Field The Sound of Gematria

1. Auflage 2023
ISBN: 978-1-78864-981-0
Verlag: Cinnamon Press
Format: EPUB
Kopierschutz: 0 - No protection

E-Book, Englisch, 322 Seiten

It's the last months of the nineteenth century and twenty-two year old Euphemia Thorniwork, is out of step with the men's world she lives in. A mathematical research student at Oxford, looked on with suspicion by her her tutor, Professor Milton, she is forced to collaborate with fellow-student, Leo Lazarus, also under suspicion-for being Jewish. Haunted by dreams of Pearl in which numbers, a red heifer and Biblical purification rites provide insoluble clues, she discovers an article about communicating with the dead using sound waves. Determined to cling to rational explanations, Euphemia returns to Oxford, but when she begins to fall in love with Leo, and learns something of esoteric Judaism, their research takes an unconventional turn and the questions mount. Blending Victorian romance and drama with a compelling supernatural story, The Sound of Gematria is an engaging debut novel not to be missed.

Judith was born in Liverpool, lives in London and has been writing since 2009. She is the daughter of writers. Her grandson inspired her first published story when he broke her laptop keyboard. Unlike in the story, a magical creature didn't come out of the laptop and fix her life. Her short stories, mainly speculative, have been published in the USA, Canada, UK, Australia and New Zealand. Her short story collection, The Book of Judith, was published by Rampant Loon Press in 2014. She was shortlisted for the Cinnamon Press Literature Award in 2022. Judith has had several stories published about Euphemia, the protagonist in The Sound of Gematria, and her struggle to make her mark in a Victorian man's world. The idea for a longer work came to Judith during a synagogue service when she was reading the Bible. She came across the section about ritual impurity and wondered what would happen if this was an actual force-what might its effects be? Judith is also a pharmacist, freelance journalist, editor, medical writer, and indexer. She was awarded an MA in Creative Writing from the Open University in 2018.

Autoren/Hrsg.

Field, Judith

Leseproben

Twenty heads, you’re dead

London, October 1899

As I trudged from the graveside after Aunt Ada’s second funeral, rain soaked through my clothes, chilling my skin. Water dripped from the faceless statues of praying children and sorrowing angels.

The birds, perched in the moss-hung trees, fell silent. It grew dark and the yellow fog oozed up through the earth, snaking towards us, as though exhaled by the thousands of bodies buried beneath. I could no longer see my feet. The vicar picked his way towards me through the fallen leaves, along the gravel path winding between graves.

‘My condolences, Miss Thorniwork.’ He coughed.

The fog, smelling of rot, caught in my throat. The air tasted sour. The other mourners, muttering to each other, remained clustered by the wrought iron gate. My shoes clicked along the path as I stepped, shivering, towards the waiting carriage. I must be the first home. Mother would not be able to answer the door, and I would have to receive the visitors.

The clocks in the house had been stopped at the time of Aunt Ada’s and Pearl’s deaths. Mirrors were draped or turned to the wall and the curtains were drawn, as though my poor aunt and cousin had just died. I stepped inside the parlour and a blast of stuffy air hit me. I moved to the window, where fog crawled up the outside of the pane. It must remain closed.

‘Why Aunt Ada?’ Cousin May put her plate of Chelsea buns on a side table, knocking a pile of condolence cards onto the floor. I knelt to gather them, and when I stood and faced her a tear pooled in her right eye, overflowing until it ran down her cheek. She did nothing to check it. ‘And why Pearl? Why did the horse have to bolt?’

She pulled a black-edged handkerchief from her sleeve and dabbed the corner of one eye.

‘Why not?’ I said. ‘There is a one in a million chance any of us might meet an accidental death.’

‘Is this supposed to ease my grief? How could God let it happen? Or what came afterwards? Poor Aunt Ada. Poor Pearl. To think that they… I cannot speak of it.’ She reached for a bun.

‘Not God.’ I pursed my lips. ‘Events, unpredictable and uncertain. The odds are the same as of throwing a coin twenty times, and its landing on heads, upon each occasion.’

‘Do not speak of gambling. Where are your tears? If you do not shed them for Aunt Ada, then for poor Pearl. You and she were as thick as thieves.’ She clutched the brooch, pinned to the neck of her blouse. A swirl of bright auburn hair, mounted in rock crystal. I reached to touch it, for contact with something that had been part of Pearl. She jerked backwards. ‘You shall not have it.’

‘May, I’m not trying to rob you, I just…’

‘Just what? This is all I have of her, now. Father gave it to me, to try to ease my grief. Of course, it could not. My sorrow is inextinguishable. Your dry eyes reveal your indifference. You care not a jot where her… her body is.’

‘May, that is unkind.’ I clutched my hands to stop them shaking. ‘Nobody wants to find Pearl more than I. But we must leave such matters to the police.’

May turned to Uncle Jacob who had come to stand next to her, a teacup in one hand and his hat in the other. She grabbed his arm. Tea slopped into his saucer. ‘Father, the police, she says. Bungling blue-bottles who could not catch a blindfolded burglar!’ She burst into tears and buried her face in her hands.

Uncle Jacob put down his cup and patted May’s arm. ‘She thinks of nothing but numbers and her studies.’ My fingertips brushed the outside of my skirt pocket, where I kept, like a touchstone, the miniature copy of Burkhardt’s Theory of Functions of a Complex Variable. The last thing I had bought in Oxford. ‘Come, we will leave now.’ He turned back to look at me as, tutting and shaking his head, he led her away. ‘Show some respect, Euphemia.’

As you did, in deciding on a sixth-class funeral costing only three pounds and five shillings? Their bodies would not have been taken, had you agreed to cremation. A gasp from Jacob, and a further sob from May told me that, worse than simply thinking the words, I had spoken them.

‘You are cold, young lady. It was a mistake, holding the wake in your house. With your poor mother so unwell that she could not leave her bed.’ He strutted into the hall, dragging May after him. I followed them and heard Mother’s bedroom door close on the floor above.

Aunt Emily, Uncle Jacob’s wife, came down the stairs. ‘Poor Agnes is no better, Jacob,’ she said. She turned to me and took my hand. ‘Your mother ought to be in a sanatorium. Of course, we do not begrudge her a minute of our time and will continue to visit her each day. We will be back tomorrow. Will you be here?’

Jacob pulled her hand. ‘Come!’ he snapped, before I could reply. ‘We depart.’ He opened the door and stepped into waist-deep fog. ‘This foul vapour! It comes earlier each day.’ He coughed, making a sound like a clogged drain, and glowered at me as though I were to blame.

The yellow fog had appeared from nowhere, about six months earlier. Every night, it seeped from the ground, causing sickness. When we awoke it would be gone, but it persisted for longer each morning.

The last guest stepped out, holding a handkerchief over his mouth and nose. The laurel wreath hanging on the outside of the front door clattered as I shut it. I moved aside the black crepe covering the mirror in the hall. To stop Aunt Ada’s soul getting caught up in it, as she tried to leave, Aunt Emily had said. But more likely, so we would not have to see our own expressions. My face was pale, with shadows under the eyes. We had buried Aunt Ada, again. But Pearl’s only memorial was an emptied grave.

I went upstairs and put my head round the door of Mother’s bedroom. She lay in bed, next to the window. The fog rose up the outside of the glass, edging toward the open casement. I ran across the room and shut it, before the choking tendrils could creep in. Mother turned her head towards me, her alabaster face scarcely darker than the pillowcase.

‘I’m sorry to have woken you.’

‘I wasn’t asleep. But… have they gone?’

‘Yes, thank goodness. A gaggle of ghouls, trying to outdo each other’s grief.’

She took a deep breath. Her chest rattled. ‘I forbid you to speak of our family in such terms.’ She tried to sit up.

‘Let me.’ I plumped her pillows and managed to move her to a semi-recumbent position. Her counterpane slid down. Under her nightgown, her skin stretched over her ribs and her hip-bones protruded. It required no more effort to move her than to lift a cat. I replaced her cover and straightened up. ‘I’ll make us some supper.’

‘I have no appetite. This fog… I feel I could get up and come downstairs, if only I could breathe.’

A resonant cough left her shaking. ‘I’m sure our relatives mean well, although they are overwhelming in large numbers. Your Aunt Emily and Uncle Jacob are kindness itself, looking in on me while you are away at your studies. Which opportunity I do not, of course, begrudge you for so much as a second.’ She coughed again, deep, shattering, and leaned back against the pillow.

After a few moments, she drew breath. ‘I shall be better, once this fog lifts. Will you return to Oxford soon? Emily asked me.’

‘Perhaps. I don’t know.’ I stroked a wisp of damp hair from her forehead. ‘You’d rather I stayed?’

Mother put her hand on mine. ‘Euphemia. You look as gloomy as Emily.’ She smiled. ‘The truth is, while no mother would choose the life of a bluestocking for her daughter, your father would have been proud of your mathematical ability. Although I can see no practical application of your skills, they’re not bestowed on many.’ She drew a wheezing breath. ‘I only pray that you may meet a young man who will value them.’ She closed her eyes.

I pulled at the starched collar of my black dress where it chafed my neck. My head ached. I had no appetite either. It might help Mother if she could sleep.

I went downstairs into the kitchen and drained a glass of water, to which I had added a few drops of laudanum. The bitter taste fitted my mood as I turned down the lights. I went to bed.

I lay, staring at the ceiling. The clock in the church across the square chimed the quarter hour, half, three quarters, the hour. Thoughts chased each other inside my head. Pearl. Aunt Ada. Why had I not told May and Jacob that my grief was of the heart, rather than a brash outward display? Why did I not defend myself?

Normally, when sleep eluded me, I would be soothed by the elegant logic of a mathematical text. I turned my head to the shelf next to the bed. There were several books there, but tonight the thought of reading such a thing repelled me. Why had I ever thought mathematics engaging? I had no skill in the subject. I had managed to trick everyone into thinking I did, but soon my duplicity would be discovered. How could I leave Mother here in London, and return to University? How could I be beholden to Jacob and Emily? I would leave Huxley College. I had no skill in any subject. So much of what I had to do in daily life was unpleasant. Why add the unnecessary to it, by deluding myself that I had an academic mind? I must give up this fancy...