with the tips of his fingers, as if the exact position of them was of the utmost importance. Leah caught his eye and smiled fleetingly.

‘I think our garçon fancies you,’ Ryan said.

‘I think you’re imagining it. You always did.’

‘Except in Turkey.’

‘OK, I’ll give you Turkey. But it wasn’t me that got to them – it was the blue eyes and the yellow hair.’

‘I could have been rich. One of them offered me his house for you,’ Ryan grinned.

‘I wasn’t yours to sell,’ she retorted. ‘Besides, he was about sixteen. Probably still lived at home with his mama.’

‘That wasn’t the only one,’ Ryan said, putting a whole profiterole into his mouth, which would barely close. Leah couldn’t help but laugh.

‘You pig! You’ve got chocolate on your chin. What wasn’t the only one?’

Ryan chewed for a long time before answering. ‘That wasn’t the only letter, in our soldier’s tin. There was another one.’

‘Really? Why didn’t you bring it? What does it say?’

‘It’s a lot shorter than the one I’ve shown you. And obviously written earlier – fairly soon after whatever it was happened, would be my guess. It’s a bit confused,’ he explained.

‘Well, where is it?’ Leah asked, dipping her little finger in the hot sauce and sucking it clean. Only with Ryan would she have done something so childish. It was treacherously easy to fall back into old habits of being, old habits of feeling.

‘It’s in my room,’ Ryan said, quietly.

The Rectory,

Cold Ash Holt

Dear sir,

The child is due any day now, and I am full of fear. How can I do this? You know of what I speak – I am sure you do. I might as well be alone in this house, surrounded only by ghosts. Do you see what you have done? Half of me wishes I had never known you. More than half of me, some of the time. I find myself trying to picture you now, trying to picture what you might look like without your usual clothes, without your books and your smile. All of those little icons that made you up – your ‘divine truth’. What of that now? Is it all abandoned, as I am?

Everything is ruined. I can’t even take pleasure in teaching any more, in the children, because as I stand on the floor before them, I know what lies beneath my feet. I told you what I did, didn’t I? I can scarce remember. I’d thought it would be only temporary, a place where nobody would think to look. Trying to find what I had already found, what I picked up from the library floor that morning. I was going to destroy it all, you see. Every last thing, but then I thought perhaps you might one day have need of it to offer proof, to offer mitigation. So there it stays, beneath the floor. I can scarce think of it without such a storm of dread arising in my heart that it leaves me weak, and shivering; let alone dare to move it, to touch it.

I think this child must be a boy, and a big one. I am quite unrecognisable, I am vast. The creature has taken over my body. He’s too big now to even move around and kick me like he did these last few months. He’s tight packed in, like the air in a balloon. How I wish he would stay there! I don’t know where I will find the strength to raise him with a pure heart, happy and carefree, when I labour under such shadows. Enough now. I am tired. Even writing a letter is enough to tire me out; and especially a letter to you, sir, when I come to know that I shall have no reply. Still I hope for it, and that tires me even more.

Wishing this letter brings you some comfort, in the cruel place where you are,

H. Canning

Again, Leah read, and reread. She read the letter a third time, but only because she did not trust herself to look up, to look at Ryan and to speak to him. How did it always come to this? She cursed inwardly. That liquid feeling, hot in the marrow of her bones, as though her resolve was an actual substance that could melt under pressure, rush off into her bloodstream and be quite lost. Ryan was not even that close to her. He was perched on the window sill opposite, and she was sitting on the edge of the bed, one hand holding back her hair as she read. He stood up so suddenly that Leah jumped.

‘More coffee?’ he offered, voice so casual that Leah doubted herself, doubted that he had feelings anything like her own.

‘No thanks.’ She didn’t look up.

‘Sounds like she was in a right pickle, doesn’t it?’ he asked, pouring hot water onto a fresh scattering of instant granules. ‘What do you make of it?’

‘I hardly know. Something dire happened. She was left to deal with the aftermath by herself, our guy buggered off somewhere, and then to the war. She thinks he knows something about what happened,’ Leah said. Now she looked up at him. His back was turned, it was safer. The long, loose shape of his spine, the broad spread of his shoulders beneath his shirt. Just flesh and skin and bone, no more than she; but still magic, somehow.

‘But they weren’t lovers?’ he said.

‘I don’t think so, no. She’d hardly call him “Dear sir” if they were, would she? Not even a hundred years ago. It’s a bit cold and formal.’

‘The content of the letters isn’t though, is it? Cold or formal, I mean,’ Ryan pointed out. He sat down next to her, too close, touching at thigh, hip, elbow. Leah felt a sinking inside, the pulling open of old wounds. It was an odd pain, almost satisfying; like tugging at a loose tooth, pressing a bruise. A bruise that went right the way through. She remembered his treachery, the flying apart of everything she thought she knew.

‘It is and then it isn’t. Very odd. It’s as though she’s trying to be proper about it all, but there’s no way to reconcile what she needs to say with that. And the way she’s so vague – it’s almost like she half expected someone else to get hold of the letters and read them, and she didn’t want to give too much away…’ Leah trailed off. Ryan had tucked her hair behind her ear for her, left his fingers to brush her cheek with a touch softer than snowflakes. Mutely, she met his eye.

‘So you’ll look into it then? Try to find out who he was?’ Ryan said. Leah nodded. ‘It’s like old times, watching you get stuck into a mystery. An… unexpected bonus.’

‘What do you mean? Didn’t you think I’d do it?’

‘No, I thought you’d deliberately avoid doing it just because I’d asked you to.’ He smiled.

‘I did think of that,’ she admitted. ‘I… part of the reason I came out here was for the chance to say no to you. To refuse you something.’ Tears blurred into her eyes and she wiped them away angrily.

‘You fell at the first hurdle,’ he said, softly. ‘You came out here in the first place. When I asked you to.’

‘I know. Not very good at this, am I?’

‘I don’t know. You’ve made me wait five months to see you. You made me come to Belgium to try to forget you.’

‘That’s a lie. You always wanted to come and work with the War Graves Commission,’ she said, struggling to find a toehold, something to grasp as she slipped further and further over the cliff edge.

‘Leah, I’ve missed you so much,’ Ryan whispered, his lips in her hair, words touching her skin like butterflies. In silence, Leah gave in.

When she woke it was to the sound of more rain, flecked with hail, tapping at the window pane. The little room was dark and gloomy, the bed crowded. Ryan was turned to the wall, his back to her, deeply asleep. Without moving a muscle, Leah scanned the room, made note of each item of her clothing, cast off the night before. For a second, she tried to find a way to undo what she’d done, knowing it was utterly futile. She shut her eyes and let despair wash through her. It was like being underground, being smothered, seeing no way out. I will never be free.

But then, scribbled across the red-black of her eyelids, came the words of the Canning woman’s letters. Everything is ruined. I was going to destroy it all… there it stays, beneath the floor; I labour under such shadows! There was something there to be discovered, some hidden story, some truth. Not just the identity of the dead soldier, but whatever it was that had caused this woman such anguish, such nightmares. And why it was that the man she wrote to never wrote back to her; and why it was that he kept only these two of her letters; and why it was that she thought he might one day have had something to prove, to mitigate, as she put it.

Like a lifeline, something to cling to, the loose threads of the story wound their way down to her. She could just about reach them, concentrating hard, bending all her will to it. The first thing she had to do was leave. Not even wake Ryan, or speak to him, or tell him goodbye; never mind that the smell of him was in her hair and on her fingers and in her mouth, like traces of some pernicious drug that fed her as it wasted her. On soft feet she rose, dressed, picked up the copies of the letters from the floor and folded them into her bag. She did not look at the bed; she did not leave a note. As she left the room she thought she saw a gleam with the corner of her eye, a shard of light reflected from the dark form tangled up in the pillows and sheets. As if Ryan’s eyes were open as she slipped from the room.

1911

In the mornings, the house is cool and quiet, full of bright sunshine that glints on every speck of dust swirling in the still air, settling slowly onto the furniture. As Cat sweeps the hearths and rugs, clouds of it billow around her, resettle all around to be wiped off minutes later, back into the air, on to the floor. She is glad Hester is never up in time to see how futile trying to be rid of it is. People are made of dust. Houses are made of it. Cat brushes her fingers on her apron, again and again, not liking the thought of it clinging to her skin. She cleans the downstairs rooms and lays the table for breakfast before Hester comes down. Sometimes, she is called upstairs to help Hester dress. Then, when the vicar is back from his morning jaunt, he and Hester eat breakfast while Cat goes upstairs, gathers the dirty laundry and mending, makes the bed, cleans the bedroom and bathroom, the upstairs corridor. She airs guest rooms that she has yet to see any guests use; opens shutters in rooms nobody will enter all day, shuts them again when the sun begins to set. She persecutes flies endlessly, swatting at them; watching those that fly too high, out of reach, waiting for them to tire and die.

All the time, the quiet resounds in her ears. In London there was the steady hum of the city, even on exclusive Broughton Street. As each set of shutters was opened, a low sound of lives being lived would greet the ears. Cab horses would clatter by, steel feet striking sparks at the end of gaunt, sinewy legs; and motor cars, their engines throbbing like panting dogs. Boys on bicycles, delivery wagons, the ponderous clop of the dray’s hooves. Pedestrians too, mingling voices. The servants could grab a look at passers-by, could keep tabs on the fashions of the day. Now when she opens the shutters Cat is greeted by swathes of green – a landscape, on three sides of the house, unbroken by any sign of human endeavour. The sky is wide and high and the sound is of birdsong, almost exclusively. Now and then a cart passing; now and then a dog barking. It’s unnerving but she can’t resist it, and finds herself hung, pausing at the windows she is meant to be cleaning, her gaze softening, reaching out into this new, quiet distance. And her body needs these rests, like it never has before. She has worked since she was twelve, her muscles made hard by it. But Holloway has made her weak, has made her legs tremble by the time she has climbed from the cellar to the attic.

At breakfast, she sits with Mrs Bell at the wooden table in the kitchen. The cook’s chair creaks ominously underneath her, all but obscured by her bulk. Only spindly wooden legs are visible, chafing against the flagstones and wobbling with the strain. One day they will snap, Cat thinks. She will not be able to keep from laughing when it happens. She runs the scene in her mind – Mrs Bell, flailing on the floor like a beetle on its back, unable to rise.

‘What are you smirking at?’ Mrs Bell asks suspiciously.

‘I was picturing you rolling on the floor if your chair broke,’ Cat replies, quite honestly.

‘Why, you cheeky minx!’ Mrs Bell gasps, staring, her eyes stretched wide for once; but she can’t seem to find any other riposte, so Cat goes back to eating her porridge. She has to concentrate on eating, in an odd way. She has to concentrate on not noticing she is doing it. If she notices it too much, the flavour of it, the texture, the brief choking sensation of swallowing… then panic rises and makes it impossible.

‘I’d been wondering what they locked you up for,’ Mrs Bell manages at last, ‘but like as not it was for impertinence when you should’ve held your tongue! Who was it you gave back-chat to?’ she asks, trying to sound angry but unable to hide the curiosity in her voice.

But Cat can’t answer. At the mention of prison her throat has closed, her mouthful of porridge has nowhere to go. She can feel it clogging her up, sticking to the back of her throat. She rushes to the sink, coughs and gags it all out.

‘Saints preserve us! What is the matter with you?’ Mrs Bell exclaims, blood mottling her cheeks. ‘No wonder you’re such a sparrow! The mistress will hear of this.’

‘It can only be good economy for her, if I don’t eat,’ Cat gasps, wiping her chin with the back of her hand. Mrs Bell grunts dismissively as Cat returns to the table and pushes the bowl of porridge away.

‘Well don’t waste it! Hand it to me,’ Mrs Bell says, and dips her spoon into the bowl. She flicks her eyes at Cat again. ‘What’s that badge you wear?’ She points a finger at the little silver and enamel portcullis pinned to Cat’s collar.

‘My Holloway medal. Given to me by my friends, to show that I have been to gaol for the cause,’ Cat says, her fingers drifting up to touch it.

‘I hardly think it’s something to be proud of,’ the housekeeper says scathingly.

‘You’re wrong.’

‘Well, you shouldn’t be wearing it on show like that. Under your clothes if you must, but I don’t want to see it again,’ Mrs Bell tells her, with a curt nod of her chin. Cat glowers, but does as she is told.

Cat is called into the drawing room after lunch, when she had been on her way to her room, to rest for a while. Her hands are red and puckered from the washing-up suds, the nails that grew long in the week before she arrived have all snapped off again. The vicar’s wife is dressed in white muslin, with frills at her collar and cuffs and hem. Her corsets cinch her in at the middle, but she is still broad, soft looking. Her breasts pile up above the whalebone, pushing outwards slightly, into her armpits. Her face looks like this too – broad, soft, accommodating. By contrast her hands are small and fine, the fingers tapering to shiny pink nails. Her feet are tiny. In high-heeled shoes, she half resembles a spinning top.

‘Ah, Cat.’ Hester smiles. ‘I wonder if you would be so good as to take this along to the post office and send it for me? Thank you, child. And perhaps a few madeleines for tea? There is an excellent baker on The Broadway. Mrs Bell won’t like it, but until she can raise a light sponge, she leaves me no choice!’ Hester laughs a little as she says this. Cat takes the letter, and the coins Hester proffers, hating to be called child by a woman only a few years older than herself.

‘Very good, madam,’ she says quietly. Hester’s face falls a little. Cat notices that the woman’s gaze darts past her and around her, and down at the letter. As if she fears to make eye contact with her new servant.

‘You know the way to Thatcham, do you?’ Hester asks.

‘No, madam,’ Cat admits. She had not thought to ask. Would have quite happily set off from the house directionless.

‘Well, the quickest way on a fine day like today is to take the footpath opposite the house – there’s a little stile you must climb – then follow that across the river at the footbridge until you reach the canal, which won’t take you ten minutes. Turn left and follow the towpath for two miles and there you shall find Thatcham. It’s a charming town. Please consider yourself at leisure to take a little extra time to look around. It will be useful in future for you to be familiar with the location of the butchers and the grocers and the like,’ Hester says. Cat’s heart lifts at the thought of the excursion.

‘Thank you, madam,’ she says, with more feeling, and Hester’s smile widens.

Unhindered by corsets, Cat swings easily over the stile and sets off across the field. She steps lightly around the cow pats, examines the new oddness of the turf beneath her feet. She has never walked on grass so long, on ground so unmade. In London the garden had a lawn, but servants were not allowed to walk on it. The Gentleman was quite specific about this – there were paths to be kept to, neatly laid flagstones, or raked gravel hemmed with miniature box hedges. Here there is long ragged grass and other plants too, things she has not seen before. Wild flowers. Tiny blue ones the colour of the summer sky; purples, yellows, spiky white clouds of something she cannot name. In the bright sunlight she feels the day’s warmth seep into her skin, chasing out the lingering chill of the prison cell. She carries Hester’s letter and the coins for the cakes in a purse on a string loaned to her, grudgingly, by Mrs Bell. Dangling it from her fingers, she swings it to and fro, twirls it around, makes it whoosh through the air. A skinny black-haired girl, walking a meandering path across a meadow.

The canal is a wide, lazy channel of murky water, crowded in by weeping willows. Boughs of young elder lean out over the far bank, flowering with acrid enthusiasm. Clouds of midges careen across the surface, and they soon come to crowd infuriatingly around Cat’s face; to nip at the backs of her hands. Cat reaches the towpath, and looks right. All the way to London, this path leads. She could follow it; walk until her feet were ragged and bloody. How long would it take? She has no idea. And what would she do when she got there? Nowhere is home any more. But she could look for Tess. She could make sure Tess was all right, she could bring her here. To this alien place, so green and quiet and different. But Cat turns left and starts walking, more slowly now, swatting at the midges and dodging the piles of muck left by the barge horses.

Soon, buildings come into view. Warehouses, small boatyards. She passes two locks, watches a boat pass through one of them, fascinated by the workings of it. As water foams through the sodden beams, it sends up clouds of scent: moist, rank, somehow alive. The breeze ripples the water’s surface, makes it appear to flow. Experimentally, Cat picks up a stick to test whether this is so. She throws it into the water, but the purse string comes loose from her wrist and flies in after it.

‘Damn and blast it!’ she mutters, looking around her. The canal banks are steep and the water looks deep. There’s a long, wide boat moored nearby, and even though it looks empty she daren’t trespass on it. She casts her eyes around, picks up a fallen sycamore branch and reaches out to the purse, which, mercifully, is floating. She struggles to balance, to hold the branch steady, hook a twig around the purse string and begin to tow it towards her. It works for a moment but then she over-balances, has to drop the branch to steady herself. The purse swirls gently in a circle. Cat edges down the bank, crouches precariously, reaches her fingers for it. It is two inches beyond her fingertips. Two inches, no more, but no matter how she stretches she cannot reach it. ‘Why, you stinking, cursed sprog of a pox-addled whore!’ she shouts at it, standing up in a fury.

A laugh startles her, makes her step back and stumble.

‘Whoa, steady there, miss. You don’t want to follow it in now, do you?’ a man says. He is half emerged from a hatch in the deck of the barge moored beside her. Cat gets an instant impression of tawny brown, of warmth. Weathered skin the colour of the scrubbed boards of the boat; rough hair, undyed clothes.

‘Who are you?’ she demands, suspiciously.

‘George Hobson. And more importantly, I’m in possession of a grappling hook, should you have need of one.’

‘What’s a grappling hook and why should I need one?’ Cat snaps, feeling that she is being laughed at.

‘This is the item, and I’ll fetch that bag out for you if you’ll give me your name,’ the man offers, picking up an evil-looking metal claw attached to a long pole from the deck of the boat.

Cat frowns at him and thinks for a moment, then says: ‘I’m Cat Morley, then. Do fetch it, will you, before the letter inside is soaked completely.’

The brown man comes all the way out of the hatch, crouches on the edge of the deck and sweeps the purse, drizzling water, out of the canal. He shakes it a little, folds the string into a neat bundle in his palm and squeezes it. His hands are like shovels, wide and square, the knuckles lividly bruised, ridged with scars. He jumps onto the bank and approaches her, and Cat squares her shoulders, stands up to him although she does not meet his shoulder height. He has more than twice her width; the solid look of a tree trunk.

‘I’d thought you a lad in a long shirt, until you spoke up,’ he says.

‘Thank you, sir,’ Cat says, sarcastically.

‘Now, I meant no offence by that. Only the lasses round here, and I can hear you’re not one of them, they all wear their hair long,’ he explains. Cat says nothing. She holds out a hand for the purse, but when he keeps hold of it she folds her arms, eyes him calmly. ‘And I never heard a lass round here curse like you just did, miss. No, I never heard that,’ he laughs.

‘May I have that back, please?’ Cat asks at last.

‘You may.’ George nods, passing it to her.

Cat scrabbles it open, tips out water, weed, coins and the letter, which she blots hurriedly against the front of her skirt. ‘Oh, blast it. You can scarce read the address it’s to go to. The ink is quite washed away,’ she murmurs, half to herself. ‘Perhaps there’s hope – I could write over it, perhaps, if somebody would lend me a pen. Here – do you think it’s readable, still? Can you make out the name?’ she asks, holding out the letter to George Hobson. The big man flushes, looks at the letter with a frown of bafflement.

‘I don’t rightly know, Miss Morley,’ he mutters.

‘Is it ruined?’ she asks. George shrugs one shoulder, noncommittal, and Cat understands him. ‘Can’t you read?’ she asks, incredulously. George hands the letter back, shrugs again, frowns at the look on Cat’s face.

‘Not much call for a bargeman to read,’ he says. ‘I’ll bid you good day, then.’ He turns back to his boat, is aboard in one wide, assured stride.

‘Well now, you can laugh at me but I can’t laugh at you, is that the way of it?’ Cat calls to him from the bank.

George pauses, smiles a little. ‘Well, you have me there, Miss Morley,’ he admits.

‘My name is Cat,’ she tells him. ‘Nobody calls me Miss Morley except-’ She breaks off. Except the policemen who took her, the judge who tried her. She shrugs. ‘Nobody does.’

‘You’ll be about town, will you, Cat?’

‘Now and then, I dare say.’

‘Then I shall look out for you. And that sharp tongue of yours.’ He smiles. Cat eyes him, tips her head to one side. She likes the sparkle in his eyes, the way she abashed him like a schoolboy. With a quick smile, she walks on into town. After the post office she buys the madeleines, which she carries carefully, still warm and sticky; the scent of vanilla oozing from the paper wrapper. She buys herself some cigarettes, and a copy of Votes for Women for a penny from Menzies. She will hide it under her skirt when she gets back, spirit it up to her room, and read it after hours.

One Thursday, Hester and Albert eat an early supper of lamb steaks as evening falls outside and bats replace the birds, wheeling across the lawn. Cat serves them, walking from one end of the table to the other with the soup tureen, then the plate of meat, then the vegetables. In London she was to be silent, invisible; servants were not acknowledged at table. But each time she puts something on Hester’s plate, Hester smiles and thanks her softly. Cat was startled the first few times this happened, and did not know how to respond. Now she murmurs ‘madam’ softly, each and every time, like a gentle echo after Hester speaks. Albert seems not to notice any of this, eating his dinner with a diffuse, faraway look punctuated now and then by traces of a frown, or a smile, or an incredulous lift of his eyebrows. He is quite captivated by his own thoughts, and Hester watches him fondly as they proceed across his face.

‘What is the subject of tonight’s lecture, my dear?’ Hester asks, once Cat has withdrawn. ‘Albert?’ she prompts him, when he does not reply.

‘I do beg your pardon, my dear?’

‘Tonight’s lecture. I was wondering what it was about?’ There are lectures once or twice a week in Newbury, and Albert tries to attend at least one of them, especially if they deal with matters philosophical, biological or spiritual.

‘Ah – it should be a most interesting one. The title is “Nature Spirits and their place in the Wisdom Religion”. The speaker is a rising star in theosophical circles – Durrant, I believe his name is. He hails from Reading, if I remember correctly.’

‘Nature spirits? What can he mean?’ Hester asks, puzzled. She doesn’t ask the meaning of theosophical – is unsure that she could pronounce it right.

‘Well, dear Hetty, that is what I intend to discover,’ Albert says.

‘Does he mean hobgoblins and the like?’ She laughs a little, but stops when Albert frowns slightly.

‘It does not do to laugh simply because we do not understand, Hetty. Why shouldn’t the figures of childhood stories and myth have some basis in reality, upon some level or another?’

‘Well, of course, I didn’t mean-’

‘After all, we all know the human soul exists, and what is a ghost but the disembodied spirit of a human soul? Surely none could argue against the wealth of evidence for their existence?’

‘Indeed not, Bertie,’ Hester agrees.

‘The conjecture, I believe, is that plants, too, have spirits, of a kind – guardians to tend them and guide them in their growth and propagation,’ Albert goes on.

‘Yes, of course, I see,’ Hester says, quite seriously now.

They pause for a moment, silent but for the clink of their cutlery, the sounds of their own eating.

‘And you are off to Mrs Avery’s, for a game of bridge? What time shall I see you back here again?’ Albert asks at length.

‘Oh, I expect I will be back before you, dear. We shall only play until about ten,’ Hester says hurriedly, knowing that Albert does not approve of her playing bridge, and wanting to move on from the subject as quickly as possible.

‘And will Mrs Dunthorpe be joining the party?’ Albert asks evenly, and that small frown of disapproval that Hester can’t bear puckers his brow again.

‘I… I really don’t know, Albert. I doubt it, as she didn’t come the last time…’

‘She really is not the right kind…’

‘I know, dear; I do know. But even if she does come along, I can assure you that we’ll only be playing for matchsticks, nothing more,’ Hester assures him. Mrs Dunthorpe’s love of gambling is widely renowned. Over Christmas last, she lost so much in a hand of poker that her husband was forced to sell his horse.

‘It’s not only that which troubles me-’

‘Oh, don’t be troubled, Bertie! Mrs Avery’s character is unimpeachable, after all – and I hope you have some faith in my own mettle?’

‘Of course I do, dear Hester.’ Albert smiles. ‘You above all people have proved the uncorrupted nature of your soul to me.’ A telltale blush creeps up from the neckline of Hester’s dress.

She hasn’t actually lied about anything, Hester reassures herself, as she waves Albert off on his bicycle. He is to pedal the two miles to Thatcham, then catch a train into Newbury for the lecture. With him safely out of sight, she wraps herself in a lightweight coat and fastens her hat with the pins Cat hands her, patting her hair into place all around it.

‘I’ll be back by half past ten, when a little cocoa will go down a treat,’ Hester says brightly, eager to be away.

‘Very good, madam,’ Cat mutters. Hester notes the dark circles under Cat’s eyes, the fact that she has not yet, many days after her arrival, filled out at all. She makes a mental note to talk to Sophie Bell about it as she sets off along the garden path. There are angry purple and black clouds on the northern horizon, bulging up towards heaven like vast and ominous trees. Hester doubles back for an umbrella.

Albert’s real objection to Mrs Dunthorpe lies less in her gambling, though that is bad enough, and more in the fact that she is a medium, and has more than once led a seance on a night that had begun as a game of bridge. And however much Hester tells herself that she doesn’t know for sure, the fact remains that she spoke to her friend Claire Higgins after the service the previous Sunday, and Claire had hinted in the strongest possible terms that tonight might be just such a night. Hester feels a thrill of anticipation.

Mrs Avery’s house is the largest in the village, and well appointed, as a rich widow’s should be. Her husband had invested heavily in the railways, had seen his money grow tenfold, and had then been cut down by the very thing that made him, when his cab was struck by a train as it crossed the tracks late one night. The driver had fallen asleep at the reins, and his passenger, by all accounts, had drunk himself to falling down. He left Mrs Avery very well off and very bored, so that the widow has become the centre of society in the village, and indeed in the whole district of Thatcham – outside the realm of the truly grand houses, of course. She spends a lot of time visiting friends and family in London, is always quite on top of the latest fashions; and Hester finds her more than a little frightening. But, as the vicar’s wife, it would not do to be excluded from Mrs Avery’s company, and so she makes every effort to maintain her good standing with her. On nights when Mrs Dunthorpe is present, it is no chore.

Mrs Dunthorpe is thickset and well-bosomed. Her hair is a faded chestnut colour, her eyes a faded blue. Aged about fifty, she has come lately to wealth; so lately that she speaks with a Thatcham twang that she can’t be rid of, however hard she tries. Were it not for her extraordinary powers, perhaps she might not have been such a regular guest in Mrs Avery’s drawing room. As it is, she sits proudly on a damask chair as the other guests arrive, to be greeted by each of them perhaps with less deference, but with more enthusiasm, than they show their hostess.

‘Mrs Dunthorpe… I had so hoped you would be here! Will you lead us in a circle tonight? Will we hear from the spirits at all?’ asks tiny Esme Bullington, her reedy voice little more than a whisper as she grips the older woman’s hands.

Mrs Dunthorpe smiles with a hint of reserved mystery. ‘Well, my dear; that does depend upon the wishes of our charming hostess, of course. But, should she assent, and it be the will of the party, I could of course lead a foray into the unseen world,’ she says, loudly enough for all to hear, and for Mrs Avery to scowl.

‘Perhaps we might wait at least until we are all assembled, and have taken a glass of sherry?’ Mrs Avery suggests, rather coolly. Mrs Dunthorpe seems quite oblivious to the rebuke, but Esme Bullington retreats from the medium with two spots of colour high in her cheeks.

Hester makes a polite tour of the room before returning to stand beside her particular friend, Claire Higgins, the wife of one of Cold Ash Holt’s prominent farmers. There are thirteen ladies altogether: an auspicious and carefully engineered number. They sip sherry from crystal glasses, and soon their faces are flushed beneath the pale powder, and they laugh more easily, and the lights seem to shimmer and blur the room, setting satin ribbons and skin and eyes shining. The rising anticipation is like a low humming sound; impossible to pinpoint the source of it, and impossible to ignore it. At last, when Mrs Avery deems that they have all been acceptably sociable, and have shown that her society and good graces were what matters above all, their indomitable hostess clears her throat.

‘Mrs Dunthorpe. How do you feel? Are you quite up to an attempt at communion with the spirits?’ she asks. The other women all fall silent at once, and watch matronly Mrs Dunthorpe closely as she seems to consider with great care.

‘I believe we may have a good deal of success this evening,’ she says at last, to an excited murmur and a squeak of joy from Esme Bullington.

With intent expressions, they hurry to a grand, circular table at the far end of the room, around which thirteen plush red chairs have been arranged. Mrs Dunthorpe bids them sit close to the table, their forearms resting upon it and their hands clasped firmly. Hester has Esme Bullington’s tiny paw in one hand and the dry, creased fingers of old Mrs Ship in the other. Whilst they have been talking and drinking the wind has risen outside, and blows fitfully with a sound like distant whispering voices. It makes the budding branches of the wisteria patter and scrape at the window glass; sounding for all the world like the questing fingertips of someone trying to get in. As the day was so warm, the curtains have been left open and the bottom inch of the window raised to allow air into the room. But the temperature has dropped, and the breeze that is creeping in has a chilly touch. It is not yet fully dark outside, but all that’s visible beyond the reflections in the window glass is the dark grey sky, bloated with cloud, and the gnarled branches of the old medlar tree in the garden. Hester shivers involuntarily, and feels Esme’s hand tighten around hers.

A servant turns off all the lamps and lights a single candle, which she sets in the middle of the table before withdrawing, eyes cast down. The candle kindles fire in the gemstones on Mrs Avery’s knuckles, at her neck and ears. Albert would not approve of such a show for a simple assembly of ladies. Hester suppresses a spasm of guilt. There is little Albert would approve of about her evening, but these gatherings are utterly compelling to her. Silence falls around the table as the women stop shuffling their skirts and their positions, and grow still. Hester takes a deep breath to steady her capering nerves.

‘I bid you all to turn your thoughts to the world of spirit, and away from that which you see and hear around you,’ Mrs Dunthorpe begins. She is wearing a shawl of bright emerald green, iridescent like a starling’s wing. ‘Close your eyes, to keep from distraction, and bend your mind to it with all the force of your will. Send out an invitation, and a welcome, to those travellers on the roads of the spirit world who might hear, and grant us their presence.’ Her voice grows deeper and more sonorous. Hester, so alive with expectation that she can hardly sit still, opens one eye and glances around the table. She is flanked by the shuttered faces of her companions, each one arranged into some expression of entreaty or thrall. Mrs Dunthorpe has thrown back her head, and her lips move soundlessly. ‘There is one amongst us who disrupts the energy,’ the medium snaps. Hester jumps guiltily and glances at her, but Mrs Dunthorpe’s eyes remain closed. ‘The circle of thought must be complete, or none may come forth,’ she continues, testily. Hurriedly, Hester closes her eyes tightly, and tries to concentrate.

There is a long and steady silence. Just the sound of shallow breathing, and the low moan of the wind as it scrolls around the corners of the house. Hester can feel Esme trembling slightly beside her, as if poised for flight like a startled deer. ‘Will you not come forth? I can almost hear you,’ Mrs Dunthorpe whispers, the words barely audible. Hester strains her senses. She pictures the spirit world as a vast and heavy black door, beyond which lies a stormy sea of souls too lost or confused to have found either heaven or hell. As Mrs Dunthorpe speaks, she imagines ghostly fingers curling around that door and pushing, inching it wider and wider, following the compelling voice and allowing the living a glimpse of the cold and unearthly realm beyond. Her heart beats so hard she fears it will be heard; pressure builds between her temples, as though invisible hands grip her skull. Esme has stopped trembling; her hand has gone as limp as a dead fish, and just as cold. Hester’s skin crawls away from it, but she dare not open her eyes, or turn her head to look. For what if they have strayed too close to that black door; what if they themselves have trespassed into the spirit world? What if little Esme has gone, and in her place Hester holds the hand of a ghost – the cold, dead hand of a corpse? She can’t move a muscle, she can scarcely breathe.

‘Someone speaks to me!’ Mrs Dunthorpe says suddenly, her voice taut with exhilaration. ‘Yes! Yes, I can hear you! Tell me your name…’ she asks hoarsely. Hester holds her breath, straining her ears for the voice the medium hears. ‘The spirit comes with a warning… a warning for one of us in this very room! It says dark times are coming… that an evil force has entered one of our houses, though we are none the wiser,’ she says, her voice ranging from a vibrant blare to a heavy whisper. Hester hears someone gasp, but can’t tell who it is. ‘Tell us more, dear spirit… who is this intruder? What do they plan? How do you come to know of it – are you a relative of somebody in this room? Or a friend? We welcome your wisdom!’ There is a long silence, and in the blameless wind Hester hears voices crying out in fear and pain. ‘Oh! It is very afraid of what is to come! It wishes to warn us… The voice is growing faint… Come back, please, spirit! I’m losing you, I can’t hear what you’re saying,’ the medium says; then she pauses with a loud and frightening gasp. ‘Oh, saints preserve us!’

Suddenly there is a loud bang, a crash that shakes the table, lifts it up violently and clatters it back to the floor. As one the women cry out in alarm, break the circle and clasp their hands to their mouths, muffling little shrieks of terror and excitement. Then they all chatter at once, like a hedge full of sparrows.

‘Oh, what was that?’

‘Did you feel it? Did you see anything?’

‘Dear Lord, I thought I would faint quite away!’ Mrs Dunthorpe is the last to re-enter the room. Her hands remain extended to either side of her, though nobody holds them any more. Slowly, her head rocks forwards, her mouth closes, her breathing quietens. The women all watch her powdered eyelids, transfixed, as they flutter open. ‘I can do no more tonight. Our visitor was frightened off by another spirit, one much troubled by grief and rage at its own passing. It is a shame that I couldn’t glean anything more from the first voice that came through, since it clearly had information that would have been of great value to one of us. Such a negative experience has quite drained me, and we are lucky that this darker spirit has passed further along the road again, and will not stay to trouble us,’ the medium declares.

Murmurs of consternation chase around the room. Hester shudders at the thought – that they might have opened the door to a vengeful ghoul, only to then be haunted by it, chased and hounded by it. Esme has gone as white as a ghost herself.

‘Are you all right, Esme dear?’ Hester asks.

‘I could feel it. I could feel the last spirit – the hurt and the pain!’ the girl whispers.

Mrs Avery grunts a little gracelessly, and rings a silver bell. ‘Bring some brandy for Mrs Bullington. In fact for us all, please, Sandy,’ she bids the servant who appears.

‘You say “it”, Mrs Dunthorpe – can you tell us if it was a man or woman? A child or a grown adult?’ Sarah Vickers asks. ‘Can you tell us why the spirit was so troubled? Was he – or she – perhaps… murdered?’

‘Such brief encounters give more an impression of emotion, of feeling, than a coherent conversation,’ Mrs Dunthorpe replies. ‘I was not able to calm the spirit sufficiently to ask such rational questions as you pose.’

‘But, if you heard it, surely you could determine the sex, at least?’ Sarah Vickers presses. There is the hint of a challenge in her tone, which Mrs Dunthorpe is wise to in an instant.

‘Spiritual noise is quite different to that of the human voice, I assure you, Miss Vickers; but if I were to hazard a guess from its tone, I would say it was male. An adult man.’

‘Ah. Well. A pity he stayed only long enough to kick the table, and not to give account of himself. Perhaps we might have caught his murderer for him!’ Sarah smiles.

‘Indeed,’ Mrs Dunthorpe agrees frostily. The two women glare at one another.

‘But what of the first voice who spoke, Mrs Dunthorpe?’ Claire Higgins asks, hastily filling the uneasy silence. ‘Was there anything else you could discern about him – or… it?’

‘That was a kindly spirit, a woman, I believe. She was so determined to convey her warning to us, I could not persuade her to give me much information about herself. I sensed great age and wisdom about her, and that she was a woman of refined culture and manners.’

‘Well, if she had been a relation of one of us, I should say she would have had good breeding,’ says Mrs Avery thoughtfully. ‘My own mother died some years ago,’ she adds. Esme Bullington gasps.

‘Do you think it was your mother who spoke? Do you think the warning was for you, Mrs Avery?’ she whispers, eyes wide in her face.

‘I shall certainly be on my guard if I receive any unexpected house guests.’

‘I think we all owe Mrs Dunthorpe our thanks for such a compelling display of her psychic abilities,’ Hester says, suddenly desperate for the lights to be switched back on and the shadows chased from the corners of the room.

‘Oh, yes! It was quite remarkable!’ Esme agrees, her colour returning.

Gradually, the atmosphere in the room eases, and conversation rises again as each compares her experience of the visitation with her neighbour. They sip their brandy and eat crystallised fruit, and swap polite gossip.

‘Mrs Canning, I hear tell you have a new maid of all work, come down from London,’ says Mrs Avery, cutting across the circle to Hester. It is not a question.

‘That’s correct, Mrs Avery. Cat Morley is her name. She’s beginning to settle in, although she’s not quite as quick about her work as I would have expected for one trained in a grand house,’ Hester replies.

‘I heard that she had been imprisoned until lately. Is this true?’ their hostess asks, her face pressed into flat lines of disapproval. Hester feels the blood rush to her cheeks. How on earth has it got about? Only from Sophie Bell, and Hester asked her most explicitly not to speak of it to anyone.

‘Well, I… ah…’ Hester stammers.

‘Well, was she or wasn’t she?’

‘Indeed, most unfortunately, she was, it is true… not for very long, I understand… a short sentence…’

‘And you are happy to have a felon living under your own roof with you? Is that wise?’ Mrs Avery asks, peering along her nose, pinning Hester with the question.

‘My… my husband and I thought it an act of charity to give the girl a livelihood, and a chance to regain a place in society… After all, she has repaid her debt, in the eyes of the law,’ Hester manages.

Mrs Avery grunts, twitches the ends of her shawl into a neater shape, tucks her chin into her chest. The light shines from the iron-grey swathe of her hair. ‘Indeed. That may be the case. Very commendable, I am sure; and the least one should expect from the household of a clergyman, I suppose. Tell me, what was her crime?’ she asks.

‘That… that is… the details are known only to the girl… to Cat Morley. I have not pressed her for the particulars. I thought it better to let-’

‘Oh, come now! I won’t have it – you must have known what crime she committed before you took her on! No one but a fool would not have found it out! What if she were a murderer?’

‘If she was a murderer, her sentence would have been very long indeed, and she would hardly have come out of it still young enough to come here to the vicar’s house,’ says Sarah Vickers, sensing Hester’s unease.

‘I… I have undertaken not to speak of it. I do apologise, Mrs Avery,’ Hester says, her pulse racing and her cheeks flaming crimson. She squirms a little, longing for the woman’s spotlight glare to move away from her. ‘Whatever she did, it is between her and God. I hope that… by coming here she is able to leave it all behind her.’

Mrs Avery’s eyebrows arch coldly, her mouth flattens even further. ‘Commendable discretion, I’m sure,’ she says, the words like a whip cracking.

Suddenly, Esme Bullington gasps, her hand flying to her mouth.

‘Mrs Canning! What if the warning was for you? What if this new girl of yours is the one the spirit meant – the source of evil that has entered your home?’ she asks, grasping Hester’s arm with her short, bony fingers.

‘Oh! Surely not… I’m sure the spirit can’t have meant Cat…’ Hester smiles uneasily.

‘Have you any elderly female relatives, recently crossed over?’ Mrs Dunthorpe asks her seriously. The eyes of all twelve women fix upon Hester.

‘Well… my great aunt Eliza, I suppose… She passed away four years ago, of the palsy,’ Hester admits.

‘That’s it, then! That was her – it must have been!’ Esme cries. ‘Oh, Mrs Canning! Do be careful – do heed what was said, won’t you? That a source of evil has entered your house, and will bring dark times upon you… Poor Mrs Canning! Do be careful!’

‘Now, now, Esme. Calm yourself,’ Mrs Avery admonishes the woman, who is dabbing at her eyes with the corner of her handkerchief. ‘I am quite sure that nothing truly evil would take root in the house of a man of God. Isn’t that right, Mrs Canning?’

‘Yes, of course,’ Hester says. For the rest of the evening she feels glances aimed in her direction, and catches expressions of pity and wonder on the faces of her peers. She smiles more often than she might usually, to make light of it, but the party is ruined; and beneath her façade lies a kernel of deep unease. She thinks of Cat Morley’s black gaze, and the way her shadowy thoughts stay so well hidden behind it; the smudges under her eyes and the painful thinness of her body, as though some blight is indeed eating her away from the inside.

As Hester walks home, she wonders anxiously if she will ever be asked back to Mrs Avery’s. Twice she has lied, in one evening – but surely this second time it was the right thing to do? She had decided not to divulge details of Cat’s past – and she does know more than she said, although not much more – and she stayed true to her vow. Thunder is thudding across the sky, sounding like heavy stones rolling, and the wind comes in powerful gusts, making the late spring branches flail, dashing pollen from the blossoms, sending petals flying into the air. A spattering of rain begins to fall. Hester pulls her coat tighter, and struggles with her umbrella for a while before giving up when the wind threatens to tear it.

With the sky so heavy and low, the road is near invisible. Only the faint yellow glow from the windows of houses lights her way as she passes, and this dwindles to nothing as she comes to the far end of the village, and walks the last stretch to the vicarage. Hester finds herself peering into the darkness beneath the trees and hedges, straining her eyes as she had strained all her senses at the seance. The black depths seem watchful, the wind seems to carry voices, whispered words. Shivering, Hester pauses. Her knees feel weak and unsteady. The wind curls around her, unpins her hair, threatens to carry off her hat; she clamps one hand upon it, eyes screwed up against the onslaught and the stinging rain. There is a large horse chestnut tree just outside the garden wall of the vicarage, its leaves already full out, broad and young and softly green by daylight. A flicker of lightning lights the tree with the grey tones of the underworld, and there, against the trunk, a figure stands quite still. Hester catches her breath in a gasp. No more than a black shape, a motionless outline, but quite definitely watching her with an implacable patience. Hester tries to cry out but her voice is strangled. She stands frozen, thinking of the violently angry spirit they had conjured that night, and the dire warning of evil which might have been for her. For a moment she can’t think or move, and is wholly seized by a spasm of shock. Then, with a small cry of fear, she bolts for the safety of home, heart beating fit to burst.

Cat waits until she hears the front door slam shut before she relaxes again. She pictures Hester with her back to the door, eyes shut, panting; and she smiles. From behind her back she lifts her cigarette to her lips, takes a long pull. The smoke makes her lungs burn, and she coughs, but perseveres. The doctor whom The Gentleman took her to see upon her release encouraged her in the habit, told her that the hot smoke would help to dry out her lungs. The first taste of tobacco in weeks. She came outside to smoke it to be away from Mrs Bell, and to watch the storm. Never before has she stood beneath a tree whilst the wind throws it about with such violence. Never before has she heard the terrific roar that it makes – a hissing, rushing sound like waves crashing ashore. She shuts her eyes and listens, lets the sound swirl around her, until she feels like one more leaf on the tree, one more helpless, insignificant thing. Like she might fly away in the next second. When thunder hammers out, right over her head, Cat smiles in the dark.

‘Where the bloody hell have you been?’ Mrs Bell snaps at her when she returns to the kitchen. ‘I’ve got the mistress clamouring for a hot water bottle and cocoa and her wool bedjacket unpacked from the winter trunk, and you nowhere to be found!’

‘It’s a thunderstorm, not a blizzard. She hardly needs a bedjacket,’ Cat says, fetching milk from the cold store and pouring it into a copper pan. The white liquid looks gorgeous against the bright metal, and she swirls it around as she sets it on the stove.

‘Whether or not she needs it, she wants it, and who are you to argue, girl?’ Mrs Bell grumbles. ‘You go and find it – it’ll be in the trunk on the far landing – and be sure to find all the mothballs from it before you give it her. I’ll do that – move away before you scald the milk!’

‘Yes, Mrs Bell,’ Cat sighs.

‘Don’t you “yes, Mrs Bell” me…’ Mrs Bell says, but can’t quite put her objection into words. She falls silent, whisking the milk vigorously and shaking her head. The whisking shakes other things too – sets up a wobble that shifts her from bosom to thigh. ‘Take a lamp with you – he doesn’t like the lights on upstairs after she’s retired,’ she calls after Cat.

‘I don’t need a lamp,’ Cat calls back, as she makes for the stairs. Within a few paces of the kitchen, her eyes have adjusted to the dark.

Hester sits shivering in bed, her toes and fingers tingling as the blood returns to them. Her head is aching after the frights of the evening. In spite of the lamps filling the room with yellow light, she thinks she can still see shadows, lurking figures in the corners of the room that vanish when she looks full at them. An evil force has entered one of our houses… Hester longs for Albert to come home and banish her fears with his calm faith and soothing presence. Gradually, she begins to relax, and has just picked up a book of homilies when a soft thump outside the room makes the breath freeze in her lungs. She waits, ears tuned for the noise to come again. And come again it does – a scuffle, a slight thudding. Hester berates herself for her fears, for believing that anything ghostly has followed her home from the seance.

‘It’s probably one of the cats, you silly girl,’ she tells herself aloud, and the very ordinariness of her own voice gives her courage. To prove that she is rational and not afraid, she gets up and crosses to the door. But with her hand on the latch she pauses, and swallows. Her throat is entirely dry. She opens the door as quietly as she can. Outside the room, the corridor is in complete darkness, and a noticeable draught noses along it, east to west. Hester makes a show of looking to either side, though her eyes see nothing but pitch blackness, an emptiness from which anything might spring. Her skin crawls and she turns to go back inside, and as she does, a figure appears right by her elbow. Hester screams, then sees the glint of dark eyes and dark hair in the light from her bedroom door. ‘Cat! Why, you scared me half to death!’ She laughs nervously.

‘Sorry, madam; I didn’t mean to. I’ve brought you your bedjacket,’ Cat says, holding out a knitted cardigan ripe with the stink of camphor.

‘Thank you, Cat,’ Hester says, her pulse still racing. Cat stands still, watching her. Hester glances at her, and again feels a rush of unease. ‘What were you doing out here in the dark? Why didn’t you bring a lamp, or put the lights on?’ she asks. Cat blinks, and regards her steadily.

‘I can see quite well in the dark,’ she replies.

‘“Black Cat”,’ Hester murmurs, the nickname coming unbidden to her lips. She sees Cat stiffen.

‘Where have you heard that?’ the girl asks abruptly. Hester swallows nervously.

‘Oh, nowhere… sorry, Cat. I didn’t mean to… Thank you for bringing me this. Please do go to bed yourself now. I won’t need anything else,’ she says hurriedly.

‘I’ll bring you the cocoa you asked for as soon as it’s ready,’ Cat contradicts her.

‘Oh, yes, of course. Of course. Thank you, Cat. Sorry.’ Hester retreats back into her room, unsure what she is apologising for. Cat is still standing in the dark corridor when she shuts the bedroom door behind her.

Albert returns not long afterwards, with a distracted look on his face. He pats Hester’s shoulders uncertainly when she flies into his arms the second he enters the room.

‘Albert! I’m so pleased to see you,’ she murmurs into his chest.

‘Are you all right, Hetty?’

‘Oh, yes. It’s just… the storm. It startled me as I walked home, that’s all,’ she says breathlessly. ‘I had to drink some cocoa to warm up again.’

‘Come now, there’s nothing to be frightened of. As Saint Paul said: “God makes His angels spirits – that is, winds – and His ministers a flaming fire.” In the wind that blows, there are living spirits; God’s angels guide the thunderclouds, and the mighty thunderclap may be a shock vibration of the air, as today’s men of science tell us, but it is also more than that – it is the voice of God Himself!’ Albert smiles, his eyes alight. Hester smiles back at him, unsure how to respond.

‘Let’s get into bed. It’s chilly tonight,’ she says.

‘Very well. It is rather late – I shan’t read for long.’ His habit is to read scripture for at least half an hour every night; with quiet concentration, like a pupil who knows he will be tested.

When at last Albert closes his book, lays his spectacles upon it and places both on the bedside table, Hester smiles. He turns out his lamp, slides lower in the bed, meshes his fingers across his chest. But his eyes stay open. Hester leaves her lamp on, and lies facing him. The storm is abating, but still the wind blows, and throws rain hard against the window pane. The room, with Hester’s lamp the only light, seems like a close cocoon, shielding them from the wild night. Perhaps it is this, perhaps it is the fright she had earlier in the evening, but Hester feels a powerful need for comfort. She yearns to be touched, to be held by her husband. She looks at his smooth face, at the warm glow of his skin, coloured from all the time he spends out of doors.

They have never even lain naked together, he on top of her or vice versa. She has never felt the press of his skin against her chest, and thinking of this makes Hester’s throat dry, makes her heart rise up and half choke her. Without a word, she moves closer to Albert, until she can lay her cheek on his shoulder. He does not move, or speak. He can’t claim to be tired when clearly his mind is oddly alert tonight. After a minute, when there is no protest at her touch, Hester raises her face again. Albert is so close she can’t focus her eyes on him properly. He is a creamy-coloured blur, soft shades of gold and brown and milky white in the half light. The smell of him fills her nose. The soap he uses to shave with, the gentle tang of his skin underneath it.

‘Oh, Albert,’ she breathes, and all her love and desire for him rush into those two words, making her voice deeper, more resonant. She lets her hands run over his chest, pressing them into the cloth of his shirt, seeking the heat of the skin underneath, the slight resistance of the sparse hair growing there. Reaching up, she presses her mouth to his, feels the wonderful warmth of his lips, the softness of them, just for an instant, before he pushes her away.

‘Hetty…’ he begins, looking at her with something like despair, something almost fearful.

‘Oh, Albert!’ Hester whispers desperately. ‘Why do you always push me away? Don’t you love me? It is no sin, for man and wife to touch each other, to lie in each other’s arms…’

‘No, no; it is no sin, dear Hetty,’ Albert replies.

‘What then? You do not love me?’ she asks, stricken.

‘Of course I do, silly thing! Who could not love such a sweet wife as you?’ He releases her arms, clasps his hands across his chest again in a seemingly casual manner; but it is a guarded gesture, putting a barrier between them.

‘I’m not silly, Albert; I… I don’t understand. Are we husband and wife in name alone?’

‘We are husband and wife in God’s eyes, and that is a sacred thing, an unbreakable thing,’ Albert says, his voice almost fearful. His eyes roam the room, as though he longs to escape it.

‘I know it, and I’m glad of it; but… our union is not consummated. And what of children, Albert?’

‘I…’ Albert shuts his eyes, turns his head away slightly. ‘A family… a family is what I want. Of course it is, Hester…’

‘Well, though I do not pretend to know a great deal about these things, I know we shall never have one while you will not touch me, or kiss or hold me.’ Without meaning to, Hester bursts into tears. They are hot on her cheeks, and make her eyes burn.

‘There, there now; stop that, Hetty! We shall have a family, all in good time! We’re young yet, and… perhaps we are too young. Perhaps it would be better to wait a while longer, until we are both more tutored in the ways of the world…’

‘I am twenty-six on my next birthday, Albert. You will be twenty-five. Many women younger than I are mothers thrice over already!’ She sniffs, blotting at her eyes with the cuff of her nightdress. ‘But it is not just that – not only that! I need… I need tenderness from you, Albert!’

‘Hetty, please. Calm yourself,’ Albert begs, and he looks so strained, so trapped and awkward that Hester relents.

‘I don’t mean to make you unhappy,’ she says, swallowing her sobs.

‘How could you? Dear Hester,’ he says, and in his eyes is a look of helpless anguish. He watches her cry for a moment, and then rolls onto his side, towards her, and brushes her cheek with his fingers. He seems to come to a decision. ‘Very well. Will you turn out the light?’ he says, and Hester is shocked to hear his voice shaking. Mutely, she complies.

In the darkness, Hester waits. Albert moves closer still, so that the length of his body presses into her side. She turns her face towards him, and can feel his proximity, the way her own breath hits his skin and bounces back to warm her. When he kisses her she leans into him, crushing their mouths together. She can’t seem to catch her breath. The room spins and it is wonderful, intoxicating. She puts her arms around him, fingers splayed to touch as much of him as she can. She gathers up his shirt, bunching it with her fists until she finds the skin underneath, and runs her hands along it, delighting in the heat of it, the smooth texture. Albert shivers at her touch. Gently, she pulls him closer and closer, so that he loses his balance and has no choice but to lie on top of her. Holding him tightly, feeling the weight of him squeezing the air from her lungs, a strong surge of joy shoots through her. She smiles in the dark, and kisses him again.

‘My Albert… I love you so much,’ she breathes. His kiss is firm, lips clamped together. Hesitantly, Hester opens her mouth; just a little, but Albert pulls back. ‘I’m sorry,’ she says quickly.

‘No, no. I…’ Albert whispers, but doesn’t finish the sentence. His hands are at either side of her face, lightly holding her head and stroking her hair. Hester wriggles a little, desperate to feel his hands move lower, to feel his touch on her breasts and stomach and hips. On instinct she moves her knees apart, a fraction at a time, so it seems as if it is his weight that pushes them open. He comes to rest against her pelvis and Hester moves her hands to his hips, to hold him tighter to her. The feeling is irresistible, compulsive. There is a delicious ache in the pit of her stomach, butterflies of anticipation making her shudder. She lets her hands stray to his buttocks, and pulls him closer. Albert freezes. His face pulls back from hers and she can hear his breathing, fast and almost panicky.

‘Albert, what’s wrong?’ she asks, craning her head up to be kissed again. But Albert pulls further away. He swallows audibly, and carefully climbs off her, to lie on his side of the bed, not even touching her. ‘Albert, please! Tell me what’s the matter!’ Hester whispers, the sting of this rejection all too sharp.

‘I’m so sorry, Hetty,’ he says, meek and desolate. Hester’s heart aches for him, and she bites her lip to keep from crying. But try as she might, she can find no words to comfort him, no way to say that it doesn’t matter. Because at that moment it matters more than anything else in the world. She lies silent for a long time, too upset to sleep; she can tell from his breathing and his stillness that Albert is also awake. They lie there inches from each other, but it seems to Hester that a wide gulf stretches between them.

In her attic room, Cat begins a letter to Tess. The hardest thing for me, in that rotten cell, was knowing that you were somewhere nearby, in just such a cell, but still I could not see you or speak to you, she writes, the candle’s flicker making the shadow of her pen leap and stagger. This is not true, though. The hardest thing had been waiting in the morning’s pale, cold light, which woke her early, as she heard the trolley and the footsteps come down the corridor towards her. She heard it stop, heard doors open and close, heard the screams and scuffles behind them, the choking sounds, the retching and coughing, the swearing of the wardens. All the while it came nearer and nearer, all the while she knew she would be next. Her turn was coming. The waiting for it was the worst, the fear of it debilitating. In a haze of hunger and dread, she had lain for an hour, some mornings, listening to that trolley squeal and rattle its way towards her. The sound of it pushed a bow wave of horror into every cell along the row, so strong it was almost palpable. The few simple items aboard that small vehicle were enough to cause strong hearts to falter, and tears of sheer terror to well in Cat’s eyes.

I’m going to send this to Broughton Street in case you have been in touch there, in case you’ve left word of your whereabouts, she continues. She pauses, grips the end of her pen between her teeth. How can she not think what to write, to her best friend? To the person she thinks of most often? I do miss you, Tess. Here is not such a bad place, I can see that with my waking eyes, but all the while I feel trapped. I feel like I am still in prison. Do you feel it too? Ever since you and I made our escape from the house to that first meeting – that was when we were free, Tess! For the very first time. I didn’t think it would end up this way. Cat stares at her own scant shadow on the wall, falling into the memory of it. They weren’t even supposed to be friends, a parlourmaid and a kitchen-maid. Cat ranked higher, and was not supposed to talk to the lower servants, not even at mealtimes at the long table in the servants’ quarters where they all met, three times a day. Tess shared a cellar room with the scullery-maid, Ellen, at first. But then the room, which was below ground level, was flooded out one night, and took weeks to dry. Mildew furred the walls, damp put a stiff chill in the air. So Ellen was given a truckle bed in with the first kitchen-maid, and Tess joined Cat in the attic.

Tess was only sixteen, little more than a child. Cat taught her to read a little, told her of faraway places, read to her from Byron and Milton and Keats. Tess’s eyes would light up at each twist and turn in the story, at each horror and wonder. When the Mariner killed the albatross, when Isabella planted her lover’s head in a flower-pot.

It was Tess’s idea to sneak out, the first time. Until then, Cat had not considered the idea. She had been raised in obedience, and deference; she had been raised to love and fear The Gentleman. But Tess read the leaflet that was brought to the servants’ quarters, and showed it to Cat. Waving it under her nose in a quiet corner of the corridor, tucked into the recess by the scullery doorway where they could not be seen from the butler’s pantry or the housekeeper’s room. ‘Let’s go along to it, Cat! I dare you! Oh, do let’s go!’ On Sunday afternoon, their only free time, they put on their best clothes and went. And it lit a fire in Cat. For there to be life, outside the house. For there to be a roomful of people, all gathered together of their own free will, and for her to be one of them. Tess’s cheeks were pink at the thrill of it, and Cat was all but struck dumb. It was like the world had started over, and would never go back to its old, drab turning.

The local meeting hall had been decked out in purple, white and green; from the sashes, flags and swags of bunting that hung from every banister and balustrade, to the sprays of flowers in vases that stood all around, dousing the air with their scent. Huge banners wafted gently overhead. One proclaimed: Who Would Be Free Themselves Must Strike the Blow! Another bore the graceful likeness of Emmeline Pankhurst, and praised her Daring Rectitude, calling her a Champion of Womanhood. There was a bustle and a hum of excitement, and Cat and Tess stayed on their feet at the back, overawed by the grandness of the ladies seated towards the front, who seemed to know each other well. Never before had they been in the same room as upper- and middle-class women, and yet been on the same footing as them. For Tess, that was enough. It was enough to be counted as a person, to count for something for a while. But for Cat, it was the words that were spoken, the arguments she heard that night from the various speakers, that shook her to her very core; seemed to shake her awake for the first time in her life.

‘A man may be drunk, or mad, or a convicted criminal; he may be lame, unfit for military service, or a keeper of white slaves, and yet he may vote! A woman may be mayor, or nurse, or mother; she may be learned in medicine, and be a doctor or a teacher; she may work and support herself and her family in industrial factories, and yet she may not vote! A soiled dove may be taken, if she is found to be infected by venereal disease, and kept against her will for many months until the infection has been treated, and yet there is no penalty for the men who have frequented and infected her! A husband may beat his wife, and indulge all his many urges upon her body, and she has no recourse to refuse him. A man may philander before he weds, and try himself with several female partners, and still he may go on to make an honourable partnership – and yet these women he has known are cast out by society!’

At this Tess had giggled, and coloured up, and Cat shushed her, gripping her hands to still her.

‘While only men can vote, only men’s economic grievances will be addressed by the government of this country. Our opponents point out that we have not the earning power of men: well, how can we have when all the most lucrative and important positions are barred to us – by men? As long as a woman has no political power, then she will have no economic power, and will remain at the bottom of the ladder when it comes to earnings. Until parliament is made responsible to us as voters, none of these inequalities, none of these imbalances will be addressed! They say that if we have the vote, women will no longer listen to men, and all will descend into chaos. We say, why should men not listen to women for once? Comrades! Spread the word! Give up your time; give up your money if you can. Raise up your voices and make yourselves heard!’

There was enthusiastic applause, and then the presentation of a medal to a frail lady, whose brown dress matched the brown hollows under her eyes, and who had recently come out of prison for disrupting a Liberal Party meeting. The woman pinned the medal to her dress, then spoke in a reedy voice of her ordeal, thanking her sisters for all their support, and vowing to fight on. She was given a standing ovation.

‘Let’s go, Cat – we’d better. It’s almost four o’clock,’ Tess whispered urgently, as the speaker stepped down.

‘Not yet. I want to ask what we can do!’

‘What do you mean, Cat? Do about what?’

‘Did you mean for this to be our first and last outing, then? Don’t you want to help them? Be one of them?’ Cat asked incredulously.

‘Be one of them?’ Tess echoed, with a startled smile.

‘You heard what she said! Why shouldn’t we have the vote? Why should I earn less than the hall boy, when I am older and have worked longer and hold a higher position than he?’

‘But… it’s not for the likes of us – we’ve got duties to attend to. Look at all those rich women! They’ve the time and money to take part. What have we got?’

‘And we’ll always have no time, and no money, and duties to attend to, if we never do anything about it. Don’t you want to be part of something?’ Cat demanded, giving Tess a little shake. Tess’s eyes were wide, and she swallowed, but in the end she nodded.

‘I do, Cat. If you’ll be there with me. I do want to be part of it,’ she said, looking up at Cat with gentle wonder.

‘Good.’ Cat smiled. ‘Come on. Let’s ask what we can do.’ They gathered leaflets, and paid a penny for a copy of Votes for Women, and learnt the whereabouts of their local WSPU office, where they could go and pay a shilling to join, and sign the declaration of allegiance.

In the weeks that followed, they went to the Women’s Press Shop on Charing Cross Road to buy the colours – all manner of accessories in white, purple and green were on sale, from hat pins to bicycles – and volunteered their time filling envelopes, handing out leaflets, and advertising meetings and fundraising events. And they went, from then on, each Sunday afternoon, even though their feet were throbbing and their backs aching, and they could have spent the time lying down or drinking in the pub, or meeting with a sweetheart. They wore their WSPU badges pinned to their underwear all week, where they would not be seen and confiscated; and from then on they were not merely servants, they were suffragettes.

It was a game at first, Cat thinks. A game in which she dictated the rules and Tess played along. Cat shuts her eyes in anguish, the letter lying unfinished in front of her. How can she write something as insufficient as a letter about it all? How can she hope to make amends? Sweet, trusting Tess; little more than a child and besotted with Cat, willing to do whatever Cat asked of her. And what Cat asked of her would come to ruin her. It would end with her blood staining the ground around her, and her spirit beaten down. It would end in her violent devastation. Cat signs off with two bleak little words. Forgive me. She presses the letter to her chest, as if it will absorb some of the remorse from her heart, and carry it to Tess.