Daughters of the Witching Hill Read online

  When I was twelve, they finished building the New Church of St. Mary's in Goldshaw to replace the old crumbling chapel of ease where I'd been christened. The Bishop of Chester came to consecrate it just in time for All Souls' when we rang the bells the whole night through to give comfort to our dead.

  Back then we still had our holidays. Christmas lasted twelve days and nights with mummers and guizers in animal masks dancing by torchlight. The Lord of Misrule, some low-born man, lorded it over the gentry to make poor folk laugh. The Towneleys of Carr Hall used to invite all their neighbours, rich and poor alike, to join their festivities. Upon Palm Sunday everyone in the parish gathered for the processions round the fields to make them fertile. After dark the young folk would go out to bless the land in their own private fashion. Everyone knew what went on, but none stood in our way. If a lass and her young man had to rush to the altar afterward, nobody thought the worse of them for it. I went along with the other girls, arm in arm with my best friend, Anne Whittle, both of us wearing green garlands and singing. Cherry-lipped Anne loved to have her sport with the boys, but mindful of my own mother's fate, I did nowt but kiss and dance and flirt in those days. Only went astray much later in life, when I was a married woman and sore unsatisfied, seeking my pleasures elsewhere.

  In my youth, upon May morning, we arose before dawn to gather hawthorn and woodruff. We'd dance round the Maypole and drink elderflower wine till the very sky reeled. At Midsummer's, upon the eve of the feast of John the Baptist, we carried birch boughs into the church till our chapel looked like a woodland grove. Bonfires blazed the whole night through. Some folk burned fires of bone, not wood, so that the stench might drive away evil wights from the growing crops. Most of us gathered round the wake fire of sweet apple wood where we danced all night, collapsing upon the grass at sunrise. On Lammas Day the reapers crowned the Harvest Queen and one year, by Our Lady, it was me, a lass of fifteen, crowned in roses and barley, the lads begging me for a kiss.

  Old King Henry was dead by then, and we lived in hope that the old ways would live again. Crowned in roses, I led the procession of maidens on the Feast of the Assumption, each of us bearing flowers and fruits to lay upon the altar of the Queen of Heaven. Only weeks later Edward the Boy King sent his men to smash every statue in our church, even that of the Blessed Mother herself, whilst we clutched ourselves, full aghast. They tore down the crucifix over the high altar and burned it as though it were some heathen idol. They destroyed our roodscreen, outlawed our processions, and forbade us to deck the church with greenery upon Midsummer or to bring red roses and poppies to the altar on Corpus Christi. They set fire to our Maypole, forbade us to pray for the dead, or celebrate the saints' feast days.

  Six years on, weakling Edward wasted away and his sister Mary Tudor promised to bring back the old religion. For the five years of her reign we had our holidays again, our processions, our mass with swirling incense, and the sea of candles lit for the saints. The Towneleys, the Nutters, and the Shuttleworths paid for the new roodscreen, the new statues, altar cloths, and vestments. We had our Maypole and rang the church bells for our ancestors on All Souls' Night. But our joys soured when the news came of the heretics Mary burned alive, near three hundred of them, their only hope to end their agony being the sachets of gunpowder concealed beneath their clothes. Our Catholic queen was nowt but a tyrant. Before long Mary herself died, despised by her own husband, so the story went.

  With Queen Elizabeth came the new religion once more to replace the old. The Queen's agents stormed in to hack apart our new roodscreen. But they could not demolish the statues or the crucifix this time round, for the Towneleys, Shuttleworths, and Nutters had divided the holy images between them and taken them into hiding in secret chapels inside their great houses. In those early days, some said Elizabeth's reign couldn't last long. Anne Boleyn's bastard, she was, and it seemed half of England wanted her dead. On top of that, she refused to marry and produce an heir of her own religion. Yet the Queen and her crushing rule had endured.

  In truth, the old ways died that day Elizabeth's agents sacked our church. For the past twenty-odd years, there had been no dancing of a Sunday, no Sunday ales like we used to have when we made merry within the very nave of the church. Though the Sabbath was the only day of leisure we had, the Curate refused to let us have any pleasure of it. No football, dice-playing, or card-playing. Magistrate Roger Nowell, my own half-brother, forbade the Robin Hood plays and summer games, for he said they led to drunkenness and wantonness amongst the lower orders. Few weeks back, the piper of Clitheroe was arrested for playing late one Sunday afternoon.

  The Curate preached that only the Elect would go to heaven, and I was canny enough to know that didn't include me. So if I were damned anyway, why should I suffer to obey their every command? Mind you, I went to church of a Sunday. It was that, or suffer the Church Warden's whip and fine. But I'd left off trying to hold myself to the straight and narrow. Perhaps I'd have fared no better even if the old church had survived, for hadn't I been an adulteress? But still my heart was rooted, full stubborn, in that lost world of chanting, processions, and revels that had bound us together, rich and poor, saint and sinner. My soul's home was not with this harsh new God, but instead I sought the solace of the Queen of Heaven and whispered the Salve Regina in secret. I swore to cling to the forbidden prayers till my dying day.

  I am getting ahead of myself. Back to the story. That evening, after Tibb first appeared to me, I hared off in the long spring twilight, heading home to Malkin Tower. Wasn't safe to be about after dark. Folk talked of boggarts haunting the night, not that I was ignorant enough to believe every outlandish tale, but I was shaken to the bone from seeing the boy who disappeared into nowhere. The moon, nearly full, shone in the violet sky, and the first stars glimmered when, at last, I reached my door.

  Our Malkin Tower was an odd place. Tower itself had two rooms, one below and one above, and each room had narrow slits for windows from the days, hundreds of years ago, when guardsmen were sat there with their bows and arrows, on the look-out for raiders and poachers. But, as the tower had no chimney or hearth, we spent most of our time in the firehouse, a ramshackle room built on to the foot of the tower. And it was into the firehouse I stumbled that night. My daughter Liza, sat close by the single rush light, gave a cry when she saw me.

  "So late coming home, Mam! Did a devil cross your path?"

  In the wavering light, my girl looked more frightful than the devil she spoke of, though she couldn't help it, God bless her. Her left eye stood lower in her face than the other, and whilst her right eye looked up, her left eye looked down. The sight of her was enough to put folk off their food. Couldn't hire herself out as a kitchen maid because the housewives of Pendle feared our Liza would spoil their milk and curdle their butter. Looking the way she did, it would take a miracle for her to get regular work, let alone a husband. Most she could hope for was a day's pittance for carding wool or weeding some housewife's garden.

  Ignoring her talk of the devil, I unpacked a clump of old bread, the gleanings of the day's begging, and Liza sliced it into pieces thin as communion wafer.

  Liza, myself, Kit, and Kit's wife, also Elizabeth, though we called her Elsie, gathered for our supper. Kit hired himself out as a day labourer, but at this time of year there was little work to be had. Lambing season had just passed. Shearing wouldn't come till high summer. Best he could do was ask for work at the slate pits and hope to earn enough to keep us in oatmeal and barley flour. Elsie was heavy with child. Most work she could get was a day's mending or spinning.

  When we were sat together at the table, my Liza went green in the face at the taste of the old bread and could barely get a mouthful of the stuff down before she bolted out the door to be sick. Out of old habit, I crossed myself. I looked to Kit, who looked to his wife, who shook her head in sadness. Elsie would deliver her firstborn within the month and now it appeared that Liza was with child as well. First I wondered who the father could be. Th
en I asked myself how we would feed two little babes when we were hard-pressed to do for ourselves. We were silent, the lot of us, Elsie doling out the buttermilk she had off the Bulcocks in exchange for a day's spinning. Our Kit gave his wife half of his own share of bread—wasn't she eating for two?

  Then I found I couldn't finish my own bread, so I passed it to Kit before hauling myself out the door to look for Liza. By the cold moonlight I found my poor squint-eyed broomstick of a girl bent over the gatepost, crying fit to die. Taking Liza in my arms, I held her and rubbed her hair. I begged her to tell me who the father was, but she refused.

  "It will be right," I told her. "Not the first time an unwed girl fell pregnant. We'll make do somehow." What else could I say? I'd no business browbeating her for doing the same as I'd done with Kit's father, twenty-two years ago.

  After leading my Liza back inside, we made for our beds. I climbed to the upper tower. Room was so cold and draughty that everyone else preferred sleeping below, but of a crystal-clear evening I loved nothing better than to lie upon my pallet and gaze at the moon and stars through the narrow windows. Cold wind didn't bother me much. I was born with thick skin, would have died ages ago if I'd been a more delicate sort. Yet that night the starry heavens gave me little comfort. I laid myself down and tried to ignore the hammer of worry in my head. The Church Warden and Constable were sure to make a stink about Liza. Another bastard child to live off the charity of the parish. They'd fine her at the very least. She'd be lucky if she escaped the pillory. Sleepless, I huddled there whilst the wind whistled through the thatch.

  When I finally closed my eyes, I saw Tibb, his face in its golden glory. Looked like one of the angels I remembered seeing in our church before the Queen's men stripped the place bare. Out of the dark crush of night came his voice, sweet as a lover's, gentle as Kit's father was in the days when he called me his beauty, his heart's joy. Tibb's lips were at my ear.

  "If I could," he told me, "if you let me, I'd ease your burdens, my Bess. No use fretting about Liza. She'll lose the child within a fortnight, and none but you and yours will know she fell pregnant in the first place."

  My throat was dry and sore. Couldn't even think straight.

  "You're afraid of me," he said. "But you shouldn't be. I mean you no harm."

  "You're not real," I whispered. "I'm just dreaming you."

  "I'm as real as the ache in your heart," he whispered back. "You were meant to be more than a common beggar, our Bess. You could be a blesser. Next time you see a sick cow, bless it. Say three Ave Marias and sprinkle some water on the beast. Folk will pay you for such things. Folk will hold you in regard, and you won't have to grovel for the scraps off their table."

  What nonsense. The Church Warden would have me whipped and fined for saying the Ave Maria—and that was but mild chastisement. Catholics were still hanged in these parts, their priests drawn and quartered. I told myself that there was no such boy called Tibb—it was just my empty stomach talking. I rolled over, pulling the tattered blanket to my ears.

  He wouldn't give over. "It runs in your blood. You've inherited the gift from your mam's father."

  I shook my head no. "My grand-dad was an ostler. An honest man."

  "He was a horse-charmer, if you remember well."

  Tibb's voice summoned the memories. I was sat on Grand-Dad's knee, and he jostled me so that I could pretend I was riding a bouncy pony whilst he chanted the charm to St. George to ward horses from witchcraft. Enforce we us with all our might to love St. George, Our Lady's knight. Grand-Dad died when I was seven, but he'd taught my mam all his herbcraft for healing beast and folk alike, which she, in turn, had taught me, though Mam herself had no dealings in charms.

  What a marvel. Grand-Dad working his blessings in the stables at Read Hall, beneath the Nowells' very noses. He must have served them well, kept their nags healthy and sound, so that instead of reporting him for sorcery they became his protectors. Perhaps that, indeed, was why the Nowells had given Malkin Tower to Mam—it did no good at all to vex a cunning man by treating his daughter ill.

  Still, the knowing made the sweat run cold down my back. To think that I carried this inside me. I could not say a word, only pray that Tibb would vanish again and leave me in peace.

  "My own Bess, do I need to give you a sign or two? You'll see what I've said of Liza will come to pass. Now I'll give you more knowledge of the future. Before the moon is new again, Elsie will bear a son."

  In spite of myself, I laughed. "Any fool can see she's carrying a boy from the way she's bearing so high and wide. I don't need a slip of a lad like you telling me about wenches bearing babies."

  My mocking didn't put Tibb off. He only coaxed me all the more. "They'll name the lad Christopher after his father, and you'll see your Kit's father in the little lad's face, my Bess. You'll feel so tender that the years of bitterness will melt away."

  Tears came to my eyes when I remembered my lover who had given me such pleasure before he bolted off, never to show his face again, leaving me to bear my shame and endure an angry husband fit to flay me alive and the gossips wagging their tongues and pointing. My husband refused to give the baby his name, so that was why my Kit was named Christopher Holgate, not Southerns. As punishment for my sin, I was made to stand a full day in the pillory in Colne marketplace.

  "That's not all I can tell you of your future," said Tibb, nestling close, his breath warming my face. "In time, your Liza will marry an honest man who will love her in spite of her squint."

  "Fortune-telling's a sin," I squeaked. In this the Curate and the priests of the old religion had always been of one mind. A dangerous thing, it was, to push back the veil and look into the future, for unless such knowledge came from a prophecy delivered by God, it came from the other place, the evil place, the Devil. Diviners and those who consulted them would be punished in hell by having their heads twisted backward for their unholy curiosity.

  But Tibb carried on in a voice I couldn't block out. "Liza will give you three grandchildren."

  How seductive he was. If only I could trust him and believe that my Liza would be blessed by the love of a good man, a happy family.

  "Her first-born daughter will be your joy," Tibb told me. "You'll love her till you forget yourself, my Bess. A pretty, impudent lass with skin like cream. A beauty such as you were at her age. She'll be your very likeness, and you'll teach her the things that I'll teach you." His voice sang with his promise.

  "What else can you tell me?" I asked, my heart in my mouth.

  Opening my eyes, I dared myself to look him in the face, but I only saw the stars shining in the window slits.

  Poor beggar women mustn't allow themselves to be led astray by foolish fancies. Have some sense for once, I told myself. So I did my best to put Tibb out of my mind. Life carried on, same as it always had. I went begging or took what work was offered to me. Spent an afternoon on my hands and knees, scouring Old Master Mitton's henhouse in exchange for a loaf of bread, a cup of ale, and a bowl of thin gruel. As I scrubbed that stinking henhouse, Tibb and his promises seemed worlds away. How daft to think a woman such as I could ever charm or bless any person or thing.

  After my work, I washed myself in the brook before heading home. Our Kit was gone, having found work at the slate pit, but Elsie was sat there in the firehouse with a face stark and clenched as winter. At first I thought her time had come.

  "What is it?" I asked, the sweat rolling off me. "Have your waters broken?"

  Lips glued together, Elsie pointed to the dark corner where Liza lay upon her pallet. The blankets and linens had been stripped off and were soaking in a bucket of cold water to loosen the red stains. My Liza was wan, her breathing shallow, but I could see no regret in her face. More like relief and silent thanksgiving.

  "She took the tansy," Elsie said, speaking cold and hard.

  I looked to the rafters where my garden herbs were strung and, indeed, the stalks of tansy with their shrill yellow buttons were gone.


  "You've no business growing that evil weed in your garden," Elsie went on, "knowing what sin it's used for."

  "Oh, shut it, Elsie," I told her.

  Bustling over to Kit and Elsie's bed in the bottom room of the tower, I stripped off the blanket and carried it to Liza, draping it over her. Took my girl's hand and pressed it in my own.

  "All will be well," I vowed.

  Next I laid hands on Elsie's shoulders.

  "You'll not breathe a word of this," I told her.

  My hard grip set her trembling. She dipped her eyes and clutched her belly, so big it looked fit to burst.

  "You'll not tell a soul," I went on. "Even our Kit. Our Liza never miscarried. She never fell pregnant. You understand my meaning?"

  If the Constable and Church Warden were quick to punish girls who carried bastards, there was no telling what they would do to a wench who made herself abort—or, indeed, to the one who had provided her with the herb.

  Elsie clutched herself and nodded.

  Sore and aching though I was, I dragged the bucket of soaking blankets out to the brook and pounded them against the stones, scrubbing with lye soap till my hands were raw, till the last trace of Liza's blood had vanished out of the wool.

  None of this was Tibb's doing. Liza had taken her fate into her own hands, brewed a strong dose of tansy, swallowed it down, and waited till the herb opened up her womb. Just as I might have done those many years ago if I hadn't been so soft and still in love with the man who had given me such happiness, only to abandon me.