STAGS 2, page 12
‘Nor again is there anyone who loves or hunts or desires to obtain pain of itself, because it is pain, but occasionally circumstances occur in which work – or rather toil and pain – can procure him some great pleasure. To take a trivial example, which of us ever undertakes laborious physical exercise, except to obtain some advantage from it? But who has any right to find fault with a man who chooses to enjoy a pleasure that has no annoying consequences, or one who avoids a pain that produces no resultant pleasure?’
‘Well,’ I said, handing it back, ‘it seems to have absolutely zip to do with the play. Except for the reference to hunting.’
‘It’s part of a wider discussion on hedonism, if that helps.’
‘Well, that’s something the old Medievals knew all about,’ I said grimly. ‘You didn’t ask Friar Overbury, did you?’
‘No, Amish girl. I asked Friar Google.’
‘OK. I mean, thanks. But forget all that –’
‘Glad I bothered.’
‘No, I mean the meaning doesn’t really matter. You were right first time. It was placeholder text.’ I jabbed my index finger at the Lorem ipsum text. I’d underlined the first letters of each line.
As soon as Nel twigged, she forgot to be pissy.
‘Whoa …’
‘Yes. It’s an acrostic, see? Ben Jonson used acrostics all the time at the very beginning of his plays. He used them to set out what he called The Argument. It was basically the story of the play in a few lines. Look at this one from Volpone.’
Nel frowned. ‘Volpone? That’s Cass’s part. Is it a sequel?’
‘What? No. No, different play. Look, I copied it out.’ Now it was my turn to give Nel a handwritten sheet. It read:
V olpone, childless, rich, feigns sick, despairs,
O ffers his state to hopes of several heirs,
L ies languishing: his parasite receives
P resents of all, assures, deludes; then weaves
O ther cross plots, which ope themselves, are told.
N ew tricks for safety are sought; they thrive: when bold,
E ach tempts the other again, and all are sold.
Nel handed the papers back. ‘OK, but you’re not suggesting that Ben Jonson wrote the Lorem ipsum page, are you?’
‘No, of course not. It was typed. What I’m saying is, it’s on message. It’s very … Jonsonian.’
‘Then who did write it?’
I turned my back on the well and watched the long shadows the rising sun was casting over the playing fields. ‘My money is on mrs_de_warlencourt. I think she’s in the school.’
‘Or he.’
‘Hmm. More likely to be a girl though.’
‘Why?’ asked Nel.
‘Well, because she has been seriously fangirling Henry for a year, if you look at her Instagram.’ (I had, a lot.) ‘Also, it would be much harder for a guy to creep around in Lightfoot after lights out.’
‘Unless,’ said Nel, ‘he happened to have a girl twin that looked exactly like him.’
‘Point taken. But there’s no use in guessing.’
‘I s’pose. OK then. So Lorem ipsum is the major clue. You think Act Five is at Longcross? Where would it be?’
‘In the library. Will you come? This weekend?’
She thought for maybe three seconds ‘Yes.’
‘But I don’t want to go in an estate car. I don’t want to be driven anywhere by that half-man, half-tree Perfect, if he’s still around.’
‘Hell no,’ she agreed. ‘I’ll drive us in the Mini.’
Nel had brought her eighteenth birthday present to school this year – just one of the other privileges afforded to us new Medievals.
‘Great. And this time,’ I said, ‘we’re taking our phones.’
I wasn’t about to be the prey again.
Scene i
Everything was different at Longcross this time, and I was glad.
For a start, Nel and I did drive down in her gold Mini, radio blaring, GPS on. I didn’t want to relive the Medieval experience of last year, with a silent and scary Perfect at the wheel, no radio and no conversation. Then it had been night-time, as we’d left school on the Friday evening after Justitium Mass. This year I’d pushed for us all to go on the Saturday morning. As every horror film in history will tell you, nothing bad can happen during the day.
The biggest difference, of course, was no Shafeen. I’d planned that since we would be at school together over the Justitium weekend, alone unless you counted all the other sad acts who couldn’t go home, we could maybe see if we could mend things. But after I’d accepted the invitation to Longcross (OK, begged for it), that was out of the window anyway. And now, after we’d fought like cat and dog the night before, a reconciliation seemed out of the question. The only comforting thought was that if he wasn’t spending the weekend with me, he wasn’t spending it with Cass either, as she too would be at Longcross. I couldn’t tell Nel about the row, not just yet; it was too raw and I might easily cry. We bowled along the country lanes on a sparkling winter morning, with the low sun varnishing the frosty fields and the icicles glittering in the hedgerows. We sucked on sweets and I yelled along to stupid songs on the radio, just to show myself I was OK. And at least the dull ache of unhappiness sitting stubbornly somewhere underneath my ribs didn’t leave any room for me to be scared.
Even when we caught sight of Longcross, nestling in a dip of a distant valley, I didn’t feel a qualm. This time it didn’t look like a vast ocean liner, all night and lights. It looked like it was made of gold. For the first time on that journey I thought of The Isle of Dogs and the King of El Dorado. This was the kingdom of gold, indeed, and Henry had been its king.
When we arrived we even went in a different door. Last year Perfect had taken me through the side door to the infamous boot room, but this time we went through the grand front entrance into the hall. This time there was no Henry waiting in his weird red jeans, but the twins and Ty arranged in armchairs around a vast and empty stone fireplace in the entrance hall, like they were in a photoshoot. They looked amazing – they so blond and she so dark, still in their black Tudor coats, arranged around the ornate fireplace. Betty was there too, serving tea and cake and tiny triangular sandwiches from a silver tray, and I must admit that the sight of her did give me a bit of a jolt. She looked exactly the same, with maybe one or two more threads of silver in her hair to match the tray. She bobbed a curtsy at us and handed us tea and cake without meeting our eyes. Nel and I, as it seemed to be the done thing, sat down too around the non-existent fire.
While we all made chit-chat about the journey, I looked around me. There was still only Betty in evidence, even though there must have been tons of unseen servants downstairs. No Perfect, thank God. I felt relieved, even though I supposed he must’ve driven those guys down in the estate car so would be around somewhere. I just wasn’t ready for him yet.
I remembered how to talk to Betty – no eye contact, no thank-yous. It felt wrong, but I’d learned my lesson last year. There was nothing to be gained from being nice to her or her Frankenstein’s monster of a husband. But her very presence added to our discomfort. There was no doubt about it, our little lunch party was definitely awks. The clatter of our teacups and silver spoons sounded stupidly loud. Our voices echoed in the cold and cavernous place and all us visitors lowered our voices as if we were in a library. The vast stone staircase curved up to the rooms beyond, and far above us, in a domed ceiling, cherubs hid behind fat clouds, listening to us. Welcoming it was not.
Cass obviously thought the same thing. She banged down her teacup. ‘God, this place is dreary,’ she exclaimed, in a bored upper-class voice that recalled the deadly Lara from last year. ‘Let’s get a bloody Christmas tree, brighten the place up. We’ve got ages until dinner.’
‘Ooh yes,’ said Nel, clapping her hands. ‘It’s almost December, so it’s not too early.’
‘I always thought this would be an amazing Christmas house,’ I said, quite truthfully.
‘Where would we get one from?’ asked Ty shyly. ‘We must be pretty far from the nearest Homebase.’
Cass laughed, but not unpleasantly. ‘From Longwood, of course. There are millions of fir trees there. Betty, let’s get everyone to their rooms to freshen up and change – we can hardly go like this.’ She fingered the dark fabric of her Tudor coat. ‘Let’s meet back here in an hour.’ I stole a look at Louis – he was meekly silent. I’d never seen Cass take the initiative like this before.
‘Very good, m’lady,’ said Betty in her northern accent, just as if she were in a film. ‘And will you be dining in the Great Hall?’
‘Christ no,’ said Cass decidedly. ‘It’s even more of a mausoleum than this place.’ Once again, I felt relieved. Dinner, too, would be different – I’m not sure how I would’ve coped with the ghosts from those three fateful dinners of a year ago, overlooked by the ghost of Henry and a forest of stag antlers. ‘We’ll eat in the Queen’s Dining Room,’ ordered Cass. ‘It’s much cosier.’
‘The Queen’s Dining Room, my lady. Very good,’ said Betty the maid-bot.
On the way up the stairs, a thought occurred. I caught up with Cass as she strode confidently upward, two stairs at a time, and plucked at her black sleeve. ‘Cass,’ I murmured, ‘who is older? You or Louis?’
‘Me,’ she said. ‘By seventeen minutes.’
Then it clicked. Cass had never been like this at STAGS, but we weren’t at STAGS any more.
Here, at Longcross, Cass was the boss.
Scene ii
We all went upstairs together with Betty and were dropped off at our various rooms. Louis had a nice room on a different floor, and we girls were all in the same wing of the house, a part I knew well. I’d half hoped to be given a different room, to really draw a line under the experiences of last year, but it was not to be. I had the same room, Lowther, with same expensive but shabby decor, and on the wall my old friend Jeffrey, the stag’s head.
‘Hello, Jeffrey,’ I said, once I’d closed the door behind me. ‘Betcha you weren’t expecting to see me back.’
He regarded me with his dark and glassy gaze, but had nothing to say on the matter. With his eyes still on me, I walked to the window to look at the well-remembered view: the ornamental gardens and beyond that the wildness of the forest, which stretched all the way to the tower of Longcross church, the place, I knew, where Henry had been laid to rest. And now I knew that the forest, the de Warlencourts’ personal Homebase, where you could just go and get a Christmas tree, had a name: Longwood.
A movement on the drive caught my eye. A guy in a flat cap and a quilted green waistcoat was leading a dog up to the house on a leash. Then I saw another guy and another dog. Then another, and another. I guessed there must be something going on this weekend – a dog show maybe.
It didn’t take me long to unpack. After my experience of last year, I’d only brought what Esme had called ‘the foundation garments’, as all my clothes would be provided. Sure enough, an outfit deemed suitable for Going to Get a Christmas Tree at a Country House had already been laid out on the bed. I had brought my mum’s dress though, and laid it tenderly next to the alien clothes, just to balance things out a bit. Despite what had happened here last year, I still considered it a talisman, a lucky charm.
I took off my uniform and transformed myself into a houseguest in front of the mirror, but I still had a bit of time before I was due to meet the others in the hall, so I decided to look around the house.
Again, this was a very different experience to a year ago. Then, I’d fantasised about being the lady of Longcross. This year the house was a very different place. It seemed to have shut down. I walked through room after room where the priceless furniture was shrouded in big white dustsheets, as if in mourning. Some rooms were in total darkness until I opened some vast shutter a crack. Then a shaft of weak winter light would stream in to reveal the ghostly shapes of hiding chairs and wardrobes, only an elegant golden leg or a curlicued wooden scroll to be seen, peeping from beneath the sheet. Even the carriage clocks remained unwound, their hands drooping like sad moustaches. It was then that I got the strangest, strongest feeling that this was not a house in mourning but a house in waiting. But waiting for what?
Lost, I wandered down a passageway where I’d never been, and saw a thread of light from beneath a door. The light was enough to illuminate the gilded name above the door that all the bedrooms had at Longcross. It said Alnwick. Tingling, I pushed open the door.
This room was quite different to the shuttered, sleeping house. This was a room that was lived in. There was a battered Barbour jacket and a tweed flat cap hanging on the back of the door I’d just come through, and a robe slung over the back of a chair as if its owner was just taking a bath. There was even a merry little fire burning in the grate.
I walked to the neatly made bed. There was a carafe and a half-drunk glass of water on the bedside table and the inevitable silver frames of photographs, just as I’d seen in Louis’s bedroom at STAGS. But I knew this wasn’t Louis’s room – I’d seen him go into one on the first floor. Besides, the photographs were different. The first one was of a blond adult couple. From the resemblance, I guessed that they were Henry’s parents, the parents I’d never met. Was this their room? Were they actually here this time and I’d have to explain to them why I hadn’t saved their little boy from his watery death? Swallowing, I picked up the other frame. This one was of Henry, when he was perhaps eight years old. I remembered asking Shafeen what he’d been like at that age, but it was hard to believe this eager, open smile could mask any inherited evil. I put my finger on his sweet, innocent face, and left a smoky fingerprint. Henry wasn’t alone in the photo. He was holding a little girl in his arms, even though she clearly wasn’t much younger than him, and she was laughing up at his face, her little star-like hands reaching for him as if he was the only person in the world. Beside them was an identical little boy, who was shading his eyes and looking at the camera with a surly expression. He looked quite apart from the other two. I put down the photo of Henry, Cass and Louis and looked around the rest of the room.
On the dresser there was a little enamel tray covered with the usual male crap. At home my dad had what we jokingly called his ‘man drawer’, where he’d chuck all the stuff from his pockets. This tray was just like that – coins and receipts and nail clippers. And something that shone out – a little nugget of gold. Uneasy, I picked it up. It was a gold signet ring, to be worn on the pinkie finger, just like the ones that all the Medievals and the friars used to wear in the bad old days.
Just like the one that Henry used to wear.
I slipped it onto my little finger, looking at the tiny pair of antlers etched in the gold. The ring was cold and heavy but warmed to my skin immediately. The heat frightened me. Heart thudding, I took off the ring and dropped it in the tray with a little clatter. I looked at the other things on the table. There was a bottle of posh-looking aftershave, with a label from a shop in St James’s, London. I picked it up and sniffed the neck.
And that was what did it. That’s when I knew.
This was Henry’s room.
It was that time-machine thing again, instantly taking you back to a moment and a place. I’d smelled that scent on his tanned throat when he’d waited for me outside my room, in this very house, leaning on the panelling, the black tie loose at his neck. I’d smelled it again when he’d taken my hand to slide along the long gallery in our stockinged feet. And I’d smelled it on the roof when he’d leaned in to kiss me.
I put down the bottle and turned around, 360 degrees. This was so weird. They’d kept it, clearly, just as it had been the day he’d died. It was like a shrine. That was his robe on the back of the chair, his Barbour jacket, his flat cap. Had they lit the fire every day, like the flame of the unknown soldier, in memory of him? Had they taken the ring from his cold, dead hand? I remembered seeing David Lean’s Great Expectations, with that crazy old Miss Havisham who had been jilted on her wedding day. She’d kept everything in her house exactly the same as it had been on that day, growing old in her wedding dress, sitting among the mouldy cake crumbs, trying to cling onto the last time she’d been happy. This room was just like that. It was hard to believe Henry had gone. It was like he’d just popped out and would be back any minute.
Suddenly I could feel an enormous sob ballooning in my chest, closing my throat, stinging my eyes. I knew if I stayed here another second, I would cry. I left the room as quickly as I could, and the house too. I needed some air.
The cold outside was a welcome shock after that weird Dickensian room. I heard the stable clock chime the hour, but I reckoned I had time – I went round the back of the house in the direction of the stable-yard to look for the dogs. Their stupid slobbery faces and waggy tails were what I needed right now. The bright sun cheered me, and so did the sight of these beautiful red roses twining up and around the stone archway into the yard.
But my way was blocked by something quite terrifying.
Under the stable arch, as if he’d been waiting for me, stood Perfect. And he wasn’t alone. He had a massive dog, and I mean massive. Hound-of-the-Baskervilles massive. My stomach felt like it was going down in a lift. The gamekeeper was just standing there, staring at me, like Hannibal Lecter in his cell in Silence of the Lambs. But the dog wasn’t nearly that composed. He started baying at me and straining at his leash. His bark was so loud I heard it in my ribs as well as my ears and I jumped about a mile in the air. Trying to style it out, I took a few slow steps backwards, as if I’d never meant to go into the stable- yard anyway, then I turned and practically ran back into the house, to company and safety.
Scene iii
Getting the Christmas tree was lovely.
Perfect was there, but it was actually OK. In the forest he was different to how he’d been in the stable-yard – like his dog, he just needed someone to keep him on the leash. Thinking about it, he’d always been OK when Henry was there – I remembered that last, beautiful day in the fishing boat when Perfect was our ghillie and his behaviour was almost human. I supposed Cass would now keep him in line, taking over from Henry – and sure enough, Perfect deferred to her in everything. Even more interesting was the fact that he all but ignored Louis, to the point of insolence. He was humble and compliant to his mistress, but blanked her brother altogether.
