White Stone Day (2 page)

'How
very singular, said Emma to the mallet in her hand as she ran down
the hill to the forest, lifted her skirts, dropped to her knees and
bent sideways to peer under a wall of vegetation – only to be
met by the indifferent gaze of two centipedes and a worm.

'Oh,
dear! said Emma to her mallet. I had meant to put Miss Pouch out of
play, not lose her entirely! '

'What
did the mallet say?' Three years younger than Emma, Lydia retains a
fondness for talking objects.

'On
this subject, the mallet had nothing to say.'

CROUCH
MANOR, CHESTER WOLDS, OXFORDSHIRE 'Oh, bother.'

'When
her eyes had finally adjusted to the dark of the forest, Emma managed
to catch a glimpse of Miss Pouch's ball, whose red stripe stood out
in the gloom of the forest – and it was still rolling!'

'"How
peculiar," is what I should say then,' says Emma, anticipating
his request.

'How
very peculiar, Emma said, and without further hesitation strode
briskly into the forest – reasoning that, since the ball was
not rolling very fast, it should be a simple matter to fetch it.

'Yet
the ball appeared to have a will of its own. When she reached for it,
the ball hurried beyond her grasp like a playful kitten – only
to come to rest a few yards further on. This it repeated until she
had lost her way. And what did she say to that?'

'Fiddlesticks,
I suppose.'

'Oh,
fiddlesticks! Emma said to the croquet ball. What a pickle you have
got us in! And the ball finally allowed her to pick it up. 'As you
know, Adderleigh Forest is uncommonly dismal and damp. Enormous
trunks towered above the girl like the legs of giants. Sharp brambles
reached out for her, and slimy creatures squirmed underfoot, which
have never felt the sun – not since a time when monsters
wallowed in the fens and witches stirred boiling cauldrons of baby
soup!' Lydia squeals in delighted horror.

'A
procession of fancied terrors raced through Emma's sensible mind as
she stood in what seemed like a darkened room, surrounded by rough,
dark columns and a warren of unlit hallways. So many ways to go –
and all equally unpleasant–looking! she said to her mallet,
which had also grown rather tense.

'Perched
on a branch high above her head, silhouetted against a narrow slice
of sky, two cormorants hovered, their long beaks curved downward.
That will be a dainty mouthful, said one, come nightfall? Boltbyn
executes a sudden, shrill imitation of a bird, causing even Miss Emma
to flinch in alarm.

'Oh
dear! she cried to her mallet, which had grown quite rigid with fear.
Whatever shall we do?'

'Surely
the mallet must have some reply,' protests Lydia.

Not
a word, I'm afraid. Then, to Emma's astonishment, there came a low,
gruff sort of a voice from the shadow of a dead tree: If you keep
making such a hullabaloo, you will bring all kinds of beasts, mallet
or no mallet.

Emma
was so startled she forgot to cry out – peering into the shadow
of a dead hawthorn tree she glimpsed a small figure in a long tweed
overcoat, tiny eyes gleaming just beneath the brim of a hunting cap
and, in between, the pointed, upturned snout of a hedgehog.

'You
needn't frighten a person so, she said, trying not to appear as
frightened as she really was.

'To
which the hedgehog replied: You, young lady, were in a state from
which the capacity to be frightened issued by itself.

'That
is because I am lost. Please, can you show me the way back home?

'The
hedgehog replied: Back is the one way you don't want to go. Unless
you have eyes in the back of your head you will run into a tree.
'Very well then, replied Emma, endeavouring to remain calm. Can you
suggest which way I should go?

'If
I were you, the way I should go would be . . . up. But you needn't
listen to me, being a rummager and not a climber.

'And
on that note he turned tail, shuffled into the deeper dark of the
forest, and disappeared.

'Come
back! cried Emma, but received no answer other than a soft shuffling
sound. Alone in the gathering gloom, the poor little thing dropped
her mallet and Miss Pouch's ball upon the ground, buried her face in
her hands, and began to weep.

'At
that moment, from immediately behind her issued a most peculiar sound
. . .'

Boltbyn
abruptly suspends the narrative, to the ardent pleas of the younger
member of his audience, at least. (The vicar hasn't an inkling what
the 'peculiar sound' is or who is making it, and will require time to
come up with something.)

He
glances at the open watch on his lap, then at Miss Pouch, still
asleep by the fire, her mouth open as though waiting to be fed. Soon
Lizzy, the maid–of–all–work, will place the nursery
china upon the oilcloth table top; and most significantly, soon the
head of the house will arrive for supper. Boltbyn is not partial to
the Reverend Lambert, precentor of the Church of St Swithan, whom he
considers a vain, pompous ass, shamefully neglectful of his daughters
and his young, ailing wife.

'Mr
Boltbyn,' pleads Lydia, 'if you don't tell us what made the peculiar
sound, I shall be too afraid to sleep!'

'And
she will keep me awake with her tossing and turning,' Emma adds.

CROUCH
MANOR, CHESTER WOLDS, OXFORDSHIRE

'I
don't see why I should,' Boltbyn demurs. 'I have been doing all the
imagining while you young ladies loll about as indolent as frogs in
the noonday sun.'

Taking
her sister's part lest Lydia start to cry, Emma removes the vicar's
watch from his lap, climbs upon his knee, frames his face with both
her hands and fixes him with an imploring stare. How silly he looks,
with his pink cheeks; his silly hair as though parted by his
governess! 'Please, Mr Boltbyn? Won't you please tell us just a
little bit more? Just this once?'

'I
sh–shall continue,' he replies, meeting her clear, intelligent
eyes. 'But only briefly and on one condition – that each of you
must give me two kisses, one on each cheek. And if each kiss is a
very sweet kiss, then we might once again find our way into
Adderleigh Forest, and follow Emma's wondrous adventures just a bit
further.'

The
sisters do just that.

Boltbyn
takes a moment to think upon what might possibly happen in the next
scene. He regrets having invented the hedgehog. A badger would be
better, or perhaps a rabbit. Meanwhile, his eyes roam about the
nursery – his favourite room, the only place in the house where
he feels comfortable.

To
judge by the barred windows, the grated fireplace, the bare walls
whitewashed against infection, the room has always been a nursery.
His gaze falls upon the reproduction of William Nixon Crede's Bathing
Beauty, in which a young girl has fallen asleep in the bath: a
sentimental favourite in nurseries throughout England, and the main
source of Crede's renown. The vicar wonders whether the artist's
reputation would diminish if they knew that the original painting is
itself a reproduction – a painted copy of a photograph taken by
Boltbyn himself?

Probably
not, he thinks. Originality does not count for much these days, if it
ever did.

Gazing
upon his two friends, the imprint of their kisses still burning his
cheeks, the vicar resolves to mark this date in his diary with a
white stone, and to accompany it with a rhyme the day has inspired:
Elf locks tangled in the storm,

Red
lips for kisses pouted warm.

Long
ago, when Boltbyn was a child, playing with his sisters, inventing
ways of passing the afternoon, he began his lifelong habit of marking
significant days by pasting a small, smooth white stone (gathered
from the beach on holidays) in his diary, as a sign of special
happiness.

How
the white stones accumulated during those charmed, carefree early
years! And how dismally they petered out after the death of his
mother, the demands of school, and the repetitious burden of daily
life. Until Emma.

It
was during a croquet tournament in the quadrangle of Christ Church:
the wind blew his hat from his head onto the ground – and
impudent Emma spiked it with her umbrella! Her governess was
mortified when it emerged that the owner of the punctured hat was
none other than Wallace Beverley – Beverley being the pseudonym
under which Boltbyn creates his light verse and children's books. How
utterly needless were her apologies! For Wallace Beverley had found
his muse and William Boltbyn his happiness at once – and all
for the price of a hat!

With
huge umbrella, lank and brown, Unerringly she pinned it down, Right
through the centre of the crown.

Emma
was barely ten, and on an outing to Oxford with her family. Over the
nearly three years of their acquaintance, Boltbyn's diary has been
strewn with white stones, whole weeks smiling like rows of little
teeth, while his shelves and drawers bulge with photographs of his
favourite subject in all sorts of guises, from beggar–girls to
wood– nymphs.

The
vicar looks upon Emma, photographing her in his mind, fixing in his
memory the look in her hazel eyes, still filled with the mystery and
wonder of childhood. At the end of this day he can safely affix
another white stone to his diary – but for how many more? Soon
Emma's eyes will acquire another kind of knowledge – and then
the golden light of childhood will die, and he will be alone, an
orphan and a widower, at once.

Whitechapel,
1858

In
the shadow of London Hospital, a solitary pedestrian slouches along
Raven Row, wearing corduroy breeches and a muffin hat. It is early
evening, the temporary silence before the lamplighter arrives, that
in– between hour when the day–creatures have gone to
ground and the night–creatures have yet to emerge in their
tattered finery. Buildings of stone and brick loom like the blackened
hulks of abandoned ships as he turns up Sneer Lane, looking neither
to right nor left. In East London, the unguarded pedestrian does his
best to remain invisible.

Passing
by the shadowed entry–way of a vacant tobacco shop, through the
corner of an eye, he discerns a curious tableau within –
something like a Madonna–and–Child. But he does not take
a closer look; in this part of the city, curiosity has killed more
than cats. In the entry–way, perched upon a square wicker
laundry hamper in front of the boarded–up door of the shop, the
figure in question waits for the footsteps to recede, then returns
his attention to the child. There is indeed something tender, even
maternal, in the way he cradles the slender girl in his arms. His
faded, threadbare, once scarlet sleeve is that of a corporal in the
Indian Army; the hand that cradles her slim neck is missing its
thumb, which appears to have been torn out by the root.

Hovering
above him like Joseph at the Manger is a man in a similar uniform,
except his stripes and markings have been torn off, leaving a trail
of needle–tracks in the shape of the rank of
lieutenant–colonel. He seems narrow–shouldered for an
officer, with a large head of matted hair that is all but white;
standing at attention, he resembles an inverted mop or broom. At
present, however, he is bent over his companion, and his outstretched
hand presses a cloth over the mouth and nose of the silent girl.

The
pleasant sweetness of chloroform disperses quickly, trumped by the
immanent reek of the Thames.

'Be
careful,' whispers the seated man. 'Mustn't overdo it or she is gone
from us and we is gone to the devil.'

'She
is not ready,' replies the lieutenant–colonel in the clipped
tones of command. 'She has ceased to struggle, yet I feel her breast
move more quickly than it should.'

'That
is a relief, Mr Robin, at least there is breath left.'

'Of
course there is breath, Mr Weeks, I am not an idiot. The point is, we
must make certain. Mr Lush warned as how the clever ones will pretend
to be asleep. Imagine if she awoke in transit!'

'Granted,
Mr Robin, yet I do not like the use of chemicals for this purpose. It
is a low business for men who have seen the epic of the race.' 'Focus
on the larger picture, Mr Weeks. England is teeming with cashiered
troops washed up on her shores, seeking positions. Shall we join them
in the workhouse?'

Robin
avoids mentioning that he is the more likely of the two to wind up in
that dreary institution, owing to the condition of his face. Sunburnt
to charcoal during the siege of Lucknow, it is an unsightly film of
scar tissue, and his eyes are agony in sunlight without the
protection of dark glasses.