The Midnight Witch (9 page)

Downstairs there is a sense of happy family muddle, children and adults all squeezed around the kitchen table, dog wagging and barking for tidbits, Jane ladling a carrot-heavy stew into an assortment of bowls.

“Twins,” Jane pauses in her dishing-out, “put George in the garden, do. He’s making such a frightful racket.”

As the small boys drag the dog out one turns to Bram to explain, “We named him after the king!”

Gudrun shrugs and puts in, “Mangan enjoys giving orders to a monarch.”

“Join us, Bram from Yorkshire!” Mangan beckons to him. “Do not linger upon the threshold or the hungry hordes will devour your meal.”

“There is a little meat in the stew,” Jane assures him, “though I’m afraid it is very much brother-where-art-thou, rather than brother-don’t-push.”

Bram takes his place on a wobbly stool next to Freedom.

How curiously they live. All these mouths to feed, and so little to feed them with. And yet they take me in, an additional burden. I must prove myself different. I must make my way, under the guidance of this strange man, and repay them for their kindness. For their faith in me.

*   *   *

The heat of the day has not yet penetrated the thick walls of Number One Fitzroy Square, so the temperature in the morning room is pleasant enough. I sit with Mama after breakfast attempting to encourage her to arrange activities beyond the house, but she is resistant even to the idea of a walk in Regent’s Park. I try to tempt her with the idea of the rose gardens, but she says it is too late for roses, and she does not wish to see them faded and dying. Since the duke’s funeral she has become increasingly listless, and I fear for her health. I wish my skills as a witch extended to some manner of healing that might ease her suffering, but the fact is, there is no magic in the world that can banish the pain of grieving.

Withers knocks and opens the door.

“Viscount Harcourt has arrived, my lady,” he informs Mama.

“Show him in, Withers,” she tells him, at last showing a modicum of interest. Indeed, my marriage is perhaps the only subject for which she has any enthusiasm, it seems.

Louis brings his customary energy and sense of purpose with him into the room. He greets us with easy charm and succeeds in eliciting a smile from my mother. Fifteen minutes of pointless chat and Mama’s determination to turn every minute of the conversation around to who is marrying whom, are more than I can stand.

“It is too lovely a day to be indoors,” I say, rising again. “Louis, would you like to sit awhile in the garden?”

“If Lady Annabel can be persuaded to join us,” he answers with convincing sincerity.

As if my mother would ruin this opportunity for you to speak to me alone. I think not.

“Oh, no.” Mama, suddenly the frail dowager duchess, sinks a little deeper into the cushions of the sofa. “I shall be quite content to remain here in the cool. You two young things go out. Run along now, I insist,” she says, waving us away.

Outside the air still retains a morning freshness, though the sun is bright and the sky a cloudless stretch of blue above us. In the rigorously tended flower beds lilies and pinks bloom quietly and sweetly, but the sunshine sets the orange petals of the tiger lilies alight and causes the blue of the giant ceanothus on the south wall to sing. I lead Louis along the narrow gravel path, up the broad stone steps, past the little pond and its trickling fountain, and up to the paved corner with wrought-iron table and chairs. Someone has had the foresight to open the sun parasol, so that a pool of shade covers the seating area. Iago is stretched out on the warm stones, luxuriating in the sunshine. I stoop to stroke him as I pass, his gleaming fur almost too hot to touch comfortably.

“You foolish puss,” I tell him, “you’ll cook yourself.” I choose a chair in the shade and sit down. Louis takes the seat next to me. My eye is caught by the small rose bed to the left of the table. Mama was right, it is late for roses. Most blooms are starting to wither, petals crisping in the heat. Father would have had words with the gardener for not seeing to them sooner. No one wants to look at death while they sip their lemonade. No one save a necromancer, maybe. Who else can see the beauty in decay?

I glance at Louis and know that he would understand. There is, indeed, an intimacy to be found in the company of another witch that is inevitably absent when I am with a non-witch. I know Louis would have me believe that only a witch could ever truly understand another witch. And the viscount is a very fine witch indeed, and has grown into a necromancer worthy of respect. And he is my friend, and I do feel in need of a friend just now.

“Well, Lilith, I am astonished to find myself sitting alone with you, and at your own instigation,” says Louis, his bright blue eyes laughing. “Should I be encouraged?”

“I could not endure another word on the subject of weddings.”

“Lady Annabel is somewhat single-minded on the topic.”

“With Father gone, marrying me off has become her chief concern.”

“And she does enjoy it so. Why not humor her? Marry me before the month is out and make your dear mother happy.”

“Charmingly put, Louis.”

“I’ve tried charm”—he shakes his head—“waste of time on you, Lily, you deflect my best attempts as if you were clad in armor.”

“I can’t possibly agree to some huge society wedding while we are in mourning.”

“There is nothing to stop us naming a day, a date that reflects a respectable pause, of course, but at least it would be a date. A fixed point. Something for us all to look forward to.”

“I really can’t think of weddings, not now. I have new responsibilities. New challenges I must rise to.”

“You will make an excellent Head Witch. I know it.”

I look quickly about me. I am uncomfortable even saying the words to myself in private, let alone somewhere where they might be overheard.

Louis takes my hands in his.

“Darling Lily. You don’t have to do this alone. I will support you in every way possible, if only you’ll let me. You must know that.” He looks at me with disarming affection. I believe he is fond of me, that his interest in me extends beyond pleasing his father. Beyond even simple desire. Is it love, then? Is that what he feels? Why can I not feel it for him?

“Thank you, Louis. I do value your friendship, and, of course, I too look forward to the day when we can be married. But the coven must come first now.” I smile back at him, but it is a guarded, polite smile, and he knows it. I withdraw my hands. “You will attend the inauguration, won’t you?” I ask him.

“Nothing would keep me away. Are you nervous?”

“About the ceremony? No. About stepping into the role my father played so well? I’d be lying if I said I wasn’t daunted.”

“You will be magnificent. And wise.”

I shake my head. Louis grins. “You agreed to marry me one day,” he says. “Best dashed demonstration of wisdom I ever saw.”

This time my smile is warmer. “I will need a friend, Louis.”

“You have one, right here at your side. Always.”

I am about to say something more on the matter when I am distracted by the sound of whispering, which grows to shouting. The noise is so unexpected and so forceful it shocks me, blotting out all other sounds. I put my hands over my ears as the voice grows louder, more insistent. I recognize the echoey, distant, reedy quality of the speech of the dead. I am accustomed to listening to them, of course, but this is different. This is not one of the familiar spirits who have become friends to me over the years. Nor is it a spirit I have called or summoned. This voice belongs to another, a soul who is somehow more disturbed, and who is shouting, demanding my attention in a disturbing manner. As the volume increases and the words become clearer I recognize the speaker as the same one who came uncalled into my thoughts at Father’s funeral. The spirit is saying, no,
shouting
my name, over and over, the sound booming in my mind so that with a gasp I throw my hands over my ears in a futile attempt to shut it out.

“Lilith?” Louis is becoming concerned. “What is it? Tell me what is wrong.”

I shake my head, as much to try to clear it as to indicate to him that I cannot speak. My mind is filled with the ever-increasing bellowing of my own name. I have never been so assailed by the voice of a spirit.

Stop! Stop! “Stop!” I cry aloud.

Louis kneels before me, putting his hands on mine, at a loss as to how to help, anxious to ease my distress.

There is nothing he can do. Abruptly, the shouting ceases. All that remains is a buzzing echo in my mind. I meet Louis’s troubled eyes as he searches my face for answers.

“It’s all right,” I tell him, though in truth I am still shaking. “There was a voice, a spirit, very loud, very … strong.”

“But you didn’t call anyone?”

“No. I did not.” I am unable to clearly understand what has just taken place, but the message delivered in such a startling way by the unwelcome spirit is clear. I am a witch who calls herself skilled in necromancy, a person who summons the dead to help me when I wish. Only this time, the dead are summoning me.

5.

Bram has visited several artists’ ateliers, some belonging to painters, others the workplaces of sculptors, but he has never in his life seen anything like Mangan’s studio. The space must have originally consisted of a large room at the rear of the house. A wall has been roughly knocked down to extend it into an adjoining room. This in turn has had its doors and far wall removed so that both spaces now run into the rather rickety conservatory that clings, spiderlike, to the back of the building.

“Light! Light, my young friend,” Mangan explains, waving an expansive arm at the devastation wrought upon the old house. “An artist cannot work without it. Art cannot thrive in the darkness. What is comfort, what is convention, what is property next to the value of the aesthetic? All must be subjugated to art. There can be no half measures.”

This man is incapable of any action which is not extreme,
Bram thinks.
His opinions, his politics, his personal life, even the way he moves and speaks—all are extreme. Is it any wonder he produces such radical work? But which came first? Does the man shape the nature of what he creates, or does it shape him? If I stay here long enough will I, too, become extreme? Will being in his company draw from me further my own obsessive nature, so that I, too, am consumed by my art? Such an existence can only be a short step away for me. Would I produce my best work this way, or would I merely lose stability further?

Mangan’s chosen medium is stone. Huge chunks of pale limestone hewn from the quarries at Portland sit heavily on the groaning floorboards. Here and there is evidence of shoring up of the level below, with stout props visible through gaps, installed to reinforce the floor and prevent the stone disappearing into the cellars. Two pieces of natural rock are untouched, a third shows marks and gouges and other signs of the early stages of work. Another has been extensively chiseled to reveal the lumpen, rough form of a reclining woman. At the conservatory end of the studio are several smaller sculptures, all at different stages of development, all bearing Mangan’s distinctive style—angular, bold, with planes that catch the light and hollows which harbor secret shadows. While Mangan revels in showing his new protégé his work, Perry labors away preparing stone and sharpening tools in one of the darker corners of the space. He smiles over at Bram reassuringly.

When does he ever get to do his own work? I wonder. Is everyone so in thrall to Mangan that they allow themselves to be … absorbed by him and by his art? I must not let that happen to me. I must guard against it.

Bram is still weary from scant sleep. After sharing a meal with the family, he retired to his room and set about working on his first painting in his new home. He had started with such high hopes, applying paint to canvas boldly, confidently, joyously. But as the hours progressed, so the image in front of him seemed to slip away. What he saw on the canvas fell woefully short of what he was aiming for. Exasperated, he dipped a rag in turpentine and scrubbed away the failed picture. He took a breath, steadied himself, and began again. Two more hours passed in a futile attempt to make something of the sketches from which he was working, to reproduce the energy and the drama of what he remembered. But to no avail. He worked on, into the night. Discarding and starting over. Again and again. Each time with equal determination but dwindling faith in his own ability.

Now, today, he must start afresh. Renew his belief in himself. He steps forward and touches one of the pieces of stone Mangan has selected for his sculpture. The surface is surprisingly warm beneath his fingers. When he lifts his hand again a fine layer of dust coats his skin. The same gritty film that covers everything, and everyone, in the studio.

“So, Bram from Yorkshire.” Mangan comes to stand beside him, momentarily and unexpectedly still. “What do you think of my work?”

“What do
I
think?” Bram is taken aback. He is in the presence of genius, here to learn from a master, and he, an inexperienced, unknown painter, is being asked his opinion of the great man’s work.

“Don’t be coy.” Mangan resumes striding about the room, snatching up this hammer or that chisel, gesticulating as he goes. “I surround myself with artists because I wish to be challenged, to be tested. Assail me with your criticisms. Beat me with your ridicule. Such wounds as you inflict will serve only to strengthen my resolve, I promise you.” He turns his intense gaze onto Bram, searching his face for honesty.

“Well, I…”

“Come, come!”

Bram studies the sculpted stone in front of him. It is sufficiently representational to be clearly seen as a figure, a female, but the norm has been exaggerated, twisted, stretched, to extreme limits. Limbs would start perfectly formed, the sensuous curve of a shoulder leading into an upper arm, say, and then flatten and meld back into the rock, as if the base material will not fully release it. The face has no features, but the line of the jaw and the pale, broad brow are exquisitely and lovingly rendered.