The Cottage in the Woods (8 page)

Safely in my own room, I realized I was trembling. Though I had put a good face on it, I was shocked by the ferocity of the badger’s conduct. I wondered if poor Teddy had ever been treated to this spectacle, and how it was that Nurse kept this aspect of her character so well hidden from his parents. Twisting my handkerchief in my paws, I struggled to formulate some foolproof plan for avoiding her. There was no way to circumvent the nursery, as it was adjacent to my chamber on one side, and the schoolroom on the other, and I certainly had no way of controlling her comings and goings. It was out of the question to go to the master with my complaint. With a deep sense of melancholy, I came to the conclusion that I must simply resign myself to the specter of Nurse’s hateful countenance popping out at me at any moment like some depraved jack-in-the-box.

Trying to calm myself, I still agonized over who or what had been hiding in the woods—and why? What honest business could anyone have lurking there? Had someone really followed
me from town, or seen me leave by that route and waited on purpose for my return? It seemed a fantastic idea, but my mind was agitated and grasping at straws.

I spent the remainder of the evening at my desk, attempting to make sense of the Latin texts Mr. Vaughn had given to me to learn. Asking Betsy to bring my supper to my room, I applied myself to the most basic Latin lessons.
Amo, amas, amat
. “I love, you love, he loves.” Though I scolded myself severely to concentrate on the texts, my thoughts were drawn once more to the little white-haired vicar who had known my parents. I carefully took off Mama’s locket, my one cherished heirloom, and opened it to see the picture of her and Papa inside. They looked so young and happy! I had been a small cub when she was taken from us, so my memories of her were hazy and dim. This was the only picture I had of her and Papa, and I had always wondered what lay behind the hint of mischief in her smile. Wearing that smiling face next to my heart gave me the feeling that she was watching over me.

I set the locket carefully down, and tiredly struggled to refocus my attention on Latin, but my mind was still filled with the vicar and his account of the tragedy of the Vaughns’ three lost cubs. Saddened, I laid my head down on my book and closed my eyes. For some time I hovered on the borderland of sleep, fantasizing images of the Vaughn family as it might have been. In my flight of fancy, I could see Teddy with his brothers and sister, somersaulting on the lawn; or the troupe of exuberant little bears filling the house with laughter; or the four of them tucked up snugly in the nursery. As I fell into a deep slumber, the dream cubs began to take on lives of their own, now scampering through the hallways in a game of hide-and-seek, the
littlest one counting while the others fled to their hiding places. In my dream I joined the game, chasing after the fleeing cubs down hallways I had never seen, which stretched on and on and faded into nothingness. And then I heard it, the sound that was to haunt my dreams so often in times of distress or strain: the high, desolate wail of a human child. This was not like Teddy’s gruff, solid cry. It had that poignant quality of the frail human, heartrending and insistent. I could not ignore it. In this dream I was overcome with a sense of urgency, a feeling that I
must
find the woeful child and save it. Yet even as I stumbled through a rising mist, down the next hall, up the next stairway, it remained always in the distance. Finally, overwhelmed, I knew I was lost, the weeping child forever beyond my reach. There I awoke, as I always would, feeling helpless and inconsolable.

Though my eyes were open, night had fallen. It took several minutes for me to orient myself, to realize that there was no crying child, and that I was sitting at the desk in my own room. Despite the faint moonlight filtering in through the windows, a tremor of fear went up my spine. Darkness, my old nemesis, had me surrounded. Groping my way to my candle, I desperately tried to spark a light from the flint and failed repeatedly. Finally giving it up as impossible, I faced the choice of changing into my nightgown in the dark or climbing into bed fully clothed. Not even pausing to remove my shoes, I dove under the covers and pulled them over my head.

For some time I lay there as still as death, with my ears attuned to pick up the slightest hint of sound. All I could hear was the wind howling around the corners of the house and rattling the windowpanes. But the windows were new, as was the rest of the house, and they fit the moldings as snugly as if the
wood, stone, and glass were all of a piece. Yet something was undeniably rattling. Was it the windowpanes? No. It was my door. Abruptly, the rattling stopped. I froze, afraid to breathe, straining to hear I knew not what. A whisper? A soft shuffle of footsteps? A presence. My fur stood on end. I could not scent anything through the heavy coverlet, but instinctively I knew that I was not alone. My heart pounded a wild tattoo in my chest. I struggled to remain still, my muscles aching and trembling with the effort, and I gasped for air under the thick counterpane. My thoughts ran riot. Who could be in my room in the middle of the night? Who could wish me harm? Nurse’s snarling visage came immediately to mind. Could she really hate me enough to attack me in my sleep? And who had been trailing me in the woods? Could they have gotten indoors? I lay contemplating all the possibilities until my lungs screamed for fresh air.

It seemed finally as if I must give away my hiding place or suffocate in it, and something deep inside of me refused to lie quietly any longer. I threw down the covers and sat up in one motion, bellowing “Ha!” as I did so, hoping to catch my nocturnal visitor off guard. My vision had adjusted to the dark sufficiently that I could tell in the moonlight that the room was empty—but my door was now open. Wide open. I was sure I had closed it when I had begun my studies earlier in the evening. Hadn’t I? How could it have rattled if it had not been closed?

Suddenly I thought of Teddy asleep in the nursery next door. Was he safe? I had seen the little badger-sized bed near his and assumed that Nurse slept there, but I thought of her flask. What if she had imbibed, and slept too soundly to be awakened by an intruder? My heart shrinking in my breast, I realized that I would have to go and check on him. Without allowing
myself to contemplate it too long, I got out of bed and tiptoed to the door, poking my head into the hallway. There were no windows here; in fact, there was no light at all. Could I feel my way to the nursery door? Sinking my face down onto my arm, I moaned and said a small prayer, then forced myself to step into the inky darkness and spread both paws on the cold wall. My breath came short and shallow while I tried to imagine what I would do if something came up and touched me. Thoroughly frightened, I began to count my steps as a way of blocking out the dreadful thoughts that threatened to overwhelm me.

“One … two … three … four …,” I whispered, sliding tentatively along the wall. Was that a noise behind me? After a short pause, I went on, “Five … six … seven …” At thirty-four I bumped into the doorknob on the nursery door. I tried to turn it with my trembling paw, but the knob wouldn’t move. The door was locked. Without stopping to puzzle why this should be so, I felt a moment’s relief that Teddy was safe behind it. Then the darkness seemed to close in on me again. My head swam with dizziness as I wondered who or what might lie waiting in this black void. Pausing only for a deep breath, I reversed my direction, counting my steps backward to my own door with all the speed I could muster. This having used up all of my thin store of fortitude, I found my bed at last, and dove in again, though this time I kept my snout out to breathe.

I don’t know how long I lay there in the night with my dark imaginings. Someone had been in my room. I was sure of this even though I had not seen them. What could I do about it? I could imagine my employer’s response if I went to him with such a tale. He would think me a hysterical fool. My mind continued to spin round in circles, with no helpful results. I could dimly
hear the big grandfather clock in the great hall striking twelve, the quarter hour, the half hour. One o’clock. Two.

I must have slept a little, for I came uneasily awake with the first glow of dawn. I felt none of the benefits of having slept; my head ached and the inside of my eyelids felt dry and rough. It would be hours yet before I would meet Teddy in the schoolroom. I made a cursory inspection of my chamber in the faint light, to see if anything had been taken or disturbed, but I could see nothing amiss. Putting a wrap around my shoulders, I stepped out on my balcony to soak up the reassuring ambience of daybreak. I sat for some time in the comfortable wicker chair there, watching the morning star dwindle into the sunrise, struggling to achieve a more sanguine frame of mind.

Below my balcony lay the kitchen garden, nestled within its high stone walls. A motion in the mellow light drew my eye to a bent figure there collecting vegetables in a basket: Cook, I thought. Content in my solitude, I eased back in my chair so that I could not be seen from below, and allowed my thoughts to return to the events of the night before.

As daylight threw the solid objects of the landscape into stark relief, reality seemed a simple enough state to define. It could be seen, touched, smelled, heard. But what of that which could only be felt? Could I trust it? Now, in the light of day, I was forced to ask the question: Had anyone really been in my room at all? There had been a rattling that could have been the wind and a feeling—admittedly, a strong feeling—and a door that I might have left open. Had I really heard shuffling footsteps? Could I have heard anything clearly through the heavy coverlet? I gave myself a shake. It was nonsense, that was all. The overstimulation of the past days had whipped my imagination
into full gallop, and there was only one cure for it. I must be ruthless and rein it in. I thought wryly that the only real danger I had to face was that, in allowing my fears to keep me awake most of the night, I had left myself too exhausted to do my job well. Now I must put all my fears aside and get on with my day as if nothing had happened—which, indeed, I realized, must be the case.

I tried to think of something to make me stronger. I thought then of Papa and the things he had taught me to appreciate: the priceless gift of a newborn day, the sweet essence of fall in the air, a wild madrigal of birdsong. As if on cue, a lone sparrow landed on the railing of my balcony, tilting its head in quick little movements as it eyed me up and down. It held its congenial pose for all of a minute, giving me the feeling that I had been smiled upon, then a noise in the far end of the garden startled it and off it flew.

The sun was fully up now, gilding even the most mundane objects with outlines of refulgent light, and I could see the door opening in the far end of the garden wall. My curiosity aroused, I watched as Fairchild stepped over the threshold. He was not in his butler’s uniform, but ordinary town clothes, with plain trousers and a brown greatcoat draped loosely over his lanky human frame. Knowing that he had his own quarters near the kitchen, I wondered where he had been at this hour. Following his progress as he made his way between the garden rows, I perceived, as he drew nearer, an expression of black rage on his brow. Curious and concerned, I observed him carefully as he approached the kitchen door, confident that he, like most humans, would not look up.

“Good morning to ye,” Cook called to him. Then, seeing
the intensity of his expression, the canny old bear lowered her voice and said, “What news? What’s the mood in town?”

By now they were both outside my line of sight, directly below my balcony, but their voices drifted up to me, and, ignoring the good manners I had been raised with, I listened in.

“There’s trouble brewing, and that’s for sure,” Fairchild’s voice fairly growled. Then came a pause and his hushed inquiry. “Is anyone else about?”

“No one but us, and old Meg inside building the fire, and she’s deaf as a post. What is it?”

“This is for the master’s ears only, you understand, but you have a sister in Bremen Town, don’t you?”

“Lord, yes. My sister Violet. Is this about the uproar there? Those musicians taking over the old Hawkins place? She says it’s all anyone talks about.”

“Well, there’s some that will do more than talk, and she’d best be prepared.”

“I told her there’d be trouble! It’ll make no difference that those four musicians drove off a band of robbers, I said; they’ll still say it’s a bunch of animals that’ve run a gang of humans out of their own house. The society won’t take that lying down!”

My ears pricked up at the mention of “the society.” I recalled the handbill in the Post Office that had started so much trouble. Could she be talking about that? I leaned closer to the edge of the balcony and cocked my ears.

“Well, you didn’t hear it from me,” Fairchild’s voice ground out, “but there’s going to be the Devil to pay. By the time Babcock finishes whipping the townsfolk into a lather, those robbers the musicians chased out will be sounding like a pack of Sunday school teachers, and the sole support of their starving little grannies,
and those poor old tired musicians will sound like a pack of wild savages. Nobody will blink an eye when— Well, never mind. You’d best get word to your sister, that’s all. A week from Friday, you tell her to keep herself inside and lock the doors and shutters, and if she’s smart, she’ll see nothing, hear nothing—and above all, say nothing. Mind, you didn’t hear it from me, or my neck’s on the line.”

“So you’ve been to their meeting, then? It’s a dangerous game you’re playing, Fairchild. Just let the constabulary deal with them.”

“The constables? The constables are all in with them! There’s even a judge that’s one of the society! Slugby’s his name, and he lives up to it! No, we can’t rely on the law.”

“But if ever they get onto you, I don’t dare to think—”

“Don’t worry about me, Bess. I’m not alone, you know. Just you stay out of it, and warn your sister to stay out of it too. You’re no match for the likes of them.”

“Well, I’ll pray for the Almighty to watch over you, Fairchild. I can do that at least.”