The Curious Tale of the Lady Caraboo (15 page)

Caraboo soon regretted this last action, as she was fairly dying to see how the portrait looked. It was a vanity, but she could not imagine any living soul, now or in the future, wanting to paint Mary Willcox of Witheridge, Devon.

And in any case she longed to stretch her legs and get out of the house, even if only for a moment. So she ran across the lawn and down to the lake. She turned for a moment to glance back at the house: Captain Palmer was looking out of the window, plain as day, a ship's glass trained upon her and following her each and every step.

At least if he was in the house he could not be on the island. She made her way to the lakeside and pushed the rowing boat away from the shore. He could not follow her now. She reminded herself that Caraboo was still a princess – she had known it all along, well before he came along with his overblown story of kidnap and pirates. He might have her cornered, but she had to maintain her dignity. At least Captain Palmer didn't know about Mary Willcox, had never so much as heard of her. She held that truth close as she struck out through the water.

But when she stepped onto the island, she knew she was not alone. The path through to her fireplace and altar had been trodden down. Cassandra? No, Caraboo didn't think she could swim. Fred, then? Of course.

She wished she had the kriss on her, but settled for a sharp stick, then made her way as stealthily as she could towards the clearing. Caraboo had wanted to be alone – this was her island, her place . . . except that of course it wasn't. She calmed down. Nothing real belonged to Princess Caraboo.

She shinned up a tree and watched him for a while: he was only half dressed, his wet shirt hanging over a branch as he desperately tried to light a fire. How did the ruling class get to rule when they were all, to a man and woman, so inept?

He cursed, and she had to stifle a laugh. Then he got up and threw his tinderbox on the ground with enough curses to turn the air blue.

Caraboo jumped down, stick raised like a spear, yelling all kinds of Javasu oaths, and Fred Worrall, shocked and stunned, stumbled back into the ashes of the fire, and fell on his backside.

Good
, she thought, and stood over him with her spear. He shouldn't be here.

He shuffled backwards. ‘Princess! Caraboo, listen! I'm not here to intimidate you.'

Caraboo did not understand ‘intimidate'.

‘I know about the captain – I know he's put you up to something and I just don't know what it is. Believe me, I want to help.'

Caraboo was wrong-footed. Her heart thumped. What did he know? What had the captain said? She turned away, put down her stick and lit the fire in moments. She sat in front of it, trying to think.

‘I heard you last night, crying,' Fred told her.

She ignored him.

‘Then I saw you again this morning, and you avoided his eyes. Something happened.'

Caraboo blew at the embers, and the flames burned brighter. She looked at Fred, sitting across from her. He wanted to help. And didn't Caraboo need all the help she could get?

‘Captain no good,' she said.

‘Exactly!' Fred said. ‘That's it exactly, Caraboo. I believe you – I know he's crooked.'

‘Caraboo no crooked,' she said firmly.

‘No, I don't believe you are.'

She felt a wave of relief wash over her, and smiled at him. There was a twinge, a pang of something else – guilt, perhaps – but she was doing everyone a favour by leaving. And wouldn't she have left days ago now, if she'd had her way?

Fred had brought two fish wrapped in cloth, and she took them and cooked them in the ashes – enveloped in leaves, the way Mary Willcox had seen her father do one summer a long time ago in Devon.

‘Caraboo go,' she said as she turned them over. ‘Caraboo need go.'

Fred looked at her. ‘Perhaps. But wouldn't it be better if the captain went?'

Caraboo looked blank.

‘Captain go,' Fred said.

Caraboo looked scared. She stood up and backed away from the fire.

‘No, Princess, not with you!' Fred shook his head. ‘What I mean is, Caraboo stay, Captain go!'

‘Captain stay, Caraboo go,' she said.

‘Perhaps I can get the captain so completely drunk . . .' He mimed drinking and then falling over.

Caraboo shook her head. Rum was water to the captain. She made her fingers into a little person, called it Caraboo and made the finger-person climb onto a horse and gallop away. ‘Caraboo go – far.'

‘I wish you could talk to me, Caraboo,' Fred said. ‘I wish you wanted to stay.'

She turned away. Fred sighed. She didn't understand at all, he thought.

‘Fred help,' he said at last, leaning so close that she could feel his breath on her cheek. She looked at him, then bent down until her lips brushed his. The Princess felt herself melt into him. Thought of nothing but his touch, his fingertips tracing circles on her neck, his mouth on hers—

Up in the trees a magpie rasped out a call and the Princess Caraboo remembered who she was and leaped away.

She studied Fred: he was completely and utterly lost. She had done it! Her heart was galloping against her ribs – the Princess told herself that it meant nothing. No doubt Fred's beat all the faster.

She smiled.

When Caraboo returned to the house, Mr Barker, the artist, had gone. In the library, Mrs Worrall was reading, while Cassandra sewed and Captain Palmer nursed a glass of rum and looked daggers at her.

‘Oh, Princess, if you had seen your portrait!' Mrs Worrall beamed. ‘Mr Barker says he will work on it and you are to visit his studio in Bristol on Friday. Fancy that – a real artist's studio!'

Caraboo knew she was dripping on the marble floor, but this was almost too good to be true.
Bristol
, she thought. The city – this was her chance, served up to her on a plate. However, she kept her face blank. Mrs Worrall mimed an artist, and she smiled.

‘Yes, and we shall make a day of it,' Cassandra said. ‘Mama and I will visit the milliner's, and Captain Palmer says he will come along and translate!'

Mrs Worrall took Caraboo's hand. ‘Oh, you are so cold and wet, Princess; do warm yourself or you'll catch a chill.'

‘Oh yes, Mama, poor Caraboo – but we shall have such fun in the city! Perhaps Fred could come with us and we might show Caraboo some of the sights after Mr Barker has finished his work?'

‘A wonderful idea!'

Caraboo saluted and went upstairs to change. So the captain would be coming too. No matter. She could lose him in the city a thousand times over. She would only need a change of clothes, ordinary clothes, and she could vanish into the stew in a flash. And if any kind of diversion was needed, Fred would help. Hadn't he said so?

She lay back on her bed and took a deep breath. It would be all right after all.

Mr Barker's Studio
Bristol
May 1819

On the morning of the trip to Bristol, Fred had still not found a moment to talk to Caraboo. The whole household was up early. Mrs Worrall was in a flap about the lectures and dinner party this coming weekend, to which it seemed she had invited half the county. Lady Gresham and Edmund would be arriving for supper this evening, so they had to be back at Knole for six.

Mrs Worrall had arranged to borrow the Edgecombes' cook, who was expected to prepare the mountain of fancies necessary for such an enterprise. Mrs Bridgenorth was in a huff on account of it, and consequently the breakfast eggs were cold.

‘Bridgenorth!' Mrs Worrall complained. ‘Bring up some of the fruit preserves. I simply cannot abide cold boiled eggs!'

Fred smiled. ‘I'll have yours, Mama.'

‘And, Fred, you will be sure to meet us at lunch time, at your father's office?'

‘Of course, Mama.' He did not tell her that he planned to spend the morning in the Admiralty office or round the docks, hoping to dish up some dirt on Captain Palmer.

‘And if you are there before your sister and me, be polite – remember he only thinks of your future.'

‘Of course, Mama . . . but you know, I was thinking . . . I might do as Edmund plans, and take time for a tour. I am not sure about university.'

‘For Heaven's sake, Fred, do not mention such foolishness to Mr Worrall! A tour is out of the question! You have a place at Oxford waiting for you in the autumn. I will hear no more about it.'

Cassandra made a face at him across the table.

‘And, Cassandra, remember Edmund Gresham will be here tonight. I expect you to behave like a lady, not a street urchin.'

Captain Palmer stirred close to a dozen spoonfuls of sugar into his coffee. ‘Ah, now, Mrs Worrall,' he said, leaning back in his chair. ‘Lads Mr Fred's age – they have a natural sort of hankering after the world. I have seen it before, many times.'

‘Not in this family, Captain Palmer.' She smiled a tight smile and sipped her tea. ‘Fred is off to Oxford and that is that.'

Fred couldn't bear to look at Captain Palmer's smug face any longer and went up to his room to dress. It would always be the same. His life had been mapped out: school, university, the bank. He looked out of the window and saw that Vaughan was readying the coach in the stable yard. He felt trapped.

Cassandra kept Vaughan waiting while she changed her tippet twice. Caraboo, Fred noticed, was very quiet; she was dressed in her hunting outfit and turban and was still barefoot, even though Mrs Worrall had suggested sandals might be advisable for the city. She refused to take the kriss, but carried one of the kitchen knives tucked into her belt. Only Captain Palmer, who filled a hipflask full of rum in lieu of any food, seemed calm, Fred thought.

He waited until the coach had left the drive before he got the stable boy to saddle his bay mare. He could reach Bristol with hours to spare before lunch and he didn't have to rely on the road, rutted and hard as it was bound to be. He was bound to find something or other on Captain Palmer, and if he could get shot of the man, Fred thought, kicking the mare into a brisk trot, then Caraboo would see that he meant well. Since he couldn't talk to her, his actions would have to speak for themselves.

Princess Caraboo was grateful for the fact that the captain had no option but to sit outside with the driver. The thought of spending an hour pressed close to the man, as the carriage rocked and jolted into town, had kept her awake all night.

No, she told herself, it was not simply that. She had been planning how to take her leave – thinking of a million and one ways in which she might escape from under the captain's nose and lose herself in the city. She had no change of dress or shoes, her reasoning being that the captain might be less on his guard if she seemed entirely artless.

As they approached Bristol, Caraboo found her spirits lifting. She had been at Knole Park for two months and had quite forgotten about the world outside. They passed people on the road – pedlars, knife-sharpeners, fruit-sellers, then shops and workshops, wheelwrights and smiths, the smells of smoke and work and real life.

Mrs Worrall and Cassandra got out first: Mrs Worrall had a list as long as her arm of things she needed to buy for the party before she visited the milliner's. Caraboo sat up straight as Captain Palmer tipped his hat to the ladies and slid into the seat next to her. He leaned close – Caraboo reckoned if she'd had a light she could have ignited his breath, it was so completely and utterly malodorous.

‘We must make plans,' the captain said evenly. Caraboo said nothing; she tried to move away but he sat so close that she was pressed against the side of the carriage.

‘I know you understand me, Miss whoever you are – I tried my damnedest to warn you off that writing lark. Even all those professors old Ma Worrall writes to can't be as cotton-headed as Heyford. Our goose is cooked. Our clock is running down, do you see? I'd give it five days – thank the Lord for the party, then there'll be enough of those county nobs that one or two choice items going missing won't matter here or there.'

‘Caraboo no steal!' The Princess had never intended to take anything from the Worralls. She had only wanted a place to stay.

‘Too late, girlie,' the captain said. ‘My time is money. Then we can hightail it north and make ourselves a penny or two on the fairgrounds over the summer; they won't have heard of you up there.'

Caraboo looked daggers. ‘No,' she said. ‘No fairs! No stealing!'

‘Well, that's where we part company, lady. And that's where you're wrong.' He looked at her, grinning. ‘See, if you don't, I'll pin the thievery on you, and instead of a few months round the fairs you'll be spending your time locked up in the dark.'

Caraboo shut her eyes.
Worse and worse
, she thought.

‘Oh, I don't know why you're sulking, lady,' the captain went on. ‘I don't doubt that being Princess Caraboo is a lot easier than being whoever you really are, having that young gentleman follow you around, gawping at you like some lovesick dog.'

She hid her shock. Was it that obvious? What if someone else at Knole had noticed? Caraboo looked away, humming softly to herself. She didn't want to listen to Captain Palmer any more, especially when she knew that what he said was true.

‘I know you heard me, so there it is: keep your mouth shut and prattle all that trash for three more days till Mrs Worrall's guests go, then so will we.' The captain smiled, showing teeth that were deep brown, like rum; then put his hand upon her thigh.

She slapped it away immediately. He made her feel sick, but she had to keep her wits sharp today. She was trying to keep a map in her mind and work out the lay of the city, but she did not want Palmer to divine from her face that today was the last day on earth for the Princess Caraboo. After today, she prayed, she would never have to see Captain Palmer ever again.