Life and Death of the Wicked Lady Skelton (17 page)

The household was at rest, but the old house itself never slumbered. In the deep silence of the night there were
strange little creaks and crepitations, as though Maryiot Cells stirred like an old rheumatic hound.

Barbara had no particular love for Maryiot Cells. She was its mistress, and so it had considerable importance in her eyes, but it was too old-fashioned for her taste, the symbol of her cramped and confined life. She would have fancied a handsome and symmetrical mansion in the fashionable style, but Sir Ralph, though he had allowed her in moderation to redecorate the house and had given her even greater liberty in the garden (provided that he had his hunting, hawking and bowling, he cared not how much his lady adorned the pleasure garden with orange and lemon trees in tubs, sundials, or yew clipped into fantastical shapes), would not allow her to alter the house itself in the slightest degree. The present structure had been built 140 years ago on the foundations of the dissolved monastery by his great-great grandfather. What was good enough for his forebears was good enough for him.

Barbara never speculated on the personalities of these past tenants of Maryiot Cells, whose portraits in stiff, ungainly Tudor costume, or in the still more ridiculous though less remote fashions of the Martyr King's reign, decorated the walls of the Long Gallery. There was only one person dead or alive connected with Maryiot Cells who interested her, and that person was Barbara Skelton.

Nevertheless, she felt a certain hostility towards the house because she was vaguely aware that other personalities than her own, with their emotions, hopes and fears, had left their mysterious impress on its atmosphere.

She was not fanciful, but tonight it seemed to her that Maryiot Cells was more than ever watchful, as though it were aware of her secret purpose. She stood by the fireplace in her bedroom and, stirring the logs with her foot, provoked them into a flame that threw a faint warmth on to the silk Indian gown which she had thrown over her night-shift.

She was ready for bed, her hair brushed and combed into a wreath of shining bronzen curls; even her hands – those hands that would soon be holding pistol butt and reins – had been rubbed with scented paste to keep them white and delicate. She had submitted to her waiting-maid's ministrations with the same languid patience that she showed every other night, had bid her ‘good night' in agreeable if absent tones.

Now she roused herself suddenly from her reverie, darted to the door and locked it, drew the rose-coloured curtains round the empty bed. She stood for a moment in the middle of the room, not so much listening, for she knew that the house was still, but savouring the intense secrecy of the moment. In all this great house, the tapestried figures on the walls, Venus, Mars and the other embroidered deities who stared at her stupidly, were her only witnesses.

She took a bunch of keys from a silver box and, carrying a lighted candle in her hand, went into the closet that adjoined her bedroom. Slipping her hands over the panelling she opened a little door in the wall. Perhaps this door had been originally intended as a secret mode of egress; if so its purpose had long been forgotten. Its existence was known to, but ignored by, the present
occupants of Maryiot Cells. It led to a very narrow staircase in the thickness of the wall which wound up from the lower regions to a disused room above.

Young Lady Skelton slipped through the little door and, lifting her Indian gown to save its hem from the dust, went lightly up the narrow staircase. She unlocked the door at the top with one of the keys she was carrying and let herself into the room. It was small, a mere attic with sloping walls and ceiling. It was bare except for a table with a gilt mirror on it, a silk covered stool and a chest painted in the Dutch fashion with sprigs of spring flowers.

Barbara set the candlestick down on the table, and opening the chest pulled from it a suit of men's riding clothes, boots, hat, belt, pistols, all the cherished accoutrements that she had laid away reluctantly for the winter. She handled them with a caressing eagerness that, fond as she was of the bravery of fine clothes, she had never accorded to lace mantua or embroidered sultane,
²
for these things were the symbol of her partial emancipation from the dragging reality of life.

With the impatient but deft movements characteristic of her, she stripped off her Indian gown and silk nightrail, smiling down at her beautiful naked body, before clothing herself in her man's attire. When she was ready, the long heavy boots pulled on, the over-large belt girded round her elegant waist, her wide-brimmed hat set jauntily on her head, she sat down at the table and gazed at herself in the mirror.

She loved her face in all its moods, but never better than in this strange, bizarre aspect; the green eyes wide and wild with excitement, the curious nostrils poised – you might
almost say! – for flight. Her face looked back at her, daring her to bold and dangerous deeds, and it was then that she resolved to try her luck on Watling Street.
³

Up till now she had avoided the important highway which led from London through St Albans, Dunstable and Stony Stratford to the North, keeping to the by-roads where she might hope to pounce on unwary and solitary travellers who believed themselves safer on these less frequented ways. On Watling Street she would be exposed to greater risk of detection and pursuit, but she could hope for a more certain prize. Nothing galled her more than to wait – as she had done on more than one occasion – hidden in thicket or ditch for several empty hours without reward. This thwarting of her talents, as she had grown to consider her aptitude for highway robbery, plunged her into an irritated and melancholy humour that was scarcely to be borne.

Carrying her saddle over her arm – not her crimson velvet one with a matching fringe, that she used when she rode abroad on her lawful occasions, but a serviceable leather one – she made her way down the staircase. It ended in a little cubbyhole or cupboard. With infinite caution she let herself out of this into a narrow stone passage. She was now in the lower regions of the house, and must take care lest a noisy movement roused one of the scullions sleeping by the fire in the great vault-like kitchen near at hand. The passage was very dark, but she slipped along it till she came to a low door, used mostly for bringing wood into the house. She unbolted this and was out in the cold starlit night.

The stars glittered with a brilliance that showed that there was frost in the air. Barbara, taking a deep breath,
regarded the coruscating worlds above and thought what a fine and fit night it was for her purpose. She was standing among bushes. The dark irregular shape of Maryiot Cells rose behind her, ominous against the spangled sky. Below her, across the sloping grass, she could hear the river singing.

Fleury was out at grass. When she reached the meadow where he grazed she had only to call his name softly. He came to her at once, whinnying with delight. She shared his pleasure. To stroke his velvet nose, to saddle him, to spring on to his back, to trot gently across the stone bridge and down the dark gallery of the yew glades, to canter across the sleeping countryside – all this gave her infinite content.

She rode west, then crossing a river before reaching Fenny Stratford struck north, and passing Eaton and its church and Bletchley, reached the shelter of Rickley wood.

And so she came to Watling Street. The highway lay empty and silent under the twinkling sky. Hard to believe that it was the channel for a vigorous and multifarious stream of human life. Its surface was as deeply rutted as a side lane; patches of loose stones, gravel and bundles of furze testified to the unwilling labours of the parishioners, the ‘King's highwaymen' (the ‘King's loiterers', they were jeeringly nicknamed) who had been recruited to repair it. In parts, trees and scrub threatened to overgrow the road. But Barbara regarded it with the eye of a marauder, not a traveller. Its very deficiencies might lend themselves to her advantage. The difference in outlook between the prey and the one who preys was a lesson that she was learning with ease and satisfaction.

Yet she chafed at her inexperience, as she rode along, half deciding on, then discarding, this or that lurking-place. There must be some art in all this; highway robbery surely had its rules as much as any other science. She wished to perfect herself in her chosen career. To match daring with a nice kill was her aim. She could only acquire this exact knowledge by practice. Meanwhile she must rely on her intuitions.

Finally she selected a spot that she believed would suit her purpose. The road, thickly wooded here, dipped into a little hollow; on either side a rough track wound away aimlessly, to all appearance, under the trees. In one of these, screened by the bushes and the bare but overhanging branches, Barbara took up her position and awaited her luck.

This period of waiting never failed to exacerbate her nerves and depress her spirits. Her wide-opened eyes strained into the shadows, as though by their intense staring they could conjure something out of nothing.

The sound of hoofs approaching roused her expectations, but her hopes drooped again as the plodding tempo announced a string of pack horses. Unmolested they passed her with their no doubt mean and commonplace burdens. Barbara sneered inside herself to think how their driver, shambling along unsuspectingly beside them, would stiffen into terrified attention if he knew what lurked in the bushes a few yards from him.

Another wait. The frosty sky sparkled unconcernedly above the shadowy, ill-defined world beneath. Barbara's hands inside her riding gloves were stiffening with cold, her mind stiffening with tedium. She gnawed at her lower lip in
chagrin. Must she go home unfulfilled and empty-handed? And on this, her first outing of the new year. Oh cruel!

And as she fretted through the vacuous moments, there came the sweet rumble of a coach's wheels. Expectation flowed into her body, warming it with a physical glow. Whatever was coming along the highway, however well guarded, she was resolved to attack it. With a gentle pressure of her knees she edged her horse forward. A cumbrous shape was advancing along the road. It had not the appearance of a private equipage. Could this be the stage coach, delayed beyond its usual hour and lumbering now with clumsy haste to safety? Barbara blessed her good fortune. This was novelty and the certainty of booty. Her body tingled with the familiar sense of excitement and power. Fleury pricked his ears; fidgeted with a rustle of twigs and withered bracken. Barbara breathed deeply once or twice to steady herself. Then as the coach approached in a surge of hoof-beats and rumbling wheels, she drew her pistol from its holster and urged Fleury forward. And as she swept down athwart the coach, shouting ‘Stand and Deliver!' a masked horseman broke cover from the opposite side of the road and seized the horses' heads.

This unexpected sight disconcerted Barbara, but only for a moment. The passengers of the stage, rudely jolted out of their drowsy security, were poking their heads out of the window, fumbling to hide their valuables, cursing or squealing, as their sex inclined them. Their confusion and alarm invited robbery. Barbara set about her business with her usual briskness. Forcing each passenger at the pistol muzzle to descend into the road so that she could the better see what
she was about, she neatly collected purses and loose coins, pitilessly stripped jewellery off the ladies, removing as well from one woman a modish fur tippet that took her fancy.

To speak more than a few words in an assumed masculine voice was a strain, so she left unanswered her victims' indignant protests. ‘You'll hang for this, you rascal!' ‘Fie on you, you wicked brute, to treat a poor helpless woman so.' Her unnatural silence, accompanied by her business-like actions, produced an uncanny and alarming effect upon her victims and helped to paralyse their already feeble powers of resistance.

Meanwhile the strange horseman kept the plunging horses from bolting, covering the coachman and guard with his pistol as though it were the most natural thing in the world that he and Barbara should work together in unison.

Only when Barbara had robbed the last passenger did he forsake his passive role. With a cool deliberation that surprised Barbara, he shot the leading coach horse, shouted, ‘After me!' and, dashing across the road, galloped away down the track where Barbara had been hiding. As she followed him the coachman, stung into courage by the wanton slaughter of his beast, fired at the retreating riders. But the shot fell short of Fleury's flying hoofs. Soon Barbara and her unknown companion were deep among the trees.

Barbara neither knew where she was going nor with whom she was going. But she resolved recklessly to see this adventure through to its end. The track widened up into a rough lane, and after cantering along this for a while the highwayman drew rein, wheeled his horse round and faced Barbara.

She waited in wary but agreeable anticipation for the congratulations which she felt were her due. She had done a pretty piece of work. This man – whoever he was – could not fail to acknowledge that.

He seized her by the throat and said, ‘Now, you son of a bitch, perhaps you'll kindly tell me who gave you leave to trespass on Jerry Jackson's preserves?'

To reply was impossible – his hands held her neck in a cruel grip. But as she struggled, gasping horribly for breath, her hat fell off. Even by starlight the contour of her head and hair, the soft line of her brow and chin, proclaimed her masquerade.

He dropped his hands abruptly. As she put her hands pitifully to her throat he ordered, ‘Unmask!' She obeyed him. There could be no refusal in the face of his brute force. But already she intended to exploit her weakness to the utmost. Though her throat ached painfully from his throttle-hold, she was not displeased with the resonant masculine note of his voice.

The crepe mask slipped off from her face and she turned her strange heavy-lidded eyes towards him. He stared with intense curiosity for a moment, then burst out laughing. ‘Be poxed to it! So now our wild ladies are turning bridle-cull!' Barbara said in her low soft voice, ‘You seem surprised, sir, at my sex. I am surprised at your behaviour. Since when has dog taken to eating dog? The world has come to a sad pass when rogues must prey on each other.'