Autumn (7 page)

             
“No, she’s in town, it’s just us two for dinner,” Arabel responded, leading Eli into the front parlour.

             
A fire crackled and snapped in the large grate and Eli gladly seated himself in a cozy armchair in front of it. Arabel sat opposite him in a burgundy wingback chair.

             
“You’ve heard the latest, I presume?” Eli queried and when Arabel shook her head, he continued. “Lady X is apparently Alice-May Marpole, most recently from Ravenswood Glen. Her lover was a traveling salesman, someone called Indra Northrup, but he’s not been located. They’re searching for him everywhere.”

             
Arabel stared into Eli’s troubled eyes. “You don’t think the lover did it?” she queried and Eli shook his head regretfully.

             
“Doesn’t add up for me,” Eli responded uneasily, “though maybe it’s meant to look that way.”

             
Morna appeared and ushered Arabel and Eli into the formal dining room where they saw that Cook had outdone herself with a cranberry salad, red pepper soup, garlic mashed potatoes and herbed pilaf. Arabel and Eli tucked into the meal with obvious relish and sipped at the elderberry wine.

             
“How is it that it has taken so long to identify her?” Arabel questioned.

             
Eli didn’t respond, as it made no sense to him either. He shrugged.

             
“How high upstream does the intrigue go, I wonder?” he mused and Arabel wondered herself.

             
“Will you take me to the Copse tonight?” she asked eagerly, the desire for action springing up within her strongly. It was horrible to feel as if there was nothing you could do to distract disaster but sit and wait for it to strike. Arabel much preferred to take action.

             
“The Copse?” Eli repeated. “Why’d you want to go there?”

             
“We need to make sure there aren’t others who’ve gone missing, but have been overlooked. And maybe someone there has seen something, or knows something…” Arabel trailed off as Eli stared at her.

             
“You really want to go there, tonight?” he asked dubiously and she nodded. “Well, alright,” he agreed somewhat reluctantly, “but you might want to change your clothes. We’ll be traveling deep into the brush, and there’s mud. And I mean lots of mud.”

             
Eli continued to look doubtful but Arabel was confident enough about the excursion for both of them.

             
“Don’t worry,” she said quickly. “I’ll be fine. I’m excited to go. Someone knows something, they just have to!”

             
Arabel then proceeded to inform Eli of the attack in her room the previous night and today’s activities delivering goods to the cottages. She told him about the ominous laughter and the chilly reception at the Mantuives and the oddly disconcerting energy at old Mrs. Cranston’s. The rest of the visits had been uneventful and no one had shed further light on the state of things, though speculation was rampant.

             
“It seems to be getting stronger, bolder,” Arabel stated, shivering slightly despite the warmth. “But besides death, I can’t fathom what it is that it wants from me.” Arabel was speaking again of the evil, energetic charge of the grey eyed man, who seemed to be the primary force in the violence against her.

             
Eli was content to sit for a moment longer. The dining room was warm and he felt somewhat drowsy from the wine. He knew soon they’d be leaving the soft comfort of Arabel’s home and he wanted to just relax for one more moment with his full belly and grateful muscles.

             
Arabel watched Eli relaxing. He looked so tired that her enthusiasm for their night-time adventure ebbed and she wondered if she should just see about going to the Copse with him another night or perhaps on his next day off. But everything in her warned that there was no time to lose.

             
“I’ll go change,” Arabel said hastily, brooking no opposition, and she disappeared to her room to do so before Eli could recant his agreement of the plan.

             
When Arabel re-appeared, dressed now in a simple brown riding habit and stout black boots, with her hair tied away from her face, she looked so much like a pixie woodland creature that Eli laughed in earnest approval.

             
“Arabel, the witchy girl, the pixie maiden,” he said softly, repeating the nicknames she’d heard throughout her life. Arabel jerked away from the touch of his hand upon her shoulder.

             
Eli moved back in surprise. “I don’t mean to offend you,” he said immediately and Arabel relented, giving him a small smile.

             
“Just don’t throw any sticks at me, and we’ll be fine,” she said.

             
They left the house and Eli helped Arabel up onto the stallion he’d borrowed from the Murphy stable. The horse was a sleek black beast with a frisky nature and a love for speed. He would make good time on their journey.

             
“Come on, Jovah,” Eli said, snapping his wrist lightly on the reins. “Let’s be off,” and they commenced the hour long journey into the deeply thicketed woods of Ravenswood Glen.

             
Arabel sat behind Eli, her arms wrapped tightly around his frame, her body closer to his than she’d ever been to a boy before. There were no colours this time, but there was sensation, and Arabel was glad of the dark shield of night-time. As she held onto Eli, she felt something snap into place within her.

             
It felt so right to hold onto him; she, who’d never really had anyone to hold onto before. Arabel smiled into the fabric of his jacket and a sense of delicious enjoyment overtook her. This, she realized, was the heady delight of infatuation.

             
Eli was very aware of Arabel’s arms around his waist and he wished he could return her embrace, although he couldn’t very well turn around just then and kiss her as he’d like. Soon, he promised himself. He hadn’t slept well last night. He’d been haunted by visions of Arabel and her enticing beauty. In the dream she’d been entreating him to kiss her, to make love to her. And he’d been resisting. More fool, I, Eli thought now, grinning in the dark, her hands warm against his belly.

             
The moon hung high overhead and their way was facilitated by its pale white light. Once they’d entered the woods Eli slowed Jovah down to a canter and farther in he walked him. Eli hadn’t been exaggerating when he’d told Arabel there was mud. There was, and as promised, an abundance of it. There’d been too much rain lately and it had turned this part of the forest into a veritable mud pit. Arabel was glad of her sturdy black boots as they’d withstand the muddiest of conditions but she’d be holding her riding habit up as high as it would go to prevent ruining the hem.

             
There were lights in the distance and Arabel could hear the beat of a drum. The forest was alive with people and activity and her heart leapt in excitement. She was here, deep in the forest to search the Gypsy lair and her adventurous spirit revelled in the knowledge. Arabel was so used to being alone that it felt strange to have a companion. But this new sensation of partnership she took in stride, it had fallen into place so effortlessly; she would do nothing to jinx it.

             
They dismounted a short distance away from the cluster of caravans and Arabel looked around in amazement. Torches burned every few feet and the main meeting ground was filled with brightly dressed women and men. The Gypsies were sitting on benches sharing stories or playing card games of chance around fold-up tables, and children; everywhere there were children, running through the trees playing chasing games or sitting on wide laps with satisfied grins.

             
A dog or two scampered between the children and a cat meowed nearby for scraps from a spit being turned by a toothless old man. He nodded to them and Eli returned the motion. Everywhere Arabel looked, the forest teemed with life, with energy, with spirit. Arabel found she was smiling as she surveyed the scene.

             
“How magical it is!” she whispered.

             
Eli took Arabel’s hand and led her through the maze of Gypsies and down a side path well worn and slightly less muddy. They walked past groups of caravans, past more torches and playing children and barking dogs. A chorus of guitars serenaded them as they passed a group around a fire and the beat of the drums echoed a primal, sensual rhythm.

             
Arabel felt her blood heat. There was something so seductive about the music, the scent of the pines, and the feel of Eli’s strong hand within her own. Arabel felt alive in a way she’d never felt before. It excited her and she felt truly reckless, free for once of the heavy feeling of responsibility that weighed upon her all the rest of the time. Until this very moment, Arabel hadn’t realized just how tense her shoulders were, or how hard she’d been trying to figure things out, and how much her head ached from the resulting effort.

             
Arabel squeezed Eli’s hand and he turned to smile at her.

             
“That’s my parents’ caravan, on the left,” Eli said, pointing to an indigo coloured structure deep within the forest greenery. Arabel felt a twinge of nervousness. She suppressed it and they approached Eli’s parents’ home.

             
Before Eli could knock, the door was flung open and a small woman with exotic features and a deep red dress of billowy silk enveloped them both in a fierce hug.

             
“Mama!” Eli laughed, returning her bear hug. “This is Arabel.”

             
The small woman flashed a generous smile at Arabel immediately.

             
“Welcome, Arabel,” she said and Arabel was delighted that her voice was musical, almost sing-songish, as if she was a shrill, lushly feathered creature, a corvid in human form. The imagery smacked Arabel immediately with its accuracy.

             
Eli’s mother was dark of hair and features and extremely bird-like. She was beautiful in a way Arabel had never seen before. Her beauty wasn’t the sculpted, coiffed and shiny patina of those who paraded for praise at the Priory or the slick, pretty manner of the primping salesgirls. Rather, hers was an earthy beauty made more graceful for the setting of night-time stars and bonfires out of doors. Arabel was nothing short of enchanted.

             
“I’m Mireille, and this is my husband, Baltis.” Eli’s mother clasped Arabel’s hand to Baltis’ hand and Arabel felt another kind of shock run through her. It was a new sort of sensation, one she couldn’t actually place, but it had a good energy to it, as opposed to creepy or evil, so Arabel went with it unresistingly.

             
“You have the Sight,” Baltis observed, grinning at her.

             
And yes, Eli shared his father’s features, including the cut-glass cheekbones, Arabel noted.

             
Arabel nodded as Baltis and Mireille ushered them into the caravan, which was more spacious than it had appeared from the outside. The caravan was divided into three separate areas, kitchen, bedroom and small living room. All of the rooms had arched doorways with beaded curtains but no actual doors, and throughout the space ran smooth, dark wooden floors. The living room was painted in a bright, toasted pumpkin hue and boasted a small peat burning fireplace and a much beloved looking dark brown sofa with sagging springs and numerous throw cushions in cream and orange.

             
What Arabel could see of the bedroom was that it was a small nook rather than an actual room, and had charming pale green coloured walls. A plump looking straw and feather mattress on the floor dominated the room. The dark wooden floor was covered completely here with a thick knotted rug of forest green, which the bed then mostly covered. A small circular window was across. The caravan was staunchly bohemian and Arabel loved it.

             
They moved into the bright kitchen and Arabel was delighted that it was painted in a solid canary yellow and had a small pine table with four pine chairs in the center of the space and a clay oven to their right. Candles stood in large stone holders on the table and the room was welcoming. There were two small windows and a slanted looking counter space which was crowded with spices and herbs and drying plants.

             
A fragrant aroma filled the kitchen and Mireille motioned to the large black pot overtop of the clay oven, which was fuelled by a peat fire. The smell of the peat burned into Arabel’s nostrils and she was glad to pass by the black pot as Mireille motioned her to smell it.

             
“I’m preparing some herbs for the Priory market tomorrow; I’ll send some home with you. Good for sleeping.” Mireille said in her sing-song manner, the magnetic smile never leaving her heart shaped face.

             
Eli settled into a kitchen chair and Arabel followed suit. Baltis was up at the slanted counter pouring them some lemon water as Mireille tended her herbs. Arabel glanced around in curiosity. The walls of the caravan were covered in artwork, some of it good, some of it flashy, and some of it truly inspired. Arabel found she couldn’t tear her eyes away from the image of sunflowers against a sinking red sun. She stood up, to better see the image.