Lady of the Highway Read online

  Once we had some light I could see her face was purpled all down one side. A trickle of blood had dried to a crust on her cheekbone.

  ‘Let me find some water to wash your face.’

  ‘What did I tell you?’ she said. ‘My son was right. Bad luck rides pillion with you.’

  I wrung out a cloth in the pail and held it out, but she shook her head. ‘Now, I’m here, you’d best show me to Abigail.’

  ‘Are you sure you’re all right?’

  ‘No. But maybe she’s worse. Let’s take a look, shall we?’ She stood up, swayed slightly, but grasped the table for support. I went to take her round the waist, but she shrugged me off. Together we went up the stairs into my chamber where I’d left Abi coughing. Was it only a few hours since I’d left? It seemed like days. As we went up, I saw that Mrs Binch was thinner. We all were. The years of fighting and civil disorder had left us tired; food was scarce and women always the last to be fed.

  Mrs Binch drew the candle closer to Abi’s face, and even from here I could see Abi was ashen, her face grey as water against the sheets. I was used to giving orders, and expected them to be obeyed, but even I could not make someone live if they wanted to die. Even if she was my closest friend.

  Her chest rattled as she breathed, like corn in a sieve. The sound filled me with dread. Mrs Binch turned Abi on her side but she barely reacted. She was like a limp leather bag, no fight left in her; her eyes were closed as if to shut out the world.

  A bad sign. Abi was deaf and used her eyes to hear. The fact she could not find the will to open them meant she would be in a world of utter silence and darkness. Not that I could blame her. She had buried her mother and her baby brother together, and afterwards, her elder brother Ralph, who had died in a sword fight.

  At the thought of Ralph, my heart contracted. The image of him rose up in front of me, his tousled blond hair and his ready smile. Grief at his passing made my stomach heave, and I had to go to the chamber pot to cough up bitter bile. A month or more I had endured this grief-sickness, along with a sense of loss so sharp it made me moan.

  My house was full of ghosts. Markyate Manor had its wandering monk, its headless spectre, and now Ralph. I still could not believe him gone. I sat down heavily on the end of the bed. I must not cry.

  I straightened the sheets angrily, pulling them taut, noticing how Abi’s ribs showed through her thin shift. I knew she had lost weight, that she wouldn’t eat, but for the first time I saw how thin she really was. The few blankets were rolled into a heap at the end of the bed, so I dragged them up over her shivering form.

  Despite the chill, her forehead was burning to the touch. ‘Don’t you dare die,’ I said through gritted teeth. Of course she couldn’t hear me.

  At the other side of the bed Mrs Binch turned away, her face grim.

  ‘She’ll be all right, won’t she?’ I asked.

  Mrs Binch ignored the question. ‘Fetch more wood. We must keep her warm. And I need to look in the larder.’

  ‘It’s empty,’ I said.

  ‘We’ll see,’ she brushed past me, one hand to her sore face, the other holding a candle. ‘Boil water,’ she called back. ‘And fetch more blankets. And while you’re at it, get dressed. Or you’ll catch your death too, and I can’t nurse the two of you.’

  I was about to protest at being given orders, but shut my mouth. It was a relief to do something. I didn’t want to think. My heart hammered from the thought of the two men in the woods. I still felt the touch of those rough fingers on my back. They’d known my name. I clutched my torn chemise together and shook the uneasy feeling away. I was well known round these parts. Many would know my name.

  As I threw on warm skirts and a front-lacing bodice and sleeves, I remembered the falling branch. It was so odd. There’d been only a breath of wind before that, and then all of a sudden – that great gust. A prickling sensation, like needles inside my skull. I kept thinking of Ralph. My ordinary eyes couldn’t see him, but I knew he was there. As certainly as a bird knows the dawn and begins to sing.

  Even now, it was as if my chest was caving in at the thought of him. I pulled the laces tight and pressed my hand to the pain in my chest. I hadn’t known love could be such agony. The loss of him was like waking to find yourself in another foreign country where you knew no one and where none of the language made sense.

  I took a deep breath. I must put him from my mind and concentrate on Abi. It’s what Ralph would have wanted, that I should look to his sister. She was like a sister to me too now. When I got back to the chamber with more blankets, the room smelt pungent. I suppressed the urge to gag. A bowl wafting steam stood next to the bed, and Mrs Binch was holding a vaporous cloth near Abi’s nose.

  ‘Camphor,’ I said.

  ‘Yes, from the master’s clothes chest. She has more need of it than the moths, and there’s little else. Does her sister still work at the apothecary’s?’

  ‘Elizabeth? Yes.’

  ‘Then go there tomorrow, I’ll write you a list.’ Both of us ignored the fact I would have to ride down that highway again, though the unspoken fear was in both our eyes.

  Why hadn’t I sent a note to Elizabeth? I suppose because any fool could see that Abi and her sister didn’t see eye to eye. ‘I thought of that,’ I said, ‘but…’

  ‘Money is it?’

  I swallowed my pride. ‘I can’t pay her. Not unless we can sell something, and—’

  ‘She’ll surely give you credit, when she knows who it’s for. Go at first light. But go careful. Go ’cross the fields, down the biddy bridleway. Don’t risk the main highway.’

  I did not reply. I’d go on the main highway if that was quickest.

  Mrs Binch interrupted my thoughts, ‘I’ll sit with Abigail a few hours, mistress. You sleep. Doesn’t do for us both to be awake.’

  ‘If you’re sure.’ Strangely, I was glad to hear her use the familiar term ‘mistress’.

  She nodded and took her attention back to Abi. She sent me to rest, but I could not sleep. Slanted moonlight fell in bars across the floors, but I prowled the shadows, as if too much light might show up the hollow in my heart, as well as the dust.

  I wandered into the main chamber noticing the mouldering candle stubs in the sconces. I ran my hand over the once smooth mahogany of the mantelpiece, now rough with gouges of musket fire. The house was battered and empty, and unloved.

  I couldn’t bear it. One day, I vowed, there would be a vase of roses just here, and a fire blazing, and chandeliers flickering beads of light across a polished table. One day, it would be a home again, filled with friends, and laughter and light.

  Abi had to pull though. Dear God, hadn’t I lost enough?

  3: The Fanshawe Luck

  The next morning I saddled Blaze, my riding horse, and set off for Wheathamstead. Though it was slower, I went by the quiet bridleways. I did not want to come across the robbed coach or risk seeing those two men again. I wore a plain black worsted dress, and a plain velvet hat to hide the fact that there was nobody to dress my hair, and because my copper-coloured hair was like a beacon advertising who I was. With luck, I might pass for a village woman as I rode side-saddle across the common.

  One or two men out in the fields close to the village stood up to stare, but daylight had washed the world of fear. Autumn sun burned through the mist, the cows grazed in heavy dew. A pigeon cooed from the distant woods. As I rode a wave of nausea made me sway in the saddle. I prayed to God I was not catching Abi’s sickness.

  I pulled Blaze up short and dismounted to vomit into a heap of autumn leaves at the side of the track. Afterwards I felt better, but wondered if it was grief, or whether my body was still trying to get rid of that feeling from the night before, the feeling of that filthy highwayman’s hands on my bare skin.

  When I got to the apothecary’s I was surprised to see Elizabeth was not in mourning for Ralph. Instead she wore an amber linen dress, with a clean white waist-apron, and a frilled cap holding back her dark curly
hair. Her chemise was cut low on the bosom, so that you could not help but notice the expanse of pale skin and cleavage in front. She looked up when I came in and her face closed in a scowl. She waited for me to speak.

  I drew out the list I had written on Mrs Binch’s instructions. ‘All this, if you can,’ I said. ‘It’s for your sister. She’s in a bad way.’

  ‘Why?’ Elizabeth said, taking the list between finger and thumb, and eyeing it suspiciously. ‘What ails her?’

  ‘She can’t stop coughing. And she’s so weak. Ralph’s death has knocked the straw out of her. Could be an infection of the lungs.’

  ‘Has she seen anyone?’

  I paused. I had promised Mrs Binch nobody would know she was there. ‘No one,’ I said.

  ‘She was always sickly,’ Elizabeth said. ‘It’s probably just a cold. She’s a right malingerer. I’ll give you a pinch of onion powder and ginger.’

  ‘You don’t understand. She’s really ill. I need it all.’

  Elizabeth narrowed her eyes, and ran a finger down the list. ‘It won’t come cheap.’

  ‘I thought that… as they’re for Abi…’ I let my words hang.

  ‘Oh no.’ She slapped the list down on the table, and backed away, her hands up. ‘You’re asking me to give you all this for nothing? It’s more than my job’s worth. What would I say to Mr Jones?’

  Her righteous expression riled me. I managed to hold myself in check, but only just. ‘I’ll pay,’ I said, ‘soon as I can. But it’s all happened so quickly, I find myself temporarily… I mean if you could just wait a few days—’

  Elizabeth gave a knowing smile. ‘Mr Jones says not to give credit to the king’s sympathisers.’

  I felt rage rise in my throat. ‘But it’s for Abi. Surely you can make an exception? She can’t come herself, and there’s nobody else.’

  ‘When we had bad harvests did the Fanshawes give us grain for nothing?’

  ‘That was different. This is your own sister. Now, don’t be a fool. Fetch me the things I need, for I’m not leaving without them. You owe it to Abi.’

  ‘Fool am I? Don’t take that tone with me. I’ve no need to do what you say. You don’t own any of us anymore. Besides, I owe my sister nothing. Nothing!’ Elizabeth stalked round the front of the table and stood before me, mouth set in a grim line. ‘Do you know what she did? She burned down our house. Destroyed everything our parents had built, made us all paupers overnight. Why do you think my father turned to the liquor?’

  ‘Now wait a minute—’

  But she was in full spate, and she carried on shouting over me, ‘I’ve clawed my way back up, and if there’s one thing I’ve learnt through being poor, it’s pride. Never to ask for credit. You think because you’re the great Lady Katherine Fanshawe we’ll all jump to serve you, but I’ll tell you this – the king’s gone. Fled, like the coward he is. Your title means nothing to us now; it’s worthless. If you want anything from our shelves you’ll have to pay on the nose, like everyone else in the village.’

  The door behind Elizabeth opened and an elderly man with an eyeglass jammed in one eye, peered out, looking from one of us to the other.

  ‘What’s all this commotion?’

  Elizabeth’s face was red but she did not speak.

  ‘I’m from the manor. I need these items straight away,’ I said, with authority. I swept up the list from the table, and held it out to him. ‘But I need them on tally.’

  He plucked the eyeglass from his eye and stared at me. His eyes were cold and hard. ‘Do you now? You’ll not get a grain of dust from me. Even if you offered me a whole chest of bloody gold you’d not be welcome here. Your Royalist scum killed my son at Naseby.’

  He turned and went back through the door. It shut behind him with a bang.

  Elizabeth smirked, as if to say, ‘Told you so,’ as I backed away out of the shop. The venom in the man’s eyes had pierced me like a dart. But that pain lasted only a moment. It was followed by incredulity. How could Elizabeth care so little for her own sister?

  I burst back through the door. ‘You don’t deserve a sister!’ I cried. ‘If she dies,’ I jabbed my finger at her, ‘make no mistake – you will be responsible.’

  *

  The days were shorter now, and the sun was low and cold in the sky as I galloped home. I squinted through the rain, my hair whipping around my face, for the wind howled blustery from the north. My skirts soon grew sodden with wet. Poor Blaze – I cursed the weight of my woman’s clothes and wished I was riding like a man again.

  When I arrived, Mrs Binch was in the kitchen bending over a pot on the fire. She looked up hopefully as I arrived, but her face fell to see me empty handed. ‘What happened?’ she said, as my feet left wet footprints on the flags.

  I told her.

  Mrs Binch’s face grew taut with outrage. ‘The hussy. She wants a good slapping. If I ever get hold of her… what’s the world coming to? What shall we do with no medicine? You’ll have to go out, gather what you can from the hedgerows.’

  ‘Me?’

  ‘Yes. I can’t ride, and you’re not too grand to get a bit of mud on your hands are you?’

  ‘It’s not that. It’s just… I don’t know what to gather.’

  Mrs Binch threw up her arms. ‘Did no one teach you anything?’ Then her face softened. ‘You’re soaked. Come here by the fire.’

  I warmed my wet hem by the embers.

  ‘Abigail won’t eat,’ Mrs Binch said. ‘I’m going to try her with some warm milk and honey from the hive. She’s lost her fight. She won’t open her eyes to me. And who can blame her, with so many of her family already in the ground? Except for her sisters. I suppose Martha’s too small yet, to know what’s happening. Has she heard anything from Elizabeth?’

  ‘Not a word.’

  Mrs Binch sniffed with disapproval, and picked up a ladle to stir the pot. ‘I suppose Elizabeth refused to have Martha there, did she?’

  ‘Weeks ago,’ I said. ‘She insisted there’s more space here, which I suppose is true, but I can’t help feeling she’s loading all the responsibility onto Abi. It’s just not fair, given that Elizabeth’s the eldest.’

  ‘Aye, she’s always been a lazy sow. What will you do?’

  ‘One good thing, I had a message from the parsonage yesterday; they’ll keep Martha with them a while longer, until Abi is well again.’

  ‘I can’t believe Elizabeth and that Jones – that they’d have the gall to turn you away.’

  ‘There’s no welcome there.’ I hitched my skirt and perched my hip on the edge of the table. ‘I’m reaping the harvest of my stepfather and my husband. The tenants haven’t forgotten Sir Simon’s ruthless tithe collecting, nor Thomas, and how he danced to Sir Simon’s tune. They remember there was no mercy from the Fanshawe men, not even in hard times.’

  ‘This house needs life in it. I remember in your mother’s time – so beautiful it was then, all the gentry from round about used to come for the big May ball. Lights twinkling in the chandeliers, the fires all lit, the ladies in their silks and satins. Then I really did have someone to cook for.’ She paused to push me off the table. ‘Look at it now, it’s so sad, I don’t know how you can bear to stay.’

  ‘I know. But with my husband in exile, what choice do I have? I’ve no other relatives to take me in.’

  There was no answer to that, so Mrs Binch pressed her hands on her back as if it ached. Then she sighed heavily and tipped the hot mixture into an earthenware cup. I passed her a cloth to wrap it in, and heard her boots creak up the stairs towards Abi’s room.

  I poked at the fire and it blazed up, so I backed away, watching steam wreathe from my skirt. In the old days, a chambermaid would have brought me a clean dry one, but no more. This last year had turned my life upside down. I was no longer the fine Lady Katherine Fanshawe, but just a girl, with a huge manor house to run.

  4: Two Visitors

  Next morning, the sound of a horse took me to the kitchen window. It darkened
, then moments later Ralph’s friend, Cutch, was at the door. He stood on the threshold, twisting his hat brim in his hands.

  ‘Elizabeth says Abigail’s ill,’ he said.

  ‘Where’ve you been?’ My voice was sharper than I’d intended. ‘Fine friend you are. You’ve been gone weeks, ever since the funeral, with never a word. We thought we’d seen the last of you.’

  ‘Aye. Well I needed some time to think. Now Ralph’s gone… well it hit me hard. I didn’t want to be beholden.’

  ‘You should’ve told us where you were—’

  He held out a leather satchel. ‘Never mind that now, I came to bring these.’

  I sighed, and beckoned him in.

  He dumped his bag on the table. ‘It’s a good thing I know a little about herbs,’ he said, ‘from the battlefield. There’s rumours all over the village that Jones turned you away.’

  ‘You gathered these?’ Mistress Binch asked, pouncing on the bag. She picked through it. ‘Shepherds’ purse and feverfew.’ Her face lit up in a smile. ‘I can make a tisane.’

  ‘Aye,’ Cutch said. ‘Mix it with honey. And there were late apples under the trees, and some plums. Oh, and I borrowed some oats.’

  ‘Borrowed?’ I raised my eyebrows.

  ‘Soper’s barn was open. His horses will have to go hungry.’ Cutch nodded to Mrs Binch’s face. ‘That looks nasty. If you can spare a few, you could use some of these oats to make a poultice for that bruising.’

  Mrs Binch raised her hand to her cheek. ‘It’s nothing. Better to eat it than waste good food.’

  ‘Can I see Abi?’ Cutch asked.

  So it was, that Cutch came back into our lives. He never said where he’d been, but from the look of him, I could tell he’d been living rough. He had the same haunted look in his eyes as Abi.

  When the drink was made, we went up to see her. The room was in semi-darkness, with just a wall sconce to illuminate the room. Even from the door we could hear her breath, rasping and shallow. Cutch was suddenly quiet. He tiptoed over, stared down at her. ‘How long’s she been ill like this?’ he asked, his face angry.