He didn’t answer, but kept staring into the fire as though I weren’t there. ‘But what hope is there for me?’ he said softly. ‘Always to play the follower. Always to beg for scraps. It is evil to think on it, but… it is the only way…’ He trailed into silence, the flicker of flames animating his face.
‘My lord?’ I tried again. Nothing. I looked over at the flapping embroidery again for a cue and Lachlan made a poky motion. ‘Try to touch him,’ he mouthed.
In front of me the earl sighed deeply and scratched his groin. I still wasn’t sure whether he could see me or not, or whether he was ignoring me as the inferior female I clearly was.Tentatively,and expecting to be gripped by the wrist at any moment, I stretched out a hand and prodded him on the cheek. Or, at least, I tried to, because my hand went right through and I ended up poking the back of the chair quite hard instead. The lack of reaction on the part of the earl continued.
‘Well, that’s that, then,’ said Lachlan in a normal voice from the staircase. ‘He can’t see you either.’
‘Bugger,’ David put in.
‘Yep. Bang goes my theory. Oh, well, come on out, lass.’ Lachlan held up the tapestry for me to pass under, at which point the earl looked up, saw the flapping fabric and shouted.
‘John! John, get yourself here and close this doorway up! The draughts in this place are enough to freeze a stallion.’
‘John’ came up the stairs not particularly fast and muttering. He passed right through all of us as we headed downwards and I could have sworn I heard him say ‘righteous oaf’ as he went. I would have inserted a few more epithets in there, but I was too relieved to be unmolested. We went back to our dingy cellar, where I unwound the blanket from my head and collapsed on a stool.
The others left us alone. Maybe they didn’t want to have to face Lachlan, who was looking grim-faced. He lit a candle. ‘That’s it for that idea, then,’ he said, pushing the candle onto the middle of the table between us. ‘I really did think I’d got it.’
‘Got what?’ I was wriggling back into my jeans under cover of the skirt and the table. It was way too breezy for a shift and a skirt and I had no idea how all the other women weren’t freezing.
‘Why we’re here.’ He lowered his voice with a glance towards the other three. ‘I was so sure that you were here to talk to the earl, either to get or give some information.’
‘What kind of information though?’ I paused in the middle of putting my boots back on to watch his face through the flame. His stubbled cheeks were highlighted by the flickering light andhis eyes looked enormous. The rest of his face was planes and angles, all of which looked depressed.
‘I’m not sure. Something that I know, something that could be important to him, with you to pass the information on was where I was coming to, but if he can’t see you either, that’s going to be tricky. So, maybe it’s not that. But if not, then what?’ He rubbed his hands over his face. ‘Maybe I was wrong all along. Maybe this really isn’t anything to do with either of us. Any of us. Perhaps we are all here by accident.’ He shook his head.
‘It’s weird though.’ I began picking at the table. It was so roughly hewn that it was only one stage removed from the actual tree it had been. ‘Look. We can touch the table.’ I rapped it with my knuckles to illustrate my point. ‘We can toucheverythingthat isn’t alive. We can open doors, we can pick things up… but we can’t touch, be touched or be seen.’
‘Your point?’ Lachlan leaned forward now so we were almost nose to nose over the candle.
‘If we’re not here – because nobody can see us – then how come we have to eat and wee and the animals know we’re here?’
He gave me an angled-head look that seemed to be thoughtful. ‘I see what you mean,’ he said slowly. ‘We’re in a kind of between state.’
‘And… and—’ I warmed to my theme ‘—there must be areasonfor it, surely? Or, not a reason, but a solution? I mean, maybe we could write a note to the earl? Get into that room and find some paper and a pen and write what we need him to know? When we find out what that is, obviously.’
‘Oh, now there’s a good thought.’ Lachlan was still assessing me. ‘Maybe it’s not about us, it’s about what we know. We need to work out what we need to say first and then find a way to get the information to him.’
‘Yes.’
‘Could be trickier than we think.’ Lachlan was looking at my hands now; I was still picking at the table. ‘They don’t leave pens and ink lying around. It’s not like at home where there’s a biro in every drawer – here you have to make your own ink and use quill pens.’
‘Oh,’ I said, deflated.
‘No, no, it was a good thought. But maybe some other way?’ He laid a hand over mine, stopping me from shredding my nails on the unfinished wood surface. ‘We could carve the message into wood? Or stone?’
‘Like the Ten Commandments?’ I felt better again. I was havingideas.
‘Why not? There’s plenty of both about, and we can steal a knife. Maybe we could use a sword?’
We stopped talking, suddenly aware that the other three had also stopped their conversations and were listening in.
‘You want to write the Ten Commandments?’ David asked, clearly baffled.
‘Something like that.’ Lachlan grinned at me and then winked.
‘Because Pax can’t prostitute herself?’ David went on.
‘If there’s ever a prize for Weird Conversational Topics, you two are in with a fighting chance of first prize,’ Mal said. ‘I want you to know that.’
