Peel Castle, Isle of Man, Autumn 1446
Peel Castle, Isle of Man, Autumn
I MAKE NO protest when Mary leaves at Michaelmas, though Glegg is clearly expecting a complaint when he brings the new woman and tells me that Mary has gone, without even saying goodbye.
This new maid will change at the next quarter too – he is terrified that I am going to enchant them or the guards or himself.
But I have been waiting for this. Now that Mary has gone back to Lancashire – and her Peel lover with her – there is nobody in the castle who knows that there is a long barrow which runs somewhere from the vault under the crypt, beneath the sea, to Horse Hill on the mainland.
I guess that the spine of the causeway is the roof of the undersea barrow.
The only person in Peel Castle who knows this secret is me.
No one in the Stanley force can know of it, or it would have been filled in and blocked, and they would never use the crypt as a prison.
Nobody in the little town of Peel knows of it – the whole island is riddled with the barrows, the domain of the dead and the fairies; they leave them undisturbed.
Only Dolyn and his dead father discovered the vault underneath the crypt and the barrow that runs to Horse Hill – and now Dolyn has gone away to Liverpool with his bride, and his father’s white stone is on the cairn for Peel men who drowned at sea.
Only the Fey – the fairies – know of their barrow; only them, and now me.
I go to the chapel every day to my sidelong seat, where I kneel unseen and watch the priest at the service of Prime through the squint hole. I can see the dark stairs at the side of the chapel going down to the crypt door.
It is used occasionally by the guards as an underground prison.
Local rebels or smugglers are thrown into the damp darkness and left for a week or so, till they are ready to beg pardon, and Glegg binds them over to keep the peace and sends them back to their fishing nets.
Drunken guards are left down there till they are sober and then whipped and returned to duty.
The new maid has brought some household goods from the Stanley treasury, and now I am served on proper plates and with a silver spoon, though they take it away at the end of each meal, and I am still not allowed a knife.
I asked for paper for writing and ink and a quill; I said I have a right to compose prayers for my salvation and to petition my former husband and the Church authorities.
But when they give me a few pages of vellum, I tear it up into little squares and draw a set of pictures, like playing cards.
They look strangely grotesque without colour.
The outlines in ink seem eerie; the characters more ominous than I remember.
The new maid bridles when she sees my little pack.
‘I don’t know what you’ve made them for,’ she says rudely.
‘No one will play with you; I’m not allowed. And Captain Glegg won’t, for sure.’
I gleam at her; I don’t care if I frighten her. ‘They’re not for playing,’ I say. ‘You know what they’re for . . . tell me the day you were born.’
‘Not me!’ she exclaims.
I flip a card over, and as luck would have it, it is the moon. ‘Moon,’ I say. ‘Danger. And just think: we’re coming up to All Hallows’ Eve and it will be a full moon.’
She blanches with fear; she crosses herself and clenches her hands into fists, her thumb between her forefingers to make the sign of the cross. She backs away from me, her staring eyes on my face, and hammers the door with her heels, kicking backwards until the guard comes running up the stairs.
‘Let me out!’ she shouts at him. ‘She’s a’doin’ something – let me out!’
He spies through the hole and sees me calmly seated at the table, apparently shuffling little paper notes, and he opens the door, and she tumbles out, and he slams it behind her and locks it.
I hear his question and the gabble of her frightened reply and then her hurrying down the stairs.
She will be running past the inner red wall to the fort, dashing through the gatehouse and up the stairs, demanding to see Captain Glegg.
She will tell him I am making magic and calling up a devil.
I clap my hands over my mouth to stop myself laughing as I hear the rapid march coming back to my tower, the saluting of the guard at the outer door, the noise of Glegg’s boots on the stairs and then the rasp of the spyhole and the drag of the door opening.
He comes in; he gestures to the guard to close the door and stand with his back to it.
Both of them are grimacing with fear; Glegg’s jaw is pulsing as he clenches his teeth.
Slowly, I raise my smiling eyes and look at him as warmly as if I am about to declare love.
‘The woman says you are fortune-telling,’ he says tightly. ‘That is forbidden.’
‘No such thing,’ I say. ‘I have made some playing cards.’ I spread them out in a fan. ‘Won’t you play with me?’
He is white. ‘No,’ he says. ‘No one will play cards with you, and I will take these that you have made and burn them.’ He nods to the guard, who comes slowly forward and holds out his shaking hand.
‘Catch!’ I say and fling them at his face. He flinches back as if they are on fire already and scuttles back to the door as Glegg snaps at him: ‘Fool!’
They flutter to the floor, and neither of them dare to touch them.
‘You are bound over to live as a Christian woman,’ Glegg says. ‘You did penance; you confessed. You attend church daily. What are you doing now?’
‘I’m going mad in here!’ I leap to my feet, and they both take an involuntary step back against the door.
‘I do nothing, every day of my life! I cannot be left here like a dead woman! The devil finds work for idle hands – do you want me idle? D’you want the devil to find me work?
I am furious with boredom; I am mad with idleness.
You cannot keep me here – I will break out! I swear I will swim away!’
‘Be at peace! Be at peace!’ he urges me. ‘It’s been nearly five months; it could be years more – you must settle your mind . . .’
‘I will not!’ I scream. I snatch up my quill, and I come towards him, holding it as if it is a dagger.
‘You don’t let me have a knife, but what if I can wish this into a blade?
A poisoned blade?You leave me all alone, but what if I have a dog, a black dog who follows me everywhere and will tear out your throat?
You can take and burn my cards, but what if I have a pack here – in my hand—’ I hold out my empty palm, my fingers curled, as if to hold a pack of painted playing cards.
‘What if the first card I draw is your future?’ I smooth my forefinger over air as if dealing a card.
‘What if I read it aloud, and it comes true?’
‘Enough!’ he says, his voice hard with fear.
‘This is madness – this is women’s madness.
’ He hammers on the door, and the guards outside shout their readiness.
‘Take her,’ he says, unlocking the door to them.
‘Gag her, tie her, put her in the crypt, and leave her there overnight. She’s running as mad as a black dog. ’
They hardly dare touch me, but I freeze and do nothing but cry softly, like a melancholy-mad woman, as they put a linen washcloth over my mouth and tie it behind my head and tie my hands behind my back and a rope around my waist.
‘I am sorry for this,’ Glegg says breathlessly when I am roped.
‘I would treat you kindly, but you must calm yourself. When you are calm, I will release you. You must pray for your wits to return, and so will I.You cannot—’ He breaks off for breath.
‘I will see you tomorrow. I will have the priests pray for you.’ He turns to the men.
‘Take her cloak; untie her when she is in the crypt; leave her. No light, no fire, no food, no water – no one to open the door. She is to be left in the darkness all night. Two men on guard on the crypt door on regular watches. Understood? No one to open the door till I come tomorrow morning.’
They nod their heads; they shuffle around me.
Nobody wants to touch me, but when they move, I go with them, encircled by frightened men.
Glegg looks at me; for a moment, he frowns as if he is puzzled, and I think I have lost him to his common sense.
I want to shout: ‘No! Don’t stop to think now!
Let the fear catch you up; let my playacting incite your nightmares!
’ – but just as he pauses, watching me with narrowed eyes, the wind from the open door lifts the cards from the floor, and they swirl around me as if I have summoned them.
‘Get the damned witch in the crypt!’ he swears and leads the way, clattering down the stone stairs.
THE STAIRS TO the crypt are so narrow that one man has to go in front of me, and the others follow single file, their shoulders brushing either side against damp red sandstone.
The first opens the thick wood door at the foot of the stairs and has to step into the crypt before me.
The minute I am inside, he cuts the rope that ties my arms, drops it on the floor, whirls around, and is out of the door.
They slam the door, and I hear the barring beam dropping down into the brackets.
The door is so thick I can hardly hear them go back up the stairs and leave me.
The crypt is beautifully vaulted; the blood-red stones soar into a point high above my head; ahead of me is an open arrow-slit window and, beyond that, the sea roaring. The wind whistles with a keening sound like a crying woman.
I shake my head. I am not afraid of the wind or the sea, nor the eerie cries they make.
There is a filthy little hole under the arrow slit that has been used by prisoners for centuries, which would stink if the wind did not scour through it.
The light is fading; it is going to be dark soon.
I had better start my search for the entrance to the vault.