Lament for a lost lover

When I walked out in the gardens, my footsteps invariably took l me towards the arbour. It was beginning to exert a fascination over me. Now that the trees were losing their leaves I could see it from my bedroom window and I made a habit of looking at it.

Once when I found my footsteps leading me that way, I heard my name being called and turning saw Chastity running after me.

“Don’t go there, mistress,” she said. “Don’t go nowhere near that place. Tis haunted.”

“Oh, nonsense, Chastity,” I said. “There’s no such thing as hauntings. Come with me and we’ll go together.”

She hesitated. She had always been particularly fond of me since the day when I had given her a pretty button.

“Come on. We’ll go and look. I’ll prove to you that there’s nothing to fear. It’s just four walls overgrown by shrubs because no one has cut them back for a long time.” She put her hand in mine, but I was aware that she was trying to drag me back as we went along.

I opened the door and stepped inside. The place smelt a little musty. The dampness of the wet wood and the smell of leaves permeated it.

They were together here ... Harriet and Edwin ... My eyes went to the window where the fanatical eyes of Old Jethro had looked in. I could almost hear the shattering of the glass, the firing of the fatal shot ... at closer range than the one which had been fired at me. I could picture Harriet, stunned, and yet collecting her wits quickly enough to run to tell Carleton what had happened. Chastity was looking up at me, her eyes round with horror.

“Mistress, it is haunted. Come away ... now...”

Yes, I thought. It is haunted ... haunted by memories. I never want to come here again.

Chastity was tugging on my hands and we went outside.

“Well, you see,” I said, “there was nothing to fear.”

She looked at me curiously and said nothing. I noticed how hard she gripped my hand until we were well away from the arbour.

That night looking from my bedroom window I saw a light flickering close to the arbour.

I stared, fascinated, watching it moving among the bushes like a will-o’-the-wisp. Now the light had disappeared. A lantern, I guessed, and I wondered who carried it and whether he-or she-had gone inside and for what purpose? I watched for a long time, but I did not see the lantern again. I began to think that I had imagined it.

I was still feeling weak.

Sally said: “Women can take a year or two to recover from a miss. Some says it’s worse than a birth. It’s unnatural, like, you see. And then of course that other affair ...”

She seemed to be right. I was not like the Arabella I had been. Sometimes I thought I would like to go to Far Flamstead and try to tell my mother something about the doubts and suspicions which seemed constantly to be chasing themselves round and round in my mind.

And yet I wanted to stay here. I felt there was something going on in the house, something which deeply concerned me. I wished I could shake off this uneasiness, this feeling of foreboding.

Was it really that someone had shot at me, had hoped to kill me? It had been said that I was lucky. The pellets had hit my arm. Had they gone into my head or some other vital part of my body, they could have been fatal.

If Leigh had not accidentally shot me, who had? Was it someone aiming at a pigeon ... or at me?

Carleton had been summoned once more to Whitehall. He looked a little sad sometimes, as though he wondered what was going wrong with our marriage, for after that display of tenderness when I had had my accident, we seemed to be on edge, both of us. I was unable to express what I felt for him; indeed I was not sure. I wanted him to love me, to be with me, to act as a husband. It seemed sometimes that I was trying to make him a different person from what he was. I was suspicious, uncertain of him, asking myself whether it was possible for a man who had lived as he had to reform and become a faithful husband. I could not forget Edwin and the manner in which he deceived me; and I could see-while I was unable to prevent it-that I was allowing this to colour my life.

I continued to be fascinated by the arbour. One afternoon when the household was quiet, I went out into the garden and almost involuntarily my footsteps led me there. It was November now-a dankness everywhere; almost all the leaves had fallen and only the conifers gleamed a shiny green. Cobwebs were draped over them, for it was the season of spiders.

And as I came near to the arbour I heard a voice which seemed to be singing a mournful dirge. I went closer and to my amazement there against the wall of the arbour knelt a man. I recognized him at once as Young Jethro.

I approached and studied him. He was on his knees and his hands were clasped together as in prayer. Then I realized that he was praying.

He stopped suddenly. He must have been aware of my presence. He turned sharply and looked at me out of those wild eyes which were almost hidden by the unkempt eyebrows. “What are you doing?” I asked.