Miss Constantine" is the seventh and final episode of the first season of West Country Tales, a British supernatural anthology television series written by acclaimed children's horror author Josephine Poole. First broadcast on March 8, 1982, by the BBC, the folk-horror drama explores themes of isolation, urban development encroaching on tradition, and the breakdown of reality.
Miss Constantine
by Josephine Poole
The motorway cut through the land that belongs to the big house. Now there is a new bridge near Map's cottage, where strangers park their cars and watch the holiday traffic hurtling in and out of the West Country.
Old Map used to hurl himself after rabbits and catch them barehanded as they rushed from the diminishing islands of corn at harvest time People all round remember this and the marshland that the road gobbled up, the marsh birds and butterflies. Before the road there were apple orchards, and beehives. A strip of compulsory development — it is difficult to believe that the Authorities can smell flowers, or know the taste of an apple. The death's-head Authorities —
Miss Constantine lives on her own in the big house. It is as old as the Tudors, and includes forty rooms — counting the servants' bit -- with unique moulding on two drawing room ceilings. The jackdaws call for Jack! Jack! all summer, round the roofs that have aged to a tender grey. Beards of grass overhang the gutters, and a blackbird nests in the Tudor plumbing. The patched walls hide under a Boston ivy — like a shabby woman clinging to her fur coat. But in autumn the creeper turns to a raging, a furious red; the house glows then, as if it was burning.
The wood nearest the house needs cleaning out; a tree uprooted in the last south-westerly balances on its neighbour like a fainting person. Over the tattered trees, the rooks blow about like scraps of burnt paper. A rickety wooden gate leads into the flower garden. The great pillars on either side of the gate are garlanded with ivy.
Once there was tea on the lawn — sandwiches, and plum cake. There were servants then to carry the bone china. There were tennis courts in those days. Tennis was a game, and always good-humoured. 'Sorry !"Bad luck!' Well played!'— these were civilized comments.
But Miss Constantine doesn't linger on the lawn, though there is the acacia tree, hung with mistletoe bunches as big as footballs, and the swing where she used to rock, child and girl, lazily expectant, drifting in a controlled arc between green grass and blue, cloudlessly blue sky. No: as a rule she hurries on up the narrow path between the box hedges, where the greenhouse used to be.
A wide yew hedge separates this part of the garden from the tennis lawn, and there is a strip of grass which used to be a bowling green, with an ornamental pond at the end. On the other side of the path is a long flower border, beautifully sheltered by a red brick wall. The path ends at the `Temple' with its pagoda roof, where the bowls (and deck chairs, and garden tools) used to be kept. No vandals in those days. Now bees nest just over the door. At least the bees keep the boys out.
The flower garden keeps its old-lady smell: roses, myrtle, honeysuckle; the dusty smell of box. It was designed for private delight, but ivy and boys have long since climbed the wall.
Most days — weather permitting — Miss Constantine works at her rockery. It's a fight with weeds for possession; and the weeds are winning. For she can't stay long in the garden without being distracted.
They ran races up and down this lawn, Miss Constantine and her brothers. She puts down her trowel and covers her face, standing with her back to the boys. That's Grandmother’s Footsteps, and Reggie creeping up to touch her before she can catch him. More of a slap than a touch, but she doesn't complain, and off they go, helter skelter down the grass, until there's a splash Oh, Reggie!
The pond has been dry for years. But Miss Constantine, you see, still plays, in the pot-pourri scent of the old garden.
And she calls the dogs to heel, as she goes back to the house. Come along, dogs! Pilot! l3rownie!
Those are the names on the little grave stones under the yew tree. Miss Constantine lives in the past. She's happy there.
The mullioned windows, catching the rays of the weltering sun, glare as if the house is on fire. Swallows come back every year to nest in the servants' hall. They dart in and out through a broken pane.
There aren't any servants now of course, just Miss Constantine, at home. She opens the door, and goes in.
The house has the accumulated darkness of very old things, a darkness of times and people gone forever. But it's home to Miss Constantine: or it would be if it wasn't for the young people from the Authorities.
The young people from the Authorities! She can't remember now when they moved in. She doesn't know their names. If she speaks to them, they don't answer. They are simply present, in a group, standing together or sitting
in a row. They dress alike. She can't tell how many of them there are. And their faces — Their faces are white, as if they've been rubbed with ash —
Miss Constantine's use of the house shrinks in winter. It's too difficult for her to toil to and fro with logs, or buckets of coal; so she crouches in the rooms she can heat electrically, whose windows aren't broken and whose ceilings don't leak. But in summer — in summer she travels through this house which contains her whole lifetime's experience. She meanders through the light, the shadowy coolness of the different rooms.
Her fingers leave a trail up the dusty banisters, all the way up to the attics where the cobwebs hang like the ghosts of hibernating bats, and Reggie set out his trains. The creeper has grown right across the attic windows. The leaves pressing the panes are luminous, as if they too are made out of glass.
Other people go away in the summer, but she has a cheaper solution. For she can spend hours in the attic, looking at the labels on the suitcases, remembering dead holidays. She catches herself laughing aloud at times, at some of the things she remembers. Yes, on the whole they were happy days.
But now the young people from the Authorities have moved in. They've no discretion. They turn up anywhere.
The other day she tried to get through to them. She tried to make them understand her point of view, see things from her angle. And she must have started to scream. She woke up on the floor, with a splitting headache; she must have struck herself when she fell. She thought then that perhaps she'd scared them off. But she hadn't. That was the night they got into her bedroom.
She'd taken her pills, and gone to bed very calmly. It was a beautiful moonlit night, and she played with Reggie by the stream, much later than they were allowed. The stream and the trees and fields were black and grey and white. It was almost possible, in the silence, to understand the language of the stream; and the owls were just starting to hoot; they listened to them but not to Nanny calling thinly from the house.
Miss Constantine fell asleep then. When she woke, moonlight was streaming across her white bedcover, and the young people — the terrible young people — were standing in a row at the foot of her bed. It was the first time they'd ventured in, and something she would not bear. Quick as thought, she slipped out of bed and grabbed her valuables — Mother's rings and her brooch from Father, and Reggie's medals — shut them up in a drawer and locked it, and hid the key in her nightgown. There! They won't get their hands on those in a hurry!
But that was when the stealing started. It was only her shopping list to begin with. She found it at last, screwed up in some rubbish. Oh, they're devils!
She knows what they want, of course. They want to get her out. They want to get her put in a home. They want the house for themselves.
But she won't have that. Her family have lived and died here for hundreds of years. She won't give way, no matter what they do.
If only she could tell someone about them! But one has to be so careful. Tittle tattle, Chinese whispers. She doesn't want people talking about her. People can be so unkind.
But she'll have to get rid of them somehow. They'll simply have to go. Before they drive her mad.
Miss Constantine used to be a regular churchgoer. She trudged the family footpath across the fields in her hat like a brown bowl, her old-fashioned prayer book clamped under one arm. Bad weather provided a challenge, and put an edge to her voice in the hymns.
But recently, she's missed the Sunday service, and this worries the Vicar. She's been such a constant attendant, he almost feels as if the font or pulpit has been mislaid.
He finds her in the churchyard one morning, among the generations of Constantines. She's brought a basket of flowers for the family graves. Her parents have roses; every week she offers them a formal bouquet according to the season. But the forget-me-nots are for her brothers, with daisies and buttercups for Reggie; he always liked butter, yellow under a little boy's chin.
The Vicar asks her gently whether anything's wrong. He feels his way, carefully insisting; he can see she's troubled. She explains that she's mislaid her reading glasses.
The Vicar is a good man, and he knows his parishioners. He can imagine how cut off she feels without them. He offers to go home with her and help her to find them.
There's no knowing whether she's pleased or not; but she's obedient, anyway. She trots off across the field, and he has to hurry to keep up with her All the birds are out today, singing.
On the way he tries to draw her out, though she's even more fluttery than usual. But he gathers it isn't only the glasses that have gone; she's lost her pension book, as well.
Well, what of it? That's nothing to worry about! He's absent-minded himself. He's always forgetting people's names; worst of all, he loses himself in the sermon, starts off in Acts and wanders into the Gospels -- she must have noticed it. But while he passes it off, making a fool of himself to console her, she lays a timid hand on his arm. There's more to it than that —
He bends, and she whispers in his ear.
Not lost, but stolen!
Now who would steal from Miss Constantine?
The young people from the Authorities! What does she mean?
Funny old thing! He's glad he's with her; it sounds as though she needs help. He'll sort it out.
But he's conscious of a certain change in the air, as they approach the house. A change that he can't quite put a name to. It's as if the ordinary rule of things has lifted, just here; as if there is no longer any clear division between what can, and what can't be. (He's been taught to analyse, but it doesn't do him much good.) He thinks it may have something to do with the stubborn persistence of a certain way of life, which has thrown its surroundings out of gear: like finding a dinosaur on a golf course. There is certainly something — well — unusual about the place —
They pick their way down the drive which is puddled with little skies, blue and white. He throws out a remark about the unsettled state of the weather.
The house casts a long shadow, even in summer.
It's all locked up, of course; she's very particular about that. And she has to go in by the back door in order to undo the front. She won't let him follow her; certainly not. He must wait for the formality of the front entrance.
He looks at the gabled roofs — too sharp for comfort; at the tall chimneys; at the television aerial hanging out of use, as if the house, annoyed, had shrugged it off. The starlings know which chimneys are never used, and build there.
Crumbling stone, patched like an old suit. Tudor glass, with bars at every window: you'd think they'd keep the thieves out! But where is Miss Constantine? He's been forgotten!
He rings the bell. The bolt clanks back at once and the door opens on the chain. Miss Constantine's scared eye peers through. She seems relieved to see him there. She opens the door, and after this little drama, he walks in. The door closes slowly, squeezing out the sunlight.
He stands in the lofty hall, looking about him. He is dogged by one banal thought — how cold all this must be, in winter!
Now, this pension book. Where to look first? He follows her into a shuttered room.
The chaos is unbelievable. You might stumble on a Rembrandt or a Ming vase -- or .a cough-drop tin filled with plastic buttons. He notices several clocks, all stopped, as if the time weren't worth telling any more. The old grandfather shaped like a coffin — he's been dead for years.
And the rocking horse, her dappled Beauty, with his arched neck, and legs caught in the act of galloping. Miss Constantine used to hunt him when her brothers rode to hounds. He's been waiting ever since for the new generation, the children who were never born.
She trips ahead of the Vicar, leading the way to the morning room. But he gropes after her like a sleep-walker, the past wrapping round him like a cloak. So out of touch he is, so ignorant of the contents, the implications of the seething house.
The morning room is reassuring. At least it has a lived-in air; and the oval paintings of children on the walls are charming. And there on the table, among bills and bills, and gardening catalogues, and more bills, he spots her glasses. That's something, at any rate!
There are three staircases in the house. The one from the hall is painted white. There seems a vast space between the red Turkey carpet in the hall, and the landing ceiling. The banisters crowd upwards like the spears of storming soldiers.
When Reggie tried on the old military uniforms, Nanny heard footsteps up and down here all night.
Miss Constantine and the Vicar peer into the kitchen. Ranks of home-made jam — her bazaar and garden fête offerings. He wouldn't care — or dare — to eat here.
But it was easier for the children when the servants left. Not so many complaints. Cook hung on to the last. Boiled mutton and macaroni pudding, and the food cold by the time it reached the dining room. Where the Constantines ate their meals under the family portraits, making conversation in a congealing silence.
The portraits! You can't move your eyes without encountering the gaze of a great-great someone or other. The Vicar doesn't like it. They give him a haunted feeling.
They move into the drawing room. The windows are barred and shuttered. He has to edge his way round the furniture, the muddle. He is suddenly confronted by an Adam fireplace, very beautiful; he is face to face with a white marble head, contemplating him with sightless eyes.
Mother never felt comfortable in the drawing room. She didn't care for parties. Father had his shooting. For some reason there is the gun case in the corner, as if Father was preparing for a shoot-out. There's a curious little three-sided cupboard lined with glass: for displaying ornaments, most likely. Miss Constantine doesn't like mirrors. You never know who you'll see looking over your shoulder.
The flotsam and jetsam of a lifetime. The vicar feels disconcertingly out of his depth. But what's this? Deliverance! Her pension book!
Now let's have no more talk about thieves! Exit one very untidy old lady, and a kindly vicar.
But as he is about to leave, Miss Constantine clutches at his sleeve. She's made up her mind. She speaks very fast. Please will he throw out the young people sent from the Authorities?
He stares at her. What does she mean? What young people?
She becomes agitated. But didn't he notice them, a moment ago? They were in there, sitting on the sofa! He must have seen them!
She leads the way to the morning room. Look! There they are, still sitting in a row!
Well! He can't see anything! But that won't help her. So he tells her to open the doors through to the hall, and to hold the front door open herself.
Then he pretends to drive them out. Now come along please, you can't stay here any longer. Miss Constantine can't put up with you anymore. Come along, all of you! Out you go! He shoos them in front of him like a flock of geese, while Miss Constantine stands nodding and smiling at the door.
He asks her then if they have all gone. She shakes her head. No, because there's a nun under the piano.
He stares. A nun. Under the piano.
She smiles up at him. She beams confidence.
He goes to the piano, crouches, peers into the dark cave beneath. It's years since he's played hide-and-seek. Come along, Sister! You ought to be saying your prayers. You've no right to hide under a piano. Come along, out you go!
And that's that. Yes, they've all gone now. The house is empty.
She asks him then, whether he noticed their faces. He tells her no, not particularly.
They're so pale, she says. Their faces look as though they've been dipped in flour.
Her choice of words sends a chill down his spine.
He pauses on the threshold to warn Miss Constantine. She mustn't tell anybody about this. People talk. People might think she was imagining things — But she reassures him. She won't tell. She knows what people would say. She'll keep herself to herself — has done for years.
So the Vicar walks home across the fields.
And Miss Constantine locks herself in. She feels extra ordinarily light and free. She floats among the rooms. They have surged back, her family who belong here, all those who were temporarily eliminated by the young people from the Authorities. She's not afraid of ghosts. These house ghosts are her friends.
And Reggie — he's been sent to bed without any supper. She never feels hungry herself when that happens. She'll choose one of his favourite books, read aloud to him in bed. He always enjoys that—
But the Vicar is not easy in his mind about Miss Constantine. Next morning he cycles over to see how she spent the night.
The old black bicycle bounces down the drive. He rings the bell, and stands back, looking up at the house. How many faces must have looked out of those windows! How much hope and grief, love, pain, joy lie crammed within those walls! No wonder she loses her bearings!
But he needn't have worried. He can see at once that all is well. Miss Constantine slept like a child. She assures him that he has cleared the house of the young people from the Authorities.
So he pedals away, whistling a hymn (Ancient & Modern), congratulating himself on the success of his little trick. Meanwhile, the clouds are thickening over the sun; there's a storm coming. He'll have to get home quickly or he'll be soaked.
He's caught, though, at the drive end, as he grapples with the gate. The man who lives at the cottage, old Map's son, leaves his gardening and comes across.
Here, Vicar. You know those young people you threw out of Miss Constantine's yesterday —
Our Vicar is taken aback. He protests. Now — come on. What's all this about? Just an old lady and her imagination!
But the man interrupts him. He means the young people, with the faces like they've been whitewashed.
He saw them. They were trying to get in again all night
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