Not long after I first heard her name, I began to see her. She was the shadow on the rooftop, the eyes that glittered in the dark, the swish of hair behind a pillar. The physicians called it paranoia, but I knew she was real.
Her story floated between the lips of servants when they thought I couldn’t hear.
Another Act, another tax,
another freedom taken.
Sugar, Currency, Quartering, Stamp,
until we are forsaken.
We protest but they think best
To have poor Massachusetts
Pay the kingdom that we came from,
‘til we’re deep in our debts.
A liberty assembly,
A dark and daring daughter,
A guilty man, a secret plan,
To bring the king to slaughter.
Attack, dear Jill, at Windsor Hill,
Avenge us ever-after,
Break his crown and take him down,
and fill the night with laughter!
Jill. Her name echoed in my head as I disentangled myself from my bedsheets, musty with days of feverish sweat. On trembling legs, I quickly dressed and made my way to the dining room. I took my seat, trying not to conjure the click of a ramrod out of the clatter of a spoon, or picture a hand sprinkling powder over the plate that was served to me. A bead of sweat carved a path from my temple to my jaw. A hand appeared in front of my face and I reared back—
But it was only my wife, concern etched into her features as she offered a napkin to daub the spittle from my mouth. With a start, I realised I had been muttering again. Ironic, that the thing making me froth at the mouth was not poison but my own delusion.
“I-I need some air,” I sputtered, embarrassed, as I rose to my feet.
I ran for the garden, heading straight for the maze and the privacy it brought. At the centre, I collapsed on the edge of the fountain and closed my eyes, lulled by its watery whispers. Leaves brushed against each other, stirred by the caress of careless zephyrs. Crickets chirped a steady rhythm and my breath clouded the April night, still crisp and newly born from winter. For a moment, my pulse relaxed from a frantic thunder to a steady patter, gentle as summer rain.
“It’s funny.”
My eyes flew open at the sound of the voice. I blinked, waiting for the figure before me – the hallucination – to disappear. It didn’t.
“Do you know how many people would kill for a pail of water?” Leisurely, teasingly, the woman let her fingers trail in its shallows. “And here you are, using it as a decoration.”
She drew her hand out, flicked off a few droplets and reached into her cloak to pull out—
I closed my eyes, waiting for the shot to ring out, but there was only the crackle of paper. She raised a brown bag to her lips and swigged from the bottle within. I eyed the bottle, suddenly registering the way it swayed in her hands and the flush that stained her cheeks.
“Hilarious, isn’t it? That after months of biding my time, the one night you decide to amble into the maze unarmed, unguarded and unaware,” she chuckled, “I’m plastered!”
I turned and ran.
But her senses weren't as dull as I had hoped. Pain detonated in my head. Dully, I registered the vinegar scent of dirt-cheap wine trickling down my face, mixed with something warmer, redder. My crown lay in pieces on a bed of broken glass. I scrambled to my feet, ignoring the pounding in my head. My legs pumped but, looming ahead of me, the hedge was an impenetrable wall. A dead end – a fitting name, given the promise in Jill’s gaze as I spun to face her. Her smile was a slash in the fabric of the night. Moonlight whipped her cheeks, casting her eyes as shadowed hollows. In her hands was a long rifle pointed at me. Her finger quivered over the trigger, savouring the second before the kill.
But I wasn't helpless. Years of honing my reflexes in fencing allowed me to grab the barrel, lift it up and push back so the opposite end slammed into Jill’s stomach. Winded, she fell forward, and I snapped the barrel over my knee. I fled until my legs burned, expecting to hear her close behind, but all that followed was eerie silence. I skidded to a halt.
Where is she?
Blood dripped between my lashes from my head wound, blurring my vision. I clamped down on the need to gasp for air and I pressed myself into the hedge.
Maybe… she’s lost? I dared to hope.
Tentatively, I stepped out from the safety of the leaves, searching for an escape route.
My insides tore open. I cried out at the knife now buried in my abdomen and fell to my knees. Jill stalked forward, reaching to drive the blade home, but my hands curled in the gravel. I flung a fistful into her eyes, using the momentary distraction to knock her to the ground. Pinning her down was pointless - she only bucked her waist up to drive the still-protruding dagger deeper into my belly. My grip slipped and she rolled on top of me. I kicked her backwards, sending her staggering to her feet, while I struggled to my own. Jill launched at me, and my knees were taken out by something solid from behind. I fell, and realised where I was – where she had herded me back to – the fountain. Water swept over me, buried me. Jill’s hands were vices, trapping me in the shallows. My lungs screamed for air. I tore at her fingers, but she would not let go. She wouldn’t— she—
Finally, I gave in. Liquid rushed into my lungs, and my body spasmed at the wrongness of it. The last thing I saw was a barbed-wire smile wavering in the ripples above. But for whatever reason, it wasn’t Jill’s face—but mine.
A single trail of footprints led them through the maze. They found my body floating in the fountain, blood unfurling from the knife wound in the centre of my chest like the petals of a rose. A broken bottle lay close by and my clothes reeked of alcohol. No evidence could be found of an attacker. My death, they said, was a drunken fit.
Self-inflicted.
Appendix
1764
Sugar Act, Currency Act and Quartering Act imposed by Britain on its American colonies.
1765
The Stamp Act is introduced. The ‘Sons of Liberty’ begin to assemble in Massachusetts in protest of the taxes, sometimes inciting violence.
January-April: King George III suffers the first of many maladies in which he can talk for hours until he is frothing at the mouth.
Estimated year that the nursery rhyme ‘Jack and Jill’ was created. Some versions contain a verse in which Jack’s head is mended with a plaster of vinegar and brown paper.
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