I’d noticed that the library had been catalogued on the Dewey decimal system and that the cabinet where the maze diagram was shelved was labeled 133, the listing for books on occult matters. I guessed it was a Woodthorpe family joke as “occult” can also mean “hidden.”
Luckily the cabinet was still unlocked. That afternoon I’d seen a first edition of Elliot O’Donnell’s Screaming Skulls with which I hoped to read myself to sleep. While looking for the O’Donnell, I came across a folder bound in red buckram that had the appearance of a scrapbook or diary. Conscience and curiosity tugged me in opposite directions. Curiosity won.
The date on the first page was 26th July, 1823. The handwriting was crabbed, and for the most part illegible; a sure sign, my conscience took glee in reminding me, that it’d been meant for the writer’s eyes only. I leafed over the pages, pausing here and there to attempt to decipher a passage, a sentence, or even just a word, usually without any luck. But partway down the second page was a word beginning with K, followed by something like Birdfellow. Whoever or whatever this may have been, both names were referred to several times throughout the diary. Another name that was repeated, though only in the last few pages, was “Mother Gwynne.” She seemed somehow to be associated with that Latin phrase about being bound by water, as it was referred to (in semilegible printing) on two separate pages immediately following her name. Around the middle of the diary I managed: “The Ground Keepers have communicated their distress in that there are Shapes abroad.” Nowhere was the writer identified.
Before I left the library I noticed in passing that the folder had been shelved tightly against Wentworth Day’s Here Are Ghosts and Witches.
I sat at my window for a long time, alternately reading Screaming Skulls, trying to decipher more of the diary, and watching the long summer twilight come in, all English and still new to me. Nothing like sunset at home, where night falls out of the afternoon sky like a black weight.
In the distance were the tops of the trees standing inside that inner wall of the maze. Perhaps it was the fading light or my eyes tired from reading, but I could’ve sworn they were nodding and tossing although there Wasn’t a breath of wind anywhere.
Next morning I woke up early and ragged, having had nightmares of screaming skulls half the night.
A phone was ringing somewhere downstairs, and ten minutes later as I passed the drawing room door I heard Mrs. Winton saying, “… booked a room, as per your instructions, My Lord…”
I scratched up a bit of breakfast for myself, and was just cracking into a boiled egg when Mrs. Winton entered the kitchen. She said, “Oh, Mr. Pine…” and for several seconds more found nothing else to say. Then, “Have you been here long?”
“Three minutes, unless your egg timer’s slow.” I wondered if she’d meant Did you overhear me on the telephone? I said, “Was that His Lordship?”
“Yes. It was.” She made a pretense of looking out the window. “It’s going to be a lovely day today. If you’re going for a hike around the grounds, I’ll make you a packed lunch. What would you like?”
Subtle, yes, in a sledgehammer way. Half an hour later I picked up a small hamper bag from the entrance hall table. It was heavier than a roast beef sandwich had a right to be, so I checked it out. Sandwiches. Bottle of cordial. Binoculars.
“All right,” I muttered to myself. “All right, I’ll play your silly game,” and headed for the maze.
Keenen was outside the stables, arming his contracted gardeners with hoes, rakes, and other implements. He glanced my way as I passed, then turned back quickly to his charges. It was a sure-thing bet that he knew as much as Mrs. Winton why I was being guested here at the Manor, against, as I was beginning to suppose, the Earl’s instructions. It all had to do with the maze.
I stopped at its entrance, remembering its complexity, feeling defeated, already lost. I didn’t have much faith in my copy of the diagram. Still, I stepped through the gate—straight into a sticky splash of whitewash. A few steps on was another splash, and another, and another. Soon I was following a trail of whitewash and the prints of gardeners’ Wellingtons past the dead flower beds and dry ornate fountains, over dwarfish bridges and dusty ruts, in and out of wall gaps, past stone benches and statuary and a sundial that was an hour behind the times.
Following this whitewash paper chase, it took me only ten minutes to reach the center. Unsurprisingly, the ancient padlock was gone, the iron gate ajar.
Retine quod aqua coercetur.
“I think those Indians are friendly, General Custer,” I muttered, and pushed hard on the gate.
It grated open onto a lawn run amok. The sight of all that long grass made me think instinctively of snakes. Then I remembered where I was and that Britain has just one poisonous snake whose track record is ten people in a hundred years. Hoping there wasn’t an adder out there that could count to eleven, I waded in.
It’d once been a sloping lawn, and what it sloped down to was a pond that was perhaps fifteen meters across. I stumbled down to the edge, where the water was deep green with algae. With a long stick I tried to find the bottom, and couldn’t. I looked out over the lake. It was utterly flat, undisturbed by fish or bird, and I began to wonder what I might see break the surface if I sat down to wait.
But I didn’t want to sit down. Instead I set off along the stone path running beside the lake, kicking moss pads into the water. At one place I almost joined them as I tripped over a rusty ring fixed into the stone. It sported a rag of rope, giving it the look of a mooring point, which I supposed it to be. But whatever, it’d been a hell of a time since anyone had taken a punt out here.
Farther along were the wooden remains of what may have been a small summer house halfway up the slope. Once upon a time this had been a pleasure garden of the most stylish kind. Today all it had were its memories (whatever they were) and an air of ruined elegance. Why, with the rest of the grounds so carefully manicured, had this garden been forgotten?
I spotted the island.
It’d been hidden by the foliage. In an instant I had the binoculars out of the bag and up to my eyes.
An island, a tiny island overgrown with grass and bushes. But here and there they were threaded through by pathways, and in a couple of places the weathered stone of some broken structure poked into view. Something moved.
I joggled the glasses, trying to sharpen focus. I could’ve sworn something had flitted past a break in the bushes. But, no. Nothing out there moved now. Perhaps it’d been imagination, or maybe a bird flitting from one branch to another. If it had been a bird, it was the only animal life I’d seen so far in this garden. The pond, if properly cleaned out, would’ve been ideally suited for ducks and carp; probably had been once, though that would’ve been long, long ago. I continued on, hoping to find a bridge to the island. Instead I found something else.
It lay in the water ahead. Stenciled letters and numbers along one side of the rubber raft proclaimed it a navy surplus job, which put the kybosh on my “good fairies” theory. Obviously it was a setup, and it was obvious by whom. Only the why of it all remained as murky as the pond. But here was the raft and over there was the island.
Paddling slowly, I did a circuit of the island, looking for a place to land. In a sort of little cove I found a jetty. But its fungus-covered poles, rotted boards, and smell of decay kept me paddling. Finally I found a bit of pebbly beach and ran ashore there.