Free Savage Magic by Lloyd Shepherd Page B

upset?’
    ‘Wouldn’t you be? And I’ll tell you this: broken mirrors make for bloody insane women. Bad luck, they all said. Weeping and wailing and gibbering. They wouldn’t go anywhere near the glass, neither. Guess who had to clear that lot up?’
    Horton ignores the complaining tone in Crowley’s voice, and wonders why the broken looking-glasses do not appear on Mrs Graham’s list of the miseries experienced by Thorpe Lee House.
    Working his way down the list of staff, Horton speaks to the housekeeper Mrs Chesterton (‘widder, sir, I was barely married two minutes when the Lord took my Jack from me’), who weeps profusely when she tells Horton of the matters which have taken place, particularly when she speaks of ‘the poor hounds’ which had been slaughtered.
    ‘Lor’, that sent the mistress into a proper frenzy,’ says Mrs Chesterton. ‘Right disturbed, she was.’
    ‘The dogs were definitely killed? There was no chance that they attacked each other?’
    ‘Well, they might’ve. But I don’t believe that. The bitch killed ’em, didn’t she?’
    ‘The bitch?’
    ‘Cook. The one ’oo was sacked. She done it all. Stands to reason, don’t it? She wrote those nasty bloody words on my cupboard, ’n’ all. Bitch. Devil’s bitch.’
    Horton is taken aback by the spite in Mrs Chesterton’s words. She looks like she might happily snap the neck of Elizabeth Hook, if she were in the same room as them.
    ‘Why is it so obvious to you that Elizabeth Hook did these things?’
    ‘Well, it all stopped after she left, didn’t it?’
    ‘Not quite. Miss Tempest Graham fell ill a good few days afterwards. And the looking-glasses . . .’
    ‘Oh, don’t remind me of
that
, sir.’
    There is no reasoning with Mrs Chesterton. For her, the sacked cook is at the root of every evil which has befallen the house. The narrative is fixed in her mind. Though Horton notes that neither she, nor Crowley, nor Mrs Graham seem able to understand
why
Elizabeth Hook should indulge in such matters. Crowley seems to be able to hold two opposing ideas at the same time: that Hook is causing mischief to happen, and that there is no such thing as bewitchment.
    The lady’s maid is a thin, ugly Yorkshire girl who gives her name, incongruously, as Béatrice. She pronounces the word with deliberate emphasis and care, as if she has been schooled in it.
    ‘It’s a French name, thou know’st,’ she says in her strong northern accent, and Horton acknowledges that this is so before asking her about the house’s mishaps. She lists the events already given by the butler and the housekeeper, leaving out the mirrors. When Horton raises this, she looks horrified.
    ‘I am shocked that Mr Crowley would reveal such a thing,’ she says, her small eyes opened wide. ‘It is a private matter for Mrs Graham, surely?’
    ‘But it happened, did it not?’
    ‘Why, yes, but I assumed . . .’ And she stops at that.
    ‘Assumed what, Béatrice?’
    ‘Well, that the mistress had done it herself.’
    ‘Why would she do that?’
    ‘I cannot imagine. But she is not a happy woman, sir.’
    ‘She is not?’
    ‘No, sir. She weeps a great deal. And she is terribly afraid for her daughter.’
    ‘Afraid of what?’
    ‘I cannot say. For me, I think Miss Ellen is a strong girl, and she will overcome whatever ails her.’
    ‘You mean the illness?’
    ‘Yes, sir. You must know what I mean.’
    ‘I’m not sure I do. Is there something more than illness?’
    She crosses her arms and draws her mouth into a thin little line and refuses to say anything else at all. Horton does not pursue it; he has no authority to (after all, no felony has yet been committed), and he believes he will be able to talk further to her.
    The footman, a lad called Peter Gowing, comes in with the scullery maid, Daisy Webster, and although they sit apart Horton can see that the girl, in particular, is desperate to reach out and hold the boy’s hand. Gowing stares fiercely at her