Sourdough and Other Stories

by Angela Slatter

  Outside the sun is very bright and blinds me for a moment so I don’t see who grabs me by the arm and gives me a bit of a shake. When my eyes adjust I find my father, his handsome face dark with an anger he so seldom experiences he doesn’t seem to know how to wear it. Luckily I bit back those swear words I’m not supposed to know.

  ‘What do you have to say for yourself?’

  ‘I was just . . . I was only . . . I was late, not absent.’ In truth, I’m too perplexed to be afraid of Peregrine’s temper, and I also know he never can maintain a rage for very long. Sure enough, I’m rewarded by the clearing of his expression the same way a strong wind blows away storm clouds. ‘And anyway, what are you doing here?’

  ‘Collecting a book for your grandmother about the uses and tasteful arrangement of lilacs.’ He pulls a face. ‘How much do you hate that school?’

  ‘It bores me rigid, Papa, you know that.’ I lean my head against his shoulder. He smells like aftershave and wool. ‘The instruction is mindless and I fear my brain will atrophy if I’m left there much longer.’

  He snorts. Peregrine is especially bad at being authoritarian. ‘Then, my Rose, what do you want to do?’

  ‘Well,’ I say slowly as if I haven’t been thinking about it. ‘I do believe Grandma was right when she said I should learn a trade.’

  ‘It won’t be baking, my heart.’

  ‘Yes, I think we all know that even if it weren’t for Mother’s objections, I have absolutely no talent in that direction anyway.’ I sigh unconvincingly. ‘But what I would like to try, Father dear, is bookbinding.’

  ‘Bookbinding?’ He looks startled as if this would never have occurred to him in a hundred years—and truly it would not. It’s only been in my head for a couple of months.

  ‘I’m sure someone will take me on—if not as a proper ’prentice, then at least someone will teach me, surely?’

  ‘There’s a Mistress Kidston who is a bookbinder of great repute—she’s in the one at the end of the lane,’ he says, considering. ‘She’s repaired books for me before, made my dairies and ledgers. I think she would be appropriate.’

  I love that my father knows this. He wouldn’t have me ’prenticed to some smelly old man. I also love that my father doesn’t insist on me becoming a lady too fine to tie my own laces or pour my own milk. I love that he’s given up on my current education as a bad joke.

  ‘This, of course, is on the condition that you promise to attend better to your ’prentice studies than you have thus far to your young ladies’ studies. And you will confess to your mother what you’ve done. And what agreement you’ve forced me into.’ He rolls his eyes upward like a saint being martyred.

  ‘Cowardly cat,’ I scorn, but hug him hard. ‘We have an accord, sir.’

  ‘I suppose there’s no point in sending you off to—what is it today?’

  ‘Needlework.’

  ‘Oh, messy. Now, come on home. May as well get into trouble sooner rather than later.’

  ***

  In a week, I will start my ’prenticeship. Emmeline met my announcement with an amicable and rather relieved ‘Thank Heaven’. Grandma grumbled but accepted it. Henry and Jacoby looked at me with a new respect, for a while at least. Now it’s time to gather all the accoutrements for my new trade. Peregrine has ordered the tools from a man Mistress Kidston recommended. Had it been up to my father, each and every instrument would have been hand-made and carved with my initials, but I think he sensed the pain of embarrassment this would cause me. I must admit my excitement as the craftsman listed all the things I would need: the nippers, the frottoir, the paring and lifting and skife knives, the polishing irons and the ever-so-elegant spokeshave, but to turn up on my first day like a princess with her own engraved tools was a little too much.

  Tildy has taken it upon herself to organise the uniform part of my requirements. Miss Lucy’s tiny modiste’s is set below street level, but bright in spite of it. The full fronted glass of the shop draws in light, and the artfully-made gas lamps are all alight and cast a golden glow over the white and green rooms.

  ‘I’d prefer overalls, you know,’ I grumble, flapping at the outfit being pinned on me. It’s calico, a practical fabric and hardwearing and perfectly suited to a ’prentice. What’s not practical are the skirts, which are almost as voluminous as those of a party dress; the pockets are good, though, and deep. Lucy Pye, tiny silver spikes held precariously in her mouth and stuck in the silken cushion on her wrist, puffs up at me, mumbling about little misses.

  ‘I know,’ sighs Grandma. ‘But it’s enough you’re being allowed to be a ’prentice instead of going to that fancy school, isn’t it?’

  I grudgingly admit it is.

  ‘Can’t expect to dress like a boy too, my Rose. Now go and change. We’ll pick these up in two days, Miss Pye.’

  I go behind the curtains into the cramped dressing room and strip off the frock, careful to avoid the pins. I can hear the whine of the seamstress as she talks at Tildy.

  ‘No point, if you ask me, in your young miss to be ’prenticing. What’s she need that for? Got money and a fancy home; no doubt her father’ll find her a husband to look after her. Why does she need a trade?’

  ‘That’s enough out of you, Lucy Pye, keep your fingers to stitching and your lips from flapping and making a breeze,’ says Tildy mildly. ‘My granddaughter won’t depend on chance in her life—she’s smart enough to know the only person she can rely on to look after her is herself. That makes her smarter than most people I know. I never relied on anyone, nor did you so don’t go looking down on my Rosamund for not being a lazy brainless girl with nothing in her head but sequins and beads.’

  ‘Might have been nice,’ snipes Lucy, ‘to have the choice, though. Do you really think I’d have spent all these years sewing if there’d been some useful man around to take care of me?’

  ‘Take care of yourself. Can’t ever be sure when a man’s going to die or change.’ I hear the clink of coins on the glass top of the counter. ‘Be thankful you’ve only yourself to rely on.’

  I struggle back into my own frock and do up the buttons on the front of the bodice, cursing every one of them. I tidy my hair and step out. Grandma Tildy stands and nods to a chastened seamstress. ‘We’ll see you Friday, Miss Pye.’

  We walk out the white door that looks like a wedding cake, then take the steps leading to the street. You can tell it’s a good neighbourhood because crevices like this don’t smell like cats’ pee.

  ‘Honestly, Lucy Pye and her opinions everyone’s got to hear!’ Tildy clicks her tongue in annoyance. ‘Now, a few years back there was a seamstress who sewed like an angel, you’ve never seen such dresses for all that she worked in the Golden Lily. Gentle as a doe and never said a mean word about anyone. She’s one I miss.’

  ‘What happened to her?’

  ‘Moved away,’ says Tildy shortly, and I recognise the tone she gets when she realises she’s begun telling a story she doesn’t want to give you the end of. I’m about to start pricking at her to ease out more information when a tall shape appears a few paces ahead of us in the gathering afternoon. I see him only briefly; he gives a sharp-toothed smile and then slides into an alleyway. I think I see a flash of dark red at his heels.

  I turn to Tildy, whose hand convulses on my arm. Her face is stricken-white.

  ‘Who is that, Rosie? That boy?’

  ‘I don’t know, Grandma. I met him a few days ago at the bookshop.’

  I can feel her shaking and worry that she will fall. ‘Come away, Rosamund, we must get home.’

  ‘Tildy, are you alright? Do you need to sit down?’ There’s a tea shop not far down the street.

  She shakes her head. ‘No, love. We just need to get home.’

  Tildy insists we cross the road even though it takes us out of our way—but it also keeps us away from the mouth of the alley, which is black, toothless. ‘Rosie, promise me you’ll stay away from him if you see him again.’

  ‘Why? I b
arely know him, Grandma.’ I protest, not about the ban on him, but the idea she seems to have about my connection with the nameless boy.

  ‘Let’s just get home, Rosie.’

  I heard from some of the girls at Miss Peach’s how their grandparents went soft in the head, but with my fierce grandmother it seems unlikely. Still she’s frail and afraid and I’ve never seen her like that before. It frightens me.

  She spends much of our walk looking back over her shoulder as if we might be followed.

  ***

  Emmeline has gone to bed early, troubled by a headache.

  After dinner, I leave Tildy and Peregrine to talk and take the boys upstairs.

  When they are washed, sleepy and in their pyjamas (the ones with the feet in them), I agree to read them a story. They always choose the one about the Robber Bridegroom because, they say, the clever girl wins. So I give them the tale and only when they are drifting off do they let slip a disturbing fact.

  ‘Met your boyfriend today, Rosie-rose,’ singsongs Henry as I pull the covers up to his chin.

  ‘Boyfriend!’ chimes Jacoby, who holds tight around my neck before I tuck him in too.

  ‘I’ve not got a boyfriend, as you both know.’ I kiss two warm, shiny foreheads.

  ‘He said he knew you,’ mumbles Henry. ‘He was waiting outside the gates of our school and talked to us.’

  ‘What’d he look like?’ I ask the drowsing children. Jacoby mutters that he is tall and dark-haired, which tells me very little, but makes me cold. There’s no further news to be had from the twins, both are asleep and even if I had the heart to wake them I doubt I’d get much more information.

  I look in on my mother. Her nightgown has ridden up as she’s tossed and turned in distressed sleep, her hair is damp and sweat beads her brow. Beneath her lids, her eyes dart here and there, searching for something. Her hands clutch and clench. I wipe her forehead and cover her with the sheet lest she take a chill.

  Peregrine and Tildy are talking still, and I can hear their voices raised. This is unusual in and of itself.

  I creep down the stairs, careful to avoid the ones I know will protest my weight.

  ‘I know what I saw, Peregrine. I saw him look at Rosamund and I saw him true.’ Tildy’s voice is hard with urgency. ‘He’s a cold lad.’

  ‘Oh, Tildy. Don’t be ridiculous. I don’t believe in any of that nonsense.’ But Peregrine’s tone is more bravado than truth and Grandma hits back at him with undiluted scorn.

  ‘You don’t believe! How can you say that? You of all people, when you know what Emmeline did! You know what’s possible.’

  What Emmeline did. Why my mother no longer bakes. Her power and its consequences, her revenge and how awful it was. What Emmeline did.

  I don’t pay attention to his reply for there is a shifting of the air behind me and my mother walks past. Her eyes are still closed and she moves toward the other stairs that lead down to the kitchen.

  I stick my head in the door of the dining room and beckon my arguing relatives.

  They follow and by the time we get to the stone-vaulted basement kitchen Emmeline is a whirl of white nightgown and red and white hair. Her eyes are closed, but she moves with graceful assurance around the room and finds everything she needs. Emmeline begins to make the bread mixture she’s not dipped her hands into since before I was born. On my mother’s face is an expression which plainly says that she does this against her will. She mouths ‘no, no, no,’ but her hands keep mixing, mixing, then she dumps the dough out onto the tabletop and begins to knead it angrily. I am frozen, unsure of what to do; Peregrine and Tildy watch with a kind of fascinated horror that pins them to the spot.

  Emmeline makes no recognisable shape. I think her mind resists even in sleep, and whatever has pulled her from her bed has failed. When at last she stands, unmoving, her head low and her tears dripping into the leftover flour on the bench, then I put my arms around her. She doesn’t start or cry out. I talk to her in a low voice and Peregrine and Tildy do the same. We walk her out of the kitchen, up the stairs and back into her own bed. We do not wash Emmeline’s hands for fear the touch of water might wake her, so we gently try to pick off the remains of any dough, and hope she will not remember this night’s venture.

  ***

  The day is miserable, grey and dull. It has been raining constantly, monstrous great drops of moisture hit the windows with a savage sound and pour down the panes like small violent rivers.

  Emmeline retreated to her bed again soon after breakfast. We none of us have spoken about her nightly excursion and she senses something is wrong and it makes her short with us, as if she knows we are not telling her something important. That we are treating her as if she’s a child. She pleads weariness and a headache and no one doubts it. Tildy gives her a tincture of Valerian. In return, I do not tell my father what the boys said last night about the slender young man. I do not wish to worry him, although I’m certain Tildy would be happy to crow a victory over that piece of information.

  The twins have been bickering since early this morning and by the afternoon it has worn thin. Peregrine has, uncharacteristically, lost his temper and sent them to their room. This caused no end of uncomprehending distress and many tears. My father maintained his rage long enough for the boys to disappear up the stairs, pathetic sobs wafting down behind them as they slowly closed their door as if waiting for the reprieve that did not come.

  I give my father a severe look and he has difficulty meeting my eyes. The trouble with being so easy-going is that people start acting as though you’ve no right to a bad mood. It is unfair but unavoidable.

  ‘Oh, all right!’ he huffs and makes his way up the curved staircase, his boots thudding with displeasure on every step. The boys will think themselves in line for a hiding now. I smother a grin, and Tildy stomps out of the front parlour. Her humour is no better than anyone else’s in the house at the moment.

  ‘Shouldn’t you be doing something?’ she demands. Idle hands and all that. I sigh.

  I try to look saintly and put-upon. ‘Saturday, Grandma, and even the worst of the wicked get a day off.’

  ‘You little . . .’ she trails off so I never hear what she thinks of me. Her eyes dart past my shoulder and out one of the front windows. I turn and follow her gaze.

  Through the decoratively etched glass panes on either side of the front door I can see the youth, impervious to rain or so it seems. I fling open the door and make to go out, but Tildy grabs my arm and pulls me back. She charges past me and I can feel her fear like an icy breath coming off her skin. She’s terrified, but she will protect me no matter what.

  ‘Who are you?’ she yells. ‘What do you want?’

  I see his mouth curl up at one corner, part contempt, part fondness, as if he knows her better than she might ever think; as if he won’t do her harm because he’s terribly, irrationally, mysteriously fond of her.

  But then she slips on the soaked stone steps and falls like a sack of potatoes down our long front stairs. The expression on the boy’s face is one of distress in the moment when he’s still there. I look to my grandmother, flick my eyes back up and he’s gone yet again.

  The rain is cold and hard against my skin as I kneel down beside my grandmother.

  ‘Tildy! Tildy, are you all right?’ I’m too scared to move her. Did she hit her head? Did I hear bones crack? Is there blood anywhere? Will she be all right?

  At first there is a silence, a lack of response that makes my heart contract to the size of a pin. And then the sound of salvation, the most beautiful noise in the world: Tildy cursing up a blue storm.

  Peregrine has heard the commotion. He looks impressed at the range of his mother-in-law’s profanity. Indeed, there are things I’d like to write down—one never knows when one will need a decent curse.

  ‘Can you get up, Tildy?’ My father speaks to her as if she is better beloved than his own mother—which she is.

  ‘Everything aches and it will be worse tomorro
w.’ She moans, lying still. I try to feel for any broken bones. She tolerates it for a moment, then brushes my hands away. ‘Enough, child.’

  ‘I’ll send for the doctor,’ says my father, and puts his hands under one of Tildy’s arms, and gestures for me to do the same.

  ‘Never mind that. I’ll go and see my friend—she’ll have something that will dull the pain better than any of those sawbones will come up with.’

  ‘She’s on the other side of town.’

  ‘A walk will do me good.’ She’s being stubborn. She doesn’t want to go out alone, doesn’t want to encounter the cold lad again.

  ‘Take her in the carriage, Papa. It won’t take you more than an hour. I’ll keep an eye on things.’

  There is no more debate when Tildy gives in and admits that although nothing’s broken, she is not in a state to walk the streets and she will need some kind of treatment to ease her aches.

  They climb into the carriage, Peregrine’s driver at the reins, just as the afternoon bruises into night.

  ***

  I ask Cook to throw together a light supper. I go upstairs to check on the twins and find them both asleep, curled beneath their beds as if they hid there after Peregrine’s tirade. Dark, damp curls are infested with dust-bunnies.

  I open the door to my own room and immediately something feels wrong. The carpet underfoot squelches, saturated as if someone dripping wet paused there. On the cream coverlet of my bed I can see paw prints, large but fine, in a mud that may be almost as red as their owner’s fur. The prints trek across the wide expanse of the mattress, then show a leap onto the small stool with its covering of cream and gold brocade, then a slight skid across the glossy painted surface of the duchess.

  I go through my trinkets, the shiny things in the small cut-crystal bowls, all the bits of jewellery I’ve been given over the years by my parents and Tildy. The only piece missing is the ring twisted out of true by my fall and still stained by my blood. Given mother to daughter and then again, as I expected to do to my own daughter in turn.