Free Whispering by Jane Aiken Hodge

moment he thought she had seen through his story and was about to order him to leave. But instead she moved across the room to stand behind him. ‘No, no, don’t get up. I am not a woman now, Mr Craddock, but a healer.’ He felt her slim, strong hands at the back of his neck.
    â€˜Ah, yes,’ she said. ‘An absolute nest of vipers. Take off your jacket, Mr Craddock, and your cravat, please, while I close the shutters. You find the light trying, do you not? It is always better to work in twilight. Close your eyes, if you please, and think of some happy place where you have been. In your childhood, perhaps?’
    â€˜Mine was not a happy childhood.’ He had shrugged himself out of the well-fitted jacket, glad that he had never risen to the services of a valet, and gladder still that he had put on a clean shirt that morning.
    â€˜I am sorry.’ She had closed the shutters now and the room was more like a deep-sea cave than ever. ‘But there must have been some happy times, some happy places.’ She was behind him again, her hands finding tensions at the back of his neck that he had not known existed. They moved gently upwards and through the close-cropped hair to his temples. ‘No, no,’ she said. ‘Don’t think about your hair, Mr Craddock, think of that happy place, be quiet there.’
    He had indeed been wishing he had washed his hair that morning and was deeply disconcerted. How long was he going to be able to keep up his pretence with this sorceress? A happy place? He found himself thinking of something Caterina hadsaid that morning about their happy time at Falmouth. It was true. It had been happy, that carefree walk along the cliffs, with the larks singing above. It had been a halcyon moment, the three of them easy together, good companions.
    â€˜That is better,’ said the soothing voice from behind him. ‘Keep your thoughts there, keep them calm, keep them gentle. Then I think I will be able to help you.’ Her hands were quite still now, and, to his amazement, he began to feel something communicate itself from them to him, a warmth, a tingling … He had studied Dr Mesmer’s theories of animal magnetism and electrical currents for the purposes of this charade, and had dismissed the whole thing as charlatan’s rubbish. So what was happening to him now?
    â€˜Don’t fight it, Mr Craddock.’ Her voice seemed to come from far away. ‘I cannot help you if you fight me. And you do need help, though maybe not the help you thought you needed.’ The gentle fingers moved down over his forehead and eyes. ‘Calm now, quiet now, you might even sleep a little. Think of that faraway, happy place, rest there.’
    He was nowhere now, or everywhere … There was no time, no place, only a rhythm that might be the waves of the sea or the beating of his heart … It went on for five minutes? For half an hour? An eternity?
    â€˜That’s very good, Mr Craddock.’ The hands lifted from his forehead and he opened his eyes slowly to the underwater dimness of the room. ‘I’ll leave you for a moment. When you feel able, open the shutters for me, would you?’
    I would do anything for you. But he did not say it. He sat for a few moments after she left him, trying to recapture that deep quiet, to understand what it had meant, what had happened to him. He had seen something, understood something, but what was it? At last, he rose a little unsteadily to his feet and moved over to throw back the shutters and look down at the dazzling view of the river below, with its active tangle of small shipping, and, on the far side of the river, the
Anthea
, reloading now. She would sail for England soon and he must send a report by her, but what would he say?
    He moved to a silver-framed looking glass and tied his cravat with hands that shook a little. Putting on the blue coat Stultz had made for him he tried again to recapture what