‘Oh no, keep it dear. It’s a present. You’ll realise what a foul lot the Dearmans were, despite the name. Nothing dear about them at all. Bunch of bastards. Lionel did it very well; pulled all the skeletons out of the cupboards, which is why I can’t let people like Titus Sutton read it. Titus is a distant relative and has mentally rewritten history . . .’ Lilian leaned in as if Titus Sutton might be within hearing distance and tapped her temple. ‘In his head the Dearmans belong to a noble lineage, friends with royalty, rich as Croesus and God’s right-hand men. Not the case at all; they were cruel arse-lickers. Although Lionel didn’t quite use that expression when describing them, being a man of the cloth. “Toadying” was the euphemism he plumped for.’
Marnie thought she might enjoy reading about the Dearmans. She needed to get her teeth into something this weekend to stop her thinking about what might be happening over at Justin’s house and Buster Edwards and Ronnie Biggs weren’t really doing it for her.
‘My family have owned Wychwell for generations,’ Lilian went on. ‘Henry the eighth gave the manor to my ancestor Edward Dearman as a reward for his loyalty when he was looting all the monasteries. Frightful man, according to history. Two-faced bastard. Staunch Catholic but knew which side his bread was best buttered. It was he who cursed us all.’
‘Cursed us all?’ Marnie echoed as a question.
‘Oh, you’ll read all about it in the book. He had a witch drowned in the well outside her cottage in the woods, hence the name of the village. Some harmless bugger who happened to have a black cat and grew comfrey, probably. She’s supposed to haunt the place. I’ve never seen her myself but some say they’ve seen orbs of light through the manor windows at night. Usually after a heavy session at the Wych Arms, no doubt.’
‘How very sad,’ replied Marnie. ‘Is the well still there?’
‘Somewhere, but we lost it,’ Lilian said with regret. ‘Her cottage was burned down and the well closed up to seal in the bad luck, which was unfortunate as it tapped into a spring and was the only clean water around. Probably why she was so healthy and the rest of the village was riddled with pox. It didn’t get rid of the curse at all. Of course, it might have helped us if we’d fornicated outside the family occasionally.’
Macaron woman on the next table slammed her china cup down onto her saucer in a gesture of disgust. It had no effect on Lilian whatsoever.
‘Do come for the May Fair, Marnie. Everyone dresses in medieval costumes, or as witches, apart from the Suttons who prefer their country tweeds. I can show you Little Raspberries. You never know, you might take a liking to it.’
‘Thank you, I’ll put it in my diary,’ said Marnie, not committing herself to a promise because country fairs weren’t really her scene and she had other plans for that May Day weekend. Lord knows why Lilian Dearman was so keen to show her an empty cottage. She could hardly live in it and commute to Leeds every day, if that was what she was thinking.
The waitress brought the amended bill and Lilian snatched it deftly up from the table.
‘Let me get it,’ insisted Marnie.
‘Absolutely not. I invited you here, so the onus is on me,’ replied Lilian, foraging in her bag and pulling out a purse which was battered and bright purple and fat with notes. ‘You can get the next one.’ She counted out the exact cost and then added a fifty-pence piece to the saucer.
‘Okay, I will then,’ Marnie said as Lilian struggled to her feet, stiff from sitting down for so long.
As they walked out, Lilian took Marnie’s arm for balance.
‘It’s no fun at all getting past sixty when you have defective genes. I’m old before my time.’
Marnie didn’t comment, though she remembered how sprightly Mrs McMaid had been in her eighties. Even after all these years, Mrs McMaid continued to pop into her thoughts on a regular basis.
As the duo walked into the street and then around the corner, Marnie knew instantly that the huge vintage black Rolls Royce parked very badly must be Lilian’s. It made every other car near it look like a Matchbox toy.
‘We always have the best weather at the fair. It hasn’t rained on our May Day celebrations for over a hundred years. The bloody weather hasn’t cursed us at least,’ Lilian said, opening the door to the Rolls and sliding her stick across the seat into the passenger side footwell.
‘Oh my,’ gasped Marnie as she took in the beautiful interior of the Roller. With its walnut dash and many dials, it looked more like the cockpit of a private jet.
‘It was Daddy’s car,’ said Lilian. ‘Hideous man. He hated it so he never drove it. That’s why I can because I don’t have any memories of him associated with it. I’m thinking of leaving it to my groundsman when I die. You’ll like him. One of very few men on the planet who isn’t a bastard.’
Marnie couldn’t help the giggle that escaped from her lips. Poor Lilian must have suffered at male hands in her life. It wasn’t really anything to laugh about but her delivery was just too funny.
Despite her frail frame, Lilian turned to Marnie and embraced her with a grip worthy of a WWE wrestler. As she did so, Marnie caught a whiff of face powder and talcum and the bottom notes of that lovely perfume and as a picture of Mrs McMaid puffed past her brain like the lightest of warm breezes, Marnie now knew for certain that they both wore the same fragrance. How delightfully odd and wonderful, she thought.
‘Dear Marnie, you are exactly how I thought you’d be. What a joyous hour I’ve had,’ Lilian said, with feeling. ‘Do come and see me soon. May Day falls on a Sunday this year so we will be celebrating on the actual day rather than the nearest weekend to it. Always has stronger magic when we do that.’
Marnie smiled. She believed that there was a little magic circulating in the world. Like Mrs McMaid’s special ingredient. And whatever magic had brought her and Justin together at Clifford’s retirement do. Yes, there was still some around, for sure.
‘I’ll see,’ she said, helping Lilian into the Roller. Then, she stood and waved as Lilian pulled out onto the road at a snail’s pace, testing the impatience of a car driver who had slowed down to allow her to manoeuvre out. He beeped on his horn and Marnie saw a long arm being extended through the window of the Roller, one finger held aloft. Then Lilian sped off as if the drugs squad were after her, the sound of a chirpy double-pip on her horn trailing behind her like a tail.
Chapter 6
HISTORY OF WYCHWELL BY LIONEL TEMPLE
with contributions by Lilian Dearman.
Edward Sutton Dearman was a brutal, feared man in the county. When Henry VIII embarked on his project to dissolve the monasteries between 1536 and 1541, Edward saw his way to bring himself to the attention of the king at court and his toadying demeanour was attractive to the king’s vanity. Edward, it was said, could smell a priest hidden in the walls of a house as sure as a dog could smell a rat. Ironic that he convinced his fellows that this gift was God-given and not witchcraft.
As a reward for his duties, Henry ejected the Lord of the Manor Sir Percival Shanke and his immediate family, executing them for their allegiance to the Catholic faith, and gave the house and lands to Dearman.
Dearman forcibly married Elizabeth Swannecke, the niece of Percival’s wife, but after a succession of miscarriages, Dearman – who had made many enemies through his ruthless ambitions – decided there was black magic working against him.