“’Tis a shame the girl is come to this. I will not believe her to be a thief.”
“It is not for us to judge. But we may at least provide her with sustenance. She should not suffer hunger on top of all else.”
“Mistress Lovewell must know her to be innocent. Surely she will retract her accusations.”
Mary gave a shrug. “On the matter of Alice, the mistress is conflicted, Willis, we both know this.”
At last Xanthe saw a chance to talk to Alice! A move closer to securing Flora’s safety and being able to return home. Xanthe stepped forward, making Mary start and Willis frown.
“Please, might I be allowed to accompany Mr. Willis? I would very much like to take the food to Alice.”
“The habit of eavesdropping is a dangerous one, maid,” Mary warned. “Do you not know that?”
“Forgive me, but I couldn’t help overhearing. Please let me accompany Mr. Willis. He will not have time to sit with her, but I could. It would surely be a kindness for Alice to have someone to talk to while he goes about his errands. At least for that short time, she would not have to be alone.”
Willis shook his head. “I doubt they will let you inside the jail. You would have to content yourself with speaking through the grille.”
“It would be better than nothing.”
Mary put her hands on her hips and drew herself up. She was a strong, tall woman, her body toned from years of hard work and fortunate good health. “You have duties of your own. Who will do your share of work if you are gone half the day? We are already in disarray with the preparations for Mistress Clara’s birthday celebrations.”
“I will make it up to you, I promise. I’ll work late. Whatever you want. Only let me go, let me see her.”
“Why do you care so much?” Mary asked. “What is she to you?”
What answer could Xanthe give to that? She was not a relative or someone Alice was even known to have met. What answer, save the truth?
“She is, I believe, a young girl wrongly accused, shut away from the sun, alone and afraid, awaiting an uncertain fate. She needs the hand of friendship extended. Are we not all of us, at some time or another, dependent on the kindness of others? Would we not wish someone to act selflessly for our sake?”
Mary pursed her lips and then gave an impatient sigh. “Very well, you may accompany Willis. But see to it your tasks are finished this night. There will be no rest for you with things left undone.”
“Of course. I promise.”
“Come,” she said, walking toward the pantry. “We will find what will not be missed.”
“Oh,” Xanthe said, suddenly remembering her instructions, “Master Lovewell has asked for venison pie.”
“Has he indeed?” Mary picked up the plump pastry case, but instead of setting it on a platter for her master she wrapped it in cloth, tied it tightly, and slipped it into a deep wicker basket. “’Tis a shame, then, that there is none left,” she said, shoving the basket into Xanthe’s arms and fetching apples and cheese and bread to go with it. When the basket was brimming she looked at her sternly. “Tell no one else what you have been given or for whom it is meant. And for pity’s sake take off that apron before you leave! Care you nothing for the reputation of this household?”
16
By the time Xanthe climbed aboard the cart, taking her place next to Willis on the front seat, the rain had stopped. There was still a cold wind blowing, and she was thankful for the thick woolen cape Jayne had loaned her. One look at Xanthe, with her own picnic rug wrapped around her shoulders, had reduced the kitchen maid to helpless laughter. Jayne had been certain Mary would change her mind about letting Xanthe go if she was to be seen looking such a sight, so she offered her own cloak. In her pocket Xanthe had some of the coins she had brought with her from Mr. Morris’s collection. At least Alice might be able to use them to pay for more food or bribe someone to help her, if only in a small way. In the back of the cart, beneath some burlap flour sacks, were the charred remnants of ruined harness and tack. Even days later and in the open air it was still possible to smell the fire on them. No one had yet found the cause of the blaze, but this did not seem to worry them greatly. Perhaps such fires were commonplace, and people were only relieved they had not lost any of the horses, or servants. Or perhaps Willis had his own suspicions about Peter’s fear of the dark and carelessness with candles and chose to keep them to himself.
There was a single brown mare pulling the cart. No fancy carriage for this journey, but Xanthe did not care. Here at last was the chance she had been hoping for. She would be able to reassure Alice that she was not alone, and to ask her where she had hidden the chatelaine pieces. She could return them to Mistress Lovewell’s room, and the charges against Alice would have to be dropped. Her main challenge was going to be getting the poor girl to trust this odd-looking stranger who had suddenly popped into her life. Would she have seen her in a dream, she wondered, in the same way Xanthe had seen her? Had the chatelaine worked its magic for both of them? It would make her task easier if the girl recognized her, though it might terrify her. This was an age of superstition and belief in witchcraft—she might be horrified to see someone from one of her own visions standing in front of her.
The countryside on the way to Marlborough was remarkably similar to how it was in the modern day. Much of the county was given over to arable farming rather than livestock, so that it remained largely unfenced or enclosed in any way in the twenty-first century. Crops did not need walls and hedges to keep them in, after all. The main difference was the road. The persistent rain had turned the muddy track into a rutted mess of soupy soil and sharp stones, so that the horse had to move at a frustratingly slow, plodding trot, and the cart lurched and bounced, demonstrating with every turn of its wheels that suspension was not fitted on such lowly conveyances.
The journey took a full, tortuous hour, making Xanthe think wistfully of the way her beloved black cab had beetled along the same road. Had it only been a matter of days since she bought the chatelaine at the auction? It felt as if she had done so in another life. The wind was still doing its best to dislodge her hair from its cap and pins, as the cart finally crested the hill that led down into the town. The sight of the town took her breath away. She had not felt the distance between the date she was at and her own time as keenly as she did at that moment. The town was so small! Most of the buildings she knew were not yet there. It was little more than a village, by modern standards. There was a church at either end of the broad high street, and she recognized the grand merchant’s house, the town hall, and the pub. Her heart lurched at the familiar sight of the low-beamed inn. Its sign declared it to be The Three Quills, not The Feathers. One day she would be sure to tell Harley about that. The main street was almost as muddy as the road, and the bad weather seemed to be keeping most people indoors.
Suddenly, without her being in any way prepared for it, there was the jail. It looked even smaller than she remembered, set as it was partially into a high wall that ran along the north of the town. What struck her most, though, was what was not there. No shop. No home. Flora’s precious antique shop did not yet exist. She felt her heart constrict at the thought. Somehow she must have held the idea of her mother being just down the road all the time she was at Great Chalfield. Now she had to face the fact that they were separated not by a few miles of rough track and rolling barley fields but by yawning centuries. She had to fight the urge to take hold of her gold locket. She longed to feel connected to her mother again, but she dared not risk slipping back to her own time. She was so close to Alice now. So close, she hoped, to finding a way to save her. She could not take the risk of disappearing, for even if she found her way back again, how would she ever explain that to Willis? She would never be allowed to set foot anywhere near the Lovewell household and would surely be branded a witch.
They drew to a halt beside the swath of green that led across to the jail. Despite being set in the wall, it looked so isolated, so lonely, as if
the point was being made that whoever was in it was no longer part of the community. Their actions had put them beyond reach. There was no sense of innocent until proven guilty, and she doubted many people who were sent to the jail escaped a conviction of some sort. Willis nodded toward it.
“Get yourself over there. I’ll inform the constable you’ve brought provisions for the maid.”
Xanthe climbed down, her boots sinking into the wet mud of the street. She clutched the basket to her and leaned against the wind, making unsteady progress across the rough grass to the jail. It was strange seeing it in its original state. The circular building was built as part of the long wall that ran off toward the older houses, forming a protective boundary for the little town. The stone tiles of the roof were new and free from moss. The walls looked horribly solid, and the only openings were the tiny air vent at the top of the stonework, and the door itself, which was wooden and studded with iron bolt heads and hinges. Set into this was an opening too small to really be called a window. It was about twelve inches square, near the top of the door, without glass, but with thick metal bars.
Xanthe was about to call through the grille when something made her stop. She had the sensation of being watched. More than that, of being scrutinized. She turned and saw, standing on the far side of the green, a tall figure, his wide-brimmed hat pulled low, long blond hair caught up by the wet wind. She shuddered, uncertain as to why this stranger should so unsettle her. She was accustomed by now to feeling out of place and being on her guard, yet something about this man frightened her. She turned her attention back to the blind house. Back to Alice. She leaned against the door, calling through the bars at the tiny opening.
“Alice? Alice, can you hear me?” Her voice was whipped away by the wind. “Alice?”
“Who is it? Who’s there?” came the faint reply.
“My name is Xanthe Westlake. I have been sent from Great Chalfield.”
“I do not know you. Who was it sent you?”
“Mary. I have food for you. Willis brought me.”
She heard a movement inside the jail. It occurred to her then that maybe those tiny structures were called blind houses not because they had no windows—or eyes—for people to see out, but because the interiors must have been so dark the people inside might have thought they had gone blind.
She felt the door shudder slightly as Alice stumbled against it. At least, she assumed it was Alice. For the first time she contemplated the thought that the girl might not be alone in there. Which would be worse, she wondered, to be shut up on your own, or with some drunk or possibly violent criminal?
“Alice, are you … unharmed?” Xanthe asked.
“I am quite well,” she said with admirable grit. “But a little hungry.”
Xanthe looked at the narrow gaps between the bars. It would be almost impossible to pass the food through. “Willis has gone to tell the constable I am here,” she explained. “As soon as he comes I will give you the basket. There is fresh bread and cheese, and even venison pie.”
She heard a weak laugh. “Master Lovewell would not willingly give up such a favorite, I think.”
“Well, Mary didn’t think it necessary to bother him with the details of your basket,” she said.
“She must not take risks on my account. No one should.”
“You have friends, Alice. Do not give up hope. You are not forgotten.” Xanthe glanced over her shoulder, in the direction of the buildings in the high street. She could see Willis’s cart outside the costermongers, the horse dozing at the rail, its ears turned against the wet weather, but there was no sign yet of any constable. The wind whined around the jail, and at that moment it seemed a heartbreakingly bleak and cruel place to keep a person. “Alice, I want to help you. I don’t believe you are a thief. Let me prove to Mistress Lovewell that you are not,” she said.
“Who are you that you would wish to help me?”
“I am a minstrel, only recently come to the area. I heard of your plight,” she told her, choosing her words with painful care, trying to make them sound less modern and at the same time sincere, while not actually being able to tell her the truth. “I … I know what it is to suffer an injustice. I will do all I can to help you gain your freedom.”
“You think I did not take the silver pieces from the chatelaine?” she asked.
Xanthe took a deep breath. There wasn’t time to tiptoe around the matter. The constable could appear at any minute, and this might be the only opportunity she got to talk to Alice alone.
“I think that you did take them, Alice.”
She didn’t respond to this, though Xanthe thought she heard her gasp.
“I think you took them for an innocent reason; to use them, but not to steal them and sell them. You planned to return them before they were missed, but something prevented you from doing that. And when the mistress discovered they were gone the household fell into uproar, and it was too late.”
There was a moment’s tense silence and then Alice asked, “For what purpose would I have taken them?”
“You needed them to sew up the hem of the tapestry, Alice. I found the rosary.”
This caused her to cry out. “Leave me be! You cannot help me.”
“I can. All I have to do is put the silver pieces back. No one need ever know why you took them. I have told no one about the rosary, I promise you.”
“I don’t know who you are! I know of no such rosary!” she insisted, her voice growing hoarse with fear.
“I know it’s hard for you to trust a stranger, Alice, but believe me, I can help you.”
“I know of no rosary, I tell you!”
“You must realize how serious your situation is.”
“You think I do not?”
“Those pieces, the needle case and scissors, they were very valuable. The law regarding such thefts is harsh, cruel even. The very best you can hope for if you are convicted of stealing them is transportation. You could hang, Alice. I’m sorry, but that’s the truth of it.”
“It is a truth that haunts my every moment, waking or sleeping, here in this place of darkness and despair! It is a fate I am resigned to.”
“But you don’t have to be!” Xanthe grabbed hold of the iron bars of the grille, pulling herself up, trying to peer in, to see Alice, to let her see that Xanthe was just a girl, like her, that she could be trusted. That she had to trust her. “Just tell me where you hid the pieces. I will put them back in Mistress Lovewell’s bedchamber. She may never know where they have been or why, but she will have to drop the charges against you. You will be freed, Alice.”
“I tell you I know of no rosary! Do you wish to see me condemned as a traitor? Do you wish me to suffer a traitor’s end?”
Xanthe thought then about what Willis had said about her family. All of them executed as traitors. Only Alice spared. The family name tainted forever. This was her greatest terror then, not transportation, or even being hanged, but to be confirmed as a Catholic, a follower of the old religion, a traitor to the crown.
“Alice, I—”
Suddenly, the girl jumped at the door, grabbing hold of the grille and pulling herself up so that her face was close to Xanthe’s. In the bleak autumn light she saw the deep shadows beneath Alice’s eyes, the pallor of her skin, the fear in her expression. She looked, more than anything, like a caged animal.
“I escaped the fate of my family by the narrowest scrap of fortune. My punishment was to be left orphan, alone and entirely without support in this dread world. But that was not enough for those who would stamp their preferences upon us all and allow no other. I was made to suffer a greater torment, for they forced me to watch my loved ones go to their deaths. My mother and grandmother they burned before me. My grandmother was weak and mercifully not aware of what was being done to her, her frailty robbing the spectators and accusers alike of their cruel sport. My dear mother held my gaze as long as she was able until the smoke obscured us from one another. With his last gold, my father had bribed
the executioner to step up and slit her throat, so she at least was spared the greater torments of the flames. He had no riches left for his own defense, however. He was dragged through the streets, humiliated and pelted with rotten vegetables and sharp stones. He was strung up by his neck until he was half choked to death. Then he was taken down and opened with a scythe, his innards pulled from him and burned on the fire so that he and I both could smell them as they cooked. Only then did they take an axe and remove his sweet head. His body was divided and scattered about the city. His head was put to decay upon a spike outside the tower.” She paused then, the fury and the fight seeming to go out of her. More softly she asked, “Who will find gold to pay for mercy for me? Tell me that.” She let go the bars and slipped back into the darkness.
“Alice.” Xanthe scrabbled to reach her with her fingers, as if she might pull her back and make her understand. “I promise you, I have told no one of the rosary, nor will I ever. Only tell me where you hid the pieces and you will be safe. You have my word on it.”
From the direction of the high street came the sound of rattling and heavy footfalls. She turned to find the constable almost upon them, a large ring of keys in his hand.
“Alice, we must be quick!” she hissed through the opening. “Tell me where I should look.”
But there came no reply. She was too terrified of what the consequences might be if she trusted a stranger.
“Stand aside there, missy,” said the jailer. He cast an eye over the basket, lifting the cloth that covered it. He pawed the contents. “Got to check there’s nothing here as should not be.” He whistled at the sight of the pie. “Fine food for a felon,” he declared, and Xanthe wondered how many times he had used that line hoping for a little of what he found.
She pulled the basket away from him. “All sent by Master Lovewell, who will hear of it should something fail to reach its destination,” she told him.
He gave a snort and turned his attention to finding the right key for the lock. All the while, Xanthe was trying to think of a way of getting Alice to tell her what she needed to know, but time was running out, and the presence of the constable was only likely to make the poor girl more reluctant to speak. The key turned in the lock and the door was dragged open, heavy on its hinges, as if reluctant to let air or light in, or to allow anyone out. The constable made to take the basket, but Xanthe held it tight.
The Little Shop of Found Things--A Novel Page 20