Author's Note:
This Gothic short story was written for my HSC English Extension Two major work, over the course of several months in 2019.
TRIGGER WARNING: Suicide.
“There is something at work in my soul, which I do not understand.” - Mary Shelley, Frankenstein
***
The fate of Clara Shelley, the heiress to Lochmere Estate, was decided the bitterly cold winter’s day Adeline Pleasance Liddell drowned in the boating lake of St Monica’s Catholic School for Young Ladies.
It was a dark, wintery morning, deep in one of Oxford’s bitterest Novembers. It was the kind of winter that would be talked about in typical British small-talk for years to come, remember that year, what was it, when poor Miss Liddell drowned in the boating lake, ah that was a cold one, wasn’t it? It was the kind of winter when the frost would bite at the girls’ red noses, all wrapped up in matching duck-egg-blue scarves, as they traipsed to-and-fro across the school grounds towards their boarding houses. And the folks of all around would compare it to the Great Frost of 1684 when the Thames froze over.
The ice was all Clara could see when Sister Gwendolyn dragged her from her bed in the dead of the dawn, wrapping a quilt around her shivering shoulders and frog-marching her to the office. The police have questions to ask you, Miss Shelley.
Jack Frost had been at work again that night, spreading ice across the lake like a deathly looking-glass. She could picture the police wading into its icy depths and dragging out the night-gowned body. Clara wanted to remember Adeline’s eyes. They always reminded her of the autumn days playing Conkers with horse chestnuts in the Botanical Gardens, but all she could picture was Sister Gwendolyn bent over Adeline whispering per istam sanctam unctionem ignoscat tibi Dominus quicquid peccaveris sive deliqueris, and closing those eyes.
Clara could only see the cracked mirror of ice with its seven-years-bad-luck as the undertakers took away the shrouded body of her Adeline. She lay in bed during the funeral, staring at Adeline’s half-finished paintings and the embers burning low in the fire. They asked her questions, but the stones in Adeline’s pocket told their own story. Still, the girls who read too many Penny Dreadfuls peeked into her dormitory, their voices plagued her; whispers and snatches of was it murder? Only Clara knew the whole story, yet doubts crawled around her mind as she buried under the dusty blankets. Adeline had been her only companion at St Monica’s, to others she remained elusive. She dreamt of her childhood home, of a time before Adeline; every cobblestone in Oxford held innumerable memories of their time together. She took me there, to Oxford, many years later, and told their story.
10th of November, 1897, from the port of Southampton.
Dearest Sister Gwendolyn,
This is a brief note before I board my ship, HMS Prometheus, and set sail for India, but it is an urgent matter. My daughter, Clara Shelley, in your care, wrote to me late last week to express her desperate grief at the death of her intimate acquaintance, one Miss Liddell. I express my most sorrowful condolences to all those who knew the young woman, and suggest, in the light of such a traumatic incident, a doctor be sent to visit my daughter. I have heard wonders from the Americas about Dr Silas Weir Mitchell and his treatment of hysteria.
Yours truly,
Captain J. R. Shelley.
***
The doctor appeared in her dormitory late one afternoon, not more than three weeks after the death of Adeline. Awoken by the bright winter light Clara threw her faded quilts over her head in anguish, as if she were a child of the night, Stoker’s vampire, not a young lady. Slats of dusty light pierced the foetid air, and the doctor slunk towards her, instruments of examination hanging like rotting fruit from his grey-tinged pockets. A note was left behind Hysteria it said, grief-stricken, neurasthenia and a rest cure will do the girl a world of good.
That evening Sister Mary draped the girl’s travelling coat around her shoulders and packed her battered trunk into the back of the cab; her school books, unopened for weeks, her winter clothes, salted meat, tins of biscuits, cocoa and Indian tea. Clara gazed emptily at her reflection as Sister Mary’s hands braided her hair, remembering the feel of Adeline’s fingers on her neck. Guilt rose in her throat. She was running away again, as far away from the ghost of Adeline as she could get - Scotland.
***
The cab clattered over the cobbled streets, the dreaming spires of the city shrouded in winter fog as if it too were mourning for Adeline. Clara breathed damply on the cold glass and wiped the window clear, taking one last look at the city that had been her home for six years. On the top of the college buildings, yellowing like the pages of old newspapers, perched a crow, which eyed the cab beadily. Everywhere she could see, Oxford, her city which had once looked so promising, full of colours and stories, was now grey and yellow. The fog enveloped the cab and Clara was left staring at her ghostly reflection in the window as they traversed the backwater hedge-lined lanes of the countryside and green rolling hills turned into violet mountains.
***
The cab came to a halt, jolting Clara awake. The driver didn’t turn, she hadn’t once seen his face this whole journey, just his white driving gloves. Miss Shelley, we have arrived at Lochmere, you’re home Miss. Clara stepped out of the cab, clutching at her bags with white knuckles, the great twisting metal vines of the gates rose up above her. She had not been home for six years, since the death of her mother, since the fourth time she ran away to Glasgow and her father decided it would be best to put her in a convent. She had always been good at forging her father’s signature, but had she taken it too far this time?
Lochmere Estate sat above a deep purple loch. Water lapped at a courtyard filled with tumbling vines of ivy, an untended forest of weeds. Clara remembered the roses that filled the sweet-smelling summer gardens of her childhood, the autumn beech trees, the lichen that licked every branch, the freshly cut grass, the fallen logs coated in thick damp moss, the soft purple heather, and the stretching expanse of water buried between towering snow-tipped mountains. Clara looked up at the melancholy, crumbling mansion lost among the weeds and brambles like Brier-Rose’s castle. It appeared foreboding in the dusk, looming like an apparition over the loch.
***
Miss Shelley, said the magpie-like nun, as she peered beadily over the top of her glasses at Clara, this is Miss Liddell. She addressed the girl in the doorway, Adeline, could you take this girl up to the dormitories, and show her to Mary’s old bed please? Clara smiled shyly at the freckled girl with the frizzy plaits escaping from underneath her boater who stared back. Come on then carrot-cake, we have milk and fresh biscuits in the dormitories, let me help you with your trunk. The two girls heaved the large trunk up stoney spiral staircases and into a small dormitory with two beds. This is your bed, you can put your things in the cupboard with mine. The room smelt of damp stone and oil paint, like a cathedral. Clara clutched her mother’s pocket-watch that was strung around her neck and struggled to hold back salty tears of homesickness, imagining her father far out to sea rolling over star-spangled waves. It’s perfectly normal to feel lonely Clara, we all do. Adeline Liddell sat down on the dusty faded quilt next to Clara, and reached out a pale hand, grasping Clara’s own, white-gloved fingers. St Monica’s is your home now.
***
No one was there to greet her at the door, not that she expected anyone; no one was expecting her. Her father dismissed the all the household staff when her mother died. Clara reached out a slender white-gloved hand towards the door, an ancient wooden monstrosity warning intruders of the past.
The house certainly looked unkind but when she turned the rusty key in the lock it clicked. The door opened slowly with a creak that echoed around the entrance hall. Clara shrugged off her travelling coat and hung it up. She unwound her St. Monica’s scarf and slid off her white kid gloves and placed them on the ornate ebony dresser. Reacquainting herself with the strangely familiar mahogany parquet-floored hallway, Clara wandered around the entrance hall. It was cold and shadowy. Placing her pocket-watch on the dresser next to her gloves, Clara gently fingered the petals of the dead lilies which sat in a Ming Dynasty vase, and watched as they crumbled into dust. She bent down to the grate, her boots sinking into the ashes, and pulled out a Bryant and May box of matches. Her cold hands fumbled with the match and it burst into flame. She lit the gas lamp and its dim light cast shadows dancing about the room. She was unused to fending for herself and the damp wood refused to light. Picking up the tiny silver timepiece Clara held it to her ear. She imagined it ticking and whispered to herself, Oh my ears and whiskers how late it’s getting! but no sound emitted from the pocket watch. The only timekeeper in Lochmere was the beating of her tell-tale heart.
An empty frame was hanging on the wall, carefully holding an absence, like a birdcage with the door open. Clara remembered standing on tiptoes and peering into the looking glass that was once held in that frame. That was before. The housekeeper had gossiped loudly, wiping her wooden spoon on a floury apron. Your father cannot stand the sight of his own face. Clara knew he also could not stand the sight of her, not since her mother died.
***
Adeline had a picture frame on the table beside her bed, the glass marked with fingerprints. It was her parents’ wedding day photograph. Spidery brown handwriting on the edge read Mr & Mrs Liddell 1879. Adeline treasured that photograph and what it meant, memories of her childhood and all her brothers and sisters back in London. Yet one autumn evening, when Clara lay flopped on her bed, watching Adeline paint, something had changed. Her brushstrokes were angry, the landscape fiery. On the floor lay the sparkling shards of glass from the frame amongst the torn-up photograph. Red candle wax was spilt across her father’s young, happy face. What did they say, Adeline? Her hands were bloody and the painting burned.
***
Clara shivered as she wandered about the long labyrinthine hallways and passages of Lochmere. Every turn, every creak in the floorboards felt like a deja-vu to Clara, at once familiar and foreign. In the shadowy corners of her mind memories flickered, like the light of a gaslamp, memories of her childhood here, of a nursery room she has not yet rediscovered, of her dead mother’s ringlets, and the smell of her perfume, of her father’s charts and maps in the study, of looking-glasses and dances, of a nurse chasing her around the loch screeching Clara! Miss Clara! Come here right this moment Miss Clara! Then came the guilty whispers burning up around her mind, she shut her eyes tight and covered her ears to block them out.
Miss Shelley and Miss Liddell, there was always something queer about them-
I would bet anything she killed the poor girl, she was jealous of-
Did you hear what Sister Madeline said?
She did it, Miss Shelley sir, Miss Shelley was the only one who saw her all week!
The injustice of it all! Clara remembered Adeline smiling at her from her reflection in the looking-glass in their dormitory, as she braided her hair tightly around her head. Clara could not see her own reflection in the glass, just Adeline. She felt Adeline’s hand in hers, heard her whispers late at night, the taste of her lips, watched the spidery scrawl of her handwriting, addressing feverish letters home. She knew it was not her fault, it’s not anyone’s fault, but all she could think about were the whispers. All she could see were the torn-up letters and Adeline’s bloody hands. All she could see was the shattered ice and the soaked nightgown.
As she lay in bed that night, the damp-smelling sheets wrapped around her shivering legs Clara thought she could hear sobbing. The muffled sound of a child sobbing, as if locked behind a door. When the first sounds of dawn crept through the cracked windows, Clara untangled herself from the sheets and went to wash her face. The faucet grumbled and moaned and the water that trickled out was muddy like water wrung out of winter dresses. The mirror in front of Clara was misted up, she could not discern an outline of her own face but knew it was tear-stained and dirty from travelling. Out of the window, figures moved in the garden but she blinked and they were gone.
***
A melody floated through the empty house hovering in the air. She thought she heard the door swinging shut. It was a half-forgotten memory from her school days. Nocturne No.2 in E flat major. Chopin.
The night at the ballet, The Nutcracker. The gilded foyers of burnished gold reflected the flickering candles and the faces around her. She remembered twirling in front of her reflection to the orchestral score that floated around her childlike head, dancing her way down the stairs, her Sunday best; velvet and starched linen. Adeline mimicking the staccato music, creeping after her and clutching her hands together as they danced down the hallways. That was what it felt like inside Clara’s head that winter, like one half of Tchaikovsky’s pas de deux.
When the music faded Clara sat down in front of the fireplace and lit a weak fire. The wood had dried and it coughed and sputtered smoke up the chimney out into the cold Scottish evening air. A book lay open and unread on her lap, and she could still hear the desperate sobs and little footsteps running around the house. Feverishly she explored the estate but most of the doors were locked, no child to be found. She was certainly alone. She went to grab another shortbread, but the last one was gone, sticky fingerprints and crumbs all that was left.
In all her wanderings, it troubled Clara that she could not find her childhood nursery. She remembered it so clearly; the pale ugly-patterned yellow wallpaper, the big double-sash windows, the mirror she once twirled in front of every morning as Nurse untangled her hair. A hallway, lined with foreboding portraits of her ancestors, looked so familiar she thought perhaps one of the doors opened into her nursery - but every door was locked. On occasion, it reminded her of the dark stony corridors of St Monica’s. It was the small things she missed about St. Monica’s. The musty smell of the library. The taste of paint on Adeline’s soft fingers. The feel of the icy-cold stone floors on a summer’s morning. The smoky sting of Adeline’s chapped lips, the bitterness of the tobacco she would smoke out of the window in secret; the nuns would be fuming if they ever discovered her.
The night at the ballet, The Nutcracker. The gilded foyers of burnished gold reflected the flickering candles and the faces around her. She remembered twirling in front of her reflection to the orchestral score that floated around her childlike head, dancing her way down the stairs, her Sunday best; velvet and starched linen. Adeline mimicking the staccato music, creeping after her and clutching her hands together as they danced down the hallways. That was what it felt like inside Clara’s head that winter, like one half of Tchaikovsky’s pas de deux.
When the music faded Clara sat down in front of the fireplace and lit a weak fire. The wood had dried and it coughed and sputtered smoke up the chimney out into the cold Scottish evening air. A book lay open and unread on her lap, and she could still hear the desperate sobs and little footsteps running around the house. Feverishly she explored the estate but most of the doors were locked, no child to be found. She was certainly alone. She went to grab another shortbread, but the last one was gone, sticky fingerprints and crumbs all that was left.
In all her wanderings, it troubled Clara that she could not find her childhood nursery. She remembered it so clearly; the pale ugly-patterned yellow wallpaper, the big double-sash windows, the mirror she once twirled in front of every morning as Nurse untangled her hair. A hallway, lined with foreboding portraits of her ancestors, looked so familiar she thought perhaps one of the doors opened into her nursery - but every door was locked. On occasion, it reminded her of the dark stony corridors of St Monica’s. It was the small things she missed about St. Monica’s. The musty smell of the library. The taste of paint on Adeline’s soft fingers. The feel of the icy-cold stone floors on a summer’s morning. The smoky sting of Adeline’s chapped lips, the bitterness of the tobacco she would smoke out of the window in secret; the nuns would be fuming if they ever discovered her.
The hallway of locked-doors stretched out in front of her, dizzyingly long, the furthest doors big enough only for mice. I need only a bottle of potion labelled drink-me. Clara mused. Between every door was a portrait of her stony-faced ancestors. A Shelley great-great-grandfather, a Shelley great-uncle, a Baron Shelley, a General Shelley - a family tree hidden in a hallway of locked doors. Clara stroked the dust off the rotting frames that held her ancestors' faces, the peeling gold paint flaking off in her fingers. She did not know why all these faces looked at her with such disdain. Her mother’s portrait hung regally in the ballroom, above the dusty fireplace devoid of embers, but Clara had not opened the door to the ballroom, was yet to see the rosy brushstrokes that were all that was left of her mother. She never found a portrait of herself in this house. No images were to be seen of the cursed Shelley women.
Not even a looking-glass was anywhere to be seen. Every time she caught a glimpse of a reflection in the darkened windows, in the spoons and pots and pans all Clara saw was Adeline’s face. There used to be mirrors all around the house. Clara remembered peaking through the doorways, under the servants' feet, into the ballroom and seeing the ecstatic reflections of her parents’ friends. The gilded ballroom sat behind a locked door, the memories of parties and perfume and powder. The ladies’ stiff dresses, like birds of paradise, all bows and bustles. The men in embroidered tailcoats and extravagant moustaches. She remembered listening to the laughter, smelling the heady stench of absinthe. She remembered the dances; the Boston waltz, la valse a deux temp.
***
Clara drifted in and out of dreams, dreams that were nightmares, monsters crawling through her brain, people awakened from the dead calling her name. The days and nights slipped through her fingers like the water of the lake. She spent the nights tossing and turning like a feverish child.
The house wheezed in the darkness, its bones creaked and moaned. The air was still, moonlight streamed through the open shutters of the attic window. Clara could not bear to shut it, despite the cold, for fear of trapping herself in this place forever. Out of the window, the moonlight reflected on the still water of the loch, tree boughs were weighed down by snow.
Come away to the water. She heard the child calling her in her sleep. Not sobbing anymore but calling out accusingly. Come and find me. Find me by the river Clara.
Rosy-fingered dawn rose over the estate and Clara awakened. The dream slipped away from her. Fear flooded through her. That irrational fear of dreams that feel so real they curdle one’s blood, and yet she knew, when she awakened, that it was just the work of her imagination. Adeline smiled a melancholy smile in Clara’s mind, and turns and walks away, wet footprints left on the ash floor of the corridor. That’s odd, mused Clara. They found the body still wearing galoshes.
***
The loch was icy-cold as Clara dipped her fingers into it. Far too deep to freeze over, the water was glacial. Who knew what lurked in its depths? Her breath hung in the air. Shivering in her nightgown, Clara disturbed the water’s surface, carving spirals that danced out as ripples about her fingers. Above her, Lochmere sat shrouded in mist, encrusted in ivy. The coldness seeped into her skin, but Clara paid no attention. Her petticoats were crusted with the mud that squelched between her toes. The water stilled and Clara peered into the depths. There, in the water, was Adeline. Her lips blue, her eyes closed, her dark hair tangled. Her winter overcoat, pockets filled with pebbles, covered her duck-egg-blue St Monica’s nightgown. Clara stumbled back from the water’s edge, tripping over the crumbling steps of the courtyard and landed heavily. Cautiously, Clara crept toward the water once more. The ripples had died down, and there again, in the place of her own reflection, she saw the ghostly image of her Adeline. Adeline is dead. Adeline drowned herself weeks ago, in Oxford, she is not here, not real. The spectral image shuddered on the surface of the water but it did not disappear.
***
Clara remembered deep in a winter like this, when the girls went ice skating. They felt as if they had learnt to fly. Adeline danced on the icy river gracefully, her crimson winter coat flying out behind her, some ethereal spirit on the ice. She pulled Clara close, feeling the warmth of their intermingled breathe, clasping her icy-cold hands tight in her own. Adeline never wore gloves, much to the disapproval of the nuns, and her fingers were numb as they span round, round and around carving spirals into the mirror of ice.
***
Her heart rested uneasily in her throat. Her fingertips were blue from the cold, but to Clara, they looked crimson. It was her doing. She was the undoing of her beloved. Her heart beat hollowly in her chest, icy cold terror coursed through her veins. Dropping her lantern on the steps of the courtyard and slamming the door behind her, she tore up the staircase. The wind followed her, the windows rattled in their panes, doors banging in the draught. At the end of the hallway of locked doors, she saw a light from underneath the last door. She rattled the handle. Let me in, let me in. The light went out and Clara sank to the floor. Her body felt icy and she wrapped her coat closer around her, her bones aching for warmth.
***
At the bottom of her trunk lay a beautiful burgundy velveteen gown which Clara had not worn since the Christmas Ball in 1895. She had felt like the belle of the ball in the way Adeline looked at her that night. Clara sighed shakily as she untied the brown paper which the gown was wrapped in, and caressed its soft material. She remembered descending the staircase into the ballroom. Adeline did not have eyes for anyone else in the room. Not even for Sister Dorothy’s handsome nephew - who was being whisked around the ballroom with wild abandon by smitten girls. She only had eyes for Clara.
***
Adeline’s dark hair fell softly like autumn leaves around her shoulders, as she sat in front of the misty looking-glass. She held a letter, paper as thick and creamy as the fabric of her dress, blue ink and spidery handwriting. Clara’s pale cold fingers fumbled with silk ribbons. Adeline’s skin was feverish, her breathing heavier with the waltzing of Clara’s fingers across the silk and ivory, her own knuckles vividly bruised and swollen, the mark of Sister Gwendolyn's wrath. Adeline shook with heart-wrenching silent sobs, crumpled the letter and threw it to the ground. Clara hummed the waltz obliviously and glided across the soft dancefloor of Adeline’s back. She touched the silver pocket watch which never ticked that hung around her neck. Tell me. Adeline, tell me what he said. What did your father say? Adeline never responded.
***
Two years had passed, but it still fitted her. Clara struggled with the ribbons and tied it tight, her breath hitching in her chest. Stroking the deep burgundy skirts down, she was reminded of her father’s study with its crimson wallpaper and piles of books and maps gathering dust. She was not entirely sure why she felt compelled to dress up in her finest, but she was most glad to get out of the torn, muddy nightgown. It made Clara want to confront her trepidations. She slid her feet into her boots and laced them up. At her feet, the ashes stirred. Clara glanced around with uneasiness, but no window was open to the night air. She bent down to the grate, the embers blinking out and ran her fingers through the soft grey ashes. She peered closer at a curious imprint, there in the embers. There was another, and another just a little further away. Footprints in the ashes. Footprints of a child.
Clara, heart in her throat, span round almost tripping on her laces. In the looking glass with its rust spots and fogged up glass, Clara saw the shadowy outline of a figure behind her.
Clara. The voice was closer now, a sing-song whisper hissing like stormy winds down chimneys. Clara, come with me. You have to help me, Clara.
***
The footprints disappeared at the end of the hallway of locked doors and Clara reached out tentatively to the doorknob. The cold metal burned her fingers, but the door swung open.
Not even a looking-glass was anywhere to be seen. Every time she caught a glimpse of a reflection in the darkened windows, in the spoons and pots and pans all Clara saw was Adeline’s face. There used to be mirrors all around the house. Clara remembered peaking through the doorways, under the servants' feet, into the ballroom and seeing the ecstatic reflections of her parents’ friends. The gilded ballroom sat behind a locked door, the memories of parties and perfume and powder. The ladies’ stiff dresses, like birds of paradise, all bows and bustles. The men in embroidered tailcoats and extravagant moustaches. She remembered listening to the laughter, smelling the heady stench of absinthe. She remembered the dances; the Boston waltz, la valse a deux temp.
***
Clara drifted in and out of dreams, dreams that were nightmares, monsters crawling through her brain, people awakened from the dead calling her name. The days and nights slipped through her fingers like the water of the lake. She spent the nights tossing and turning like a feverish child.
The house wheezed in the darkness, its bones creaked and moaned. The air was still, moonlight streamed through the open shutters of the attic window. Clara could not bear to shut it, despite the cold, for fear of trapping herself in this place forever. Out of the window, the moonlight reflected on the still water of the loch, tree boughs were weighed down by snow.
Come away to the water. She heard the child calling her in her sleep. Not sobbing anymore but calling out accusingly. Come and find me. Find me by the river Clara.
Rosy-fingered dawn rose over the estate and Clara awakened. The dream slipped away from her. Fear flooded through her. That irrational fear of dreams that feel so real they curdle one’s blood, and yet she knew, when she awakened, that it was just the work of her imagination. Adeline smiled a melancholy smile in Clara’s mind, and turns and walks away, wet footprints left on the ash floor of the corridor. That’s odd, mused Clara. They found the body still wearing galoshes.
***
The loch was icy-cold as Clara dipped her fingers into it. Far too deep to freeze over, the water was glacial. Who knew what lurked in its depths? Her breath hung in the air. Shivering in her nightgown, Clara disturbed the water’s surface, carving spirals that danced out as ripples about her fingers. Above her, Lochmere sat shrouded in mist, encrusted in ivy. The coldness seeped into her skin, but Clara paid no attention. Her petticoats were crusted with the mud that squelched between her toes. The water stilled and Clara peered into the depths. There, in the water, was Adeline. Her lips blue, her eyes closed, her dark hair tangled. Her winter overcoat, pockets filled with pebbles, covered her duck-egg-blue St Monica’s nightgown. Clara stumbled back from the water’s edge, tripping over the crumbling steps of the courtyard and landed heavily. Cautiously, Clara crept toward the water once more. The ripples had died down, and there again, in the place of her own reflection, she saw the ghostly image of her Adeline. Adeline is dead. Adeline drowned herself weeks ago, in Oxford, she is not here, not real. The spectral image shuddered on the surface of the water but it did not disappear.
***
Clara remembered deep in a winter like this, when the girls went ice skating. They felt as if they had learnt to fly. Adeline danced on the icy river gracefully, her crimson winter coat flying out behind her, some ethereal spirit on the ice. She pulled Clara close, feeling the warmth of their intermingled breathe, clasping her icy-cold hands tight in her own. Adeline never wore gloves, much to the disapproval of the nuns, and her fingers were numb as they span round, round and around carving spirals into the mirror of ice.
***
Her heart rested uneasily in her throat. Her fingertips were blue from the cold, but to Clara, they looked crimson. It was her doing. She was the undoing of her beloved. Her heart beat hollowly in her chest, icy cold terror coursed through her veins. Dropping her lantern on the steps of the courtyard and slamming the door behind her, she tore up the staircase. The wind followed her, the windows rattled in their panes, doors banging in the draught. At the end of the hallway of locked doors, she saw a light from underneath the last door. She rattled the handle. Let me in, let me in. The light went out and Clara sank to the floor. Her body felt icy and she wrapped her coat closer around her, her bones aching for warmth.
***
At the bottom of her trunk lay a beautiful burgundy velveteen gown which Clara had not worn since the Christmas Ball in 1895. She had felt like the belle of the ball in the way Adeline looked at her that night. Clara sighed shakily as she untied the brown paper which the gown was wrapped in, and caressed its soft material. She remembered descending the staircase into the ballroom. Adeline did not have eyes for anyone else in the room. Not even for Sister Dorothy’s handsome nephew - who was being whisked around the ballroom with wild abandon by smitten girls. She only had eyes for Clara.
***
Adeline’s dark hair fell softly like autumn leaves around her shoulders, as she sat in front of the misty looking-glass. She held a letter, paper as thick and creamy as the fabric of her dress, blue ink and spidery handwriting. Clara’s pale cold fingers fumbled with silk ribbons. Adeline’s skin was feverish, her breathing heavier with the waltzing of Clara’s fingers across the silk and ivory, her own knuckles vividly bruised and swollen, the mark of Sister Gwendolyn's wrath. Adeline shook with heart-wrenching silent sobs, crumpled the letter and threw it to the ground. Clara hummed the waltz obliviously and glided across the soft dancefloor of Adeline’s back. She touched the silver pocket watch which never ticked that hung around her neck. Tell me. Adeline, tell me what he said. What did your father say? Adeline never responded.
***
Two years had passed, but it still fitted her. Clara struggled with the ribbons and tied it tight, her breath hitching in her chest. Stroking the deep burgundy skirts down, she was reminded of her father’s study with its crimson wallpaper and piles of books and maps gathering dust. She was not entirely sure why she felt compelled to dress up in her finest, but she was most glad to get out of the torn, muddy nightgown. It made Clara want to confront her trepidations. She slid her feet into her boots and laced them up. At her feet, the ashes stirred. Clara glanced around with uneasiness, but no window was open to the night air. She bent down to the grate, the embers blinking out and ran her fingers through the soft grey ashes. She peered closer at a curious imprint, there in the embers. There was another, and another just a little further away. Footprints in the ashes. Footprints of a child.
Clara, heart in her throat, span round almost tripping on her laces. In the looking glass with its rust spots and fogged up glass, Clara saw the shadowy outline of a figure behind her.
Clara. The voice was closer now, a sing-song whisper hissing like stormy winds down chimneys. Clara, come with me. You have to help me, Clara.
***
The footprints disappeared at the end of the hallway of locked doors and Clara reached out tentatively to the doorknob. The cold metal burned her fingers, but the door swung open.
Moonlight poured through the open windows, filling the yellow-walled room with an eerie glow. The candle in Clara’s hand flickered and went out in the breeze. Its trailing entrails of smoke reached helplessly into the sky like blood in the water. The moonlight remained bright enough for her to see without a candle. A rocking-horse under the window swayed gently, its faded paint was flaking off but Clara still recognised it from her childhood.
This was the nursery. A cradle, spotted with damp, sat by the empty fireplace. A child’s bed in the corner was draped with yellow blankets, matching the patterned wallpaper. Clara folded them back and saw a glittering underneath. She reached to pick it up. She turned the locket over in her cold hands, rubbing the green encrusted on it with her thumb to reveal engraved initials. J.R.S & F.M.S. Clara pressed down the catch and the locket sprang open. A lock of red hair floated onto the dusty floor. There were two photographs. They were old, worn at the edges and faded. A couple, neither more than five-and-twenty-years-old, were dressed in all their finery. The woman looked steadily at the photographer, her curled hair pinned under a majestic hat. Her husband, in a sailor’s uniform, gazed lovingly at her. The woman had fire in her eyes, but they were mournful. The other photograph was stained, but Clara looked closely. A little girl, perhaps six years old, cradled a swaddled toddler. Faint writing below the photograph was visible, Clara & Isabelle, May 1886.
She undid the clasp and put the locket around her neck. It rested there, cold against her chest where the tell-tale pocket-watch used to sit. Tasting her tears stinging her cracked lips, Clara lifted her velveteen skirts and hums. Nocturne No.2 in E flat major. The song her mother would play on the pianoforte. Dancing in the moonlight she span, the room gathering speed around her; a carousel of the past. As the phantom of her sister disappeared, Clara wished she could go with her.
A cloud drifted in front of the moon, obscuring her vision, but there it was. The looking glass. Floor to ceiling in an ornate ash frame, painted with images from the Grimm Brothers’ tales of princesses and swans and frogs and witches. Clara crept closer, and there in the mirror, she saw the hollow, frightened, face of a young woman, with crimson lips and stormy grey eyes. Rusty red curls hung around the gaunt, pale face. Her eyes a wild deers’, her cheeks were tear-stained and flushed. Clara felt a warm hand on her shoulder. She looked behind her, chills creeping like icy fingers down her spine, but not even the ashy spirit of her sister was there. She looked back in the mirror and there was Adeline, in the flesh, standing beside her. Clara reached out to touch her dead lover, but her fingers met her own reflection in the glass.
Adeline looked mournful, every joyful glint in her eye extinguished. She did not look like herself without dimples. Clara remembered with fresh pain, the last time, at the end of summer, she had seen Adeline’s dimples. The first day she realised there was no hero in this story, no one who could save Adeline. Tears rolled down Clara’s cold cheeks and Adeline nodded gently, it will be fine, her eyes seemed to say. But I wish you could come with me. Raising a single finger to her lips, Adeline disappeared and Clara was left staring at her own reflection.
***
The strength which had so characterised Clara, her vivacious attitude and warmth, had seeped out of her. It was dusk and all she had seen for days was her own reflection. Not a ghostly footprint to be seen. The windows rattled and banged in the rough breeze. Looking out at the still silver loch, Clara opened the dirty, rain-stained window and gulped in a rush of icy cold air which whipped about her ears. Her slender fingers trembling, she clutched her skirts, hoisting them above her loosely-laced boots, stepping up onto the ledge. The loch was far below her, and her head swam as she looked across the courtyard. Just one step, one fall, and she could join Adeline at the bottom of the water. Resolutely clinging to the crumbling sash, Clara lowered herself out of the window onto the ledge, tangling her dress amongst the thorny vines. In the courtyard, she saw a figure, a man in a large overcoat, a broom in hand. She remembered the caretaker and the caretaker’s son from when she was a child. How he brought her flowers from the garden and the housekeeper shooed him away with her duster. Clara’s fingers slipped on the gravelly stone wall and she stumbled, catching herself by a hair’s breadth. Her dress was caught on the thorny blackberry brambles. She remembered all of a sudden gathering the blackberries that tumbled around the estate and tiptoeing down to the kitchen to ask the cooks to make mouth-watering apple crumbles. She remembered being very young and her mother giggling, her lips stained blackberry-red as they snuck around the gardens in the cool early evening air.
This was the nursery. A cradle, spotted with damp, sat by the empty fireplace. A child’s bed in the corner was draped with yellow blankets, matching the patterned wallpaper. Clara folded them back and saw a glittering underneath. She reached to pick it up. She turned the locket over in her cold hands, rubbing the green encrusted on it with her thumb to reveal engraved initials. J.R.S & F.M.S. Clara pressed down the catch and the locket sprang open. A lock of red hair floated onto the dusty floor. There were two photographs. They were old, worn at the edges and faded. A couple, neither more than five-and-twenty-years-old, were dressed in all their finery. The woman looked steadily at the photographer, her curled hair pinned under a majestic hat. Her husband, in a sailor’s uniform, gazed lovingly at her. The woman had fire in her eyes, but they were mournful. The other photograph was stained, but Clara looked closely. A little girl, perhaps six years old, cradled a swaddled toddler. Faint writing below the photograph was visible, Clara & Isabelle, May 1886.
She undid the clasp and put the locket around her neck. It rested there, cold against her chest where the tell-tale pocket-watch used to sit. Tasting her tears stinging her cracked lips, Clara lifted her velveteen skirts and hums. Nocturne No.2 in E flat major. The song her mother would play on the pianoforte. Dancing in the moonlight she span, the room gathering speed around her; a carousel of the past. As the phantom of her sister disappeared, Clara wished she could go with her.
A cloud drifted in front of the moon, obscuring her vision, but there it was. The looking glass. Floor to ceiling in an ornate ash frame, painted with images from the Grimm Brothers’ tales of princesses and swans and frogs and witches. Clara crept closer, and there in the mirror, she saw the hollow, frightened, face of a young woman, with crimson lips and stormy grey eyes. Rusty red curls hung around the gaunt, pale face. Her eyes a wild deers’, her cheeks were tear-stained and flushed. Clara felt a warm hand on her shoulder. She looked behind her, chills creeping like icy fingers down her spine, but not even the ashy spirit of her sister was there. She looked back in the mirror and there was Adeline, in the flesh, standing beside her. Clara reached out to touch her dead lover, but her fingers met her own reflection in the glass.
Adeline looked mournful, every joyful glint in her eye extinguished. She did not look like herself without dimples. Clara remembered with fresh pain, the last time, at the end of summer, she had seen Adeline’s dimples. The first day she realised there was no hero in this story, no one who could save Adeline. Tears rolled down Clara’s cold cheeks and Adeline nodded gently, it will be fine, her eyes seemed to say. But I wish you could come with me. Raising a single finger to her lips, Adeline disappeared and Clara was left staring at her own reflection.
***
The strength which had so characterised Clara, her vivacious attitude and warmth, had seeped out of her. It was dusk and all she had seen for days was her own reflection. Not a ghostly footprint to be seen. The windows rattled and banged in the rough breeze. Looking out at the still silver loch, Clara opened the dirty, rain-stained window and gulped in a rush of icy cold air which whipped about her ears. Her slender fingers trembling, she clutched her skirts, hoisting them above her loosely-laced boots, stepping up onto the ledge. The loch was far below her, and her head swam as she looked across the courtyard. Just one step, one fall, and she could join Adeline at the bottom of the water. Resolutely clinging to the crumbling sash, Clara lowered herself out of the window onto the ledge, tangling her dress amongst the thorny vines. In the courtyard, she saw a figure, a man in a large overcoat, a broom in hand. She remembered the caretaker and the caretaker’s son from when she was a child. How he brought her flowers from the garden and the housekeeper shooed him away with her duster. Clara’s fingers slipped on the gravelly stone wall and she stumbled, catching herself by a hair’s breadth. Her dress was caught on the thorny blackberry brambles. She remembered all of a sudden gathering the blackberries that tumbled around the estate and tiptoeing down to the kitchen to ask the cooks to make mouth-watering apple crumbles. She remembered being very young and her mother giggling, her lips stained blackberry-red as they snuck around the gardens in the cool early evening air.
Despite the deep November chill, berries still clung to the brambles and Clara, carefully balancing on the ledge, hurriedly gathered them in her hands, as if in just a moment Nurse would appear around the window to chastise her. Fingertips and lips stained red, Clara gazed out across the misty loch towards the purple mountains looming in the distance, their tips obscured by clouds. Breathing in the icy cold air, she sighed with resignation. The loch lapped at the steps as if mocking her on the ledge. You cannot join her, they say, you cannot ever leave. You belong here, Clara Shelley. She climbed back in through the window and shut it tight. Nothing, not even juicy blackberries tempted her to play that sort of game with fate. Clara dusted the ash off her skirts, wrapped her mother’s damp fur coat around her and went to find some matches.
***
Adeline stared at her reflection in the mirror, her features blank, dark circles under her eyes. Clara softly kissed her neck but Adeline did not flinch. Come on, Latin starts in 10 minutes. Dried oil paint crumbled around Adeline’s nails, blues and greys, the colour of the winter sky. It’s cold Clara, it’s so cold. Clara poked at the embers in the fireplace, getting ashes on her scuffed boots, she wrapped the faded quilt around Adeline’s shoulders. Stay warm. She closed the door, quietly behind her, leaving Adeline alone among the ashes.
***
The rapping came at the door a second time, she was certain of it now. Clara deftly pinned her hair up with a rusty hatpin and made her way to the front door. The knocking was much louder now, rattling the door on its hinges, three knocks, a pause, and then again. Clara considered taking the hot fire poker with her as a weapon, but decided better of it. She stood tall and unlocked the door.
There on the doorstep, a gloved fist raised to knock once more, stood a tall bony-featured young man, carrying a preposterously large conifer.
***
Adeline stared at her reflection in the mirror, her features blank, dark circles under her eyes. Clara softly kissed her neck but Adeline did not flinch. Come on, Latin starts in 10 minutes. Dried oil paint crumbled around Adeline’s nails, blues and greys, the colour of the winter sky. It’s cold Clara, it’s so cold. Clara poked at the embers in the fireplace, getting ashes on her scuffed boots, she wrapped the faded quilt around Adeline’s shoulders. Stay warm. She closed the door, quietly behind her, leaving Adeline alone among the ashes.
***
The rapping came at the door a second time, she was certain of it now. Clara deftly pinned her hair up with a rusty hatpin and made her way to the front door. The knocking was much louder now, rattling the door on its hinges, three knocks, a pause, and then again. Clara considered taking the hot fire poker with her as a weapon, but decided better of it. She stood tall and unlocked the door.
There on the doorstep, a gloved fist raised to knock once more, stood a tall bony-featured young man, carrying a preposterously large conifer.
Miss Shelley? Yer Miss Shelley, are ye nae?
He had a rough accent and took in her dishevelled appearance as if it were a normal occurrence to find a young lady in a fur coat in an abandoned house in the middle of winter. Another figure appeared from behind the man’s overcoat; a girl, not much younger than Clara herself, with warm eyes and brown cheeks, stained rosy in the cold evening chill.
O’ coorse she is juist look at her Eddie. Th’ spitting image o’ th’ late mistress, rid locks ‘n’ all.
O’ coorse she is juist look at her Eddie. Th’ spitting image o’ th’ late mistress, rid locks ‘n’ all.
She grinned at Clara, who raised a hand to the untamed mass of red curls pinned loosely on her head.
We didnae mean tae intrude. The girl gestured to the tree. We thought mibbie ‘twas our guid Christian duty tae keep ye company over yule. I’m Ida. She smiled widely at Clara. And Edward ‘ere wanted tae mak’ sure Lochmere wasn’t haunted o’coorse. She nudged the man in the ribs playfully.
Blithe yule tae ye. The man nodded, his eyes crinkling. Christmas. How time had passed. Clara thought she was the sole survivor of the shipwreck of her past, that the clock had stuck on the day that Adeline had drowned, and yet real, shivering, people stood on her doorstep.
That is very kind of you, she murmured, come on in. Clara opened the door as a strange thought occurred to her. How did anyone know I was here?
They laughed. It’s hardly a family secret. Look. He pointed out across the silver loch. Lochmere flickers lik’ a lamp o’er th’ loch.
Ye kin see it fae every hoose in th’ glen. Ida gestured across the sparkling water below the mansion and Clara saw for the first time, dozens of lights reflected on its surface, not stars but cottages. The water no longer looked like a shattered mirror of ice but a fireplace, warm welcoming glowing embers.
Anytime soon wid be guid, this tree isn’t aff tae decorate itself. The man’s voice was gruff but he smiled warmly. Clara reached out a hand and the girl grasped it, burning her cold skin with the touch, and they followed Clara into the hallway, stamping their boots where the snow melted in puddles on the chequered tiles.
Blithe yule tae ye. The man nodded, his eyes crinkling. Christmas. How time had passed. Clara thought she was the sole survivor of the shipwreck of her past, that the clock had stuck on the day that Adeline had drowned, and yet real, shivering, people stood on her doorstep.
That is very kind of you, she murmured, come on in. Clara opened the door as a strange thought occurred to her. How did anyone know I was here?
They laughed. It’s hardly a family secret. Look. He pointed out across the silver loch. Lochmere flickers lik’ a lamp o’er th’ loch.
Ye kin see it fae every hoose in th’ glen. Ida gestured across the sparkling water below the mansion and Clara saw for the first time, dozens of lights reflected on its surface, not stars but cottages. The water no longer looked like a shattered mirror of ice but a fireplace, warm welcoming glowing embers.
Anytime soon wid be guid, this tree isn’t aff tae decorate itself. The man’s voice was gruff but he smiled warmly. Clara reached out a hand and the girl grasped it, burning her cold skin with the touch, and they followed Clara into the hallway, stamping their boots where the snow melted in puddles on the chequered tiles.
So, Ida looked round in awe, this is Lochmere. Th’ hall o’ th’ cursed. She murmured. She glanced at the space on the wall where a mirror used to hang. She started, but Edward held out a hand as if to say not now.
Clara wrapped her coat close around her. What curse? Dread fell away in bleached colours from their faces. Edward placed the tree upright in the corner. Silence hung over them, the unspoken words pregnant with meaning. Clara closed the door and leaned heavily against the doorway. There is a curse on my house? She repeated to her guests.
Ida took off her red travelling coat and hung it up. She unwound her scarf and pulled off her kid-gloves, placing them on the dresser. Nae oan Lochmere, Miss Shelley, oan yer family. Oan th’ Shelley wummin. Clara suddenly found her throat constricted as Ida continued. Thare is an age auld story o’ an ancestral curse that haunts th’ Shelley wummin ‘n’ all they wha geit claise tae them. A fatal curse. Clara’s head swam. The story felt all-too-familiar. All those who get close to Shelley women die. That explained...but how?
Ay lassie that’s enough. It’s likelie juist an old-wives tale, Miss Shelley. Edwards shot a curt glance at Ida. Shadows pooled around the hallway, eating away at the light, and Clara could hear the ticking of her broken pocket-watch as she crumpled against the wall.
Miss Shelley? A warm rough hand grasped her shoulder and guided her to a rocking-chair. Strong smelling-salts wafted under her nose. A match was struck and its flame danced around the hallway, setting the puddles alight in colour; a fiery landscape waltzing on the water.
***
Did grief and misfortune not humble poor Clara Shelley? Despite the whispers of the villagers about the mournful girl who haunted Lochmere Mansion, it could not be said that misfortune was her undoing. Days later it snowed again, and Clara and I made our way through the estate to her mother’s grave. I had kept it clean all these years, but that day it was covered in snow. She sank to her knees beside it placing the wreath she and Ida had made. She brushed aside the icy snowflakes, tracing her mother’s name with her pale fingertips.
Aeternum vale
Florence Mary Shelley
May 4th 1859 - December 31st 1889
Her eyes were fiery as she looked up at me through the tears. You really think the curse is broken? She asked, but she knew the answer.
Clara wrapped her coat close around her. What curse? Dread fell away in bleached colours from their faces. Edward placed the tree upright in the corner. Silence hung over them, the unspoken words pregnant with meaning. Clara closed the door and leaned heavily against the doorway. There is a curse on my house? She repeated to her guests.
Ida took off her red travelling coat and hung it up. She unwound her scarf and pulled off her kid-gloves, placing them on the dresser. Nae oan Lochmere, Miss Shelley, oan yer family. Oan th’ Shelley wummin. Clara suddenly found her throat constricted as Ida continued. Thare is an age auld story o’ an ancestral curse that haunts th’ Shelley wummin ‘n’ all they wha geit claise tae them. A fatal curse. Clara’s head swam. The story felt all-too-familiar. All those who get close to Shelley women die. That explained...but how?
Ay lassie that’s enough. It’s likelie juist an old-wives tale, Miss Shelley. Edwards shot a curt glance at Ida. Shadows pooled around the hallway, eating away at the light, and Clara could hear the ticking of her broken pocket-watch as she crumpled against the wall.
Miss Shelley? A warm rough hand grasped her shoulder and guided her to a rocking-chair. Strong smelling-salts wafted under her nose. A match was struck and its flame danced around the hallway, setting the puddles alight in colour; a fiery landscape waltzing on the water.
***
Did grief and misfortune not humble poor Clara Shelley? Despite the whispers of the villagers about the mournful girl who haunted Lochmere Mansion, it could not be said that misfortune was her undoing. Days later it snowed again, and Clara and I made our way through the estate to her mother’s grave. I had kept it clean all these years, but that day it was covered in snow. She sank to her knees beside it placing the wreath she and Ida had made. She brushed aside the icy snowflakes, tracing her mother’s name with her pale fingertips.
Aeternum vale
Florence Mary Shelley
May 4th 1859 - December 31st 1889
Her eyes were fiery as she looked up at me through the tears. You really think the curse is broken? She asked, but she knew the answer.
***
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