 DEATH OF A FOOL by Niall Marsh Authors' Note To anyone with the smallest knowledge of folklore, it will be obvious that the dance of the five sons is a purely imaginary synthesis, combining in most unlikely profusion the elements of several dances and mumming plays. For information on these elements I am indebted, among many other sources, to England's dances by Douglas Kennedy, and introduction to English folklore by Violet Olford. N. M. Chapter 1 Winter Solstice Over that part of England the winter solstice came down with a bitter antiphony of snow and frost. Trees, minutely articulate, shuddered in the north wind. By four o'clock in the afternoon the people of South Mardien were all indoors. It was at four o'clock that a small dogged-looking car appeared on a rise above the village and began to sidle and curvert down the frozen lane. Its driver, her vision distracted by wisps of grey hair escaping from a head-scarf, peered through the fan-shaped clearing on her wind-screen. Her woolly paws clutched rather than commanded the wheel. She wore, in addition to several scarves of immense length, a hand-spun cloak. Her booted feet cramped about over break-and-clutch-pedal, her lips moved soundlessly, and from time to time twitched into conciliatory smiles. Thus she arrived in South Mardien and bumped to a standstill before a pair of gigantic gates. They were of wrought iron and beautiful, but they were tied together with a confusion of shopkeepers twine. Through them, less than a quarter of a mile away, she saw on a white hillside the shell of a Norman castle, theatrically erected against a leadened sky. Partly encircled by this ruin was a hideous Victorian mansion. The traveller consulted her map. There could be no doubt about it. This was Mardien Castle. It took some time, in that deadly cold, to untangle the string. Snow had mounted up the far side, and she had to shove hard before she could open the gates wide enough to admit her car. Having succeeded and driven through, she climbed out again to shut them. Saint Agnes Eve, ah bitter, chill it was, she quoted in a faintly teutonic accent. Occasionally, when fatigued or agitated, she turned her short eyes into long ones, and transposed her Vs and Ws. But I see no sign, she added to herself, of hair, nor owl, nor of any living creature, God of mercy. She was pleased with this improvisation. Her intimate circle had lately adopted God of Mercy as an amusing expletive. There arose from behind.