The snow was heavier now, eddying around the mare’s nostrils as she puffed and snorted. She was tiring. His own legs, wet from ditch-water, had gone numb, his hands on the reins were stiff
and aching.
The sinking sun was in his eyes now, flashing red between the trunks of the trees. It would soon be dark. He squeezed the mare’s flank but she had no more left in her.
A few minutes later the sun vanished and the road plunged into shadow. At first there were just rustlings and the last calls of the day-birds, but soon more eerie sounds came out of the
blackness: distant screams, a low chirruping that sounded like a chuckle, the sudden snap of a branch close by. He gave the mare a cruel kick, muttering sharply to her, but she only whinnied with
pain.
Then something sprang from the trees to his left. The mare reared up but he managed to hang on, his heart galloping. Had the forest spirits come for him at last?
But it was only a man. A man with a knife. He made a lunge for the reins but Barnaby easily kicked him back, sending him stumbling down the snowy bank into the trees. Then the horse wheeled
sideways: a second man had her bridle. Kicking out at this accomplice, Barnaby lost his balance and fell heavily onto his back; the snow not thick enough to prevent him jarring his head against a
rock. A moment later the man’s knife was at his throat and rough hands were fumbling at his belt. His money pouch was expertly sliced off and after a final kick to Barnaby’s head for
good measure, the men were gone.
Once the dizziness had subsided he rolled onto his front and levered himself up onto all fours. His lip was split and blood spots splattered the snow, scarlet against the white. Or not quite
white. Night had deepened and now the snow was just the lightest shade of the greys and blacks that loomed all around him.
He staggered to his feet, clicking his tongue for the mare, who had probably been spooked and bolted.
But it was worse than he could have imagined.
Hoofprints vanished in a straight line up the track: she had not bolted, the men had taken her. And now he was alone in the forest as night closed in, with no horse, no money, wet clothes and a
five-mile walk to Grimston.
He sank down onto his haunches in despair – if only he had told his parents where he was bound – but a howl from the forest jolted him up again. If he was to die, better it be from
cold than from being torn apart by wild animals. After rubbing his thighs to get the blood flowing again he started walking.
By the time the snow really started falling he was too far gone to care. Walking had become something mechanical, detached from the fading point of his own consciousness: his
legs were someone else’s; his arms dangled by his sides as if broken; his eyelashes were so crusted with snow that he walked blind, ricocheting off trees and tripping in potholes. The next
time he fell he could not get up again. The world reeled, the shades of grey and black twisting together, spinning faster and faster, like the spool of a spinning wheel. But then he noticed that
one of the strands was orange. He tried to focus on it but it spiralled away from him. He squeezed his eyes shut, pressing his thumbs into his sockets until the spinning receded. For the briefest
of moments when he opened them again he had a clear view of the path ahead. The orange glow radiated from the windows of an inn not three hundred paces ahead – he must have reached the
outskirts of Grimston – but it might as well have been three million.
The snow was as soft and warm between his fingers as his own duckdown quilt. He felt so light he might take off at any moment and float towards the inn. The image of himself drifting through the
night sky as bewildered bats and owls flew past made him giggle. Giggling and trembling like a drunk, he barely noticed as he crawled inside the semicircle of amber light. Then the door swung open
and he was enveloped in a warm fug of tobacco smoke and sweat and beer.
He shuffled over the threshold and fainted.
It wasn’t so bad in the end. A day spent shivering by the fire while the landlady plied him with broth and potato cakes. As she said, he was lucky not to have been more
badly injured and the road was known to be a terrible spot for banditry and what did he think he was doing out there in the dead of night? On his way to visit friends in the town, he said, and she
seemed satisfied. It transpired that her husband had done business with his father and they were prepared to wait for payment for his board and lodgings until he returned home, and even to loan him
a few shillings for his onward journey, though they made him stay one more night to make ensure he was fully recovered, despite his protestations.
So, the following morning he bade them farewell and limped the short distance into the town, still bruised from the fall.
The gaol was easy enough to find: squashed like a black insect under the fine white shoe of the magistrate’s court. The people who climbed the steps of the court seemed not to see the
waxen faces that stared from the barred windows beneath them and were deaf to their cries for food or water, although they did hold handkerchiefs to their noses to try and block out the smell.
Melting snow ran off the streets to dribble between the bars and Barnaby could feel the deadly cold emanating from the place from ten feet away.
Suddenly he was afraid. How could she have survived a minute down there?
Ignoring the pain from his bruised hip he set off at a run around the building and eventually came to the entrance to the gaol.
The gaoler received his meagre bribe wearily and led Barnaby down a flight of stairs that vanished into the gloom.
‘How is she: Miss Waters?’ Barnaby asked him. The gaoler shrugged. ‘Alive.’
As they reached the bottom and began walking past the cells Barnaby realised he should be grateful even for this small mercy. In the first cell were three men: one lay in the black puddles on
the floor, his breath coming in irregular rattles, while a second huddled in the corner muttering something that might have been a prayer. The third had been rolled back against the far wall and
was obviously dead. Evidently the corpse had been there a while and Barnaby covered his nose and mouth with his sleeve.
In the cell opposite, three old women crouched on the floor, indistinguishable from one another with their filthy rags and wild hair.
‘Your friend’s lucky,’ the gaoler said. ‘As of this morning she has some company.’
Barnaby said nothing.
‘Although not so lucky for the company!’ the gaoler added with a wheezy laugh.
At the sound of his voice one of the old ladies stirred. The lantern light caught the glitter of an eye she fixed on Barnaby through matted hair. She clawed her way up the wall to stand, then
began hobbling over to the bars.
Barnaby quickened his steps.
‘An apple for luck, pretty!’ she called in a cracked voice, stretching a skeletal hand through the bars.
He hurried past.
None of the cells was empty, and each inhabitant looked as wretched and half dead as the next. Occasionally he saw a bucket, but it seemed that most of the prisoners were forced to relieve
themselves against the walls, and a channel running down the middle of the tunnel was filled with brown, stinking liquid. The gaoler must have followed his gaze for he leaned over conspiratorially
and whispered, ‘Thems as pays gets the buckets.’
Whoever had been shouting from the windows had given up now and the silence deepened the further they went. Occasionally he would hear laboured breathing or the scrabble of rodents but there was
no weeping or moaning nor any talking amongst the prisoners.
And then he did hear a voice, one that was achingly familiar, and clear and beautiful as a lullaby. He set off at a run. The gaoler struggled to keep up and when Barnaby reached the cell the
voice was coming from, he couldn’t make out anything in the darkness, not even the pale circle of a face.
Naomi was speaking tenderly to the other occupant of the cell. She broke into a quiet song and he pressed his forehead against the iron bars and waited for her to finish. She was alive. And she
could still find enough hope to sing.
The gaoler caught up and shone his lantern into the cell.
There were two wooden pallets, one on each side. Naomi crouched in the puddles beside one of them, upon which lay a motionless figure. They had shorn off all her curls.
‘Naomi,’ he said when the lullaby ended.
She turned and raised her hand to shield her eyes from the light, then slowly let it drop.
‘Barnaby?’ she said.
‘Yes.’
She rose unsteadily and came across to him.
Her face was gaunt, and there were bruises on her cheeks, but she attempted a smile.
‘She is not well,’ she said, nodding to the figure on the pallet.
He frowned. ‘I have not come to see her. I have come to see you.’
A shadow of confusion passed across her face.
‘Get on with it,’ the gaoler said. ‘It stinks down here.’
Barnaby spun round. ‘Piss off,’ he spat. ‘Or you will get no more from me.’
The gaoler sighed and turned to go. Barnaby snatched the lantern from him and waited until the old man’s back had disappeared into the gloom. Then he hung it from a hook on the wall and
turned back to Naomi. Reaching through the bars, he took one of the hands that dangled limply at her sides.
‘What happened?’ he said. ‘The accusation was withdrawn. Why did they take you?’
She averted her eyes from his.
‘Did they make you confess? If so it can only have been through torture and will not stand in court . . .’
‘It wasn’t that,’ she said, and her voice lowered to a whisper. ‘The searchers said . . . they said they had found a . . . a teat from which I suckled the devils’
imps.’
He stared at her.
She withdrew her hand from his and pulled the sleeve of her dress up to the elbow. On the white skin of her inner arm was a mole. It was not quite round, and had rippled edges like a flower.
‘They said it had an infernal shape.’
She rolled down her sleeve.
‘But it’s just a mole,’ he said.
She pressed her lips together and nodded.
‘Is that all?’
She took a deep breath. ‘When they had found it they said they must wait for the imp to come for its milk, and so they tied me to the chair and I was so tired I fell asleep and when I woke
up there was a cat in the room; I had never seen it before, and the cat came over and started rubbing itself around my legs. They said it was the imp I sent to do my infernal bidding.’
Anger tightened his chest. ‘Such as?’
‘Making the snow come early, blighting the crops . . .’
‘What, you alone?’
‘They said I was a member of a coven. That there were more of us. That’s when they went after Juliet.’
It was as if all the air had been sucked out of his lungs.
‘What?’ he managed finally.
Naomi half-turned to reveal the figure on the pallet and his heart stood still. How could he have missed her? Right there in front of him, not two feet away, were the familiar patched soles of
her shoes. He had seen them so often from the comfort of his bed while she knelt to stoke the fire or polish the floor. He knew every contour of every crack and each careful mend of the hem of her
dress.
‘They were crueller to her than to me,’ Naomi said. ‘She was delirious when they brought her in this morning.’
‘This morning?’ he echoed stupidly.
‘She has a fever. She needs water but he will not give me any.’
In the shadows just out of range of the lantern something moved. He leaned forwards until the cold damp metal bars were against his cheeks.
‘Juliet?’ he called softly. ‘Wake up. It’s me, Barney.’
The figure made no sound.
He took Naomi’s hand again and squeezed it.
‘I will get you out of here, I swear. Look after Juliet and try to stay strong.’
She swallowed, nodded, then slipped her hand from his and went back to kneel beside Juliet’s pallet. He unhooked the lantern and returned the way he had come. On the way past, the old
woman who had called to him earlier reached through the bars at him. Nestling in the crook of her elbow, like a grotesque tick, was a black lump with purple lines emanating from it. He had never
seen such a thing. If anything was an imp’s teat then surely it was this monstrous thing. Surely any sane magistrate would tell the difference. He shrank from her clutches and hurried back to
where the gaoler squatted, warming his hands over a couple of stubby candles.
In the end he gave the man all the money the landlady had loaned him, and his own coat, on the promise that Naomi and Juliet would be well fed and watered, and provided with blankets and
candles.
Then he trudged back up to the fresh air. He felt guilty as he drank in its ice-cold freshness, sweetened with the scent of bonfire smoke. Somewhere nearby meat was roasting. He wished he had
saved some money to buy the girls a meat pie or some chops but it was too late now. The only thing to do was to try and find someone willing to take him back to Beltane.
The first inn he came to was full of maudlin drunks, perhaps those who had just been fleeced at the court, and he moved on. The second place was much larger with a wide yard filled with horses
and vehicles. The atmosphere inside was bustling and efficient. Young boys and girls came flying out of the kitchen carrying plates of food stacked three to an arm. Trying not to be mown down,
Barnaby made his way across to the bar.
It took several minutes before he was able to attract the landlord’s attention.
‘I’m looking for a lift back to Beltane Ridge!’ he shouted over the hubbub. ‘Payment on arrival from my father, Henry Nightingale – you might know him.’
‘Henry Nightingale?’ the landlord shouted back. ‘Can’t say as I do. A lift, you say?’
Barnaby nodded, but before he could say more the barman’s attention was distracted by a scream. Someone had bumped into one of the little waiters, knocking the scalding hot bowl of soup he
had been carrying all down the front of his shirt.
‘Water somebody!’ a man cried as others attempted to strip him to prevent more burns. The barman hurried away.