When she had gone, he splashed water on to his face, buried his face in the soft cotton towel, and felt marginally better for it. He took out his watch. There was a train on the half-hour and he had just time to be on it.
In the street, as he hurried, Anthony Vaughan chided himself for his foolishness. Suppose the woman had jumped at his idea? Suppose he had taken Helena there and word had got out? It might have done something for the wife of the man in the story, but Helena … Helena was not like other men’s wives.
On the platform a number of other passengers were waiting for the train. He stood a little away from them. He did not like to be spotted. Small talk with people you were only distantly acquainted with was something he avoided whenever he could, and the curiosity of strangers, who sometimes knew his face when he did not know theirs, was even worse.
According to the station clock, the train would be approaching in a minute or two, and while he waited he congratulated himself on a narrow escape. What her game was in refusing his money he couldn’t tell, but no doubt she’d intended to get a pound of flesh from him one way or another.
He was so absorbed in thoughts of his recent encounter that it took a little while for him to become aware of the sensation that tugged quietly at his mind. Then he did notice it but, still befuddled by the strangeness of the events at Number 17, it took a moment to separate this new feeling from the oddness of a little while ago. When he did, he recognized it: anticipation. He shook his head to dispel his weariness. It had been a long day. He was waiting for a train and the train was about to come. That was all.
The train arrived; he mounted, found an empty first-class carriage and sat by the window. The sense of anticipation that had begun on the platform was reluctant to fade. In fact, as the train left Oxford and he looked through the darkening mist towards the place where the river lay invisible in the gloom, the presentiment increased. The rhythm of the train on the tracks suggested words to his overtired brain and he heard them as clearly as if an unseen person had pronounced them: Something is going to happen.
Lily’s Nightmare
ON THE OTHER side of the river from the Vaughans’ grand house and half a mile downstream, there was a patch of land that was too wet even for watercress. Set back from the river, three oak trees grew there, and their roots drank thirstily from the wet soil, but any acorn that fell on the river side of its parent rotted before it could germinate. It was a godforsaken place, good only for drowning dogs, but the river must have been more biddable in the past because at one time somebody had built a cottage there, between the oaks and the water.
The little dwelling was a squat box of lichened stone containing two rooms, two windows and a door. There was no bedroom, but in the kitchen steps led up to a platform just wide enough for a straw mattress. At one end this sleeping ledge adjoined the chimney, so if the fire had been lit the sleeper’s head or feet might be warm for the first hours of the night. It was an impoverished place and was empty as often as it was tenanted, for it was so cold and damp that only the desperate were willing to inhabit it. It was almost too small to have a name, so it comes as a surprise to learn that in fact it had two. Officially it was called Marsh Cottage, but it had been known for as long as anyone could remember as Basketman’s Cottage. A long time ago, the basketman had been a tenant there for a dozen years or thirty, depending on whom you talked to. He collected reeds all summer long and made baskets all winter, and everybody who needed a basket bought it from him, for his goods were well made and he did not ask too much for them. He had no children to disappoint him, no wife to nag him and no other woman to break his heart. He was quiet without being morose, said good morning very pleasantly to all, and quarrelled with no one. He lived without debts. He had no sins anyone knew of or could guess at. One morning he walked into the river, his pockets full of stones. When his body knocked into one of the barges waiting to be loaded at the wharf, they went to his cottage and found potatoes in a stone jar and cheese on the side. There was cider in a flagon, and on the mantelpiece was a tobacco tin, half full. There was consternation at his demise. He had work, food and pleasure – what more could a man want? It was a mystery, and overnight Marsh Cottage became Basketman’s Cottage.
Since the time of the basketman, the river had undercut the bank by washing away layers of gravel. This created dangerous overhangs that looked solid but would not hold a man’s weight. When they collapsed, all that was left to contain the river was a shallow slope where the frail roots of loosestrife, meadowsweet and willowherb attempted to knit the soil together and were washed away with every high water. At equinoxes and after heavy rain, and after moderate rain that followed baking sun, and in times of snow melt, and at other times for no reason other than the random malice of nature, the river flooded on to this shallow slope. Halfway up this slope someone had driven a post into the ground. Though it was silvered by time and cracked by repeated submersion, the carved lines that marked the water level were visible still, and you could make out dates that told you when the flooding had taken place. The flood marks were numerous at the bottom of the post, and almost as numerous in the middle and in the upper section. Further up the slope a second post had sprouted, more recent. Evidently there had been floods that had entirely swallowed up the first post. This newer one had two lines in it, from eight years ago and five.
Today a woman stood next to the lower post, looking at the river. She clutched her coat to her with gloveless hands that were chapped and red with cold. Strands of hair had worked loose from her too few hairpins and hung about her face, moving with the breeze. They were so fair that the silver that had started to appear was almost invisible. If her hair was younger than her forty-odd years, the same could not be said of her face. Trouble had marked her, and permanent creases of anxiety were scored into her forehead.
The river was a good yard from the post. There would be no flood today, nor tomorrow either, yet still the woman’s eyes were fearful. The water, bright and cold and fast-running, hissed as it passed. At irregular intervals it spat; when a spot of river water landed near her boot, she jumped and edged back a few inches.
As she stood there, she remembered the story of the basketman, and shuddered at his bravery, walking into the river like that with his pockets full of stones. She thought of the dead souls that are said to live in the river and wondered which ones were racing past her now, spitting at her. She thought – again – that she would ask the parson one day about the dead souls in the river. It wasn’t in the Bible – at least, not so far as she knew – but that didn’t mean anything. There must be a great many true things that weren’t in the Bible. It was a big book, but still, it couldn’t have every true thing in it, could it?
She turned and walked up the slope towards the cottage. The working day was no shorter in winter than in summer, and by the time she got home it was almost dark. She still had to see to the animals.
Lily had come to live in the cottage four years ago. She had introduced herself as Mrs White, a widow, and was thought at first to be slippery because she gave evasive answers to any question that touched on her past life and nervously rebuffed all friendly interest. But she appeared at church every Sunday without fail and counted out the scant coins from her purse for every modest purchase without once asking for credit, and over time suspicion faded. It wasn’t long before she started work at the parsonage, first doing the laundry and then, because she was unstinting in her efforts and quick, gradually doing more and more. Since the retirement two years ago of the parson’s housekeeper, Lily had taken on entire responsibility for the domestic comfort of the parsonage. There were two pleasant rooms reserved there for the use of the housekeeper, but Lily continued to live in Basketman’s Cottage – because of the animals, she said. People were used to her now, but it was still held locally that there was something not quite right about Lily White. Was she really a widow? Why was she so nervy when anyone spoke to her unexpectedly? And what sensible woman would choose to live in damp isolation at Basketman’s Cottage when she could enjoy the wallpapered comfort of the parsonage, all for the sake of a goat and a couple of pigs? Yet familiarity and her connection with the parson worked together to reduce suspicion, and she was now regarded with something closer to pity. Excellent housekeeper she might be, but still, it was whispered that Lily White was a bit soft in the head.