Twelfth Night Read Free Page A

“I’m not entirely certain you children are supposed to know about that.” My father’s sister had established a home for reformed prostitutes in Whitechapel, a place to help them put away their gin and bad language and learn to be seamstresses and maids. She frequently bullied her family and friends into taking them on when they had completed their training, and my own Morag was a product of the place. It was never discussed in front of the children, but I was not surprised to find they knew of it, and Tarquin gave me a pitying look.
    “Of course we know. We know masses of things.”
    “I’ll wager you do,” I assured him.
    Quentin spoke up then. “But they ought not to be wasting Mr. Brisbane’s time with babies,” he said, curling his lip. “Not when there’s a proper ghost in the village.”
    “It isn’t a ghost,” Tarquin contradicted. “It’s a witch.”
    “ ’Tisn’t ,” Quentin argued, shooting me an abashed look. It was bad manners to argue with his host, but I could see that his passion for accuracy warred with his upbringing.
    “What’s this about a witch?” I asked them.
    They both perked up, and Perdita withdrew a little, as if accustomed to giving way to her brother. But of course, she would have to, I realised with a pang. Tarquin was her elder and a boy. Everything in civilised society had taught her that her opinions were not as important as his, her skills not as valued. I felt a rush of affection for her, but just then I saw her small, clever hand reach out and deftly slip the last jam tartlet off his plate and into her mouth. Perdita would be just fine.
    I turned my attention to the boys, who were vying politely for the right to tell the story.
    “There’s a cottage by the river, beyond the vicarage. It’s called Stone Cottage. Do you know it?” Tarquin asked.
    “I do. Clever name,” I added as I pulled a face.
    “Actually, it is,” he said with a pained expression. “It wasn’t called that because it’s made of stone. The family that built it were called Stone.”
    “Ah, I see. Proceed.”
    “Well,” he said, warming to his tale, “the family died off, all except the old Mrs. Stone. She was rumoured to be two hundred years old, and she kept a pack of cats as big as dogs.”
    “Two hundred? Really?”
    He gave me a repressive look. “She wasn’t really two hundred, Aunt Julia. You mustn’t be gullible. But she looked it. Her chin and nose had grown quite close together, like this,” he said, pulling his chin and nose as near to one another as he could. “And she had a crooked back,” he added, hunching himself like an amateur actor in a production of Richard III.
    “And cats as big as dogs,” I reminded him.
    “Yes, exactly. The villagers called her Old Mother Stone.”
    Something stirred in the back of my memory. “Wait, I remember her! She was still alive when I was a child. But she didn’t look anything like that. She was a sweet little old woman with silver hair and a face like a plump apple. She was nearly as wide around as she was tall! And there was one cat, a slim little white thing called Snowdrop.”
    Tarquin’s expression was reproving. “That’s not nearly as good a story.”
    “Well, I am sorry, but it happens to be the truth. Aunt Hermia used to worry over her because she hadn’t any children to look after her. She would send us down from time to time with a basket of things, and Old Mother Stone always gave us fresh honeycomb on bread to eat.”
    “Definitely not a witch,” said Quentin with some satisfaction.
    “As I was saying,” Tarquin said repressively, “the old lady gained a reputation as a witch.”
    “She wasn’t a witch,” I protested. “She was just a countrywoman, good at healing nettle rash and beestings.”
    “So you thought,” Tarquin corrected. “After she died, the cottage fell into disrepair and folk began to talk about the things she had done for them, secret things.”
    I felt a stab of unease. If Old