The boy said nothing, but shifted on the stool. Clearly the thing had been well made because it did not so much as squeak. The wooden legs were exquisitely carved with mice and field birds and the golden seat had been perfectly woven. Surely a peasant farmer could not afford such a quality piece.
Then he understood.
‘Did your sister make that?’
The boy grinned. ‘For me.’
‘How much do you want for it?’
The boy thought hard. ‘A penny.’
Barnaby guffawed and when Naomi emerged a moment later he told her how cheaply her labour of love had been lost.
‘Oh it wasn’t all my work,’ she said, blushing. ‘Father turned the wood for me. Here are some other things.’
She had brought an armful of baskets: some large enough to carry a week’s worth of logs, others small and woven tightly enough to hold the most delicate of trinkets. There was not a single reed or stake of wicker out of place and in the centre of each base was a perfectly symmetrical five-pointed star.
‘Why are you a maid exactly?’ he said finally.
She smiled and shrugged. ‘The wicker is too time consuming to gather in sufficient quantities and too expensive to buy. I do it for pleasure.’
‘This is pleasurable? Doesn’t it hurt your fingers?’
She held up her hands. ‘They are not so delicate.’
It was true. Her fingers were stubby, the nails bitten to the quick, and the backs criss-crossed with scars.
‘Now let me see yours.’
He glanced down at them then dug them into his pockets. There was no way she was going to see how shamefully soft and white they were.
‘I think Father would be interested in these,’ he said to change the subject.
‘I couldn’t produce them in enough quantities.’
‘You could have help. What about your brother?’
‘Benjamin? He’s five. His fingers are soft as bulrushes.’
The boy had wandered off but glanced up at the mention of his name.
‘We may be poor,’ she went on, ‘But we are not so desperate that we would cripple our children.’
Barnaby flushed. ‘I did not mean . . .’
‘Perhaps you could assist me?’ He was relieved to see that she was smiling again. ‘Or are your fingers too soft?’
It seemed simple enough at the beginning. Naomi gave him a handful of sticks and a bodkin then showed him how to split them down the middle. He only wrecked a few and soon had enough to push the others through to make a cross shape, securing it with some fine, thread-like shoots.
He paused to smile smugly at her before starting on the spokes.
Here it all went wrong. The spokes would not stay an even distance from one another and kept bunching together; the thread snapped and had to be knotted to another length, which also snapped. She tried to help but he slapped her hand away and started weaving the willow strands in and out of the higgledy-piggledy spokes, fully aware that the basket was already doomed. But he was too clumsy and the jagged end of one of the spokes dug into his belly.
The sight of the blood soaking into the waistband of his breeches made him feel faint. He closed his eyes and leaned back against the wall. Mistress Waters cried from the house, ‘What’s happened? Oh goodness, is he hurt?’
‘I’m alright,’ he murmured. ‘Honestly.’
‘Benjamin!’ Naomi cried. ‘Go and get some cobwebs from the wood shed.’
When the scampering footsteps returned, she wiped the wound gently with some damp material and pressed the soft gauze over the cut.
‘There,’ she said. ‘It will be healed by tomorrow.’
He opened an eye. The cut was now covered in grey webbing and had started to itch already – a sure sign of healing.
‘And wasn’t it all worthwhile?’ she said, holding up the wretchedly deformed basketwork.
He snatched it from her. ‘It’s mine and I shall finish it, or you will only berate me for giving up.’
More cack-handedly than ever he began thrusting the stalks through the yawning cracks in the weave.
‘It would be perfect to hold something large,’ she said. ‘A pumpkin, perhaps.’
‘Quiet. You’re distracting me.’
‘Benjamin!’ she cried. ‘Come and watch the master at work!’
A moment later the boy was peering over his shoulder, laughing as hard as his sister.
A shout from over by the lake made them all look up.
Squinting into the low sun, Barnaby could make out three figures silhouetted against the glittering water.
‘Your father has finally given up on your merchant’s career, then?’ a voice called.
It was Richard. His tone was gently teasing rather than the usual jeer, but Barnaby thrust away the basket and stood up.
‘My maid was showing me some peasant crafts,’ he called back. ‘But I’ve had my fill of it if you are heading anywhere in particular.’
‘Only to Griff’s,’ Richard answered. ‘It’s my aunt’s birthday. There will be chicken and lamb and plum cake if the last one was anything to go by.’
‘Excellent,’ he said and, without looking back, went to join his friends.
‘The sun has burned your face, Barnaby,’ Richard said. ‘You should be careful. The girls will not find you so handsome with a blistered nose.’
‘My blistered nose will be infinitely more handsome than your great lump of dough,’ he said with a grin, but he didn’t feel like grinning.
He felt as low as a mongrel dog as he walked down the slope and away from the little crooked cottage. A stone whizzed passed his ear and a moment later he heard Naomi speak sharply, followed by a slap and the sound of Benjamin crying. He whistled to drown out it out.
He’d nothing to reproach himself for, Barnaby told himself later. Naomi was his maid, not his equal, and he had been perfectly courteous all day, had taken all the teasing about his basket in good humour, and had not even made her return to the house with him. Plus he had saved her from a fate worse than death – preparing Abel’s bath. The girl had had an entire day off for heaven’s sake!
And yet he couldn’t shake the feeling that he had behaved badly.
When he got back that evening, full of devilled lamb kidneys and apple cake, all he wanted was a drink and his bed, but catching a glimpse of Naomi in the kitchen he decided to forgo the drink and went straight upstairs.
He was awoken next morning by a knock at the door. It was his mother.
‘Have you see Abel’s silver crucifix?’ she said. ‘He can’t find it and is beside himself with worry.’
‘No,’ he said and turned over.
When he next awoke someone had filled his ewer with warm water and lavender and a bowl of cherries stood on his side table. He really hoped it had been Juliet. Peeling off the cobweb dressing in order to wash, he found that the wound had closed completely, leaving just a small red scar in the shape of a crescent moon. He remembered that Agnes had always said cobwebs had magical properties, but perhaps they were just sticky enough to keep cuts closed. Somehow he couldn’t imagine Naomi believing in the supernatural abilities of a house spider.
The crucifix was still not found by the time he went downstairs and Abel was too distressed to leave his room.
Barnaby stepped over Juliet, who was on her hands and knees looking under the dresser, and sat down at the table.
He had no desire to help look for the necklace, which had been given to Abel on his last birthday, wrapped in a lawn shirt whose lace collar and cuffs had been painstakingly worked by Frances. Abel had dismissed it as showy and vulgar. That same year Barnaby had been given a florin to buy whatever he liked from Grimston market.
Naomi brought out some warm rolls and butter.
‘Good morning, Master Barnaby,’ she said evenly.
‘Good morning,’ he said, focusing his attention on splitting the roll.
‘Naomi!’ Juliet called from the floor. ‘Your arms are longer than mine: is that
something right at the back by the wall?’
Naomi got to her hands and knees beside Juliet.
‘I think it’s just a butt—’ she began, but then something slipped from her apron pocket to clink on the flagstones.
Barnaby saw the bewildered look that passed between the girls before Naomi got up and announced that the crucifix had been found.
She had barely spoken before Abel emerged onto the landing.
‘Ah,’ he said. ‘Where was it?’
Naomi swallowed and looked at Juliet.
‘Under the dres—’ Juliet began, but Naomi spoke over her, directing her words to Frances. ‘It was in my apron pocket, Mistress. I don’t know how.’
Abel gave a little gasp but Frances just frowned. ‘How odd. Well, I think we’re done, girls, if you could clear the table.’
‘Odd indeed,’ Abel said, coming down the stairs. ‘How could it have got there?’
Naomi blinked rapidly, as if the sun was in her eyes.
‘It might have fallen off your shelf, Master Abel,’ Juliet said evenly. ‘While Naomi was polishing the floor.’
Abel gave a derisive snort. ‘That seems unlikely, don’t you agree, Mother?’
‘The important thing is that the chain was found,’ Frances said with a strained smile. ‘So get about your work, girls.’
With simultaneous Yes’ms Juliet and Naomi hurried to the kitchen.
That morning Barnaby was to have an introduction to the accounting ledger. A local man clerked for his father but Henry insisted that it was vital for a merchant to understand his own business and they duly traipsed over to the clerk’s cottage which was, fortuitously, right around the corner from the Boar.
Barnaby nodded and mmmd as the clerk explained each column and row, the concepts of profit and loss and cash flow, and the necessity of obtaining receipts for all moneys paid and goods received. He tried to concentrate but his mind kept wandering to the brownish stain near the gutter of the ledger and wondering whether it was gravy or blood. The cut on his belly tingled and he thought how much he would prefer to be outside on that sunny pew again, using his hands to make something solidly useful, rather than his brain, which seemed to him as if it must be made of cold porridge. It was a mystery to him (and, he suspected, his parents) how a woman of his mother’s education and a man with his father’s natural quickness with figures could produce such a dolt of a son.
It was a great relief when they retired to the Boar and spent a pleasant hour or two drinking beer and listening to the barmaids gossiping about a witch coven that had just been uncovered in Stalyridge, a village a few miles away. The witches had all been taken to Grimston for trial and would certainly hang. Barnaby wondered if their names had been on the list in the forest.
The following week a merchant colleague of his father visited the house. Barnaby made sure he was breakfasted and out of the way well before the man’s arrival, in case he was asked his opinion on anything business-related.
He sat on the back step sharpening his hunting knives while Juliet washed the linen and Naomi churned butter. Mid-morning Juliet announced she had forgotten to pick up some lace she needed to repair one of Henry’s collars and would pop into the village.
For some reason, when she left the atmosphere in the back yard changed. Barnaby’s hands became clumsy and once or twice he nearly cut himself. For her part Naomi seemed to have forgotten how to use the churn and kept jerking the staff too hard so that the lid clattered up and down, frightening the chickens.
Having chattered happily away to one another all morning the conversation dried up and all Barnaby’s attempts to restart it sounded, to his ear, either terminally dull or stupid. Once he said that a cloud drifting past the church spire looked like a rabbit’s tail and then blushed furiously: all clouds looked like rabbits’ tails. Fortunately Naomi just said, ‘Hmm,’ as if she hadn’t really been listening.
It was a great relief to him, and perhaps also to Naomi by the way she leaped for the gate, when the Widow Moone came begging.
Soon the widow was enjoying a tankard of small beer and a large slice of pie at the kitchen table. The sun was now high in the sky and the way it flashed off the blades gave Barnaby a headache so he put away his rabbit-skinning knife, half done, and followed them into the kitchen. After helping himself to the pie, and pouring himself some of the better beer from the pantry, he sat down at the table opposite the widow. But watching, and listening to her eat, took away all his appetite.
She bolted the food like a starved dog, packing her mouth so full she could barely close it as she choked down huge hunks of pastry and meat.
‘Slow down, Mistress,’ Naomi said. ‘There is plenty more.’
Barnaby fixed her with a disapproving glance – it was their pie, after all – but she turned back to the sink without glancing at him.
After the pie Naomi offered the widow some rhubarb crumble with the fresh cream from her own father’s cows. Barnaby was about to protest about the cream, which he liked a great deal, when Abel came in. Crossing the threshold he came to an abrupt halt and drew in his breath.
‘What is this creature doing in our house?’ he demanded.
Naomi opened her mouth to reply but Barnaby spoke over her.
‘We are giving alms to the poor, brother,’ he said evenly. ‘As the Bible commends us to.’
Abel ignored him and turned on Naomi. ‘This woman is a witch!’ he hissed back. ‘Get her out!’
Naomi appeared not to hear him and stayed where she was, stirring ale over the fire.
Juliet entered through the back door, humming to herself. She stopped humming and visibly paled when she saw the Widow Moone at the table, slurping the thick yellow cream through her gappy teeth. After rapidly crossing herself Juliet curtsied and greeted the widow politely.
The widow did not reply: all her attention was focused on the finger she was using to wipe every last smear of cream from the side of the empty bowl.
‘Juliet!’ Abel hissed. ‘Eject this woman from the house immediately!’
Juliet shook her head and breathed, ‘Not I, Master Abel, I would not provoke her ire for anything, and you may have me beaten for it if you wish.’
Abel looked ready to snatch up the rolling pin there and then and take her up on her suggestion but instead he gritted his teeth and walked right up to the table.
‘Depart, woman,’ he declared. ‘You have had your fill.’
The widow squinted up at him with one milky eye.
‘Ah,’ she said. ‘’Tis the Nightingale Runt.’
Abel’s mouth open and closed. The widow leaned back in the chair.
‘Instead of turfing me onto the streets, Runt,’ she continued, making Abel wince, ‘ye should be falling at my feet in gratitude.’
‘Do not call him that, Mistress,’ Naomi said quietly, ‘Gather your belongings now: it’s time you were off.’
The widow said nothing, only fixed her eyes on Abel, who had turned pale.
‘Begone,’ he managed finally, but his thin voice was drowned out by the simmering of the ale.
The widow rose from the table. Her skirts were as threadbare as fallen leaves in winter: no more than a filigree of brown lace. From her shawl hung strange trinkets: the skull of a mouse, a mermaid’s purse with its curled horns woven into the wool, a desiccated sea horse, a hank of yellow hair plaited with red ribbon.
As she advanced around the table, Abel shrank back but seemed unable to unstick his feet from the flagstones. She passed Barnaby’s chair and he was struck by foetid smells he couldn’t recognise. His back felt wide and vulnerable as she moved behind him.
Juliet gasped as the widow took Abel by the shoulders and smiled into his fearful eyes.
‘G . . . get your f . . . filthy hands off me,’ he stuttered through stiff, white lips.
But the widow merely raised her hands to his cheeks and held his face.
‘These filthy hands,’ she said, her accent almost too strong to understand, ‘
eased your poor twisted guts, stopped you shitting green slime, and prevented your father from leaving you upon yon midden heap.’
Abel stared at her.
‘’Tis true,’ she chuckled. ‘He woulda sent you the way of t’other one were it not fer your poor ma, comin’ to me in a lather askin’ if I might find a way to bring you some comfort afore all the villagers ganged together to throw you in the lake.
‘“Not that Nightingale Runt screechin’ again!” they’d shout when you passed, hollering your guts out. Yer father could barely stand to be in the same room as you. He used to go out with that pretty brother of yours all day and only come back when you’d cried yourself out and your poor mother was dead with exhaustion from rockin’ and nursin’ you.’
The bubbling of the ale grew louder and wisps of stream drifted from the pot to curl around the widow’s wild hair.
‘Lying bitch,’ Abel whispered.
‘Careful, Runt,’ she said quietly. ‘Or maybe I’ll see fit to bring back them there gut twisters.’
Her hand made a sharp movement up by his hairline. Abel cried out and jerked his head free.
‘There,’ she said, holding up to the light the single dark hair she had plucked from his scalp. ‘’Tis all I need.’
For a moment everyone was still and silent. Barnaby could see Abel’s heart throbbing beneath his thin shirt.
Then, with a laugh, she tossed the hair into the air. It danced for a moment in the updraughts from the fire, then drifted invisibly down onto the flagstones.
The widow turned back to Abel and grasped his shoulder once more, this time giving it a little shake.
‘Be not so grave, Master Nightingale,’ she said lightly. ‘I were only a’teasin’ you! Sally Moone’s always been your friend, boy. Whatever your father and them others said, I knew there were nothin’ wronger about you than there were about the last one.’
With that she patted his cheek, gathered up her meagre belongings and walked back out into the summer’s afternoon. Halfway up the path a crow bobbed up to her and she spoke quietly to it before letting herself out of the gate and vanishing behind the wall.
The sudden hiss and billow of smoke made all of them cry out. The ale had boiled dry.
The Blood List Page 9