Miss Ellerby and the Ferryman (5 page)

Mrs.
Grey merely looked intrigued. ‘What is it, Rossan?’ she
said.

The
brownie, Rossan, inched closer to Mrs. Grey and said to her in a
hoarse whisper: ‘Is it she? Is that the one?’

Mrs.
Grey’s eyes twinkled at Isabel. ‘My niece, Miss
Ellerby.’

Rossan stared at Isabel. She appeared to reach no particular
conclusion, for she finally turned away without comment and offered
something to Mrs. Grey in her two small hands. This offering was
accepted with care, and the object tucked into Mrs. Grey’s
reticule. Isabel could not see what it was, but she heard Rossan
say in a low voice, ‘Well fed, and fast asleep.’

Mrs.
Grey nodded, and murmured her thanks. Isabel watched these
proceedings in utter mystification, but her aunt did not see fit to
explain. She merely rose from her chair with enviable grace and
gestured Isabel out of the room. ‘You will wish to rest, I imagine?
We will enjoy some cosy outing together tomorrow.’

Isabel was too well brought-up to display a vulgar curiosity
where none was either expected or wanted. She left her questions
unvoiced, and allowed herself to be gently shepherded back to her
room. Mrs. Grey had always been among Isabel’s favourites of her
relatives, but her habits and behaviours did sometimes puzzle her
niece — particularly since the death of Isabel’s uncle two years
before. Her aunt had settled into her solitary state with alacrity,
and though nothing about her life had undergone any significant
change in the intervening years, the woman herself had certainly
changed. It had happened by such slow degrees that for some time
Isabel had barely noticed. Reflecting upon it now, she was aware
that the respectable, dutiful aunt she had known in her first youth
had faded away. Standing in her place was the woman who could speak
slightingly of matters which meant a great deal to her family;
could disparage the social niceties around which their worlds
revolved; and who could display an inordinate degree of interest in
matters magical, when all those around her strove to hide or
explain them away.

Isabel loved her aunt as much as ever, but the alteration
puzzled her, and sometimes left her feeling lamentably out of step.
She did not know what her aunt intended from this visit, but it was
evident that her mother’s expectations of her sister were somewhat
misplaced.

Isabel withdrew to her room, settled herself in an armchair,
and took up an improving book. She intended to focus her mind upon
the text, and thus to banish all the disquieting thoughts that
disturbed her peace of mind. In this she was unsuccessful. Her mind
turned upon its pressing questions without cease; and by the time
the dinner hour arrived, Isabel had been thinking with little
interruption upon such curiosities as Rossan the brownie, the
obliging Tiltager and the Ayliri assembly for almost two
hours.

She
went down to dinner with the piper’s face before her, his indigo
hair swept back and his violet eyes fixed upon her as he
played.

Chapter Four

The
next morning was so mundane in character that Isabel felt
reassured. She accompanied her aunt in paying some morning calls
upon various of their acquaintance, and nothing untoward occurred.
Isabel did not glimpse so much as a brownie wandering the
drawing-rooms of her aunt’s friends. They were universally
respectable, and the conversation turned upon such well-trodden
topics as the recent marriage of Mr. George Barnes to Miss Mary
Blackwell; some hazy conjecture as to the progress of Bonaparte in
Russia (or perhaps it had not been Russia, perhaps it was rather
another place entirely; Mrs. Spender could not precisely
recollect); and the newest fashions from Paris.

Isabel listened placidly, and rarely interjected any comments
of her own. It was her habit to listen a great deal more than she
talked, though perhaps it was not considered becoming to be so
quiet.

But
upon their return to Castlegate, Isabel’s tranquil mood abruptly
evaporated. As she followed her aunt out of the carriage and back
onto the street, shading her eyes against the glare of the noon
sun, an irate voice reached her ears.

‘At
very last!’ it said crossly. ‘And how very dare thee! Didst thou
think I enjoyed the journey to find thee the first time? I did not!
I most very indeed did not! And what must thou do the very moment I
find thee at long last but step into thy fancy-fine carriage and
sail away!

‘Not,’ continued the voice, ‘that I am ungrateful for the
eatin’s. That was suitable. But what happened after the eatin’s!
That was most very surely not!’

Isabel had been casting about throughout this speech for the
source of the irritable tirade, but the street appeared to her to
be virtually unoccupied save for their two selves. A carriage was
turning in at the end of the street, but the voice could not
possibly be emanating from so far away.

‘Down, my girl!’ said the voice. ‘Look thee down, by thy
daintily-shod paws! Aye, there. Here I am.’

Isabel blinked. Lying flat to the ground by the wheels of
Mrs. Grey’s carriage was the strange cat-like creature with the
striped fur that had appeared on the doorstep at Ferndeane. The
creature appeared to be exhausted, for it — she? — lay in a spent
huddle, though her head was raised to stare at Isabel with no
friendly demeanour. Knowing herself to have secured Isabel’s
attention at last, she slowly toppled over to lie stretched and
inert upon the pavement, her long tail drooping.

‘My
very goodness,’ said the creature. ‘I will have some more of those
fine eatin’s before the mornin’ is very much advanced! Make no
mistake about that.’ One long ear twitched.

Isabel found her voice. ‘I…’ she began. ‘I did not know that
you were… are you looking for me?’

The
ear twitched again, twice, and the creature said in a faint voice,
‘Why, ‘tis rare to encounter a companion with such ready
wit.’

Isabel felt her cheeks warm, and she gazed helplessly at her
aunt. ‘But truly, it seems so very odd. And I am not accustomed to
being addressed by… well, by such a being as you.’

‘The
nature of thy duties seems to be escapin’ thee,’ replied the
creature, ‘so I’ll explain. What thou must do is bend down a ways,
take up the poor exhausted bein’ lyin’ at thy feet, and convey her
into thy humble abode. Once done, thou must find some comfortable
spot for said bein’ to occupy an’ ply her with the choicest of
eatin’s, without the smallest delay. An’ then, perhaps thy new
companion will not track thee down only to expire at thy uncarin’
feet.’

‘I
will call Rossan,’ said Mrs. Grey smoothly. ‘Perhaps she can
help.’

Mrs.
Grey disappeared inside the house, her composure unruffled by this
untoward event. Isabel watched helplessly. Did she encounter
talking animals so often as to make such an occurrence
commonplace?

‘Immediately, would be best,’ added the creature, her tail
swishing once with displeasure.

Isabel secured her reticule upon her arm and bent down. The
creature’s fur was silky-soft under her hands as she gently lifted
her up and settled her in her arms. ‘There, now, is that better?’
Isabel said in a soft tone.

‘No,’
replied the creature.

Isabel blinked. ‘Eatings,’ she said hastily. ‘Without
delay.’

The
creature nodded once, her fur bristling. ‘And lots of
it.’

Ten
minutes later, Isabel and her aunt sat in the parlour, watching
with some amazement as the striped creature devoured a heroic
portion of food. Mrs. Grey, guided in part by Isabel’s prior
experience of her visitor’s tastes, had requested of her cook every
delight a garden in high summer could afford, together with an
array of sweet things. The cook had, with impressive promptitude,
produced an enormous platter spread about with raspberries,
strawberries, currants, cherries, apricots, chunks of courgette and
carrot and piles of crisp green leaves. She had also provided tiny
porcelain bowls filled with honey, milk, cream and weak tea. The
little beast worked her way down the mountain of food upon the
platter, methodically and without pause, until not a scrap of food
was left. She then proceeded to slurp noisily through the contents
of each bowl, delicately licking up the residue until each
porcelain dish was scrupulously clean.

Having completed this magnificent repast, the creature tucked
herself into a neat ball upon the parlour carpet and, to all
appearances, went to sleep.

While
all of this was going forward, Mrs. Grey had been quietly tatting
lace. Her whole manner was one of placid acceptance of these
untoward occurrences. Even more strangely, there was something in
her face when she glanced at Isabel that suggested smug
satisfaction. Isabel could not understand it.

‘She
will sleep for at least a day,’ Mrs. Grey said at last. ‘She has
undertaken a long journey.’

‘From
where, aunt?’ said Isabel cautiously. ‘And how can you know
anything of this?’

Mrs.
Grey carefully set aside her tatting and regarded Isabel in silent
thought for some moments. At last she said: ‘Do you trust me, my
dear?’

‘Yes,
of course, but—’ began Isabel.

‘Excellent!’ This word was spoken with a delighted, cat-like
smile which made Isabel faintly nervous. ‘In that case.’ Mrs. Grey
reached a hand into her sleeve and withdrew something from within.
The object was tiny, whatever it was; Isabel could discern nothing
about it from her station across the room.

Mrs.
Grey reached down and opened her hand. Something tiny, green and
furred tiptoed delicately off her her palm and set off across the
floor towards Isabel, who watched its approach with mounting
amazement. It resembled a vole in size and shape, but in no other
respect. Its colour was that of spring grass mingled with velvet
woodland moss, and its ears were long and pointed. It scurried up
to Isabel’s feet, its long claws sinking into the elegantly pale
carpet, and began to climb her leg.

Isabel flinched, for the claws scratched a little. She dared
not display any objection to this intrusion, however; she had said
she trusted her aunt, and she did. She held herself still while the
strange vole clambered up to her left leg to her knee, and there
stopped, its snout lifted to inhale whatever assortment of scents
met its long nose from this vantage point.

‘Smells sweetlish,’ it pronounced, startling Isabel. ‘Leerwise
she be, but soundish enough in the toploft.’

Having delivered itself of this strange speech, the vole
sniffed the air twice more, nodded in a decisive manner, and ran
lightly down Isabel’s leg to the floor. From there it ambled back
to Mrs. Grey and was received back into her sleeve. Isabel watched
until the tip of its green tail had vanished inside the soft muslin
of her aunt’s gown, speechless.

‘My
companion,’ said Mrs. Grey. ‘His name is Vershibat.’

Connections snapped together in Isabel’s mind. ‘You…’ she
began, though her voice failed her. She cleared her throat and
tried again. ‘You said you knew a piper,’ she managed.

Mrs.
Grey beamed. ‘Soundish in the toploft, indeed!’ she said. ‘Yes, my
dear, I did. Oh, more than twenty years ago now.’

‘You
have some connection with Aylfenhame.’

‘Had,’ corrected Mrs. Grey. ‘Vershibat is the only link I have
retained.’

‘He
is a fae beast,’ Isabel said. ‘So is…’ she stopped, unsure by what
name to refer to the striped, furred creature still asleep on the
carpet.

‘They
are here for a reason.’

‘What
reason?’ Isabel watched her aunt’s face, puzzled. ‘And how came you
to visit Aylfenhame? Who is the piper?’

‘My
grandmother was the belle of Tilby,’ said Mrs. Grey, apparently at
random. ‘She was the most beautiful woman ever seen in those parts
— or so I understand. But her beauty was of a peculiar kind. Her
hair was a shade of red never before seen in England, and her eyes
of an unusual hue: brown, but shaded with gold. Everything about
her was uncommon, and unlikely. It mesmerised.’

Isabel nodded, uncertain as to the direction of her aunt’s
reflections.

‘There is one in Tilby who remembers her,’ continued Mrs.
Grey. ‘The bridge-keeper. He told me a tale of her, once. She was
said to take a striking pet about with her everywhere. Some kind of
weasel, it was said to be, only smaller, and strangely
coloured.’