The Skull Beneath the Skin (19 page)

Sir George said: “It’s for remembering the good chaps who’ve gone. Once a year. For two minutes. You wouldn’t think that was too much to ask. And why degrade it into a sentimental mass love-in? At our last parade the padre preached a sermon about the Third World and the World Council of Churches. I could see that some of the older chaps in the Legion were getting restless.”

Roma said: “I suppose he thought his sermon had something to do with world peace.”

“Armistice Day isn’t to do with peace. It’s to do with war, and remembering one’s dead. A nation that can’t remember its
dead will soon cease to be worth dying for. And what’s so peaceful about the Third World?”

He turned quickly away and for a moment Cordelia thought that his eyes were moist. But then she saw that it was just a trick of the light and was embarrassed at her naivety. He might be remembering his own good chaps and the lost, forgotten and discredited causes for which they had died. But he was remembering without tears. He had seen so many bodies, so many deaths. Could any death now, she wondered, be more to him than a single statistic?

A door in the vestry led down to the crypt. To make their way down narrow stone steps lit by Ambrose’s torch was to descend into a different world, a different time. Here alone was there any trace of the original Norman building. The roof was so low that Ivo, the tallest of them, could hardly stand upright, and the squat, heavy pillars strained as if bearing on their capitals the weight of nine centuries. Ambrose put out his hand to a wall switch and the claustrophobic chamber sprang into harsh unflattering light. They saw the skulls at once. One whole wall was patterned with them, a grinning parade of death. They had been ranged on rough oak shelves and were so tightly wedged that Cordelia judged that it would be impossible to separate them except by hacking them apart. Little care had been taken in the arrangement. In some places cement had been poured over them fixing mouth to mouth in the parody of a kiss. In others, the grit of the years had seeped between them binding them into cohesion, blocking the nasal cavities, collecting in the eye sockets and laying over the smooth domes a patina of dust like a shroud.

Ambrose said: “There’s a legend about them of course; there always is. In the seventeenth century the island was held by the de Courcy family; they had, in fact, been here since the
fourteen-hundreds. The de Courcy at that time was a particularly unpleasant representative of his breed. Someone must have told him about Tiberius’s little doings on Capri—I don’t suppose he could himself read—and he started to emulate them here. You can imagine the kind of thing: local maidens from the mainland abducted;
droit de seigneur
exercised on a scale which even the most compliant tenants found unreasonable; mutilated bodies brought in on the tide to the general disapproval of the locals. Speymouth was a small fishing village then. The town only reached any size or importance in the Regency—a sort of West Country Brighton. But the word got around. No one did anything, of course. The story is that the father of one of the abducted girls, whose tortured body floated ashore three weeks later, laid information against him with the local magistrate. De Courcy was subsequently tried at the Assizes but acquitted. One supposes it was managed in the usual way, a venal judge, perjured witnesses, bribed jurymen, a mixture of subservience and fear. And, of course, there was no direct evidence. At the end of the trial the father—he was an immensely powerful man according to the legend—rose up in court and cursed de Courcy and all his clan in the customary dramatic terms of dead firstborn, revolting diseases, the castle falling into ruins, the line extinct. Everyone must have enjoyed that part immensely. And then, in 1665 came the Plague.”

Cordelia thought that Ambrose’s pause, if intended for dramatic effect, was unnecessary. The little group ranged round him were gazing at him with the rapt attention of foreign tourists whose guide, for once, is giving value for money. Ambrose went on.

“The Plague raged particularly fiercely on this coast. It was said to have been brought here by a family from Cheapside who
had relations in the village and fled here for safety. One by one the local families fell victim. The parson and his family died early, and there was no one to say the rites over the dead. Soon there was only one old man willing to bury them. Anarchy reigned. The island felt itself to be safe and de Courcy threatened death to anyone who landed. The story is that a boatload of women and children with one adult male to manage the boat did try. But if they were hoping to arouse de Courcy’s compassion they were disappointed. He was behaving perfectly reasonably in this instance, of course. The only way to escape the pestilence was quarantine. It wasn’t quite as reasonable to drive holes in the planks in the bottom of the boat before forcing it out to sea so that the human cargo drowned before they could reach shore, but that may be only a gloss on the story. About those seventeenth-century boat people, I think we ought to give him the benefit of the doubt. And now for the climax.”

Ivo murmured: “This story has everything but costumes by Motley and incidental music by Menotti.” But Cordelia saw that he was as interested as any of them.

“I don’t know whether you know about the bubonic plague, the symptoms I mean. The victims would first have the sensation that they could smell rotting apples. After that came the dreaded pink rash on the forehead. The day came when the father of the murdered girl smelt the smell, saw in his glass the mark of death. It was a summer night but unruly, the sea turbulent. He knew that he hadn’t long to live; the Plague killed swiftly. He launched his boat and set sail for the island.

“De Courcy and his private court were at dinner when the door of the great hall opened and he appeared, his great shambling sea-drenched figure, stumbling towards his enemy, eyes blazing. There was a moment when they were all too
astounded for action. And in that moment he reached de Courcy, flung his great arms around him and kissed him full on the mouth.”

No one spoke. Cordelia wondered whether they would break into polite applause. The story had been well told and it had, in its simplicity, its terror, its almost symbolic confrontation of innocence with evil, a remarkable power.

Ivo said: “That story would make an opera. You’ve got the scenario. All you need is a Verdi or a second Benjamin Britten.”

Roma Lisle, gazing at the skulls in fascinated distaste, asked: “And did the curse come true?”

“Oh yes. De Courcy and all his people here caught the Plague and were wiped out. The line is now extinct. It was four years before anyone came here to bury them. But then a kind of superstitious awe surrounded the island. The landsfolk averted their eyes from it. Fishermen, remembering the old religion, crossed themselves when they sailed in its shadow. The castle crumbled. It remained a ruin until my great-grandfather bought the place in 1864, built himself a castle in the modern style, reclaimed the land, cleared the undergrowth. Only the ruins of the old church remained standing. De Courcy and his islanders hadn’t been buried in the churchyard. The locals hadn’t thought that they merited Christian burial. As a result Herbert Gorringe kept turning up the skeletons when planting his pleasure garden. His men collected the skulls and arranged them here, a nice compromise between Christian disposal and tossing them on the bonfire.”

Roma said: “There’s something carved above the top shelf, words and numbers. The carving’s a bit crude. It could be a biblical reference.”

“Ah, that’s a personal comment by one of the Victorian workmen who thought that the setting up of this row of Yoricks
might be an opportunity to point a moral and adorn a tale. No, I shan’t identify it for you. Look it up for yourselves.”

Cordelia didn’t need to look it up. A convent-born knowledge of the Old Testament and a lucky guess led her unerringly to the text.

“Judgement is mine saith the Lord. I will repay.”

It was, she thought, an inappropriate comment on a vengeance which, if Ambrose’s story were true, had been so singularly, so satisfyingly human.

It was very cold in the crypt. Conversation had died. They stood in a ring looking at the row of skulls as if these smooth domes of bone, the ragged nasal orifices, the gaping sockets, could be made to yield the secret of their deaths. How unfrightening they were, thought Cordelia, these age-long symbols of mortality, set up like a row of grinning devils to frighten children at a fairground and, in their denuded anonymity, stripping human pretensions to the risible evidence that what lasted longest in man were his teeth.

From time to time during Ambrose’s story she had glanced at Clarissa, wondering what effect this recital of horrors might have on her. It seemed to her strange that the crudely drawn caricature of a skull could produce such fear while the reality provoked no more than an exaggerated
frisson
of distaste. But Clarissa’s refined sensibilities were apparently capable of sustaining any amount of assault provided the horrors were anaesthetized by time and there were no threats to herself. Even in the harsh, draining glare of the crypt her face looked flushed and the immense eyes shone more brightly. Cordelia doubted whether she would be happy to visit the crypt alone but now, feeling herself the centre of the company, she was enjoying a thrill of vicarious dread like a child at a horror movie who knows that none of the terror is real, that outside is
the familiar street, the ordinary faces, the comfortable world of home. Whatever Clarissa feared, and Cordelia couldn’t believe that the fear was faked, she had no sympathy with these long-dead tormented souls, no dread of a supernatural visitation in the small hours. She was expecting that, when her fate came and in whatever guise, it would still wear a human face. But now excitement had made her euphoric. She said to Ambrose: “Darling, your island’s a repository of horrors, charming on the surface and seething underneath. But isn’t there something closer in time, a murder which really did happen? Tell us about the Devil’s Kettle.”

Ambrose avoided looking at her. One of the skulls was unaligned with its fellows. He took the white ball between his hands and tried to grind it back into place. But it couldn’t be shifted and, suddenly, the jaw bone came apart in his hands. He shoved it back, wiped his hands on his handkerchief and said: “There’s nothing to see. And the story is rather beastly. Only interesting really to those who relish in imagination the contemplation of another’s pain.”

But the warning and the implied criticism were wasted on her. She cried: “Darling, don’t be so stuffy! The story’s forty years old at least and I know about it anyway. George told me. But I want to see where it happened. And I’ve got a personal interest. George was here on the island at the time. Did you know that George was here?”

Ambrose said shortly: “Yes, I know.”

Roma said: “Whatever it is, you may as well show us. Clarissa won’t give you any peace until you do and the rest of us are entitled to have our curiosity satisfied. It can hardly be worse than this place.”

No one else spoke. Cordelia thought that Clarissa and her cousin were unlikely allies even in persuasion and wondered
whether Roma was genuinely interested or merely hoped to get the story over with so that she could get out of the crypt. Clarissa’s voice assumed the wheedling note of an importunate child.

“Please, Ambrose. You promised that you would some time or other. Why not now? After all, we’re here.”

Ambrose looked at George Ralston. The look seemed to invite consent, or at least comment. But if he were hoping for support in resisting Clarissa, he was disappointed. Sir George’s face was impassive, its restlessness for once stilled.

Ambrose said: “All right, if you insist.”

He led them to a low door at the west end of the crypt. It was made of oak, almost black with age and with strong bands of iron and a double bolt. Beside it on a nail hung a key. Ambrose shot back the bolts then inserted the key in the lock. It turned easily enough but he needed all his strength to pull open the door. Inside he reached up and switched on a light. They saw before them a narrow vaulted passage only wide enough for two to walk abreast. Ambrose led the way with Clarissa at his shoulder. Roma walked alone followed by Cordelia and Simon with Sir George and Ivo at the rear.

After less than twenty feet, the passage gave way to a flight of steep stone steps which curved to the left. At the bottom it widened but the roof was still so low that Ivo had to stoop. The passage was lit by unshaded but protected light bulbs hung from a cable and the air, although fusty, was fresh enough to breathe without discomfort. It was very quiet and their footsteps echoed on the stone floor. Cordelia estimated that they must have covered about two hundred yards when they came to a turn in the passage and then a second flight of steps, steeper than the first and rougher, as if hewn out of the rock. And it was then that the light failed.

The shock of instantaneous and total blackness after the artificial brightness of the tunnel made them gasp and one of the women—Cordelia thought that it was Clarissa—gave a cry. She fought against a moment of panic, calming by an act of will her suddenly pounding heart. Instinctively she stretched out her hand into the darkness and encountered a firm warm arm under thin cotton, Simon’s arm. She let go but almost immediately felt her hand grasped by his. Then she heard Ambrose’s voice.

“Sorry, everyone, I’d forgotten that the lights are on a time switch. I’ll find the button in a second.”

But Cordelia judged that it must have been fifteen seconds before the light came on. They blinked at each other in the sudden glare, smiling a little sheepishly. Simon’s hand was immediately withdrawn as if scalded and he turned his face from her. Clarissa said crossly: “I wish you’d warn us before playing silly tricks.” Ambrose looked amused.

“No trick I assure you. And it won’t happen again. The chamber above the Devil’s Kettle has an ordinary light system. Only another forty yards to go. And you did insist on this excursion, remember.”

They went down the steps with the aid of a looped rope which had been threaded through rings bolted into the rock. After another thirty yards the passage widened to form a low-roofed cave. Ivo asked, his voice sounding unnaturally loud: “We must be forty feet below ground. How is it ventilated?”