The Memory Palace Page 9

  Zeal kept her head down as she began to cube the stale bread. ‘It’s all true.’

  Mistress Margaret squeaked like a small rusty hinge. She got up and took the yeast sponge from the oven where it had been rising overnight along with a bowl of water. Still silent, she beat down the puffy yeast mix with a wooden spoon, measured flour by the hand full, mixed all together. Her amethyst ear drops trembled.

  Zeal swept the bread cubes and crumbs into the hens’ basket, then stooped to feed the sleeping fire under the first bread oven.

  ‘I don’t understand,’ said Mistress Margaret at last. ‘If you love my nephew as you claim, how can you bolt to the altar before his ship has scarce cleared the horizon?’ She turned the dough out onto the floured tabletop and attacked it with both fists. She pinched her small mouth, then sniffed angrily. ‘I expected better of you, my girl.’

  ‘I’m sorry.’

  Mistress Margaret turned the dough and slapped it, though not as hard as she might have done before the knuckles of her hands had grown swollen and red. She worked for several minutes with her head down. ‘I’m not sure I can live here if Wentworth becomes master. Even if he deigns to permit me. But where can I go? How can you do this to me, at my age?’

  Can’t she see what’s before her eyes? Zeal wondered. Even if she’s never carried a child herself? Rachel guessed.

  She ached to tell the older woman, but Mistress Margaret had kept a secret just once in her life, and then only when her nephew’s life had depended on it. ‘I won’t let him turn you out, aunt. In any case, our lives won’t change that much. He has no ambitions beyond his fishing. We shall carry on just as before.’

  Fiercely, the older woman pressed down on the dough, folded and turned it then pressed down again. The smell of raw yeast began to fill the air. ‘I had thought – at the worst, if it came to it – that you might have to make a business-like marriage to bring in some money to help run and repair the estate. And pay our Crown levies. But all Master Wentworth can settle on you is a bucket of trout! And not even his own trout, at that! Most likely your trout! The old wrinkle-shanks!’ She thumped the dough again and raised her voice. ‘And I don’t care if he hears me!’

  She paused as one of the dairymaids staggered in from the cow barn with two full pails. Together the three women lifted the heavy pails to pour the milk into a shallow lead sink rescued from the dairy house, so that the cream could rise to the top for skimming.

  ‘The churn Mistress Wilde lent us from Far Beeches needs to be scoured and set to dry in the sun,’ Zeal told the maid.

  ‘Waste!’ muttered Mistress Margaret, pummelling her dough again.

  Zeal began to pump the bellows.

  ‘I like the man well enough, don’t mistake me,’ said Mistress Margaret.

  Slap, thump.

  ‘…As far as I’ve had a chance to know, that is. It’s not that…can you find me the seeds?’

  Slap, thump.

  ‘…but he’s old. And odd.’

  Thump!

  ‘…keeping to himself, forbidding anyone to clean his chamber. He might be a murderer for all we know. Have chests full of severed heads.’ She sliced the dough into six smaller lumps.

  Zeal took a lump and began to shape a cob loaf. ‘I like him well enough too.’

  ‘“Like!” La, la!’ Mistress Margaret stood staring down at her loaf. Then she burst into tears and hobbled out of the bake house.

  Before Zeal had shaped her second loaf, Rachel came into the kitchen. Without speaking, she went straight to the second oven and began to work the bellows.

  After several minutes, Zeal said into the silence, ‘Yes, it’s all true.’

  ‘God be praised!’ Rachel’s elbows flapped as if she were a duck trying to lift off a pond. ‘I can save my tears then.’

  When Zeal passed him in the forecourt mid-morning, Doctor Bowler wore the expression of a kicked dog and avoided her eyes.

  ‘Terrible, terrible about Harry,’ he said. Though he did not mention the proposed marriage, she knew by his odd manner that Wentworth had spoken to him as promised.

  By the end of morning milking, the rest of Hawkridge estate seemed to have heard the news of both death and marriage, and split into those for the match and those against. John Nightingale had been popular during the fourteen years he had run the estate, first for his uncle and then for his cousin. Wentworth shunned friendship and had often given offence by repulsing well-meant overtures. Few were in favour.

  ‘They’ll work it out soon enough,’ Rachel told her, having caught Zeal near tears in the still room. ‘But we must get you into a safe berth first.’

  Zeal pinched her lips and drew a deep breath. ‘And what do you hear about Sir Harry’s death?’

  Rachel peered into a tiered muslin sieve, which was dripping a greenish juice into a crock. ‘Everyone on the estate knows the truth of what happened. Any rumours will soon die.’

  Zeal had never before felt out of favour here, even when first proving herself to them as Harry’s new, fourteen-year-old wife. Now the averted eyes and pursed lips hurt her. She hated the way talk stopped whenever she entered a room. She was frightened by the occasional assessing eye that measured her waist. Wentworth was right. They must marry as soon as possible.

  That morning, Wentworth abandoned his rod and the river to spend several hours with Sir Richard. Then, he borrowed a horse from Zeal and set off for Winchester.

  She watched her betrothed settle into the saddle and gather up the reins. At least I now know that he can ride.

  The beech avenue swallowed him.

  Perhaps he has gone for good. His proposal was a cruel jest. And he has taken my horse. How can I know differently?

  She had planned to write that morning to tell John of her proposed marriage. Now she decided to wait until she knew for certain that Wentworth was coming back. It was best not to tempt fate.

  Wentworth returned three days later with an ordinary ecclesiastical licence issued by the diocese, which allowed them to be wed at once, without calling the banns. Though the growing child was the reason for this saving of three weeks, Zeal was grateful that news of the marriage need not be published throughout the parish. The disapproval and curiosity on Hawkridge Estate alone were as much as she could bear. She did not ask how Wentworth had managed to acquire the licence. Nor did she know that both Sir Richard and Master Wilde of Far Beeches had each stood surety for a large sum of money, to guarantee, accurately or not, that Wentworth’s written allegation presented to the archdeacon contained no falsehoods concerning her state of legal spinsterhood.

  After one night back, on Michaelmas Day, Wentworth borrowed the horse again, this time to ride to Basingstoke.

  ‘Surely I must settle a jointure on you, not the other way round,’ Zeal told him unhappily. ‘Do we need a lawyer to ensure your right to my pile of ashes?’

  On marriage all her property became his, as it had become Harry’s. She had much less now than then, but nevertheless, if Philip had had a male heir, that heir, not she, would have the right to whatever remained after Philip’s death. Or a creditor of his might attach the estate, or the king might declare it forfeit if Wentworth committed a crime.

  From the little he had told her so far, an unknown crime did not seem beyond possibility. These risks were the price of her child’s life.

  The lawyer Wentworth brought from Basingstoke was eating toasted bread and cheese at the bake house table while a kitchen groom held another slice on a knifepoint over the fire. The man’s papers and pens waited on Zeal’s table in the estate office.

  Wentworth nodded curtly at yet another of the house family who had found an excuse to visit the bake house kitchen. ‘Am I a specimen in a menagerie, that all these people must come peer at me?’

  The second dairymaid’s face disappeared from the kitchen door.

  ‘You’re not often seen. And, by day, this is always a busy place.’

  ‘Small wonder I prefer the riverbanks!’ He led her t
o one of the little windows and stooped as if to look out. ‘I will almost certainly die before you,’ he said quietly. ‘I want no one to find anything irregular in our union. For the child’s sake.’ He glared at the kitchen groom, who fled. ‘Also, I want to make secure your absolute title to Hawkridge again after I am gone, not just dower rights or a widow’s annuity.’

  She nodded. It was kind of him to think of such things, although she would be leaving Hawkridge in any case, when John sent in seven years for her to go to the West Indies. None of which Wentworth knew. ‘Arrange things as you wish,’ she said, avoiding his eyes.

  He scratched the bristle on his chin and smiled. ‘“On my obedient wife, Zeal Wentworth, I settle, herewith, two fishing rods of willow with copper rings, four Brown Queens, two Peacocks and a dozen hooks of the finest Spanish steel.”’

  Zeal laughed.

  Wentworth looked at first startled and then pleased that he seemed to have amused her.

  ‘You might find use for my rods, if you’ll allow me to teach you to fish. Then you can leave them to the child…the thought pleases me. I might even leave the cub my books direct.’ He peered through the window again. ‘And here comes Sir Richard at last, to be our witness. I swear he’s making his horse trot on tiptoe to spare his head.’

  That image of her neighbour, short, round and undoubtedly sore-headed from his night of drinking, made Zeal laugh again.

  Wentworth again looked both startled and pleased.

  He’s grown used to amusing only himself, she thought. At the least, I can give him my laughter. I think he really does mean me well.

  The lawyer finished the last of his bread and brushed the crumbs from his long white collar as Sir Richard opened the bake house door.

  The old knight took off his hat and fanned himself. ‘Oho! The happy couple.’ He mopped his bald head and replaced his hat. His reddened eyes sat in their puffy sockets like specks of grit in two oysters. ‘Don’t know how you’ll take to this news, but Doctor Gifford sent me word that he can make time to marry you Saturday next, if I have no objections as magistrate.’

  ‘That’s only eight days!’ cried Mistress Margaret, returning with ale for Sir Richard in time to hear. ‘How can we prepare in eight days?’

  ‘But surely our own Doctor Bowler must marry us!’ Zeal protested. ‘If he’s willing.’

  Sir Richard and Wentworth exchanged glances.

  ‘Doctor Gifford is the parish incumbent and a strong voice in the parish council,’ said Sir Richard. ‘Doctor Bowler merely your estate parson.’

  ‘All the more reason for him to bless an estate union.’ Zeal folded her arms. ‘I don’t like Gifford. He will be a weight dragging us down. Doesn’t the man know that God resides above? He should lift spirits, not always be tugging them down towards damnation.’

  ‘I can’t stomach the man,’ said Sir Richard. ‘But it would not be politic to offend either him or the parish vestry.’

  ‘Why not?’ she demanded.

  Sir Richard and Wentworth exchanged another of those maddening male looks.

  ‘We must give no one any excuse to question the marriage,’ said Wentworth.

  Zeal pursed her lips and wound a sleeve ribbon around her finger until the tip looked like a ripe cherry. She tried not to think of the darkness that Gifford would cast over the wedding. The whole venture was already as fragile as a bubble. ‘He must agree at least to marry us here at Hawkridge in our own chapel. I shall tell him so.’

  ‘Best leave that to me,’ said Sir Richard hastily. ‘I’ve an examination to make in Bedgebury tomorrow in any case.’

  The lawyer cleared his throat politely to indicate that he was now ready.

  The next Sunday, as negotiated on the night of the inquiry into Sir Harry’s death, Zeal took herself and her household to their monthly service in Bedgebury parish church. Sir Richard, of course, had not been part of the deal and waved them off with too much gusto for Zeal’s liking. Wentworth had never attended prayers and apparently did not mean to begin now.

  He’s the blasted rudder after all, Zeal thought crossly as the little procession set off along the track downstream along the river to Bedgebury. But I don’t suppose Gifford is worried about his soul.

  Doctor Bowler, however, trudged glumly at her side, still avoiding her eyes. ‘All that sermonizing,’ he said. ‘I won’t be comfortable. And with no hymns or Prayer Book! I shall feel as if I’m talking to a stranger, not my own God.’

  ‘I wish you were marrying us, not Doctor Gifford,’ said Zeal.

  They both huffed and waved their hands to disperse a cloud of late gnats, which hovered in a sunny patch.

  ‘Will you want wedding music?’ Bowler enquired carefully as the shady tunnel closed round them again.

  ‘Oh, yes! But I feared to ask.’

  ‘Because Gifford will disapprove.’ He nodded in understanding of her difficulty.

  ‘Gifford can’t be allowed to order everything in the parish!’ She glanced at his long, hound’s face. He suffered so when he found himself at odds with anyone. ‘No, I didn’t ask because I know you don’t approve of the match.’

  They crossed a little hunting bridge in silence. Then, as they joined the larger track that led from Far Beeches to Bedgebury, Doctor Bowler said, ‘I had thought I might compose an epithalamium.’

  Zeal beamed. ‘Dear Doctor Bowler!’

  ‘But what of Doctor Gifford?’

  ‘Master Wentworth seems to know how to deal with him. I’m sure that if I say I want your epithalamium, we shall have it.’

  They smiled at each other with the delicious relief of truce.

  ‘Would you also deck the chapel?’ she asked. ‘If Master Wentworth and I are to be united by that dispiriting Scot we can at least cheer ourselves with the sight of ivy and green boughs.’

  ‘And sheaves of ripe corn,’ said Bowler. ‘And pumpkins. All the bounty that autumnal Nature provides.’

  ‘Apples.’

  ‘Grapes and peaches.’ Bowler flushed with excitement. ‘It will give me great pleasure both to decorate and to compose a celebratory piece for you.’ He gazed up into the trees. ‘Seth must re-string his viol so we can march on the firm ground of his continuo.’ He hummed a few notes in an exploratory way. ‘…great pleasure.’ He seemed as relieved as she was at his relenting.

  She had heard it said that Bowler failed as a clergyman because he always understood both sides of any question with equal conviction. He could not find it in himself ever to condemn. Anyone who wanted to know exactly where he or she stood in relationship to Heaven and Hell or whether to play shove ha’penny on Sunday, had to attend church in Bedgebury, where Doctor Gifford delighted in firm pronouncements, invited or otherwise.

  She smiled sideways at her parson as they trudged onwards towards Bedgebury. He continued to frown and hum, waving his hands from time to time, even voicing a few notes.

  How dare Doctor Gifford dismiss him as a clergyman? Though perhaps an over-forgiving shepherd for wayward sheep, Doctor Bowler gives us rich gifts of the spirit in return for his milk and eggs.

  She glanced over her shoulder at the straggling procession behind them.

  From among those walkers Bowler had formed a chapel choir of an excellence surprising in such a rural backwater. For this choir, he composed psalms and hymns exactly suited to their voices. From among those same estate residents, he also mustered and tutored a consort of instruments, which included his own fiddle, a double bass viol, a viola da gamba, several pipes, a tabor and the smith’s great drum. He and this crew played for church festivals and for dancing on secular feast days with equal fervour and delight. But Bowler’s unique gift was his voice.

  It was high, but not falsetto, nor was it a simulacrum of a woman’s soprano, like the voice of an Italian castrato. Its piercing purity of tone suggested some other instrument than a human voice, an instrument not known on earth, the vibrating of a silver reed blown only in Heaven.

  Bowler loved to sing as mu
ch as he disliked making judgements. For feverish children, who saw wolves and demons among the bed curtains, he stood diffidently in the sick chamber and sang light into the shadows and smiling faces onto the foot of the bed. He sang a small green grass snake into his pocket and a robin onto the corner of the pillow.

  For the dying, he sang stars of light into dusty folds of hangings. He sang the smell of fresh pine and the sweetness of witch hazel blooms. He sang long-vanished faces around the bed. He sang clear still water. He sang rest.

  For the others, he sang rising barn walls, candles, leaping flames, magic cups that were always full. Sweet meats and diamonds. Golden arrows for the hunter’s bow. God. He could sing warmth around the heart, lightness beneath the ribs, fizzing in the belly. He could lift the hair on your neck with the sound of hope.

  For Zeal, Doctor Bowler’s music would bless her strange, uncomfortable marriage with a joy she saw nowhere else. She did not see that she had just declared war against an unreasoning enemy, with her little parson as both ally and cause.

  13

  Gifford nodded with gratification when he saw their party arrive in the Bedgebury parish church. Heads turned in the congregation. Some bent together to whisper. Elbows nudged ribs.

  Zeal missed the pleasure of singing hymns and had difficulty suppressing yawns during Gifford’s long sermon on the spiritual perils of revolt. She found the undecorated stone walls of the parish church astonishingly plain for a house of God. Otherwise all seemed well enough, until they left.

  Doctor Gifford stood in the porch bidding farewell to his sheep. As Zeal and Bowler stepped out into the sunlight, he gave the parson a letter.

  ‘But I am certain, madam, that you will wish to note the contents.’

  Zeal knew instantly that she would not wish any such thing but, mindful of the caution voiced by Wentworth and Sir Richard, she bade the minister a civil farewell.