At least they let me undress in private. The crowd stood tense and silent as I trudged naked across the tarmac to the massive flame-thrower, that towered, nozzle-downwards, on three spindly legs like a surreal telescope.

Their doctor had tried to be kind in his fashion. ‘Turn round in the flames, if you can bear to,' he had urged, ‘That way your nerve endings will quickly be destroyed, and you will feel no more pain.’

Tears welled uncontrollably as I lay down on the marked spot beneath the nozzle. The fear which earlier had possessed me had long spent itself, and I felt only sadness and desolation, knowing I had done nothing to deserve to be burnt to death. Guards fastened the chains – a murmur rippled through the crowd. The drums stopped.

The world began to shake. I fancied the shaking was the roar of the flames, but there were no flames yet. The ground rumbled as at an earthquake – paradoxically I had visions of the darkness following Christ’s death when the graves opened. Something was shaking me, a blast of fire buffeted my shoulder. The crowd’s voices swelled. Dazzling light seared my eyes; the flames, it must be the flames. I turned as bidden and buried my face in the tarmac but the shaking, the lights, and the voices continued more loudly. Finally, as if everything inside me had broken, I cried out – a helpless shout of utter desolation.

The hand on my shoulder tightened. A voice, familiar and concerned, sounded urgently above the tumult. ‘Jack, Jack, you’re all right, Jack, you’re safe.’

Slowly, scarcely daring to hope, I allowed my eyes to open, Colleagues clustered round my desk, which was wet with sweat, or maybe tears. My manager’s arm was round my shoulder, as if reassuring a child waking from a nightmare. For an instant I let myself sink in his strong grip, then embarrassment – horrible red-faced shame – jerked me upright.

‘I’m sorry,’ I muttered, ‘I’m so dreadfully damned sorry. I must have fallen asleep.’ The words sounded corny, absurd - ‘a bad dream.’ I forced a smile, hastily resuming the role of urbane executive. ‘It must have been something I ate.’

They took some reassuring, and I was offered the rest of the day off, but having awakened – and screamed – I felt shaken but OK, and wished to assert normality by continuing work at once. Any more such ‘episodes’ in the office would do my career no good at all.

That evening, standing sardine on the train and fretting in the car-park exit queue at Northampton station, I wondered if my wife Anna had been right, and I should ‘go easy a bit’ as she put it. My promotion, achieved after bitter infighting, and the price we got for our semi in North London, had enabled us to buy and restore a splendid 17th century property in rural Northants just before the price ripple spread out there from the metropolis. Yet it had taken more out of me than I liked to admit. The half-hour drive to the station, the tedious commute on crowded unreliable trains, the demanding work and endless long hours, had meant that, for the first time in my life, I suffered from nightmares. For some reason these usually featured fires or burning. This, Anna assured me, only half-jokingly, was my my subconscious warning of executive burn-out.

It had been Anna who spotted Fitch’s End in a Telegraph classified. Raised in rural Dorset, the isolation of the house after bustling North London was like a relaxed homecoming for her, and she had flung herself with verve into renovating and redecorating, proving the match of any professional. Our little girl, however, torn from her much-loved playgroup and nursery school, had settled less easily, To my amusement, and Anna’s occasional concern, Claire had commandeered the figure from the Quaker Oats packet as an ‘invisible playmate.’ She chatted cheerfully to him over the breakfast table, and drew his picture (with taller hat) on every available surface.

As my Volvo lurched down the track to Fitch’s End, Anna, paint-brush in hand and a towel round her head, came out to greet me. She frowned slightly as we kissed. ‘Had you forgotten we’re going to Tom and Rita’s tonight?,’ she asked reproachfully, ‘We’re due there in an hour.’

’Drat!’ I replied. Events in the office had driven it from my mind. ‘I’m sorry, I had that awful dream again today – the one where I’m sentenced to death by burning. I must have dozed off at my desk, and woke up screaming to find Bill Shepherd’s arm round my shoulder and everyone standing round staring. I could have died of embarrassment – that bastard writes my performance reviews. And that,’ I smiled, cupping her worried face in my hands, ‘is why I forgot all about Tom and Rita. Am I forgiven?’

‘Oh Jack!’ She pressed against me for an instant, then drew back to look me in the eye, shaking her head slowly like a worried mother. ‘Jack! You’ve got to ease up, darling, you really do have to.'

‘OK, I promise,’ I said, ‘Though I do recall it wasn’t so long ago that a certain person was forever nagging me to go after this promotion and the salary that went with it. Now be careful with that paint brush’ - I pushed her gently away - ‘I don’t think an application of magnolia emulsion would enhance my suit!’

’Come on,’ sighed Anna, ‘Let’s get ready. We can talk about it later.’

I followed her through the side door to the utility room, three sides of which gleamed with new emulsion. An unpleasant tang of scorched paint hung in the air, and I noticed a blowtorch on the table. On the fourth wall, about two feet from the ground, a large figure in a tall black hat had been scrawled in shaky pencil.

Anna laughed. ‘That’s Matthew, as Claire calls him - the man from the cereal packet. I promised not to strip that wall till you’d seen it. She took ages doing it. Remember to be suitably impressed.’

' Why does she call him Matthew?' I enquired, amused.

'Don't know,' Anna shrugged, 'prefers it to Mark, Luke, or John, I suppose. They've been doing the four evangelists at Sunday School. Anyway, I'm off to take a bath.'

Though neither Anna nor myself is religious, we enrolled Claire at a nearby Baptist Sunday school so she could meet other children, there being no nursery school or playgroup within reach. The minister, whose daughter sometimes baby-sat for us, having failed to lure us into his pews, had conscripted us to his pet secular cause – a pressure group to have lighting installed at a roundabout half-a-mile or so from the chapel. This notorious danger-spot lay in a woody hollow, lethally prone to frost and fallen leaves, and had given Anna, driving to the supermarket in Wellingborough one chilly morning, her first ever skid. Tom and Rita Fisher were local teachers whom we’d met in the pressure group, and the excuse for tonight’s dinner was to celebrate the erection of the lights, though they were not yet in use. The Fishers lived in a converted mill about four miles west of Fitch’s End.

At this point, the little girl ran in, and jumped into my waiting arms. ‘Have you been a good lass?’ I asked, hugging her.

Claire, as usual, ignored this daily question. ‘Look, Daddy, I drew Matthew, Daddy.’

‘Yes,’ I said,’ he’s very nice, but Mummy will have to strip and paint the wall now, and then you mustn’t draw on it any more.'

A cloud crossed Claire’s face. ‘I can stay here tonight, can’t I Daddy? I don’t have to go to that bad place?’

‘Of course you can stay here, ‘ I laughed, trying not to show annoyance, ‘Wendy’ll be along soon to look after you till we come back.’

Claire looked relieved. ‘But,’ I persisted, ‘you’re being very silly, Claire. Tarsus and Tandy are lovely friendly doggies. They’ll never hurt you – they only want to love you.’

Claire shivered and her lip began to twitch. ‘No, no, hate them, hate, hate, hate them,’ she cried, ‘Wicked bad doggies, horrid king, bad brute doggies!’

‘All right, all right,‘ I said hastily, ‘You don’t have to see them ever again.’

‘Never?’ said Claire doubtfully.

‘No never, if you don’t want to,’ I reassured her. ‘Now off outside and play, and let me have a bath.’

‘Mummy’s in the bathroom,’ said Claire.

‘Is she? Well I’ll have a shower downstairs instead,’ I said.

As the warm water poured comfortingly over me, my worry about Claire resurfaced. She had always loved animals, and had invented names for the cows over the garden fence, apparently recognising each one individually. In London she had been on patting, often cuddling terms with half-a-dozen pooches, including a usually rebarbative Doberman, and her first meeting with Tom and Rita's two spaniels had been ecstatic.

Then something had happened. Claire had asked Rita 'what sort of doggie' they were, and on being told 'King Charles Spaniels' let out a piercing scream. 'Go away, go away, hate you, hate you, horrid brutes!' which had startled both us and the previously gambolling dogs. We had thought they might accidentally have nipped her, but no bite-marks could be found. Whatever the cause, she utterly refused thereafter to visit the mill where Tom and Rita lived, and hid if they called on us at Fitch's End, emerging only if assured the dogs had been left behind. Even the words 'Tarsus' 'Tandy' or 'King Charles Spaniel' drove her to a frenzy of screaming.

The minister's daughter's small motorcycle spluttered up the drive as I finished dressing, and soon she and Anna could be heard laughing in the kitchen.

'Hello, I was admiring Claire's drawing,' a muffled voice announced as I entered, 'Where is she, by the way?’

'Out playing - she'll be in soon enough,' Anna said, 'Do you need some help with that crash-helmet, Wendy?'.

The offending headgear finally came off, releasing a riot of golden curls. 'I expect she'll want a ride on my bike like she did last time,' sighed Wendy as she shook out her hair. 'I'll go very slowly down that track along the front of the house - it’s well off the public road.’

'Don't you dare give her any ideas!' I roared. 'It's bad enough her drawing Matthew everywhere.’

'It's the man she always draws - she calls him Matthew,' explained Anna, 'Actually, if you're feeling really angelic, you could strip and paint that wall for me, and get rid of him. But be sure Claire's in bed first! There's a blowtorch on the table - it's a propane one; dead easy to use - no messing about with meths or pumps. And the painting things are in the corner there.'

‘Great!' said Wendy, 'I love decorating. It'll make a nice break between study chunks.’

I glanced at my watch. ‘We really must go. Let's find Claire now, and be off.'

But the little girl appeared just then at the door, and with a squeal of delight leapt into Wendy's waiting arms. 'A ride!' she cried, 'Can I have a ride?'

I looked at Anna helplessly, and we both laughed, defeated. 'Of course,' I said, 'But only one. And you must be in bed by nine o'clock and not give Wendy any trouble. She's got her A-level revision to do.'

‘You’re never any trouble, are you, my pet,’ Wendy hugged the delighted Claire. ‘I’ll get my books out of the pannier, and you can have that ride straight away.'

We walked outside, where the setting sun bathed the house’s golden stone in a fiery glow. ‘I almost forgot,’ said Wendy, fumbling with the pannier’s catch, ‘Do you remember asking Dad if he knew anything about the history of your house? Well, he’s found something.’

‘Oh yes?’ I said with interest.

‘It’s not much,’ Wendy sounded apologetic, 'Only that there used to be a man called Fitch lived in a house here, but he died in the Civil War and the house was destroyed. That happened a lot hereabouts; Naseby battlefield's only just up the road. What a shame they had to drive the A14 road through it, by the way. Your present house dates from William and Mary's reign, I think, and got the name ‘Fitch’s End’ then.’

‘Do we know what side Fitch was on?’ asked Anna.

‘He was Puritan, so his lot won.’ Wendy carefully balanced a pile of books on the saddle and closed the pannier. She grinned. ‘Dad thinks the Puritans were wonderful – God’s Own Englishmen and all that – but they sound a boring load of old killjoys to me. When we watch Sealed Knot performing, we always cheer different sides.’

‘If Fitch backed the winning side,’ I said, ‘How come his place was destroyed?’

‘Search me,’ Wendy shrugged. ‘You’d have to ask Dad. He’s the historian in our family. Or you could try old Stan Green in the village; you know, the retired headmaster. There’s not much he doesn’t know about the history of this area. As for me,’ she tapped her stack of books, 'give me physics or maths any day.’

On the way to the mill, as we approached the roundabout, Anna remarked ‘I forgot to ask Wendy what college she's going to.’

‘She’s applied to Somerville, her father tells me.’ I answered, ‘Why do you want to know?’

‘I just wondered if that was Rita’s old college,’ said Anna.

‘Well you can ask Rita in about ten minutes time,’ I began, but Anna yelled ‘Watch out!’ I slammed my foot on the brake, and the Volvo slithered to a stop at the roundabout just in time for a yellow van to dart across in front of us with inches to spare. I blasted the horn, and cursed loudly and long, but the offender had vanished down the road to my left. Anna was pale and trembling.

‘That would have been just wonderful,’ I said at last, through clenched teeth, ‘Two members of the campaign to light the roundabout, on their way to a victory dinner with two other members of the campaign to light the roundabout, crash their car at the same sodding roundabout. And it’s not even dark yet. Are you all right, by the way?’

She nodded. ‘Not that it would make much difference if it was dark,’ I went on,’ Seeing that the bloody lights aren’t working yet.’

Anna squeezed my knee. ‘Shall I drive?’ she asked.

‘No,’ I said, ‘You can drive us home when I’m pissed. God! I could use a drink right now, after that.’

Rita was at the door as we parked in her drive. She wore slacks and an old coat, and grinned at us rather bashfully, I thought, as if we had caught her doing something mildly improper. Around her the spaniels, Tarsus and Tandy, yelped and bounded in a frenzy of tangled leads.

‘It’s all right, you haven’t come on the wrong night,’ she called as though reading my thoughts, ‘Go right in. I’ll be dressed in a minute. I just had to do something to calm these two down.’

Tom appeared in the doorway. ‘The whisky is poured,‘ he said, ‘we heard your car and anticipated your needs.’

‘Very prescient of you,’ I replied, following him into the parlour. ‘We both need something. Would you believe we almost came to grief at the bloody roundabout? Some berk in a van. If I’d got his number I’d report the bastard. These lights up there can’t be switched on too soon as far as I’m concerned. I say, this is nice – what is it?’

‘40-year-old Strathisla' Tom grinned, ‘At distillation strength. I watered it a bit of course, but be wary if you’re driving home.’

‘Well it’s most welcome,’ said Anna, looking around. ‘Are you expecting anyone else?’

‘Old Mr Green the local historian, used to be head of Rita’s school. He’s nothing to do with the road campaign, but we do owe him a favour, and decided to kill two birds and invite him tonight.’

A scrabbling and panting in the hall announced Rita’s and the dogs’ return. ‘I just don’t know what ails these animals tonight,’ Tom sighed, ‘They just will not settle – it’s not at all like them.‘

Remarkably few moments later, our hostess, in immaculate gown and radiant necklace, appeared smiling in the doorway. ‘Told you I’d be ready quickly,’ she laughed.

'Crikey!' I said, 'Could you give Anna a few lessons?' At that moment the former headmaster's minicab arrived, and the party was complete.

Mr Green was a chubby, effusive old gent, in crumpled jacket, non-matching trousers, and lurid tan brogues. ‘Oh dear people, I do so hope I have not delayed you unduly. It’s so fatally easy to lose track of time when one has retired,’ he confided, pressing a monster bouquet into Rita’s delighted arms. ‘A peace offering, dear lady, a peace offering. Now, may I be introduced to these charming people?’ He peered enquiringly at Anna and myself through thick glasses.

Rita called us over. ‘Come and talk to Mr Green,’ she said, ‘He knows all the local history and all about your house. Mr Green, may I present Jack and Anna Yates, present occupants of Fitch’s End.’

‘Oh dear lady, not everything, never everything!’ The old man flushed pink with pleasure. ‘One can never know everything about the past – the subject is too vast, too vast’.

‘But you know something about Fitch’s End?’ I said.

Mr Green fixed me in a beaming squint. ‘But of course, of course, Fitch’s End has a well-known local legend, very well-known. You see, in the Civil War ... '

‘Dinner’s ready,’ Rita called from the doorway, ‘Feeding time! Come through please.’

In the dining room a tempting table awaited us. Blue Spode lay surrounded by heavy glittering silverware, and beside each place stood a heavily carved crystal goblet. A matching pair of decanters sparkled on a rosewood plinth in the middle of the table, flanking a huge bowl of roses set between two silver candelabra whose light illumined the scene.

Mr Green uttered squeals of delight and approval, clasping his plump pink hands like an excited child. I muttered sideways to Anna ‘This is a bit O.T.T isn’t it?’

‘Just a morsel,’ she whispered back. ‘Nice, though!’ ‘Think of the return job,’ I persisted, ‘Can you match this?’ Host and hostess took up position at top and foot of the table, with Anna and myself on one side facing Mr Green across the plinth.

‘Your starter,’ Rita announced, ‘is lobster with fresh peach.’

‘And the opening wine is Sancerre Rosé,' said Tom, passing Anna one of the decanters. ‘Never say we don’t spoil our guests.’ Her eyes sought mine. 'Ought I have any if I’m to drive back?’ ‘Just take half a glass and leave more for me,’ I said. As she poured it, a cloud of moisture misted the crystal. Then, smiling mischievously, she handed the decanter across the table.

‘Mr Green,’ Anna said, ‘Do have some Sancerre Rosé before my immoderate husband finishes it.’

‘Never mind,’ Tom said, ‘there’s plenty more down below. One of many good things about this old place is the lovely cellar – perfect for plonk, though the damp can mess up the labels, which is why I always decant.’ He retrieved the wine from Mr Green. ‘Here, Jack, I’ll fill up your glass.’

'Sancerre Rosé!’ I said, raising my glass for closer inspection. 'I always thought Sancerre was strictly a white wine.' As the goblet passed before the candelabrum, the magnifying curve of crystal momentarily swelled the light into a large menacing flame. I flinched and stared, but the image had gone.

‘Please all start,’ Rita called. I took a sip of the wine. It was cool and fragrant, and the solid goblet a pleasure to hold and use. The lobster too was at peak of perfection and blended exquisitely with the ripe white peaches – not a combination I’d encountered before. The same thought must have occurred to Anna and Mr Green, for just as I reached again for my glass, both began to heap congratulations on Rita and enquire about the recipe. But Rita’s reply was drowned in my shriek of pain and the crash of the heavy goblet falling on the Blue Spode plate, shattering both. I doubled up in agony, clutching my seared hand in horrified amazement.

‘What the hell?, What’s the matter?’ Tom and Anna exclaimed in chorus.

‘The glass!’ I gasped, ‘It’s hot – burning hot. I’ve burned my hand.’

‘What? The wine? Hot? What are you saying, Jack?’ Tom touched his own glass. ‘That wine’s chilled. You know that, you drank some, I saw you.’

‘It was hot, scalding.’

I brandished the blistered weal on my fingers round the table. ‘There, do you believe me now?’ Rita had come to my side, and was gently feeling the broken crystal. ‘It’s not hot, Jack, nothing’s hot.’ Bewildered I looked from the smashed goblet and Spode to my wife and friends’ disbelieving faces. ‘That’s well-nigh a hundred quid’s worth of damage, not bad for one go,’ Anna said. Annoyance and worry fought for control of her face.

‘I don’t get, this, am I going mad?’ I said. ‘The thing felt red-hot. And look – the blister's real enough.’

‘Maybe you put your hand in the flame of one of the candles when you reached for your glass,' Rita suggested.

‘I was nowhere near the bloody candle,’ I cried ‘Do none of you think I know my own actions?’

Anna squeezed my arm. ‘OK, calm down’ she said, ‘There’ll be a rational explanation once we find it.’

I’m sorry,’ I said, ‘Rita, Tom, I’m dreadfully sorry about your lovely things; I’ll pay for them, I promise.’

Mercifully, the rest of the meal passed uneventfully. My spirits rose at the roast wild duck, with vegetables and salad things fresh from the mill garden, washed down with Gewurzrtraminer Reserve. The sweet was a perfect mango sorbet, fluffy and delicate, that melted like snowflakes on the tongue leaving a fragrant tang of fruit. A fine Sauternes accompanied this, followed by coffee, and samples from Tom’s amazing collection of malts.

As we trooped back to the drawing room, I again apologised to my host and hostess. ‘I’ve had a beastly day,’ I confided. ‘First I nod off in the office and have a night- or rather day-mare, and wake up screaming in the MD’s arms, then the near-accident driving here, then I break your lovely glass and plate.’

‘Did I hear someone say ‘nightmare?’ Mr Green had commandeered the most comfortable chair. His nose twitched like a hunting dog’s. ‘Do tell all about it – dreams are a topic of abiding fascination to me.’

Relaxed by drink and good food, I flopped on to a sofa. ‘Oh it’s just a silly nightmare. I have it quite often, or variants of it. It always ends in my getting burnt alive.’

‘Indeed! Most interesting!’ The ex-headmaster seemed to fix his radiant squint on someone over my left shoulder. ‘And now you burn your hand on a glass of chilled wine.’

‘I must have imagined it,’ I laughed, ‘Frayed nerves play tricks.’

 ‘But don’t leave blisters,’ said Mr Green. Anna, as if reading my thoughts, broke the rather tense silence that followed.

‘Mr Green, you said earlier you knew something about Fitch’s End.’ The old man turned his smile to her. ‘Oh yes, there is a well-known story attached to it concerning Matthew Fitch.’

‘Did you say ‘’Matthew”?’ I interrupted.

‘Yes, Matthew Fitch, a Puritan widower of the 1640s.’

‘A Puritan?’ Anna and I exchanged glances. Mr Green said ‘Have I said something odd?’

‘No,’ said Anna, ‘It’s just...’

‘My small daughter Claire,’ I cut in, ‘has adopted the man on the Quaker Oats packet. You know, the one in the puritan hat – well she draws him with a bigger hat actually - and christened him ‘Matthew.’

‘Indeed! said Mr Green, ‘The historic Matthew Fitch was a widower living alone with his small daughter in an earlier house on the site of yours. After the battle of Naseby, so the story goes, some routed royalists burnt him alive in his own house.’ He turned to me. 'So you see ~ you and the first- er - incumbent of Fitch’s End seem to have fiery problems in common, only poor Fitch’s were real, all too real.’

‘Charming! And thanks’ I groaned, ‘I really needed to hear that’.

On its table by the door, the telephone rang, a half-hearted pinging sound as if the bell was partly jammed.

‘Is something wrong with the phone?’ Rita rose to answer it. ‘It doesn’t usually sound like that.’ She briefly pressed the receiver to her ear, and replaced it. ‘No-one there, or no connection. They’ll call back.’

‘Who’s looking after Claire?’ Tom asked.

‘Wendy, Pastor Clark’s daughter.’ replied Anna, ‘She’s a treasure, Claire gets on really well with her. I asked her to strip and paint a wall tonight – Claire drew Matthew all over it and we didn’t dare touch it till after she’d gone to bed. She’s rather possessive about Matthew.’

‘But, dear lady, does it not strike you as odd that she should pick the name ‘Matthew’ in the house of Matthew Fitch?’ Mr Green said.

‘It’s Saint Matthew, the evangelist. They’ve been doing him at Sunday School,’ Anna explained.

‘Ah!’ said Mr Green.

The telephone half-rang again; absently Rita picked it up. Her expression tightened.

‘Who is this, who do you wish to speak to? It’s some sort of nutter,’ she said, hanging up. ‘Didn’t say his name or who he wanted to speak to – just started wittering religious stuff – bits of the Bible I think.’

‘I hope,’ said Tom, ‘This doesn’t mean the Jehovah’s Witnesses have taken to phoning their victims. It’s bad enough when they bang on the door, usually when I’m in the shower or watching an exciting match.’ Unaccountably, I felt a cold prickle in the pit of my stomach.

‘Oh do tell us exactly what the man said.' Mr Green sounded as if he hoped the call might have been obscene.

‘Pious claptrap,’ said Rita. ‘Something about God forsaking him, giving his body to be burned, and it profiting him nothing. I’m afraid the Bible isn’t my forte, atheist that I am.’

The vice in my gut tightened and my eyes sought Anna’s face. ‘Christ!’ I said, ‘I’ve about had my fill of fires for one day.’

The telephone rang again, with a clear proper ring. This time Tom answered. We heard Wendy’s agitated voice but not her words. Stone-faced, Tom passed me the handset.

‘What is it, Wendy?’

‘Jack, I don’t know what’s happening, but I’m scared. I stripped the wall over an hour ago, and put on one coat of emulsion, but the wall feels hot again, and I smell burning but can’t see where it’s coming from or what’s causing it. And Claire - she's had some dreadful nightmare and woke up screaming and sweating and said 'Matthew' was in the room and told her he was going to die, and she keeps screaming 'I love Matthew, don't let him die,' and I can't calm her and just don't know what to do.'

Anna had come to my side and heard most of this. Our eyes met. ‘Look,’ I said to Wendy, ‘do your best, and we’ll come back and see if we can settle her. Dinner’s finished anyway.’ I tried to sound calm and in charge, though my mind spun in a turmoil of terror. ‘If the burning smell gets worse, call the fire brigade – they wont mind - it could be a cable or something, and they’re trained to find such things.’

‘Trouble?’ Rita had read our faces.

‘It’s Claire,’ Anna said, ‘She’s been having bad dreams and won’t settle. And Wendy smells burning. I think we’d better get home and sort things out.’

‘Thanks for a super evening, and apologies again for the breakages,’  I said, ‘We’ll call when we get back and put you in the picture. Mr Green, it’s been a pleasure meeting you. You must visit us one day, and tell us the whole story about Matthew Fitch.’

‘My pleasure, my pleasure.’ The old man clasped our hands in both his. He seemed uneasy. ‘And my best wishes, my very best wishes.’

‘I’d better drive,’ said Anna, as we walked to the car, ‘You’ve had a fair skinful.’

‘No, I’ll risk it,’ I said, firmly holding the keys. ‘With my nerves in their current state I need the concentration to take my mind off.’

We drove in tense silence, through darkness palpable, thick enough to taste. Even the Volvo’s quartz-halogen beams seemed blotted up by the gloom. My blistered hand hurt to grip the wheel, but I kept the speed as high as I dared in the narrow lanes, their enclosing stone walls a faint, close blur. A distracting red glow ahead made visibility even more awkward, and it took concentrated peering to stay out of the ditch.

‘They must have turned the lights on at the roundabout,’ Anna said, ‘At least that means a safer journey.’

‘They might,’ I said, ‘or it could be something very much worse.’ She did not answer, but stared out of the window, suddenly asking ‘How fast are you going?’ I flicked my eyes to the speedometer’s dim disc. ‘About forty’ I replied, ‘I daren’t go quicker on this road in this darkness.’ ‘How fast can a horse travel?’ she persisted in a taut voice. ‘Eh? A horse? What are you rabbiting on about?’ Her voice rose. ‘Can a horse run as fast as we’re going now?’

'Oh I don't know,' I snapped. 'What time is this for stupid questions like that? How the hell should I know how fast horses run?'

‘A horse has just passed us,’ Anna said, ‘A horse with a rider in old-fashioned clothes has just gone past on the far side of the wall.’

Rage and fear swelled in me. ‘ Don’t be such a fool’ I snapped. 'No horse could survive the pace we’re going, not in this darkness. We’ve got the headlights on full beam and I still can barely see.’

‘I saw a horse’ she insisted, ‘and another one and another. This whole bloody place is swarming with them and they’re all passing us.’

I did not answer. It was becoming difficult, verging on impossible to steer. By now we had passed the roundabout, its lamps resolutely unlit, and reached the crest before the turn-off to Fitch’s End.

Our home was ablaze. What had seemed solid blackness was revealed to be smoke, made glowing and lurid by light from the burning cottage. In this glare I too saw a horse. It galloped past, huge in the murk, its hatted rider crouched low in his saddle. It was only afterwards I realised its hooves had made no sound.

The wind blew the smoke towards us. It seeped through the car’s ventilators, searing our eyes. Neither of us spoke, though a glance at Anna’s face bore eloquent witness to her thoughts. I didn’t know how close I dared approach, but, wishing to keep the lane clear for the Fire Brigade, which I prayed Wendy or Rita had called, pressed on to the outer garden wall and turned into the track. We opened the doors and staggered out.

Smoke swirled round us, rasping our lungs. Shoving a handkerchief over Anna’s mouth I grabbed her hand, but she tried to wrench free. ‘Claire!’ she panted, ‘I must find Claire.’ I gripped harder, tugging her along the track to escape the direct line of wind. Her voice rose, ‘Stop, Jack. I must find our child.’

‘You’ll find her outside,’ I yelled, ‘Or you won’t find her at all. Nobody could survive in there.’

At the corner by the holly bush where smoke was noticeably less dense, we paused. Anna flung herself on me sobbing, and buried her face in my lapel. ‘I can’t look, I can’t bear to look’ she screamed. At that moment a swirl of wind briefly cleared the smoke and the f ire was revealed in all its fury.

The roof of Fitch’s End had gone. Only a skeleton of rafters reared black against a curtain of flames. Sometimes some structural member was consumed and crashed into the inferno, releasing fountains of sparks. The noise was unbelievable yet familiar – the same shuddering roar always seeming to get closer that I recalled from my my dream. I trembled and clutched the sobbing Anna closer. Of Wendy and little Claire there was no sign – we could only hope and fear.

My eyes smarted from smoke and grief, and I briefly closed them. Anna chose that moment to gather courage to turn. Her grip slackened and tightened as she let out a loud scream.

‘Jack! Jack! There’s someone there. There’s someone in the fire.’ I opened my eyes, and the sight that met them sent a shock-wave of horror through my stomach. The upstairs window above the garden door – Anna’s little dressing room – framed the figure of a man. Its arms were raised above its head, which bore a tall Puritan hat, and it leaned forward as if trying to escape or jump, The figure wavered and retreated, then rushed forward propelled by a violent spurt of fire. In horror I noticed flames rise from its arms and hat as if its body itself was burning.

The man began to cry. Not as a child cries, but a low intense groaning, at first barely distinguishable from the crack and crackle of burning timber and masonry. The figure hovered in the casement, exposed or engulfed in the ebb and flow of the flames, all the while groaning louder and more agonisedly. A further jet of fire spewed from the window and the man’s cry swelled to a terrible loud roar. Stricken and aghast we gazed. Its upper garments being consumed, we saw with horror that the upraised arms had no hands, only charred stumps along which melted body fat guttered and bubbled hideously.

Again the wind shifted. It plucked a queer ugly humming from the stricken structure and puffed the blaze like satanic bellows, swirling the smoke into a myriad circling eddies. Or so at first it appeared. The gusts died, but the eddies did not clear. While the man at the window screamed, they merged and coalesced into faces; hideous ringleted faces that dissolved and re-formed round the fiery casement like nightmare bubbles. Some were apparently on horseback, others mere masks of aristocratic hatred and superior contempt. The strange humming grew louder and more distinct till with a start I realised it was the sound of men singing, raucous and triumphant:

‘Down among the dead men
 Down among the dead men,
 Down among the dead men
 Let him lie! ’

A long blast spurred the fire to a final climax. The cavalier heads and their mocking chorus dispersed, and the figure in the window ceased its howling – or was it merely lost in the fire’s roar? Then, in one last great struggle it raised melting stumps of arms and cried out, in a musical rich voice; a last dignity bestowed by merciful death at the instant of release. ‘Father, I Thy poor servant Matthew Fitch, into Thy hands do commend my spirit’. The last words of Jesus on the cross. This said, the figure sagged, and the upper floor collapsed in an uprush of sparks, taking the suffering Puritan with it.

A faint cry from the holly tree distracted our attention. Slowly, dreading, we approached it. Something dark huddled in its shade. As we approached we saw it was Wendy, clutching Claire in her arms. Though exhausted, and numb with terror they nonetheless seemed unhurt. Wordlessly Anna gathered Claire in her arms, I placed mine round both women and my child. And there we stayed, unspeaking, still sobbing, none of us daring or bearing to separate until the Fire Brigade and Police finally arrived.

   *****************************

‘Ah yes, Matthew Fitch was a most interesting character,’ beamed Mr Green. We were sitting in Tom and Rita’s conservatory on a mild, pleasant Sunday some weeks later, dissolving an excellent lunch in 25-year old Campbeltown. Our friends, who were out for the afternoon, had kindly lent us their spare room whilst our new home – a smart prefabricated Swedish bungalow – was building, by courtesy of our insurance company, at the far corner of the Fitch’s End site. We had planned to change the name, but the local history society had petitioned County HaIl, so rather than suffer aggro, we had agreed a compromise address, Holly Tree Cottage, Fitch’s End, near Naseby, Northampton.

Ecstatic squeals and yelps outside announced the passing of Claire, in a flurry of leads, the spaniels Tarsus and Tandy cavorting around. She was taking them for a romp in the field beyond the mill garden, and had lost all fear of them. Whatever spell had bound her, seemed now broken.

‘You were saying?,’ said Anna to Mr Green.

’Ah yes!’ The old man drained and generously refilled his ample glass. ‘As in all wars, but especially in civil wars, there were good and bad on both sides, but this particular lot were a real rabble, the dregs of the royalist army, Anyway, they besieged Fitch in his house, determined to have some fun at the expense of anyone from the side that had just trounced them so thoroughly at Naseby. They seized Fitch’s daughter Marjorie – she was only little – and declared she was a witch whose spell had brought about their defeat, and would burn her there and then. It may have started as a cruel prank, but the devil seems to have taken hold of them, and they built a fire, and whilst some held Fitch, others taunted him by passing the screaming child nearer and nearer the flames. But the joke went wrong, for the man holding Marjorie tripped – or so the legend goes – and she fell on the fire, whereupon the father broke free and leapt into the flames and saved her. He threw her clear, and she landed near that holly tree – it’s about 350 years old, just a sapling in those days. Then the soldiers locked Fitch, who was already severely burned, in the house and set it alight, singing the song you heard: ‘Down among the dead men let him lie.‘

‘Then they made off before the locals, who were staunch Cromwellians, could muster a militia. A village woman called Nell Shouler found little Marjorie Fitch, alive but burned, and gravely injured by her fall. She died later that same night.’

Mr Green, who had been drinking steadily throughout this discourse, replenished his glass and turned a flushed excited face to Anna and myself.

‘And this, dear people, is where you enter the picture, A house was built on the site of the old one in 1692, during the reign of William and Mary. That was the house you bought. Now, local lore has it that if the occupants of Fitch’s End had no children, or only boy-children, or daughters older than about eight or nine when they moved in, then nothing untoward occurred. But, if there was a little girl in the family,’ he paused dramatically, ‘then things began to happen.’

‘What sort of things?’ Anna asked, uneasily I thought.

‘Hauntings!’ announced Mr Green triumphantly. ‘Noises, cold places in warm rooms, an overpowering sense of grief in certain parts of the house and grounds. And, of course, the child in question reporting seeing strangely dressed men in tall hats around the place. Indeed, in 1829, the then rector Rev Abraham Atwood sought and obtained leave from the Bishop of Peterborough to perform an exorcism in the house, and did so with apparent success, for no further manifestations were reported until you good people’ - he waved the whisky glass at Anna and myself - ‘moved in.’

‘Why us?’ I asked, ‘What did we do to undo an exorcism?’

‘Who knows?’ Mr Green beamed like a fishmonger trying to explain the disappearance of cod to a complaining housewife. ‘So many spirits have been disturbed in these parts lately – building the A14 road through Naseby battlefield  probably raised swarms of them. That might account for your cavalier heads. But when your babysitter took the blowlamp to Fitch’s image, that’s probably what clinched it and raised him.’

‘Will he ever come back?’ asked Anna, ‘I know I could never face going through that again.’

‘My dear lady,’ said Mr Green ‘On the original occasion, when the soldiers burned Fitch to death, the child Marjorie also perished. On this occasion, the child – your little Claire – was saved. I think Matthew Fitch will be able to rest in peace now. Ghosts, it seems, are often condemned to re-live some tragedy in their own past, like reading a sad story over and over, looking for the happy ending that never comes. Change that ending, and the reader is satisfied, closes the book, and moves on.’

‘And you think Fitch has moved on?’ I said.

‘Oh undoubtedly,’ said Mr Green, ‘I’m old-fashioned enough to believe he has gone to join his child on a farther shore where death and parting are as forgotten as last night’s bad dream.’

‘And my own nightmare,’ I pressed him, ‘the one where I dream I’m being burned, Can I be sure I won’t be plagued by that again?’

‘Some of Fitch’s memories got mixed up with your own,’ said Mr Green. ‘Now he’s gone, so will those dreams be.’

‘It’s certainly the case,’ I mused, ‘that since the fire they’ve never recurred.’

Silence fell. The day had ripened to a mellow, glorious late afternoon. Through the open conservatory lights, we could hear the distant calls of Claire and the dogs above the birdsong and whispering leaves and soft gurgle of the millstream. Westward – the mill faced west – some wisps of cloud relieved the fervent blue, most white, one a long, smoky streamer.

We stared at it and could have sworn we discerned something familiar in its shape, something redolent of a tall hat but risen, lovely, at peace, It was as though a kindly spirit was reaching across time to bless and thank us for the rest he could at last enjoy for ever.

Copyright © James Scott 1992 and 2008

[Jim Scott] [A Boy A Book A Story] [Darkness] [Pat from Lancashire] [The Quaker Oats Man] [A Matter of Conscience] [Picnic] [Incident at a Railway Station] [Cauld Comfort Kail] [Moral Uplift] [The Soldier] [Madonna] [Hero of the Revolution] [The Messenger] [Tramlines] [Innocents] [Unlucky Dip]