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I lean toward her. “Your blood would say differently.”
We turn and walk back out into the night where mist has once again turned to rain. It’s still light though and won’t interfere with my work.
She’s quiet as I lead her back outside although the resistance has begun again. That and her shivering.
“I’m cold,” she says.
“They’re colder,” I tell her as we walk to the farthest point in the cemetery on the west side of the chapel. The mausoleum is on the east side. Here lies a single grave marker and this grave is not tended. It’s overgrown with weeds and surrounded by its own rotting iron fence. The only thing kept intact are the name and dates of birth and death of the grave’s inhabitant.
“This one,” I start, pointing to it, feeling the cold creep over me, just the same as when I was taught our history as a child. “This is Nellie Bishop.” 1690 – 1711. “She lived two years more than Mary. They were supposed to be friends if you can believe it. A Bishop and a St. James. Friends.”
“I’m really cold. Can we please go back?”
“No.” I release her, and she rubs her bare arms. “You see, you Bishops have always been a greedy lot. The men coveted their neighbor’s possessions. Their wives. And as founding members of IVI, they had power. Power they abused. Although they underestimated Draca St. James.”
“I don’t know what you’re talking about.”
“Do you know the name Reginald Bishop?”
She nods. “I’ve seen his portrait in the house.”
“He, like your father, had a hard time keeping his dick in his pants. Except that Mary wasn’t his. She’d worked for him, though, before she married into the St. James family. Imagine that. A servant in one household who becomes queen in another. Draca St. James fell in love with her on sight. I’ll show you a portrait later. You’ll see why. He married her within weeks of having laid eyes on her. But Reginald, like most Bishops, was an entitled man. I’m sure selling off half his land to what he considered the help in order to keep afloat didn’t help. Maybe that’s why he did it. Who knows? What is certain, is him believing himself entitled to Mary. Even when she no longer worked in his household, he felt he had some claim to her. Even after she was a St. James, a member of IVI. The same Society his family had founded, he felt himself above any law. He took her. And when she wouldn’t have him, he raped her.”
Isabelle looks horrified.
“And when he was finished with her, he sent her back barefoot and pregnant. He waited until her stomach swelled with his bastard to do it. I imagine he took some sick pride in it. In impregnating the wife of another. A man he deemed lesser.”
I don’t realize I’ve grown quiet until she speaks. “What happened then?”
“Draca took her back. He loved her. And he was the one to discover her hanging in that cellar not one week later.”
She gasps, covers her mouth with her hand.
“Is she what I felt? The ghost?”
I study her but don’t tell her there is more than one. We have a history with rope, my family. An obsession with it.
“She couldn’t stand the thought of bringing another Bishop into the world,” I say instead, ignoring her question altogether. “She felt shame. Shame at what he’d done to her. Shame at being raped.”
“What did Draca do?”
“He initiated The Rite.” I watch her as I say it. Her face blanches and she hugs her arms tightly around herself. “He took Nellie Bishop, Reginald’s daughter. And he married her. They never had children, thank goodness. He wouldn’t pollute our bloodline.”
“But The Rite safeguards against an abuse of power. And marriage is an abuse of power in a case like that,” she says, and I get the feeling she’s arguing her own case.
“IVI supported it. Just like they supported my initiation of The Rite.”
“But—”
“See, Bishop did make a mistake. It’s always an error to think yourself above the law. He was an arrogant man. And not well-liked within The Society. He’d made enemies. Like your brother has,” I add. “And when it came to The Rite, The Tribunal sided with St. James. It was to punish Reginald Bishop as much as anything else. And at that point, our family’s fortunes far exceeded those of the Bishops. Similar to today, actually.”
She shakes her head. “Did he hurt Nellie?”
I remain wordless, studying her.
She shudders. “I want to go back.”
“When your history lesson is over.” I turn back to the grave. “Nellie died two years after the marriage. Threw herself into the well and drowned. Or so it’s said. Draca married again but only to continue the family line. His one true love was Mary.” I pause, look at Isabelle who is studying the inscription on Nellie’s grave. “There’s space for one more beside hers,” I tell her. She looks at me, confused. “Another Bishop to keep Nellie company.”
