There mead and metheglin were freely served, with sloe gin and wines made from cowslips, and gillyflowers. When the company had eaten its fill and the musicians were about to play, my father stood up and said he had news to impart which gave him great pleasure.
“My friends,” he said, “you are this day celebrating the betrothal of my son Connell and Melanie, whose mother and brother are here with us. Alas, that her father could not be here also, but I promise her she will find in me one who is willing and eager to take his place.”
There was a filling of goblets and glasses and toasts were drunk and Connell and Melanie rose and stood beside my father holding hands in the traditional way.
I caught Fenn’s eye and I could see that he was pleased. Indeed everyone seemed to think the betrothal highly suitable.
Then my father called to the musicians to play and he rose from the table and, taking Melanie by the hand, he opened the dance with her. Connell took Melanie’s mother as his partner and Fenn took me. Others of the company fell in behind us and we danced round the hall. Some of our guests remained at the table drinking and watching us as we danced.
I said to Fenn: “This betrothal pleases you.”
“I like well,” he replied, with a pressure on my hand, “that our families should be united. If your brother makes my sister happy I shall be well content.”
“I trust he will,” I answered fervently.
“There has been a restraint between our families because of my aunt’s marriage to your father. It was wrong of my grandmother to blame him for her death. She was somewhat unbalanced and became very strange before she died. But that is over now. Now there will be friendship between us.”
I was happy dancing with Fenn. I felt certain that our families were going to be united by more than that marriage tie.
Then the happiness of the evening disintegrated. Above the sound of the music came the sound of piercing screams. The dancers stopped; so did the musicians. My father cried angrily: “What means this?” But the screaming went on.
The door at one end of the hall opened into the kitchens and it was from this direction that the screaming came. Senara and I were close behind my father as he flung open the door.
Two of the serving-girls were being held up by others and they were the ones who were making the noise.
“Silence,” cried my father.
So great was their fear of him that he could silence them whatever the state of their minds.
I saw that Merry was there. She curtsied and said: “Master, these two girls have seen something terrible.”
All the guests were crowding round the door and my father said: “You’ll be whipped for this. What think you you are doing, disturbing my guests in this way?”
My stepmother had taken charge. She said: “The girls are beside themselves with fear. You had better tell me what has happened.”
“’Twas what they did see, Mistress,” said Merry.
“Let them speak for themselves,” said my stepmother. “Jane. Bet. What was it?”
The two who had been screaming stared at my stepmother with round frightened eyes. But they had recovered their senses. They were as frightened of her as they were of my father—though for different reasons and I had at times wondered which they feared most, the whipping which he would order or the vague terror which the thought of witchcraft could inspire.
“We did see a light, Mistress.”
“A light! What light?”
“’Twas in the burial ground … ’Twas moving hither and thither, like … a ghostly light. ’Twere not natural.”
“Is that all? You saw a light and you make this noise?”
“Bet, she said to me she’d wager I wouldn’t go with her … and I said I would and then we wished we hadn’t, but we went and … oh, Mistress, I dursen’t speak of it.”
My father said: “A pack of silly girls. Their foolishness will be beaten out of them. What did they see?”
The girls looked at each other; they seemed as though they tried to find their voices and could not and were going off into hysterics again.
I said: “We’ll search the burial ground and see who’s there. It must be someone playing tricks.”
“Let’s go now,” cried Senara, her eyes alight with excitement. “Let’s go and see what it was that frightened those silly girls.”
Our guests were quite clearly amused by what was happening. Senara was chatting gaily to Squire Horgan’s son who was very taken with her.
“It must have been someone’s ghost,” she said. “We’ve lots of ghosts. Melanie, do you like ghosts? You’ll get to know them when you come to live here.”
Melanie smiled serenely and said that she would have to wait until she had made their acquaintance until she could tell Senara whether she liked them.
It was a beautiful moonlight night. “We should have had the musicians out here,” said Senara; “we could have danced in one of the courtyards.”
“The cobbles would have been hard on our feet,” I answered.
Senara came and walked on the other side of Fenn as we came into the burial ground.
“Why did the ghost need the flickering light?” someone asked. “He could see well enough in the moonlight.”
Fenn and I with Senara had walked over to the spot we knew so well. Senara gave a cry and said: “Look.”
There was a stone on the grave of the unknown sailor. On it had been printed in large black letters:
Murdered October 1600
Everyone crowded round to look.
I saw my father clench his hands; he cried: “Good God! Look at that.”
My stepmother came forward and stared at it. “Murdered,” she repeated. “What does it mean?”
“Some joker. By God, a poor joke. He’ll be flayed for this,” cried my father.
He pulled it from the earth and in an excess of anger threw it from him. It landed with a thud among some brambles.
He turned to the company and said: “This is the grave of a sailor who was washed up on our shores. My wife was anxious that he should be given decent burial. Some foolish joker put that stone there, hoping to frighten the maids. Come, we will go back to the hall. Those stupid girls will wish they had not disturbed us, I promise you.”
In the hall he commanded the musicians to play; but some of the gaiety had vanished. I noticed that Fenn was particularly affected.
We sat together on a window seat, neither being in the mood for dancing. I had imagined our sitting thus while he asked me to marry him; but after what we had seen in the burial ground, I realized that Fennimore could think of nothing else. He had so identified that unknown sailor with his father that he was shocked to see that inscription on his grave and he could not get it out of his mind.
The next day, we talked of it.
“You see, Tamsyn,” he said, “it was in October 1600 that my father disappeared.”
“That was the year the sailor was buried. It was the year my mother died. It was on Christmas Day.”
“I couldn’t sleep last night,” said Fenn. “Every time I closed my eyes I could see that stone with those words on it. Who put it there, Tamsyn? Who could have done such a thing?”
“Perhaps we shall discover,” I said.
He was shaken. So was I. I could see that the discovery of that strange stone had made it impossible for him to think of anything else.
He did not mention our betrothal.