Cheese and bread required little preparation. She sliced both upon the lid of her trunk and ate standing, unwilling yet to trust the settle. The sharp scent of the onions cut through the damp air.
The rain had strengthened into a proper storm—at least, she supposed the hammering sheets pelting the roof and washing down the windows would be accounted a proper storm here. In Hertfordshire, rain like this would stop all carriages and farm work for a day. Here, perhaps it was a nightly occurrence.
She crossed to the window facing the tower and wiped the steamy glass with the edge of her sleeve.
The pyre burned high upon the knoll, its light bending sideways under the force of the wind. Smoke trailed low across the headland and vanished into the dark. Beyond it, the sea lay unseen, though she could hear it more clearly now, a heavier pulse beneath the storm.
She waited.
Her uncle had spoken of the lantern with something close to reverence—the beam sweeping a broad arc across the water, visible miles offshore. A steady rotation, white against the night, returning at exact intervals to reassure the coast. She had carried the image with her from London. She had expected to see it from this window tonight.
But the tower remained dark.
She waited longer. Perhaps the apparatus required more preparation than she had supposed. Perhaps the keeper would not light it until well after dark, or perhaps the wind was gusting wrong for the flame.
Still nothing. Only the fire.
It was no small blaze. He had constructed it with intention—the same deliberate economy she had watched from this window that afternoon. She could see him at intervals moving against the backdrop of flame, adjusting some portion of the stack. Once the flame dipped, then rose again.
A warning, he had said.
She drew back from the window and set the lantern upon the mantel beside her books.
If the tower stood for the safety of the coast, why was the coast dependent upon a bonfire? Why had neither Mrs Hargreaves nor the keeper spoken of any defect? Thetrustees’ letter had contained no hint of difficulty. Her uncle had expressed no concern beyond the weather.
Yet something was plainly amiss.
The storm gathered its strength without haste. Rain ran in uneven lines down the glass; the wind pressed and withdrew, pressed and withdrew, as though testing the mortar of the walls. The pyre upon the knoll bent sideways under each heavier gust, its flame drawn thin and then swelling again.
Still, the tower remained dark.
Elizabeth leaned nearer the pane, narrowing her eyes against the reflection of her own small lamp behind her.
There—a point of light moved within the gallery.
Not the broad revolving beam her uncle had described, but a smaller, warmer glow within the tower itself. It shifted once along the curve of the glass, paused, then disappeared. It flared again, nearer the centre, and lowered as though set upon some surface within.
She held her breath to prevent fogging the window and peered harder. The keeper was there. The light proved it—advancing and retreating, describing no orderly arc, only the uncertain path of a hand-lantern carried from one side of the chamber to another.
He was trying to light it. She was watching a man fail.
If the apparatus were ready, why would the flame not hold? The structure stood intact. The lens, from what she had seen, was whole. Had some portion of the mechanism failed? Had the oil spoiled? The questions multiplied faster than she could order them, and none had answers she could reach from this window.
The smaller light lifted once more, hovered briefly near the heart of the lantern room, and sank from view.
Elizabeth had just turned from the window when the chimney gave its first warning—a low, hollow sound within the flue, as though wind had found some unguarded cavity and set it moaning.
She tilted her head. The fire had been burning well enough. The coal bed glowed evenly; the smoke had drawn cleanly upward. She stepped nearer the hearth and watched the flame. It bent sharply toward the room and then righted itself.
A second gust struck harder. This time, the smoke did not rise.
It rolled.
A darktongue unfurled from the throat of the chimney and spilled downward, bringing with it the bitter scent of soot long undisturbed. Elizabeth jumped back, one hand rising to cover her mouth.
“Oh, no.” She lunged forward and tried fanning it with her skirt. “No, no, no!”
If only she had a bellows—but no, it would be too late for that. The draft had reversed.
