The Morrow Secrets (5 page)

Tallitha woke early the next morning from a dream-filled sleep about the mysterious girl. She snuggled down under the soft quilt. This was her favourite time of day. Outside she could hear the clamour of rooks, caw-cawing high above the Spires and the rain pitter-pattering against the window. Alone in her room she could imagine all kinds of ‘what ifs’ and ‘what nexts’. She picked up her mirror and studied her small face. A fairly ordinary girl looked back at her and she liked what she saw. She wished it could always be like this, with no one telling her what to do and how to behave.

Cissie brought Tallitha breakfast in bed as a treat. The tea and muffins tasted wonderful and as she savoured the hot melting butter and licked her fingers one by one, Tallitha invented details about Agatha’s daughter. She imagined the colour of her hair and the sound of her voice, what sort of things she liked to do and whether they would be friends. Tallitha could smell adventure in the air. Secrets were so irresistible. If only she could find the missing girl, then she would be free. The day ahead was beckoning and she leapt out of bed.

Marlin called for Tallitha at precisely half-past nine, grumbling away in her sitting room. She could see the black-hearted snake nosing around and picking up her things. Despicable toad! She coughed loudly and slammed the door to warn him off.

‘What’s he come so early for?’ she whispered to Cissie, spying on the shrove from behind her bedroom door.
‘Knowing ’im, he’s probably going to try and confuse you so you won’t remember the way to the sisters’ apartment.’
‘Well, we’ll see about that. How can I mark my way, without him noticing?’
They found a box of coloured pins and some tailor’s chalk.
‘Look these should do,’ whispered Cissie, ‘chances are the servants won’t notice them. Drop ’em by the staircases and mark the walls when his nibs isn’t watching.’
So Tallitha put the chalk and the pins in her pocket and left with the old shrove. Cissie was right, Marlin was an odious worm. He led her down a maze of corridors and staircases, charging ahead bad temperedly, scratching his chin, as if to feign confusion. But when he wasn’t looking, Tallitha dropped her pins and marked the walls with a small cross. Eventually she realised the devious shrove had doubled back. They had returned to the corridor with the bluebell wallpaper.
‘We’ve been here before, Marlin. I thought you were supposed to know the way,’ said Tallitha sarcastically.
Marlin hopped about salivating and sniffing at her in his devilish fashion, flinging back a cursory look every now and then. After a steep climb up two of the enclosed staircases, Marlin began fumbling about with his precious keys and unlocked a door to an abandoned apartment. Inside, the room was bare apart from stacks of towering papers. Marlin opened a small door to reveal a spiral staircase. The shrove scampered inside and up into the dusty darkness. At the top was another door, a series of steps and more corridors. Although Tallitha kept dropping her pins and marking the way the shrove had outwitted her. How would she ever retrace her steps to the Crewel Tower?
After more devious twists and turns they eventually arrived at the sisters’ apartment. The shrove smiled victoriously and bowed with an insincere flourish. Tallitha pulled a face, pushed him out of the way and barged through the sisters’ door.
‘You’re late!’ grumbled her grandmother.
Edwina Mouldson’s vexation oozed out of every pore as she stiffly turned and coldly eyed her tardy granddaughter. Tallitha knew the evil shrove had made her late on purpose.
‘Sorry, but Marlin took me on a very complicated and unnecessarily long route.’
‘Fiddlesticks! Leave earlier tomorrow. We won’t be kept waiting!’ exclaimed Edwina pompously. ‘Here’s the sampler – now copy it if you can,’ she sneered.
Tallitha pulled a face behind her grandmother’s skinny back and pretended to settle to her needlework. But the sisters’ enormous sitting room was much too interesting, especially as Tallitha had things she wanted to discover about the Morrow family. The room was designed like a spider’s web with corridors leading to spinning rooms and manuscript vaults. One half of the room was festooned with fabrics and the other was full of books. The sisters used two long ladders on steel runners to whizz backwards and forwards past all their treasures. As Tallitha watched her grandmother climb the library steps she wondered how she could get rid of the interfering sisters and start exploring on her own.
Tallitha was drawn to the colourful stacks of material and mesmerised by the shimmering hues neatly organised in descending shade order. There were tens upon tens of hot reds, crazy pinks, iridescent yellows and fizzing greens, each one individually sorted and neatly labelled. The kaleidoscope of brightly snapping colours made her head spin as if she had drunk a bewitching potion. Tallitha was so absorbed that she didn’t hear her Great Aunt Sybilla creep up behind her.
‘You’re distracted little girl. Daydreaming rather than sewing!’ she hissed nastily in her ear. ‘If we have to waste time with you then your needle must be busy!’
Tallitha hated her aunt but decided to turn on her charm.
‘I’m admiring Grandmother’s wonderful library,’ she said sweetly.
Sybilla was taken aback and studied Tallitha more closely. She was an odd child.
‘Sister, she’s being annoying,’ Sybilla shouted to Edwina, then turned on Tallitha. ‘They’re our things little girl, not yours!’ she said sounding extremely spoilt.
‘Is this Great Aunt Agatha as a girl?’ asked Tallitha picking up a miniature portrait, ‘or maybe someone else?’ she ventured, gauging Sybilla’s reaction.
Tallitha’s fingers tingled as she held the portrait and she experienced a powerful urge to find Asenathe, much stronger than before.
‘That’s our mother,’ Sybilla replied tartly, snatching the portrait out of Tallitha’s hand.
Tallitha knew her Great Aunt was lying. The two old crones were as tight as a clam. They would never reveal anything.
‘May I look at your books?’ asked Tallitha, desperate to begin her search.
‘No of course you can’t, wretched child. You’re here to...’
But Edwina’s train of vitriol was disturbed by an unexpected visitor. In a flurry of silks and perfume, Esmerelda entered and waved a bumbling Florré out of her way. She rarely visited her mother and the two sisters glanced at each other with irritation all over their faces.
‘Why Essie, what an unexpected pleasure,’ said Sybilla untruthfully.
They both knew it was a lie but proceeded nonetheless with the slippery veneer of politeness.
‘You should have made an appointment. Well, what brings you here today?’ asked Sybilla fiddling with her pins and eyeing her daughter suspiciously.
Esmerelda was dressed in a long silky purple and pink dress that fluttered tantalisingly behind her as she walked. Her demeanour created the impression that she was constantly on the move, a restless woman who would not stay for long. Her long auburn hair hung like a mane about her shoulders. She looked more like a Romany gypsy than the daughter of a wealthy family. Esmerelda threw her mother a look that perfectly captured the lack of affection between them.
‘I came to borrow some samplers and a couple of stitching books,’ said Esmerelda coldly rummaging in an old needlework box.
‘Very well, but don’t mess up the materials,’ said Sybilla crisply.
‘We’re in the middle of our work so don’t disturb us,’ added Edwina cantankerously.
The sisters exchanged under-their-breath complaints and sauntered off, hag-like, into the depths of their archives. As Esmerelda watched them disappear her face twitched and she turned on her heel to face Tallitha.
‘I hear you’re being tutored by my mother and Aunt Edwina. How’s it going?’ she asked, watching her young cousin carefully.
‘They’re too strict and I’m hopeless at this,’ she grumbled showing the knotted sampler to Esmerelda.
Esmerelda winked at Tallitha and took the sampler. The girl was interesting and definitely ready. She was at her peak, she was certain of that.
‘Let me help you, just a little improvement here and there, and it will be beautiful,’ she whispered enticingly.
The needle flashed before Tallitha’s eyes transforming the bargello stitches in moonstone and jade into an intricate pattern. Esmerelda’s touch was magical and Tallitha became aware of the hypnotic way Essie chanted to herself whilst she expertly manipulated the stitches, adding some and removing others.
‘Cannya, cannya-fe, cannya, cannya-fe,’
she said hauntingly, over and over again.
Esmerelda’s lips twisted into a knowing smile and her eyes shone brightly.
‘What are you doing?’ asked Tallitha.
Esmerelda stared into Tallitha’s eyes and she began to feel drowsy.
‘Essie, what’s happening to me?’ she sighed.
A sickly odour filled the air and Tallitha pulled at the neck of her dress, trying desperately to breathe more easily. Esmerelda took a shiny bauble from her pocket and dangled it in front of Tallitha’s face, making the light sparkle in all directions. Tallitha could hear Essie’s voice as it ebbed and flowed, lulling her deeper into a trance.
‘Just relax. Stay with the sensation and let yourself be drawn in by the shimmering light,’ said Esmerelda bewitchingly.
Tallitha felt herself falling and the sensation of being stretched away from her body. She was powerless to resist Esmerelda’s hypnotic control and the repetitive, humming sounds.
‘I can’t breathe, Essie,’ she said trembling, ‘everything feels so tight.’
‘Tallitha, stop resisting me,’ demanded Esmerelda, hauntingly.
Tallitha was transfixed by Esmerelda’s eyes that hexed her like a bobbing owl. Her deep eye sockets held circles of swirling dark green, blue, and purple whirlpools that pulled her further in. Tallitha felt the last vestige of her will slipping away. She was falling into an unknown place which was bottomless, timeless and endless. She was slipping away from her body... then there was an enormous whoosh and she entered another realm.
The noise from the sisters’ room stopped abruptly and Tallitha found herself floating, surrounded by a foggy grey light. Everything was slow and dreamlike and as Tallitha turned, she could see her own body lying motionless, connected by a fine translucent silver cord that shimmered in the soft light. Then a strange force pulled her from above and she began to move upwards through a narrow tunnel, the twisting motion elevating her until she was floating free with the cool air rushing past her.
Tallitha found herself flying over the mountains with the rivers and forests spread out beneath her. Then out of the mist she saw the jagged outline of a castle with many towers, and she began to feel afraid. Suddenly she found herself pressed up against a window and saw a girl... the vaguest outline of a face... a girl in a black dress. Tallitha looked back at the flimsy silver cord, it seemed insubstantial... Then she panicked. Immediately there was a snapping sound and the vision disappeared.
Esmerelda clicked her fingers and Tallitha returned with an enormous whoosh sucked back into her still body. She felt as though she had fallen and had bumped down a long tunnel, ending at the bottom with a thump, although she wasn’t hurt in anyway. Esmerelda threw her head back and laughed.
‘Did you have an interesting journey?’ she asked menacingly. ‘Whom did you see?’
Tallitha’s tongue felt oversized in her dry mouth and her head felt grainy as though she hadn’t slept for many hours. Her body tingled and her hands and feet were numb. Esmerelda lifted Tallitha’s face and smiled.
‘No matter, you can tell me later.’
Perhaps Esmerelda was a devil, a crazy woman who had possessed her.
Esmerelda clicked her fingers one last time, and as quickly as she arrived, she collected her samplers and floated from the room.
The sisters, who had been busy in their archives, ambled back into the circular room. Tallitha felt heavy from the trance and looked down at her needlework – it was perfect!
Had Essie done that? She couldn’t remember and she felt decidedly odd. Esmerelda was weird, thought Tallitha.
‘Has Essie gone?’ asked Sybilla with relief.
Tallitha nodded. ‘Here’s the sampler, it’s finished.’
Sybilla took the sewing and turned to her sister. ‘Yes quite good. That will be all for today,’ she said ushering Tallitha out of the room.
Tallitha hesitated by the towers of bright fabrics.
‘Grandmamma,’ said Tallitha tentatively, ‘tomorrow, will you tell me about the Morrow family?’
‘What do you mean?’ asked Edwina suspiciously.
‘What did she say?’ asked Sybilla stiffly.
‘Nothing dear,’ shouted Edwina to her sister.
‘I just wondered about the family and its past.’
Sybilla stared at her great niece. She was a handful and no mistake, Agatha had been right about that.
‘Now run along. Stop asking questions. You’ll wear us out,’ and with that, Sybilla shooed Tallitha out of their apartment and closed the door.
It was useless. They wouldn’t tell her anything. They were as tight as ticks, the pair of them. Damn them all!
She would find out about the missing girl without their help.
Now Tallitha was more determined than ever to discover the secret about Asenathe Morrow!

As it turned out Tallitha didn’t have long to wait. Every morning she returned to the sisters’ apartment accompanied by Marlin and each day he took her on a slightly different route, meandering through the grand house in order to confuse her. But Tallitha had begun to notice how the wallpaper patterns followed on from each other and piece together a route of her own which she was determined to try out at the first opportunity. She had also decided to make the best of the situation with the sisters, use it to her advantage and so the days took on a certain rhythm. Bit by bit she teased information from Edwina and Sybilla about the Morrow family and when she returned at the end of her lessons, Tallitha reported these snippets to Tyaas.