The Lawrence Harpham Boxset Page 11

  How do you think my mother felt having to beg the overseers for parish relief? Imagine the humiliation of a once prosperous merchant’s wife making an inventory of her worldly goods to prove she needed charity? Do you think they found everything she owned? They did not, which is why I have parchment and paper to write this upon.

  They granted her a small sum, and it broke her to take it. They called me before the Parish Constable and made me say who had impregnated me. Do you know what they did when I answered them? They jeered and said I was a liar. They did not attempt to pursue Page for his bastard, and they gave me next to nothing for its upkeep. Did you help us then? Was the Church not obliged to provide charity? Perhaps for some, but not for us.

  We lived off our chickens until they died, then we had no meat and no eggs. We grew what we could in our yard, but it was not enough to feed a family of four with one on the way. We scavenged the forests for fungus and berries and anything that might feed us. We grew weak and thin. The seasons changed, and our house grew colder. My mother was forced to beg for wood, so we did not freeze to death.

  One by one, the village turned against us. In the beginning, only some believed in our crimes, but not everyone. Occasionally we were shown charity and given food or fuel, but anyone who showed kindness, was vilified by the rest of the village. Eventually, nobody would help or even look in our direction.

  One day my mother was walking the lanes, looking for sticks to burn, when Thomas Aldous came by in his cart. As he approached, his horse bolted for no good reason, and he was unseated, and the cart was overturned. Mother watched in silence, but Aldous rose from the ground and confronted her, waving his fists. Like John Brame before him, he accused her of bewitching his cart and horse. The murmurings of witchcraft, which had begun to subside, grew to a crescendo again. After the cart, they said she caused cattle to ail and gave James Smith’s son the pox. Then they decided that the summer’s poor harvest had been caused by magic and declared it to be her doing.

  Wherever she went, they cried witch. Nobody had a kind word for her or any of us. We were utterly abandoned, and in the depth of the winter of 1644 in a freezing house, my bastard son was born. Nobody came, and nobody helped and how he stayed alive, I do not know for I had scant milk to give, and I did not care if he lived or died. As you know, Vicar, he lived…

  Lawrence turned the page. The account stopped and at the bottom of the page, was an ellipse followed by the words ‘Journal three’. Only then did he realise that he had read far more than he’d intended. Frustratingly, the journal finished partway through the account and Lawrence wanted to know more. The manuscript had mentioned bewitchment. Could the woman be Faith Mills? Her name had not been mentioned, but Lawrence felt sure it must be her.

  Lawrence was intrigued and almost ready to take the lamp and return to the outbuilding. His sore throat and lethargy caused him to stop short, but he resolved to visit the basement as soon as possible the next day.

  He turned off the lamp and attempted sleep. It did not come easily, but eventually, he felt his eyes grow heavy, and darkness descended.

  Chapter 17

  On the Mend

  Lawrence awoke late morning feeling as if he was over the worst of the fever, though his throat was still damnably sore, and he needed a tonic. Lawrence reached for the prescription left by Doctor Taylor, but it was not there. He rose and padded over to the dressing table to see if it had been mixed up with the parchments and journals, but despite his best efforts, he could not find it. The prescription had vanished. He was still debating whether to get dressed or stay in bed a little longer when there was a knock at the door and Mary entered carrying a tray containing tea, toast, and a boiled egg. Next to the food were several brown packets balanced against the side of the teacup and marked ‘take twice daily after meals.’

  “Is this my prescription?” he asked.

  “I believe so, Sir,” said Mary. “Miss Smith dropped it into the Chemist yesterday.”

  “That was good of her,” said Lawrence. He had not seen Violet remove it the day before, and she’d not asked if she should. “Please thank her, Mary,” he said.

  Mary bobbed and left the room and Lawrence took the decanter from his bedside table, poured a glass of water, emptied one of the powders and gave the mixture a vigorous stir. He sipped a few mouthfuls of tea while waiting for the solution to settle. Lawrence had hardly eaten the previous day. Breakfast was welcome and quickly disposed of, and he reclined in bed until he had finished eating while watching the treetops shimmer in the slight breeze. Eventually, Lawrence decided he was well enough to get up and do something useful and rose, dressed, and exited the room, leaving his breakfast dishes on the side.

  He went downstairs to the morning room but found it empty and relocated to the drawing-room where Violet was sitting in an armchair deep in conversation with Mrs Harris.

  “Sorry to intrude,” said Lawrence, “I hoped I would find you here, Violet. I wanted to thank you for the breakfast tray.”

  “It was no trouble,” smiled Violet. “How are you feeling today?”

  “Much better,” said Lawrence, “Apart from a sore throat and I dare say those powders will do the trick.” He grimaced, “dash it, I’ve left one dissolving upstairs. I had better go and fetch it.”

  He left the room and almost bumped into Michael in the hallway, still holding the door he had opened to admit Doctor Taylor.

  “Hello again,” said Lawrence, surprised.

  “I was just passing and thought I would look in on you,” explained the young doctor.

  “I am much better,” said Lawrence, “as you can see.”

  “Good,” replied Dr Taylor, “Your colour is improved, but I will check your temperature to be sure. Is there somewhere we can go?”

  Lawrence nodded and showed him to the empty morning room, while Michael discreetly disappeared to the study.

  “I hear you were busy yesterday,” said Lawrence.

  “News travels fast,” said Dr Taylor, grimly. It was the first time Lawrence had seen him without a smile.

  “It does,” said Lawrence. “I am supposed to be conducting a discreet investigation myself, but it transpires that several people knew of my mission long before I set foot in the place.”

  “I knew,” said the doctor, opening his Gladstone bag and retrieving a thermometer.

  “Open.” He popped the thermometer under Lawrence’s tongue.

  “Yes, I was told that you were here to hunt a witch.”

  Lawrence’s eyes widened.

  “Only joking, not that it is anything to joke about. I am a man of facts as I am sure you can imagine,” he said, “but certain people in this village are convinced that witches are afoot. They are afraid.”

  He removed the thermometer. “That’s better,” he said. “Back to a normal reading.”

  “Did you see the body of the child that died?” asked Lawrence.

  “No,” said Andrew Taylor. “I am a locum and only usually present when holidays and sickness demand it. I did not see the body, though I have read the medical accounts of it.”

  “What do you think happened?”

  “I don’t know. I have never encountered anything like it. The child’s body was covered in pustules, the skin thick and horny. It was red as if burnt, but not scalded. I cannot account for it, and neither could the surgeon. No residue remained of any substance that might have been applied to the skin.”

  “And the young woman who died yesterday,” said Lawrence. “Did you see her?”

  Doctor Taylor nodded. “I examined her, but I won’t participate in the autopsy.”

  “There will be an autopsy then?”

  “Bound to be. We can’t account for the death by natural means.”

  “Why?”

  “Her eyes were dilated, considerably so. And she had vomited. Her face was contorted as if she died in pain. It could be nothing unusual, of course, but we must check. I trust you won’t discuss this?”

  “
Of course not,” said Lawrence. “Could the two deaths be connected?”

  “No,” said Andrew. “There are no similarities at all. Why do you ask?”

  “I intended to visit Eliza Clay this week,” said Lawrence. “There had been some difficulties and she’d argued with Mary Corbyn. She feared Mrs Corbyn, and I want to know why.”

  “I am surprised,” said Doctor Taylor, “Mary Corbyn was an odd woman, though harmless and certainly not a witch. No such thing. She had a lay person’s knowledge of medicine, and though her tinctures would not have been much help, neither would they have caused any harm.”

  “She was disliked,” said Lawrence, “particularly by her husband.”

  “Yes, Mary Corbyn was strong-willed,” said Doctor Taylor. “George Corbyn did as he was told while she was alive. Now that she has gone, he has grown bolder.”

  “He grieves for the loss of his grandchild,” said Lawrence, “and regrets his marriage to Mary. He would still be with his first wife if she had not died.”

  “Now that was a less straightforward death,” said Doctor Taylor. “It was one of my first visits to Fressingfield as a newly qualified doctor. I was assisting Doctor Anderson when we were called to the Corbyn house. The first Mrs Corbyn lay dead in the bed when I arrived. She’d suffered from heart problems for a long time but was strong in all other regards.”

  “There’s nothing odd about that.”

  “There was a little,” Taylor continued. “Harriet Corbyn had also vomited on her death bed. I remember the smell of it. Most peculiar. Vomiting is not commonplace in heart cases, but equally not unheard of. It made me uneasy, but Doctor Anderson felt justified in citing the cause of death as heart disease, though he considered an autopsy.”

  “Did you know that George Corbyn thinks his second wife bewitched his first?”

  “I have heard talk of it, but it is complete nonsense. Granted, the vomiting was unexpected, but there’s no connection whatsoever with witchcraft.”

  “You can’t entirely rule out foul play of some kind?” asked Lawrence.

  “Doctor Anderson is far more experienced than I am, and he said the cause of death was heart disease alone.”

  “That is not what I asked,” said Lawrence, firmly.

  Andrew Taylor sighed, “I cannot rule it out entirely,” he conceded.

  “And when will they perform the autopsy on Eliza Clay?”

  “The surgeon lives locally and is readily available. I dare say Mr Smart will have it finished in the next few days.”

  “I would be glad of any information you can give me,” said Lawrence.

  Doctor Taylor snapped his bag shut and replaced his hat, then shook Lawrence’s hand.

  “Come and see me at the surgery in two days,” he said, “I’ll share what I know.”

  Lawrence escorted Andrew Taylor to the front door, as Emily and Loveday walked downstairs.

  “Hello, Doctor,” said Loveday.

  Doctor Taylor tipped his hat. “Good morning, ladies,” he smiled.

  “We are walking into the village,” said Loveday. Emily opened her mouth as if to speak, but Loveday glared, and Emily kept quiet. “We will keep you company.”

  They exited the door leaving Lawrence standing in the hallway. Loveday had not even acknowledged his presence. He turned to find Violet watching him from the drawing-room door. She raised an eyebrow but said nothing.

  Lawrence pursed his lips, feeling a little hurt, then decided to do something productive. He would defy the doctor and visit George Corbyn’s daughter. Time to get to the heart of the matter, though he would have to tread carefully. The poor woman had only recently been bereaved.

  Chapter 18

  More About Mary

  It was a short walk to Sarah's cottage, which was just as well. Lawrence had not realised how ill he still felt until he left the confines of the warm vicarage. It was spring, and though the weather was mild, Lawrence could not stop shivering. He was unsure whether Sarah would agree to see him and wondered whether the journey would be a futile waste of time. He asked a passer-by for directions to her house, and she pointed to a stone cottage further down the street. Lawrence approached the dwelling and knocked at the shabby wooden door. After a few moments, it opened to reveal a woman in her late thirties, most likely Sarah Hammond. She looked Lawrence up and down and waited for him to say something.

  "I'm Lawrence Harpham," he said, "your father sent me."

  She pursed her lips, and he regarded her heart-shaped face and high cheekbones. Her sunken eyes were dark rimmed, and her full lips fell into a frown, not natural but circumstantial. In another life, she would have been pretty. "You had better come in," she said.

  Lawrence stooped as he entered the low door of the cottage, which led to the front parlour where four wooden chairs were clustered around an empty fireplace. A large gap between the bottom of the door and the stone floor left the cottage draughty and cold, and Lawrence regretted leaving his bed.

  "What do you want," Sarah asked abruptly.

  "Your help," he said, "if it doesn’t cause you any more pain. I am sorry for your loss but would ask you to consider answering a few questions about your daughter."

  She grimaced. "I am sorry too," she said, "I loved that child, and she knew it."

  "She? You mean Mary Corbyn?"

  "Yes, I mean the witch, Mary Corbyn. I hope she suffers in purgatory for all eternity."

  Sarah's lip wobbled, as she held back tears.

  "Sarah, you don't have to speak if it's difficult. Your grief is still raw, and I understand."

  "No doubt you do," she sighed. "But it hurts. It hurts because I loved my child, and it hurts because I knew it would happen, and it hurts to have been right all along. At least I am not afraid anymore. The worst has happened."

  "There is nothing to fear," said Lawrence gently.

  "Not now, but there was."

  “Your father suggested that you hated rather than feared her."

  "I hated and feared her equally," said Sarah. "She was not right in the head, but the worst of it was that she took pleasure in frightening people. I don’t doubt that Mary had power, but people misunderstand the nature of it. My father thinks she was a witch, plain and simple. He thinks of witches as supernatural; women who fly at night on broomsticks with devils and imp familiars. That wasn’t it. Mary was a witch, but in the manner of a wise woman, versed in the art of divination. She understood how to use herbs and poisons."

  "Poisons?" asked Lawrence. "You suspect poison?"

  "Why not poison?" whispered Sarah. "What is the alternative? That the devil walked among us and destroyed a tiny life?"

  "I agree, it's preposterous," said Lawrence. "But was she capable of such a thing?"

  "She was hateful enough," said Sarah, "unkind and not unintelligent. She knew the lore, knew where to pick things and what was dangerous to use but she did not know how to keep her mouth shut. She was not clever enough to hide her true feelings, and she loved to boast."

  "But what grievance could she have towards your young child?" asked Lawrence.

  "She liked the child well enough," said Sarah. "It was me that she couldn’t abide. Look, you had better sit down. I can’t talk about this standing by the doorstep as if we were having a pleasant chat."

  Sarah slumped on to a wooden chair to the left of the fireplace and gestured at Lawrence to do the same. He sat straight-backed, watching her wipe some imagined dirt from her clenched hands as if they were full of untapped energy.

  "Why did she hate you so much?"

  "I knew her for what she was," said Sarah, "but I did not show my fear. My father tolerated her nonsense because he was afraid. I did not seem fearful - but look at me now – unhappy and bereft."

  Lawrence wanted to reach out and touch her, pat her hand, and tell her she would come to terms with her loss in time. But how could he peddle a lie? The pain had never left him. Sometimes he forgot for a moment. He might see a rainbow or feel the sun upon his skin and fo
r a second, the sadness slipped away, but it always returned, and just as viciously.

  Sarah continued, "as it turns out, my father was right. He lost a woman he had grown to despise, and I lost a child I loved. Had I not angered her; she might not have taken Edith."

  "I still can’t understand why she disliked you. It must have been personal. Surely, if Mary hated you enough to destroy your child, a great deal of animosity must have existed first."

  "She killed my mother," said Sarah.

  "What makes you think that?" asked Lawrence, taken aback.

  "She told me."

  "Told, you," repeated Lawrence, "calmly or in the heat of an argument?"

  "As calmly as we are sitting her talking now," said Sarah. "As unemotionally as if we were discussing the weather."

  "What did she say?"

  "It happened one Sunday," said Sarah. "We were at the christening of Chester Calver's child, and one of the guests drank too much cider and was much the worse for wear. The guest tripped over an empty jug and broke her wrist and Father accused Mary of wishing it upon her as they recently had words. Mary said it was true, and that was the way of things. Whenever someone crossed her, they always suffered."

  "She sounds delusional," said Lawrence.

  "There is more," Sarah continued. "Hannah Roper was standing with us at the christening, and Mary turned to her, face shining with satisfaction. 'See Hannah, the spirits avenge me, just like they did with Harriet Corbyn.'

  My jaw dropped to the floor, and Hannah looked mortified. Mary kept gloating, as if gossiping to a stranger and not in the presence of the dead woman's daughter."

  "Did she say anything else?" asked Lawrence.

  "Only that she had words with my mother a few days before she died. Apparently, Mother looked at her in an odd manner, and Mary took affront. Mary said Mother would pay for it, and then she died."

  "That’s not really a confession," said Lawrence.

  "It sounds like a confession to me." Sarah crossed her arms and looked at him defiantly.