He stared at her for a few minutes while she tried to stop herself crying. She wanted to shout that he was a lunatic, a filthy, perverted bastard, but she was hardly in a position to risk anything that would trigger him into an uncontrollable frenzy.
“I have some information about a member of your family.”
She was astounded. “Really? My family, but how? What?”
“I will tell you if you do something for me.”
“Do what?” she said, unable to mask the suspicion in her voice.
“I have some holy water, mixed with body oil, which I want you to rub over yourself. And I want to watch you do it.”
She looked hard into his eyes, to try to read him, but it was no good. He did not, however, try to escape her gaze as he usually did. Marda said, “I will put oil on myself, if you give me some news of my family. What could you know about them?”
“I have met someone who is apparently your brother.”
Marda squealed in delight. “My brother?”
“Captain Stewart, I believe. Strong-looking chap, in his mid- to late twenties.”
“Yes, yes. That’s him!”
“He gave me this.”
Her tormentor showed the leaflet to the frightened girl.
“Oh, Mark. Mark. What did he say to you? What did you say to him?”
“I will tell you if you’ll oblige by letting me watch you rub this ointment on to yourself. It is harmless. It is based on the gimmicks they sell in Lourdes, more water than oil. I have added a few perfumed plants from the Hurtwood. Smell it.”
Opening the bottle, he put it under her nose. He poured a little into his hand, and rubbed it vigorously over his face.
“Observe, it’s not caustic soda. I am not a sadist. But I need to see you do this. I want to show you that I do not find you unattractive. And you are safer, let us say, restrained by steel rather than by my religious vows or your sexual guiles. Do this for me, and I will tell you as much as I can about your brother and his Sherlock Holmes play- acting.”
Reluctantly Marda took the bottle, while Duval sat and watched her.
With her free hand, she poured a little on to her arms and legs, then rubbed the mixture into her skin, while he lit up his pipe, broke the dead match in two and put it back inside the matchbox.
Marda used his annoying habit as an excuse to stop. “Please don’t stop,” he insisted. “I want you to rub it all over yourself…to rub it into your breasts and thighs.” He sounded like a doctor telling a patient how to take a prescription.
“Please don’t make me do this,” she said, as tears teased the corners of her eyes. “So far you have tried to teach me uplifting things, about the Bible, about life, civilisation, history. This is degrading, just not like you.”
His anger had abated somewhat, and the schoolmaster voice began to take over: “I tried to instruct you in spiritual matters, but I see you are addicted to the ways of the flesh. So be it. I no longer respect you in the way I did before.”
Marda wondered whether he was a repressed homosexual, or perhaps he was just massively repressed, full stop: what normal male would have reacted so aggressively to her naked form? Now he had revealed himself as a voyeur. Whatever was wrong with him, she was terrified of the repercussions of the traumatic dinner.
To Duval, Marda was now far less like Christine. He tended to be ultra-deferential with the few women he met whom he deemed his intellectual or social superiors. With women he regarded as inferiors, his sadism grew more pronounced. He had abandoned the almost masochistic worship of Marda as Christine; now he was beginning to despise his young prisoner as a fallen woman, not worthy of his religious dedication.
Marda pleaded, “Please don’t hurt me or starve me like the others, please don’t.”
“I won’t if you do precisely what I say,” he said. “Please continue rubbing in the oil.”
She did so for a few more minutes, embarrassed, and in silence; a silence interrupted only by the sound of Duval sucking on his pipe. Her goosepimples grew hard with cold and fear.
“That is enough,” he ordered.
He gave her back the blankets.
“I have one more request,” he said, as he pulled out a pair of scissors from his jacket pocket. Marda was now really frightened.
“Don’t be afraid. I would like to cut a small lock from your hair.”
Marda’s memory raced back to the scene of Christine’s mother cutting a lock from the hair of the dead Margaret.
“Please don’t scalp me, just take a small piece if you really have to.”
“Thank you.” He leaned over, cut a small section of her hair and put it into his top pocket.
“Now let me unlock the cuffs.”
Marda was suddenly reminded of her dentist. He is so clinical, she thought. He’s like a medical specialist explaining his methods to a nervous patient.
He undid her right foot first. She thought of striking him with her right hand as he bent over her ankle, but she could do little while her left hand was cuffed. Having unlocked the other handcuff, he moved back quickly to face her.
“Please tell me more about my brother,” she pleaded.
“He was staying in your flat, I understand. He has spent the last two months looking for you.”
“Where am I?”
“You are not much more than a mile from your flat, just outside Shere.”
A look of amazement came over her face.
“He came here to give me this leaflet and to ask if I had seen you. The leaflets are all over Shere. Of course, I had to lie…unfortunately. He left quite satisfied. I understand that after two months of fruitless search he has left the village. He has gone back to his regiment in Germany, or so I’m told.”
“How do you know all this?”
“Village tittle-tattle, and I’ve seen one or two articles in the local rag. Constable McGregor, our local protector, sometimes chats to me when I am out walking Bobby. Quite a little chatterbox is our PC McGregor. And too nosy for his own good, I’m afraid. Rather irritating Scotsman, but he is a useful source of information. And, of course, my brief meeting with that fine young man, your brother, was also interesting. But everybody has given up. They will not find you, Marda, so if I were you I would try to behave myself. I have a short time to decide whether to leave this place and go to South America or stay here, but I cannot just let you go. That would be too dangerous.”
Marda felt bile rise in her throat, but anger made her speak: “You have lied to me all along!”
“Be reasonable,” he said smirking. “I know you must think me a little mad, but I am not mad enough to let you just walk out of here.”
“But you promised you wouldn’t hurt me, or leave me to die of hunger.”
“I don’t
He locked the door and left the light on, while Marda read and re-read the leaflet he had left.
Duval bathed in cold water and scourged himself with a scrubbing brush as penance for his act of voyeurism. Cleansed, he returned to his writing. His new appreciation of Marda, or rather his depreciation, gave him some fresh ideas. Initially, he had been concerned with Christine’s visions during her re-enclosure. This original text would form a major part of his conclusion, but perhaps Christine might have been more rigorous in her self-mortification, especially when she returned to her cell. He decided to rework some passages of his history.
To help his work, he mixed a potion of fly agaric. Although highly lethal in its natural state, if the mushroom is dried and ground, and carefully measured, it can be added to honey and water to form a mind-expanding drug.
