On the far side of the dormitory, a door leads down a narrow passageway. From the other end, I can hear familiar sounds: pots clanking, bread dough slapping on wood, a sharp voice saying, “That fire needs stirring.”
I tiptoe down the passage, toward the smell of smoke and simmering oats.
When I peek through the door into the kitchen, the cook I met at the marketplace squints up at me from a chopping block. “You’ll get your meal at midday, just like everyone else,” she says when she recognizes me.
“Can I help?” I ask.
She gives me a long stare. “There’s a new girl coming today, but she isn’t here yet. You can stir those oats till she gets here.”
I peer into the pot that hangs over the fire and see oats bubbling, making little plop, plop sounds as they boil. Their steamy scent smells like home.
“Are you going to let those oats burn?” the cook calls to me, and I pick up the wooden spoon to scrape the pot’s sides and bottom.
As I stir, I look for Constance, but I don’t see her. The big man I saw in the kitchen yesterday stands wiping his hands on his long apron, talking to someone just outside the doorway. He moves aside to let the young man with the round head come past him, his arms piled high with firewood. The young man drops the wood in the corner with a bright clinking sound and begins to stack it. Over at the fire, Henry is at the bellows, and just like yesterday, he’s pointing them wrong, sending ashes into the air around him. He doesn’t seem to mind, though—instead, he watches, smiling, as if he’s having fun. When he gives the bellows an extra-hard pump and grins at the shower of ash he’s created, I smile, too.
At that moment, Constance rushes through the door, her hair coming loose from her thin brown braids, a load of onions gathered into her apron. She stoops to whisper to Henry, who frowns and moves his bellows back to the glowing coals where they belong. Constance scurries on toward the cook who spoke to me and unloads her onions. As she does, the cook says something, gesturing with her head toward me.
Constance comes over and smiles a shy greeting. “I’ll stir. Alice says will you help her?”
I hand her the spoon.
Alice looks around at me. “Still want something to do? Those pots over there need washing.” She points at a stack of dirty kettles. “Water’s in a barrel by the door.”
I scrub the gruel that’s stuck to the bottom of the kettles. Poor Alice must never be able to find someone who knows how to stir her pots. A fly buzzes around my face and I slap at it, getting water in my eye, but I keep scrubbing.
The kitchen is full of air and light, with huge windows facing the chapel. Brown-robed friars pass them, and every now and then, one comes into the kitchen to speak to the man wearing the apron.
Once, passing me, Constance whispers, “That’s Master Alan, the head cook. Try to stay out of his way. But Wat’s all right.” She gestures at the younger man and smiles. As if he’s heard his name, he looks over at us, his round face lighting up when he sees Constance. Then he squints his eyes shut and loses himself in a fit of sneezing.
Constance and Alice rush from task to task, and almost before I finish each job she gives me, Alice is ready with new orders. I chop carrots and onions, I stir pots and wash them, I measure millet and sweep floors.
When it’s time for the midday meal, I’m still hard at work, but I don’t mind. I think of Cook at home in Lynn and hear her throaty laugh. Alice isn’t like Cook at all; she never laughs once all morning. But she never yells at me, either, even when I spill some porridge. Instead, she sighs and shakes her head before helping me clean it up.
After the rush of serving the midday meal dies down, Alice says gruffly, “You might as well eat in here with us.”
Constance and Henry take their bowls to the hearth beside the big fireplace. Constance puts her hand on the hearth beside her and looks a question at me.
Gratefully, I join her. My knee throbs, and I burned my finger on a pot, and the onions made my eyes sting, but I feel wonderful.
“Don’t know where that girl is,” Alice says. “Hope she didn’t find herself a position somewhere else, in some private house.” She looks toward the door as if the girl will show up now that she’s been mentioned.
Alice may want her, but I hope she’s found another position, an easy one she’ll never quit.
I stay in the kitchen all day, doing everything Alice asks and trying to do it quickly. Later, when darkness falls, I find my cot in the women’s dormitory and fall into a dreamless sleep.
In the morning, after Mass, I’m back in the kitchen. I look around, but the new girl still isn’t there. Alice sees me and doesn’t say a word, just points to a kettle. I pick up the spoon and stir. Later, I help Constance weed the garden. She snaps weeds off at their stems, leaving the roots in the ground, so I show her how to work a stick into the dirt to get the weeds by their roots. “That way,” I tell her, “they can’t grow back as easily.”
As we work, Constance asks me more about Dame Margery and my pilgrimage. “How could she do that to you?” She shows me a long, thin root she’s pulled out intact. “If she comes here, will you go with her?”
I concentrate on a thick yellow root, digging the dirt around it with my stick, and don’t answer.
“What would you do if she left you again?” Constance asks.
I look up to meet her steady gaze. I don’t know how to answer.
“Johanna!” Alice calls from the kitchen.
The new girl must finally be here. My shoulders slump. Slowly, I rise and dust the dirt off my skirt. I don’t want to go back to Dame Margery, but when she shows up, I’ll have no choice. Pilgrims are only allowed to stay here for a few days before they have to give up their beds for new arrivals. When I leave, I’ll have nowhere else to go—except with Dame Margery. There’s no other way for me to get home.
I glance back at Constance just in time to see her snap a weed off by its stem. She gives me a guilty look. Then I step through the kitchen door.
“Hurry up, girl,” Alice barks, slapping flour from her hands as I come in. “I thought you wanted something to do.”
“I do,” I tell her, not mentioning that weeding the garden is doing something.
“Come along,” she says. She guides me through a doorway to a set of steps leading downward. “Let me show you how the wine works.”
Suddenly, I feel light and happy. The new girl still isn’t here.
I skip down the steps behind Alice into a cool, dim cellar and stand blinking until I can see again. Great wooden casks line the dirt wall, and a wooden counter stands in front of them.
“See this spigot?” Alice says, going behind the counter and picking up a cup. “You have to turn it slow, like this.” She twists a knob on the first cask, and red wine dribbles into the cup. “You try.”
The wine gushes out, spilling onto my hands, and Alice reaches up to shut the spigot off.
She shows me again and has me practice until I get it right. The cup the wine goes into is almost full. Alice takes it, looks at the stairs, and drinks it down. Then she gives me a funny look, the side of her mouth going up. I think it’s a smile.
I grin back at her and give my head a little shake to show her I’ll never tell anyone what she did. Well, maybe Constance.
She hands the cup back to me. “Three days of free wine for rich people, eight days for the poor,” she says, patting at her mouth. “Think you can keep track?”
My eyes widen as I look at her. “I’ll try my best.” I have no idea how to keep track.
The side of her mouth goes up again—another smile. “Never you worry. Father Morgan has a system,” she says. “You’ll just need to stay down here from terce to nones turning the spigot. Any trouble, you call for Father Morgan.”
I nod and we go back up the stairs.
“Alice,” I say as we emerge into the light.
She stops in the doorway to look at me.
I take a deep breath. “If the new girl doesn’t show up, th
e one you hired?”
“And what if she doesn’t?” Alice says, frowning.
“Do you think I might have her job?”
She squints at me, her mouth drawn into a thin line. “That’s something you’d have to ask Father Morgan.” Suddenly, she turns her head, listening. “Hear that bell? That means a new group of pilgrims is here. Hurry, we have work to do.”
as Alice and I get back to the kitchen, Constance comes running in, rubbing garden dirt from her hands. All of us scurry like chickens scattering from a colefox. Enough porridge, enough wine, enough beds for all the new pilgrims means the ones who have already been here for more than eight days have to leave. I’ve been here two. I try not to think about what I’ll do if my days are up before Dame Margery arrives—or what I’ll do when she comes.
Mostly, though, I’m too busy to think. We don’t have time for a midday meal. Instead, we just grab oatcakes and munch them while we work. We keep going long into the evening, preparing things for the next morning. Even Constance’s little brother Henry has to scrub pots so I can help Alice lift the heavy kettles.
I never get a chance to ask Father Morgan about a position in the kitchen, but I’m a little relieved about that. Asking Alice is one thing, but asking a priest? And what if he said no? Then what would I do?
By dark, I am too tired to worry about it, so weary that I can scarcely make it to my bed. When I get there, I have to share it with two new pilgrims, a mother and her grownup daughter. They’re from York, and they want to tell me all about their journey and hear all about mine, but I mumble my apologies and crawl under the blanket. I know they must think I’m rude, but I don’t have the strength to care. They kneel to say their prayers, and I shut my ears to their noise. I’m asleep before they finish their Paternoster.
The next day is as busy as the last—and then the bell rings again, two times. I look around to see Constance’s mouth fall open and Alice shaking her head. “Hear that? New pilgrims yesterday, more today,” she says, and lets out a sigh of exasperation. She looks at me. “Two bells? A big group of them.”
I look at her in disbelief. A bigger group than yesterday?
Alice sees the expression on my face. “This is the slow season. Just wait till summer,” she says.
By the next day, she no longer needs to tell me what to do. I glide from one task to the next, leaving for the wine casks when I hear the bells chime terce and running back up the stairs at nones to spoon bowl after bowl of oatmeal.
Finally, on the morning of the fifth day, things calm down so much that Alice sends Constance to the market—and tells me I can go along, too. It’s cold and the sun has disappeared behind thick clouds, so we pull our cloaks around us and tuck our fingers inside to keep them warm. Constance leads me on what she says is the long route, past the river. We stand watching a stick bobbing on the brown water and then look up as a boat goes by, four men in tall red hats sitting importantly in it, red cloaks billowing behind them.
“Cardinals,” Constance tells me before heading out again. We go through an alleyway, ducking to avoid wet linens that a woman is hanging out. “Those will never dry in this weather,” Constance says.
As we emerge into a wider street, a dog with golden eyes and sharp ears barks at us, then joins us as we hurry toward the market, his tongue hanging out of his grinning mouth.
“We’ll call him Fox, because he looks like one,” I say.
Constance opens her eyes wide, then smiles and joins in my game. “We’ll hide him from Alice—she’ll never know he’s there.”
“Wat will help us find food for him.”
“He can sleep with Henry and me—we’ll be covered in dog hair, but he’ll keep us warm.”
“Wait, where did he go?” I ask, looking behind me.
Constance points and I see the dog nosing at a pile of something. “I guess that smells more interesting than we do.” She gives me a rueful look.
“Goodbye, Fox,” I call, but he doesn’t look up.
“This way,” Constance says, leading me around a corner.
The market opens before us, full of people and noise and delicious smells. Chickens squawk and men call out, hawking their wares, while a knot of pilgrims peers at the goods displayed under the canvas awnings.
I stand back watching while Constance stops in front of a stall, sniffing at little pots until she finds one that satisfies her. She hands a coin to the woman behind the wooden counter, who lets out a torrent of words, shaking her head and gesturing sharply, palm down.
I move up beside Constance, who whispers, “That’s how much Alice told me it costs. That’s all she gave me.” Her face tells me how frightened she is.
“Here, give it to me,” I say, taking the coin and the little pot from her. I sniff at it. It’s some kind of spice, I don’t know what, but it smells wonderful, tickling my nose and making me think of tales about knights journeying to far-off lands. Still, I wrinkle my nose in distaste and say loudly to Constance, “You would pay that much for this?” I don’t think the woman behind the counter can understand my words, but I make sure she comprehends my tone. “Don’t say anything,” I hiss to Constance between clenched teeth. Then I speak loudly again, pointing at the pot. “This is terrible; it will never do.” I shake my head dramatically and set the pot back on the shelf. “Come along.”
The woman behind the counter says something, and I glance briefly over my shoulder at her, but I keep moving away.
Again she says something, and this time I look back at her, my eyebrows raised. She takes the little pot off the shelf and holds it up, her other hand outstretched, palm up.
With as much scorn as I can muster showing on my face, I return to the stall and take the pot from her. I sniff it again and shake my head.
The woman says something to me and I sigh, holding up the coin.
She snatches it from me and drops it into the bag at her waist.
“This will have to do,” I say to Constance, and turn, holding my head as stiff and proud as a noble lady’s.
We’re outside the marketplace before we dissolve into laughter.
“How did you dare?” Constance says as I bow low and present her the pot of spice.
Grinning, I tuck my arm into hers, and we start back for the hospice. We haven’t gone far before we come to a small church almost hidden between two buildings that tower over it. Constance stops, her face solemn again. “Let’s go in,” she says.
Reluctantly, I follow her. She kneels, crossing herself and lowering her head. I stand behind a column, waiting, swallowing the bile I feel rising in my throat. I think it’s the smell of the incense that makes me feel so ill. I try to think of a prayer, but my mind feels blank. Cold from the stone floor seeps into my soles, chilling me. I wish Constance would hurry.
Finally, she’s finished. She gives me a strange look as we go down the church steps, but she doesn’t say anything until we’re on the street. “My mother loved that chapel,” she whispers.
“Your mother?” I drop my voice to a whisper, too.
She nods and tears glint in her eyes. She lowers them and then, after a moment, looks up at me, smiling. “Alice said you were going to ask Father Morgan if you could have a position at the hospice. What did he say?”
Now it’s my turn to look away. “I haven’t asked him yet,” I mumble. Every time I’ve seen him, I haven’t been able to get up my courage, and besides, I’ve had too much to do. But with all the new pilgrims arriving, I have to do something fast, or I’ll find myself out on the streets again, just like I was when I ran away from Petrus Tappester in Venice.
Neither of us speaks the rest of the way back to the hospice. The leaden skies seem to settle themselves around my heart.
Alice looks at us sharply when we come into the kitchen. We were away too long, and we both know it. But when she takes the jar of spice from Constance and sniffs it, her expression lightens. “This is very high quality,” she says, sniffing again. “How did you get this much? How di
d you pay for it all?”
“You gave me the money,” Constance says.
“You got all this for the coin I gave you?”
“No.” Constance gestures toward me. “But Johanna did.”
“Did she, now?” Alice gives me an appraising look, then takes the spice with her to her chopping board, closing her eyes and breathing in its scent again before she puts it away. She turns to see us watching her. “Those pots didn’t clean themselves while you were gone,” she says, but I can tell she’s pleased.
I smile at Constance as we turn toward our tasks.
after Mass the next morning, I run back to the dormitory to drop off my cloak before I head to the kitchen. Just as I’m about to go through the kitchen door, I hear Alice’s voice.
“She knows her way around a kitchen.”
I stop to listen, my heart pounding. Has the new girl finally shown up?
“Did everything I asked, did it fast, and never complained.”
When did all this happen? The new girl wasn’t there when I went to bed last night, and it’s too early for her to have been here today. Then I remember yesterday’s trip to the market, and I kick myself for how long Constance and I took.
Someone else is speaking now. “She does have a mistress, doesn’t she, though, who will be looking for her?” It’s Father Morgan.
“A mistress?” Alice harrumphs. “Begging your pardon, Father, but what kind of mistress leaves a young girl alone like that in a foreign place?”
Realization dawns on me. It isn’t the new girl they’re talking about. It’s me.
“Is that what her mistress says happened, then, Alice?” Father Morgan’s voice is grave.
I hold my breath, listening.
“Haven’t ever seen the woman, have I? But I believe the girl.”
“So do I, Alice, so do I. But if she’s bound to someone else …” His words trail off.
“Someone who’s left her alone these past weeks,” Alice adds.
The Book of the Maidservant Page 14