Charlotte Markham and the House of Darkling (8 page)

When it was lunchtime, I took the boys to the dining room. Everton buzzed with the flurry of daily life. Fredricks left Mr. Darrow's study with an air of distinction, carrying the tray of an empty tea set with hands so tremulous that Roland walked carefully beside him, catching stray cups and saucers before they crashed to the floor. Meanwhile, Mrs. Norman circled around the nervous maids like a vulture, the young women frantically dusting and sweeping to avoid her wrath.

I was suddenly reminded of her warning about the mysterious man who was waiting for me and told the boys that I would meet them in the dining room. Paul and James were more than happy to be rid of me, as I had made it perfectly clear that for the time being I would not change my mind. I returned to the landing on the stairs where Mrs. Norman ran her finger along the railing, testing it for dust in the presence of a young maid named Catherine. It was clean, much to Mrs. Norman's dissatisfaction, and she dismissed the maid as I approached.

“Good afternoon, Mrs. Markham.”

“Hello, Mrs. Norman. I was hoping you might be able to help me with something.”

The older woman was immediately suspicious. “How might I be of service?” she asked with not a small hint of sarcasm.

“I was wondering if you might be able to tell me about spirits.”

I could see immediately that it warmed Mrs. Norman's stony heart to know that when it came to the occult, people thought of her, but she maintained her haughty composure and raised a single eyebrow.

“There is much to say on the subject. What is it that you wish to know?”

“Are they predominantly good or evil?”

Mrs. Norman waved her hands impatiently. “You ask a question that has no answer. Are people predominantly good or evil? I should say that every man, woman, and child has a great capacity for both, but the discipline for only one or the other. I suppose it depends on whose spirit you are seeing.”

“I'm asking more for the sake of curiosity than from experience. I can't say that I've been lucky enough to receive any visits from the Other Side.”

She observed me carefully. “I see. In that case, it depends upon the relationship between the spirit and the person it's sought out. Spirits only return when they have unfinished business. I suppose the only way a person would be in danger is if they either caused the death of the person who became the spirit or meant to impede it on the completion of its otherworldly task.”

I waited for Mrs. Norman to say more, but it seemed that she had finished doling out advice on the supernatural.

She raised her eyebrow again. “Is there anything else?”

“No, you've been most helpful. Thank you.”

She seemed to falter for a moment. “The other afternoon in the nursery . . . the man who watches. Have you found him yet?”

I had been trying not to think about the housekeeper's warning. “No, I have not.”

“Find him before he finds you.” Mrs. Norman went up the stairs and left me alone on the landing. I felt very weary. I had been going round and round with my dilemma, trying to decide if such extraordinary events warranted disregard of the suspicion I felt deep in my heart. There was something wrong with Mrs. Darrow's proposal. There was something wrong with the mysterious house in which she lived. And yet, I could not shake the feeling that there would be something terribly wrong with me if I did not assist the boys in sharing a little more time with their late mother. Had I had such an opportunity with my mother, even at present, I would have risked life and limb for a moment's conversation. There is always so much left unsaid, even when one has the opportunity to say good-bye, and despite my apprehension, I continued to return to the same conclusion: I would take the boys to visit their mother. I would be guarded, and I would bring the appropriate articles of protection, even if I doubted their usefulness, and I would remain alert for the slightest sign of mischief. Heaven and Earth had been moved to accommodate Mrs. Darrow, and I could not find it in my heart to deny what was so obviously a mother's right to demand. As for the woman herself, I believed that she could be managed. She loved her family, and if she wished to have access to them, then she would do so on my terms.

I found the children in the dining room devouring plates of roasted pheasant and slabs of cheese on toast. For all my inner turmoil, I had lost my appetite and was anxious to continue with my plan before I lost my resolve.

“Would you care to take the remainder of your lessons outside?”

The boys looked up at me, their mouths full of food. Before they even swallowed they were dashing away from the table to grab their coats out of their room. I took a heavy shawl and placed it in my favorite basket.

As I took the children out the back of the house, we could hear Mrs. Mulbus still shrieking at Jenny. “How could you scrub the fine china?!”

Once outside, the boys took my hands and pulled me along toward the forest. I closed my eyes for a moment and let them lead the way as if I were caught on the sharp autumn wind.

The light dwindled as we entered the woods, and suddenly everything was silent except for the sound of our shoes crunching through the dried leaves and twigs that littered the ground. We came to the tall cage of roots at the base of the large oak tree, and were overcome by the thick, swirling mist that separated the living from the dead.

Part 2

The Human Fashion

CHAPTER 7

The House of Darkling

T
he light from the moon cast pale, sharp silhouettes that danced between the orchard trees. I wondered if there was such a thing as daytime there. The boys tried to race ahead, but I kept hold of their hands and struggled successfully against them. Despite the safety that had been assured to us by Lily Darrow, I did not trust anything about the place. If the former mistress of Everton was strong enough to turn back death, then I was obviously in no position to deny her something she had worked so hard to earn. It's not every day that the natural order of the universe becomes subverted, and if death could be turned back once, then perhaps it could be done again.

If the woman proved to be malicious in her intent, then I hoped that I would be able to deal with her when the time came. I had put on a silver cross necklace before we left Everton, but even as it pressed against my skin, it did little to soothe my apprehension as the gloom moved around us.

We walked along the path between the trees. Paul was careful not to stray far from us, and he avoided looking too closely at the bulbous pieces of fruit that twitched on the ends of the branches. Something moved up ahead, more solid than the ominous darkness that swirled languidly around us as we headed for the House of Darkling in the distance. It stepped into the center of the path and knelt down on one knee.

It was a child, a boy of about nine or ten, smartly dressed in a black waistcoat, the chain of a gold pocket watch hanging from his side. His face was long and thin, fixed with an expression of sly amusement, and yet there was something soft about his features. His face lacked any lines or creases; there was an indistinctness about him that was unsettling. I assumed it was just the light, but his skin had an orange pallor similar to the color of a peach. The boy rose from his bow and placed a finger before his lips, wordlessly silencing the children and me before leading us the rest of the way through the orchard.

The doors to the great house stood open much as before. Without the pressing anxiety that had accompanied my first visit I was better able to get a sense of the place. The entrance from the orchard was actually at the back of the house. The entryway sprawled out toward the massive oak doors at the front of the foyer, which were taller than half a dozen men standing head to toe, but the entrance was empty save for the grand staircase that spiraled away into the distance many floors above us, and the strange glittering tiles that covered the floor.

The tiles nearest to the walls were made of stone, and the band after that of rough marble, and then glazed ceramic. The tiles themselves were rather plain, but at the center of the display was a mosaic made from shards of metal and glass, the color of which shifted depending upon where one stood. As we walked over the various strata on the floor, the room changed. In the ring of stone the place was empty just as it had been before, but once we moved over the line of marble, the walls, which were tastefully paneled in wood, began to glow with an inner warmth revealing intricate etchings that seemed to tell a single story, the light burning through the designs, each panel a stained-glass window made from wood. The elegant crystal chandeliers that hung in empty space above the room began to bloom with liquid flame, light erupting out of them like stars to illuminate the corners of the space where gilded curios and antique end tables held glittering, unknowable things: strange pools of water that rippled in place but did not drip or cascade onto the floor; an iridescent apple with skin so glossy and sleek that the light it invited made it appear translucent; a portrait of a crying old woman whose tears smeared the paint; a pair of shears so sharp they seemed to cut the very light that touched their edges. But these baubles were nothing compared to the transformation that occurred at the center of the room in the mosaic. The floor was blazing with a radiant fire, pulsing in time to the silent song of the universe, throbbing with life and energy, searing not the eyes but something secret in the soul.

I gasped and the children paused in wonder, but our young guide kept moving us forward, and in the next band of tiles, the one made of glazed ceramic, the room dimmed. The liquid flame of the chandelier became drawn out and stretched away from where it hung in space, translated through the crystals so that the entryway became a living world of color that shimmered and danced like the northern lights. The inner warmth of the walls gave way to delicate, incandescent fractures in the wood, smoldering and cracking like dying embers. The curios and end tables held different objects in this version of the room: a small silver harp with lines of thin shadow instead of strings, theater masks that shuddered under the weight of the emotion in their expressions, a leathery flower that grew from a pot of diamonds, a trail of black ink in a water-filled glass vase that twisted itself into the shape of a face, staring pensively at us with a gaping mouth as we passed. The mosaic on the floor withdrew into itself, the vibrancy muted in a faint red sunset flecked with blue and gold that inspired a feeling of melancholy I was not unfamiliar with.

At last we crossed over the center of the room, and as we did the pieces of glass and metal in the mosaic flared with a pale, cool light that cast all else into shadow and reflected off every surface like a million distant stars. We were lost in our own private universe, a singular nocturne that would not end so long as we stayed in the circle at the center of the entryway. For a moment I felt at peace and marveled at the power of true silence, for all sound had been extinguished. But the boy pulled us onward, and we passed across the other half of the room, into dusk, into dawn, and back into the true emptiness of the place.

It was a strange house. As feeble a thought as this was, I could not find any others to adequately describe my opinion of the House of Darkling. The little silver cross that hung below my throat was even less comforting than before.

The boy in the black waistcoat continued to guide us through the manor without slowing down. I would have worried about getting lost in a house with so many twisting corridors, but as I was being strung along by two boys who currently had more in common with a pair of excited bloodhounds straining against their leashes than with the polite, refined young men I was striving to create, I remained unconcerned.

We were led down a tall, mirrored hallway with flickering gaslights, past oval windows covered in silver latticework and a collection of heavy oak doors. The door at the end stood open, a curved wall of coarse stone panels visible beyond the threshold. The boy took us inside.

“Children?” Lily Darrow rose from a plush green leather chair at the center of a magnificent library. The room was entirely round and four stories tall, with each subsequent ring of bookshelves smaller than the one beneath it, leading up to a domed glass ceiling, beyond which the moon hung ominously between the clouds. An ornamented footbridge led from the fourth level to a closed door. Lily opened her arms, and the boys were quick to enter her embrace. She squeezed James and kissed Paul on the forehead.

“You've come back to me . . . it's been so long.” Her eyes trailed away and stared into space, until Paul put his hand on her shoulder.

“But, Mother, we were here just yesterday.”

“Of course, yes. Time passes differently here. Days and years can become so confusing.” She shook the thought away. “I see you've met Duncan?” She gestured to our young guide. Now that we were inside, I could clearly see that the discoloration of his skin was not simply a trick of light in the orchard. His complexion was indeed a soft shade of orange. The boy bowed out of the room and winked at us as he left. “He serves the master of the house. Good help is difficult to find, and so Mr. Whatley grows his own.” I connected Duncan's appearance to the fruit in the orchard, and how it had wandered off during our previous visit.

“This Mr. Whatley grows
people
?”

“Duncan is not a person. Not yet, at least. Perhaps someday.” She took a breath and smiled, seeming to become more like herself again. “We have much to do. I expect you'll be staying the night?” She glanced in my direction expectantly, and I pressed my lips together in a flat, expressionless smile.

“I'm afraid we didn't bring any other clothing,” I replied.

“Of course you didn't. People would become suspicious.”

“Just as they would if we didn't return home in a timely fashion.”

“There's no need to worry. An entire day may pass for you here while a minute passes for everyone in Blackfield.”

I suppose this was meant to alleviate my concern, but it only made me feel very sorry for Lily. If what she said were true, then our last visit must have taken place years ago. She seemed much the same as before—but then the dead could not be expected to age—regal, beautiful, but with a solemn undercurrent of fragility, as if the weight of her own virtues might cause her to collapse.

Paul and James looked in my direction and then back to their mother, sensitive to the subtle power struggle embedded in our exchange. I was again conscious of the silver cross hanging from my neck, completely useless against the decidedly un-supernatural force of Lily Darrow's verbal persuasion.

“Then I suppose it's not a problem.”

“Splendid. Would you care for a tour?” It wasn't a question. She twirled on the spot and waved her arms at the shelves of books. “This is the library, naturally. Charlotte, you're more than welcome to use it whenever you'd like, but do be careful. The books here have a reputation for their cunning. Some readers enter for an evening's diversion and are never heard from again.”

“Mmm.” I could not stop myself from delivering a rather patronizing smile, but the other woman failed to notice.

“At the top of the library is Mr. Whatley's study. As I said, he is the master of the house, and always very busy. Do not disturb him unless you've been invited to do so. I expect you'll be meeting him soon enough.” Lily looked away from us for a moment and seemed to flinch, but it was a quick movement, and I could not be sure that it wasn't caused by something mundane like a speck of dust caught in her eye. I nearly asked about Mr. Whatley and his connection to our hostess, but I held my tongue. That was a conversation that did not need to take place in front of the children, who looked up at their mother with rapt attention and an almost luminous affection. There was not a moment when one of them wasn't holding her hand or placing his forehead against her. I did not even toy with the idea of discouraging that sort of behavior. If my mother had suddenly returned from the dead, I would most likely do the same, so long as my mother still looked as graceful and alive as the former mistress of Everton.

Lily swept out of the library, the boys trailing behind her. I followed suit, and as I struggled to keep up with them, I was overcome by the suspicion that the day was going to feel much longer than it actually was. As we passed the large oval windows in the hallway, I took the opportunity to survey the estate. There were hills in the distance, speckled with thin, barren trees. A light mist roiled close to the ground, and far off a stark, short metal gate marked the edge of the estate.

We continued down the hallway and turned a corner at a marble sculpture of some amorphous, many-headed creature with knots of tentacles twisting out from both ends of a sleek, tubular body. I was glad when the boys passed it without really seeing it, as it was the sort of thing that would give James nightmares, if I didn't suffer from them first. I suddenly wished that I had brought some holy water from St. Michael's Church. Even if it were useless, it might have improved my appraisal of the situation I had allowed myself and the children to fall into.

Lily opened a set of large doors trimmed in gold leaf and took us inside a cavernous ballroom lined with rough stone pillars that could have been plucked from the bowels of the earth. The floor was a smooth black and white marble chessboard. The walls were gilded in silver and set with exotic glittering jewels of every imaginable color. Red velvet curtains clung to the sides of the windows.

“We don't entertain nearly as much as we'd like.” Her voice echoed through the massive chamber. I estimated that Everton would fit comfortably within the ballroom twice over. “But we expect to hold a ball sometime in the near future. Have you learned to dance yet?” She lifted James into her arms and swung him through the air. He threw back his head and giggled with abandon.

Paul looked at her strangely. “Father hasn't held any parties.”

His mother set James back down on the floor and seemed to notice that both boys were dressed all in black, still mourning the death that hadn't taken.

“Yes, of course. How callous of me.”

“Can't we bring Father with us?”

She was quick to respond. “It's quite out of the question, and any mention of this place will close it off forever.”

Paul stepped toward me, perhaps taken aback by the unpleasant reminder that mothers could be bossy.

“Don't worry, Mother,” James said. “We can keep a secret. Paul brought a hedgehog into the house and kept it in the wardrobe for a whole week before Mrs. Norman found it and screamed like a girl, but I didn't tell a soul.”

Lily patted her younger son on the head, visibly aware of the emotional divide that had appeared between her two children. “Thank you, James. Shall we continue?” She led us out of the ballroom and into a labyrinth of tight, narrow corridors, twisting and turning through the house, past the dining hall and the kitchens, the parlor, the greenhouse, the craft room, the baths, until the children were lagging as far behind as I was, perspiring and out of breath. When she realized she was twenty feet ahead of everyone else, Lily stopped and folded her hands with the graciousness of every great hostess. “As you can see, the house is rather large. Perhaps we should survey the grounds?”