The end of Nathaniel Crozier’s visit to Whitby
We left Nathaniel Crozier just after he had tortured and killed poor old
Mr Roper.
His next evil deed is to send the horrible fish demon he
has secured to his service to kill Ben so that he can then destroy the magical
artefact that Mr Roper passed on to the little boy.
Luckily, the monster follows the wrong trail; it kills
another boy instead. ‘By chance’, this is someone who has bullied Ben in the
past.
Miss Boston returns from a harrowing visit to London, and
finds that all hell has broken loose because Nathaniel Crozier has destroyed
two of Whitby’s guardians. Once again, she decides that she must confront an
evil newcomer who is about to destroy Whitby. This at the age of 92: if she
isn’t a good role model for older ladies, I don’t know who is.
Miss Boston knows that she has taken on what looks like
an impossible task, but she sees it as a good sign, a sign of weakness, that
the appalling man wanted her out of the way and used his agents to try to
destroy her in London.
She has an advantage in that Nathaniel Crozier
underestimates her. He never has a good word to say about anyone - he called
his wife Roselyn stupid and greedy and Miss Boston an odious hag - and he
thinks of Miss Boston as a senile, dabbling amateur.
Crozier would get on well with Lord Voldemort, who also
underestimates the opposition and believes that “there is no good and evil,
there is nothing but power and those too weak to seek it”. Crozier boasts of
being a master of control and domination; he scorns limits and warnings – they
are for the weak.
He awakens an evil sea monster and temporarily forces it
to obey him. He plans to use it to help him either rule the world or destroy
the world. He ends up being destroyed himself, by arrogance and over-estimation
of his powers.
Once again, Miss Boston destroys her enemy. She overcomes
her uncontrollable despair and physically attacks Crozier, distracting him long
enough for his spell to break. He is unable to resume control. He is caught in
his own trap and gets a taste of his own medicine: the monster turns him to
stone and shatters him, just as he smashed the stone head. This is poetic
justice. Before his death by calcification, he is revealed as a coward: he begs
the monster to spare him.
Unfortunately, Miss Boston herself is almost destroyed
too. Not only did Nathaniel almost strangle her, but the efforts needed to
return the sea monster to the depths were too much for her strength. A Warlock
in Whitby ends with her being brought back home in an ambulance. She is weak,
bedridden and cannot speak.
We have not seen the last of Nathaniel Crozier. Although
he is dead, his spirit lives on and he does great damage via the women he has
enthralled. Before we come to that, there are some more episodes in A Warlock
in Whitby that are of particular interest.
The Gregsons see
the light
One good result of Nathaniel Crozier’s reign of terror in
the Gregsons' household is that once the immobility spell wears off and Mr
Gregson is restored to consciousness, Mrs Gregson’s behaviour towards him – and
her neighbours – undergoes a huge change for the better. Living in fear of
Crozier has tamed her and destroyed her aggression, making her a better person.
She had promised herself that if Crozier ever let them
go, she would never shout at her husband again. For the first time ever, she
appreciates and cares about him. She is a reformed character; she keeps her
word and this has a positive effect on her husband.
The formerly unpleasant and lazy Mr Gregson helps to bring
Miss Boston’s bed downstairs, and he presents her with some snowdrops on her return
from hospital; Mrs Gregson helps to sew some new curtains for her.
This is all very touching and encouraging.
Miss Boston’s
visit to London
Miss Boston goes to visit a friend of hers, an old lady called
Patricia, who is very ill. She finds a
nightmare scenario in operation. Her friend is being held hostage; she is confined
to bed and is in the power of and being intimidated by a horrible, sinister,
hostile nurse who is more like a jailer. Patricia is a widow and a white witch;
she has had a good life but somehow all her avenues have been closed and she
and her home are in the hands of enemies.
It is painful to read about cruelty towards and exploitation
of weak, vulnerable, helpless, bedridden people who have no one to look after
their interests. I have written about
how Maria Callas and the Duchess of Windsor ended up like this. I learned
recently that something similar happened to Taylor Caldwell.
Miss Boston brightens Patricia’s final hours despite the
efforts of the nurse, who is under Nathaniel Crozier’s spell. Miss Boston escapes
death at the hands of the nurse, although her friend is not so lucky.
It is a very dark and chilling episode in the story, and
a warning about what might happen to unprotected, isolated people.
More warning
signals
and red flags
Just as Nathaniel Crozier must seek permission to enter
someone’s home, he may be required to give warnings to intended victims.
Unfortunately,
some people can see these things only in retrospect and after the damage has been
done; they may not have much in the way of knowledge or defences against his
powers either.
We first see an example of this when Crozier arrives at
Whitby and gets off the train. He notices an attractive girl ahead of him and
stares hard at her. She feels a chill, and shivers. She feels a tugging and
searching sensation. She has a lucky escape: he releases her from his spell
because he has come to Whitby for a specific reason and must not attract
attention.
Mr Gregson feels an inexplicable twinge of fear when he
first sees Crozier. He doesn’t want to have anything to do with him, but his
wife overrules him. In this case, it is all for the best in the long run.
A terrible drowsiness comes over Miss Boston when she is
being interrogated by him. Although she didn’t reveal the last name of her
friend, Nathaniel mentions it when he sees her on her way to catch the train to
London. She doesn’t see the significance of this, and has only a vague feeling
that she has heard the name of Crozier before. It is very important not to let
such things go.
It is possible that people such as Nathaniel
affect others badly just by their presence, so the bad feelings they induce are
not always a sign of an impending attack.
Either way, it is best to look out for
similar warning signals and avoid anyone who generates them.
Still to come: the witches and The Whitby Child
There is much more to say about Nathaniel Crozier as
witchmaster and the women who do his bidding. The final article will cover this
topic.
Robin Jarvis’s depiction of his villain Nathaniel
Crozier with the stone head:
