A flurry of sounds streak through the house later that morning; servants juggling trays and buckets of water and coal on the landing, their cheap boots scuffing the floorboards. Chamber doors opening and closing. The surprising timbre of a baby’s cry.
Andrew is in a foul mood from missing the mummy unrolling last night and has taken his frustration out on the nurse, who weeps, the red pattern of Andrew’s palm on her cheek. The children of the guests gurgle and guzzle about the nursery, oblivious to their surroundings.
Once Andrew is dressed, his hair slicked back so tightly it enhances the shape of his cranium, I take him outside to watch the hunt.
There is a promise of snow in the sky, the sun over the moors dull like it’s been painted over with broad brushstrokes, and such mist in the air that I can feel it on my eyelashes.
Pheasants, partridges, and ducks are released on the grounds. The dogs are then let loose in a growling, slobbering tangle. The armed men dart unfettered across the moors, occasionally snapped at by Mr Pounds in a blatant display of dominance. (The women are not allowed to partake in such rigorous activity – the exertion might cause their wombs to drop out.)
The gamekeeper follows them grimly, his callused hands clutching his rifle, his eyes narrowing with disdain at Mr Fancey’s royal-blue waistcoat embroidered with tiny fox heads.
I look down at my shadow on the mossy ground. The weak sun shouldn’t be producing such a shadow, but my shadows tend to turn up when least expected. The shadow turns, elongating somewhat, and points left. I look in that direction, down the hill, where I can discern a scattered collection of cottages. I obey.
I ARRIVE AT the gamekeeper’s flint cottage. His dog kennel in the garden is empty. The gamekeeper’s wife is on her knees, pulling withered parsnips from the earth.
I sneak into their outhouse, where a salted pig hangs, wrapped in old curtains. A little pile of coal is stacked in a corner. The gamekeeper’s traps, flecked with scraps of skin and fur, hang from rusted nails. I finger the metal springs, the jagged iron jaws, almost hoping for one to snap, to arouse a wink of surprise somewhere inside me. I select one of the smaller ones – big enough for a fox paw. It’s heavy and cold in my hands, smelling of old blood. I pocket it.
As I walk back to the house, the trap slaps uncomfortably against my hipbone, like a live, bound animal.
I RETURN TO THE HOUSE in time for lunch amidst the excited chatter of the shooting party and the admiration of bagged birds.
Lunch is arranged along the sideboard for the guests to serve themselves. Cold roast beef and hot game hashes and game pies with crusts of elaborate designs and game pâtés and potted ham and chicken and beef patties and silver tureens of partridge soup and hare soup. Anything that flies or hops has been prepared in every conceivable manner – boiled, broiled, roasted, puréed, stewed.
I take in the guests as they recount the tedious incidents of the day with pronounced excitement – the men proud to arouse admiration in the women, the women thrilled to experience an emotion beyond contempt for the men.
In a fit of eagerness that shifts into the dull monotone of prepared discourse, Gormire Fancey explains he was named after the lake where his parents met and courted, while absent-mindedly stroking the embroidered fox heads on his waistcoat. I wonder if he is aware of the legend purporting that the lake is the entrance to hell. Superstitions and portents don’t always reach the privileged, or if they do, the privileged assume the warnings don’t apply to them. Mother would say that bad luck wasn’t a dish served to the wealthy. I used to believe it, too. Over time, however, I’ve come to realize bodies are liable to suffer accidents no matter their position on the social ladder.
Mr Fancey is explaining all the ways in which his mother was inadequate when, from the sweaty clutches of Drusilla’s slight bosom slips a tiny engraved gilded locket. It falls through her dress and slaps against the marble hearthstone.
The guests take a step back.
Mrs Pounds picks the locket up daintily, like it’s been vomited up. She snaps it open. Within the locket is a chalk-and-crayon likeness of the lecherous painter, most likely of his own creation, for it is substandard.
There is a collective bracing in the room, like a buttock compressing to stifle the passing of wind.
Mrs Pounds – who does not abide corporal punishment – drops the locket and slaps Drusilla across the face. She then stomps on the ornament, the glass crushing under a turquoise silk-wrapped heel, again and again and again, until the guests’ eyes film over with boredom and they return to the sideboard to resume their empty chatter.
I imagine what a marvel it would be for Drusilla to slit her mother’s throat with the cheese knife – forked like a serpent’s tongue – and spray Mrs Pounds’ blood across my awed smile. Drusilla does no such thing.
Making his way through the guests, Mr Pounds advances towards his females, taking a last sip of wine before thrusting his empty glass into a footman’s hands, and slowly crouches before the locket. He picks it up, blows on the dust of broken glass, and hands it to Drusilla. ‘Hold it out,’ he says, so quietly Drusilla has to stammer – ‘Wh-What?’
The firearm Mr Pounds has used for the hunt rests against the farthest of the dining-room walls. It is a beautiful thing, boasting stag and boar motifs engraved in wood and brass on the stock. Mr Pounds takes it in his hands and lifts it to his shoulder, pointing it at his daughter on the other side of the room.
‘Papa –’
‘Hold it out, Drusilla.’
Drusilla looks towards her mother, who nods encouragingly. She is not happy, per se, to watch her daughter suffer at her husband’s hands, but it must be one of them, and I suppose she’d rather it not be her.
Drusilla lifts her arm, the chain pinched between her fingers, the now lidless locket dangling by it, Mr Johnson swivelling within it, an expression of profound gaiety depicted on his face.
The guests quieten, licking game pâté off their fingers. Miss Manners meets Drusilla’s gaze, then lowers her eyes. The Dowager smirks. Art Fishal is, unexpectedly, the only one who attempts a feeble intervention – ‘John, you may regret this’ – but is brushed off by Mr Pounds, whose round black eyes are narrowing, his posture unflinching. He pulls the trigger.
The snap of the cock lever is followed immediately by the roar of the shot, and the locket is blown violently from Drusilla’s grip.
The guests clap and congratulate Mr Pounds on his aim. One of the footmen emits a relieved chortle. Drusilla leaves the room clutching at her hand, which is trembling uncontrollably.
Something caresses my insides and I look down to see little Andrew has gotten into my pocket and is extracting from it the leghold trap I have forgotten I stole. He sways slightly under the bulk of it, holding the trap up with two cupped hands, as if holding the Eucharist. I crouch down to him as he pokes his finger into the mechanism, which is clamped shut.
The guests’ prattling rises and falls, the occasional female guffaw followed by a reprobation in a low, masculine tone.
Kneeling before Andrew, I open the trap, prying the metal maw apart as it whines with rusty pain. Andrew blinks at it, his golden eyelashes fluttering.
He inches closer. I jump, barking curtly, and Andrew starts. I smile. He smiles back.
Nobody sees.