The Witch of Exmoor Read Online Free PDF

that they will always end up on the right side of any shift or redistribution of power. Yet that complacency comes from a source more mysterious than might at first appear. Seen from afar, the Palmers–Daniel, Gogo and Rosemary–might seem to carry the assumptions of the British middle classes, carried on from generation to generation. But they come from nowhere. They have turned themselves into members of the English middle class by sleight of hand. Their manner, their voice, their pretensions–they appear to date back for centuries, but, as Nathan knows quite well, they date back no further than Frieda Haxby Palmer and her missing husband, whoever he may have been. Nouveaux, that is what they are. But totally convincing. It is a mystery to Nathan. How have they managed it? David D’Anger’s family is distinguished, and Patsy’s is rich: David is of the expatriate intellectual Indian revolutionary aristocracy of Guyana, and Patsy is of comfortable Quaker stock. The Palmers are nobody, they have come from nowhere, but they look as though they have seized the reins of power. They look as though they have been born to this house, this garden, this tennis court. The D’Angers and the Herzes can never be British. They have the wrong genes, the wrong skin, the wrong noses.
    The Palmers spring from Frieda Haxby Palmer, the self-elected witch of Exmoor, the daughter of the Fens. A genetic freak of talent, intelligence or mother-wit had elevated her, and her children had slipped quietly up the ladder after her. Now she has gone mad, spun off into space, but they smile still from their perches like smug saints mounting a cathedral coping. As though they had always expected to be there, as though nothing short of revolution could dislodge them. And, as David D’Anger’s game had illustrated, that revolution will never come, or not in this millennium. What we have, we hold.
    Nathan knows he will have to go in and face yet another late-night discussion about Frieda. Loitering in the poisoned garden will not let him off. Nor does he wish to be spared. He is fond of Frieda, in his way, and like all the rest of them he finds her of obsessive interest. He will return to the kitchen, in the hope that the washing-up is over and the coffee and the brandy on the tray. He takes a final inhalation, as he makes his way back towards the house–he breathes the stink of the bitter cress, the Mermaid rose.
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    In the kitchen, we find Patsy, covering cheese with cling-film. The kettle boils on the Aga, and there will be a choice of real coffee, unreal coffee, tea, herb tea. This, as Nathan likes to reflect, is the age of choice. Patsy is tired, and she has a busy day on Sunday–she has decided, masochistically she supposes, that she must attend the Quaker meeting, and then she has to rush back and provide lunch, not only for her house guests but also for a neighbour or two. Why does she do it? God knows. She is tired, and Daniel too looks tired. She thinks he may drop dead of a heart attack. He works too hard. They both work too hard.
    The washing machine already purrs quietly, but David D’Anger is drying the crystal glasses, which must be done by hand, and wondering where Nathan has got to. Nathan always disappears when there is any housework to be done. Nathan is an old-fashioned bastard, thinks David, whereas David considers himself to be the New Man. There David stands, tea-towel in hand, the New Millennial Black British Man. He has, of course, another label–indeed, he has several others. He is an academic. He is a politician. He is a journalist. He appears on television. He is a parliamentary candidate for a marginal constituency in West Yorkshire, which he fully expects to win. He is the future. But he has astutely allied himself to the clan of the Palmers, which gives him added credibility. He is the coming man, and they will back him.
    You will never guess what Gogo does, when she is not