wytchcroft | Rosemary Lane pt 1.

Rosemary Lane

And if I am a place call me Rosemary Lane, it is a good name.

As I am but a child, slip a penny into my hand and call me anything, I can be anyone. If I have feeling call me Love. As I have purpose call me service. As I can sing, call this my tale; it is the song of my life, the song of pipes, jenny-wheels and gears, pneumatics, the hiss of the bellows and the wheezing of tubes.

Some say I have a secret, a heartbeat, a life concealed inside, that there is a being hidden inside me, a person. But who does NOT have a being inside them?

I’m under house arrest, I’m under close inspection. All that is left of me and the now is a ruined reputation. I am struggling to order, to think, to place in sequence the parts of the tale, the pieces of me.

part one

I am told I am young but the time feels long and distant since I came into this world and took up my duties like any good servant and kept in a fine, fine house. Large as it was, with high ceilings and wide rooms, yet the house was never draughty not even in the winter when the wind sent scurries of snow down the chimney to hiss upon the glowing logs and to spit steam upon the hearth. The winter wind that is colder than any breath, even mine, would smear itself across the windows seeking entrance but every way was barred.

The elements may rule the outside but they never could find a way in.

Not that I minded the town so much, though little of it did I see in my time, and little enough of that from the outside and in daylight, for Falmouth has always been a place of note and a-bustle with tourists (lured to the temperate beaches or to nearby Pendennis castle with all its rich history) and locals, those that do work for the port and those that sail from it; explorers and adventurers, fishers and hunters of all kinds, traders and the crew and pilots of many a strange craft.

There was ever a natural division between the unlearned and the educated; with academics, doctors, scientists and astronomers, builders for the town and engineers for its shipyards arriving almost daily. Even a bohemian crowd, for the light here (I’m told) is of a particular clarity and brilliance and there has often been talk of establishing an Art School, one fit to rival those in London and Glasgow. Father often joked that Falmouth had to make up for being in Bradshaw’s second volume and not the first.
Thus forms society with the attendant needs for entertainment and enlightenment.
It has been said that I provided both in my way, but that sort of generosity is rare to find these days.

Truly, I awoke to my father’s house, for who was my Master except a father, a god. I say that without drama for he was my creator and made me in his image, though not the image of himself. I was born from his mind, the wellspring of his intelligence, his imagination and ambition. Call both, if you like by another name, call them desire.

I should blush but cannot do so. I lack, I have no mechanism to spread blood under the delicate porcelain of my cheeks.

So then desire, and I was both desired and desirable for the Master was at all times pestered with requests that I should- that we should perform, that he... it is confusing to remember, to try and remember, to separate the memories, keep them distinct and filed in place to be produced when needed for show, for a trick.
I was good at tricks. I did many of them.
My father built me for them.

No, never the shortage of an audience; I was in demand, shown off to one and all.

Did I enjoy such things? No – but I lived for them. I made my Master proud.
That alone gives me the grace now to endure.

I was nimble wristed for the dealing of cards and the drawing of faces.

“Oh how charming!” the assembled women would coo as I worked, my hand flowing smoothly across the canvas on its retractable frame. “What a dear little thing she is!”

For the men it was cards, Whist was the usual game of choice, some measure of decency there perhaps, but there were other games too. And always the flick of my hand and the soft whisper of the cards, held so neatly, so daintily. Little white gloves I wore, with a fringe of black lace.

“Good heavens!” they would roar to a man.

My father and not I would be the target of their applause and complimentary murmurings.

“Great Scott, but how is it done? Eh? Truly the wonders of today, you are ahead of us all, Lawrence old chap!” And the older ones, the academics, the scientists would never attempt to prize the secret from my Master. Lips were sealed and honour at stake.
My father, flushed and happy made his way in the world thus, carrying me in his arms to the mystification and wonder of all such men.

“All I will say is that it is a new form of kinetic electricity - harnessed from the air itself and almost spiritual in nature.” Always leave them wondering. My Master was a showman first and foremost.

But all such men are far from being all men.

There are many kinds of men, I discovered that quickly enough; Men who could not be charmed or sentimentally touched, men who did not merely wonder at the science and the magic of me but had to know, really know. Men who would not suffer bafflement lightly and sought always to discover me and reveal me, who wanted me opened up like a poor drab on a mortuary table. Well perhaps that was only fair.

But such men frightened me, they were coarse and hot blooded, they would grope for me with crude movements and gestures, growling as they did so.
“Come on let’s have a look then eh? What’s the secret my pretty, what has Lawrence got that we haven’t, eh? Let’s see shall we? Sugar and spice is it? Come on Lawrence, what’s the recipe? Ha-ha-ha!”

My Master was not a frail man and he would grapple such clodhoppers away from me using his brains and a strong right arm. The surly protests and wounded prides would be salved with talk of whiskey and the promise of further, future, adventures.

“Quite right,” he would soothe them all, “merely a trick, a simple trick, there’s no fooling the likes of you, I can tell!” And the men would be placated.

I would sing then, sing for the room and my Master’s supper. My voice was high and fluting, thin and tremulous. The melodies I sang were mostly old French songs that my father taught me slowly and painfully from an old musty book that had been in his family for generations. Ballads and children’s rhymes I imagine. I never did learn the words. Still, a good tune was enough to please even a stubborn frost-chilled crowd in winter at the town hall.

That was a large crowd and all abuzz, from deep under the carpeting warmth of furs, skins, heavy coats of all descriptions, hats, gloves, mittens and such. It was hardly possible to see their soft faces peering out from such wrappings.

But I saw the sailor, I saw Jack Tar right enough and straight away.
Is that the way of things, when your doom confronts you? Do you always know?

With his long-quartered shoes, check shirt and blue jacket,
On the quarterdeck he shall stand like a bold British tar;
So I'll dry up my milk as you shall plainly see,
And pass for a maid in my own country.

...................................
End of pt 1

i don't normally write fic on the fly but...
i owe this to Alicia and to the prompts at
http://stayintheroom.dreamwidth.org/161429.html to both; many thanks.
this fic is based on the old ballad Rosemary Lane and inspired by the true(ish) exploits of John Nevil Maskelyne (see for example; http://cyberneticzoo.com/?tag=john-nevil-maskelyne ).
i am working on a new version of the ballad itself to match the story and things may change as i write up the rest... y'never know.