“Wanted some books, you know, and so there was this teacher, got lost on his way to Waterton, and wandered over into here. You’d be surprised how many people get lost.” Beth grinned. “Course, maybe the fact we’re handy with road signs accounts for that.”
“Are there more?”
“Might be. He had a bunch of books. I looked at the pictures, but they were pretty dull.”
Maggie dug in the trunk. Yes, there were more readers. Along with this, The Eclectic First, were the second, third and fourth. As well, she found the Pictorial Primer. As helpful as this was, it seemed an insurmountable task. To teach someone to read in a few days? Impossible. It was like a fairy-tale task, where the maiden must spin straw from gold, or empty the sea with a slotted spoon.
“Can you pull your chair over? I’ll sit on the trunk. That way we can both see the book.” She picked up the candle and put it between them. “All right, let’s see where we stand. Do you know the sound of letters? If I point here, do you know what the letter is?”
“It’s a B.”
“Yes. And the one after it?”
“An O, two Os.”
“And the next?”
“A K.”
“Can you tell me what a B sounds like?”
Beth made the sound. “Buh.”
“Yes. Good, now the Os, what do they sound like?”
Beth looked puzzled and said, “Is it the same if there’s only one?”
“What would one sound like?”
“Same as it’s called?”
“Close, sometimes it sounds like uuhh, so the B and the two Os would be buuhh …”
Beth practiced the sounds, with her dirty fingernail against the page.
“It’s a kind of magic, reading. The letters are like a clue to the sound, and then, when you learn to make a connection between the way a word looks and the way it sounds, it pops into your mind. So, if we take the buuhh and add a K sound onto it, what do we get?”
Beth started with the B sound and moved, with only minor difficulty, into the Os, getting them not quite right. At the K she came out with a word that sounded a bit like bouquet.
“Almost,” said Maggie. “But shorten it. Just make the sound of the letter; don’t repeat the name of it. Buuhh …”
Beth scowled. She pressed her finger into the paper, leaving a smudge. “Buh – uuhh –” Then she moved her finger to the top of the page, to the illustration of two little girls and a little boy. The girls were in long dresses and the boy wore short pants and a frilly collar. The girl in the middle was older than the other children and she held a book, from which she appeared to be reading. Beth’s finger hovered over the drawing, as her brow furrowed and she made buh-buh-buh noises. Then, suddenly, she poked the book the older girl held. “Book! Book, it’s book.” She pointed at two more places on the page where the word appeared.
Beth shone with effort and delight and Maggie thought she looked like a young girl. The candle’s flame sparked. “That’s it exactly,” she said. “Well done.”
“Do it again,” said Beth. “Give me another word.”
“What a wonderful way of putting it. We’ll begin. I’ll read the page aloud, and then you can try.”
Beth nodded and chewed on her lower lip. “It’s hard.”
“Once you get the hang of it, you’ll be amazed at what lies between the pages of a book,” Maggie began. “Lesson one. The New Book. Here is John. There are Ann and Jane. Ann has a new book. Ann must keep it nice and clean.”
Beth said, “I smudged it.”
“That doesn’t matter,” said Maggie.
“Yes, it does. I want to wash my hands. You stay here. Don’t move.”
Maggie thumbed through the books and found charts of sounds and discussions of diphthongs and exceptions, regular and irregular sounds. It was confusing. She’d never teach Beth to read in time. Books on history, geography, biology. She wasn’t sure what she expected to find … something magical perhaps. A book with a red botanical illustration on the cover caught her eye. It was a compendium of properties contained in different fruits, seeds, plants and trees. The cover drawing was a pomegranate, cut in half so that the tough outer rind revealed the sweet red seeds within. Pomegranates? That reminded Maggie of something, but what? Pomegranate seeds! The dream … healing pomegranates. The little enamel box with Mr. Strundale’s gifts to her, one of which was a pomegranate seed.
CHAPTER EIGHTEEN
SHE DOVE FOR HER PACK AND FOUND THE BOX. She shook the seed into her palm. It wasn’t an ordinary seed. This was firm as glass, more like a bead than a seed. But what to do with it? Beth would be back any moment. She picked it up and held it between her thumb and forefinger. It glowed like a little ruby heart, lit from within with the tiniest of flames. Should she eat it? Get Beth to eat it? As she lowered her hand to the book in her lap, the seed flared brightly. Of course. She could already read, but Beth could not.
Beth’s footsteps sounded, and Maggie tucked the tiny seed in her pocket. Beth entered and held out her hands for inspection. From the redness, Maggie thought she must have scrubbed them with a wire brush. The nails gleamed.
“Beth has a new book,” she said, grinning. “She must keep it nice and clean.”
“Excellent. Let’s get back to work,” said Maggie.
A while later, Maggie said her throat was scratchy from so much talking, and surely Beth’s must be as well. Did she want something to drink? Perhaps some tea, and with honey, if they had such a thing.
“I’d rather have beer,” said Beth.
“Well, it’s best to concentrate when doing such hard work.” Maggie wasn’t sure what it would be best to hide the seed in but thought putting it in something hot and sweet might help it dissolve, or do whatever it was supposed to do. Beth grunted and said Maggie would find what she needed in the storeroom. They acquired all sorts of delicacies from travellers, and she might even find some biscuits. Beth said she’d take the dogs out for a break.
Maggie headed for the storeroom and as she neared it, Winnie called out. She sat on a stool near the front entrance, working a churn. “Where do you think you’re going, missy?”
“Beth wants me to make tea and look for biscuits.”
“Tea and bloody biscuits, is it? Aren’t we la-de-da? What are you two doing in there, anyway?”
“I’m telling Beth about what I saw in Wallis Tilden’s town. Is it all right? And would you like a cup of tea? I’d be happy to bring you one.”
Winnie snorted. “Tea? Not likely.” She stopped churning, picked a wineskin up from the floor, held it above her head and sent a stream of red wine into her open mouth, only a little of it trickling down her chin. “Go on, then,” she said. “Back to what you were doing.”
Maggie stepped into the storeroom and stopped short. Shelves lined the room, four rows high, and on them were flour, sugar, pecans, honey, molasses, candied ginger, pickled eggs, coffee, tea (six canisters of various blends), dried beans, salt, smoked hams, cans of smoked oysters, jams (quince, strawberry, rosehip and blackberry), bottles of wine and spirits, pickled beets, pears in wine, sardines, wheels of cheese … The robbing business must be going well. She picked a canister of strong tea, as well as lavender honey and a tin of cardamom-scented shortbread.
Back in the hall, she made tea over the fire, boiling the water in a smoke-scarred kettle. Four little boys in filthy leggings and soot-blackened shirts raced around near her, the braver one – a red-haired boy with a face full of freckles and two missing front teeth – dashing near to touch her, as though on a dare. Maggie opened the biscuit tin and held one out. There was much poking and jostling, but finally he tiptoed over, much as an untamed fox would, snatched the cookie and raced back to his siblings. He stuffed it in his mouth and from the astonished look on his face Maggie guessed he didn’t get cookies ve
ry often. Maggie held out a handful of cookies and after a moment’s hesitation, the boys rushed her, nearly knocking her into the fire. They grabbed the cookies and retreated to their lairs in the shadows.
Poor wild things, Maggie thought, which is when another idea began to form. She made the tea, strong and black, and poured it into two earthenware mugs. She stirred in the honey and slipped the pomegranate seed into Beth’s cup. It sank to the bottom, as any seed would, and for a moment her stomach pitched, thinking she’d wasted it, but then it floated to the top and blossomed into a small golden drop of light, which for a second illumined the inside of the cup, and then, poof, it was gone.
She returned to Beth’s room, with the biscuit tin tucked under her arm. Maggie sipped her tea and handed the other cup to Beth, who blew on it and then drank. Maggie held her breath. She put down her cup and opened the tin. “Have a biscuit?”
“Don’t mind if I do,” said Beth. She dipped the biscuit in the tea and then ate it in one bite. “Good. Give us another.”
“You have so much food in the larder,” said Maggie. “Why bother with the rabbits?”
“You never know how long it’s going to be between travellers.” She took a big mouthful of tea. “We had an awful hungry winter a few years back. Best to keep the stores full.”
“Ah. Shall we get back to work?”
“The boys,” read Beth, “rrrr – an … no, run.”
Maggie watched Beth from the corner of her eye, trying to discern any reaction, any difference. “Very good.”
“‘One of the boys,’” Beth continued, and then stopped. “Is that right?”
“It is.”
“Huh. ‘Th-th-they run as f-f-f-is’ no ‘fast as they can.’”
“Oh, excellent.” Maggie’s pulse began to race.
The big woman grinned and slurped her tea. “Feels a bit tingly.”
Beth looked at the illustration of two running boys, taking a long drink. She said, “‘One of the boys has no hat.’” And then she laughed, pointing at the sentence. “See, that’s it, isn’t it? ‘One of the boys has no hat.’” She drained her cup and put it down on the floor.
“Yes, yes, go on!” Was it just Maggie’s imagination, or did Beth’s features seem less heavy, lighter somehow? And something else as well, the room didn’t smell quite so fetid. She sniffed. Lavender? How bizarre. Must be from the honey.
“‘Here is a small dog. He has the boy’s hat. The boys …’” She tilted her head. “‘… cannot get it.’” She flipped the page. “‘The horse eats hay. The hay is on the ground. The hay is made of grass.’” She stopped and unbuttoned her jacket, flapping it to create a breeze. “Has it gotten hot in here?”
“It might be all that learning catching up with you.” Maggie glanced around the room, looking for the source of the lavender scent. The window, which had previously been a hole to only blackness, was clear now. The light shone in through panes of green and golden glass. Her eyes widened. The walls no longer seemed so damp. The straw mattress was plump and clean looking, and from the way Oso sniffed it, was probably the source of the lavender.
Beth took off her jacket and tossed it on the straw. And then she noticed the changes in the room. “What’s happening here?”
“I’m not quite sure. Could it be the reading?”
“Is it magic, then?” The dogs, sensing something was up, whined, sat up and stared at her. Oso wagged her tail. “Let’s see about that.”
Beth pawed through the trunk – on which the brass fittings now shone – until she found another reader, The Eclectic Third Reader. She opened it and ran her finger over the page. Then she began laughing so hard she sputtered and wiped her eyes. “‘One day his wife,’” she read, “‘on going to the bath, left the in- the in- the infant to her husband’s care. Begged him not to leave the cradle until she came back. Scarcely’ … what’s that? ‘Scarcely, how- however, had she left the house when the king sent for her husband. To refuse the royal sum … mons, was im-impossible.’ He’s going to leave the baby? Though his wife said not to?” Her face, far cleaner than a moment before, was a mask of disapproval.
Maggie smiled. Beth was so involved in the story she didn’t realize how impossibly well she was reading. But now Beth paled, her eyes on the brocaded chair, which was stainless, all stitching repaired. “What the hell? And look at my pigeons.” The cages were clean, without any droppings or seed husks. The metal gleamed. The birds cooed. A shaft of sunlight pooled on the floor, so inviting even Maggie wanted to curl up in it like a cat. “What magic is this?” Beth stood and dropped the book.
Maggie picked it up and handed it back to her. She thought it best not to mention that not only did the room look much improved, but Beth herself was changed. Her clothes and face were clean. Even her hair shone. “I won’t deny there’s magic afoot here. And perhaps … well, I’m just thinking aloud of course, but is it possible you awakened it? I’ve never seen anyone learn so fast.”
Beth scratched her head. “I know I’m smart, but … magic?”
“It’s possible. And good magic, clearly. If I had to guess I’d say it’s because the power of story has come here at last. Story has such power. Why don’t you read a little more? I suspect there may be something in it for you. That’s one of the great gifts of reading – to learn that others have felt as you have.”
Beth frowned and ate another biscuit. “I don’t know about that. But if it’s magic it’s about goddamn time we had some of that around here.” She stood and pulled back the curtain on the door, peering into the hall. “Seems all the same out there.”
“Why not read on, and see what happens?”
Beth took a deep breath. “‘The husband, the-there-therefore’ – Well, look at me reading the big words – ‘went to the palace straight away, leaving the child to the care of his favourite dog. When the father returned from court the dog ran out to meet him, and as the man bent to praise him, he saw the dog was stained with blood and the man imagined he had killed the child.’” Beth stopped reading and glared at Oso. “Stupid dog ate the baby. World’s so hard on little things.” Her eyes glistened. “It’s like this everywhere then, is it? Not just here with us?”
Beth looked so miserable, so deflated and beaten. Maggie touched Beth’s shoulder. She flinched, but allowed it. Maggie kept her hand there for a moment and then took it away. “Pain is like the wind. It gets in everywhere, blows at every door.”
Beth considered this. She looked down at her hands, at the cuffs of her shirt, worn and frayed a few moments ago, and now crisp and clean. She turned back to the book. “‘The man rushed inside the house and found the cradle over-overturned, and the child gone. In fury, he struck the dog a killing blow with his walking stick. He turned the cradle over, fearful of what he would see, but there beneath he found the child safe, and a large snake lying dead in a corner, its head bloody and its neck broken.’ I’ll be trussed up and tarred,” she said. “He should’a known. Poor dog. Saved the kid and what thanks does he get for it?” Beth crossed the room to where Oso and Badger sat. She crouched down next to Oso and took the dog’s face between her hands. “You woulda protected the babe, wouldn’t you?” Oso’s tongue lolled and her tail thumped the floor.
“So, what do you think the story’s asking us to think about?”
“Think about? Do I have to think about things as well as read them? More work than I thought, but the reading part’s easy enough. Don’t know why I couldn’t figure it out before.” Beth scratched Oso’s ears and sat down on the floor. Oso lay down beside her and put her great bristly head in Beth’s lap. She stroked her. “Well, it wasn’t fair, and he didn’t wait to think things through. He didn’t trust his dog.”
“I’m seeing certain similarities here, aren’t you? No, really. You didn’t trust Oso, did you? At least you didn’t trust her to obey you unless you forced her.�
�
“Maybe.”
Maggie was quite sure Beth blushed a little. “Forgive me, but can you be trusted?”
This question seemed to surprise Beth. “I’m good as my word,” she said. “Can’t no one say different. I tell you I’m going to do something, I do it. I tell you I’m going to cut you open neck to nuts, well then, that’s what I’m going to do.”
“Not precisely what I was thinking,” said Maggie. “But fair enough. Do you trust, say, Oso? To do what you tell her, like the dog in the story?”
“I suppose.”
“So, if it appeared she’d done something out of character, would you assume the worst, or give her the benefit of the doubt until you discovered the truth? You wouldn’t just condemn Oso, would you?”
“I guess not.”
“Of course you wouldn’t, but perhaps in the heat of the moment, up until today, you might have forgotten that. Now, since you’ve read this story, you’re more likely to remember, and to take a minute to think before you hit her.” Maggie held her palms open. “Stories give us tools we can use later, and they make us feel less alone, and sometimes help us see things from someone else’s point of view.”
Beth picked up the book of fairy tales and flipped it open to the middle. “‘Prince Milan rode on slowly with his bride without fearing any further pursuit.’” She smiled broadly. “I can read. Really read.”
The soft light of late afternoon filled the room. “Yes, you can. I told you I would try and teach you, and I did.”
The smile disappeared. “You’re going to say I don’t need you anymore.”
“I was going to say you might do something wonderful. You might,” she raised her eyebrows, “become a teacher yourself, and teach the little ones.”
The Grimoire of Kensington Market Page 19