Wintercombe, page 41
part #1 of Wintercombe Series
‘Heard? Aye, I have — whole village too, come to that,’ said Mistress Baylie. ‘And what a shame, eh, that he’s still alive.’ She grinned cheerfully up at Silence, who was not especially tall but stood half a head higher than the older woman. ‘Have your remedies not finished him off then, my lady?’
‘No, unfortunately not,’ Silence said, grinning back; she always found Christian’s forthrightness infectious. ‘He’ll be back in the saddle by the end of the month, alas. And when he’s returned to his former self, I would like Rachael to be well out of the way.’
‘Ah,’ said Mistress Baylie, seeing her point at once. ‘And you’d like her to come stay at Wick, would you, my lady? Well, one more mouth won’t make much difference, and she’ll enjoy the change. And with the spring coming on apace, we could do with another strong arm in the dairy.’
‘She’ll be only too happy to lend a hand, I expect,’ Silence told her. ‘She always liked to help our dairymaid Bessie, and learned a lot from her — of dairying, mind you.’
‘Just so long as it was only dairying,’ Christian said, understanding her perfectly: Bessie’s morals were as notorious as her skills were famous. ‘I’ll be glad to have her, my lady, for as long as you want — and don’t bother to send word, I’ll expect her when I see her come up to our barton.’ Her eye slipped past Silence’s shoulder again, and she whistled softly, in a most unladylike way. ‘Well, well, well. Look at what the cat’s brought up.’
Silence turned. They were standing at the west end of the churchyard, close to the tower. Beyond the low boundary wall lay the lane that led past the Vicarage towards the great South Field, once open strips but long since divided up into scores of tiny closes of pasture or arable. Along the wall were tethered all the horses that had brought those of the better sort, Baylies and St. Barbes, Apprices and Flowers, to the church, under the watchful eyes of a couple of boys paid a penny each for the task. And behind them, suddenly arrived, she saw half-a-dozen or so troopers, with Nick Hellier on his tall chestnut at their head. He saluted Silence with a smile, doffing his hat, while his horse sidled restlessly, champing its bit. The noise, and the turning heads, alerted the rest of the crowd. Gradually the talking died away, the scampering children stood and stared with a mixture of admiration and fear, and the separate knots of gossipers coalesced into one large, hostile mass, gentry and cloth-workers, labourers and husbandmen, old and young, all merged and joined together to face the threat.
The threat of six men, Silence thought, disturbed, against a couple of hundred people? For the first time, she understood the import of Nick’s words about the sullen peasants he had encountered on the expedition to find General Cromwell. The faces around her, weather-hardened, seasoned by suffering and toil and poverty, were all alike steeped in menace. She felt their hatred rise, almost a tangible thing, and despite the cool breeze in the April sunshine, a sweat broke out on her body.
‘Good morning, people,’ said Nick affably, his voice, deep and clear, pitched to carry to the back of the crowd. A heave and sway around Silence presaged the arrival of Parson Willis, perspiring and earnest, at her side. He shouted, his own insignificant tones sharpened by recent practice in the pulpit, ‘Why were you and your ungodly rabble not at prayer, sir? Are you above God’s law, as you are above man’s?’
‘There isn’t room for us all,’ Nick pointed out, reasonably enough, Silence felt. ‘But that is an issue which does not concern me now, Master Parson. I have come here for the purpose of clearing up certain misunderstandings which seem to have arisen amongst your flock.’
The flock, a notably independent and opinionated set of sheep, stared at him resentfully. Someone, safely at the back, called out, ‘Bain’t ee come to rob we, then?’
There was a mutter of laughter. Nick, his hand still holding his hat, which rested on one knee, smiled with what appeared to be genuine amusement. ‘No,’ he said cheerfully. ‘For once, I have not. Oh, I don’t deny that your contributions to our garrison’s supply will be needed as much as ever, but that’s for your own protection, to keep you from the ravages of the Parliament’s army.’
Silence heard the irony rich in his voice, and wondered that the villagers did not. Above the surly murmurs, he went on. ‘But it has lately come to my notice that a rumour has been put about alleging that men, and women, will be conscripted to work on the garrison’s defences. I can tell you, here and now, that rumour lies. The defences of Wintercombe are all but finished, and we have no need of your assistance — particularly no need of your forced assistance. None of you will be asked by me to contribute any labour whatsoever to the fortifications. Is that clear?’
If he had expected a cheer, even a mutter of assent, he was doomed to disappointment. The village of Philip’s Norton eyed him in a dubious and stony silence, and waited. Quite unperturbed, Nick surveyed them in leisurely fashion, the muted colours of the countryside: the undyed greys and faded browns of the poor, more prosperous people in russets, blues and mulberries, and everywhere the dull black of the bereaved or the godly. His own brilliant scarlet cloak, draping the quarters of his horse, seemed almost a blasphemy in the gentle spring sunshine.
In the front rank of the villagers he saw Silence, flanked by the rabbity little parson and a stout woman with the red hands and complexion of a farmer’s wife. Her clear face, shadowed from the sun, stared up at him as impassively as the rest of these sullen peasants. But he had seen her mouth twitch, and knew that, once again, she was closer to him than she was to the people amongst whom she stood.
He went on, ignoring that extremely unpromising lack of reaction. ‘As for the matter of contributions, as I said, they will still be necessary. But it is my wish that it will be done with all consideration. Where we can, we will pay. Where we cannot, we will take less from the poorest of you, more from those well able to afford it.’
‘Just like Robin Hood,’ said a scathing and anonymous voice from the body of the crowd, eliciting a collective snigger.
‘Yes, just like Robin Hood,’ Nick agreed, refusing to rise to the bait. ‘As I said, it will be done gently. No abuse, no wanton destruction, no rape or murder. My wish, and my command. There has been too much harm done already here. I can’t aspire to your good will — I realise that only too well. But perhaps we may co-exist without too much ill feeling on either side. We will undertake to protect you from other plunderers, and enemy forces — in return, you and other villages will supply us with what we need. The country hereabouts is rich enough for all of us — there is no need for anyone to go hungry, and if there are some amongst you in real distress, we shall leave you alone.’
He paused, seeing the grim, highly sceptical faces before him. At least they were not throwing things — although the presence of the pistol holsters at his saddlebow, and similar, sinister-looking cylinders by the knees of his men, might have something to do with that forbearance. He knew that this speech was as likely to succeed as Canute’s to the tide, but at least he had made a brave, and probably quite ludicrous attempt to heal the chasm lying between them, a far greater obstacle than the low churchyard wall and the line of dozing, somnolent horses that separated him from the resentful people of Norton, upon whom, like a leech, he parasitically fed.
‘If any of my men, or Captain Bull’s, cause any problem, any nuisance at all, then you can refer it to me, and I will punish the misdemeanour. I am as interested in justice as are you, and I will do my best to administer it fairly.’
The sounds emanating from the crowd at these hopeful words were so redolent of disbelief and derision that Nick laughed aloud, causing several of the less sleepy horses to flick their ears in alarm. To the surprised villagers, he said recklessly, ‘You can believe me or not — but when the time comes, you may try me. My thanks for listening so patiently. Goodbye!’
Silence watched, trying not to reveal her laughter, as he wheeled the fiery chestnut about, the flamboyant cloak swirling with the abruptness of the movement, sunlit motes of dust around his head like a halo. The horse reared, all tossing mane and high, plumed tail and flailing hooves, and several villagers appeared disappointed that the ungodly, insolent Captain failed to fall off. Then he clapped his hat on his head, and the chestnut, all four feet back on the ground, was given free rein. The soldiers, never reluctant to join a race, turned their own, less lively mounts and followed in cheerful pursuit, uttering whoops and hunting cries.
Amid the grumbles, condemnations and fevered discussion, Silence stood, smiling wryly. Nat appeared, with young William Tovie, his own age and a head taller, to ask if he could spend the afternoon at Wintercombe. Knowing the other boy was urgent to see the soldiers at close quarters, Silence agreed. If Will carried the tale back to the George, that the wicked Cavaliers were in fact moderately civilised human beings, who might drink, smoke, swear and dally with willing serving girls, but who did not toss babies on pikes or engage in hair-raising orgies with droves of terrified village virgins, then it might be no bad thing.
She found her own placid Strawberry, who had pieces of grass sticking to her bit. Nat made his hands a stirrup for her, and for Tabby and Rachael, and she rode home with them, trying to think of domestic matters, the servants, dinner, the right remedies for little Ned Grindland and ancient Jack Waters; anything, in fact, to expel from her mind the bright sunlit image of an autumn-coloured man in a scarlet cloak, laughing at his own foolishness, showing off his prowess in horsemanship before the people of Norton, who, as he well knew, were likely to be entirely unimpressed…
*
She visited Susannah Grindland that afternoon, taking all the things she had planned, to assuage her own guilt at having wealth, a husband, a fine house and healthy children; and the tearful thanks she received only made her feel worse. Then she rode down South Street, Mally pillion behind her, avoiding the shrieking, laughing children, playing exuberantly on the one day of the week when they would not be required to pick stones, scare birds, spin or weave or make butter and cheese. She nodded to elderly villagers sitting comfortably in their doorways to catch the first of the spring sunshine, and stopped outside Jack Waters’ tenement, a small but sturdy stone-built cottage with thick, mossy thatch.
She called one of the children to hold the horse: it was Ned Merrifield, whose widowed mother lived opposite, and who had been given a free afternoon, as he was every Sunday, to visit her. Pleased to be trusted with the responsibility, he held Strawberry’s bridle while the other children, already deeply envious of his position at Wintercombe, clustered around at a safe distance. Mally gave him a friendly grin, and at Silence’s suggestion crossed the narrow, rutted street to see her stepmother, while her mistress ducked below the wooden lintel of Jack Waters’ door to minister comfort, as was the pious duty of any godly lady.
Jack Waters might be in his hundredth year, and creaky in his joints, but his blue eyes were as bright as a young man’s in his ancient face, brown and serrated with lines like the bark of an oak tree, and his hearing was undimmed by time. He greeted her in friendly fashion, and his granddaughter Alice fetched cool cider and bread and new, sweet, crumbly cheese, while Silence sat and listened to the old man talking about days that not even Sir Samuel had seen.
He had been to London, ’prenticed in his youth to a draper, and had seen Queen Bess crowned in her red hair, pale and slender and made beautiful by the love and acclaim of her people. He remembered the coming of the Armada, when beacons had leapt from hilltop to hilltop all across the West Country, a chain of fire that brought the dread news to London. But she liked best to hear him talk about the old days in Norton, so similar and yet so different. Like Clevinger, he preferred a world in which magic and mystery, mummers and revelry and the shockingly pagan maypole had all had a part: the young people going out on May morning to gather flowers and branches for garlands, the girls bathing their faces in dew to preserve their complexions, and making the cowslip balls that, tossed in the hand, were supposed to foretell whom they would marry. He spoke of unseemly goings-on at church ales, when even the vicar got drunk, with the excuse that it was all in a good cause, to mend the roof or pay for a new Bible, and worse scenes at bride ales, with the bride, the supposed beneficiary, frequently the most riotous.
And once in Norton there had been rough music, the impromptu, frightening ceremony in which adulterous couples were serenaded, with much beating of pots and pans, and in this case a bonfire outside the house, topped by an effigy of the faithless wife and her cuckolded husband, crowned with horns.
The old man described it with relish. Silence, listening, found herself sympathetic towards that erring woman. Had her deluded husband been insensitive, overbearing, dull? Had he ignored her feelings, and driven her heart away with his lack of consideration? And had her lover wooed her with laughter and delight, flattery and friendship, made her feel as though she mattered, as if she were a person of worth and value?
Frightened to the soul by the direction her thoughts were taking, Silence finished her bread and cheese, left her cerecloths with detailed instructions for their use, promised to visit again next week, and rode with Mally back to Wintercombe, where the only rough music was that made by the boisterous soldiers.
But at Wintercombe was Nick Hellier, a man she trusted because he had seemed to be her ally, and whose friendship she needed and valued, because he was the only person amongst all those in and around the house who was both friend and equal, distanced from her neither by birth nor by age.
*
He came to her chamber that evening, to teach Tabby. It had been a week since his last visit, and Silence did not like to admit that she had missed his company. She tried to subdue the leap of her heart at the familiar double knock on the door, and made herself say casually to Mally, ‘That must be Captain Hellier. Can you let him in?’
Mally, without enthusiasm, did so. She, it was plain, did not trust Hellier at all, though she had become accustomed to the puppy, as Silence had predicted. Pye, grown large and near her time, was also now more tolerant; she had confirmed her superior status, and ignored all Lily’s wagging, fawning attempts to be friendly.
Nick, entering, saw all the St. Barbes gathered in cosy domesticity, quiet in their black mourning. William and Deb were playing a solemn game with Deb’s two wooden dolls in a corner, and the soft, confident sounds of Tabby at her virginals filled the air. The twins, one each side of the walnut table, worked busily with paper and pen. Silence sat in her chair, sewing, and the white puppy sprawled at her feet, exhausted with play. Pye, rotund on the bed, stretched and yawned and chirruped a welcome, but did not move from her warm, soft nest.
‘Good evening,’ he said, and saw with pleasure how they all, save for Rachael of course, put aside their various tasks and came to greet him. Lily bounced up at him, her paws on his knees, and he laughed and patted her. ‘She’s growing apace, is she not? I think she’ll be taller than her mother.’
‘She doesn’t make messes in the corner now,’ said Deb with serious approval. ‘Mama smacked her and she knew she’d been naughty. William and I take her in the garden, don’t we, William?’
William gave Nick his merry, sly grin. His nose was running again: his sister, forthright as ever, told him so and wiped it. Ignoring her, the little boy held up something for inspection. ‘Look, Captain, look!’
It was a chestnut, old, dull and wrinkled. ‘For you,’ said William. ‘I kept it for you. It’s from the tree in the orchard.’
Nick took it with grave appreciation. William’s third birthday had fallen some two weeks previously, and he had found himself showered with gifts. Even some of the soldiers had given him little presents, a musket ball, an empty and broken powder-flask, and a beautifully carved musketeer in what Silence had suspected to be apple-wood. Intoxicated with receiving, William had taken to giving in return, and although his own gifts were perhaps more valuable to him than to the recipient, such was his charm that they were always accepted in the proper spirit.
‘You can roast it if you like,’ said the child, gazing up at Hellier with something that appeared to Silence, watching amused, to be alarmingly like adoration. What would George think when he returned from the wars, to find that his youngest son looked upon an enemy soldier almost as a father figure, and could not remember his own?
‘I might if I find myself in need,’ Hellier told him solemnly. ‘But for now I will keep it. Thank you very much, William. Hullo, Tabby. I see you have learned your pavane most excellently.’
‘Oh, did you hear it?’ Tabby asked anxiously. No false modesty with this child: one such as Deb might have played on, deliberately showing off her skill, but Tabby had stopped her practice as soon as she became aware of his entry into the chamber. Still, he had heard enough to know that her early promise would one day he fulfilled: she played delicately, accurately and with great feeling.
‘I heard a little,’ he said. ‘Why not play some more? I expect you have been practising hard, and I haven’t had the chance to listen to you all week.’
‘What shall I play?’ Tabby’s eyes, hazel like her mother’s, turned up to him, serious and a little apprehensive.
‘Try everything you know you can play well, and then I’ll go through a new piece with you.’ He watched as Tabby dived back into the hanging closet where the virginals were kept, and then crossed over to the twins, who were watching him from their table, Nat wearing an expression of lively amusement. ‘Will you play chess with me later, Captain?’ the boy asked.
‘You’re supposed to be translating your Virgil, Nat,’ Rachael said in a self-righteous voice which, to the perceptive Nick, hardly disguised her jealousy of the attention shown to her brother. Nat grinned at her, apparently oblivious. ‘I’ve nearly finished it — I can surely spare the time for one game. Now hush — I’m sure the Captain wants to listen to Tabby’s playing.’
Rachael, once more the odd one out, scowled terrifyingly and returned to her writing. Nat caught Nick’s eye, and winked. No longer surprised by the mature mind in the child’s body, Hellier winked back, and went over to the hearth as the first careful notes dropped into the quiet.
‘No, unfortunately not,’ Silence said, grinning back; she always found Christian’s forthrightness infectious. ‘He’ll be back in the saddle by the end of the month, alas. And when he’s returned to his former self, I would like Rachael to be well out of the way.’
‘Ah,’ said Mistress Baylie, seeing her point at once. ‘And you’d like her to come stay at Wick, would you, my lady? Well, one more mouth won’t make much difference, and she’ll enjoy the change. And with the spring coming on apace, we could do with another strong arm in the dairy.’
‘She’ll be only too happy to lend a hand, I expect,’ Silence told her. ‘She always liked to help our dairymaid Bessie, and learned a lot from her — of dairying, mind you.’
‘Just so long as it was only dairying,’ Christian said, understanding her perfectly: Bessie’s morals were as notorious as her skills were famous. ‘I’ll be glad to have her, my lady, for as long as you want — and don’t bother to send word, I’ll expect her when I see her come up to our barton.’ Her eye slipped past Silence’s shoulder again, and she whistled softly, in a most unladylike way. ‘Well, well, well. Look at what the cat’s brought up.’
Silence turned. They were standing at the west end of the churchyard, close to the tower. Beyond the low boundary wall lay the lane that led past the Vicarage towards the great South Field, once open strips but long since divided up into scores of tiny closes of pasture or arable. Along the wall were tethered all the horses that had brought those of the better sort, Baylies and St. Barbes, Apprices and Flowers, to the church, under the watchful eyes of a couple of boys paid a penny each for the task. And behind them, suddenly arrived, she saw half-a-dozen or so troopers, with Nick Hellier on his tall chestnut at their head. He saluted Silence with a smile, doffing his hat, while his horse sidled restlessly, champing its bit. The noise, and the turning heads, alerted the rest of the crowd. Gradually the talking died away, the scampering children stood and stared with a mixture of admiration and fear, and the separate knots of gossipers coalesced into one large, hostile mass, gentry and cloth-workers, labourers and husbandmen, old and young, all merged and joined together to face the threat.
The threat of six men, Silence thought, disturbed, against a couple of hundred people? For the first time, she understood the import of Nick’s words about the sullen peasants he had encountered on the expedition to find General Cromwell. The faces around her, weather-hardened, seasoned by suffering and toil and poverty, were all alike steeped in menace. She felt their hatred rise, almost a tangible thing, and despite the cool breeze in the April sunshine, a sweat broke out on her body.
‘Good morning, people,’ said Nick affably, his voice, deep and clear, pitched to carry to the back of the crowd. A heave and sway around Silence presaged the arrival of Parson Willis, perspiring and earnest, at her side. He shouted, his own insignificant tones sharpened by recent practice in the pulpit, ‘Why were you and your ungodly rabble not at prayer, sir? Are you above God’s law, as you are above man’s?’
‘There isn’t room for us all,’ Nick pointed out, reasonably enough, Silence felt. ‘But that is an issue which does not concern me now, Master Parson. I have come here for the purpose of clearing up certain misunderstandings which seem to have arisen amongst your flock.’
The flock, a notably independent and opinionated set of sheep, stared at him resentfully. Someone, safely at the back, called out, ‘Bain’t ee come to rob we, then?’
There was a mutter of laughter. Nick, his hand still holding his hat, which rested on one knee, smiled with what appeared to be genuine amusement. ‘No,’ he said cheerfully. ‘For once, I have not. Oh, I don’t deny that your contributions to our garrison’s supply will be needed as much as ever, but that’s for your own protection, to keep you from the ravages of the Parliament’s army.’
Silence heard the irony rich in his voice, and wondered that the villagers did not. Above the surly murmurs, he went on. ‘But it has lately come to my notice that a rumour has been put about alleging that men, and women, will be conscripted to work on the garrison’s defences. I can tell you, here and now, that rumour lies. The defences of Wintercombe are all but finished, and we have no need of your assistance — particularly no need of your forced assistance. None of you will be asked by me to contribute any labour whatsoever to the fortifications. Is that clear?’
If he had expected a cheer, even a mutter of assent, he was doomed to disappointment. The village of Philip’s Norton eyed him in a dubious and stony silence, and waited. Quite unperturbed, Nick surveyed them in leisurely fashion, the muted colours of the countryside: the undyed greys and faded browns of the poor, more prosperous people in russets, blues and mulberries, and everywhere the dull black of the bereaved or the godly. His own brilliant scarlet cloak, draping the quarters of his horse, seemed almost a blasphemy in the gentle spring sunshine.
In the front rank of the villagers he saw Silence, flanked by the rabbity little parson and a stout woman with the red hands and complexion of a farmer’s wife. Her clear face, shadowed from the sun, stared up at him as impassively as the rest of these sullen peasants. But he had seen her mouth twitch, and knew that, once again, she was closer to him than she was to the people amongst whom she stood.
He went on, ignoring that extremely unpromising lack of reaction. ‘As for the matter of contributions, as I said, they will still be necessary. But it is my wish that it will be done with all consideration. Where we can, we will pay. Where we cannot, we will take less from the poorest of you, more from those well able to afford it.’
‘Just like Robin Hood,’ said a scathing and anonymous voice from the body of the crowd, eliciting a collective snigger.
‘Yes, just like Robin Hood,’ Nick agreed, refusing to rise to the bait. ‘As I said, it will be done gently. No abuse, no wanton destruction, no rape or murder. My wish, and my command. There has been too much harm done already here. I can’t aspire to your good will — I realise that only too well. But perhaps we may co-exist without too much ill feeling on either side. We will undertake to protect you from other plunderers, and enemy forces — in return, you and other villages will supply us with what we need. The country hereabouts is rich enough for all of us — there is no need for anyone to go hungry, and if there are some amongst you in real distress, we shall leave you alone.’
He paused, seeing the grim, highly sceptical faces before him. At least they were not throwing things — although the presence of the pistol holsters at his saddlebow, and similar, sinister-looking cylinders by the knees of his men, might have something to do with that forbearance. He knew that this speech was as likely to succeed as Canute’s to the tide, but at least he had made a brave, and probably quite ludicrous attempt to heal the chasm lying between them, a far greater obstacle than the low churchyard wall and the line of dozing, somnolent horses that separated him from the resentful people of Norton, upon whom, like a leech, he parasitically fed.
‘If any of my men, or Captain Bull’s, cause any problem, any nuisance at all, then you can refer it to me, and I will punish the misdemeanour. I am as interested in justice as are you, and I will do my best to administer it fairly.’
The sounds emanating from the crowd at these hopeful words were so redolent of disbelief and derision that Nick laughed aloud, causing several of the less sleepy horses to flick their ears in alarm. To the surprised villagers, he said recklessly, ‘You can believe me or not — but when the time comes, you may try me. My thanks for listening so patiently. Goodbye!’
Silence watched, trying not to reveal her laughter, as he wheeled the fiery chestnut about, the flamboyant cloak swirling with the abruptness of the movement, sunlit motes of dust around his head like a halo. The horse reared, all tossing mane and high, plumed tail and flailing hooves, and several villagers appeared disappointed that the ungodly, insolent Captain failed to fall off. Then he clapped his hat on his head, and the chestnut, all four feet back on the ground, was given free rein. The soldiers, never reluctant to join a race, turned their own, less lively mounts and followed in cheerful pursuit, uttering whoops and hunting cries.
Amid the grumbles, condemnations and fevered discussion, Silence stood, smiling wryly. Nat appeared, with young William Tovie, his own age and a head taller, to ask if he could spend the afternoon at Wintercombe. Knowing the other boy was urgent to see the soldiers at close quarters, Silence agreed. If Will carried the tale back to the George, that the wicked Cavaliers were in fact moderately civilised human beings, who might drink, smoke, swear and dally with willing serving girls, but who did not toss babies on pikes or engage in hair-raising orgies with droves of terrified village virgins, then it might be no bad thing.
She found her own placid Strawberry, who had pieces of grass sticking to her bit. Nat made his hands a stirrup for her, and for Tabby and Rachael, and she rode home with them, trying to think of domestic matters, the servants, dinner, the right remedies for little Ned Grindland and ancient Jack Waters; anything, in fact, to expel from her mind the bright sunlit image of an autumn-coloured man in a scarlet cloak, laughing at his own foolishness, showing off his prowess in horsemanship before the people of Norton, who, as he well knew, were likely to be entirely unimpressed…
*
She visited Susannah Grindland that afternoon, taking all the things she had planned, to assuage her own guilt at having wealth, a husband, a fine house and healthy children; and the tearful thanks she received only made her feel worse. Then she rode down South Street, Mally pillion behind her, avoiding the shrieking, laughing children, playing exuberantly on the one day of the week when they would not be required to pick stones, scare birds, spin or weave or make butter and cheese. She nodded to elderly villagers sitting comfortably in their doorways to catch the first of the spring sunshine, and stopped outside Jack Waters’ tenement, a small but sturdy stone-built cottage with thick, mossy thatch.
She called one of the children to hold the horse: it was Ned Merrifield, whose widowed mother lived opposite, and who had been given a free afternoon, as he was every Sunday, to visit her. Pleased to be trusted with the responsibility, he held Strawberry’s bridle while the other children, already deeply envious of his position at Wintercombe, clustered around at a safe distance. Mally gave him a friendly grin, and at Silence’s suggestion crossed the narrow, rutted street to see her stepmother, while her mistress ducked below the wooden lintel of Jack Waters’ door to minister comfort, as was the pious duty of any godly lady.
Jack Waters might be in his hundredth year, and creaky in his joints, but his blue eyes were as bright as a young man’s in his ancient face, brown and serrated with lines like the bark of an oak tree, and his hearing was undimmed by time. He greeted her in friendly fashion, and his granddaughter Alice fetched cool cider and bread and new, sweet, crumbly cheese, while Silence sat and listened to the old man talking about days that not even Sir Samuel had seen.
He had been to London, ’prenticed in his youth to a draper, and had seen Queen Bess crowned in her red hair, pale and slender and made beautiful by the love and acclaim of her people. He remembered the coming of the Armada, when beacons had leapt from hilltop to hilltop all across the West Country, a chain of fire that brought the dread news to London. But she liked best to hear him talk about the old days in Norton, so similar and yet so different. Like Clevinger, he preferred a world in which magic and mystery, mummers and revelry and the shockingly pagan maypole had all had a part: the young people going out on May morning to gather flowers and branches for garlands, the girls bathing their faces in dew to preserve their complexions, and making the cowslip balls that, tossed in the hand, were supposed to foretell whom they would marry. He spoke of unseemly goings-on at church ales, when even the vicar got drunk, with the excuse that it was all in a good cause, to mend the roof or pay for a new Bible, and worse scenes at bride ales, with the bride, the supposed beneficiary, frequently the most riotous.
And once in Norton there had been rough music, the impromptu, frightening ceremony in which adulterous couples were serenaded, with much beating of pots and pans, and in this case a bonfire outside the house, topped by an effigy of the faithless wife and her cuckolded husband, crowned with horns.
The old man described it with relish. Silence, listening, found herself sympathetic towards that erring woman. Had her deluded husband been insensitive, overbearing, dull? Had he ignored her feelings, and driven her heart away with his lack of consideration? And had her lover wooed her with laughter and delight, flattery and friendship, made her feel as though she mattered, as if she were a person of worth and value?
Frightened to the soul by the direction her thoughts were taking, Silence finished her bread and cheese, left her cerecloths with detailed instructions for their use, promised to visit again next week, and rode with Mally back to Wintercombe, where the only rough music was that made by the boisterous soldiers.
But at Wintercombe was Nick Hellier, a man she trusted because he had seemed to be her ally, and whose friendship she needed and valued, because he was the only person amongst all those in and around the house who was both friend and equal, distanced from her neither by birth nor by age.
*
He came to her chamber that evening, to teach Tabby. It had been a week since his last visit, and Silence did not like to admit that she had missed his company. She tried to subdue the leap of her heart at the familiar double knock on the door, and made herself say casually to Mally, ‘That must be Captain Hellier. Can you let him in?’
Mally, without enthusiasm, did so. She, it was plain, did not trust Hellier at all, though she had become accustomed to the puppy, as Silence had predicted. Pye, grown large and near her time, was also now more tolerant; she had confirmed her superior status, and ignored all Lily’s wagging, fawning attempts to be friendly.
Nick, entering, saw all the St. Barbes gathered in cosy domesticity, quiet in their black mourning. William and Deb were playing a solemn game with Deb’s two wooden dolls in a corner, and the soft, confident sounds of Tabby at her virginals filled the air. The twins, one each side of the walnut table, worked busily with paper and pen. Silence sat in her chair, sewing, and the white puppy sprawled at her feet, exhausted with play. Pye, rotund on the bed, stretched and yawned and chirruped a welcome, but did not move from her warm, soft nest.
‘Good evening,’ he said, and saw with pleasure how they all, save for Rachael of course, put aside their various tasks and came to greet him. Lily bounced up at him, her paws on his knees, and he laughed and patted her. ‘She’s growing apace, is she not? I think she’ll be taller than her mother.’
‘She doesn’t make messes in the corner now,’ said Deb with serious approval. ‘Mama smacked her and she knew she’d been naughty. William and I take her in the garden, don’t we, William?’
William gave Nick his merry, sly grin. His nose was running again: his sister, forthright as ever, told him so and wiped it. Ignoring her, the little boy held up something for inspection. ‘Look, Captain, look!’
It was a chestnut, old, dull and wrinkled. ‘For you,’ said William. ‘I kept it for you. It’s from the tree in the orchard.’
Nick took it with grave appreciation. William’s third birthday had fallen some two weeks previously, and he had found himself showered with gifts. Even some of the soldiers had given him little presents, a musket ball, an empty and broken powder-flask, and a beautifully carved musketeer in what Silence had suspected to be apple-wood. Intoxicated with receiving, William had taken to giving in return, and although his own gifts were perhaps more valuable to him than to the recipient, such was his charm that they were always accepted in the proper spirit.
‘You can roast it if you like,’ said the child, gazing up at Hellier with something that appeared to Silence, watching amused, to be alarmingly like adoration. What would George think when he returned from the wars, to find that his youngest son looked upon an enemy soldier almost as a father figure, and could not remember his own?
‘I might if I find myself in need,’ Hellier told him solemnly. ‘But for now I will keep it. Thank you very much, William. Hullo, Tabby. I see you have learned your pavane most excellently.’
‘Oh, did you hear it?’ Tabby asked anxiously. No false modesty with this child: one such as Deb might have played on, deliberately showing off her skill, but Tabby had stopped her practice as soon as she became aware of his entry into the chamber. Still, he had heard enough to know that her early promise would one day he fulfilled: she played delicately, accurately and with great feeling.
‘I heard a little,’ he said. ‘Why not play some more? I expect you have been practising hard, and I haven’t had the chance to listen to you all week.’
‘What shall I play?’ Tabby’s eyes, hazel like her mother’s, turned up to him, serious and a little apprehensive.
‘Try everything you know you can play well, and then I’ll go through a new piece with you.’ He watched as Tabby dived back into the hanging closet where the virginals were kept, and then crossed over to the twins, who were watching him from their table, Nat wearing an expression of lively amusement. ‘Will you play chess with me later, Captain?’ the boy asked.
‘You’re supposed to be translating your Virgil, Nat,’ Rachael said in a self-righteous voice which, to the perceptive Nick, hardly disguised her jealousy of the attention shown to her brother. Nat grinned at her, apparently oblivious. ‘I’ve nearly finished it — I can surely spare the time for one game. Now hush — I’m sure the Captain wants to listen to Tabby’s playing.’
Rachael, once more the odd one out, scowled terrifyingly and returned to her writing. Nat caught Nick’s eye, and winked. No longer surprised by the mature mind in the child’s body, Hellier winked back, and went over to the hearth as the first careful notes dropped into the quiet.
