The churchyard, however, looked to contain more modern burials and tombstones. She couldn’t find anything older than the seventeenth century, although there were some stones half buried in the turf that looked ancient. In the porch she found a churchyard trail that helpfully explained that due to weathering, the inscriptions on all the oldest graves had been lost but there was a rather fine memorial stone from the late sixteenth century in the northeast corner that had been protected because it was beneath one of the ancient yew trees. Wandering up there, Lucy couldn’t at first locate the stone because the yews grew so close together and stooped low over the ground; pushing beneath the branches she found herself in a sort of green cavern whose floor was carpeted with sharp fallen needles. The stone, so much smaller than the memorial she had been expecting, seemed to be made of the local sarsen rock, for it was a whitish gray color, pitted with lichen, and the incised letters were hard to pick out in the gloom. She had to run her fingers over them to be sure of the words: “Where your treasure is, there will your heart be also.” The name was illegible, but there was a date of 1598. Lucy wondered if it was a biblical quote. She wasn’t particularly knowledgeable on such things.

She stood up, brushed the yew spines from her knees and stooped under the ancient boughs to emerge into the graveyard. A blackbird shot out of the tree overhead with a squawk of alarm. She heard voices carried to her on the breeze, footsteps on the cobbled path, but when she turned there was no one there. The wind felt winter-cold on her face and for a moment her head seemed to spin in much the same way it had when she had first walked into Gunpowder Barn. It was tiredness, she thought, making her feel first hot then cold. She needed to be careful. It was time to go home.

The same sense of someone watching her that she had felt in the museum ambushed Lucy quite suddenly as she went out of the graveyard onto the sunken path that led back to the road. She looked back over her shoulder, but there was no one there. The leaves on the trees that lined the track played hide-and-seek with light and shadow. Everything felt normal. And yet... She heard a crunch, as though the old, dead leaves of previous years that lay underfoot had been stirred by someone passing by, felt the sensation of skirts brushing past her and even thought she heard the whisper of a voice: “I’m so glad you came...” And she hurried down the ancient track to the road and normality.

Six

Anne Catesby

Stoneleigh, Warwickshire
Spring, 1593

Catherine, on her wedding day, looked so beautiful I imagined even the angels would be dazzled. At the wedding breakfast before the ceremony she had eaten and drunk sparingly, unlike many of the guests, who were already cast away before the nuptials began. Now we were assembled at St. Mary the Virgin in the village of Stoneleigh as Catherine and Robert married at the church door. Catherine promised to “love, cherish and obey,” giving Robert such a look of adoration that he actually blushed. Dame Alice Leigh, who was standing next to me, dug me in the ribs with her elbow.