The Death of Mrs. Westaway

“Really?” Mitzi said, her voice slightly doubtful. “How does that work, then? Don’t you feel guilty taking people’s money if you think it’s all rubbish?”

Hal felt her cheeks flush. She rarely admitted this to people she didn’t know—certainly never to clients. It felt like a doctor admitting that he had no faith in conventional medicine, or a psychiatrist dissing Freud.

“That probably sounded more cynical than I meant it to—but . . . I’m not superstitious. I don’t believe in knocking on wood, or crossing fingers, or crystal gazing, or any of that. I don’t think the cards have any special occult power, though I’m not sure I’d say that outright to a client. But they do . . .” She found herself struggling to articulate something she rarely dissected, even to herself. “They do still have meaning—even if you know nothing about tarot, you can see the richness of the symbolism and the imagery. The ideas they represent . . . they’re universal forces that bear on all our lives. I suppose what I believe is not that the cards can tell you anything you don’t already know, or that they have magical answers to your questions, but that they give you . . . they give you the space to question . . . ? Does that make sense? Whether the statements I make in a reading are true or false, they give the sitter an opportunity to reflect on those forces, to analyze their instincts. I don’t know if I’m explaining this right.”

But Mitzi was nodding, a frown drawn between her neat brows.

“Yeees . . .” she said slowly. “Yes, I can see that.”

“So will you do one?” Kitty asked. She sat up, her eyes wide with anticipation. “Do me! Oh please, do me first!”

“Kitty,” Mitzi scolded. “Harriet is not at work.”

“Nonsense,” Ezra said. He grinned across at Hal. “She didn’t have to bring her cards, did she?”

Hal folded her arms, uncomfortably unsure what to say. After all, it was true. She had chosen to bring her cards, those cards in particular. But she didn’t want to give a reading, not here, not now, with these cards. For reading the cards was revealing—and not only for the client. Hal knew that she gave away almost as much about herself in the remarks she made as she found out about her clients.

But Kitty was looking at her pleadingly, her hands clasped with anticipation, and Hal didn’t have the heart to refuse, or the skill to do it gracefully, in this house where she was a guest.

“Okay,” she said at last. “I’ll do one for you, Kitty.”

“Awesome!” Kitty said excitedly. “What do you need? Do you need a special table or anything?”

Hal shook her head.

“No, an ordinary table is just fine. Sit opposite me.”

Kitty knelt on the rug opposite, and Hal opened the tin, and drew out her cards.

“Oooh . . .” Kitty breathed, as Hal spread them on the table. Her eyes darted from one card to another: the two of wands . . . the Hermit . . . the queen of cups . . . “What’s that one?” she asked, pointing at the Star.

“This one?” Hal picked it up. In her deck, the Star was a woman bathing in a forest pool at night, pouring water over herself beneath the light of the stars. It was a beautiful card, serene and tranquil. “It’s the Star,” Hal said. “It means . . . renewal of faith, peace, communing with yourself, serenity. Or reversed, it means the opposite—discouragement, dwelling on the bad things in life.”

“And what about this one?” Kitty pointed towards a card at the edge of the deck. It showed a girl crawling across a snowy landscape. Snowflakes fell from a dark sky, their tranquility a sharp contrast to the scene below, where the young woman was poised in her endless struggle. Her bloodied fingers had scored deep grooves in the snow as she dragged herself towards some unseen goal, and in her back were nine daggers, each of a different kind, some long, some short, some polished with finely wrought hilts, others no better than wooden stakes. The tenth, a piece of glass, or perhaps ice, was in her own hand.

“That’s the ten of swords,” Hal said. She knew the card off by heart, but now she picked it up, studying it afresh, before turning it so that Kitty could better see the image. It was one of the darkest cards in the pack, and it was one that always made Hal flinch a little when it came up in a reading. “It means . . . betrayal, backstabbing, ending . . . but it can also mean that an ordeal is coming to a close. That you’ll be given peace, though the price may not be one you want to pay.”

“Because she’s going to die, you mean?” Kitty’s eyes were wide.

“On the card, yes,” Hal said. “But you shouldn’t take them literally. Now . . .” She picked up the cards, shuffled them together. “I’m going to spread the deck out facedown, and then ask you to choose ten cards. Don’t touch the cards—just show me with your finger.”

There was something comforting in the familiar ritual. Hal could do a Celtic Cross reading almost in her sleep, and as she laid the cards out and ran through the familiar commands and explanations she always used, she felt her own mind clear.

It was true what she had told Mitzi. She didn’t believe in anything mystical, but she did believe in the power of the cards to reveal something about the querent, both to the reader and to the sitter themselves.

She didn’t ask Kitty what her question was, but she knew from her bright, blushing face what it would be—something about a boy, no doubt. Or maybe a girl. There was no fear in Kitty’s face, no doubt or desperation, as there was when people were asking questions about life or death, about the safety of a child, or the health of a parent.

To Kitty, this was just a bit of fun. He loves me, he loves me not. And that was as it should be, at her age.

When they came to the final card of the reading, the “outcome” card, Hal turned it over, and saw that it was the Lovers, upright, a naked man and woman entwined, his hand upon her breast, bathed in sunlight. And she knew immediately, from the scarlet blush that mounted up Kitty’s neck and flushed her cheeks, that she had been right.

“This card,” Hal said, smiling in spite of herself, so infectious was Kitty’s embarrassed delight, “this card represents the outcome—it’s the overriding card of the whole reading, and it’s the closest that the cards come to a direct answer to your question. You have chosen the Lovers—a trump card, one of the strongest in the deck. And it means love. Love and union and relationships. What this card is saying, here, in this position, is there will be love and, yes, happiness in your future. I see a very important relationship, one that will be very dear to you, and bring you much joy. But,” something made her add, looking at Mitzi’s suddenly rather pursed mouth, “this card also means choice—the choice between right and wrong, the high road and the low. This card shows the balance between all the different forces in your life, and indicates the importance of choosing the right course—one that will keep all those forces in their proper proportions. Romantic love is just one element—and it won’t always lead you right. You must be careful not to let it dominate everything else in your life. Satisfaction from other sources—work, or family, for example—is just as important, and can bring you just as much happiness. And what this card is telling me is that you will always be loved—” She swallowed for a moment, thinking of Mitzi and Harding and the warm cocoon of security wrapped around their children. “You will always have someone there for you. You can strike out into the world, secure in that love, secure that love will find you.”

She stopped, and there was a short pause, and then a little round of applause from the others.

“What a lovely reading, Harriet,” Mitzi said. Kitty was pink and radiant, and Hal was suddenly pleased that she had agreed to do this.

“Anyone else?” she said, almost jokingly, and she was surprised when Abel grinned and put up his hand.

“Go on,” he said. “Do me.”

Hal looked at the clock on the mantelpiece. It was getting on for ten, and Kitty’s reading had taken longer than she had realized.

“Okay,” she said. “But I’ll do you a quicker version of the reading—the Celtic Cross takes rather a long time. This one is simpler, it’s called a three-card spread. You can use it in lots of different ways, to answer a question, or to feel your way through a dilemma, or even to explore your past lives, if you believe in that sort of thing, but for now let’s just do a past, present, future reading. That’s nice and simple—it’s a reading people often begin with when they’re starting out.”