CHAPTER NINE
THE NEXT NIGHT
The moon rises high over the village.
The last stragglers are coming in from the fields. Inside cottages and homes, people are washing up, putting children to bed, bringing in wood. Arguing. Making love.
Rosalind sits at the kitchen table of her family's farmhouse, sewing with her sisters. The half-finished quilt lies on the table. Agnes is in Harthome's study, playing patience by candlelight. On the narrow bed of the groundskeeper's cottage Seamus is in deep sleep. His burnt-down fire is an orange glow in the grate.
Countless miles above them the Lenten full moon sails over the sky like a warship. Shadows of deer glide through the fields. At the edge of the lawn a fox darts back and forth, hunting the bright night. Owls fly from haylofts. Bats criss-cross the luminous sky.
In Harthome's hidden cellar an animal paces the perimeter, head down, looking for the way out.