Autumn (18 page)

             
Arabel shivered, despite the relaxing water, and forced herself to stay centered within the present moment, here, in the warm tub, safe, healthful. Grandmother Amelia Bodean was at her club this evening so Arabel was free to disappear to Ravenswood Glen with Mireille after supper. There was only a short time left now before she would see Eli, but instead of the joyous reunion Arabel had hoped for, it would be a public encounter, and unfriendly eyes would be fastened upon both of them.

             
Arabel felt remorse for her part in involving Eli in her investigation. It hurt her to think she’d caused any negativity to be directed toward him. Her instincts were to cherish and protect those she loved, not to bring censure upon their heads. Arabel trailed her hand absently in the warm water, pushing through the white sudsy bubbles; she leaned back, reflecting. She knew so little, she admitted to herself reluctantly, about the Gypsy Elders. She really had no idea what to expect at a tribunal hearing and inquiry of this sort.

             
Chief Constable Bartlin had not returned to the house. Arabel fully expected he would once he was informed she was recovered and able to answer his questions. Jonty Governs was still missing and more than one source seemed to have stepped forward to place him in Magpie Moor shortly before the murder of Indra Northrup. Apparently, numerous sources also now identified the wanted man as having been seen conversing and dining at the Rosewood Inn with none other than herself, the now increasingly infamous, witchy girl of Crow’s Nest Pass: Miss Arabel Spade.

             
Arabel sighed. She had no idea who would have identified her or Jonty from their supper at the inn. Arabel didn’t know who would have watched them, spied upon them, and then done nothing to stop her from letting the thief go free, only to bring trouble upon her head this much after the fact. No, these enemies were currently well hidden from view. But they were definitely out there. Luckily, Grandmother Amelia Bodean had turned a blind eye to the speculation concerning her granddaughter, and Arabel did not question her lucky fortune. At least there was one spot in her life where events were not conspiring against her.

             
Arabel pulled the plug on the bath. It was time. Time to enlighten the Elders as best she could in regard to her intuitive actions in the matter concerning the missing outlaw, Jonty Governs, weasel extraordinaire. Arabel hoped the Gypsy Elders would understand her intuitively structured code of being; wasn’t it so very like their own?

             
Arabel dressed carefully. She wore a mid-length, black riding habit with a matching minty-green and black chequered cape overtop. Her stout black boots were pulled on last and Arabel straightened her black woollen hat meticulously as she passed the looking glass in the back hall. She added a black velvet scarf and gloves and went to stand outside on the veranda to watch the back lane for Mireille to arrive. Arabel felt the unease of the situation forcing her to review her actions again and again, repetitively, like a trained parrot with the sad indulgence of only one sentence to shriek out for the entire duration of its long-lived existence.

             
Luckily, Ira, Arabel’s crow, swooped down out of the inky blackness to land upon her shoulder, more than content to nuzzle his black beak into her long hair; he served to distract Arabel in a joyous manner. The crow had missed her and Arabel stroked its feathers in fond, reciprocal appreciation. Arabel telepathically asked Ira to locate Jonty Governs and to send her identifying pictures of the thief’s location. If she could take this information to the Gypsies, would it ease the sting of their disapproval of Eli?

             
The crow immediately sent Arabel mental images: a green caravan with rutted wheels trapped in dark, thick mud, a roaring bonfire in the wilderness, a tall oak tree with forked branches and a circular wooden plate with a strange insignia, which meant nothing to Arabel, leant up against its trunk. Arabel tried to look around from within the images, but they were static, and would only show her what the crow had seen at the time of occurrence. Arabel could not yet identify Jonty’s location with this information, but perhaps it would assist someone else in doing so.

             
Arabel shut her eyes briefly, to stare again at the images but could not ascertain any further details. When Arabel re-opened her eyes, she saw that a Gypsy carriage was pulling up now in the back lane. The white and gilt carriage was old but serviceable and the two dappled horses in charge of drawing it stamped their feet impatiently and whinnied a fair greeting to Arabel as she moved down from the shaded veranda to the gate.

             
Arabel saw Mireille peeking out from behind the gay purple curtains of the carriage. Mireille beckoned to Arabel and Arabel quickly joined her inside of the carriage. The horses set off at once and Arabel fell back against the cushions as she adjusted to the swaying motion. Ira flew above the carriage, silently surveying their passage, Arabel’s loyal sentry.

             
“You are much improved,” Mireille observed, taking Arabel’s gloved hand and squeezing it in a warm welcome.

             
“Yes, thank you,” Arabel replied, and despite herself, couldn’t resist wishing she were headed to the Copse and the magical land of the Gypsies for an occasion of greater levity. Any sort of other occasion would actually do, Arabel thought now, in a gripping moment of intense panic.

             
“They can do nothing to harm you,” Mireille remarked calmly, sensing Arabel’s sudden fear.

             
“And Eli? Can they harm him?” Arabel asked.

             
Mireille looked away. “It is unlikely,” she replied, and Arabel was from reassured.

             
“It still feels like the right thing to do, to have done,” Arabel spoke quietly and Mireille nodded  with understanding.

             
“We must all answer to ourselves,” she said easily.

             
Arabel informed Mireille that during her sickness she’d not felt the choking fingers upon her throat, not even once. Arabel wondered aloud why this might be so. The evil force had been so repugnantly persistent, and yet, when Arabel had been at her most vulnerable, ill with severe fever, the attacks against her had ceased. With the exception, of course, of the odd lascivious incident with the Chief.

             
“Perhaps the attention of the evil energy has been distracted,” Mireille offered, leaving them both to wonder what could have pulled the attention away from Arabel.

             
The carriage bumped along and Arabel suddenly noticed that the path they traveled was different from the route she’d gone with Eli to the Copse, and when she remarked upon this, Mireille explained.

             
“This is a road for carriages. It will take a few moments longer, but it is preferable when the rains wash out the paths through the woods, as they have done lately. We use the horses mostly, of course, without the bulky carriage, but it was also necessary to make sure you were not seen leaving your house. Or at least, that we have taken precautions if you are spotted. You are better protected with me in the carriage as opposed to alone on horseback.”

             
“Am I being watched?” Arabel questioned incredulously.

             
“Most certainly,” Mireille responded. “We are not sure of the intentions of all who survey you.” She peered intently at Arabel. “Do you still wear the red stones my husband gave you?”

             
Arabel realized she’d not had the stones upon her person for days, in fact, she’d almost forgotten all about them. She shook her head at Mireille.

             
Mireille slipped a gold, square-cut jade ring off of her finger. She placed it firmly on the middle finger of Arabel’s left hand, where it fit perfectly. The ring was heavy and Arabel could see it was antique. It felt solid upon her finger. The ring had a lovely floral and vine embossed design on the side and Arabel admired it immediately.

             
“It was my mother’s,” Mireille said, smiling. “She would want you to have it.”

             
Arabel gasped. “But I couldn’t!” she deflected ruefully, wishing with a certain anticipatory passion that indeed, oh yes, please, please, indeed she could.

             
Arabel was jubilant when Mireille insisted. She had other rings passed down in her family, Mireille reassured Arabel, and Arabel needed protection now, not at some vague, future date. So the ring stayed upon Arabel’s finger and she toyed with it delightedly, enjoying the feeling of it against her skin. The jade ring served as a welcome distraction for Arabel as the carriage lurched down the gravel road and the trees became a dense curtain through which the dark night slipped silently.

             
The woods were quiet. The eerie stillness accentuated the sounds of their journey. The carriage wheels groaned and swayed as they crunched overtop the loose stones and gravel. Arabel could see mud piled up in large quantities, creating an impressive embankment of mud off to the side of the road. It looked as if it had been scraped there by a large shovel or horse-driven mechanism, but Arabel knew it would have been cleared painstakingly by hand with smaller tools. The Gypsies did much of their labour manually, and they’d yet to embrace any of the new technological advances Arabel saw emerging in her own neighbourhood.

             
The windows of the carriage whistled with movement as the crisp autumn air entered through the cracks and filled the carriage interior with a winter-like intensity. Arabel was so relieved, however, to be out of the house after her long confinement that she didn’t mind the cold breeze. Arabel was even finally reconciled to the fact that her welcome escape tonight concerned a matter of grave importance, one in which she would most definitely encounter resistance, negativity, and judgement. Despite this, Arabel made sure to consciously breathe in the night air gratefully, but the snap to the wind made her shiver involuntarily.

             
“It’s going to snow,” she observed.

             
Mireille nodded in agreement as she reached into a large blue, green and silver knitting bag she had stowed away beside her on the carriage seat. Mireille pulled out her knitting items and expertly began to knit, working with some bright orange wool that looked like a soft, spun sunset. It reminded Arabel of the painting in Mireille and Baltis’ caravan.

             
“The painting-”, Arabel said immediately, and Mireille grinned and looked up from her crafting, momentarily pausing in her work.

             
“Ah, yes, the painting.” Mireille began to click the needles again; the orange wool spun magically into what appeared to be the beginning of tunic sleeves. Mireille looked deeply into Arabel’s eyes and Arabel felt a powerful sense of magical intention. She felt a sudden, unmistakeable jolt of recognition.

             
“There are those who say,” Mireille began softly, and Arabel struggled to hear her overtop the loud carriage wheel crunch of twig, gravel and stone, “that the Ancients live on, that they remain still within the land of the blood red sunset. They are waiting, along with the Contemplatives, for the bridge to re-open.”

             
“The bridge? What bridge? And what is the name of the place?”

             
“The Elmatuo Bridge; the bridge between our world and the land of the red orange sun. No one has ever named it, or told me its name.” Mireille shrugged. “I suppose that makes its name Land of the Red Orange Sun,” she speculated, clicking her needles, and smiling broadly. “It is the most beautiful place I have ever seen.”

             
“You have travelled there, then?” Arabel asked excitedly. “So you can still visit?” she added hopefully.

             
Mireille shook her head sadly. “No, the bridge was destroyed many years ago. I do not know that it will ever be repaired.”

             
Arabel was silent, picturing the painting, and seeking within her mind, a link to the bridge, a way to enter the sacred hidden land. Mireille watched Arabel as she knitted.

             
“Who are the Contemplatives?” Arabel queried after a few moments, giving up on her endeavour to find and enter the sacred space. “I’ve never heard of them.”

             
“They are those who maintain the Grid,” Mireille informed her quietly. “They hold the energetic grid of reality in place. They do not participate in the ongoing struggles and dramas of our world, or any of the worlds; they maintain the energetic reality in place, without influence.”

             
Arabel was transfixed. “There is so much I don’t know!” she exclaimed.

             
Arabel’s eye was drawn out the carriage window just then as it appeared that something white was moving rapidly within the deep forest. Arabel watched patiently for the movement to reoccur. She was distracted from learning more of the land in the painting, the Ancients, the Contemplatives, and the energetic grid, by the fleeting white shapes she spied outside.