Mist Over Pendle (32 page)

“More fool her! He’s not the man for that.”

“Nor for any crooked thing. So they quarrel, and what’s odd in that? At which the Demdike curses--and is there anything at all odd in that?”

“Baldwin did not say it was odd. He said it was a threat to bewitch him. And in that, Roger, I’m at one with Baldwin.”

Roger’s eyebrows lifted; but Nick nodded calmly, as though to confirm what he had said.

“I’ve told you before, Roger, that these women are evil and dangerous, a sisterhood of Hell. And I’ve told you that I do not put it beyond them to kill in deed, as well as in wish. And hard on that came Margery here, with her foul tale of plants fruiting in a coppice. That showed how it might be done. Yet for all of it, Roger, I fear you still do not give weight to these women and their threats. Baldwin does--more indeed than I do. But I tell you, Roger: if he errs in that, his error’s not wider than yours.”

“Yet you agreed with me not to commit to Assize?”

“Under the Statute we could do no other. She threatened to work evil, and I don’t doubt she’s tried. So far she’s not succeeded, and till she does we can’t commit. That’s how I see it. But Roger---“

His tone was warning of earnestness, and both his listeners felt it.

“Yes?” said Roger quietly.

“Baldwin will no doubt look to his daughter. Look you to Margery.”

“Margery?”

“Aye, Margery. She and the Baldwin girl swore Demdike to the stocks, and that’s a thing the beldame may remember.”

“God’s Grace, Nick!” There was a note in Roger’s voice that Margery had not heard before. “If she tries that--if harm comes to Margery---“

“Just so! You begin to understand.”

‘‘Understand? Understand what?’’

“How Baldwin feels. And
he
has a daughter dead, remember.”

Roger stood staring, and his ale-mug came slowly down as his arm dropped. Margery stood tense, half frightened and half bewildered. And then Roger spoke slowly.

“Nick,” he said. “You’ve the subtlety of the first serpent, and I make you my thanks. I ... I’ll find it in me to forgive our Baldwin. I’ll even forgive him the way of his departing this day. Nevertheless, I fear the harm’s done.”

“Meaning?”

“That I may forgive Baldwin, but it’s less likely that Baldwin will forgive me--or you. It’s not in his nature.”

“I

fear you talk sense there, Roger. More of it than I’ve liking for. These puritans are as you say.”

He sipped his ale thoughtfully, and Margery, alert and watchful, saw how grave his face had become; and suddenly, as she watched him, he turned directly to her.

“You’ve puritan connections, have you not?”

It was unexpected, and she was a little flustered. Her answer came nervously.

“I ... I used to have, sir.”

“You could no doubt have them still--for Baldwin--if you so desired?”

“For him? Why, yes sir, I think I could.” He nodded, as if well pleased.

“It’s said that the peacemakers are blessed. It’s your chance to lay treasure in Heaven. Make what peace you can--for the sake of many.”

He took horse soon after that, and was away. But his words lingered, for his earnestness had been impressive; and Margery was soon sure that here was charge laid upon her which she might neglect only at peril of soul. Nor would she delay, and the next morning, under a grey December sky, she rode to Wheathead, Frank Hilliard at her side.

She was not glad of his company, and that, she reflected grimly, showed the degree to which her thoughts were occupied. On another morning she would have found him the best of company for such a ride, but this day her thoughts were elsewhere, and she found it hard to show him a proper interest. The task Nick Banister had imposed on her needed all her thoughts, for Richard Baldwin would be in no forgiving humour. Margery was sure of that. She knew these puritans only too well, and she was perfectly aware that their God was a Lord of Hosts, much more given to smiting the adversary than to forgiving him. Her task would not be easy, and she was finding Frank a distraction from her attempts to plan an approach.

Nor was Frank himself in the best of humours, and when Margery finally gave up her attempts to think, she became uneasily aware that his usual good spirits were not with him: once or twice she caught a glance that seemed to carry a positive displeasure, and she found herself wondering if this flowed from her brusque handling of him yesterday. That, she thought, might be better than to have him suspicious of her dealings in the Southworth affair, but it was certainly unpleasant; and between that and Roger’s hints of his possible motive in riding with her at all, she found herself all but out of patience, and hard put to it to keep courtesy in their talk.

They came to Wheathead at last, and certainly they could not complain of their reception. Grace was clearly delighted, and in no time she had them in the arch of the great hearth, where the glowing warmth brought a pleasing tingle to ears and fingers numb from the ride. Frank seemed to thaw in mind as well as body, and he returned cheerful answers to Grace’s talk.

“You’re well come, both of you,” she said. “We’re so lonely here we’d say that to most, but when it’s a friend of Margery’s we say it and mean it. I’m told you’re new to this Hill of ours?”

He grinned cheerfully and said he was learning.

“Learning what?” This was Margery, alert for possible double meanings, but he only laughed.

“At least I learn that it’s a plaguey cold hill for a winter ride.”

“Yes, it has a chill at times.”

Grace had answered him gravely, and again Margery looked up sharply. She knew two kinds of cold on Pendle Hill.

“How is it--since yesterday?” she asked suddenly, and for a moment Grace sat silent.

“It’s been dreadful,” she said at last. “I spoke the truth when I said I’d have welcomed almost any visitor this morning.”

“Dreadful--from your father?”

“Yes. He’s taken it hard.”

“Meaning that he’s resentful.”

“Yes. You see---“

“Towards me also?”

“No.” Grace managed a smile. “No, not to you, Margery. He says you spoke the truth, and had no part in what else was done.”

“Will someone enlighten me?”

Frank asked it quietly, and Margery understood at once. She had told him briefly of yesterday’s proceedings, but these undercurrents ran deeper than that. A moment of further thought showed her that he might safely be told, for nothing in this touched Christopher Southworth. But before she could speak, the door swung open and Richard Baldwin came stamping in.

“Ha!” he said. “I thought I heard voices. Master Hilliard, you are welcome here. And what of you, mistress? Are you still among our friends?”

“I hope so. Is there reason why I should not be?”

He considered that thoughtfully before he answered, and Margery waited anxiously, realizing that in his usual blunt fashion he had come to essentials at once.

“No,” he answered slowly. “We’ve no quarrel with you, neither I nor mine. You bore true witness and took no other part.”‘

She made no pretence of misunderstanding him. She must come to the matter some time and it might as well be now. But she had the scent of his humour and she spoke a little nervously.

“I’m charged with some messages,” she said. “Messages from my cousin and also from Master Banister--particularly Master Banister.”

She watched him keenly. She saw the shade of doubt in his eye, and she was pleased with herself for having had the wit to use Nick Banister’s name. Evidently he still had some respect for it.

“Is it so?” There was suspicion in his voice. “You’d best come to my parlour then.”

He led to the door, and Margery had a word for Grace.

“Enlighten Frank for me,” she said, and then she followed to the parlour.

“These messages?” he said curtly.

He made no prelude, and Margery caught nothing of promise in his tone. She looked round quickly, and at once she observed the open Bible on the table in front of him. She craned her neck as she seated herself, and saw that it was open at the hundred-and-ninth Psalm--significant reading. Then she realized that he was waiting.

“My cousin and Master Banister,” she began. She hesitated, and then plunged on with a fine disregard of detail. “It seems that they are but little removed from you in the way they view this Demdike. It’s a difference only as to how her works may best be brought home to her.”

His hand slapped the Bible angrily, but she went on quickly, giving him no chance of courteous interruption. She surprised herself with the tale she made of it. She reminded him of his treatment of Elizabeth Device, and she mentioned Roger’s approval of it. Then, mixing Roger and Nick Banister into one she told him of their belief that Demdike had indeed set out to cast a charm; she glossed over their doubts of the potency of the charm, and hurried on to credit Roger with a dictum about giving a witch rope enough to hang herself. She represented the whole affair as a mere difference of policy, and then she drew once more on her imagination for a wholly fictitious quotation from Roger: ‘Better send her to the Summer Assize and have her hang, than send her at Lent to be acquitted.’ She was pleased with that, as having the true ring of Roger in it, and on the whole she thought she had kept surprisingly near the truth. She looked at Richard with some satisfaction, and as a final shot she invented a warning message from Roger, bidding him have a special care of Grace.

He looked her over coldly.

“Why?” he asked.

“He thinks the Demdike may have disliked being sworn to the stocks.”

“She did.” There was satisfaction in his tone at last. “And the whelp even more. I was at trouble to visit them as they sat. I’d some hopes the people would have stoned them and thus made an end, but I should have known better.” He smiled bitterly. “There were some three-score folk a-watch, and all but one were too frightened of the Demdike power to lift a finger.”

“And the one?”

“Some honest soul--I could not learn his name--had hung a dead cat from the whelp’s neck. It’s guts were laid open and spilled upon her. She spat her curses at the stink.” He smiled again. “Did I say I could not learn the fellow’s name?”

“You said so.”

“Yet I made a guess. There was a smile on our Constable that set me thinking. I’ll say it for Harry Hargreaves, papist though he is, that he knows what’s proper for a witch.”

Then the smile faded and his eyes were hard again.

“So I don’t doubt their malice, and I’ll have a care for Grace. There was not the need to warn me. Yet it was well intended, and you may take my thanks to Master Nowell for that thought. And bid him in his turn look to you, mistress. You, also, bore testimony against the abhorred of God.”

At least he had spoken of thanks to Roger. Margery seized on that and pressed it further, speaking urgently of Roger’s helpful goodwill. He pondered that darkly before he gave answer.

“That he has goodwill, I’ll believe” he said at length. “That it’s helpful, I see no reason to believe. He’s a deal too tender to the ungodly. They could have been sent to the Lent Assize, and if anything of proof was lacking it might have been had.”

“But how, if you please?”

“There’s juice in the driest apple if it be but pressed enough. So with these women. They were not so much as swum.”

“Swum?”

“Aye, in the nearest water. It’s a cleansing way with witches. If they float, there’s proof of guilt. If they sink, there’s hope of drowning. And either way the world’s the cleaner.”

And there he left it. He rose and said he must be back in the mill, and there was nothing for Margery to do but accept that. But she was not wholly dissatisfied; at least there was some hope, and all might yet be well if there was no more alarm of witches. And at that her satisfaction faded, for of course there would be more alarm of witches; if a cow died, or a rick took blaze, if even the ale were sour, the Demdike hand could be seen by a man who meant to see it. And then? He had given warning that he would trust in the Lord of Hosts--which meant, as Margery supposed, that he would follow his impulse and believe it to be the will of God. That was the way of puritans, as she well knew. It was at the centre of their creed that each should read his Bible and decide for himself what the will of God might be; and not every man could be trusted to decide with sense in such dark and tangled causes. Margery’s heart sank at the thought of a Demdike killed, and Roger committing Richard Baldwin for the trial of his life at Lancaster. If Richard were hanged at Lancaster, it could even be on Margery’s testimony. She stood in the doorway, looked across at Grace, and felt sick.

Grace, however, looked happier. She had apparently got quickly to good terms with Frank, and they were sitting on opposite sides of the hearth, chattering easily. And at once Margery disturbed their harmony. She felt that in her present mood, and with her present thoughts, she must get out of this house. She could not, this day, sit at dinner with Richard Baldwin and think of what he might soon provoke; so she told Frank they must be going, and he was not pleased. Grace looked disappointed, and that made Margery feel selfish; but she stuck to it, feeling that to stay would be more than she could bear, and a rather sulky Frank went in search of the horses. Margery took the chance of a word with Grace.

“I’m sorry,” she said, “but it’s not the day to linger. Everyone’s at odds with someone, and who’s to say what may come next?”

“I know.” Grace spoke soberly. “It may be better soon.” “I hope so. I fear Frank’s not pleased.”

“No. But Margery---“

“Yes?”

“Have a care for him. There’s such a web of hatred here.”

“Here?”

“In Pendle, I mean. Miles had a word to say---“

“Miles?” Margery was almost startled. Yesterday’s affair had so filled her mind that she had all but forgotten the Rough Lee, but this reminder brought her to the alert at once; it was not safe to forget the Rough Lee.

“What did Miles say?” she asked anxiously.

“Not very much, and even that not plain. But I did glean that Alice Nutter had not thought to see your Frank on Sunday. She supposed him gone from Pendle.”