“Have you heard, gentlemen – and lady,” Mr. Whitebrook nodded to Miss Deberley, the sole woman in our hitherto all-male expedition, “the tale of the songbird?” He looked about him. For several days he had regaled us with stories on our journey, some of a decidedly sinister cast.
“Is that not the bird Dr. Kellbott spoke of,” Miss Deberley asked, “in his Exotic Birds of the East?” Her voice was unexpectedly melodious. I had not heard it before now, for I had been laid up with fever since our last halt; and upon my return I found a new member among our company. I will not deny it was a pleasant surprise, for Miss Deberley was uncommonly handsome, and charming besides.
She drew the attention of us all, of course; yet it seemed to me – even at the time, as she asked after Dr. Kellbott – that she singled me out. More than once I caught her glance across the fire about which we sat that night.
“Well, yes and no, dear Miss Deberley,” Mr. Whitebrook chuckled. “I know the good Doctor well, and he told me this story himself. They say there were once a good many such birds in the East…”
Once more I found I was not attending to the tale, for Miss Deberley’s gaze had turned back to me, and I could not help but return it. With some effort I took up the thread again.
“…they say the bird itself is small, but it is not her plumage that distinguishes her,” he continued.
In the firelight a locket gleamed above the bodice of Miss Deberley’s dress, and again I was distracted in spite of myself. In those days my eye was keen, yet the light was poor, and I could make out only its oval shape and some object within, sealed beneath a clear varnish. I dared not look up after so rude an examination.
“The Doctor says that, by the account of those who have seen it, the bird is secretive, and its song is seldom heard. Well, gentlemen, perhaps it is as well,” Mr. Whitebrook lowered his voice, “for, if you credit the good Doctor, its song brings ill luck.”
There came a snort from across the fire. “Old wives’ tales,” said a raspy voice – whether Mr. Vanhoeven or another I cannot now recall. “Travellers’ fancies, Mr. Whitebrook, nothing more.”
A polite disagreement arose that did not settle so much as divide us; Mr. Vanhoeven held that the good Doctor had been imposed upon by superstitious natives, while old Mr. Ashford allowed that stranger things were known in the East than in all of Surrey. I confess I followed little of it. For in the midst of their genial quarrelling I had looked again at Miss Deberley, and found that she alone was not arguing, nor smiling, nor doing any of the things a young lady does to fill a silence she has no part in.
She did nothing but listen, with a stillness I can only call attentive, as though Mr. Whitebrook spoke not of a curiosity but of an acquaintance. It struck me as singular for a moment – and then I told myself the firelight had lent her a gravity she did not possess, and that a woman of her evident spirit was too sensible to be frightened by a fable.
“But how,” demanded Mr. Vanhoeven, “does your Doctor know any of this, if no man hears the wretched thing and lives contented?”
“Ah.” Mr. Whitebrook was quiet a moment, and the quiet did more than his voice had. “Because one man did not merely hear it. One man caught it.”
The argument fell off.
“And what became of the man who caught it?” I asked aloud, drawing the attention I had not meant to draw; but the words had flown, and there is no calling such a bird back.
Mr. Whitebrook answered me, after a pause that only seemed courteous. “A great mistake it was. They say that the next morning he found the cage empty and his wife gone – and not a soul in the whole manor could remember the man had ever had a wife.”
Miss Deberley, looking at me once more, shaped a word I could neither hear nor read upon her lips; or perhaps it was no word at all, and I had fallen prey to my own heated fancy. I looked away, as I had before; but this time I found no comfort in the looking-away, and could not have said what it was I wished not to see.
“…and that, gentlemen – and lady,” he nodded to Miss Deberley once again, “is the tale of the songbird, that brought disaster upon all who heard her song.”
With that, the night grew deep about us.
* * *
In the morning I found no Miss Deberley. The fire was out. The place where she had sat was empty.
I rose, and upon a flat stone I found a silver locket; and taking it up, I saw at last what it held. Beneath a lens of clear resin lay a feather, white, tinged with blue.
Then I heard a song. I looked for the singer and found none.
I woke Mr. Whitebrook and asked him where the lady had gone. He looked at me kindly, as one looks upon a man not yet wholly awake, and asked what lady I meant. I went round them all. Not one could recall that any lady had travelled with us at all.
All these years, gentlemen, I have kept the locket; and I have never been able to say what it was I lost that night, only that I alone remember there was something to lose. I never saw Miss Deberley again. Nor did I ever again hear the tale of the songbird – not even from Mr. Whitebrook, who, I am quite certain, no longer remembers that he ever knew it.
Songbird was a random piece of writing, and I couldn’t even remember how it came to me. I bet there’s more to it, but perhaps I have heard a song, too.
Next short story at 1st of November, Gossip. There will be stars to look at.
Thank you for reading.
Aldwin
