The Cinnabar Moth

I’m a Yorkshire girl, born and bred. When my marriage broke up I was happy to come back to my childhood home; life is slower-paced up here than it is in the south. My family has lived in the same stone house for four generations, on the edge of the moors at the feet of the Pennines. Bronte country. 

Nowadays I drive over to Harrogate three days a week to teach Craft, Design and Technology at a college of further education, but as a child I would hike for miles with my father and sister through the crowberry fields and climb the rocky outcrops with bare feet. 

Round here the summer evenings still cast long shadows and it isn’t hard to imagine how myths have arisen and stories have been passed down from mother to daughter over the years. One of my favourites is the tale of the Cinnabar moth. It is said that moths – and particularly Cinnabar moths – bring transformation and help you to find light in the darkness.  

These striking red and black insects were once a common sight on the northern heathlands, darting around the gorse and heather. People used to catch them and pin them up on their walls, but not any more, as the moths are becoming increasingly rare and elusive.  However I do have one in a resin paperweight. I’ll see if I can find it. 

Early in June last year I finally decided to bring down my great grandmother’s huge1911 edition of Mrs Beaton’s Book of Household Management (so much more than a cookbook!) which has been wasting valuable shelf space in my bedroom for years, and feed it to the compost bin. However when I slapped Mrs Beaton down on the table I noticed a folded newspaper cutting tucked into the book at page 760. The article was headed “The Simmering Passions of Mrs Beeton” and described intimate love letters between Isabella Mayson and her husband to be Samuel Beeton before their marriage and the publication of her phenomenally successful book, and before her untimely death at the age of 28 after the birth of her fourth child. 

On page 760 was a simple recipe for Royal Icing. However the margin had been heavily annotated in ink in my great grandmother’s own fine handwriting, so I had second thoughts about throwing the book away and thought I’d try to read and follow her minutely detailed instructions. 

On Midsummer Eve I  lined up all the ingredients I would need on the kitchen table. One by one I cracked open three eggs with a table knife, and holding half a shell in each hand, poured the contents from one to the other until the yolk and albumen were separated. I emptied the yolks into a coffee cup and the egg whites into a mixing bowl, then whipped the whites with a fork until they thickened.  

I weighed out 500 grams of the icing sugar I had bought that morning, tipped it into a sieve and shook the powder through the metal mesh into the bowl of egg whites. I added a tablespoon of lemon juice and stirred the mixture until the sugar dissolved and a snowy white cream began to form. 

Then I went into my studio, opened the cupboard where I keep my paints, reached up to the top shelf and found the cherished canvas roll in which I keep my best brushes. After a few seconds’ deliberation I chose a large, sable-headed watercolour brush.  

Returning to the kitchen I picked up the mixing bowl, walked back to the window, dipped the brush into the sugar paste and with careful strokes started to paint the window cill.  Allowing a few minutes for each coat to dry, I added more layers until the cill was covered in a smooth, hard shell of glistening white sugar.  

The preceding week I’d trawled the internet and paid serious money for the three fat, red candles that I now spaced out evenly on the window cill. The red against the snowy white looked oddly out of season. As instructed, I opened the window just an inch, lit the candles and then went to bed. The idea was that the heat of the candles would cause the icing to slowly dissolve and moths would be lured into the house by the candlelight and the sweetness of the melting sugar.  

Early next morning I woke up from a deep sleep and found a stranger lying naked next to me. From his bat-black hair to his blameless white feet he looked so odd in the half-light: unexpected but welcome. My hand was pressed into the warm hollow of his chest. I was sure I was dreaming, so I closed my eyes again. But this was real and I was suddenly overwhelmed by an aching sadness as he slowly withdrew his body from mine. 

I watched as he walked silently over to my closet and quickly went through each drawer in turn.  Underwear and blouses tumbled to the floor in drifts. Then leaving all the drawers open, he turned to my wardrobe, making barely a sound except for a slight rustling as he searched through all my coats and dresses until at last he found what he was looking for. 

Taking a tiny pair of scissors from a pocket in his jeans – still folded across my chair with his jacket, – he snipped a length of lace from the hem of a skirt and threaded it through the buttonhole of his jacket. I noticed that the jacket was already festooned with ribbons and lace and other trophies from other nights. He gathered up his things and disappeared as easily as a shadow.  

In the morning I tidied up my room and came downstairs into the kitchen. The candles had all gone out, the window was still ajar and there, caught in a pool of sugar on the cill was a large red and black moth, flapping its wings helplessly. I gently freed its delicate, blameless feet from the sticky mire and held the moth up to the daylight to admire its colours, but before it could make its escape I leaned over and closed the window. 

Tight shut.