The Coffin Path_'The perfect ghost story' Read online

  Copyright © 2018 Katherine Clements

  The right of Katherine Clements to be identified as the Author of the Work has been asserted by her in accordance with the Copyright, Designs and Patents Act 1988.

  Apart from any use permitted under UK copyright law, this publication may only be reproduced, stored, or transmitted, in any form, or by any means, with prior permission in writing of the publishers or, in the case of reprographic production, in accordance with the terms of licences issued by the Copyright Licensing Agency.

  This Ebook edition was first published by Headline Publishing Group in 2018

  All characters in this publication – apart from the obvious historical figures – are fictitious and any resemblance to real persons, living or dead, is purely coincidental.

  Cataloguing in Publication Data is available from the British Library

  Ebook conversion by Avon DataSet Ltd, Bidford-on-Avon, Warwickshire

  eISBN: 978 1 4722 0429 5

  Cover images © Neil C. Robinson/Getty Images; Peter Greenway/Arcangel Images; and Spumador, funtiks, Winning7799 and Julian Elliott, all at Shutterstock.

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  Contents

  Title Page

  Copyright Page

  About Katherine Clements

  Praise

  About the Book

  Also by Katherine Clements

  Dedication

  Acknowledgements

  1674: Spring

  Chapter 1

  Chapter 2

  Chapter 3

  Chapter 4

  Chapter 5

  Chapter 6

  Chapter 7

  Chapter 8

  Chapter 9

  Chapter 10

  Chapter 11

  Chapter 12

  Chapter 13

  Chapter 14

  Chapter 15

  Summer

  Chapter 16

  Chapter 17

  Chapter 18

  Chapter 19

  Chapter 20

  Chapter 21

  Chapter 22

  Chapter 23

  Chapter 24

  Chapter 25

  Autumn

  Chapter 26

  Chapter 27

  Chapter 28

  Chapter 29

  Chapter 30

  Chapter 31

  Chapter 32

  Chapter 33

  Chapter 34

  Winter

  Chapter 35

  Chapter 36

  Chapter 37

  Chapter 38

  Chapter 39

  Chapter 40

  Chapter 41

  Chapter 42

  Chapter 43

  Chapter 44

  Chapter 45

  Chapter 46

  Author’s Note

  About Katherine Clements

  Katherine Clements is a critically acclaimed novelist, self-confessed costume drama addict and current Royal Literary Fund Fellow at the University of Manchester. She is editor of Historia, the online magazine of the Historical Writers’ Association, and is a member of the HWA committee. The Coffin Path is her third novel.

  @KL_Clements

  Praise

  ‘The perfect ghost story: utterly absorbing, immersed in a world so completely authentic . . . But not only that, it’s a beautifully wrought evocation of a world and a time that feels as if it’s just around the corner’ Manda Scott

  ‘A wonderful piece of Yorkshire Gothic . . . like something from Emily Bronte’s nightmares’ Andrew Taylor

  ‘A classic of the genre. Anyone who loves Wuthering Heights will adore this’ Rory Clements

  ‘A beautifully written, nuanced ghost story which packs a powerful emotional punch. Katherine Clements expertly layers her story of the Yorkshire moors with a burgeoning sense of evil and impending emotional crisis’ Sophia Tobin

  ‘A chilling and disturbing tale of unusual power. The rich, textured writing delivers a gripping sense of time and place. I was convinced, transfixed, transported and I’ll be keeping these characters close to me for a long time to come’ Imogen Robertson

  ‘A stunning read! I couldn’t put it down. The writing is achingly beautiful and the atmosphere cillingly realised. Both as a historica novel and a ghost story it is so emotional and compelling that I’ll be recommending it to everyone’ Nicola Cornick (author of The Phantom Tree)

  ‘Seriously impressive. Full of foreboding from page one’ Phil Rickman (author of the Merrily Watkins novels)

  ‘Exquisite – the intense and brooding sense of place is reminiscent of Wuthering Heights, while Clements’ characters are as vividly evoked as the dark fate hovering over them all. Highly recommended’ Alison Littlewood

  About the Book

  Maybe you’ve heard tales about Scarcross Hall, the house on the old coffin path that winds from village to moor top. They say there’s something up here, something evil.

  Mercy Booth isn’t afraid. The moors and Scarcross are her home and lifeblood. But, beneath her certainty, small things are beginning to trouble her. Three ancient coins missing from her father’s study, the shadowy figure out by the gatepost, an unshakeable sense that someone is watching.

  When a stranger appears seeking work, Mercy reluctantly takes him in. As their stories entwine, this man will change everything. She just can’t see it yet.

  Also by Katherine Clements and available from Headline Review

  The Crimson Ribbon

  The Silvered Heart

  The Painted Chamber (digital short stories)

  For Paddy

  Acknowledgements

  I would like to thank John and Mary Pearson for an unforgettable weekend in the lambing shed at Lovesome Hill Farm; Diana Rowsell and her husband Ken for welcoming me into their home and showing me the old coffin path that runs through their idyllic Sussex village; and Simon Davies for early research advice on seventeenth-century hauntings.

  Huge thanks to the whole team at Headline: to my extraordinary editors Mari Evans, Claire Baldwin and Frankie Edwards; to Caitlin Raynor, Jo Liddiard and Hazel Orme; and to my agent Annette Green.

  I raise a glass to all my writing colleagues, especially members of the Historical Writers’ Association and the Prime Writers, whose encouragement and camaraderie is unparalleled; and to the Royal Literary Fund, whose Fellowship scheme enabled the writing of this book.

  My gratitude, as always, to friends and family who continue to give tireless support. Special thanks must go to Ian Madej, Caroline Clements, Jeremy Prosser and Claire Holloway; to John Clements for influential discussions on the Book of Common Prayer; to Jan Clements for her indefatigable red pen; and to Paddy Wells, to whom this book is dedicated, for holding my hand through it all.

  1674

  Spring

  Chapter 1

  I was born with blood on my hands.

  I killed my mother on the 22nd of August, in the year 1642, the day the first King Charles turned traitor and chose a battlefield over a throne. She was not murdered by musket shot or slaughtered by steel blade, as were so many during those years of war. Hers was a woman’s fate. She died in blood – the blood that bore me in on its tide
.

  At least, that’s what I was told.

  I’ve had blood on my hands ever since. I’m elbow-deep in a thick, viscous caul of it. Though I’ve never sweated and screamed in my own childbed, I know life and death better than most women. And now, as ever, I’m mindful of my mother. It happens every time I birth a lamb – the weighted pause before the newborn’s first breath, like a clock’s final turning before the hour’s strike, and I always think the same thing: how the moment of birth, of new life, so often means the death of something else.

  Such maudlin thoughts are natural in the cold, lonely months when days are icicle-bright and nights are heavy with peat smoke and shadows. But the February chill has lessened lately, the sky become cloud-laden, mist-thick, and the first lamb is a sure sign that spring will soon follow. It should be a moment of celebration, of gratitude and thanks, for the closing of one season and the beginning of the next – we have survived another winter – but sight of the first suckling always reminds me of the mother I never knew, the father who was left to grieve, and the debt I owe to both. With every spring, and every lamb, I have a chance, once again, to make it right.

  Up on the moor, the snow is still knee-deep and sheep huddle under peat hags. Down on the valley slopes, where this one has wandered alone, just the drifts are left. The ewe has found herself a bare hollow sheltered from the wind, against the wall of an abandoned fold, and is butting up against the stone, pawing the frozen earth.

  Ignoring the familiar twist inside – my guts telling me I won’t like what I find – I scramble down the steep fell towards her, scattering stones, my dog, Bracken, at my heels.

  This place was someone’s home once: a one-roomed cottage slowly crumbling to ruin, doors and shutters long since stolen for fuel, mist winding about the chimney in place of smoke, a dank tomb smell of lichened stone, the sheepfold now a stretch of tumbledown dry-wall. Ragged crows eye me from the naked branches of a wind-twisted willow.

  Urging Bracken to keep her distance, I move slowly towards the ewe. She’s unsteady, stumbling away from me, front legs buckling. I’d know her as one of my own even without the smudge of last summer’s tar mark on her fleece. She’s young, tupped for the first time last autumn. She should have at least two weeks until her time, but Nature has other ideas.

  I call Bracken forward and she creeps into position, head low, clever, keen eyes fixed on the sheep. The ewe grumbles, panting hard as her flanks contract. She tries to move away but careers into the wall, off balance, and stands a moment, stunned, confused. I take my chance, hook her with my crook and pull her into the corner of the fold. She struggles and complains, but she’s tired, lacking strength to fight.

  Her hind legs are bloodied, already blackened and stiff. There’s no sign of her water – it’s long been broken – but her backside is red and badly swollen. One small hoof protrudes from a seeping, sore hole. The poor creature grumbles again, loins quivering as she pushes, but instead of the double legs I hope to see, the single hoof doesn’t shift.

  I send a curse to the clouds. I’m too far from home to go for help, and Ambrose will be indoors by now, waiting for his supper, while Dority stirs the pot and bounces the baby on her hip.

  There’s a sudden cacophony as the crows rise from their watch post in a flurry of jagged wings and midnight-black feathers. Bracken barks. High above, a lone merlin circles, silent, waiting. She can smell death on the wind; at this time of year, even bad meat is better than none.

  The ewe rolls her amber eye to mine and makes a mournful whicker. She doesn’t struggle as I hopple her front legs with a length of twine, tug her ankles and shoulder her onto one side. I run my hands over her belly. She kicks her tethered feet without conviction. The flock tends to lamb by noon, before their shadows grow short, but that hour is long gone: this lamb must be stuck, or maybe worse. I must get it out or lose them both.

  Hurrying now, I strip off my heavy coat and hat, for I cannot work so encumbered. The air snatches my breath. The freezing deep of winter may be passing but it’s still bitter cold. I did not wear my stays today, preferring the ease and practicality of men’s clothes for my work, and the sudden chill bites beneath the rough kersey of my shirt.

  I roll up my sleeves and kneel at the ewe’s back end. Lifting her tail, I see it’s worse than I first thought. Instead of a clean, wet opening, she’s torn and bleeding. Though I see no sign, I wonder if she’s birthed another before this one. Perhaps she’s injured herself in the struggle to be rid of the thing inside. There’s still only a single hoof in view, no sign of a second and no sign of a head.

  I grip the lamb’s hoof in one hand and slide the fingers of the other inside the ewe. She makes a strangled complaint. My heart tightens. ‘There now, girl, let’s get this out of you.’

  I push my knuckles inside, then more. Hot, shuddering muscle grips my wrist as she takes me in.

  I feel it at my fingertips – the hard little bud of a second hoof – and slide inward to find the joint. It slips away so I push deeper, feeling for the slime-covered fleece and bone of the lamb’s leg. Then I have it in my grasp. I try to draw it gently forward but feel it pull back – a sign the lamb is alive. My hope awakens. But if it’s to come, I must help it. Left alone it will die and poison the mother too.

  A fierce determination surfaces in me – the same I feel whenever I’m faced with Nature’s fickle ways. I know it’s wrong and I should accept God’s will in all things, but when it comes to my flock I’ll fight like a wildcat to make sure His will marries with my own.

  I push further inside, up to my elbow, encased by slick heat. It’s careful work, taking all my strength and concentration as the ewe grumbles and pants. At last I have two legs within my grasp but I cannot feel the head; the lamb is lying back to front, turned away from birth rather than towards it. I have to work fast; a lamb stuck like this will suffocate before it has a chance of first breath.

  I push deep and hook the second leg, trying to bring it forward to meet the first so I can start to pull. But it’s too much for the ewe. She strains against me, desperate to escape the thing that pains her. With no one to hold her still and no means of gaining better purchase, my arm is squeezed out. I’m splashed and smeared with scarlet. There’s something horrid about the vibrant hue – this is not the clotted, viscid stuff of birth but the fresh blood of a rupture. There’s something very wrong. I’m running out of time.

  I’ve been here before, and from the first time to this last it’s always the same – the struggle only makes me stubborn. If I cannot save the ewe, I’ll save her lamb; a bargain I make time and again with God.

  I push my hand inside to find the hind legs once more. Flesh slides between fingers like ribbons, the sheep’s channel a mess of meat. I grope blindly, no longer sure what I’m feeling. I swallow down rising panic as I feel the heartbeat pulse of blood against my hand. My arm is slick to the shoulder, shirtsleeve brightly streaked. It’s not right – there is too much blood.

  I find one hoof, and soon, a second. A quick check – I have the hind legs. There’s no time to try to turn the lamb, so I grip both hooves and pull, gently at first and then a little harder until I feel it begin to slide.

  The ewe has stopped straining and gives me no aid. She’s voiceless as she fades. But I feel a faint twitch from the lamb. I hold life in my fist, so I tug harder and bring the legs out. The mother groans. I struggle to my feet, levering all my weight now, and pull as hard as I can. And the lamb is born at last, slithering forth, yellow as butter, slippery as a trout.

  The animal is formed well enough, as I knew this ewe would bring, but there’s no sign of breath. I have no straw or grass to rub it down, to hurry the life into its lungs, so I tear off my waistcoat and use that, ignoring the pinch of icy air. I wipe away the gore from its nose and mouth and dangle it, head down, swinging it gently back and forth, urging it to draw that first crucial breath. But the pale little body stays l
imp and airless.

  Most often, a healthy ewe will turn about to find her young, licking it to life. Quickly, I use my knife to slice the tethers from the sheep’s ankles but she just lies there, flanks heaving, exhausted and blank-eyed, nothing left to give. Bracken comes sniffing, nose to nose, but there’s no response – the ewe no longer has the strength even for fear. I take the lamb to her head, hoping the scent will rouse her. Steam rises from the slick little body. The mother’s nostrils quiver but her eyes are clouding: she cannot help me.

  I push the lamb against her fleece and rub hard. I wrap the tiny thing in my waistcoat once again and do the same, sending both prayers and curses up to a God who likes to give with one hand and take away with the other. And at last the lamb splutters and shudders, struggles to open its eyes.

  The mother lasts long enough to hear the first fragile cry of her newborn. She fixes me with those amber eyes and I see the moment that she gives up. She lays her head upon the grave-cold ground, ready to breathe her last.

  There’s nothing more I can do for her, out here, alone, with the dark gathering. I hate to leave her to the mercy of foxes and wild dogs. I hate to lose her, to admit defeat, but there’s a chance for the lamb, if I can get it to warmth and milk soon enough. I’m less than half an hour from Scarcross Hall, where a fire burns in the kitchen and Agnes will heat the milk. I make the painful choice, as I always do.

  I pull on my coat and hat, tighten my waistcoat around the small, quivering creature and cradle it against my chest, ignoring the feeble panting of the ewe. I’ll send Ambrose with the cart to collect whatever is left of her in the morning. Calling Bracken to my side, I start out across the fell, making for higher ground. I hold the lamb tight for warmth, feeling it shiver, pressing its timid heartbeat against my own. I do not look back.

  There’s a fog gathering, sitting heavy on the hills, sinking into the valley. I know the paths across these moors like I know every stone and slate of Scarcross Hall, but when the fog comes down it’s fast and unforgiving, and even us hefted ones can lose our way.