by Betty Burton
'You wants to keep right out of it. She's Dan's girl and he can do as he pleases. You a only make things worst.'
'I an't likely to, am I? But that don't mean I haves to have my heart broke from seeing a child with her'n broke too. I wasn't much above her age when I come to Up Teg. You was nice to me, Pete.'
'Ah well . . .' Peter smiled at the memory of the hay loft. 'That wadden the same.'
'You put your arms round me.'
'And me legs.'
'Pete! You knows what I means — before that. I was that lonely and it was you was friendly and nice. She must feel just as bad. Your Dan never really wanted her, nor did Jaen. If they did they wouldn't of never let her go on living with the grandmother all they years. I shouldn't of.'
At nearly seven, their own little girl, brown-skinned Fancy, was more than two years younger than Hanna and, like three-year-old Jamie, 'wadden no trouble to nobody'. Fancy went about her work of weeding, stone-gathering, bird-scaring and gleaning at harvest in an orderly way — quite unlike Vinnie. 'I don't know where she gets it from, I was that hare-brained.'
Growing up with Vinnie's good nature around them, Fancy and Jamie seldom needed to be wrapped around with arms and comforted as often as Vinnie would have liked. Peter, Fancy, Jamie and her brother James, were all fussed over by Vinnie. She loved to hold a baby or play with a child. Her desire to pet and cuddle was now much as it had been when she had gleefully taken the new-born Hanna from Jaen, so that when Hanna's stoical misery had made her heart bleed, she again wanted to take Jaen's Goldy to her. But the girl was almost as inside herself as Jaen had been getting the last year.
Jaen, concentrating on not allowing her eyes to rest too long upon France, withdrew into a world which was not quite substantial but was safe. There she saw only bits of reality, the bits she could cope with. She did not see Hanna.
'You don't want to take no notice when they starts shouting like that,' Vinnie told Hanna.
Hanna made a smile for Vinnie.
She returned to thinking about getting away from Them.
If they all got a fever . . . if there was a fever that took the men . . . then there wouldn't be anybody who could stop her going home. Grandmother Hazelhurst might be . . . but Grandmother Bella could deal with her.
If I move a bit? Will Vinnie pat my knee or squeeze my hand?
The fever must only be a man's fever. Only the uncles. It mustn't get out to John, nor to Mister Warren, or Mister Vickery — Jude would marry him. No!
Sometimes she hated Jude more than Jaen and Him.
Images of Dan and Jaen, slain but unbleeding.
Black bryony. Henbane. Yellow-caps.
'Aunt Vin?'
Vinnie looks encouragingly at Hanna, who seldom speaks unless spoken to.
'Why does Jaen smile at nothing like that?'
Of all questions, it was the one Vinnie does not want to think of.
Vinnie briefly draws the poor little thing to her.
'I reckon she's pleased that you come home.' She polished another plum for poor little Hanny.
13
EMWORTHY BAY
When the conversion of the cottages into an inn was finished, the Saint John/Scantlebury partners looked for a name.
George. White Horse. Black Bull. Harbour Lights, even Smack-at-Anchor were sounded out.
'It ought to sound like what we intend,' Betrisse said. 'So that people won't think it to be like other places.'
With a merry facetiousness that would have surprised them all at Up Teg, Annie said, 'The Clean and Decent Place to Sleep Inn?'
Then Betrisse said, 'Scantlebury's!' and it had sounded right.
'Funny, Bet, but that do have a ring to it.'
'Must be because of Master Scantlebury being clean and decent hisself.'
And, thinking about it, Annie thought Betrisse might not be so far off the mark at that. 'Decent' was a word that he often used in conversation.
By the time it had been going for three years Scantlebury's was a busy place, and they were ready to expand.
There had never been any real setbacks because they had started in a small way and learned as they grew. They took no business from any other establishment, for what Scantlebury's offered was quite new. The alehouses and lodging houses went on providing the same rough welcome to rough people as they had always done. Scantlebury's took those travellers who, whilst they did not object to a plain and simple room, liked it sweeter-smelling and less verminous than the other accommodation offered in the town.
Their 'clean and decent' standard was proclaimed in fine lettering on a swinging sign which hung from a fancy wrought-iron pole, above the entrance that had once been old Mr Scantlebury's house door.
SCANTLEBURY'S
A clean and decent place for
the night
GOOD PLAIN FOOD
Below that announcement, a portrait of a woman wearing a white cap and apron and holding a pile of clean linen and another with a steaming pie.
Right from the start, it was agreed that the day would come when Ted Scantlebury would eventually take more than a financial role in the place, when the right time came. For the first three years there did not seem to be a right time, then one trip he came in and slapped down his canvas bag.
'Right then, Mistress Saint John. I had my fill of seeing decent lads fed to the fishes. Tell us what do do.'
Annie had gone on with her work, waiting to hear what had happened that had made him finally decide, but he never said. She guessed that was to do with the conditions on certain other smacks in the fleet; guessed that some smack owner did not maintain a safe vessel and held his labour cheap; guessed that yet another youth might not have had hands strong enough to hold on in a rough sea, or that a rail was rotten or a rope frayed.
Whatever the final straw had been, Ted Scantlebury stopped going out with the oyster fleet and never seemed to have a day's regret.
Although his feelings for Annie had grown warm, he kept them to himself and always behaved correctly with her, almost formally. The only familiarity was his acceptance of her offer that he should use her first name.
'My name's Ann if you like.'
'Ann.'
The way he said it was agreeable to Annie.
'Will you call me Ted?'
'Thank you . . . Ted. But only outside of business. Me and Betrisse have always tried to keep off familiarities. It was her idea, she reckons first names is only all right for kitchen-boys and maids. She always says Mistress Saint John to me when we'm in Scantlebury's.' Annie smiled at her partner. 'I can't say as how I finds it too easy to call her Mistress too, but I'm getting used to it. She don't stand no nonsense.'
Ted pulled a face and smiled. 'I noticed that. I always feels it a liberty calling her Betrisse these days. If I hadn't a known her when she was a girl, I should a felt obliged to call her "Madam".'
That was understandable, for womanhood had brought to Betrisse enough of Martha's blowsiness to make her soft and round, and enough of Luke's height to carry it well. Her hair when she had been a child was a bird's nest. It had the same tendency to crimp as France's, but she now mastered it with pins; only at her forehead and nape were there curls out of control.
Living as they had, with Annie treating her as an equal in spite of their being of different generations, Betrisse had learned to be resourceful and to use her intelligence. She seldom did anything that mattered without thinking first — even to the kind of skirts and necklines she should adopt. When Annie had suggested that a girl of seventeen might show a bit more bosom without being thought light, Betrisse said, 'A lot of our clients who have been at sea might get the wrong idea about where they can lay their heads at night.'
'Lord, Bet, if you deals with them like you did that flattie skipper, you remember?'
Betrisse laughed. She remembered.
The flattie skipper had mistaken a fifteen-year-old Betrisse's bare feet and ragged working skirt as an indication of the girl within, and had finished
bedecked with fish heads and guts. She had some Hazelhurst about her, but not too much.
So, at eighteen, Betrisse had stature, common sense, and an air of confidence which, even if she had had no good looks at all, made her an attractive woman. But she did have good looks.
She also now spoke like a person of a quite different background from her own. It was this, her voice and accent, that gave her authority. She had set about learning to 'speak' as she set about everything else, with determination to get what she wanted.
That voice and speech contributed to a person's authority had long been evident to her, and when some passengers on a damaged vessel put up at Scantlebury's for a few days, she realized that to lose her broad rural dialect would be of value to the establishment. There were ten of them, two of whom were women. Three were personal servants and the others persons of some standing. Big House People, Annie called them. Good linen, good boots and good speaking.
One of the women was a companion or chaperone to the other, a woman with a girlish figure beautifully gowned in a widow's-black.
'Tippie, have water sent up. At once, Tippie. And, Tippie — be sure that their sheets have been scalded and aired. And, Tippie . . .'
That voice echoed down the years.
Oh Mu-Mawh . . . look! It snows greatly.
Betrisse had never forgotten that voice. Its fine quality, its beauty, its authority and command.
The arrival of the woman was the first time in about ten years that Newton Clare had come near to them. When Betrisse told Annie who it was that they had in the best room calling for such amounts of hot water, for washing not only her personal linen but her body also, that their service was tested to its limit, Annie covered her mouth with her and hand for a moment appeared to be very agitated.
'Oh dear Lord! Pray she don't notice us.'
'Don't be such a puddin', Annie. The only time she'd a been anywhere near us would a been in church, and to her we'd a just been "the village" — and it's ten years ago.'
'Well a course, you'm right; we an't nothing to her. You said that you knew her though, before she'd a even lifted her veil.'
Betrisse gave Annie a wry smile. 'That's the difference, she was somebody you noticed and remembered even when she was a little child.'
The young widow, Countess d'Archard, en route to view her inheritance — money grown on tea-bushes by brown equivalents to Newton Clare 'villagers' — stayed at Scantlebury's for four days. She left without knowing that she had shared a roof with a girl with whom she had once shared the wonder of snowflakes. She left also without knowing that she had planted two seeds of ambition in Betrisse Saint John — to speak as she spoke, and to make Scantlebury's a place which, in addition to their present good business, people would visit for pleasure.
'Annie, you heard about water-bathing? Have you heard of water-bathing?'
Annie did not reply, knowing that there must be something more to the simple question other than the stressed aspirants and the slightly halting speech.
'Snows-greatly asked me whether there was such to be had in these parts, and when I said that I an't . . .' correcting herself, 'I had not heard, she told me how it is becoming the very thing for gentry and Big-House folk and such as they, to walk into the sea. Don't look like that, it's true — they do it for their health.'
'She was talking of springs and sulphur-baths and that — I've heard of them.''
'No, definite . . .ly, it was sea water. They go in up to their necks for minutes at a time and then . . .' This time it was Betrisse herself who had to smile '. . . Well, they take a cup of it as a drink.'
Annie flicked out a sheet for Betrisse to help her fold. 'And then they'm sick.'
'I don't know about that.'
'A course you do. Salt and water is a 'metic, what else do anybody give to children what's eaten the nightshade? Salt-water to make them sick it up.'
'Well, anyway that's what they do. It is the latest idea for youth and health.'
'Then run and fetch us a bucket of the stuff, it's what I could do with.'
'Annie! It isn't a jest. I asked her companion. She said before the Count died, she went with them often to Brightlingsea and Southampton to get into the sea.'
'No wonder he died.'
'It wadden the sea-water. He fell from his horse.'
'And didn't all they cups of salty water never bring him back to health and strength?'
'You can jest all you like. But there's money to be made from it, and we shall have some.'
They had finished folding the linen. Annie sat down. 'All right, I know you got a bee in your bodice, so let's have him out; but you won't never persuade me to start no fancy schemes, not now we'm just beginning to get up on our feet.'
'What it seems to me is that these kind of Big House people go from place to place that's got something special. London playhouses and balls, Bath has got warm-water springs, places with sulphur and salts-ss — not salt . . . and these people stay there for a few weeks.'
'And you'm suggesting they'd come here to get into the sea and then drink it?'
'Yes.'
'And they'd pay us. With all that stretch of water out there? What in the world would they want to pay us for when they could jump in it all day and drink their fill for nothing? I know Big House people an't always that bright but . . .'
'Annie. What is it they want more than anything else?'
'Jewels? Fancy clothes? Carriages? Money?'
'Money! And they spends it on carriages and clothes and that. But most of all they wants money so they can have somebody to do things for them that the rest of us do for ourselves. If they wants to jump in the sea — they an't going to jump in by their own selves. They'll want undressing. Then dressing up in special sea-clothes . . . yes, special. They'll want to be kept private. And they would want to take their sea-water from special flasks in special little beakers.'
As Betrisse was speaking, Annie's amusement dispersed. She pursed her lips and raised her eyebrows, then began nodding in agreement and understanding. 'And they would need somewhere Clean and Decent.'
'Clever Annie. They'd want something Clean and Decent and Special.'
'And I'd hazard a front tooth Betrisse Saint John knows what "special" it is that's going to make our fortune.'
'This!' Betrisse produced a crudely illustrated broadsheet depicting a row of persons, of whom only capped heads might be seen, the rest being encased in black coffin-like baths. 'The companion gave it to me. We should start with one at first; we could build a small place on to the wash-house so that there's plenty of hot water.'
'What do the wording say?'
'I don't know, but summit to the effect that it is a health treatment for skin and joints.'
'And what, if it's summit a lady might hear, is in that there box they'm laying in?'
Betrisse tried to make her face very solemn. 'Well 'tis like the sea-water, summit we got plenty of at Emworthy Bay.'
Annie's shoulders began to shake. 'I thought it might be. So, along of their jumping in the sea, then drinking some of it, we'm going to offer people a lay in a box of Emworthy Bay mud.'
Betrisse too began to allow her false seriousness to fall into humour. 'Ah now, it wouldn't be any old Emworthy mud, you couldn't get even the nobility to pay for that. It'd be . . . clean Emworthy mud. We would not be taking their money for nothing. We should sieve it and warm it . . . and then let them lay in a box of it.'
'And should we have a broadsheet like that?'
'That's a most important part of the plan I was thinking of. And that's summit — something — that's a puzzle to me. I thought perhaps Ted might know how you gets — get — that kind of thing done.'
'Long before we gets to that point, we got to put the whole idea to him. What shall I say?. "Ted. Bet thinks we should try to get a better quality of person
'''
'Not better — just extra to what we already get.'
". . .we should try to get more people to come to Scantleb
ury's, and so Bet thinks we should offer them a box of Emworthy mud to lay in."'
'Summit like . . . something . . . like that, yes.'
'Bet? Are you trying at copying her way of speaking like you . . .'
'Yes. Like I did when I was little. That's part of the change too. If we do get these people coming, and I an't — have not — any doubt they will come, then we should have to have a bit more fanciness about the place. I'm going to learn to speak like they do, and I shall dress up for it too. Not for fanciness sake, but because it is what is needed. Like we always keeps the doors painted, boils the bedding and that, it's the sort of thing that makes Scantlebury's a bit special. So, when you hears — hear — me not talking ladylike, then you got — haves — have to tell me.'
'And be you going to say "pish-tush" and "fie" or "fee" and "praying" everybody . . . "pray hand me the blankets, Mistress Saint John". 'Cause Lors Bet, you come to the wrong person here.'
Quite to Annie's surprise, Ted Scantlebury took up Betrisse's idea seriously. He read the broadsheet aloud to them.
It proclaimed that immersion in mud was a VERY WONDER. Noble lords who had attended a spa where this treatment was offered, avowed themselves MIRACULOUSLY FREED OF GOUT AND OTHER NOXIOUS AILMENTS; gentlemen declared that STRENGTHS and POWERS that they had thought LOST, were NOW RETURNED to them; and titled ladies were thankful to have been given the SECRET of YOUTH and BEAUTY.
'Well!' said Annie. 'I should never have believed it if it wasn't put down in writing by such Big House folks for all to see.'
'I don't know about the mud cure,' Ted said, 'but we shouldn't be chancing much if we offered . . .'he thought for a moment then quoted as if on the broadsheet he held "Scantlebury's warm or natural sea-water immersion".'
Annie gave him a sideways look. 'And what do that cure pray?'
'He never said it cured,' Betrisse said.