The Peacock Room

by Henry Heffer

The rear suspension of Cherry’s Mini Cooper almost snaps like an Achilles tendon, as she fails to avoid yet another pothole scarring the driveway leading to Fenwych House. She had been distracted by a loud crack! like that of bones breaking, echoing through the mist, causing the birds to take flight. The sound is that of unculled bucks rutting. Behind them, the does are trapped beneath leafless ash trees. Wide-eyed and terrified, they flinch at every clatter of antlers.

As per the email, none of Cherry is to be wasted. Thinking this to be a reference to her time and talent, she arrives early and waits outside the servant’s entrance—also a request in the email. However, after 30 minutes of sporadic knocking, every windowpane is still dark. Creeper climbs the corbels, buttresses and turrets, whilst the relentless mist smothers the rest, choking colour from the landscape. Cherry turns to leave, but at that moment—as if her patience were being deliberately tested—Baron Bartleby Brake opens the door. Much like his estate, the man appears in a state of severe neglect.

Cherry can’t afford to be picky. In her line of work—restorer of antique textiles and upholsteries—the jobs are few and far between. But as she walks behind the crooked, pale, balding Bartleby, scarf drawn up around her nose to dull his scent, she can’t help but notice the amount of tattered but exceptional tapestries swathing the house’s interior. A good job today and Fenwych’s a potential gold mine!

“These are to blame, no doubt,” mutters Bartleby, indicating the lead-lined windows opposite the tapestry in the east-wing, state bedroom— known as the Peacock Room. At first, Cherry thinks the tapestry is blank. Much like a stereogram, relaxing her eyes makes the scene surface. “It doesn’t matter how many times I close these curtains, they are always open again upon my return. I think it must enjoy the view.”

Cherry smiles. She doesn’t believe in ghosts. She has been working in stately homes, castles, and churches since her university days. “I’ll get my tools.”

*

Without rest or provisions, Cherry practises her art. Over the course of seven hours, moving the stepladder up and down its length, she covers every inch with her brushes, trying to wake the tapestry from its slumber. However, no matter what she tries, the depictions of rural life refuse to reinvigorate. Cherry is losing hope.

Woven upon an oak tree’s bough, the peacock, grey and muted, looks out from the fabric. It seems to be appealing directly to Cherry, begging her to live again. Slipping the magnified spectacles from her face, she looks upon the creature’s plumage with the naked eye. Sliding her brush into the solution meant for dissolving finer impurities (chimney soot, deposits from insects, and the oil from fingerprints) Cherry leans closer still. She is trying to imagine the richness of the colours as they once were, colours that might never be seen again, when she is overcome by a wave of remorse and the tip of her nose makes the slightest contact with the fibres. Pain erupts. Cherry pulls her head away, tearing flesh and almost toppling her from the stepladder. The scent of scorched flesh accompanies the soft patter of blood hitting Cherry’s palm. Upon the tapestry, left hanging like sheep’s wool from barbed wire, is her nose. Before her eyes, the skin melts into the fabric. In its place, colour spreads across the threads.

“I have been promised,” croaks Bartleby, already gripping the handles of the stepladder, “none of you will be wasted.” He wrenches the stepladder from under her. Into the artwork she topples.

Suspended, paralysed, the fabric sets in quick. Cherry lets out a scream—quickly silenced when her cheek is devoured. Followed by her tongue, and finally her throat. She shuts her eyes, but the lids are eaten too. The skull is tough, but it’s eventually digested, giving way to the most delectable grey matter. As Cherry is imbibed, radiant pigment advances over the cloth. Hay bales turn golden once more, the vaulting foxes are dyed a rich umber, and—utilising the strands of muscle fibre around her heart—the Hunt’s scarlets are revived. With the last of her hair, bone marrow and bowel, the peacock’s plumage regains its lustre, and these scenes of English aristocratic life are saved.