Shadow on the Highway (2 page)

I plucked up courage and asked, ‘Beg pardon m’lady, but are you the Lady Katherine?’

She looked up. ‘Of course I’m Lady Katherine.’ Her eyes flashed. ‘Who else would I be?’

2.
A Toss and a Tumble

It was clear enough Lady Katherine had chosen me to be her servant because I was cheap, not because of anything in my skill. Not because I was clever or because I could read and write, or because anyone had recommended me. I squashed the prickle of disappointment and threw more wood from the log pile into the bucket. And a Mr Grice, whoever he was, didn’t want me here.

But I mustn’t think. I must be grateful they’d employed me at all, and remember I owed it to Mother, so she had one less mouth to feed and worry over. She had her hands full enough with baby William and little Martha. The thought of Mother made me pause mid-movement, and press my hand to the bib of my apron to stop the pain.

It was my fault we had to live the way we did, and now was my chance to make up for the terrible thing I’d done. I would save up all my wages and pay it all back to her somehow, even if it was the last thing I ever did.

I took two more loads of coal and wood back to the yellow chamber. Such a lot to remember. My head reeled with it all. By the time I got there the first logs were burnt out and the room was still cold as a tomb. I could not help letting out a cry of frustration, but Lady Katherine ignored me.

When I’d lit the blasted fire again, even then she did not snuggle up next to it where it was warm. I had to bite my lip not to tell her. Still, maybe she did not want to get her fine silk gown full of smoke. Over it she wore a tawny velvet cloak lined with rabbit fur, and I suppose she must have been warm enough.

Later, as I lugged yet another cauldron of boiling water across the yard, I saw my mistress pass the stables. She was dressed in a heavier cloak and a hat tied down over her dark curls, its scarlet feather shivering in the breeze.

I paused in filling the laundry tub to watch her ride by. She rode a big-boned black horse with a white blaze. No stable boy was with her, no farm hand. But she looked confident, capable. She swayed upright in the saddle like a man; she used her whip smartly, her mouth opened in a command and the horse broke into a trot.

Her dark shape sped away across the field, her bronze hair flying from under her hat, skirts trailing to one side. The horse flew like lightning, straight towards the blur of the boundary hedge. Surely she wasn’t going to jump that? I stared amazed as she did not even slow. The horse sailed over the hedge, her ladyship still pressed to the saddle. The last image that stuck with me was the flash of the horse’s heels and the red plume of her hat.

I let out a long whistling breath. My astonishment was soon followed by irritation. The thoughtless madam. She’d gone out, when I had lit a fire and dragged heavy coal all the way from the outside store. The fire would be blazing away with nobody to see it. Why on earth ask me to do it, when she was going out?

I stomped inside to fetch the dirty linen, still cross at my wasted effort, but soon slowed. The house seemed to be waiting for something, holding its breath. I traced my name in the dust on the windowsill. I wondered if my mistress would be displeased I could write. I knew it was not something expected of a housemaid. Then fearing it might cast some sort of hex, and would tell the devil where I lived, I rubbed it out again with my sleeve.

While she was out I took the chance to explore, tiptoeing down the empty corridors, brushing spider-webs from my face. Cleaning this place would be an enormous task, and there was only one pair of hands – mine.

In the east wing, when I creaked open one door, a pile of weaponry and armour lay in the middle of the floor. I took in a gleaming halberd, some muskets and shot, even a scythe glinting there in light from the crack in the shutters.

That would teach me to pry, I thought.

I shut the door hurriedly. I did not want to know. Did not want to feel obliged to report what I had seen to anyone in the village. Like my family, the villagers were all fixed on fighting for Parliament and would be desperate to get their hands on these, if they only knew they were there.

Mother had told me that the Fanshawes were Royalists, for the King, so she had warned me to keep quiet about where our sympathies lay.

‘Folk like us can’t afford loyalties,’ she said, ‘not any more. Not if you want to keep your place.’

*

By lunchtime my good dress was drenched from cuff to shoulder. I found aches in parts I didn’t know I had, as I dragged sodden linens out of the tub to run them through the mangle and spread them on the hedges next to the drive to dry. The wind whipped up and the sheets flapped against me as if they had minds of their own. I had to tie the corners to the hawthorn branches to stop them blowing away.

I had just finished and was praying that it would all be dry by nightfall, when my mistress cantered across the field towards me. She had taken off her cloak and it lay across the horses withers; her cheeks were flushed pink, her face merry.

She was just about to dismount when the wind caught under one of the sheets and it filled like
a sail. The horse leapt sideways, half-rearing in fright. I grabbed for the sheet but the wind was too strong and the end of it billowed out to flap right in the horse’s face. It reared again, hooves thrumming the air.

Lady Katherine clung to the pommel, but no sooner had it landed than the horse bucked and threw her, bolting off towards the yard, tail stuck up like a flag.

My hand was over my mouth. Lady Katherine did not move, but lay on her back on the wet grass. Thoughts flew. Was she winded? Dead?

What would I tell them at home, that I’d caused the death of my mistress on my very first day? I backed away, not knowing what to do. Then good sense flooded back to me and I rushed forward to help.

A flurry of petticoats and she was up, startling me, brushing herself down, rubbing her back. She saw me staring and began to shout. Her face was white as whey, her green eyes boring into me. I was too terrified to take in her words, just saw her mouth open and close, her riding crop pointing at me accusingly. I moved away, my face frozen.

Finally I was able to make sense of what she was shouting. I was stupid.
There were racks in the orchard for drying. She wouldn’t forgive me if Blaze was hurt. The horse, I realised, she was worried about her horse. I opened my mouth to apologize, but she did not give me time,

‘Take the laundry to the orchard,’ she shouted, ‘out of my sight.’

In my hurry I stumbled, scratched my arms and tore my sleeve on the hedge trying to gather the dripping sheets in my arms.

Lady Katherine watched a moment, lips pressed together,
then turned on her heel and marched off towards the stables. I could see patches of wet staining the back of her green silk dress.

My legs were so shaky I could hardly walk. When I got to the orchard I could see the drying racks hung from the trees, calm and
orderly. I should have thought that in a house like this they wouldn’t just spread the linen over bushes like we did at home. I was stupid, like she said. I’d only been here a morning and already I’d got it wrong. And worse, my new mistress could have died. What if she’d broken a bone?

A hollow feeling sat in my stomach. I hadn’t tended the fire in the library either; Lady Katherine was cold and wet and the fire would be out. I sagged, wondered how long it would be before she sent me home.

After I’d finished hanging out the laundry I was too scared to go up to Lady Katherine. I went to check on her horse though, to make sure no harm had come to it. Blaze was a fine dark bay with a white face.

‘Sorry,’ I said, reaching towards his muzzle.

He side-stepped and rolled his eyes.

I stood silently and waited with my arm outstretched.

After a moment he shook himself and offered his head to be stroked. He was a fine animal. I was good with horses, always had been. My brother Ralph let me ride his horse sometimes and I loved that feeling of sitting on top of the world. No harm seemed to have come to Blaze so my heart stopped its hammering a little. He snuffled up the grass I tore for him from the verge and blew at me through his nose with his hot breath. I rubbed his ears and he nuzzled me back.

When I thought Blaze and I had made friends, I went back to the kitchen, with a vague hope that the porridge might still be on the hearth. I was ravenous. There was the smell of baking and Mistress Binch was there, hands on hips, scowling, as if she’d been waiting especially for me to arrive.

‘Where’s my pail?’

‘Beg pardon, Mistress. I took it. To get some coal.’

‘I’ve been looking for it all over, to mop the floor. And shut that door. Do you think we live in a barn? Go and fetch my pail. Have you never heard of a coal bucket? Don’t be touching my things, do you hear? That’s not a –’

Her mouth snapped open and closed like a trap, but I didn’t want to know any more. I’d have to brave her ladyship and fetch the pail from upstairs. I tried to creep in to the library without Lady Katherine seeing, but she pounced on me as soon as I put my nose through the door.

‘The fire’s out. And I asked you to wait at this door. Where’ve you been?’

‘Hanging the laundry, m’lady.’

‘All this time? You’ll have to be quicker than that. Tell cook I’m ready for my meal. Bring it to the dining room.’ Impatience made her forget to speak slowly.

I cringed away, and made a hurried bob.
I ran down all the stairs back to the kitchen where Mistress Binch clucked her lips and frowned at the fact her good pail was full of coal dust.

‘Please mis
tress,’ I asked, desperately, ‘where’s the coal bucket kept?’

She answered me but with her head turned to the bread oven.

I asked again, and she turned and spat at me, ‘In the main chamber, like I said.’

*

I served Lady Katherine her meal of pie and pease pudding with my own stomach churning and empty. Mistress Binch did not offer me anything to eat and there seemed to be no time to stop anyway. As soon as I had cleared the dishes I was to clean the pewter and then beat the rugs. The fires were always smoking and on the verge of going out. Lady Katherine kept moving from room to room and demanding fires be lit in each one.

As twilight came I was still on the run up and down the corridors and the coal bucket was never out of my hand. Lady Katherine summoned me from where I was bent over the library hearth by stamping hard on the ground. I felt the tremor of the floorboards and turned in time to see her do it again. It got my attention, but it made me angry inside. Seeing her stamp like that reminded me of a small child who could not get her way.

‘Chaplin,’ she said, pacing up and down the room in front of me, and speaking very clearly, ‘a message came. My husband will be home the day after tomorrow, with my step-father and their servants. Wednesday. The day after tomorrow. You will have the house clean and ready. You’re to help Mistress Binch and you will serve us at table. I take it you know how to do that?’ She did not wait for an answer. ‘And fetch me hot water. My back hurts like the bloody devil.’

She turned and watched me from the corner of her eyes to see my reaction to her oath.

I coloured, remembering. The words were out of my mouth before I could stop them. ‘Yes m’lady, sorry m’lady. It was the wind. It just snatched the sheets right out of my hand. I didn’t mean to frighten your horse.’

A moment passed between us, a moment where she was just a girl looking at me, a girl who might smile and forgive me. But she tossed her head, quashed it. Her chin rose as she said, ‘Bring the water. And you’d better turn back the bed and light the rush-lights.’

I was back in my place in an instant. ‘Where, m’lady? Where would you like to wash?’

‘My chamber of course.’

I didn’t want to light another fire that day. ‘It might be warmer in here.’

She glared. ‘What a foolish idea. I’m not undressing in the library! Certainly not. Light the fire in my chamber.’

So when I wasn’t carrying coal I was carrying water. As night fell the house became a labyrinth of black shadows. Pools of grey moonlight crept in through the windows. I kept glancing over my shoulder to check there was nobody there, fearful of what else might lurk in all those dark corners. Everyone in the village knew that Markyate Manor stood on the site of an old monastery, but I tried not to think of the spectre of the murdered monk. Folk said he glided through the solid walls as if they were not there.

*

Lady Katherine’s chamber was not a very cheerful place. Grand yes, the ceilings had icings of ornate plaster, but the walls were damp and peeling. What had happened? Why was everything so run-down?

Lady Katherine arrived after I had lit the fire and the rush
-lights, and just as I was smoothing out the bed. I was proud of the way I had the jug of hot water already standing by.

‘Unlace me.’ She stood in front of me and turned, obviously expecting me to undress her, but my mouth was dry at such a prospect. I did not dare to touch her with my rough, chapped hands. Her hair fell in soft coppery tendrils over the eyelets of her bodice.

I unlaced her as she fidgeted. I helped her out of the bodice and the skirt, noticing how she shivered with the cold. She pointed at the basin and I fetched it over with the linen cloth, but I stood there, not knowing how to wash her. Which parts should I wash?