At the Sign of the Star (5 page)

I was well-known among the booksellers at St. Paul's, but it took me long to find what I sought, for I was at first too shy to ask for it. Instead I lingered at first one stall and then another, chattering idly with the booksellers about pamphlets and broadsides newly printed. At length I would drive the conversation toward the publication of plays, and the names would come drifting down like snow: Dryden and Wycherley, Etherege and Otway. I had been over an hour at the bookstalls when Mr. Fletcher said: “And of course, we publish Mrs. Behn, but you are not interested in her.”

“My father spoke of her last week, and was wanting to read one of her plays, as a curiosity. Perhaps I may surprise him with it.”

In the end I took it away with me, and found a green place to sit in Lincoln's Inn Fields, in sight of the fashionable brick houses there. The play was called
The Rover,
and had been an amazing success at Dorset Gardens a month or so ago. I settled down to read it, and the afternoon wore on without my noticing, for it was a remarkable play. It was remarkable because it was so little different from a play writ by a man: it was as funny, as bawdy, as silly. And yet the fact that it was
not
by a man seemed to echo on every page, and filled me with wonder and anger and a secret sense of intention. For if a woman might think so like a man, and write so like a man … then why might not a woman give her views at table without apology?

4

“Did you see the wedding ring?” I asked Hester the next morning, while we were still abed. “It's covered in jewels.”

Hester shook her head. Her long hair danced on the pillow. “Wedding rings smack of popery, to my mind.”

“Oh, Hester, you're nearly a Puritan. I suppose you have refused the new dress my father bought you for the wedding?”

Hester smiled broadly, and a great dimple showed in her face. For all her bantering with me, she smiled but seldom. When she did, it made me feel happy, though I had promised myself to be nothing but surly on this, my father's wedding day.

“Nay, I'm grateful enough for a new gown,” Hester said. “And so are you, I vow.”

I was. My dress was red velvet with three-quarter sleeves, and the sleeves of the chemise I wore beneath fell in lovely white pleats. There were satin bows all over my clothing—on my shoulders and bodice and skirt. Even my shoes were new.

It was early yet when people began to gather at the house, all dressed in their finest silks and velvets. They laughed and drank and made coarse jokes and laughed some more. Though I had been determined not to be merry, before long I was merry in spite of myself, for I was teased and twirled and given gloves and ribbons and bride-knots to wear, and I could not help liking it.

Everyone was there. Neighbors like Mr. Grove and the five Mr. Turners. Authors like Mr. Coles and Mr. Andrews. Mr. Pennyman came with his wife. They were given ribbons to wear, and Mrs. Pennyman got exceedingly drunk. Mr. Barker was there. He clapped my father on the back, and said the best astrologers could make mistakes. Other booksellers came, including Mr. Fletcher, who had sold me Aphra Behn's play. I prayed he would not ask my father how he liked it. Even some of our favored customers came, such as old Mr. Bledsoe, who worked for the Navy. Paul Winter was there, too, though no one had invited him.

The Beckwith family was there, of course, and many friends with them, mostly other merchants in the City. Mr. Allington was a goldsmith, and Mr. Gosse was a vintner. Mr. Gosse brought his entire family, and they were many, both older and younger than I. There was a laughing girl who spent her whole time looking after the younger children, including a baby. I could not see what she had to laugh at. Her face was pitted from the smallpox and her dress was not as nice as mine. But then, everyone was laughing that day.

We all went to the church together, laughing our way through the streets, while a fiddler and a drummer led the way. There was so much merriment, indeed, that it was hard to grow sober for the ceremony. I sat near to old Mr. Bledsoe, who wanted to tickle me throughout, which I did not want. So I changed places with Hester, who frowned at him until he became sulky. By then the sermon on matrimony was nearly over.

And then came my last chance, for Reverend Little said solemnly: “If any man can show any just cause why they may not lawfully be joined together, let him now speak, or else hereafter forever hold his peace.”

I clasped my gloved hands together tightly and prayed to hear a voice ring out, but there was only giggling and snoring. So Reverend Little spoke on, and asked my father if he would take Susannah Beckwith to be his wife, “forsaking all other,” and my father said he would. Then came the ring, which my father put on the fourth finger of her left hand, for there is a vein there that runs straight to the heart, they say. And at last he said: “With this ring I thee wed, with my body I thee worship, and with all my worldly goods I thee endow.”

Those worldly goods were supposed to be mine.

Then we all went home again. Someone broke a cake over Susannah's head when she went through the door, as is the custom, but I wished it were a brick instead.

Next came the feast. The wedding dinner had been ordered from a cookshop, and was carried through the streets in a grand procession to our house. On the table were platters of asparagus, buttered shrimps, roast pigeon, a side of lamb, a lamprey pie, a turkey stuffed with cloves, grapes boiled in butter and served with bread and sugar, three kinds of tart, and ever so much more. I think I never saw so much food before, nor ate so much. The merrier my father grew, the more I put into my mouth, as if to keep my angry tongue from trouble. At last I felt full to bursting, and climbed behind the sideboard in the large parlor, where I leaned against the leather wall-hanging and sat with my eyes closed and my hand on my belly. It was well I did for soon they all began to play kissing games. Everyone laughed and clapped when my father took his bride in his arms and kissed her lustfully, and then others began to do the like. I heard Mr. Bledsoe saying, “Where's the little one? Where's the girl?” and I was glad I had hid myself. A bit later I heard Hester saying, “La, what are you thinking of?” I peeped out, and saw Mr. Fletcher kissing her and pulling at her laces, so I ducked down again.

At last I dozed, even amid so much noise. I dreamed that my mother was looking for me, saying in a voice filled with yearning, “Where is my daughter? Where is my daughter?” I tried to answer her but I could not, for my tongue had a bride-ribbon tied around it. It had been put there so that I might stay a modest girl and not talk too freely. I woke to a great shout and cries of “The posset! The posset!”

Then I came out, and saw my father and his bride given the posset to drink, which was made of wine, milk, egg-yolks, cinnamon, sugar, and nutmeg. It was supposed to fortify them for the night to come. Then we all trooped upstairs. A brideman pulled off Susannah's garters and fastened them to his hat. My father's men took him aside to undress him, and the bridesmaids did the same for her, until both were put to bed in their night things. Then the bridemen sat at the foot of the bed and threw her stockings over their shoulders toward the bride, retrieving them and trying again until one at last hit her right in the nose. There was much laughter, and it was said that brideman would be next to marry. And the bridesmaids threw my father's stockings at him, and the same was said of the one who hit him. At last we left them alone in bed, and went downstairs where we continued to make merry far into the night. At least, some of us did, but Hester and I went to our room not so very much later. She went right to sleep, in spite of the noise. But I lay long awake, and tried not to listen at all.

THE QUEEN-LIKE CLOSET

1

“Where is my daughter?” said a voice, but it was not my mother's voice. It was the voice of Susannah Beckwith, who was now Susannah Moore.

I did not answer, but she found me anyway in the small parlor, where I was reading a manuscript my father had left on the little table there. My father spent much of his time in this room, and it was always in great disorder. Papers were piled everywhere, and there he kept his pens, and inkpots, and the tray of sand he used to blot his words when they were written. A great clutter of objects lay about: a paper knife, an empty tankard, several of my father's pipes. Dust lay upon everything, for Jane and Hester were forbidden to come in with their rags. My father did not like things disturbed.

There were two chairs there. My father by custom sat always in one, and I in the other. Mine was cane. My father's had an embroidered cushion with small blue flowers, done by my mother years ago. Now it was grimy with soot, and worn away in places from my father's sitting. Sometimes, when he was not in the house, I sat upon his chair and read his papers. It was not my job to do so, but he never minded, and I was curious to read the things he would not publish as well as the things he would.

“Margaret,” my stepmother said. I looked up at her, but for a moment she said no more. She looked around the untidy room and then cast her eyes heavenward. “Something must be done about this room!” she said, and smiled at me as though she thought I would agree.

“Father likes it this way,” I answered.

Her smile faded. She regarded me with a grave and kindly air. At last she said, “You have been long without a mother, but that is past. You are my daughter now, and I am your mother.”

“I do not need a mother,” I said. “I have Hester.”

“Hester has not taught you all that you must know.”

I looked down at my page, but she put her hand across it, so that I found myself staring at the jeweled ring on her left hand instead of the close handwriting I had been squinting at the moment before.

“I have been discussing your education with your father. How he made me laugh! What a sorry wife you would make if you were to marry now. Fortunately, you need not think of that. We have time enough to teach you all you must learn. More time in the kitchen, that is what you need, and let the apprentices take care of the shop.”

“I do not want to be taken from the shop.”

“You need not fear, Margaret. I am not sending you to drudge in the kitchen. Hester, Jane, and Cook will do our bidding, and you will learn to make plague-waters and healing teas and to order a grand dinner and how to write out an invitation and what to say to the Lord Mayor, if he should come here. We will have great fun.”

“The Lord Mayor has been here,” I said.

She lifted her hand at last, and I bent my head to read again.

“Put that aside, Margaret.”

I paid her no heed.

“Your father bade me take your education in hand, Meg. I am your mother now, and this is my household. Do you think I will fail of my duty to you?”

I looked up at her then, and saw that the kindness she began with had gone. There were spots of red in her pale cheeks, and her little eyes were nearly closed. I could see that she meant to have her way.

“Come with me, now,” she said.

“Yes, Mother,” I said. I stood swiftly and laid the sheaf of papers upon the table.

It surprised her, I saw, but she did not hesitate. She led the way to the stillroom. This was a small room near to the kitchen, where all manner of medicines were prepared for the household. The shelves were filled with dark bottles, some with stoppers and others covered with cloth. Bundles of herbs were pinned to the wall to dry, shedding their sharp scents into the air we inhaled. The room was not strange to me; I don't know how many times I had interrupted Hester there over the years. But as I stood there with my father's new wife it was not Hester I thought of, but my own mother. I remembered her there when Louis was dying, how she worked with grim face, and snapped at me when I tried to speak my fear. The memory was so strong and bitter I almost turned and ran. But I looked at my new mother and knew that hope did not lie in flight.

“Today I will teach you to make a powder which will help keep your teeth clean and sound. Hester says you do not use one now.”

This was true. It was my custom to wipe my teeth with my linen napkin after dining, and nothing more. It was what my father had always done, and it seemed good enough to me.

“First we will take an ounce of white salt. See? Next, an ounce of cuttlebone. We will mix them together…”

Obediently I took the mortar and pestle and began to grind the cuttlebone.

That week we made tooth powder, a salve for the lips made of beeswax, a cordial of orange-water, and a remedy for children with rickets.

“I am the only child here,” I said to her when she told me of this last, “and I do not have rickets.”

My stepmother did not answer at once. She smiled and looked down at the counter, which she was cleaning with a rag. I knew she was thinking of the children she meant to bear to my father.

“A good closet has many remedies within,” she said at last.

2

I was not made to leave the shop entirely, but it did not matter, for my pleasure there was spoilt. In the afternoons, when I yet helped behind the counter,
she
was there, too, welcoming those who came to buy and bossing the apprentices, while my father dined away from home and took himself to the Stationers' Hall or the printer's. Even Mr. Winter's visits were not the same. Now he gave his coin to Susannah instead of to me, and asked her about great men of the City, and what plays they most liked. In the mornings, when my father kept to the shop, I was kept from it, and I saw him but seldom now, except at table. I complained bitterly to Hester, but was wise enough to hold my tongue when my father was by, for he walked everywhere with his head lifted skyward and a great smile upon his face.

I did not understand him. She had turned our lives upside down. She had dusted and straightened the small parlor, and he did not even care. Now, if he sat there, she sat with him, on the cane chair that once was mine. But most often they sat together in the large parlor, which she filled with her pretty, silly things until I hardly knew it. I liked better to sit alone or with Hester in the small parlor, though it bore fewer and fewer traces of my father.