by Ann Turnbull
The town was quiet, this being Sunday, and our horses’ hooves rang on the cobbles. My father’s house is on the corner of High Street and Butcher’s Row, in the centre of town, with shops on either side. Ned and I dismounted and walked through the gateway that leads to the courtyard; he took my horse from me and led the two of them towards the stables.
I saw the door of the house open. My sister darted out, yellow skirts caught up in one hand, her face bright. Beside her came our little dog, Milly, barking and wagging her tail.
“Anne!” I called.
She scooped up the dog and hugged me with the animal in her arms. Milly squirmed and licked my chin. Anne giggled. “She’s missed you.”
“And have you?”
She put on a teasing face. “Sometimes.”
Now my father was at the door. I took off my hat and bowed to him.
“Will!” He came forward and threw his arms around me. “You are taller. You’ve outstripped me!”
It was true; and I’d always thought him tall. I noticed, too, that he was greyer, and a little stooped. It made me feel protective, and as I returned his hug I thought: I must fulfil all his hopes; I must not disappoint him.
Susanna
I could not settle in Meeting. Sometimes everyone enters into the silence and is still and centred. Then the meeting is full gathered, and I have felt its power. More often I feel it gathering around me but have to struggle with my own wandering mind.
That day my mind was all astir. I thought about finding work, who we might ask, what they might say. And there was something else. When I closed my eyes I saw the face of the young man we had met on the road. It was wrong, I knew, to think of such things in Meeting. I tried to clear my mind. I opened my eyes and focused on the reddened, chapped hands of Martha Streetley as they lay clasped on her apron. The apron was made of unbleached linen, and I studied its weave, noting the pleasing unevenness, the changes of colour from beige to greenish to brown, the crumpling where she had wiped her hands on it. But that only led me on to thinking of my father, and the loss of his loom, and so back to thoughts of leaving home.
After the meeting we found that most people already knew of our trouble. Gervase Prior, who farms sixty acres at Stanton, said he would try to buy the loom and bed and give them back to us. John Davies had brought a cockerel with him to replace ours. Alice Randall offered a spare bed if needed – “A frame and posts only, but thou could make hangings for it, Bess.”
My mother was in tears at their goodness, but I know she would do the same. We all help one another and pray for each other. When John Davies was moved to stand up during Meeting and speak of “our friend Robert Thorn who lies in prison at Brentbridge”, I felt the power of the Lord and the love of Friends upholding us.
“Susanna wants to go to Hemsbury to work,” my mother said – and at once there was discussion. I found all eyes turned on me and felt hot and nervous. Isaac and Deb and I were the only children of Eaton Bellamy Meeting; we’d often wished for less adult attention and more young company.
Hemsbury Meeting will be bigger, I thought; there will be more young ones.
And then someone said, “Mary Faulkner might take her on,” and I looked up, eager to hear more.
“Mary is a Friend of Truth,” Gervase Prior told us, “a good woman, though she has a proud, high spirit. She runs a bookshop and stationer’s in Hemsbury, and there is a printer’s workshop attached. Printing was her husband’s trade and she has taken it over.”
It seemed that Mary had had a maidservant who had been unsuitable; she might be looking for another girl. Martha Streetley was going to Hemsbury and would make enquiries.
So it was to happen, as I had wished. I felt excited and a little fearful. I wondered why the previous maid had been unsuitable, and whether I would be any better. And books? I was a country girl, a dairymaid. I had not seen many books. Like most people, my parents owned only a Bible and the Book of Martyrs. These I had learned to read, but I did not read as well as Isaac, who had spent time at school.
“I should like to see the books,” said Isaac, as we walked home. “At school the master used to read to us sometimes from a book of fables. There were pictures of animals, and folk fighting and dancing.”
“There is much idleness in books,” my mother said. “Susanna must be guided by Mary Faulkner on what to read, if she goes there.”
Isaac and I exchanged a smile behind her back. Our mother was a great enemy of idleness, by which she meant not only a waste of time but temptation to sin. Fighting, we knew, was a sin. Our father would never take up arms to fight. And dancing, too, often led to sin, or so we were told; it was not something we had ever learned to do. There had not been so much of it when we were little, in Oliver Cromwell’s time. Maypoles, tree and well dressing, even Christmas, had been banned by the Puritan Parliament in those years. But in 1660, when I was thirteen, we had a king again, and everything changed. On May Day that year a great maypole was raised in the village, and a bonfire lit, and folk danced till late into the summer night. Isaac and I went down to the green to watch. The sky darkened to deep blue, and the sparks from the bonfire flew up, and the fiddlers played tunes that made my feet want to dance. Suddenly people joined hands in one big circle, men and women and children all together. A woman with beer on her breath seized my hand and Isaac’s and drew us in.
“Everyone must dance this one,” she said. “Don’t be afraid. It’s easy.”
And we danced, Isaac and I. Most people were drunk by then, and it didn’t matter that the steps were strange to us at first. Soon I began to feel the rhythm of the dance and the joy of being part of the great circle. It broke up in laughter and clapping, and Isaac and I slipped away and ran home, full of guilty pleasure.
“We must go to Brentbridge,” my mother said now, “and ask thy father’s blessing on this venture of thine, Susanna.”
“Yes,” I said, but I felt a shiver of unwillingness. I hated prison visits.
We went on fifth-day.
It’s a day’s walk there and back; too far for Deb, so Isaac was left at home to mind her, and my mother and I went alone.
It was damp weather, with squalls of rain in the wind, and the road was muddy and full of ruts. We kicked up mud as we walked and the backs of our skirts were soon spattered with it. When we could, we cut across fields. The way took us not far from Eaton Bellamy, and I thought again of the young man in the fine black hat, and wondered whether he’d been bound for Hemsbury, and whether he lived there. I could not tell from his accent, for he spoke like a scholar. He’d be at ease around Mary Faulkner’s books, I thought.
“Art thou dreaming, Su?” my mother asked, and I gave a guilty start and said, “’Tisn’t far now, surely?”
“Four miles or so.”
She strode easily, carrying a pack over her shoulders. I had another. We had brought food – bread, cheese and home-baked pies – and a clean linen shirt, a collar, stockings and a blanket. Also some money, for prisoners must pay the jailer for food and beer and all their needs.
My mother had spent years like this, visiting prisons, or shut within them herself. I looked at her: small and strong, with a square chin and wide-set blue eyes. Her hair was still dark, for she is some ten years younger than my father.
Does she ever feel fear as I do? I wondered. Does her faith always uphold her?
Brentbridge Castle is a ruin, blown up in the Civil War sixteen years ago. Only the tower remains now, leaning at a dangerous angle. The prison is close by, in a place that was once a barracks.
As soon as we drew near I began to be afraid. In the yard stood a stocks and a whipping post. The yard was churned with mud and the rain beat down heavily. My mother led me to the entrance and spoke through a grille to a man who let us in and barred the door behind us.
The stench of the prison rose up.
I think this smell is not only filth – blood and excrement and decay – but is the smell of fear, of generations of people abandon
ed without hope of release. It never fails to terrify me.
The jailer – a mean-faced fellow in a greasy jacket – looked through our packs and found no concealed weapons. He led us down steps to a lower level. On the way we passed doors with grilles in them, and through one I saw a man sitting, unshaven and pale, with a book open on a table beside him. These were the cells for those who could afford to pay the jailer. They had chairs and beds.
The basement level was cold and slippery underfoot. We heard a clamour of voices. The jailer let us in, and I became aware of a crowd of people before the door slammed behind us and the stench overcame all other sensation.
I tried not to breathe, fearing sickness. As well as prisoners, there were visitors in the room: a woman with a little boy and a screaming baby that she dandled on one arm; an old woman who rounded on the jailer and began to screech at him about her son’s condition. Among this noisy throng I saw my father. The tears came up, choking me, and spilled down my face. I ran and threw my arms around him.
“Susanna,” he said. His stubbly chin scratched my face as he kissed me, and I had to fight an urge to pull away because he smelled different: a prison smell; unhealthy. “Bless thee, child. And thee, wife.” He reached out to my mother.
I delved in my pack, relieved to draw back from his smell. “We brought thee a blanket, Dad. But where…?”
I looked around the cell. There were perhaps a dozen prisoners, men and women crowded together, and only two benches, enough for three or four people to sleep on; for the rest, there was straw piled against the walls. In one corner was a bucket which served as a chamberpot.
“Most of us sleep on the floor,” my father said.
He looked pale, with dark circles under his eyes. His linen was grimy and I was glad we had brought a clean shirt and could take the other home to wash.
“They have taken thy loom,” my mother said.
“I know. John Davies told me.” He smiled. “I have been much visited by Friends from round about. Don’t fear, Bess. The Lord will provide.”
This seemed the time to tell him of my plans. He gave his blessing; said I was old enough to leave home and that there were Friends in Hemsbury to watch over me.
I looked around at the people crammed into the cell; not chained felons but ordinary folk – debtors, probably, or petty thieves.
“How long will they keep thee here?” I asked, and heard a tremor in my voice.
But he didn’t know. He was calm and accepting as ever. He is a small man, slight of build, with a quiet voice; yet he has a strength that commands attention, and I knew he would endure for as long as was needful.
He gazed around at his companions.
“We wait on the Lord, and pray,” he said. “Already several here are convinced.”
At this a man near by broke in to tell us how my father had brought him to the truth.
We gave my father the food we had brought, knowing that he would share it with his cell-mates. And I thought: If they want to be rid of Quakers, as they call us, this is not the way to do it.
“There may be many more joining us here before long,” he said, “when they bring in the new act. And it will go through, London Friends say, in the summer.”
My mother looked agitated. “I can’t believe it will happen! What harm do we do? How can they forbid us to meet?”
He shook his head. “This Parliament is against us. There’s trouble to come. Be sure of that.”
As we walked home, I thought about what my father had said. I knew little of government and Parliament – it was a faraway thing in London. But I had begun to realize that this Parliament – the Cavalier Parliament, folk called it – which had come in last year, was even more opposed to people like us than the Puritan Parliaments had been.
“Whenever there is unrest,” my mother said, “they seek to blame us for it.”
“Why?”
“Our beliefs. They fear our ideas because we say the light is in every man and every woman, and we see all equal to one another.”
So they will persecute us, I thought. And I wondered what it would be like to live an ordinary life, such as most people live: people who never go to prison; who live their whole lives without ever being beaten, or whipped, or fined; who don’t have to find courage to endure, year after year.
My parents had that courage. They lived in the power of the Lord. But did I? I feared that I could not live up to them, that when the test came I would fail.
William
It was good to be home. When my father remarried, a year after my mother’s death, Anne and I feared that everything would change, and the house be refurbished; but our stepmother is a woman of our father’s age, and did not rush to change things. Now, as she came out and kissed me and led me inside, I saw that the house looked much as it always had: well furnished but homely, the hangings a little faded, the cushions scratched by cats. A great fire blazed in the hearth and I could smell beef roasting.
But my father’s business had prospered, and money had been spent. He is a wool merchant and a man of standing in the town. I noticed a portrait of him on the wall, done in oils, and he showed me the artist’s sketches for a family group which was to include me.
“We must have your likeness put in, now you are home,” he said.
I had been hearing for months of the sittings for these portraits.
Anne showed me another new possession.
“See! Mother has persuaded Father to buy it!”
A virginal stood at the end of the drawing room, in a window bay. I stepped eagerly across to it. Its polished dark wood gleamed and felt like satin under my hands. I opened the lid and saw that the keys were new and white. I tried them; played a snippet of “Bonny Sweet Robin”.
“More!” exclaimed Anne. “Oh, sit down, Will, please, and play for us! We can sing ‘The Fair Maid of London’ to that tune. Mother has the words.”
“My fingers are stiff.” I blew on them and rubbed my hands together.
“Have mercy, child,” said our stepmother. “Let your brother get warm and take a sip of wine after his journey.”
But I was already seated and playing. I love nothing better, and the instrument was a joy. My stepmother produced the song-sheet, and I soon had them all singing with me.
We finished, laughing, and Anne said, “Oh, I wish I could play like you! My playing is all clunk, clunk. But, Will, I am having dancing lessons! Mr Kirkpatrick comes every Wednesday to teach me.”
She took a few mincing steps, holding the hand of an imaginary partner, curtseyed and turned.
Our stepmother became firm. “Anne, sit down and do not be so unmannerly.”
Meriel came in then with mulled wine and pastries, and set them on a table by the fire. I smiled at Anne as she sat, upright and chastened, on her chair. She was only thirteen, although expected to behave like a lady.
Both she and our stepmother were quiet while my father and I talked.
“Mr Grace sends excellent report of you,” he said.
“I enjoyed the scholar’s life.” I told him about my studies: Latin, Greek, philosophy, mathematics, science. It was what he most wanted to hear about: his investment. For although he’d laid money aside for Anne’s dowry, I was the one he had set on a rising course: his eldest child, his only son. He had spared nothing for my education.
He leaned towards me now, enthusiasm in his face. “Will, there’s a chance for you in London. You remember Nicholas Barron, the silk merchant? He is removing to London and will be looking for an apprentice later in the year. He thinks well of what he has heard of you and wants to meet you.”
“London?” This was what I wanted, to work in London.
“Yes. I’d be sorry to let you go so far, of course – but it’s an opportunity. Barron has done well for himself; he has connections in Bruges, Antwerp and Venice. You’d be able to travel. The bond would cost me eight hundred pounds, but it could set you up in a fine way of business…”
I was not thinkin
g of business. I was imagining Venice.
I smiled, and he said, “I see the idea pleases you. And we’d have some months together before you went. What do you say?”
“I’d like to meet Mr Barron.”
He reached over and seized my hand. “You’ll like him, Will. He’s a good master. And it’d be an excellent connection for us.”
My father always seeks connections. He is an alderman of the town and had launched into his civic duties with the same enthusiasm he applied to everything. He soon began telling me about them.
“The riff-raff society produces!” he said. “You wouldn’t believe it, Will: the idleness, thievery, drunkenness…”
“Oh, I would, Father,” I said, and laughed. “Oxford is worse than Hemsbury.”
“And do they get the fanatics too? I was in court the other day, and saw a fellow up before Justice Parkes. The man was a Ranter, or Quaker, or some such; accused of causing an affray in church—”
“In church?”
“Yes! They go there on purpose to cause trouble – challenge the priest, interrupt the sermon. Arrogant fellow, this one! Kept his hat on in court. Refused to take it off. Stood there in his hat, answering the judge back, and theeing and thouing him as if they were equals! The usher snatched his hat off him, the fellow took it back – a most unseemly tug-of-war.”
“And what happened to him?” I was not really interested in the man. At the mention of Quakers an image had come into my mind of the girl I had met that morning.
“Oh, he was found guilty; fined. But he won’t pay, you know. He’ll lie in jail; make a martyr of himself. That’s what these people do. There are too many of them about. They meet at the Seven Stars in Cross Street, and other places around. But Parliament is to bring out a new law against them in the next session.”
That evening, unpacking in my bedroom, I was at last alone with my thoughts. The excitability and chatter of both father and sister had run over me all afternoon; my stepmother had fussed; and the servants had been set to airing sheets and heating a warming-pan for the bed. Meriel had brought hot water and scented soap to my room. And Joan, in the kitchen, had remembered that I love gingerbread and had made some specially.