Thyme II Thyme (19 page)

When we returned to my kennel stall, I saw that a bowl of some sort of oatmeal had been left on a stool, presumably by one of the maids, during our absence. I wondered if Erik might release me from the dog face mask in order that I might eat, for there was no way I could feed from the bowl in the manner of a real dog, but instead he used the same funnel that had earlier delivered the water to my throat to tip small quantities of the thin mixture into my mouth, allowing it to trickle down towards my throat. And with some difficulty, I managed to swallow it.

'Now to the house we are going,' he announced when the bowl was finally empty. 'Mistress Meg is saying that master himself you wanting there is.'

So, I thought as I lumbered awkwardly ahead of Erik back up the winding path, the bitch was determined to make sure Gregory got used to the idea of me as his pet dog, for I felt certain it was she and not he that had instigated this latest house call.

Sure enough, it was Meg who was waiting for us outside the kitchen entrance, the same crop in her hand and a smirk of triumph on her face as she watched my ungainly and humiliating approach. I saw she also held a tangle of straps in her left hand, which she now handed to Erik. 'Take her through into the library and prepare her as I instructed,' she said sternly. 'I'll be through in a few minutes to check your work.'

Erik nodded and moved ahead of me to lead the way through the passageways until we entered a long room lined on three sides with bookshelves and on the fourth by a series of high windows looking out upon a flat expanse of lawn. The shelving on the wall opposite these windows was broken up by a massive fireplace, which for the moment stood dark and empty, two unoccupied chairs on either side of it. Erik guided me to one of the chairs, but I was not to be permitted the luxury of sitting in such a human fashion. Instead, he stooped down and began adjusting the small straps at my knees that augmented the lacing on my legs, and I heard the slight rasping of buckles before he straightened up again.

'Bending the legs now you can and sitting down like good dog, please,' he said.

To my surprise, I found that I could indeed flex my knees now, though with some effort. Nevertheless, I persevered and was eventually able to sit back on my haunches as I had done once before in another suit, placing my supposed forelegs out in front of me.

Immediately, Erik bent over me again and I learned the purpose of the straps Meg had given him. One strap was buckled about each of my ankles and then the longer strap to which it was attached was passed about my thighs and tightened. In this way I was kept in my sitting position with no chance of rising until someone decided to undo the straps.

'A very nice picture, indeed,' Meg declared as she entered the room and walked down its length to where I sat. 'The faithful doggie waiting for her master, all prepared to keep him company while he works.'

And that was precisely how I passed the next few hours, my legs at first protesting with cramps and twinges but eventually growing completely numb. I knew I was in for agonies when I was finally permitted to stand upright again and I dreaded the moment, but first I had to endure the boredom. Do real dogs grow so bored just sitting there as I did whilst Gregory, with barely any acknowledgement of my presence, sat at the large oak table perusing countless documents? It seemed like an eternity before he finally sat back and, stretching, glanced over at me. Then he rose, slowly walked towards me, and dropped to one knee before me so our faces were level.

'She'll grow tired of this game before too long,' he said in a surprisingly sympathetic tone. 'Once she is sure you are no threat to us, then we can find you somewhere more comfortable to live and something a little more suitable to wear. Just be a good girl until then and try not to upset her.' He patted the top of my head.

I fought back an overwhelming urge to growl at him. I wished the metal strap across my tongue did not prevent me from doing more, for I wanted to shout at him and ask the bastard if he really thought his words should make me feel better. What the fuck was he? Was he, or was he not, supposed to be the master here? And why should anyone worry about upsetting a mere maid? Except, of course, that I knew she was more than just a servant. Whether she was Carpenter's illegitimate daughter, or whatever her relationship was either to Hacklebury, his aunt, his cousin or anyone else, Meg was definitely pulling most, if not all, of the strings around here. And if Gregory Hacklebury really thought Meg would tire of humiliating me and allow him to ensconce me in some quiet little room with a nice new wardrobe, then I was pretty damned sure he had another thing coming to him.

'Teenie! Teenie, are you all right?!'

I opened my eyes and saw Anne-Marie staring anxiously at my face. Looking around me, I realised we were still standing halfway between the site of my former imprisonment and the site of the house itself, where I could see Andrea waiting for us.

'Are you all right, Teenie?' she asked me again urgently.

I blinked a few times before I was able to find my voice. 'I... I think so,' I murmured, surprised to discover that I was standing. 'I went back there again, back in time, I mean. I was up at the house. Did I pass out?'

'Sort of, you went a deathly white and your eyes went blank. It only lasted for a few seconds or so, but it was quite spooky!'

'I didn't fall?'

'No, you just stood there the same as you're standing there now. How long were you back there for this time?'

'Not long, maybe a couple of hours, maybe three or four hours. No longer than that.' I shrugged against a breeze that was now beginning to feel decidedly cold. 'Come on,' I said, grabbing her hand, 'let's get back to the car. I could use a cup of tea before we go back and interview our ancient yokel.'

We drove back onto the main A35 road and then back towards Minsley Hampton and the pub, which was still closed for the afternoon. Four miles farther on we fo
und another village with a café
where we paid silly money for not very nice tea and slightly limp ham sandwiches, but at least the break warmed us up and occupied most of the rest of the afternoon and early evening, before it was finally time to drive back again and find Jacob Henley.

The pub could only have been open for two or three minutes by the time we arrived, but old Jacob was already there, as Norman our host had promised he would be. I introduced us, he happily accepted the offer of a pint of Old Oakley bitter, and then he was more than willing to talk. For a very old man, he had a surprisingly thick shock of white hair and very alert eyes. Whatever ravages time might have otherwise wrought upon his ninety-something-year-old body, it was obvious that his mind had survived as well as his thatch.

'Spigwell, yes, John Spigwell, he was. Yes, I knew him all right, insofar as any of us hereabouts ever knew him. He was like what you might be after calling a recluse, lived in that big house all on his own excepting for some woman who cooked and kept house for him. No, nothing like that, you understand, she was just paid help and lived in, but they must have been fair rattling around the place, just the two of them. She used to come into the village about twice a week for milk and flour and all the usual stuff, but they also used to have a van deliver supplies every few weeks from some big store somewhere, if I remember rightly. John his self would appear about every fortnight at the post office to collect any post, being as how Marlins was so far off the beaten track and the postie wouldn't go out that far. Pleasant enough bloke, I suppose. He'd smile and say good morning and then he'd get back in his little old Austin car and drive off again, mostly straight back to the house, though sometimes he'd go the other way and stop at the old garage for petrol, not that he could have needed that much, what with him never going anywhere like.'

'He didn't work?' I prompted.

Jacob shrugged. 'Not like we'd call work, young miss,' he replied. 'People said he was some sort of writer, but what he wrote I couldn't tell you, and what he did with his time I couldn't say, not any more than anyone else could, saving perhaps for Minnie Greenway, her being the housekeeper I was telling you about.'

'She'd be dead by now, would she?'

He grinned. 'Less'n she's about a hundred-and-thirty, I reckon she would be. She's dead all right. Died a good twenty years back now and buried in the graveyard at St Cuthbert's over at Melcombe.'

'And John Spigwell, he died before the war, didn't he?'

'Apparently so, not that I ever saw the body, no more than there was a funeral around here, but apparently he was buried up north some place, by whatever family was still left, or so people reckoned at the time.'

'And the family never inherited the house and the land?' Anne-Marie asked.

Jacob shook his head. 'No. There was talk about unpaid death duties, or something, going way back, so I heard. Next thing we knew, they had the military people up there, though what they were up to no one ever found out. Some said it was code breakers, others that they trained people to parachute into France, but it was all just guesswork. Then Jerry flattened the place one night, and that was that. They must have known something we didn't, because they went straight for the place and not a bomb fell anywhere near anything else. Four or five planes, we reckoned, and bloody great explosions you could see and here for miles around. Our lads brought two of them down before they got back to the coast, but the damage was done. A bit after that, they had lorries carting brick rubble away for repair work and then some company bought the rights to whatever woods was left and felled most of it in the space of six months. There was a lot of rebuilding work needed doing at the end of the war, you see.'

'And now it's all farms,' I said. 'Seems a shame they cut down a whole forest like that.'

'Well, man does what man does and people have mouths as needs feeding and heads that needs roofs over them, so things change if they don't stay the way they was,' Jacob said sagely. He peered into the bottom of his empty glass.

Anne-Marie took the hint along with the glass and went back to the bar for a refill.

'What about Meg's Mount?' I steered the subject away from the house. I guessed we had learned as much about it as we were likely to, at least about how it came to its end and the estate was broken up. 'Was that part of the Great Marlins estate?'

'No, all that area ain't owned by no one, as I know of, not unless it's her majesty or the government owns it. No, that's just hills where not a lot happens. They grazed sheep there once, but the grass ain't too good, so they gave it up as a bad job.'

'And do you know who Meg was?'

Jacob raised an eyebrow. 'Well now, I don't say as I'd have known her, but I know who she was supposed to be. It was before even my time, mind, so it's only stories and I can't vouch for the truth in any of it.'

'Go on,' I urged.

He leaned back and looked over at the bar to check on the progress of his new pint. 'Well now, they used to say as how this woman, people called her Mad Meg, used to live somewhere hereabouts. Some said she lived at Marlins, others that she lived somewhere over the far side of the hill, I don't know which is right and I don't suppose it makes much difference.' He paused as if collecting his memories.

'Well, this Mad Meg was supposed to be some sort of witch, but then they said that about enough old biddies in their time, and I don't believe in that stuff, you understand. But, witch or no witch, the story goes that every new moon, or could be every full moon, she used to strip right off to the buff and go up there and dance all through the night, and then she used to sit on this big rocky outcrop and howl at the sun as it came up.'

'And that's all you know about her?' I couldn't conceal my disappointment.

'That's about all there is to know about her,' Jacob eyed me with interest. 'I was born in eighty-one and she'd have been dead twenty or twenty-five years by then, at least, so by the time I was old enough to listen, well, there'd not have been too many people left about who'd have known the woman personal, like. My old dad did used to say as how he remembered her as a tall, striking creature with dark hair, and that she was not as old as the stories would have had her, but then he'd have only been a young whelp himself when she was still alive, so you can't say anything for certain, can you?'

I couldn't, except that Jacob's father's description would have fitted my Mad Megan to a tee, and running naked around hillsides at new or full moons would have been the sort of crazy thing she might have done. Yet the idea that she thought she might have supernatural powers didn't fit in with what I knew of her.

'So, we don't seem to be much further on, do we?' Andrea remarked as we headed back east along the main road again. 'It probably was your Meg who did the naked rock riding bit, but that doesn't seem to have anything to do with anything, does it?'

At least, I thought as the oncoming headlights picked up the beginning of a drizzling rain, Andrea had cheered up somewhat now that she had been let out of that awful restraining belt. Anne-Marie could be quite horrible to her at times, and although it was all apparently part of their on-going game, I wondered just how much Andrea really appreciated it. 'Well, I don't believe in witchcraft,' I said, 'but then I wouldn't have believed in time travel or body switching, or whatever it is that keeps happening to me, and yet I know now that it's possible.'