The Ely Testament (5 page)

Anne's mother remained on the threshold of the sisters' room for a moment longer. Anne saw her throat working above the collar of her nightgown as if she wanted to say something but no words came out. Instead she reached inside and pulled the door shut. Mary was holding on so tightly to Anne's shoulders that the older sister thought she would have to prise her fingers away.

The smell of the man called Trafford still filled the room. It was not that unpleasant but she would open the casement window when she was capable of moving again. Anne looked at the ragged holes in the wall made by the man's knife, and the little piles of plaster and stuff on the floor beneath. She knew that there was no real thickness in the walls on this level of the house. There were no hiding places for a man up here, nothing like the nooks and chimney-corners down below. And the leader of the soldiers must have been aware of that too. So why had he jabbed with his knife at the lath and plaster?

The same thought had occurred to Mary who finally released her grip on Anne and said, ‘What was he looking for?'

‘Nothing, he was looking for nothing,' said Anne.

‘Why did he do it?'

‘To show that he could. He did it to make us fearful.'

The Coffin-Bird

C
yrus Chase put down his pen, blotted the paper and read over the words he had just written. He nodded to himself in satisfaction and stood up. Holding the sheet of paper he walked over towards the window. It was growing dark outside and the lights in the room were already lit. Mr Chase could see his reflection in the window panes. He preferred this partial, fragmented image to the less flattering portrait offered by a looking-glass.

Mr Chase struck a posture that was almost like a statue's, his left arm held forward slightly, his chest inflated. Once more he read through the words on the page, silently. Then he cleared his throat and read them out loud, his voice growing in confidence as he proceeded.

‘The Chase security device is a godsend to an anxious populace. No more need anyone fear waking to a fate beyond human imagining. The day is at hand when the citizens of every civilized country on earth will be able truly to rest in peace, whether they are sojourning on this side amongst the living or whether they have joined the ranks of the departed on the farther shore of that bourn from which, in the words of Hamlet, Prince of Denmark, no traveller returns. The Chase security device is a most ingenious, inexpensive and reliable mechanism, one which supersedes all others presently on the market and which is guaranteed to provide mental quietude and bodily comfort to all purchasers.'

Mr Chase returned to his desk. He took up his pen again. He crossed out ‘godsend' and put ‘blessing'. He wondered whether the reference to the Prince of Denmark was, well, a little pretentious. Would enough people recognize it? And then he decided that the kind of clients to whom he wished to appeal would most certainly be familiar with Shakespeare. But there was something wrong with the final sentence. The mention of ‘bodily comfort' lowered the tone of the piece. More work was required on that particular section.

He let his mind go wandering. He visualized himself as he had been standing a moment ago, one foot slightly in front of the other, the opposing arm extended, palm open, a posture that suggested he was offering assistance to all mankind. As indeed he was! Mr Cyrus Chase allowed his thoughts to drift further. To the possibility of official recognition for his inventiveness and hard work. The idea was not so far-fetched. After all, George Bateson had been awarded a medal by Queen Victoria for services not to the living but to the dead. If George Bateson, then why not Cyrus Chase of
Mon Repos
Villa, Prickwillow Road in the city of Ely?

Mr Chase permitted his imagination to stray wider still. To the statue that might be erected in his memory by a grateful nation. Did they erect statues to the living? He rather doubted it. Therefore he would have passed on by the time a statue was put up. So be it. At least he knew that he would be safely departed and comfortably dead, thanks to his own security device.

Cyrus Chase returned to the point in the room where he could see himself reflected in the window. He was about to run through his announcement again when he heard the distant sound of the doorbell. He went back to his desk and slipped the sheet of paper under the blotter. He did not want anyone to see or read what he had written yet. The maid knocked at the door, opened it without waiting for permission and announced the arrival of Mr Tomlinson.

‘My dear Mr Chase,' said Tomlinson.

‘Shall I draw the curtains, Mr Chase?' said the maid.

‘No, Mattie,' said Chase, thrown off balance by Tomlinson's unexpected arrival, and then changing his mind, ‘Yes, if you would.'

The two men waited while Mattie drew the curtains. Making conversation, Tomlinson said, ‘It's going to be cold tonight. There is already a mist rising.'

It was true. Charles Tomlinson seemed to have brought some of the dankness in with him. He was a tall man, with a thin jaw, coal-black eyes and a weathered complexion. Chase had to look up to him when they were standing close. He was also conscious of his plumpness against the other man's slim lines and height. For this reason, and one or two others, he did not like to stand too close to Charles Tomlinson.

When Mattie left the room, Tomlinson said, ‘I am sorry that I come a little earlier than promised. But I am eager to see the progress that you have made.'

‘You are welcome at any time.'

‘And you are always gracious, Mr Chase.'

‘Would you like some tea?' said Chase, prompted by the other man's compliment. Anyway, he did not think the other would accept. Tomlinson claimed to have lost the English taste for tea on his travels.

‘No, no. I would rather inspect what I have come to see and then be on my way. But how very up to date and fashionable of you to suggest having tea in the late afternoon rather than after dinner.'

‘It is my wife's preference,' said Chase.

‘Then how very up to date and fashionable of
her
. How is the delightful Mrs Chase? How is Bella? Thriving, I hope.'

‘She is well, thank you. Shall we go and see the . . . the apparatus . . . now?'

Cyrus Chase ushered Tomlinson from the room. He was uncomfortable whenever Charles Tomlinson turned to the subject of his wife, Bella, something which the other man did quite often. The two of them went towards the back of the house where Chase took a paraffin lamp from a cupboard. When he had lit it, he opened a door near the scullery and led the way into a small yard and from there out to the extensive garden that lay behind the house. There was a serpentine path leading off into the near-darkness. To the north and above the low-lying haze of mist Chase could just see the silhouettes of the willows fringing the rhyne or channel which marked the edge of his property. There was no noise apart from the hissing of the lamp.

It was cold, as Tomlinson had said, and Chase shivered. He should have taken a coat or muffler from the hallstand. He thought Tomlinson must be regretting having handed his overcoat to the maid on his arrival.

‘These are the right conditions for the fen ague,' said Chase.

‘I expect so,' said Tomlinson. ‘English weather is a tribulation.'

The paraffin lamp which Cyrus Chase was carrying threw a fuzzy globe of light round the two men. They traced out the winding, flagged path until they reached an outbuilding half concealed by shrubbery. Chase put the lamp on the ground where it continued to hiss. He reached into a pocket and extracted a key which he inserted, after some fumbling, into the sturdy padlock securing the door to the workshop. The door opened with a creak. He picked up the paraffin lamp, went inside and deposited the lamp on the end of a long table which took up the central area of the workshop. Tomlinson followed him, his shadow swelling on the red brick of the interior. Once inside, Tomlinson took out a pewter hip flask from his jacket pocket and gulped down a hefty swig. Chase wondered whether this was his way of protecting himself from the fen ague.

Inside were smells, of damp, of freshly cut wood, of something metallic. The shed was large, originally intended as a storage place for farm or garden implements – and indeed there were a few scythes, rakes and spades piled in a corner – but Cyrus Chase had taken over the outbuilding and adapted it for his own purposes. He alone possessed the key to the padlock. A window, with bars for security, looked out not towards the house but across the stream and trees bordering his garden. Even so, Cyrus kept the little curtain over the window shut tight most of the time. It could be chill in here too, but there was a furnace at the far end which Cyrus used for small-scale smelting, and when that was in operation the interior hummed with the heat.

On the long work-table were saws and chisels and hammers, but the principal item was an oblong box, coffin-sized and with a hinged lid. Anyone examining it would have concluded that it was a slightly odd coffin. At one end, the head end perhaps, were two metal constructions like miniature gantries. From the top of one hung a brass bell several inches high. The bell was surrounded by iron mesh. At the top of the other gantry was what appeared to be a little weather vane. Also emerging from the upper end of the coffin were a couple of tubes or hoses made out of pieces of leather stitched together. These presently hung down over the side of the work-table, like thick snakes. If it was a coffin, it wasn't what you might call a pretty coffin.

Cyrus Chase stood back, as far as the limited space would allow, and gestured for Charles Tomlinson to take a closer look at what the visitor had called ‘the apparatus'. Slipping his hip flask back into his pocket, Tomlinson came forward. He peered first at the gantry that looked like a weather vane. It was indeed a metallic cockerel, about half life-size and painted a golden-yellow colour. It could be made to rotate by means of a system of cogs turned by a looping cord which ran through small holes in the coffin lid.

Tomlinson gazed inquiringly at Chase. The small man was beaming with pleasure.

‘Do you see the symbolism, Tomlinson?'

‘What I see is that the cockerel can be operated by the unfortunate person who is lying below.'

‘Exactly. Its rapid circular motion, together with the bright gold that reflects the light, will catch the attention of anyone in the vicinity. To the bystander the sight of the spinning bird – especially on a windless day – indicates that there is life down below. Hence the symbolism of the bird. The cock crows or rather the cock spins. Signifying a new dawn – a new day – when one is sprung from the grave!'

‘Ingenious,' said Tomlinson, stroking his smooth chin, ‘and not only ingenious but almost poetic in its metaphorical aptness.'

He could not have said anything more pleasing to Cyrus Chase, who now urged him to examine the other construction on the coffin lid, the one containing the bell. A cord hung beneath the bell. Charles Tomlinson gave it an experimental tug. The bell tinged, a surprisingly sharp sound in the confines of the workshop. He clicked the fingernails of his right hand, fingernails which were rather dirty and ragged, against the iron mesh surrounding the bell. Again, he looked inquiringly at Chase. Why the mesh?

‘Think of the different things which might set off the bell accidentally,' said Chase. ‘A bird – a real bird – alighting on it, a gust of wind. The whole purpose of the thing would be defeated if it could be sounded by accident. The mesh protects against that.'

‘Isn't this like Bateson's Belfry?' said Tomlinson.

‘There are important differences between his bell and mine,' said Cyrus. He was touchy on the subject. It was George Bateson who had been honoured by Queen Victoria. Cyrus, who had been working along the same lines, considered that he had been beaten to the finishing post.

Tomlinson pulled the little bell rope again, harder this time. Then several times more, quickly. The repeated sound was so much like an impatient summons to a servant that he could not resist looking at Chase and raising his eyebrows.

‘You rang, sir?'

He giggled. Cyrus Chase was taken aback. The high laugh came incongruously from a man like Tomlinson. Chase did not like such levity anyway, not when it concerned his own creations. Nor did he like it when Charles Tomlinson tinged the bell yet again and continued in the same tone. ‘Would sir like to emerge now? Would he care to re-enter the world? Yes? But sir may have to wait a while until I have fetched a digging implement.'

He made a pretend move towards one of the spades piled in the corner of the shed. He stopped when he saw the look on Cyrus Chase's face. At once, he was all contrition.

‘I am sorry, my dear Chase. A thousand pardons. You are quite right to disapprove. You don't have to say a word, I can tell from your expression. Your novelty coffin is not a topic for lightness or careless joking. Forgive me.'

‘Of course,' said Chase, not sure of the phrase ‘novelty coffin'. He preferred to think of the coffin as a work of art.

‘Tell me the function of these,' said Tomlinson, picking up one of the snake-like leather pipes.

‘To breathe through, of course.'

‘Wouldn't a straight, metal tube be simpler? It could be run up beside the bell and use the same support.'

‘What about rainwater?' said Chase, wondering that such an obvious point had not occurred to Tomlinson. ‘Imagine rainwater pouring down the pipe. The unfortunate occupant might drown.'

‘Or suffer the torment of constant drips on his face,' said Tomlinson. ‘I had not thought of that. I believe they employed such a system during the Spanish Inquisition. Drops of cold water falling on to the forehead. Drives one mad eventually, they say.'

‘There is also a fine gauze set inside those tubes,' continued Chase. ‘To prevent insects climbing inside or flying down and annoying the occupant.'