Your Secret Friend (Timothy Herring) Read online

  “Of course I want it, Alison. I want it, and I want you. What I don’t want, for both our sakes, is a scandal. Besides, that would involve the school.”

  “Not if I left before it had time to break. A scandal about you would be only a nine days’ wonder, so long as I was no longer on the staff.”

  “I’m not so sure about that, Alison. One can’t altogether dissociate one’s private life from one’s job, and if mine was suspect I might find it difficult to get another post. After all, there are the fees at the nursing home to think of, and the various little comforts and so forth which Eunice must have. I couldn’t leave her in the lurch.”

  “No, of course you could not. Very well, but I still intend to live at Little Monkshood. It will be your affair, then, to do as you please. At least there I shall be away from prying eyes, if not free from gossiping tongues.”

  “Especially Vere’s prying eyes. Yes, I know, but—well, I shall have to be careful, that’s all.”

  “It doesn’t sound very romantic.” She smiled at the ridiculous word.

  “If I were the swashbuckling, cavalier-type of man, you wouldn’t want me. Your nature is too gentle and fastidious, and . . .”

  “And I’m past my first youth, I suppose you mean. True enough. ‘What is love? ‘Tis not hereafter.’ ”

  “Oh, Alison, don’t say idiotic things like that!” He put his hands on her shoulders. “After all, we’ve known one another now for some years, and I love you as much as ever I did—perhaps more.”

  “Yes, we might be an old married couple, mightn’t we? I’m beginning to see us as that.”

  “Alison, are you sure you’re not taking Little Monkshood as much to get away from me as to be with me?”

  Alison removed his hands from her shoulders and then shrugged, as though she were freeing herself from the memory of his touch.

  “I had imagined it was the reverse of that,” she said. “It seems that I must have been wrong.”

  “I don’t think you understand yourself, do you? Alison, supposing I had been free to marry you when I first came to the school . . . or when we first met . . .?”

  “But you wouldn’t have wanted to marry me, Simon, if you had been free. I have never thought you would.”

  “Of course I should! I would give the heart out of my body to marry you!”

  “Then you would be dead, and somebody else might have your heart. It’s no longer true to say, ‘My true love hath my heart, and I have his.’ ”

  “This isn’t the time to be flippant. We’ve got to decide what to do.”

  “I thought you had decided. All I want is for us to meet openly at the farmhouse instead of secretly here.”

  “What is the point? We still have the holidays. To meet at Little Monkshood is just plain silly. It can’t mean anything more than a polite tea-party now and again.”

  “No, I suppose not—from your point of view.”

  “Besides, I should still have to visit Eunice at week-ends.”

  “Yes.”

  “Alison, give up all idea of living away from the school! At least, while we meet in classrooms, whatever people suspect, they can’t possibly know. But if you take this house, and live alone, and I visit you there, what are they going to think?”

  “If I don’t mind what they think, why should you?”

  “But I want to protect you from those kinds of thoughts! I want you . . .”

  “Unspotted from the world? My poor Simon, it’s much too late in the day to think of that! Never mind! We’ll have an occasional polite tea-party and invite Vere, then she’ll know that her suspicions are groundless.”

  “But they’re not groundless. I don’t trust her, Alison. She’ll make mischief. She’s only been waiting for an opportunity like this.”

  “Like what?”

  “Your going off and living alone.”

  “I can’t let Vere rule our lives, Simon, although, goodness knows, she’s tried hard enough. Besides, there’s something about Vere that you don’t know yet—something that could put an end to all your scruples about coming to me at Little Monkshood.”

  “What would that be?”

  “I’m not at liberty to say.”

  “It could only mean that she’s leaving the school.”

  “Would it make any difference to your attitude if she were?”

  “Well, it would make a certain amount of difference in a way, I suppose. I shouldn’t feel so apprehensive, I admit. She gets on my nerves, Alison. I’m sorry to say it, but she frightens me. She hates us, you know.”

  “Oh, no. She hates me, not us.”

  “She senses what our relationship is, and she hates it.”

  “Yes, that must be true. She wants you for herself. She always has.”

  “Is she leaving the school?”

  “I did not say so.”

  “But are you sure that house where we went is still empty?” demanded Caroline.

  “Yes, of course I’m sure, Old Lily-Guts!”

  “There’s no occasion to be vulgar.”

  “That’s not vulgar. It’s nearly Shakespeare.”

  “It’s an awfully old house. You don’t suppose it’s haunted, do you?” asked Stephanie.

  “All the better if it is,” replied her intrepid leader. “If anybody happens to spot our lighted candles, he’ll think it’s the ghost, and it will scare him off.”

  “Suppose there’s a tramp sleeping in it?” suggested Mavis. “I believe I’d rather run into a ghost than a tramp. He might be drunk and turn nasty.”

  “We shall have two knives and the riding-crop and the cauldron. It’ll be seven to one, anyway, so what are you beefing about? If you want to be a witch, you can’t be a coward as well.”

  “I’m not a coward. I want to be prepared, that’s all.”

  “Well, now you know. All of you depart in the names of the Mighty Ones and do not fail of our holy meeting. Oh, and, by the way, some workmen may have mended that broken window I told you about, so I shall sneak into the kitchen tonight for some treacle. Who’s got a piece of thick brown paper? Stephanie, you had a parcel from home. Have you still got the wrapping? All right, then, don’t you forget to bring it along. Connie, you’re in her dorm. It’s up to you to make sure she’s got it with her, so we can break the window properly. Now for Veronica. I hope she hasn’t gone and got cold feet!”

  Veronica’s feet were rather colder at the thought of letting down Sandra and the others than at the contemplation of the night’s wild enterprise. Filled with a mixture of serious misgivings and heart-thumping excitement, she left her bed in the dormitory she shared with three others and, shoes in hand and a sweater and an overcoat pulled on over her pyjamas, she crept downstairs to the trysting-place and joined the others in the hall.

  Those asleep in the house did not stir. The rest of the school were a couple of floors higher up, the staff were not directly over the hall, the servants were in the attics and the dreaded and respected Miss Pomfret-Brown was sleeping a dictator’s self-satisfied sleep in her own distant wing of the house. Sandra put a finger to her lips and carefully unbolted the heavy Georgian front door. Her coven and the postulant trooped out behind her and put on their shoes.

  It was a long walk down the drive, but the lodge at the gates was passed safely, for the gates were always open. It was an even longer walk to Little Monkshood, but excitement and the spirit of adventure kept the coven moving cheerfully. They reached their objective at midnight. The house gave at least one of its visitors the impression that it resented their presence, but the chief witch, whatever her private feelings, led her group bravely round to the window which had been broken. It had not been mended.

  “Now,” said Sandra, when the coven, having climbed in one by one, were assembled in the basement kitchen and had lighted the candles they had brought with them, “all of you take your shoes off and ruffle up your hair. And, mind, not a word said except the ones you’ve learnt. Bring over that old table. Now, first of all, I
trace the outer circle with the black-handled—no, first I must put on my garters, my badges of rank. That’s it! Stop sniggering, Gillian! You only show how ignorant you are. Now for the athame—that’s the black-handled knife.” She drew it from her overcoat pocket. “Now I chalk the circle in. Where’s the chalk you pinched from the history room, Gillian? All right. Got that tape-measure, Mavis? One of you hold the candle while I measure. O.K. Now for the inside circles. That’s it. Now the triangle for the spirits.”

  “I don’t think much of those for circles,” said Gillian. “You should have let Connie draw them.”

  “I couldn’t. She’s not the chief witch. The exact shape doesn’t matter. It’s only to make sure the altar is completely enclosed. Now put all the things on the table. It’s a nuisance we couldn’t get a sword, but I’ve put silver paper on this poker. Stephanie, you hold it. Now, Veronica, sit on the floor and stare at it. Shine your candle on it a bit more, Caroline. Now while she’s getting hypnotised—don’t you dare take your eyes off it, Veronica—I’ll sanctify the circles with the salted water. Now, except Veronica and Stephanie, we all walk round.”

  Five silent figures perambulated the outer circle, the mystic silence broken only by a nervous fit of giggling by Stephanie and Mavis, and the rumbling of Connie Moosedeer’s hungry Red Indian stomach. The chief witch spoke again, her stern voice a reproach to the impious gigglers.

  “I call on the Mighty Ones, the ancient gods of north, east, south, and west, to assemble.”

  Something rustled and scurried in the darkness beyond the row of pillars which supported the roof of the undercroft. Veronica screamed, and two of the walkers stopped dead in their tracks and were cannoned into by those coming behind them.

  “Oh, for goodness’ sake!” ejaculated the chief witch, albeit on a high note of panic scarcely held at bay. “It’s only a rat or something. Stand up, Veronica. Are you hypnotised enough?”

  “Y-yes, I think so. But I’m terrified of rats.”

  “Don’t be silly.” The leader had regained command over her voice. “Now I’m going to put the point of the knife against your chest. Stand quite still, because it’s a kitchen knife and it’s beastly sharp. Now, then, repeat after me:

  “It is better to die the death . . .”

  “It is better to die the death . . .”

  “Than to attempt to understand the Mysteries . . .”

  “Than to attempt to understand the Mysteries . . .”

  “If the heart is overcome by fear.”

  “If the heart is overcome by fear.”

  “O.K. Now for the password. What is it?”

  “I—er—ooh—half a minute—oh, yes! Faith, love, and trust.”

  “Right. Now you can step into the circle. I close it round you by walking all round it and pointing the knife at it. Blindfold her, you two who’ve got the pillowcase. Just put it over her head.”

  “Stop struggling, Veronica, you ass!” said one of the manipulants roughly. “We’re not going to hurt you.”

  “Now bind her hands with the cord from the altar . . . Done it? Right. Now lead her . . . oh, golly! None of this is any good! We’ll have to start all over again!”

  “Oh, why?” asked several dissentient voices.

  “I forgot to write the words for the circle, and we didn’t draw the pentagram on the altar.”

  “Well, write them now,” said Gillian, in practical tones. “We can’t go through everything again. There isn’t time.”

  “There’s got to be time.”

  “We’ve got to get back to school before it gets light, and the sun rises at just after four, and it’s light enough for us to be spotted long before that.”

  “How do you know when the sun rises?”

  “It’s in my diary, so, go on, write the words, and let’s get on with it. Apart from anything else, my feet are freezing on this beastly stone floor.”

  “I’m cold all over,” said a discontented voice. “I expect this place is damp.”

  “If we all catch colds, there’ll be questions asked,” pronounced another Cassandra.

  “Oh, all right, then, but I hope it won’t put things all wrong,” said the leader grimly. “Got your pocket compass, Mavis? Thanks. Start at the north, that’s—” she printed the word with great care—“Adhby. South . . . no, I’d better do it in the proper order, not to give offence to the Mighty Ones . . . east, that’s Agial. Now the south . . . can’t you hold that candle steady, Gillian? You’ve dripped grease all over my fingers! South, that’s Tabaoth, and, last of all, west, and that’s Jahweh. Now, Veronica, I’m going to lead you round the circle to each compass point and present you to the gods.”

  “Hurry up, then,” pleaded a muffled voice from the inside of the pillowslip. “I’m getting spifflicated in this thing.”

  “All in good time. If you were going to be burnt as a witch, in the way they treated our sisters now gone before us, you wouldn’t worry about a little thing like a pillowcase.” The chief witch led her captive to the compass points. “And you’d better bow as I name each one,” she said. This part of the ritual accomplished, the postulant was led to the altar. “Kneel down, Veronica.”

  “Untie my hands and take this beastly thing off my head, then.”

  “Well, all right, but I’m not sure that’s allowed for in the ritual. There you are. Now kneel. We’re going to tie your feet together this time. Got that second skipping-rope from the gym, Mavis?”

  “No, I didn’t think we needed two.”

  “I told you!”

  “No, you didn’t. Anyway, I don’t think I could have got away with two.”

  “Well, as we’ve untied her hands, it doesn’t matter. Kneel up properly, Veronica! Don’t sit back on your heels like that!”

  “This stone floor is so beastly hard!”

  “Oh, stop complaining! Now then: Are you ready to swear that you will be true to the Craft?”

  “Oh, yes, of course.”

  “That’s not the way to answer. Say, ‘I will.’ ”

  “Like in the marriage service,” said Gillian helpfully, with another snigger.

  “Oh, Gillian, be quiet! Anybody would think you were chief witch, the way you throw your weight about.”

  “If I’d been chief witch, I shouldn’t have forgotten an important thing like writing the words round the circle. There’s another thing you’ve forgotten, too.”

  “Oh, get lost!” said the leader uneasily. “There can’t be!”

  “In that book you showed me,” said the critic inexorably, “there were little pentagons or pentagrams—anyway, those little five-pointed star things—drawn in the space between the outer and the middle circle.”

  “Oh, I don’t suppose they matter,” said the chief witch, in a tone of calculated casualness. “I’ll just sketch in a few. Who’s got the piece of chalk?”

  “You had it last, to write the words. I expect it’s on the floor somewhere,” said Gillian.

  A hasty search by candle-light proved that it was indeed on the floor, crushed into powder by the feet of one or more of the coven.

  “That’s torn it,” said Connie Moosedeer. “It’s the only stick of chalk we brought with us. I thought I was treading on a stone. It hurt, but, like all my people—”

  “Oh, well,” said the leader, who could feel her power slipping from her, “it doesn’t really matter. I’ll just sketch in a few with the point of the knife. We don’t have to chalk them in.”

  The ritual proceeded, after a high-voiced protest from the postulant as she saw the chief witch take the riding crop from the altar.

  “You’re jolly well not going to hit me with that thing!”

  “No, no. It’s the purification ceremony. I shall only tap you on the back with it. It won’t hurt at all. Don’t be such a baby. Now, then. One, two, three. One, two three, four, five, six, seven. One, two, three, four, five, six, seven, eight, nine. One, two, three, four, five, six, seven, eight, nine, ten, eleven, twelve, thirteen, fou
rteen, fifteen, sixteen, seventeen, eighteen, nineteen, twenty, twenty-one. Are you always prepared to protect and defend all other members of our Art?”

  “Yes, I suppose so.”

  “Say, ‘I am.’ Go on.”

  “All right. I am.”

  “Now I untie your feet and put the whip back on the altar, so now say after me: In the presence of the Mighty Ones . . .”

  “In the presence of the Mighty Ones . . .”

  The oath continued and came to its appointed end. It was an oath of secrecy, and the postulant imagined that she would have little difficulty in keeping it. It would never do for Miss Salter or her mother to know that she was a witch.

  “Now,” said the mistress of ceremonies, “who’s got the drop of paraffin? Carol, you were told to pinch it from the woodshed.”

  “Yes, all right. I’ve got it. Here you are.”

  “Hey!” protested the postulant. “I don’t want a bath in the stuff! It smells filthy! Oh, oh! Oh, I say! You’ve spilt it all over me!”

  “Sorry. You’ll have to wash your hair before you go into class, I’m afraid. The bottle slipped. Don’t fuss! Now the next thing ought to be wine, but we couldn’t manage that. Who’s got the vinegar? Right Here we go. It’ll help to disguise the smell of the paraffin, I hope. Now I’m supposed to kiss you. Oh, well, here goes. Now I present to you the things on the altar. Touch and remit, if you know what that means.”

  “Oh, yes. Miss Marchmont Pallis told us in history lesson.”

  “Right. Now I present you to the gods. Receive thy neophyte, O Adhby, and thou, too, great Agial. Thou, Tabaoth, take thy disciple to thee, and thou, greatest of all, Jahweh, the god of . . .”

  There was a sudden rush of flame along the stone floor. One of the coven had dropped a lighted candle which had just deposited, from the inch or so of wax remaining, a blob of very hot grease on to her fingers. The flame ignited the spilt paraffin and this caught a pile of loose straw swept to the open hearth by Marchmont’s scavengers who had tidied up the place against Timothy’s and Parsons’ meeting.

  “Scram!” yelled somebody. “The house is on fire!”