4.

~ I found my students pleasant company for the morning. The girl, Phillipa, was a dreamy sort who tackled math problems as if she were about to be thrown into a volcano.

Like her father, she seemed ill at ease with her surroundings and I knew that whatever was plaguing Mr. Cobb, no doubt affected her as well.

"Come on. Twenty four plus fifty." I coaxed as she seemed to want to be anywhere but here.

She looked woefully at the math problem on the board. I couldn't help but be jealous of her pretty blond curls and expertly made dress. The only thing marring the picture of childhood perfection her sullen little face.

"Sixty four?" she said as she wrote the number on the board.
"Try again, you're very close." I told her.

James, a broken mantle clock on his lap, was learning how to tell time.
"A quarter past five." he said proudly as he showed me the hands he was moving on the broken clock face.

"Very good. Now show me a quarter till five." I told him.

"I hate math!" Phillipa said throwing the chalk down.
"And yet we have to master it." I told her.

"Can't I paint with the water colors or play with the maps? I like those." she asked hopefully.
"First we do what we have to do, then we do what we want to do." I told her in my well practiced refrain from school. It was a popular sing song adage the teachers would tell us when we yearned to play outside and cast away all hope of schooling forever.

Phillipa looked sulky as she returned to her math problems.

~ "How were your lessons?" Arthur asked me as soon as James and Phillipa fled my classroom a few hours later for the freedom of outdoors.

"Very well. Mainly because of the excellent teaching supplies you provided." I told him.
"How do you know I provided them and not Cobb?" Arthur asked as he examined the basic French I had written on the chalk board.

I folded up the map Phillipa had been playing with and gave a shrug as Hannibal made himself at home on the rug next to the fire.
"Just a feeling. I would think Mr. Cobb is a very busy man these days. You seem to be the type to help when needed." I told him as he assisted me in picking up the mess left by the children.
"Well, you're very correct. I furnished this little classroom; I'm glad you found it serviceable." he told me.

"The broken clock was a nice touch." I said as, together, we collected the bits of colored chalk and put them in a box.

"Yes." he laughed. "It's how I learned to tell time. A broken clock is right at least twice a day."

I smiled as the fire snapped merrily behind me. My eyes averting the window where frost was threatening to invade our happy scene.

"When I was a boy, I was taught by a governess in this very room. She was a lovely woman." Arthur mused as he placed the broken clock on my desk. "I had designs to marry her when I was older, but I failed to realize she aged just as surely as I did." he confessed sadly.

"These things happen." I told him.

In some unaccountable way, I felt my cheeks grow warm. I was suddenly too embarrassed to look at him.
"Yes, it was most unfair and tragic." Arthur agreed.

We said nothing as my little classroom was now too tidy and we had nothing to keep occupied.

Arthur noticed my art portfolio in the corner and he sifted on his feet.

"May I?" he asked pointing to it.
"Please do, sir. I enjoy showing off my accomplishments." I said.

My friend was careful with my simple portfolio. Treating it like it was something truly precious and valuable. As if they were not the silly sketches of a former school girl, but of a real artist.

He carefully examined the detailed drawings I had mastered of people's hands and feet. Of clothing and hair.

"These are very good." he announced.

"You're too kind." I said as it felt oddly warm in the room.

"No one sketches people these days. It's all landscapes." he said as he examined a careful drawing I had done of one of the girls formally under my care.

His brow seemed to furrow over an overly flattering sketch of Tom, and then stopping at an especially graphic sketch I had forgotten was there.

"Is this what you saw?" he asked showing me the charcoal drawing of a black figure with red eyes who sat bird like on a child's shoulders.

I sucked in my breath. The memories of that horrible thing making me afraid.
"Yes." I whispered. "It is."

"Did it ever come back? As far as you could tell?" he asked.
"I don't think it will come back and she was fine." I told him.

He nodded and carefully placed my sketches back like he found them and closed my portfolio.

"Hannibal seems to have taken a liking to you." Arthur mused as the handsome creature by the fire looked up at the both of us.

"And I him. I haven't been around dogs much." I confessed as Hannibal let his head back down and threatened to go to sleep.

"Well, I've never seen him so enchanted before. You must have bewitched him." Arthur said.

I felt my broken heart clang dangerously in my chest at the insinuation.
"I'm not a witch, Arthur. I didn't ask for this." I told him.

Arthur had the good graces to looked embarrassed.
"I know that, Ariadne. Please don't take what I said to heart. I meant no offense." he said.

I warmed my hands by the fire as Arthur didn't seem to want to leave.
"Still cold?" he asked.
"I'll be fine." I assured him. "Will the children be alright outside? I wouldn't want them to catch a chill."

"It's more of a danger to keep them indoors then to let them prowl around outside. I'm sure they will be fine." he assured me.
"It must have been hard for them. To lose their mother at such a young age." I said.

"I lost my own mother when I was very young. It's never easy, but they have their father and myself. I've promised Cobb I would take care of them if he can't overcome this... sickness that has befallen him." Arthur told me.
"It's not a sickness." I whispered.

A damp chill seeped its way into the room, hitting the back of my neck despite the presence of a warm fire. Something had slithered across the room, listening in on our plans for Mr. Cobb.

"What is it?" Arthur asked.

"I'm not sure. I've only seen it once before and nothing so intense as this." I told him.

I couldn't understand why, but I felt afraid. My skin prickling with the sickening feeling that something was behind me. Crawling on the wall and glaring at me with sharp, hungry teeth.

Hannibal suddenly roused himself and my handsome protector started to bark at a corner of the room.
"Hannibal!" Arthur shouted over the dog's loud barking. "Quite!"

"Arthur, can we leave this room?" I asked as I hurried out past dog and master.

~ Arthur and Hannibal, who stopped barking as soon as we left the classroom, followed me into the front parlor.
"What is it?" Arthur demanded.
"Something was in there. Listening to us." I whispered. My breath coming hard as the ice on the back of my neck shed off me as soon as we were safely away.

My friend looked skeptical as his eyes rolled doubtfully.
"It's true!" I hissed. "I could feel it. Why do you think the dog was barking?"

"Because Hannibal is a fool." Arthur said. "He barks at corners all the time."

"Did he do that before Mrs. Cobb passed away?" I asked.

Arthur scowled at me.
"No." he said at length.

He shook his head as if to shake off any notion I might be right about the unseen monsters that lurked in the house.

"This is nonsense. You and Eames will have me seeing spirits next. Participating in seances and calling in mystics to read my palms." he said as he marched away from me, a certainly took hold of my mind and roared loudly at me.
"The authorities, they believe Cobb killed his wife; didn't they?" I asked.

I felt myself shirk away as Arthur turned and glared at me.
"Who told you that?" he asked.
"No one." I said as I moved closer to the fire, but could feel no warmth.
"Was it Miles? Eames?" he questioned.
"No one said a word about it." I told him.

"They couldn't prove it. Why he was never charged." Arthur admitted. "How did you know?" he asked.
I shrugged.

"They told me." I said.

"The children?"

I shook my head.

"No, not the children." I admitted.