CHAPTER 8
Ford Heath was a village not ten miles from Ben's own. On top of a hill, he looked down upon it. Its ancient church, older than the trees that swayed beneath its mighty spire, drew him down and guided him in. If this was the place where Victoria had died then surely, Ben thought, her body would be buried here. From her grave, he would find her funeral and from there, her life.
Dawn light, clean and sharp, enough to vanish the gloom, helped him search the graveyard. He looked at every gravestone that stood crooked or worn with age but found none inscribed with the name Victoria Yates. It must be missing, he thought, broken, discarded, forgotten with age. He leapt back through time, with an eye to bridge 250 years.
The morning light was now mean and grey. Previously decrepit gravestones stood proudly with youth. Others, which were new to Ben but old to the world, were half with the living and half with that below. None where inscribed with a date beyond 1693 and none belonged to Victoria Yates.
Could there be another burial ground, one contemporary to her age? He ran towards the church - an imposing, defensive, castle-like structure, built from a lifeless grey stone that, this morning, linked the sky and Earth together. The thin, arched windows were dead with black. He scaled the bell tower, up to its roof, from where the spire began its climb to reach beyond the human realm.
Now above the trees, he scoured the view. Although wilder, less in the grip of man, the countryside looked familiar to him: the patchwork green and brown; the fields, smaller but still productive land; clusters of cottages, some timber and wattle and daub, others made from stone, all thatched; a single, isolated manor house; chimneys streaming smoke; but no other church or burial ground.
A quick, accurate, jump took him back two full years. He then skimmed through the days until the church bells broke a still morning laze. He knew that to attend church in the seventeenth century was, by law, compulsory, so if this was Victoria's parish, then surely here she must come.
Crouched behind the bell tower's parapet wall, he spied on the people who came. Most approached on foot, others on horse drawn carriage. The clothes told of the age - revealed the rich, the coping, the poor. Men, of status, wearing large wide-brimmed hats, breeches, stockings and ruffs strolled in with a proud and righteous air. Their wives and children followed behind, silent and ordered, submissive within their master's wake.
The pages of history flared up in Ben. These men resembled Puritans, or rather, in his ever seeking mind, hunters and burners of witches. A local legend, taught by the German Sausage as historical fact, told of three village women, who in 1683 were tried for the crime of witchcraft. Drawings of men, who had accused and condemned similar women in similar villages, were shown to illustrate the lesson, and were now, here, made flesh. The German Sausage recalled this legend several times, and always in a tone that relished the facts.
'Deviant, rebellious women were tied to wooden stakes and burned alive! Yes, alive, while alive, while very much alive!'
He would say, proud at his association with the men, hopefully his ancestors, who had acted, 'brave and true.'
Ben knew this was an age of spirits and demons, and of witches, and of fear, of minds and imaginations unchecked by facts. A time that had flowed through the ages to trap him in its current.
Other men and women arrived at the church: women worn with years beyond their age; children devoid of youth, worked beyond play; men made hard by the labours of every single relentless day. All shared a solemn air. Many seemed unconvinced by themselves, their heads permanently bowed. The mysteries of life did not bring these people to church. It was the mysteries of death that kept them locked in - disease and famine, the hard walked road that led them, one-way, towards it.
Distance blurred faces but one, he believed, was Victoria's. She walked between two older women, all of whom seemed equal in dress: white linen shifts beneath simple woolen dresses, thick warming cloaks, and white linen bonnets - clothes that were clean, that told of status, of people who were coping well. All three looked demure, reserved and utterly in their place. Ben skipped beyond the morning service to watch as they, along with the rest of the congregation, left the church, back into the great unknown. A man, Puritan in style, addressed them, questioning. Victoria remained silent, only once giving the man a brief, shy smile. The eldest of the three, Hannah, who Ben thought to be around thirty years old, answered the man with good, deferential grace. The third woman, Mary, who Ben thought to be just twenty, stood a pace behind, her head bowed, and her eyes fixed towards the ground. The conversation quickly ended. The Man bid them farewell then turned and walked away, a look of distaste fixed on his face.
Victoria and her companions continued to stand, dutifully, as the crowd passed around them. Several brief, and somewhat reluctant, acknowledgements, came their way. All where met by Hannah and Victoria politely, with a warm and considered smile. Finally, on the tails of the crowd, they left. Ben watched until they disappeared out of sight. He then followed, hidden in time and space.
They walked along a country lane. Woodland on one side gave Ben cover. He tracked them as forest monsters, creatures and things had once tracked him. As they flickered past the gaps in the trees, their blue and green cloaks flashed colour into the grey, autumn day. Ben observed how they kept a calm, steady pace, set neither to rush nor to dawdle. It was a movement that seemed constrained, like school children walking into class while under the judging eyes of a strict teacher. Victoria and Hannah led, side-by-side; Mary followed a step behind. Between them, they shared few words.
A horse and carriage came up from behind. Hannah gathered the other two to stand at the side of the lane. The horse and carriage passed as if pushed, floating on the wind. The black, windowless cabin kept the passengers hidden inside. The driver, himself concealed beneath a grey hat and smock, passed them blankly. Once away, the sound of a whip, cracked once, snapped through the air.
The woodland began to encroach the other side of the lane. Ben noticed Mary, how often, and suddenly, she would rush her stare towards the woodland as if stirred by something hidden amongst the trees.
At the side of the lane stood a scruffy, one room hovel: mud-made walls submerged below a shabby, oversized roof made of brittle twig-like thatch; the only door was a woolen sheet; the floor was earth as it was outside. An elderly man - stick thin, with hair and skin embalmed black with dirt, wearing a grubby smock-frock - sat on a simple wooden stool beside an open fire, a smoking clay pipe was held still in his mouth. His frozen stare looked up towards a treetop, to a bird that chattered alone. Hannah looked to solicit a greeting. Blind to them, the man's stare remained fixed. They walked passed him. He turned and watched them as they continue away.
'Much a whisper in the woods this day,' the man spoke, with a dry, thirsty voice.
All three of them stopped, turned and looked. Victoria and Mary looked somewhat shocked. Hannah replied, calm but firm.
'In plain, good English?' she asked.
'To my ear,' he answered, as he returned his stare to the treetop.
'The wind through the leaves, old man. The common wind, cheap, is it not?'
The man drew smoke through his pipe and ignored her. Hannah turned away then gestured for Victoria and Mary to continue on their way.
They took a left turning onto a vague track that cut through the wood. As Victoria continued along, her solemn, demure exterior cracked, and a youthful sparkle rose within her. She ran ahead playfully. The wood began to clear. Victoria stopped and called the others to hurry.
'Come! There is still much time left in the day.'
Mary quickened her pace to catch her.
'And work to be done,' said Mary, although not with a heavy heart.
Ben, having barely heard their words, rushed forward to get closer. Mary, startled, looked towards him. He ducked behind a tree.
'What is it? What did you see?' Ben heard Victoria ask, with a rush of excitement.
'Nothing to raise our concerns,' the voi
ce of Hannah, as she approached Victoria and Mary. 'There is much that draws pictures on Mary's mind, for her mind is quick, and good. Alas, pictures are not sworn to yield the truth. Now come, we have much to do.'
Ben heard the sound of footsteps breaking twigs on the ground. Then Victoria's voice, hushed quiet.
'There are stranger creatures than any mind can draw, here on this earth, alive! I will show you.'
To the sound of more footsteps, Ben peered beyond the tree. Victoria and Mary ran, arm-in-arm, to catch up with Hannah. He followed.
As the trees thinned to the edge of the wood, into view came a good-sized, three-storey house: built from brick with a timber frame and a clay tiled roof and glass paned windows. Ben thought the house was substantial, certainly bigger than most he had seen from the church's roof, and in good repair. A woven wooden fence penned in the house and a good deal of garden.
As Mary and Victoria reached a gate, left open by Hannah, they released each other then continued into the garden. Mary followed Hannah into the house. Victoria ran to a cow which, tethered to a large patch of grass, stood chewing its cud. After patting the cow on the head, she looked over it checking to see all was well. Once satisfied, she darted away towards a stone pigsty. On reaching it, she stood on tip-toes and peered over the wall. The sound of a pig snorting, followed by a girls laughter, reached Ben's ear. Still laughing, Victoria set-off towards a patch of garden laid heavy with a crop of autumn vegetables. As she went, she dodged several free-roaming chickens leaving each in a temporary state of commotion.
Ben, hidden behind the final cluster of trees, watched Victoria as she rummaged through a row of cabbages. She seemed to be looking for something hidden amongst the leaves.
'Victoria!' Hannah's voice, raised without anger, filled the air. Ben and Victoria looked. Hannah stood in the doorway.
'Your clothes will do for church and study, not for the mud!' she continued.
Victoria stood, smiled and gave her reply.
'But the mud is good to us! It feeds us well, does it not?'
'As it would if tended to in the clothes of a beggar! Or your usual gardening dress!'
Victoria laughed agreeably then ran into the house.
Ben thought how happy Victoria was, how enthused by life, her life at home at least. A nervous shudder plucked his mind as he wondered what awful thing had turned her into the ghost he knew her to be.
Who was Hannah? Mary, he was convinced was a servant, but Hannah? An authority figure, yes, the one in charge. But Victoria's mother? Ben thought not. An aunt perhaps or even a nanny charged to look after her.
He went back through time, just a minute or two. Hannah approached the house. He stepped out from behind the trees, blatantly, straight into her path but her stare went straight through him, and he remained unseen.
'Hey!' he called after her but his voice, too, failed to break into this other world.
He looked behind; Victoria and Mary came into view. Mary froze in fear as her stare fixed on him. Victoria looked on, unseeing, confused at Mary's sudden turn. Ben slipped back through time, and once again concealed himself behind the trees. Hannah went past, followed by Victoria and Mary, who was now without the fright, or memory, of seeing a ghost. He whistled loudly, Mary looked, Victoria did not. He travelled time to once again spare Mary the memory of his haunting sound.
Ben, cloaked in time and space, entered the house. The hall sparkled new. The straight and true oak beams that framed the smooth white-washed walls and the polished floor shone as youthfully bright as Victoria did here. Ben had to remind himself that this was not the museumized past, mummified and dusty with decay; this was the living now.
What dominated the hall was a grandfather clock. It stood on guard facing the door, taller than any man. All who entered felt its shadow. Its white dial leered from its dark, nearly black, wooden case to net any pair of eyes. The hands pointed to twelve o'clock, a time Ben knew to be wrong. A small round window halfway down the case showed the pendulum, which hung motionless. The only other piece of furniture in the hall was a thin table pushed up against a wall. Four candles and a large pewter vase full of sky blue flowers decorated its surface.
He searched the house, and recent time, to learn of their lives. They lived well, a peaceful, simple existence set to a regular rhythm. As a family, they were self- contained and almost self sufficient. Mary was a servant girl, her labour hard and physical, and constant from the break of day. She would clean the hearth then start the fire; chop wood; fetch water from the well; scrub linen; scour pans; beat dust from rugs and much else besides. Ben imagined her to be powered by the light, for she never seemed to be still when the Sun was in the sky. A fear, a nervousness, smoldered within her, one never far from breaking out. She saw her place in the world, as a lowly servant girl, far more sharply than Victoria or Hannah, who, although they never questioned her work, treated her with warmth, and respect.
Hannah, Ben came to conclude, was something of a governess charged to look after Victoria. She would organise Victoria's day, give time to work and play. Her word, which was kind and considerate, ruled the household. Every night, she required Victoria read passages from the Bible. Although she sat as the teacher, Victoria read each word faultlessly. As they read, Mary would sit and listen. Once finished, they would spend an hour on lace making or embroidery. The talk they shared was light, of the day and of those that would follow. With Hannah's permission, Mary and Victoria would then go upstairs to bed although only Mary would fall straight asleep.
One night, with Victoria and Mary sent to bed, a man came to the house. Hannah had waited, at the window, for him to arrive. They greeted each other with a formal shyness, although their smiles to each other went beyond their polite reserve to touch a rawer part of the soul. The man, Thomas, was several years younger than Hannah and dressed without fuss or fancy in a heavy coat that Ben could see wrapped a heavy heart.
They sat separately, parted on two wooden chairs, their faces ghostly in the firelight, their stares locked otherwise to flush with sadness and longing unfulfilled. Ben danced through time and space in order to avoid Thomas's stare, which had previously plucked him with ease from the dark surrounds. He weaved through their conversation, in and out of words and silence. Certain moments caught him and held him still.
'I wonder, an education incomplete, takes revenge on me for it always seeks more. What thoughts has it given me? Dreams, which so quickly become torments,' said Thomas.
'Work and duty make life slow to reveal its secrets,' replied Hannah.
'Its beauty, too.'
'Its beauty, and pleasure.'
'I see both.'
'You do?'
'Even in light as dim as now.'
Hannah's cheeks reddened; her stare turned to the fire. Ben watched, captivated. He felt a tension between them, but not one he could understand - no threat of violence, no threat of rage.
From a small book held in his hands, Thomas read to Hannah. Not that the book was needed as he knew the words by heart.
'The World's a bubble, and the Life of Man
Less than a span:
In his conception wretched, from the womb
So to the tomb;
Curst from his cradle, and brought up to years
With cares and fears.
Who then to frail mortality shall trust,
But limns on water, or but writes in dust.
And then, the hush in Thomas's voice threatened by an anger that seethed within.
'Were you, Hannah, consulted when the King was restored?'
'I, a lowly woman?' asked Hannah.
'Was Mary, were beggars, or men who toil in the fields?'
'They were not!'
'Rights! What is right? The King, it is said, is right! But other men, lower men, take his power, so should we, lowly figures that we are told we are, should we take theirs? Should we wrest their power for ourselves?'
'We should,
but if I had such power, I would use it for the simplest of things.'
His anger softened, gave way to hope.
'To leave?' he asked.
'Away, in the manner of my choosing?'
'Yes.'
'I would.'
'Could you leave?'
'I could.'
'Will you?'
'When right. And in that time, will you stay?'
'I will.'
'And for how long?'
'Eternity.'
It all seemed rather odd to Ben - like spies he thought, a meeting wrapped in danger with words spoken in code.
With the hour late, Thomas knew it was time to leave. Hannah gave no resistance. She led him to the door. Ben, watched, hidden. Thomas pledged to return soon, as he always did and would. She replied silently; a silence he caught and held; it bridged the space between them and slowly drew them in. They lunged at each other with a sudden embrace, almost violently becoming as one, their bodies pressed, their mouths kissing. Ben looked away, somewhat repulsed. An involuntary movement returned his stare back to watch. Why, he wondered. Why the need to be so close? Hannah wrenched the bond apart, paused for a second then unlocked and opened the door. Thomas, unprompted, slipped out into the night. Hannah closed the door then locked it, breathless, weakened, needing to lean against it. Ben was captivated. He moved in close. Her eyes were the fullest, the most alive, he had ever seen: happy, sad; angry, serene; pleased yet disappointed; unsatisfied, expecting.
Victoria rushed into Ben's consciousness like the freshest of dreams. Her eyes, so ravenous for the world, consumed him, blindly. She breezed through her chores with a delighted ease, as if energised by an unexpected summers day that had displaced the gloom of winter to make even the most mundane of tasks a joy.
Her chores were light, but she wanted more. Ben could tell she had won the right to work the garden.
'The lady of the house, in my charge and thick with mud,' said Hannah, playfully exasperated as a soil coated Victoria stood before her, 'What would your equals say?'
'My, what fine onions! And cabbages fit for the king.' Victoria replied.
He watched her try to sleep, resentful at the need to do so. 'Sleep, must you interrupt me!' he heard her cry. For how she filled her days, always lost in wonder. Ben watched, amused, as she interrogated cabbages on why and how they grew. 'To try and reach the stars, to glimpse them, if only for the briefest of time?' he heard her ask. And then to a tiny caterpillar held in her hand,
'How small are you? To me, so very. But to other creatures you are a mighty giant. Which poor beast is the smallest of all or is everything more to some?'
Only when the Grandfather Clock was in her sights did her eyes ever darken. She could never pass it without checking the time remained stopped at twelve o'clock. Hannah and Mary too. One look at the clock and a cold, dark shiver plucked against their spines.
The only other time a sense of trepidation coloured Victoria's stare came when she climbed the narrow, enclosed flight of stairs that led to the upper floor. How gently she would creep, desperate to avoid any creek or crack. A locked door topped the stairs. Whether day or night, lit by sunlight or a candle held, before she turned the key in the lock, and again before she pushed the door open, she would pause, look down the stairs and listen hard. Only when convinced she remained alone would she step beyond the door.
The upper floor of the house contained two rooms: a bedroom and a study. The study, which was first room after the door, was simple and plain: a desk, a chair, a chest, a small table and a bookcase which held several dozen leather-bound books. Two large windows flooded the room with light. At one of the windows, on the table, stood a telescope. By the other, the desk, on which there was a microscope.
The telescope consisted of two tubes, one inside the other, both made from layers of cardboard and finished with metal bands. Mounted on a wooden ball, which was held in place by two metal braces, the telescope could be rotated up and down.
The microscope consisted of a single tube, finished in red leather, which tapered at the top to an eyepiece, and which was fastened to a vertical brass rod that allowed the tube to be raised and lowered in order to set the level of magnification. Beneath the lens was a brass plate on which the object to be magnified was placed.
This room was Victoria's ship, her place to dream and travel, to learn, to wonder, to propel her beyond the everyday. The space barely contained her enthusiasm. Ben watched her, her eye fixed to the telescope, in awe of everything the night sky revealed. Moons, planets and stars all reached down to touch her. By the light of a single candle, using quill and ink, she drew pictures of the Moon at each stage of its lunar cycle: its light and dark, its craters and textures all brilliantly realised. Of course, she would talk to the Moon and ask it questions.
'What sieges and assaults have you suffered? Why are you so blemished? The will of the Lord when all came to be? Why not skin you perfectly? Why not show the face of an angel for all earth to see? Why no rivers or seas or forests? Where they stripped, destroyed by war? Are you dead, Master Moon? Too cold to grow? Are you The Earth's waste? Were you expelled? Are you barren to warn us what we may become?'
And to the stars, yet more questions were thrown.
'Why do you flicker like candle light? Be there eyes beyond the black? Does someone dare peek at me? Does your light come in waves like ripples on a pond? Pray, how I dream you are all blessed with an earth, and a cause to shine eternal.'
The microscope would plunge her into other worlds, other perspectives. She would study insects, leaves, pieces of food, cloth and even dust. The strange creatures she had promised to show Mary were here, monsters drawn in ink. Ben looked, amazed, at her drawing of a common fly, not that he now thought them common, not now he could see them close-up and in detail. Now he thought them magical, as he did Victoria's talent.
One cloudy night she opened a window. Cold streamed in, but she gave it no notice. With her voice a firm whisper, she made her plea,
'Wind, draw the clouds to let me see!'
She returned to the desk, to her quill and ink, and then, after a while, came back to the window to see the stars for now they glittered brilliantly in a clear night sky. She knelt before them, perfectly still, as if held by their beauty, bowed to that which was all inspiring.
Then, one afternoon, Ben watched as Victoria, shocked and surprised, looked up from the microscope to see Hannah standing at the door, her thoughtful, reflective stare set gently on upon her.
'Is this right?' Hannah asked.
'I hope it to be,' Victoria replied.
'You feel it is?'
'I do.'
'To feel that which you know to be right, what fortune, what privilege,' Hannah spoke through a dream of want. Then hardened, 'alas, what would your Father say?'
'How right we are to share a fascination,' Victoria spoke a lie although one desperate with hope.
'No. He would not.' Hannah was certain.
Ashamed, Victoria tipped her stare down towards the desk, then spoke,
'No,' she agreed with Hannah.
'What thought would he give to me?' asked Hannah.
'It was I who took the key! I who choose to enter, to make use of what I knew to be idle!'
'And it was I who allowed you on your way.'
'Should it end?'
'Will he return?'
'To this day, has he?'
They stared at each other, lost in the unknown, until Hannah spoke.
'So much is hidden from us. How I hope, your eyes remain freely open, for you should seek to know all your heart desires. Whether wayward to the heavens or shrunk into places I, myself, would rather not see.'
They shared a smile, although Hannah's flashed only briefly before she continued.
'Alas, always remember the level we live at for there can be as dark as the blackest night sky.'
Victoria nodded her head. A silent understanding bound them. Hannah left the room. Victoria looked caut
ious but then continued to use the microscope. Good, Ben thought, good for her. What harm is she doing? But then, what wrath, and whose, does she risk? What father would not be proud of a daughter with such a gift, and a will to learn and discover? The father, what man can he be? What journey took him away from his home?
Another day, and another time for Victoria to creep upstairs towards the door, but as she reached the top, Hannah called from below,
'Your uncle!'
'Here?' Victoria asked, visibly taken aback.
'Yes!'
Ben travelled time and space. He found the Uncle in the hall - a sour, brooding presence with a hard sneering face, which long ago won the fight against anything as frivolous as joy. His dour skin was drained of colour, flat grey like the dullest of skies. Black, wiry hair formed a thin, pathetic beard and tuffs that burst chaotically from his nostrils and ears. How ugly he was, Ben thought, but how he revelled vainly within it. How sure of himself he seemed, how absolutely right.
His clothes were black and puritan in style. Thick black leather gloves covered his hands. In one, he gripped a horsewhip, which tested the strength of the other as it banged against the palm. A wide-brimmed hat topped his head. As he continued to wear this hat indoors, Ben considered it a deliberate mark of disrespect.
His paced up and down, back and forth, his suspicious, scornful stare poured over the room in a constant state of repulsion. Mary stood at the door behind him, her head bowed to the floor, her body as rigid and as lifeless as the grandfather clock. Every time he reached her, he set his stare upon her and let it flare with a vicious scowl. As he passed the vase of flowers, which now bloomed a bright, fiery orange, he passed his horse whip over the flower heads with an obvious desire to cut them down.
Hannah and Victoria made a nervous entrance shuffling down the stairs. As soon as they reached the hall, they showed a curtsey to the Uncle, and Hannah spoke to greet him.
'Sir, what pleasure-'
'Pleasure?' The Uncle cut her short, 'Save your flattery! I bring no pleasure here!'
'No? Then I hope no ill.'
'Ill? Could this house suffer more?'
'I assure you, any ill you find here is that which you bring yourself.'
'How you forget yourself, a low servant woman! Dare not presume to rise in front of me!'
'A servant, I am. One charged by the master of this house to govern-'
'You have no right to govern! No means to keep a house! A house without a master is a realm without a king. A sure means to anarchy.'
'We live well and peaceful in accordance with the will-'
'Of my brother!!'
His voice erupted, a sudden gust of noise which levelled all to silence. His stare fired into Hannah. She could not look; she bowed her head. He continued.
'Pray tell, did he depart this house with a mind at peace with God?'
Hannah paused to find strength and to load a reply.
'I follow my instructions as they were served to me,' she told him, in a calm assured voice.
He prowled towards her. Victoria, who stood in front of Hannah, stepped back towards her. Hannah's hands took and held Victoria's shoulders protectively.
'As you would claim, but what witness is mine for proof?'
He spoke with a calm, low voice which slithered towards her full of menace. But still, she held his stare.
'I have only my word. I can offer no more,' she replied.
'Then I will offer this, bestow time on the free and deviancy will prosper!'
Now just half a step away from Victoria, he came to a stop. His stare unflinching, drilled into Hannah's. His closeness made them look small. Using his whip to gesticulate, he continued.
'No master, no rod, no force to remind all of their duty? And what of the spirits and demons to whom women are such simple prey? What rules this house to repel them?'
'I serve no spirit nor demon nor you! I serve only your brother!' Hannah spoke with calm defiance.
'Then show him pity! God have mercy on his soul, for what soul was his when he left this house? One battered and broken. And now, alas to what? To good or to evil? For let it be known, it will be one!'
He dropped his stare to Victoria and cast it round to inspect her.
'Niece, how well you stand before. How ripe. Alas, I should say, too well, too full of youth. Is there room in you left for God?' He rubbed his thumb across her cheek. She did not move; her quivering she held within.
'These cheeks, so red, so rosy. What burns within you, niece? What sin fires you?' He Looked at Hannah. 'We are all but servants of the Lord! His work in us should scar our faces. Let us be marked by the toils of hard labour we must endure in His name!'
'We are all kept busy.'
'And your labours? As hard as they were when you weren't so free?'
'You ask of me what?'
'What brought the madness here? What called to the dark to bring my brother's possession? The conspiracy of witches?'
'Sir, they did not!'
'How sure you are!'
'Your brother's will is lawful.'
'Alas, it is!' He turned away and preached to them all. 'But God will bring me justice. This is not my sin! I share no blame; I accept no punishment! You shall all be judged away from me. My brother, a brother by blood, alas not one who stands at my shoulder in prayer. I dissent, as he too dissents, but, I, in the true gaze of God! Now, let me leave this house. Save me from it!'
He paced towards the door. Mary, her stare still daring not to look at him directly, opened the door. About to leave, he stopped, turned and pointed his whip at the Grandfather clock.
'The clock, for your souls, pray it works again!'
He left. Mary pushed the door shut, forcefully with a rush of relief. To avoid her stare, Ben moved to the staircase. Hannah and Victoria turned to look at the clock.
'Will it work again?' Victoria asked.
'At your father's hand? None can tell,' Hannah answered.
'Do you wish it so?'
She looked at Hannah for an answer, and Hannah's silence told it.
'Nor I,' Victoria agreed. 'Time stops, and we live so free, so peacefully.'
'The clock ruled your father as he ruled us. His right in law and custom. Alas, he left us, he bid us all alone. Is this time, now, not ours?'
'Yes,' Victoria spoke with certainty, but then came doubt, 'until?'
'Until, the dark unknown. Now come! How wrong it will be to waste what we have. Victoria, you were studying, Mary-'
Ben watched as Hannah rallied them. The hall emptied quickly. He moved to the clock and stood facing it. He knew he had to learn who the father was. He travelled back through time, seven months, until a man, Victoria's Father, appeared standing before the Grandfather Clock. He wore a monk's habit and a thick black clock. In his hand, he held a wooden staff. His head was bowed, pressed against the clock's face as if in prayer. He spoke, mumbling,
'I follow your order. The clock works no more. The key is my possession. Permit my return and the clock will be wound again.'
Suddenly, he turned away from the Grandfather Clock to face Ben. Ben recoiled, stepped back and to the side, as Victoria's Father's face beat him away. How dark it was, maddened and distressed, possessed with a voice that was not his own, that called him on, that demanded obsolete obedience. Ben thought of an evil wizard robbed of his power, reduce to nothing more than an average man, now forced to walk alone pursued by shadows, all of which were enemies and now able to exact revenge.
Victoria's Father rushed to the door, opened it and left. He made no attempt to close the door, although the seething wind slammed it quickly shut. Ben looked at the Grandfather Clock; the hands pointed to twelve o'clock.
Through time and space he went. Victoria's Father ruled the house, his word was absolute, and second in charge was the Grandfather Clock. Together they dictated the day-to-day lives of Victoria, Hannah and Mary, who, like freight, were shunted between the minutes and hours, forced to exist wit
hin clockwork routines. They all had times set for them, to sleep, wake, eat, work, and for Victoria, to learn. No one dared lateness. Fear drove them on. Ben watched, shocked, as Mary was pushed hard into the cellar to be locked in its cold, dark space for two full days - one for her lateness and the other for her scream.
'You deviate from the time I have set you! I offer you the light and yet you dare blink!' Victoria's Father screamed at her.
He would often enforce silence. He could bare no noise that rose above the tick-tock-tick of the Grandfather Clock. His need to hear this sound was desperate, like a man listening to hear the breath of a fallen brother. He listened to the ticking as if hearing an undeciphered code, the echoes of an alien voice that was seeking communication. The Grandfather Clock possessed him; its movement, the cogs and springs transfixed him. Ben heard him mutter,
'The clockwork mind of God, like us and all his creation.'
He would stare at the clock face, entranced.
'Look, the face, the eyes...I see...Look, the face, the eyes.' His voice a whisper.
His obsessiveness went beyond clocks and time. The telescope, microscope and his books consumed him. Night after night, he would study the heavens. Reams of disordered notes and sketches poured from him. The movements of the planets, their moons, and the stars obsessed him. Each tick of detail he felt obliged to record. The books, on science and philosophy, were read and re-read, but not with a sense of wonder or joy, rather with a swirl of anger and confusion.
Sometimes he would watch Victoria as he did the night sky, or the bits of animals he placed beneath the microscope. She, Hannah and Mary too, were trapped in his gaze. None could prise room to smile, or to question, or to explore, or to be moved or inspired, alas to be free. Whenever they spoke to him, or rather replied to his questioning, he insisted they look him directly in the eye. 'Show me your truth!' he would demand of them. In his presence, they were all obliged to stand facing him, to never look away or turn their backs on him.
He deemed gardening a low activity far beneath Victoria. The Bible was the only book he gave her permission to read. In the company of Hannah, she was set the task of writing a copy of every single page, faultless and error free. He forced silence and stillness upon her, a daily grind of routine and repetition.
How reduced she was, thought Ben. But at least the occasional adventure leaked from her eyes. As he had travelled long and far into dreams and imagination, with a body that was placid and still, she too ventured this way. When she stole a look through a window and glimpsed the colours and movements of the world outside, he knew her mind was roving endlessly and free, as it would when held by the fire, or by the needle and the lace, or when a rebel against sleep.
As the weeks fell towards his departure, he worked day and night with the manic zeal of a man who believed himself to be on the cusp of a fantastic discovery. He took no food or sleep. His notes and drawings made no sense. For hours at a time, he would scour the night sky, whether free of cloud or not, hunting for something that always remained elusive. Everyday, slave-like, he would wind the Grandfather Clock. He would stand hypnotised by the cogs and springs, trapped until a rush of willpower tore him free, back to his study where the tick-tock-tick looped in his mind. Tick-tock-tick until fear rang alarmed, a strike of fear that felled him. One strong enough to make his body shake, or rather its surface, for beneath the trembling he seemed paralysed, unable to move from the floor on which he had collapsed. Two days passed but no one came, no one dared disturb him. Finally, strength returned to his limbs, just enough to power a crawl up on to a chair, where slowly as decision and certainty grew in his mind the shaking stopped. A day later, he was gone. He gave no word to Victoria, and explained little to Hannah, only that she was to act as Victoria's guardian and run the household in a manner that, 'she, and he, and God saw fit.' Financial provision would be made for her, a slice of his annual income, which, Ben learnt, he derived from the family estate.
'Show thrift, and no indulgence, for if you do, you will be judged,' he warned Hannah.
Finally, he claimed his study was haunted and the seal, which was the door, should never be broken. He gave her the key to the door.
'Guard the key, for you, I believe are pure! If ever I have the strength, I will return to cleanse the infestation. Although I may always be weak, and so, may never return.'
With the Grandfather Clock wound down, he moved the hands to twelve o'clock, paced to the door and left. As Ben watched, he felt the chill, The... come to hunt. He sped away, forwards through time, a race to know Victoria's end, for what, how or who?
It was a Sunday afternoon one harried by an angry wind. From Church, Victoria, Hannah and Mary returned home. Hannah and Mary went straight into the house; Victoria fought the wind to check her animals and garden crops. After ten or so minutes, happy that the wind had caused no damage, she too went inside. Sheltered in the hall, she called for Hannah and Mary. Neither came nor replied. She hurried towards the door that led to the kitchen, but then, with a sudden jolt, her motion reversed as if yanked back towards the hall, forced to look again at the Grandfather Clock. She stood, transfixed, a confused panic beginning to choke. Through the small round window, the pendulum swayed. The dial showed the time, five past one o'clock.
She stumbled towards the kitchen, her voice pleaded for Hannah and Mary. Silence and emptiness were all that came in return. In the kitchen, she stood alone. About to leave, a door, the cellar door, began to open, by whose hand she knew without a single flash of doubt.
'Father, sir,' her voice barely broke sound.
An unkempt beard blotted his face. His movements were slow and considered, although his stare, which glanced only briefly at Victoria, confessed a bewildered rage. With a gentle push, he closed the door then, with a burst of aggression, he bolted it. Still facing the door, he spoke.
'And so on the Sabbath Day truth is revealed.'
He turned to look at Victoria. His stare settled on her. Silence, which came over her in waves as if to drown her. Fear poured from her, so honest and pure. Tears seemed wanted but were too scared to break. He smiled, darkly and held her stare. She wanted to run, least to look away but, terrified, she could not.
'You fear me. Alas, I am not the man who will beat the guilt from you...Look at what you have done...Look...Come child. Follow me.'
He led her away from the kitchen, from the hall, from the house. He walked through the wind as if immune to its force, stabbing his staff into the ground with a pleasurable spite. Victoria followed behind, debris on the wind.
They approached a large manor house. He told her to wait. She stood, complied immediately, silently. He continued on towards the house from which his brother, The Uncle, came out and offered a cautious greeting.
The Uncle's kitchen was plain and utterly functional, no hint of decoration to amuse or warm the eye. The walls were white, the floor was stone. All dust and dirt had been exorcised. From an oak ceiling beam hung, two dead rabbits and three dead pheasants all tied at the neck tight enough to suffocate and several bunches of bone-dry herbs. The large fireplace was spotlessly clean but gave no flame to warm the cold winter air. Two small windows allocated an insufficient amount of light to break the grey lingering gloom. Here in this room no feasts were cooked here, no pleasures brewed. At the head of a table on a large wooden chair sat The Uncle, stiff and proud, puffed-up with his own sense of superiority. To his side, on a plain wooden bench that ran the length of the table, sat Victoria's Father, his body hunched, almost bowed towards The Uncle. Victoria stood in a corner of the room, as she had been ordered to do. So still was her body, so silent. Only her eyes revealed animation, torrents of pain and fear.
'My cause is of true and great urgency,' Victoria's Father said to his brother. 'Know The Lord has restored me. That I was broken by Him to be made well again.'
'With instruments made by man, you presumed to know the mind of God!' The Uncle replied.
'It is true. To know. To see as, a
s if His mind was my mind. Alas, I failed!'
'No man would succeed!'
'They would find only His anger, the violence of His discontent! All that came to me! That I, one so low, should look to question Him. That I should try to reach as high as He.'
'When all His knowledge is already written.'
'It is! His word, which I have taken and told! I have walked this land to preach His word, to confess to all my sin! Commanded by God I went. Yet behind me was the devil! His demons inside my kin! His witches inside my walls.'
The Uncle gave a single nod, and a glance towards Victoria. 'A girl meddling in the matters of man and god!' he spat for the words tasted vile.
'She conspired against me. She looked to the heavens, but not with an eye for God! She looked below, but not with an eye for God! To discover, to honor, to study all manner of demons!'
'You left temptation!'
'The instruments will be destroyed. All will be destroyed. All in the house is condemned.'
'And you?'
'Called abroad, far away to the New World, where His work will find me.'
'And behind you? What now do you leave again?'
'But for the means to fund my journey, all my worldly possessions I surrender to you.'
'All?'
'Everything! Take them, for you are wise!'
'You bestow on me one so sinful?'
'Save her! Expediency led me to believe a daughter, and indeed a servant, would do their master's will, but I was deceived. Now, I seek certainty. I leave her under your command. Break her without mercy. Only our Lord can show her mercy now. Show her the dark in the hope she can once again appreciate the light. Then, if, pure again, let marriage own her.'
'It must be done! She will be saved!'
They looked at each other in full agreement. Victoria's Father then spoke.
'When the flames come, let it be known, their screams are her creation.'
'No!!!' she screamed at them. Both men stood, called to action. The Uncle took hold of his brother's arm and stopped him rushing over to her.
'No! I am her master now!' he said.
'You can't! You can't!' her pleas continued.
'Leave, do your duty. I will do mine.' The Uncle told his brother.
Her Father left. Her Uncle threw her into the cellar. Insults followed her into the black. That night, flames lit the sky as they burnt to ruin her home, Hannah and Mary too, who her Father had tied and locked inside. The Uncle dragged Victoria to an upstairs window, scolding her for her sin and responsibility. With the flames in sight, he forced her to watch and imagine the screams.
From then on her life was joyless and filled with hate. She was forced to be silent, to live in darkness. A famine starved her mind. Men preached at her, fought to cast the demons and witchery out. Her aunt prayed to beat her. Work was used to purge her; she scrubbed, hauled and slaved until locked in the cellar at night.
The only hope that flashed in her eyes came when she went to the well to draw water. The church bell tower, a distant vision that rose above the trees to rally her hope and imagination, appeared to her as a platform from which she could launch herself far away into the sky forever. It was the place she ran to when the first opportunity to flee came her way. One day, as dusk became night, she found herself left alone and in reach of the door and freedom. Confused as to why, she hesitated, but the image of the tower reaching up and away, burst through the fog of exhaustion and propelled her forward, never to look back again.
She ran without restraint, as fast and as reckless as ever a girl did run. Behind her, dogs, hooked into her scent, barked with every step of the chase. Horses brought the men. But the church, never locked, gave her sanctuary. She climbed the bell tower steps without pause for breath. The parapet wall stopped her, abruptly. She looked at the sky through a tear of joy; all the stars were out to greet her. She climbed the parapet wall, stood without fear and perfectly balanced. Voices, animals and men, meant nothing below. The vast wonder of the night sky held her. And then, she leapt as high as she could, her arm raised above her head as if set to grab a star. Ben jumped too. Her hand clenched shut. She held her star as gravity pulled her down.
Just before the end, Ben blinked. He turned away into time. How is she a coward, he thought. How dare she be deemed as such.