Red, White and Blue (Book Two of The Powder Trail)

Chapter Twelve: Red

The sun was setting when Sam led Ellini through Radcliffe Square to the Grand Cafe on the other side of the High. The evening had one of those strange qualities of light which agreed so well with the honey-coloured Oxford stone – it wasn't bright, but it filled everything with a kind of yellowish intensity. 

It gave Ellini's dress the look of a page from an illuminated manuscript – so much so that Manda, sitting out in the gardens of the University Church as they passed, had to look very hard at it to be sure that it was the white dress – the white dress – on which she had pinned all her hopes.

Ellini saw her and gave an awkward wave, but Manda couldn't manage much of a response. Her heart was filled with honey-coloured light.

She was wearing the white dress! True, it was only July the third, and she would have to hope that the girl wasn't averse to wearing the same dress two nights in a row, but it was a start – it was a hopeful sign – even if Sam was leading her across the square with the thunderous look of someone who'd been biting back a thousand recriminations.

She clapped her hands excitedly and turned to Madam Seacombe, who was sewing on the bench beside her. "It's going to be all right!" she blurted out. Then, seeing Madam Seacombe's bewilderment, she faltered, and added, "Isn't that dress pretty? That's Miss Syal who's wearing it – my new acquaintance."

Madam Seacombe glanced irritably at Ellini, and then back down at her embroidery.

"Very pretty, but why does it mean that everything's going to be all right?"

Manda, caught off guard, and far too happy to be secretive, began telling her about the dreams she'd been having ever since Miss Syal had come to the city. After all, Madam Seacombe had slept in the same cell before Manda had occupied it, so perhaps the ink from the Book of Woe had come creeping into her dreams too. It would be nice to have a fellow-seer to confide in.

"You see, Reverend Mother, before I even met this girl, I dreamed about her wearing a red version of that dress, and lying dead on the steps of the Turl Street Music Rooms," she chattered nervously. "Then I found that book under the floor in my cell – the one the police confiscated – and it turns out it was a book of prophecies, and it had an illustration of exactly that image – the same girl lying dead on the marble steps."

"I've seen it," said Madam Seacombe, still concentrating on her embroidery. "Was it the Turl Street Music Rooms? All I saw were marble steps."

Manda clapped her hands again. "I knew you'd had the same dreams! You see, the pages were faded, and I found all this ink in the cracks between the floor slabs – even on the underside of my mattress – and I thought, well, a book is designed to be read, isn't it? That's its purpose. And, if nobody looks at it for hundreds of years, maybe it gets a bit impatient--"

"I'm not at all surprised to hear that it's a book of prophecies," said Madam Seacombe. "As soon as I saw that woman in our city, I knew it was all going to come true. It looked as though she knew it too."

"Yes, but here's the thing," said Manda eagerly. "I've been having another dream. It's not illustrated in the book – at least, not as far as I can see – but it's so clear and detailed that I just know it's a vision of the future – or maybe one possible future. It's Ellini in the white dress, picking up a bunch of forget-me-nots, and walking past the Turl Street Music Rooms, to join Jack at the River Club on Folly Bridge."

"Oh, that," said Madam Seacombe disdainfully. "I've seen that. There's an American flag flying outside the music rooms, isn't there? I always thought that was queer – but then I heard there's some new American pianist playing there – he's supposed to be the best thing since Franz Liszt – so I suppose they'll put the flag up tomorrow, to make him feel at home."

Manda closed her eyes in an agony of joy. Not only had Madam Seacombe seen the same thing, she was assuming that it was likely to happen – as likely as the dead girl in the red dress, even if it wasn't illustrated in the Book of Woe. She could have kissed her!

"But it's the same dress," Madam Seacombe went on, deftly pulling her needle through the embroidery. "You're just seeing the beginning of the evening. It was always a white dress at the beginning of the evening."

Manda's eyes opened with a snap. "What?"

"It gets dyed with blood when he stabs her."

"What? But – when who stabs her?" Manda spluttered. She could feel the ground shifting underneath her. "It can't – that's nonsense, Reverend Mother, it can't all get dyed with blood! There isn't a patch of white on it! And it's got a three-foot train! One woman couldn't even contain that much blood!"

"It's not all hers," said Madam Seacombe patiently. "At least, I think not. The dreams didn't show me everything. But you'd be surprised how much blood one woman can contain, anyway."

"Reverend Mother," said Manda, closing her eyes and gritting her teeth against the rising panic. "When who stabs her?"

Madam Seacombe gave Manda a complacent smile, as though she was being childishly dense. "Who do you think? Who's the war criminal? Who's being held in Oxford for crimes against humanity?"

"Not Jack – it's not possible!"

"I've seen it," said Madam Seacombe. "I dreamt it night after night for twenty years, long before either of them came to this city – before either of them were even born, from the look of things, although you never can tell with new-breeds. I cried about it, of course, but they still came – they still couldn't stay away from each other – and I realized there's no use crying before the event. That's not what we're here for."

"Why does he do it?" said Manda, in a state of shock. "He loves her. He kept her letters sewn up in his coat."

Madam Seacombe frowned. "I told you, the dreams didn't show me everything," she said, as though she was annoyed at having to admit her ignorance. "It came in bits and pieces. And when I moved out of that cell, it stopped altogether."

"Well, then there's been some kind of mistake!" Manda wailed. "You saw him stabbing somebody else – one of the gargoyles, maybe, or--"

"It was definitely her. I saw her blood spreading through that white dress as though there was suddenly a red-rose pattern on the bodice. I dreamed about that so much that I'm not surprised it never featured in your dreams – all the ink from that episode was probably used up on me."

Manda – to whom tears usually came so easily – suddenly found her eyes dry with shock. She looked down at her skirts and began automatically sweeping the creases out of them.

"I don't care what you dreamed. I'm not going to let it happen. I'm going to be at that River Club, and I'm going to guard them every step of the way. I'm going to be their chaperone every minute until Jack comes to his senses."

"Like you wanted to chaperone your Lily and the Inspector?" said Madam Seacombe, suddenly laying aside her embroidery and placing a kindly hand on Manda's shoulder. "It's not in the nature of a woman in love to be cautious, my dear. And if that wretched Inspector has taught us anything, it's that men never come to their senses until it's too late." 

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