2
There existed formerly a belief on Dartmoor that it was
hunted over at night in storm by a black sportsman, with
black fire-breathing hounds, called “Wish Hounds.”
They could be heard in full cry, and occasionally the blast
of the hunter’s horn on stormy nights.
—A BOOK OF THE WEST: DEVON
H
OLMES LEFT, AND I hurriedly bundled my wet, muddy clothes into a heap, scrubbed with limited success at my face and arms in the frigid water of the corner basin, and pinned my hair into a tight, damp knot. I hesitated briefly before deciding on the woollen frock—perhaps I had better not test the old man’s sensibilities by continuing to appear in trousers. Ninety-year-old men probably didn’t believe that women had legs above the ankle.
The froufrou of women’s clothing takes longer to don than simple trousers, but I did my best and in a few minutes carried the candlestick back out into the gallery under that intriguing ceiling, which had struck me as not quite right somehow. I allowed myself to be distracted by the paintings (some of them very bad) and the bric-a-brac (some of it belonging in a museum), and stood for a long moment in front of a startling
African-style wood carving that formed part of a door surround leading to one of the bedrooms. The proud, dark, nude female torso looked more like a fertility shrine than the decoration to a Victorian bedroom; I know it would have given me pause to have passed that lady each time I was going to my bed.
I continued my slow perusal, meeting a few Baring-Goulds whose faces were more interesting than their artists’ techniques, and then made my way down the handsome stairs again in pursuit of the voices. When I came within earshot, Baring-Gould was speaking, sounding sternly critical.
“—only two miles, for pity’s sake. I’ve done it in sleet at the age of fifty, and she can’t be more than twenty-five.”
“I believe you’ll find she has more than ample stamina,” Holmes replied easily. “That was irritation you saw, not exhaustion.”
“But still, to fling the maps in your face in that manner—”
“As I remember, you yourself had a very quick temper, even when you were considerably older than Russell.”
There was a pause, and then Baring-Gould began to chuckle. “You’re right there, Holmes. Do you remember the time that fool of an innkeeper outside of Tavistock tried to throw us out?”
“I remember feeling grateful you weren’t wearing your collar.”
“Good heavens, yes. I’d have been dubbed the Brawling Parson forevermore. But the look on the man’s face when you—”
Although I was certain that the reason Holmes had distracted his companion into this bout of masculine reminiscences was that he had heard my approach, I nevertheless counted slowly to thirty so as to allow the changed topic to establish itself before opening the door.
The stone fireplace was giving off more smoke than warmth, and the dank air was thick and cold. The long refectory table had been laid with three lonely places, with Baring-Gould in the middle with his back to the fire, and Holmes across from him. I came forward and sat in the chair to Holmes’ right. Our host made a brief obeisance to manners by raising his backside a fraction of an inch from the seat of the chair as I sat down, then he reached forward and removed the lid from the tureen
of promised soup. No steam came out. By the time he had pronounced a grace and served us, the soup had cooled even more, and to top it off, when I tasted the tepid mixture, it was obvious that it had been made a day or several before.
Still, I ate it, and the fish course and the stewed rabbit that came after. The rabbit was bland and chewy, as was the custard that followed.
There was very little conversation during the meal, which suited me. I was pleased, too, at the lack of toothless slurping noises that old people so often succumb to when their hearing goes. If one discounted the actual food, it was a pleasant enough, if quiet, meal, and I was looking forward to an early entrance into the featherbed and thick eiderdown I had felt on the bed upstairs.
This was not to be. Baring-Gould folded his table napkin and climbed stiffly to his feet, gathering his sticks from the side of his chair.
“We will take coffee in the sitting room. That fire seems to be drawing better than this one. Probably a nest in the chimney.”
As we obediently trooped—slowly—behind him, I had the leisure to study his back. I realised that he was smaller than I had thought, probably barely an inch taller than my five feet eleven inches even when he was young. Now, stooped over his canes, he was considerably shorter than Holmes, but despite his obvious infirmity, his frame still gave the impression of strength, and he had eaten the tasteless food with the appetite of a young man.
He led us through to the adjoining room, which was indeed both warmer and less smoky. The curtains were drawn against the night, and the steady slap of rain against the windowpanes underscored the physical comfort of the room. If the company inside the cozy room made my feminist hackles rise, well, I was always free to slog back to the train tomorrow.
“I must apologise for the nonfunctional state of my radiators,” Baring-Gould said over his shoulder to me. “They are normally quite efficient—I had them installed when my wife’s rheumatism became bad—but yesterday we awoke to discover that the boiler gat no heat,
and I am afraid the only person competent to quell the demons is my temporarily absent housekeeper. Like its master, my house is becoming tired.” I reassured my host that I was quite comfortable, and, although I did not think he believed me, he allowed my reassurances to stand.
When we reached the sitting room, Baring-Gould made for a wellworn armchair and addressed himself to Holmes. “I received a gift today that I think might interest you. That small jug on the sideboard. Metheglin. Ever tasted it?” While he spoke, he propped his sticks against the side of an armchair and lowered himself into it, then reached to the side of the fireplace and picked up a meerschaum pipe with a stem nearly a yard long, which he proceeded to fill.
“Not in some time,” said Holmes. I looked at him sharply, but his face showed none of the humorous resignation I thought I had heard in his voice.
“A powerful substance—I would suggest a small dose if you’re not accustomed to it. Distilled from heather honey. This batch is seven years old—I should warn you, never drink it if it’s less than three. Yes, I’ll have a drop. It helps to keep out the cold,” he said, in answer to Holmes’ gesture. I took my husband’s unintentional hint and demurred, reassuring my host that coffee would be sufficient to warm me. While they discussed the merits of the contents of their glasses, I examined my surroundings.
The room was panelled in oak and had a decorative plaster roof similar to that in the gallery upstairs. Up to head height the panelling was simple oak, but above that the wood was carved in ornate arches framing dimly seen painted figures that marched around the entire room, all of them, as far as I could tell, posturing ladies in billowing draperies. I took up a lamp from the table and held it to the figure there, a woman with dogs held straining against their leads:
Persuasio
it said in a caption above her. Above the fire I found portraits of
Gloria
and next to her,
Laetitia;
between all the figures alternated the phrases
Gold bydeth ever bright
and what was, very roughly, the French equivalent,
Toujours sans tache.
“The one over there might be of interest to you,” Baring-Gould suggested, and tipped his head at the inner wall.
“Gaudium Vitae?” I asked doubtfully, looking at the figure in her gold tunic, its gold ties blowing dramatically behind her and a massive gold chalice held nonchalantly in slim fingertips at the end of an outstretched arm.
“I think he means the next one,” Holmes said.
In the panel to the left was a woman clothed in orange garments flecked with a design of black splotches that looked alarmingly like huge ants. She had wings sprouting from her temples, and her right hand pointed at a flying white bird that might have been a dove, although it looked more like a goose. At her feet a small white pug-faced dog, tail erect, had its nose to the ground, snuffling busily. Above the wings the caption read,
Investigatio
. I turned to look at Baring-Gould, suspecting a breath of humour, but he was no longer paying attention to anything but his yard-long pipe. I ran the lamplight over a few more:
Valor
(this figure was a man, wearing a short tunic),
Harmonia
with a cello,
Vigilantia, Ars, Scientia
—a room of virtues.
“Daisy painted them. My daughter Margaret,” he explained.
“Really? What was here before?” There must have been something, as the upper portion of wall was obviously designed for decorations. I wondered what Elizabethan treasure had been lost in this slightly clumsy restoration.
“Nothing. They are new. Not new, of course, but the walls were built since I came here, to my design.”
I examined the walls more closely. They did look considerably fresher than the seventeenth century.
“Local craftsmen, my pattern based on a house nearby, my daughter’s painting—I restored an Elizabethan house out of a small and frankly decrepit base.”
“The ceilings too?”
“Nearly everything. I am particularly proud of the fireplace in the hall. It belongs to the reign of Elizabeth, without a doubt.”
The idea of a heavily restored and adapted original explained the
very slightly odd feel to the gallery ceiling upstairs—far too ornate for a country house, and much too new and strong for the age of its design.
“The ceilings are very beautiful,” I said. “Does your daughter still live here with you?”
“No. Most of my children have scattered, making their way as far afield as Sarawak, where one of my sons is with the white rajah. Although one of my daughters lives just up the road in Dunsland, and my eldest son and his American wife have lived in this house for the last few years. I think they thought me too feeble to be alone.” His glare dared me to argue. “At present they are in America, where Marion’s mother is ill. I admit, I am enjoying my respite from the American régime.”
“How many children have you?”
“I had fifteen. Thirteen still living. Twelve,” he corrected himself, without elaboration.
His response brought me up short—not the numbers, which were common enough, so much as the vivid contrast it evoked, of this solitary house with its silent rooms compared to the vital place it must have been, a busy household throbbing with life, ringing with footsteps and voices and movement. I put the lamp back on the sideboard and took up the chair Holmes had pulled over to the fire for me. I accepted coffee, declined brandy, and waited with little patience while pipes were got going. Finally, Baring-Gould cleared his throat and began to speak, in the manner of a carefully thought out speech.
“My family has lived on this land since 1626. My name combines two families: the Crusader John Gold, or Gould, who in 1220 was granted an estate in Somerset for his part in the siege of Damietta, and that of the Baring family, whom you may know from their interests in banking. My grandfather brought the two names together at the end of the eighteenth century when he, a Baring, inherited Lew. After my birth we lived a few miles north of here, in Bratton Clovelly, but my father, who was an Indian Army officer invalided home, did not like living in one place for long, so when I was three years old he packed us and the family silver into
a carriage and left for Europe. My entire childhood was spent moving from one city to another, pausing only long enough for the post to catch us up. My father was very fond of Dickens,” he explained. “When his stories came out, I used occasionally to wish it might be a long one, so that we might be tied down for a longer period while we waited for the installments to reach us. Although I will admit that
Nicholas Nickleby
was a mixed blessing, as it found us in winter, in Cologne, living in tents.
“Still, it was an interesting childhood, and I scraped together enough education to enable me to hold my own at Clare in Cambridge. I took holy orders in 1864, and spent the next years doing parish work in Yorkshire and East Mersea.
“My father was the eldest son. His younger brother, as was the custom, had taken holy orders, and was the rector here at Lew Trenchard. It wasn’t until he died in 1881 that I could come and take up the post, as squire as well as parson, for which I had been preparing myself.
“You see, when I was fifteen years old I came here, and my roots found their proper soil. I had known the moor before, of course, but on that visit I saw it, saw this house and the church, with the eyes of a young adult, and I knew what my future life was to be: I would restore the church, restore this house, and restore the spiritual life of my parish.
“It has taken me forty years, but I like to think that I have succeeded in two of those endeavors, and perhaps made inroads into the third.
“What I had not envisioned, at that tender age, was the extent to which Dartmoor would lay its hands on me, heart and mind and body. It is a singular place, wild and harsh in its beauty, but with air so clear and pure one can taste it, so filled with goodness that illness has no hold there, and ailing young men are cured of their infirmities. It is odd, but although no part of it falls within the bounds of my parish, nonetheless I feel a responsibility that goes beyond legal boundaries.” He stopped and leant forward, looking first at Holmes and then, for a longer time, at me, to see if we understood, and indeed, there was no mistaking the man’s passion for the moor. He eased himself back, not entirely satisfied but trusting to some degree in our goodwill. He shut his eyes for a moment, rallying his
strength following the long speech, then opened them again with a sharp, accusing glance worthy of Holmes himself.