The Song of the Siren

I had the terrible suspicion that something might be wrong. She had fallen and hurt herself. She had wandered too far away.

I got up from my couch and ran to the window. She was lying on the grass watching something there ... some insect. I saw her stretch out a wary finger and touch something.

It was probably an ant.

I went back to my couch; and then I remembered that I had run to the window. I had not run anywhere since that terrible night. I had walked only with the utmost difficulty.

It was a revelation. I found after that that I could walk about my room a little.

I knew that visiting us was embarrassing to Carlotta because she found it difficult to face me; so we saw little of her and that meant not seeing the child.

But I thought a great deal about her. I often thought of little things that used to happen when I was well and roaming about the countryside. My special love of plants and birds and animals had made that a delight for me. There were so many stories of living things that I had known and now I wanted to tell them to Clarissa.

Then I heard the news which shattered my family. Carlotta had been abducted and taken to France; Clarissa was with her.

There was terrible consternation. Harriet came over to see and tell us what she knew.

My mother told me afterwards because since I had been ill she told me things. I think she felt that had I not been in ignorance of what had happened I would not have gone into the forbidden wood that night but would have come straight home, in which case I could probably have been nursed back to health.

What she told me was this: “Harriet says that Carlotta has been taken away by a man called Lord Hessenfield who is an important Jacobite. He was known to be in the neighbourhood. He made his escape to France.

And has taken Clarissa with him. What is not generally known is that Lord Hessenfield is Clarissa’s father.”

Then Harriet told us how Carlotta had been captured by these Jacobites when she was at the Black Boar Inn on her way to Eyot Abbass and that Lord Hessenfield had raped her. The result was that she was pregnant and Benjie had married her to help, as Harriet said, “straighten matters out.” Benjie had long been in love with her and eagerly grasped the opportunity to marry her. So Clarissa is the daughter of Hessenfield.

He must have cared something for Carlotta to risk his life to take her back with him. That she had been taken by force was clear because her cloak came off in the struggle and was found in the shrubbery. It seemed likely that Clarissa had been taken before, because she was missing some hours before Carlotta was forced to go.

It all seemed wildly incredible. But Carlotta was born to be the centre of storm.

Moreover, when I considered what had happened to my parents I wondered whether almost all of us did not at some time have to face unusual and stormy episodes in our lives.

Even I had once had a frightening adventure with Good Mrs. Brown. For a long time after that I used to let my imagination run on as I pictured all sorts of horrible consequences which could have ensued. I had never really grown away from it and occasionally had a nightmare.

We have a tenant at Enderby Hall. It amazed me that anyone should take the place.

It was so gloomy and had this reputation of being haunted. One or two people came to see it. My mother or my father and sometimes my grandmother from Eversleigh Court showed them over it. In fact people were more inclined to go to Eversleigh Court than to the Dower House.

I remember the day my grandmother came to tell us about this man who had come.

We were all sitting in my room because my mother always brought visitors to me. She had some notion that it cheered me.

My grandmother said: “I cannot think why he came to see it. He seemed determined to dislike everything even before he saw it and heaven knows it is easy enough to find fault with Enderby.”

“I always think,” said my mother, “that if one set out to change all that, one could.”

”How, Priscilla dear?” asked my grandmother.

“Cut away some of the undergrowth, for one thing. It’s terribly overgrown. Get a little light into the place. Bring in the sunshine. I visualise a happy man and his wife with a horde of children. It’s light and laughter that place lacks.”

“Dear Priscilla!” was all my grandmother said.

Of course, I thought, there had been a murder in it. Beaumont Granville was murdered there and lay buried nearby. Then there was the original ghost who had tried to hang herself from the minstrels’ gallery.

“Tell us about this man,” said my mother.

“He fitted the place, I will say that. He was lame, and of a morbid countenance.