Chapter 3

“Shall we move on? Let us walk across the bridge to the old town. Oh, it IS getting foggy. We’ll move away up the hill a little once across, the mist hangs around the river so we should climb about it.” They walked across, finding the fog meant they had to walk nearer each other. The crowds in the bridge had thinned out. As they stepped off the bridge, Luke counted the group. “Oh, where is your ... grandmother?”

“She has decided to go back to the hotel.” replied her husband from out of the mist.

“You should come closer so we can see each other. When did she go?”

“As we crossed the bridge. She told me and turned round. She’ll be fine once she is out of the mist.”

“Oh, I hope so. Where are you? Are yes. Just up this small way.” He led them through an arch and up a cobbled street. Those who had explored during the day had not realised that this arch opened to a track that led up the hill. “Now, just here is the house of Sir John Havering. Sir John was a rake – do you know what a rake is?” he asked the two sixteen year old girls, he had a slight leer on his face. They hadn’t really been listening anyway. “A rake is a ne’er do well, a wrong’un. He was well known to make ill-use of his female staff. He was a gambler and sometimes could not pay his bills. He had fought three duels before he was twenty. Some would say he just enjoyed his life. Unfortunately for him, he seduced a girl who was the wife of Captain Winnerd Smethwick, the militia captain in the town at the time. Melissa Smethwick was also daughter of the magistrate. Perhaps she was lucky, for she did not take seed. But revenge was still called for. Sir John was good at duelling with sword or pistol. He was also liked by many in the town. He was one of those people who everybody knew was bad but he was good company; he could tell great stories; he could recite love poems with emotion and persuasion. He treated older women with respect and flirting that made them feel young again. Still, he did get plenty of young women with child, and he never took any responsibility for any of them. He was found in an alley, his throat cut, his ... well, sorry ladies but I have been told to stick the facts. I fear your book will not mention this indelicate fact sir. His cock and balls had been cut off and were not found. They are rumoured to be buried somewhere in the town. Sir John must roam the town until he can rediscover his body parts.”

The mother of the younger girl was once more horrified, and said strongly that this was not suitable. This time, she took the girl’s hand and turned to go. As she walked back into the mist, she slipped on the cobbles and lost her balance. She released the girl briefly and then was lost to view in the mist. “Sadie! Where are you. Damn this mist!” she was heard to shout. Her husband called to her to come back, but she was clearly walking the wrong way. The fog on the bridge confused the direction so easily. Sadie’s sister said she would look after Sadie and shouted to her mother to go back to the hotel.

“I fear it may be too late.” said the guide. “She has been swallowed by the fog.” It was a good line to build up the dread evening. It was at that moment that the grandfather decided that he too had had enough.

“This is all hokum and balderdash. This book is carefully researched and carries references, but you are making it all up as you go along, I’m convinced. Sorry everybody, I’ve had enough!”

“Sir! I would strongly recommend you do not go back that way!” But it was too late, he had turned back and disappeared. “My apologies, my friends.”

“Could you not go and get Grandad?” Asked Sadie.

“I would if I knew where he was, but the mist you see is difficult. It blends time and space. He will be back in the morning, you have my word.”

The girl nodded gravely, she was taking all this very seriously, others saw it all for the theatre it was. Ruth, Sadie’s sister put her hand on her sister’s shoulder and they stood closer.

“Ah, Sir John, not yet I fear. Half an hour to go.” It was eleven thirty. A tall, handsome man in blue velvet coat swept off his hat and bowed, and walked on. The two men agreed that this was a very well organised guided walk. The people walking in and out of the tour just gave it a sense of reality that was very well done. “We are nearly done. Ah and here she is.”

From a grill at pavement level a large pair of eyes could be seen peering out. “This is Lottie, ladies and gentlemen. I wish I could end on a happy note, but this is a story that has to be told. It does not appear in the book on Ghosts; she is nobody famous, she is poor, small, and unimportant. But she is a story that can be found in any town, in almost any age. She lost her father to the plague in 1645, then her mother struggled to feed Lottie and Peter, Lottie’s older brother. She starved herself to do it, but that meant she was weak too and when she caught a simple chill, it became pneumonia and then TB – she didn’t call it that but that was what it was. She died and left Peter and Lottie alone. Peter tried hard, until he was caught stealing a silk handkerchief. He was put in prison to await trial in the morning, and was dead by then. Someone in the prison just beat him. No-one would say who. Lottie found herself entirely alone, hungry and lonely. She wasted away in that basement for two days. They only found her when the smell started to make the people about wretch. By that time she had been partially eaten by rats, poor wee mite.”

They all looked again at the eyes, the eyes were big because the face was so emaciated. She just stared at them, saying nothing. Sadie cried; she dropped her sister’s hand and went over to the grill. She offered the small face her bag of sweets. “It’s all I’ve got, I’m sorry. I finished my drink already.”

The clock on the church up the hill chimed twelve. The mist had risen from the river to where they were now. It deadened sound, they felt alone.

Sir John was the first to appear. He walked in and simply bowed to all the ladies. “Ah, what a delightful young lady. Come my dear, let me show you what I was renowned for.” He took the other teenager’s hand, the sixteen year old; before her father or brother could say a thing, she was led away into the fog.

“Remember Sir John! If you ever want to be released.”

“Yes, yes, Luke. Such an old nag! I shall leave her intact, rest assured.”

“What!? What does he mean? Heh! Who are you?” A pair of men had appeared and taken the girl’s father by the arms. He was led away and was still being heard complaining as he disappeared. His voice became more and more attenuated by the fog.

Two young ladies appeared. “You two want a good time?” The two teenagers looked surprised, then delighted. It was plain that they had never had an offer before. They had made suggestions to girls and been given the brush off. They were both seventeen and weren’t entirely innocent, but they had only had the occasional intimate encounter of a one-night-stand type. These two women were clearly ‘up for it’. Both were dressed in long, full dresses, with numerous petticoats. They were in blacks and browns and off-whites. These had been women who had found the easy life that resulted from being willing to lie on their backs for customers. It was always so. Neither had been forced into the profession, it was just easier than being a seamstress or a laundrymaid, or a house maid where the master of the house might claim the extra advantages without paying any more to them. This way they had kept all they earned. They quickly found other ways to satisfy the young men who paid them. That they both succumbed to diseases of the kind that all poor towns folk risked was probably lucky for them; they did not have to catch the awful sexual transmissions that could degrade their mental capacity or their good looks. Still, they might have caught them and not shown yet.

“You two boys, have you prophylatics ... French letters ... oh, you call them condoms.” The boys looked at others in the group and nodded with embarrassment. “Good.” said Luke. “Wear them, the girls are pretty, and willing, but they may not be clean.”

“Fucking cheek!” said Dolsie, one of the two whores leading the boys away to a night they would remember for ever.

“Those two caught dysentery. Of course they didn’t know what it was then. They might have other problems to pass on. They have to stay until someone wants to meet them for their company rather than their tricks; if you get my meaning ladies and gentlemen. They are not allowed to charge anymore than they did then. So fifty pence (ten shillings) would mean a long night of extremely good fun for ten shillings. REMEMBER LADIES – Dawn!”

Then a beautifully dressed woman appeared. She would have been offended to be called a woman. She was indeed a lady. Lady Jocelyn Duphrais. It had never been much of a marriage and she had not worn black for long when her husband was caught in the explosion that blew up the HMS Astounding. He had been right above the powder store. Nothing of him was ever found. She continued her life as before, entertaining men in similar ways to those other two. She just picked higher class people. Now she has to pick the less attractive, to share her pleasures rather than selfishly choosing only handsome men. Ruth saw Jocelyn take her father’s hand. Ruth laughed quietly, so her father was unattractive to others as well as herself. She suspected that her mother found little to attract her to the bed now. David looked at the pretty women dressed in feathers and flowers, offering him all he desired with her eyes. Like so many men, he was smitten by lust and simply forgot his children until too late. By that time he was being led by a hand that came from an arm he could barely see, which came from an invisible body. He briefly wondered now if she had transformed into an ogre; but it was all too late, he was lost in the fog. He did not have any condoms with him; but he would have forgotten to use them anyway, so desperate would he have been to be with, and inside, this lovely lady. She was ten years younger than him at least, probably more. She undoubtedly wore a lot of powder and kohl and digitalis; but men do not see that, they see the sexy appearance and the lovely view. They only see the promise.