Free Darkwater by Catherine Fisher Page A

in here; she crouched by his feet, wrapping the shawl tight about her shoulders to keep warm. “I’ve brought bread and potatoes and some cheese. It’s in the sack. Now tell me what you’ve got to tell, and be quick.”
    He rummaged in the dirty sacking, smiling his toothless grin. “Ah, yes. Tonight’s that night, eh?”
    She stared, struck by a thought. “You won’t sleep out in it, will you?”
    â€œI sleep where I like. On the beach, or his lordship’s woods. Maybe a barn. Maybe the church porch.”
    â€œBut tonight . . .”
    â€œOh, I’ve seen many a Hallow night.” He rubbed his red, coarse face with a broad thumb. “None of it ever hurt me. But here”—he glanced around, uneasy—“this is a chancy place.” He nodded at the box hedges. “Look at it. No gardeners, not that you ever see. But the place is dug and hoed and kept like a palace.”
    Sarah nodded. “I’ve noticed.”
    â€œServants in the house, is there?”
    â€œJust a cook. And Scrab.”
    â€œAh!” The tramp shook his head. The name seemed to alarm him. “That feller! Summoned up from some hole under the furniture, him. Who needs servants when you can magic your own vermin?”
    Taking out a piece of cheese he began to eat it, sucking at it in a way she found disgusting.
    â€œLook, say what you came to say. He told me not to talk to you. He might send for me.”
    The tramp’s eyes were bright. “He’ll be too busy tonight. So he knows I’m here?”
    â€œHe saw us through the telescope.”
    â€œHe would.” He swallowed the cheese. “I suppose he’s got around thee. Has he told thee how he got this place?”
    â€œHe won it from my grandfather.”
    â€œAye. And I dare say he’s full of remorse and wished to God it had never happened?”
    â€œSo he says.” Sarah felt unease grow inside her like the cold.
    â€œYou believe him?”
    She shrugged. “My grandfather was . . .”
    â€œThy granfer, girl, was a fool and braggart.” The tramp looked mournfully out at the darkening garden. “And a good ’un.”
    â€œYou knew him?”
    He gave a toothless wheeze. The dog yapped, and he caught its muzzle quickly with one hand. “Loved him. Oftentimes he’d speak to me, riding by. He let me make hay and help with the shearing. ‘How’s tricks, old villain,’ he’d roar, and then drink from the same cider keg as all of us.”
    â€œAzrael says”—Sarah pulled cobwebs off her dress—“that he was cruel. That he didn’t care for the people.”
    The tramp glanced at her sidelong. “His lordship should know about cruelty.” He took out a stinking old pipe and began to fill it with some peculiar weed. When he spoke again his voice was low. “I was there, that night.”
    She stared up at him. “Where?”
    â€œThe Black Dog, out on the moor. I was sitting in the corner. Let me tell thee what really went on.”
    The sky was dark now. Far down on the cliffs late kittiwakes gathered. The garden dimmed, minute by minute.
    â€œTrevelyan was drunk. Azrael was buying. Strong stuff. Cider. Brandy. I watched how he poured it into thy granfer’s tankard, filling again and again. The old man got worse and worse. That’s the truth, girlie!”
    Cold, she waited. He lit the pipe with a tinderbox, and puffed on it noisily. A tiny red ember glowed in the dark.
    â€œI suppose he told thee different.”
    â€œYes.”
    â€œThen tha’ll have to choose who to believe. Anyway, they started the cards. Azrael’s idea. He kept raising the stakes. Kept winning. Every hand turned out his way. The other players dropped out. One of them muttered he’d seen the black arts before, and wanted no part of it. Red as hell it was, with the fire and all, and a strange