Stolen Lives (The Alice Chronicles #3)

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S ometime in the middle of the night she opens her eyes and wonders if she really has opened them or is just dreaming. Darkness is not something you can see. The dream persists around the borders of sleep, words strung together without meaning, and she was pulling herself along them like the rope rising from the sea before her and falling back in her wake. The words rise. Wills, wealth, dearth, death. They pass and fall away behind, constantly replaced by others. Lady, daily, rivulets. Constant flows like rain, streaming and dripping, running and trickling, merging, forming and dissolving, and words, words, words… shame, she, dog, vile, bread, Sprag, grasp, lady bred, daily bread…

Alice comes wide awake. That’s it! Words forming and breaking and re-forming. For those who have eyes to see .

She eases herself up, lifting away Sam’s arm lying across her. Sam murmurs in his sleep, turns over and settles once more. Carefully, she pushes aside the coverlet and slips out of bed. Her loose gown is laid over the coffer and she feels for it, slips it over her shift, runs her feet into her soft house slippers and tiptoes to the door. In the passage outside, all is dark save for a scattering of stars through the window at the end. Alice draws the door carefully closed, cautiously feels her way along the passage and starts down the stairs, keeping to the edge of the treads for silence.

At the foot of the stairs are the marble flags of the screens passage, nothing to creak here, and she can relax as she turns for the long passage at the back of the house. Ursula’s parlour is down towards the far end. Alice counts along the doors. She has been here often enough to know when she reaches it. She unlatches the door, and the starlit night through the window gives her sufficient light to make out the features. Ursula’s embroidery frame is propped on the window seat, a dark huddle of skeins beside it. Three cushions. Two back stools by the hearth. Opposite, a chest of drawers stands against the wall, and between that and the window, a small table and two chairs. The tinder box is in its usual place on the table, and there are always any number of wax candles. Within a few seconds she has lit two and is reaching into the chest of drawers where she knows Ursula keeps writing materials. She takes a sheet to the table, draws up a chair and sits down. She dips quill in ink. What was it Martyn said?

His vile …

Alice pens the letters of the scratched message, scattering them randomly over the sheet, and studies them. She makes words of as many letters as she can; reveal, heated, trials, travesty, distaste. There are so many, the choice is enormous. But what do the remaining letters spell out? She combines letters here and there, extracting any further words she can form. Nothing coherent results, and repeatedly she is left with unused, unusable letters.

She separates vowels and jumbles the remaining letters around them. A few more words appear, history, marvel, salvoes. But the remaining letters stubbornly form only nonsense. Re-arranging the letters in alphabetical order does not help either.

Back she goes and starts again on a fresh sheet.

His vile rotten pleasure, WM is…

The candles are burning low and the sky starting to lighten when Alice begins to doubt her night inspiration. She stands up and moves to the window, easing her neck from having sat too long hunched over. Outside, the garden is still and quiet, the colours as yet muted greys in the pre-dawn murk. In less than an hour some of those flowers will re-open to the sun’s welcome, others that have remained open overnight will come back to vibrant colour, red, purple, yellow. Already the stars are disappearing. She must return to her chamber soon.

Alice sighs. She has muddled the idea of Sam’s new-learned letters with these scratched words. Excess of yellow bile. Too restless, too passionate, she has bound herself to the conceit of a riddle, has misled herself into believing there is a riddle.

It is as she turns away from the window that she notices Ursula has had the tapestry on the opposite wall changed. It used to depict a hunting scene, ladies merrily dining on the sward while men loosed arrows, hawks attacked with beak and claw, and dogs tore their quarry in pieces. Banquets, blood and butchery. Perhaps Ursula has had enough of death, for this new tapestry depicts Moses leading the Israelites to freedom. Moses, the slave faced with a riddle; how to get the people across the Red Sea. Well, he was favoured with divine intervention. Alice, slave to her own riddle, has only her wits.

She takes another sheet of paper, sits down and starts to write out the words again. Immediately the word “slave” jumps out at her. She strikes out the letters from His vile rotten … No, it was His vile rotted pleasures. She writes the words afresh, and within minutes, like the right key turning in a well-greased lock, the door to the puzzle opens and she knows the answer to more than one riddle.

Alice checks and re-checks each letter to be sure. It is all there, clear before her. It was never the revenge of a rejected woman, it was a totally false accusation for a purpose, and has transformed into an evil admission. And she knows who scratched it on the pane.

She sits back and ponders on how a child’s jumbled writing has pointed the way to the truth.

Alice knocks and calls softly. ‘Luella?’ No sound. She knocks again. ‘Luella, I need to talk with you.’ A movement within and the door is unlatched, opened a fraction. Luella stands there in her night shift, eyes full of sleep in a face full of hostility. ‘What?’

‘I have something you must see.’

‘Do you know what time it is?’

‘It’s about Wat,’ Alice whispers.

‘You’ve said more than enough on that head.’

‘I said I’m sorry.’

‘Leave it alone, Alice, go away.’

‘You need to know this.’ Alice plants her foot in the door as Luella pushes.

‘Get out! This is harassment!’ Luella hisses. ‘I’m shutting the door now!’

‘Then I shall stand outside and hammer on it.’

‘Go away, Alice! Stop pestering me!’

‘Hammer louder and louder until you open it again!’

‘Why can you not accept it’s over with Wat?’

‘Because it’s not! No, Luella, you’re going to see this, whether you will or no!’

‘I shall complain to Mistress Cazanove about this constant hounding!’

‘If you shut me out, she’ll soon be here, the noise I’m going to make.’

‘Oohhh!’ Luella turns her back and Alice follows her into the chamber, quietly closing the door.

‘You’ll need a light to read this, Luella.’ A sigh of pillows as Luella plumps back into bed; the swish of sheets as she twitches the covers over her legs. In the glimmering dawn Alice can clearly read the message of arms folded, eyes fixed. She goes to the night table for the tinder box, and with the candle lit, she crosses to the connecting door and pulls it gently closed.

‘You remember this?’ She sits on the edge of the bed holding out the sheet to Luella who continues to ignore her. ‘This.’ Alice thrusts the sheet of paper before her eyes. ‘You see it? Don’t jump down my throat!’ as Luella’s outraged look meets hers. ‘This is the message Martyn discovered, that so distressed you, I know. I do not resurrect it to vex you, Luella.’

Luella pushes away Alice’s hand. ‘Then why bring it here? He wants another’s love, not mine.’

‘I doubt that,’ Alice says, still holding it out to her. ‘Turn the sheet over. That is the truth. Go on, take it.’

Resentment is no match for curiosity. Luella turns it, reads. Reads again. ‘This is horrible! Who wrote these messages?’

‘It’s not two messages, Luella, it’s one. The letters have been turned around to read differently.’

Luella checks back and forth. ‘What sort of person would think this up? Why write it down at all?’

‘Because this message here, the one on the windowpane, accuses Wat without identifying the writer. Wat has long known it exists but doesn’t know where.’

‘How do you know what he knows?’

‘He told me.’

‘When?’

‘I… came upon him by chance.’

‘You seem to know quite a bit about him, one way and another.’

‘Don’t tilt at me, Luella! I have griefs enough of my own at present!’

‘… Sorry.’

‘The threat of exposure hung constantly over Wat, suggesting he indulged in an act for which he could hang. But all the time,’ Alice turns the sheet, ‘the real instigator was laughing in his sleeve. Ironically, it’s one thing we can thank Martyn for. If he hadn’t found it, this would have haunted Wat all his life. A felony for which he would hang.’

‘You just said it was false.’

‘It is. It had no more to do with love than your own agreement to marry Goldwoode. Cazanove told Wat he had found it but all the time it was Cazanove who wrote it. It wasn’t about love, or even revenge. It was about power and control because Wat had defied him in refusing to bring Ruth Harker to him.’

‘Ruth!’ Luella glances at the connecting door and lowers her voice. ‘Ruth? She’s just a child! How do you know this?’

‘Her father and uncle told me the part of the story they know. This fills in what they don’t know. Wat’s defiance will have angered Cazanove, who must have realised he didn’t own Wat as much as he thought. So he proceeded to take his revenge by scratching a lying accusation on the windowpane but he gives himself away because, I suppose for his secret amusement, he made an anagram of it. He took pleasure in telling Wat it was written somewhere in the house. That threat has hung over Wat ever since.’

‘I don’t understand. Why save Wat from the rope, only to make his life such a misery?’

‘Ah, that’s a longer story, it starts with something Goldwoode must have confided to Cazanove about Wat being an obstacle to his marrying you. Cazanove impersonated Goldwoode to corrupt those who carried out Wat’s entrapment. If questions were asked, Goldwoode would get the blame. Then Cazanove bolstered his own Good Samaritan role by saving Wat from the rope. It was his protection, you see – no one would have believed Goldwoode after that. Oblivious, Goldwoode wrote to Cazanove after Wat was imprisoned, thanking him for his help in getting rid of Wat. You’ve seen that letter, I think.’

Luella nods.

‘He paid Cazanove very highly for you, but I wonder if he realised he was now ripe to be blackmailed. He wouldn’t be the first Cazanove squeezed, but it was his good fortune that Cazanove died.’

‘So evil. It’s so evil.’ Luella rocks herself back and forth. Alice waits. She has said as much as she can, laid out all her persuasions and arguments. It is in Luella’s hands now.

At last, Luella sighs. ‘Why is it always too late that we see the truth for what it is?’

‘Don’t forget that you also were used and abused, Luella. Master Goldwoode knew you loved Wat, yet he connived with Cazanove to remove him. He stole your life, as Cazanove stole Wat’s.’

‘I should have been stronger,’ Luella berates herself. ‘I should have trusted Wat, and now it’s too late.’

‘Be fair to yourself, you had no idea of the forces ranged against you.’

‘I should have been steadfast, instead of assuming he had abandoned me.’

‘Perhaps he assumed you had deserted him.’ She wishes she could tell Luella Wat’s despairing words about betrayal uttered in Cazanove’s ruined chamber.

‘Are you trying to say that’s why he tore up my letter?’

‘I don’t know; go and ask him! Perhaps he thought he should let you go, since your father did not lift a finger to help him and he was branded a thief?’

‘But to have not a word in reply… I just don’t understand it. The waiting woman took them herself.’ Luella sits long in silence. Eventually, she says, ‘And why did he buy that horse? If what you say is true, Wat had no need to get away from Bristol at all.’

‘I keep saying, I don’t know! There’s probably a perfectly innocent explanation if only you would ask him, Luella.’

Luella is silent.

‘Cazanove was clever,’ Alice says. ‘Offer a man a horse at such a good price that he can hardly refuse. If he sold it on, he could make as much again. Cazanove wanted to be sure Wat would be accused of more than one crime.’

‘Why do that? One felony is enough to hang a man,’ Luella objects.

‘I asked Master Norrys the Justice that same question. He said you can only plead benefit of clergy for a single felony. I think Cazanove was loading Wat with as many crimes as possible, to ensure he would be condemned.’

‘So that he could reprieve Wat and make him do whatever he commanded.’

‘Under threat of a return to gaol and certain death.’

‘That’s slavery indeed.’

‘Go to him, Luella. Tell him what you know.’

‘It’s no longer possible. Not now.’

‘Why?’

Luella does not answer that. Instead, ‘I saw Sir Thomas Harcourt in the village and he has offered me a position helping his dairymaid. He will allow me to—’

‘His dairymaid?’ Even to her own ears, Alice’s voice is sharp with alarm.

‘Why not? He will allow me to keep my daughter by me.’

‘There must be other work.’

‘I have to find a place quickly.’

‘Luella, I wouldn’t go to Sir Thomas if I were you.’ Unwilling wife of one man to unwilling mistress of the next.

‘Few would take on a woman with a child.’

Desperately Alice tries to think of alternatives. ‘Don’t you think Wat would like to know your side of the story, if only to settle his mind?’

‘Alice, I have sent repeated refusals to visit him, and he has stopped asking.’

‘You surely owe him one visit? For all that has passed?’

Luella shifts uncomfortably. ‘I shall write and ask his forgiveness for my weakness.’ She sniffs back tears and her head comes up. ‘You can give it to him after I have left.’

‘There has been enough of letters and messages, Luella.’

‘Please. Just this one, then it’s over. I shall be a servant and you’ll never see me again.’

‘No, you must see Wat! Face to face.’

‘It will only distress him all over again. I won’t do that to him.’ Her voice is wobbling with the effort. ‘To think we once talked of eloping and now he has finally given up on me. I can’t blame him, after all that’s happened.’

‘You actually intended to elope?’

‘I know it is shocking, but don’t hold him responsible; I am just as culpable.’

‘The horse! It all fits!’

‘What are you talking about?’

‘How would the two of you hope to get away without a horse? Wat never deserted you. He was actively preparing for your elopement! You must see him now, Luella!’

‘Don’t, Alice; there’s no point.’ Her eyes brim.

‘Do I have to drag you there?’

‘I’m afraid!’ Luella’s voice breaks apart.

‘Oh, Luella.’ Gently, Alice takes hold of her shoulders. ‘Don’t you think Wat was afraid all the time he was working for Cazanove?’

Head down, Luella whispers, ‘He was always the courageous one; I’m not like that.’

‘Courage has very little to do with fearlessness, Luella.’

‘My darling Wat!’ Luella cries in earnest.

Alice waits silent beside her until the tears gradually ease. ‘Show him Goldwoode’s letter, and that sheet,’ Alice says at last. ‘You don’t have to tell him who broke the riddle. You can keep that between the two of you.’

Luella is silent for some moments, lacing and unlacing her fingers in her lap. ‘You know, you were right, I don’t deserve him. I love him so much and I could have been so happy with him. Why would he still love me now?’

Despite herself, Alice laughs. ‘Only Wat can tell you that, Luella, and only you can bring him happiness, and surely both of you deserve that?’

Luella takes up the sheet. ‘This Master Cazanove. You’d think he had signed a pact with the Devil.’ She turns it over to the unscrambled message.

Displeasure gone. Wat Meredith is my slave.