The Lazarus Curse by Tessa Harris Page B

the fact that her cheeks were tingling with cold.
    After twenty minutes or so they arrived at the lake. Its surface was frosted white, like a huge mirror, and the reeds that fringed it were rigid as spears. A few ducks skidded comically on its icy surface as they drew up close by. Lupton offered Lydia his hand and she descended from the cart, her feet crunching into the snow below.
    “How do you know the ice is thick enough to walk on?” she asked warily.
    “I have measured it, your ladyship. ’Tis four inches thick. Safe as stone,” he replied.
    The estate manager seemed sure of himself, but he held her gaze until she gave a nod of approval, then clapped his gloved hands gleefully.
    “Come, come then, sir!” he chirped.
    Richard, already standing up, jumped down into Lupton’s arms, then, taking him by the hand, pulled the estate manager, with the sledge in tow, toward the lake. Together they set foot on the ice, edging very slowly at first, keeping close to the bank. Lydia watched anxiously from the shore, but every few seconds Lupton gave her a reassuring smile.
    “You’re sure the ice will not crack?” called Lydia, nervous as an ill-sitting hen.
    “I give you my word, your ladyship,” came the unequivocal reply.
    Both man and boy had stepped out onto the lake’s surface now, the ice taking the full weight of both their bodies. In one hand Lupton carried a stout log and, without warning, he hurled it out into the middle of the frozen plane. It hit the surface hard and skidded a few feet before finally coming to rest near the centre, the hollow echo that it made reverberating loudly in the still air.
    “You see, your ladyship?” he called. “Frozen solid.”
    Lydia silently acknowledged this reassuring gesture and tucked her hands back into her fur muff. At least that way, she told herself, no one could see that she was wringing them.
    “Now sit yourself down, sir,” ordered Lupton, positioning the sledge. Richard eagerly obliged, drawing his legs and elbows inward and clutching the sides.
    “Ready?” asked Lupton.
    His charge nodded nervously. First threading a long length of rope through a hole in the seat, Lupton walked a few feet away from the sledge.
    “Here we go!”
    Extending his right arm, he began moving it in a wide arc. The sledge started to slide as if following the sweeping line of an unseen circle. It moved slowly at first but soon gathered speed and Richard squealed with delight as he slid ’round and ’round Lupton, pulled by the rope. Letting out the length, so that the circles made by the sledge grew bigger and bigger, Lupton, too, found himself whirling ’round and ’round. All the while he was laughing along with Richard.
    Watching the pair, Lydia, although still fearful, permitted herself to smile. It was wonderful to see her son who, only a few weeks ago was so close to death, enjoying himself as a child should.
    Faster and faster Richard went, as Lupton pirouetted on the ice like a ballet dancer. Keeping the rope taut, he let it out even farther until there was at least twenty feet between himself and the sledge, but still he continued to steer it ’round like a boat caught in a whirlpool. It eddied for a few more seconds until, seemingly exhausted, the estate manager jerked on the tether to slow it down. Lydia could tell from the way he lurched drunkenly on the ice that he had made himself giddy. The rope in his hand slackened. Richard called out.
    “More!” he yelled. “More!”
    Lupton’s head was bowed and his body began to pitch and sway like a sea-weary sailor before dropping to his knees on the ice.
    “Mr. Lupton!” exclaimed Lydia.
    Richard stood up on the sledge and stepped gingerly onto the ice.
    “Are you ill, sir?” he asked, skidding toward the estate manager.
    “No, Richard!” yelled Lydia. “Get back onto the sledge!”
    The little boy jerked his head toward his mother. As he did so he lost his footing and went crashing onto the ice. Lydia