The Witch’s Daughter (41 page)

‘Reg, old man!’ A shout came from one of his companions now standing at the bar. ‘Don’t be shy with that money of yours, come and pay for the drinks.’

Lieutenant Maidstone smiled and gave a little bow. ‘Enjoy yourselves, children,’ he said to us, before turning and threading his way between the tables to the bar. Archie seemed strangely bothered by his friend’s appearance.

‘How far does a person have to go to find some privacy in this wretched war?’ he wondered aloud.

‘He’s very jolly,’ I said. ‘I suppose you make good friends, thrown together in those dugouts.’ I scooped up a forkful of beans.

‘Lieutenant Maidstone is no friend of mine,’ he said quietly.

I was surprised. I glanced over my shoulder. The lieutenant was engaged in animated conversation with Monsieur Henri, who seemed happy enough to talk to him. There was something overbearing about him, it was true. And I recalled the way he and Captain Tremain had both stared at me in the dugout. I remembered how unnerved I had felt. I had assumed it was the captain who had made me uneasy, but clearly Archie saw something in Lieutenant Maidstone. I stopped eating and started to focus on him, to tune in my witch’s intuition, but Archie drew my attention back to him.

‘I don’t want to hurry you,’ he said, his mood distinctly altered, ‘but can we eat up and go from this place now? I have found us somewhere where we can be together. Just the two of us.’

‘Yes, of course,’ I said. ‘I would like that. I really would.’

We finished our supper in a silence filled with a curious tension not altogether born of the anticipation of the night ahead.

7

Archie summoned Monsieur Henri, and after much conspiratorial whispering we were led out via the kitchens and through a back door. In the small yard at the rear of the café, the portly restaurateur tugged back a canvas sheet to reveal a gleaming motorcycle. He handed the keys to Archie and took pleasure in explaining the bike’s finer points to him. Archie strapped my bag onto the back and helped me climb aboard the pillion seat. With three determined kicks, the vehicle roared to life. I clung to Archie, snuggling up to his strong, warm back. As we left Gironde and took the country road south, I could not have felt happier. I had no idea where we were going or how long our journey would take. I trusted Archie completely. We were together, we were away from the war, we had precious time ahead of us, and for now we could be utterly selfish. Nothing else mattered. We traveled along increasingly narrow roads through shadowy countryside. It must have been half an hour later that Archie turned the motorbike down a bumpy farm track. We passed the farmhouse itself, rattling across the cobbled yard. An arthritic dog raised the alarm, but the front door remained closed. We negotiated the ruts and potholes of the increasingly uneven path until we came to a tiny cottage sitting among a small group of silver birch trees. It was a single-story stone dwelling with a steeply sloping roof and a stout chimney out of which ghostly smoke drifted up through the still night air. Archie stopped the motorbike and switched off the engine. The quiet of the place was glorious and punctuated by nothing more than a hooting owl here and a barking fox there. Archie took my bag and led the way to the low wooden door, which was not locked. I stepped across the threshold and breathed in woodsmoke and cut flowers. Archie lifted an oil lamp from the mantelpiece and put a match to the wick. The room flickered into focus. A fire had been lit some hours ago and burned bright and hot in the large hearth. A scrubbed-pine table in the middle of the little room boasted a bowl of roses and a box of groceries. There were two wooden chairs by the table, as well as a rocking chair and a faded leather armchair by the fire. In the far corner was a washstand with pitcher and bowl. A mirror hung on the wall. Beside these stood an iron bedstead with a deep feather mattress and a patchwork quilt.

‘It’s not the Ritz, I’m afraid,’ said Archie, lighting a candle in a brass holder and placing it on the table, ‘but it’s ours for the remainder of the weekend. No one will disturb us. The farmer is a cousin of Albert’s.’

‘It’s wonderful,’ I said, ‘quite wonderful.’ A thought occurred to me and I was unable to stop myself asking him. ‘Have you … have you been here before? With anyone?’

‘Not with anyone.’ He shook his head and then stepped close to me and took both my hands in his. ‘I promise you, I’m not given to whisking beautiful young nurses off to remote cottages in the dead of night. I have been here only once before, on my own. I badly needed a little time away from the front, but I had only a few days leave. I wanted somewhere quiet. Somewhere I could let my mind rest, if just for a short time. I mentioned my wish to Albert. He is a good man. He offered me this place. When I said I wanted to visit the cottage again, this time with a friend, well, he saw to everything for me. It is heartening, isn’t it, to find such small acts of kindness in the midst of all this misery?’

I smiled at him, nodding. ‘I can’t believe it’s for us.’ I circled the room, touching the rough lintel above the fireplace, pausing to sniff the showy roses, wrapping myself in the warmth and tranquillity of the place. ‘Just us.’

‘Just us. Now.’ He rubbed his hands together and peered into the box of provisions. ‘Let’s see what treats Monsieur Henri has found for us.’

The box yielded fresh bread, a truckle of hard cheese, some waxy tomatoes, brown eggs, apples, a pot of honey, and even a few precious grains of coffee. Besides these wondrous delights were a corkscrew and two bottles of red wine. Archie beamed, holding one up to the light.

‘I’ll find glasses,’ he said, and proceeded to dig about in the one and only cupboard in the room.

I unbuttoned my coat, slipped it from my shoulders, and draped it over one of the kitchen chairs. I knew exactly where I wanted to sit, but something made me hesitate. I approached the rocking chair slowly, as if it might spring into movement without warning. I became aware of Archie watching me. He must have thought my behavior strange. To him, it was just a chair. To me, it was such a powerful reminder of my mother that here, in this cottage which was so very like my childhood home, long-stifled emotions threatened to overwhelm me. Tentatively, I touched the smooth wood. The rockers shifted and creaked minutely; the faintest tilt, the lightest whisper of a sound. I sat down and leaned against the rounded wooden bars of the backrest. Slowly I let the chair move. It gathered momentum smoothly. The light from the flames beside me blurred slightly as I rocked forward and back, forward and back. I looked across at Archie, who stood, glasses in hand, waiting for my reaction.

He knows
, I thought,
he knows so much about me.

I smiled again, aware that I had not done so with such frequency or with such genuine happiness for a very, very long time. Instantly, I felt guilty for enjoying myself when so many were suffering only a few empty miles away. I could only guess at what conflicting emotions Archie must have been struggling with.

‘It’s difficult, isn’t it,’ I said, ‘to forget the others? To put all the ghastliness of the war out of one’s mind and just … be here.’

He nodded, contemplating the inky wine in his glass and lowering himself heavily into the old leather chair. ‘I was fortunate,’ he said, ‘during my first weeks out here I had a terrific CO. Brunswick, his name was. He noticed I wasn’t taking my leave and spoke to me. “Get away from here every chance you have,” he told me. “Get away and don’t give the place another thought. It’s the only way to remain sane.” He was right. Dead now, of course, but that doesn’t make him any less right. I’ve learned to do what he said.’

‘I think it’s an excellent plan. No more war until we leave. Agreed?’

‘No more war. I’ll drink to that.’

That evening we sipped our wine and talked long into the night. We talked of our childhoods and our lives before ever we had heard of Passchendaele. I longed to hear more of his family, of his origins, of him. What he had said in the café came back to me and I wanted,
needed,
to know more.

‘You say you used to help your mother, assist her in her work as a medium. That you had the gift. Do you have it still?’

Archie allowed a rueful smile to alter his features. ‘I think now it would be not so much a gift as a curse. Out here, in this Bedlam, what tortured souls would come to me if I were able to see them, I wonder. What would they say to me?’ He shook his head. ‘I am very sure I could not stand it.’ He paused to pour more wine into my glass and to refill his own. When he continued, his voice was hoarse with emotion. ‘I was fifteen when my communications with spirits who have passed over ceased. Just like that. It was as if a light inside me had been snuffed out. I felt bereft, as though I had lost my family. Can you understand that?’

‘I can, yes. To lose that connection … how could you not feel a tremendous loneliness? But why? Why did things change? And why then, do you know?’

He shook his head. ‘My mother told me it had something to do with my transition into manhood, that’s the only way she could explain it.’

‘I have heard that children are more naturally susceptible. More sensitive to vibrations on planes other than those in our own, normal, waking world. By becoming an adult, you stepped beyond their reach. And yet your mother…’

‘My mother is an exceptional woman. Clearly, I am a lesser being. My connection was tenuous. My gift only viable when it was enhanced by my being a child. It could not withstand the brutal business of my becoming a man.’

‘But you still retain a sensitivity. You must. How else would you know … know about me?’

‘A person would have to be blind not to see that you are someone truly extraordinary, Bess. The light shines out of you. A powerful energy.’

‘It is powerful, certainly. Though that power is not always a force I am thankful for.’ I turned and studied the low-burning fire. The heat had eaten through a lump of hazel to expose an old copper nail, so that tongues of green danced among the orange flames. ‘There are times when I feel cursed. When I allow myself to let what-might-have-beens twist and turn in my gut. What if I had been able to save my mother somehow? What might have happened had I been strong enough to resist Gideon? Could I have led a simple life, with husband, family, a home to stay in and love in and feel safe in?’ I closed my eyes briefly, shutting out the familiar pain. When I opened them again, I saw how strongly my words had affected Archie. ‘I’m sorry,’ I said. ‘I should not be gloomy. Not here. Not now. I suppose I’m letting myself think of these things because of you. Because, somehow, I know you will understand. Understand something of what it is like to be…’

‘Different?’

‘Yes, but not just that. More than that. To be connected to something else, something wonderful, and yet not quite to belong there either. As if we are suspended between two worlds.’

Archie nodded. ‘I know, my love,’ he said softly. ‘I know. But it’s not all bad, is it?’ He leaned forward, eyes bright with curiosity and awe. ‘I mean, what I had, what I could do, it was special, yes, but it was insignificant compared to what
you
can do, to what you are. I understand what you say about being lonely, truly I do. And it breaks my heart to think of you, all those years, with no one by your side, no one to trust, to share your gifts and your life with. That’s hard, Bess. But, well, the magic!’

I smiled, his boyish enthusiasm lifting my mood. ‘Yes,’ I agreed. ‘The magic is splendid. To feel it coursing through your veins, to feel it inhabit you so utterly, mind, body, and soul, well, there is nothing I can compare it with. It is as if you are connected to an energy so infinite and so ancient … I am a conduit for that power, nothing more. But in that moment I am blessed, I know it. And yes, when I experience that wonder, and when I see the good it can do, and I know that I am a part of that goodness, then I am no longer alone. For the briefest of moments, no longer lonely. It would be impossible to experience separateness at that time.’

‘It sounds like bliss.’

‘It is. It is. And yet…’

‘You pay a high price for it.’

A stillness settled between us, and we were silent for a while. There was no need for further words. It was the first time since my dear mother had died that I believed myself to be completely accepted, for all that I was, by another human being.

We talked on and listened to each other until the last of the logs had burned down to a scarlet glow, and then Archie took my empty glass from me and pulled me to him. We stood in front of the dwindling fire holding each other as if nothing could ever part us. He lifted a hand to my brow and touched the white swath of hair. Self-consciously, I pulled away a little, but he shook his head and let his fingers trace the line to the pins that secured it at the back. Gently he pulled my hair free of its restraints and watched it fall about my shoulders. He leaned forward and lightly kissed that snowy trail, that gleaming streak that he knew stood for the streak of magic within me. He slipped one hand beneath my hair at the nape of my neck, whilst with the other he held me firm about my waist. He lowered his lips to mine, and we shared the sweetest kiss of my whole long life. There in the warmth of the embers, we undressed each other, slowly and with infinite care. The shadows from the lamp and the shortened candle filled the dips and hollows of our bodies, and the irregular pools of light lent a sheen to the curve of a shoulder or the angle of a hip. Archie picked me up and carried me to the bed. The coldness of the linen made me gasp, but I was not aware of it for long. Archie proved to be the most imaginative and exciting of lovers. In him, I found that ideal balance of tenderness and aggression that results in exquisitely intense and satisfying sex. We fell asleep with limbs entwined, hearts locked together, enveloped in the gentle harmony of the ancient cottage and our own deep love.

The next morning when I awoke in our warm bed, Archie was gone. A jolt of fear lurched through me before my ears became attuned to the sound of axe splitting firewood outside the cottage. I climbed out of bed, wrapping myself in the pretty quilt. I opened the door to cheerful sunlight and a morning sky painted baby blue. The air was autumn fresh and revived my sleepy brain. Archie stood with his back to me near the log pile, hefting the axe methodically as he chopped blocks of oak and ash for the fire. I was about to call out to him but stopped. Instead I sent my thoughts to him silently.