Stolen Lives (The Alice Chronicles #3)

42

M artyn is in expansive humour as Ursula, accompanied by Alice, joins him in the hall to bid him and his sister farewell from the Cazanove mansion. He occupies the settle by the hearth and invites Ursula and Alice to sit. Both remain standing. They regard Martyn in his new-fashioned wear. Over a fine linen shirt, one of half a dozen he has had made, as he tells them, is a lightweight woollen doublet and full-skirted hose banded at the knee. His silk-clad legs protrude like sticks, and his feet are shod in fine leather shoes with silver buckles. His hat, sporting not the usual one ostrich feather but three, is not of Tyrian blue, which is beyond even his newly inflated pocket, but of rich red like his doublet and hose. Leaning back, he addresses the lady of the house.

‘So, Ursula, we shall no doubt meet again in the course of business. I should be able to help you here and there, give you the odd guiding hint. Just ask me anything you need to know.’

‘I value your kindness at its true worth, sir,’ Ursula replies.

‘Meantime,’ Martyn goes on, ‘let me warn you about one of your maidservants…’ He proceeds to make complaint over some minor omission of attention.

Ursula hears him out in courteous silence, answering, ‘Indeed, Master Sprag, you may be assured I shall enquire into the matter personally.’

Helena has not yet appeared but they hear her instructing the menservants carrying their new effects downstairs. It is clear that Martyn can now boast to his heart’s content of boxes in the plural. Between awkward silences as they wait, Martyn describes the large coach he has ordered from Dorchester. He extols the comfort of its seats furnished with cushions a-plenty, and Alice suppressing a yawn listens to his delight over the sheepskins that will cover its floor. Her mind wanders as he recommends Ursula to take note when it arrives of the workmanship of the exterior. And as he boasts of the finely bred pair of horses he has selected to draw this wonder of workmanship, Alice’s thoughts break adrift to the horse Wat bought from Turner the pointmaker, the saddle that never was, invented to make it look as if Wat was trying to escape the city. The betrayals, one on another, would have driven a lesser man to despair…

Martyn is still droning on; now it is the number of menservants who will serve him in the house that Goldwoode owned in Bristol. The roll of wheels at that moment comes none too soon for Alice, irritated on Ursula’s behalf at his familiar address, his impervious self-importance. The coachman calls out, harness rattles, hooves slither. Alice and Ursula move as one to the window.

‘Your coach, sir,’ Ursula says.

An ill-matched pair of excitable chestnuts prances and side-steps. A manservant jumps down from his seat by the driver, but before he can knock, Martyn has already yelled to his sister, who obediently moves to open the door. Alice gets her first view of Helena in her new state as sister of the Goldwoode heir. She wears a simple blue gown with an unadorned white partlet at the neck, a plain white cap and new leather shoes identical to her previous shoes. She has a languid air. At the open door, she points out their several boxes stacked in the screens passage, and while the man picks up the largest, Helena reaches for a smaller one.

‘God a’mercy, Helena, you forget yourself!’ Martyn shouts. ‘I’ve got servants for that now. Come and help me up.’

The manservant also puts down his box and moves to help Helena with her brother. ‘No, stand back!’ Martyn orders him. ‘My sister is here and I prefer her help to all other. Don’t I, Helena?’

Helena gives a thin smile as she supports him across the hall. ‘Don’t I, Helena?’ he repeats.

‘You do, Martyn,’ she agrees, low-voiced.

‘And how do you feel about that, Helena?’

‘I am grateful that you wish my help, Martyn,’ Helena answers.

Alice and Ursula exchange looks. The manservant hesitates, hovering nearby.

‘In fact, Helena has made a decision,’ Martyn announces. ‘Haven’t you, Helena?’

‘Yes.’

‘Well? Tell us.’ Martyn is wearing an unpleasant smile.

‘To… help you, Martyn,’ she answers.

‘And?’

‘To continue to live with you.’

‘Oh, it’s a little more than that, isn’t it, Helena? Come, tell these good ladies.’

‘I have decided not to marry Mr Devenish,’ Helena says, so low that Martyn prompts her,

‘Say it again, Helena, so that we can all hear.’

Stumblingly, laboured, Helena repeats herself.

‘And why have you decided that, Helena? Tell us your reason.’

‘Because… because I better prefer to stay with you…’

‘… than to …?’

‘… than to marry Mr Devenish.’

‘You see what an angel I have for a sister, Ursula? An example of virtuous self-sacrifice, is she not? She has come to a right thinking as I advised her long ago, haven’t you Helena?’ He turns, leaning on his sister, and gazes as though lovingly at her. ‘You were never meant for Devenish,’ he says. ‘You know that now, don’t you?’

‘The coach is waiting,’ Helena murmurs.

‘Don’t you, Helena?’

‘Yes, Martyn.’

Together they make their way out, Ursula accompanying to bid her guests farewell. Alice remains in the screens passage. Helena has some difficulty at the door of the coach, which is too narrow for the two of them to work their way in together, and set too high for her to lift Martyn up. Still the manservant hovers at need, until Martyn snaps, ‘Stop gawping, man, and get those boxes stowed!’ His raised voice unnerves the horses, and the coach judders back and forth, jolting Martyn off the step to his red-faced annoyance as the coachman quiets the pair. ‘Useless fellow!’ Martyn barks. ‘You’ll not survive long in my service if you can’t control your horses!’

Eventually Helena gets inside and leans to hoist Martyn. She grasps him under the arms; he hangs round her neck, awaiting the lift. For a moment it looks as though Helena is raising a corpse, though which of them is the more lifeless, Alice would be hard put to answer.

Then Helena has lifted him in and is ordering his cushions, settling his blanket round his knees. Martin points and crooks his finger and the manservant closes the door. As Helena takes her seat opposite Martyn in the darkness within, the coachman whips up his pair. She turns hollow-eyed to gaze out of the window, and as the coach jolts forward, the leather coach-leaf dislodges and drops, cutting off her view.

Ursula steps back towards the house. In a low voice she says to Alice, ‘So Martyn has made sure she did not get away with it after all.’

‘As ever, he has used the situation to his own advantage,’ Alice says. ‘Did you notice she still wears her skirts short? For all his fortune, she is to remain his body servant. Poor Mr Devenish.’

‘I thought you would say he has had a lucky escape.’

‘I believe he has. But I think a gentle heart like his will take some while to heal.’

‘I imagine Helena will be wishing for years to come that she had run away with Mr Devenish and risked poverty without hope of inheritance or even allowance,’ Ursula says. ‘Together, they could have found happiness, and she would have no blood on her hands.’

Alice sighs. ‘There are no winners in that melancholy household.’

‘Well,’ Ursula says, as they enter the hall, ‘there is one household here at least, that is anything but melancholy.’ As Alice looks her question, Ursula explains, ‘Wat Meredith is up and about again.’

‘Oh, that pleases me no end!’ Alice cries.

Ursula holds up a hand, moving to close the door so that the two of them are alone in the hall. ‘I would add,’ she says quietly, ‘that he was up and about last night. In fact, I’m told his bed was not slept in.’ She looks meaningfully at Alice.

‘At last!’ Alice says, smiling widely.

‘But in God’s sight they’re not married,’ Ursula reminds her.

‘Ursula, I hope God sees a little further than the altar,’ Alice says gently. ‘Those two have been married since the night they made little Eleanor. Why wait for a ceremony?’

The evening glows gold on azure, another in the long run of days since the storm broke and the skies cleared. In Ursula’s herb garden, rose-bowered stone benches invite at the four points of the compass where paths radiate out from the sundial, now throwing a long shadow across its etched surface. Alice sits flanked by red and purple roses trickling their fragrance amongst the scents of balm, thyme, lavender in the still air. On one side of the garden stretches the mansion; bounding the other three sides is a high wall, enclosing the space that supplies the house with savours, waters, perfumes and salves. Beyond, accessible by a small door, is Ursula’s private garden, which Alice reckons her friend probably has in view at this moment as she sits on the window seat of her parlour, embroidery frame as usual to hand.

The last time Alice sat out of doors regarding the sunset was at Bishops Caundle on the way here from Guildford. Now, as then, there is much to think on, the future is still uncertain. Privately she has wondered whether to take the opportunity of this visit to stay in Dorset, take back Hill House farm and release Daniel from the tenancy to follow his true calling at the smithy. If she sells High Stoke, it would relieve her own sense of having usurped, and relieve High Stoke’s burgeoning resentments since Henry’s death. But now there is his baby…

This time there is no crack of a twig underfoot to make her jump at his approach. She hears his step, and another’s, on the path and watches them halt at the sundial. The bandage is still on his throat, just showing above the neckline of his shirt.

They turn, and she sees he carries his sleeping daughter in the crook of his arm. ‘Luella saw you from the window up there.’ He points. His voice is hoarse, the words carefully intoned; it must be painful to speak while the wound is healing.

Alice shifts along the seat. ‘How is your throat today?’

‘Improving,’ he rasps. ‘Master Apothecary thinks it will return to normal in due course.’ The apothecary dresses Wat’s throat every day with his cleansing, healing salves; every day he asks Esther for fresh strips of linen. A careful, methodical man. Ursula places much dependence on his healing skills for all her people.

Wat and Luella sit, and for a moment there is silence as all three gaze at the garden lit through long shadows by the sinking sun.

It is several moments before he shifts and takes a breath. ‘I went to see my mistress.’

Alice waits. Luella is holding his free hand in both of hers.

‘I told her of the havoc I caused in Cazanove’s chamber. I told her I cannot pay for the damage because its worth is far above my pocket.’

‘What did she say?’

‘That worldly things have no worth when they afford no happiness.’

‘You have a wise mistress, Wat.’

‘I said I felt duty bound to bow to her right to exact what recompense she named.’

‘And her answer?’

‘That one who would stand on rights is a lesser being than one who would admit transgressions.’

And that, Alice thinks, is how Ursula commands such respect. ‘She thinks very highly of you, Wat. She does not wish to lose you. Are you sure you want to leave?’

‘No,’ he says, ‘I don’t wish to leave my mistress. But I need a fresh start, and Luella feels the same. Our daughter shall not grow up in the house where Cazanove lived.’

Alice notes with pleasure that the deferential “my master” has at last been relegated to “Cazanove”. And what better opportunity than now to ask a question. ‘How did he find out you were looking for a horse?’

‘Wat has told me that,’ Luella says, as Wat pauses to clear his throat. ‘Master Goldwoode – as he was to me then – was up at the house one day so Wat asked him in a casual way if he knew anyone who was looking to sell a horse. He said he would ask around.’

‘And he passed that on to Cazanove, and a plot was hatched,’ Alice says.

‘For Cazanove, it was a gift,’ Wat rasps. ‘It was all about gaining a hold over Goldwoode that would come in useful in the future. Helping Goldwoode win Luella was his opportunity. Keeping me alive as proof of a murderous plot gave him the threat he needed. The horse became the means. It was chance that Luella’s father helped them.’

‘I doubt Father was aware of the plot,’ Luella explains, ‘but instead of defending Wat, he saw his opportunity to make me marry Master Goldwoode. You recall I said I wrote to Wat in prison? No replies, and the last came back torn in pieces.’

‘I’d never have done that,’ Wat interposes, and Luella says, ‘I know that now.’

‘Luella, you’re saying your father got hold of your letters?’ Alice asks her.

‘My mother’s waiting woman promised she delivered them herself. I think she feared for her position and delivered them instead to my father. He will have told her to return that last one in pieces as though Wat had done it.’

‘Oh, Luella, your own father!’

‘He made me believe Wat had abandoned me. To my shame I did believe it,’ Luella finishes with a sigh. Wat’s arm slides comfortingly round her shoulder, and he draws her close. She sighs. ‘I don’t know how I shall ever forgive my father, tricking me into marrying a man I didn’t love, didn’t even like. And if only I had realised, Wat had been trying to get in touch with me.’

‘Through the waiting woman as well?’ Alice asks.

Wat says huskily, ‘She passed back word that Luella wanted nothing more to do with me.’ His voice is quickly tiring.

Alice shakes her head. This pair, caught in the coils of two self-serving predators. And the rod-of-iron father playing all unknowing their hands, depriving himself at a stroke of his beloved only child and his loyal man of business.

‘You must have been desperate, Wat.’

‘When I discovered Goldwoode had married Luella, I knew Cazanove must have been in the plot from the start.’ He turns to Luella. ‘I even thought you were. I’m so sorry, my love.’

She puts up a hand to stroke his face. ‘You’re here now. That’s all that matters.’

Wat carefully clears his throat and goes on, ‘He paid me nothing. He didn’t say the word “slave” but that was how he used me. Yes, I thank you for unravelling the words, Alice. Luella was right to tell me. For months I worked to prove by loyal service I was no thief. Trying all the while to understand why Cazanove saved my life. He wanted a clerk, he told me. That was a lie, his steward Aled fulfilled that role. He told me some of the women at the dyeworks were happy to come to his chamber at the mansion. Another lie. He claimed he found the writing on the windowpane, and now I find he wrote it himself. He threatened to tell the justices but he was never going to. Lies, lies, lies. To keep me in check. He knew all the time I was no thief. He just wanted a lever against Goldwoode. There I was trying to earn his respect and all the time I was nothing!’

His voice has petered out with the effort. He will carry this sense of humiliation for a while yet, Alice senses, and he deserves so much better. In the silence, she ventures, ‘You were a great deal more than nothing to me, that evening at Bishops Caundle on the way here. You showed me how the bond of trust my husband and I had achieved shortly before his death was matter for celebration. You lit a candle for me in the dark.’

Again, the three are silent.

Then, ‘That day at Portland,’ Wat says, ‘I discovered I had three very good friends.’

Alice smiles. ‘Three amongst many, Wat. Long before that, you’d already made dozens. Don’t forget all those who taught Slank and Messer a lesson in the nettle patch.’

The bitterness, the damage to his soul, will take time to heal, but Luella in her love and understanding is the balm he needs, as he is hers for the months of misery she endured, and he now knows he has many well-wishers all about him.