By Royal Command (9 page)

I looked at the man and returned a frown for his frown, for I felt that this question was vulgar from one such as he. I dipped a very small curtsey. ‘And who is it who asks, Sir?’

He faced me out rudely, and did not remove his hat before speaking. ‘I believe it was I who put the first question.’

‘That’s as maybe, Sir,’ I replied, ‘but I don’t give information about my charges to just anyone.’

He gave a short laugh. ‘Your charges – yes! Yet you let them roll about in the dirt like beggars’ brats. What sort of a nursemaid are you? Did your maid bring
you
up so?’

I felt my face turn red. I’d had a humble upbringing, ‘twas true, but I’d never questioned whether my two girls should be raised and treated any differently from the way my ma had raised me. ‘They are merely enjoying one of the few blessings of this harsh weather,’ I said with some indignation. I looked him up and down. ‘Maybe you are a Puritan gentleman, Sir, if you think to stop little children enjoying themselves.’

‘I am not a Puritan,’ he said (and indeed I already knew this from the decorated band of his hat and his brightly coloured boots). ‘But if these are Dr Dee’s children, then they should not be mixing with the common children of the village.’

I gave a scornful laugh. ‘And who are you to say such a thing, and whether they should or no?’

There was a moment’s silence before he gave a short bow and announced with some pomposity, ‘I am their new tutor, Madam.’

Incredulous, I wanted to stand and gape at this, but doing my best to act with dignity, merely said, ‘Then I am your servant, Sir.’

‘Yours, Madam,’ he returned, before I gave the most meagre curtsey and turned away.

Without more ado, I called Beth and Merryl from the slide and we set off down the road to market. I was seething with rage, and also embarrassed and indignant. How dare he presume to tell me how to care for my own two charges!

‘Why aren’t you speaking to us?’ Beth asked after a while, looking up at me.

‘And why is your face all pink?’

‘That is, it’s pink where it isn’t muddy!’ Beth said.

‘Is it muddy?’ I asked crossly.

Merryl began giggling. ‘Yes! You look like Tom-fool the monkey the time he got loose in the boot blacking box.’

‘Oh!’ I said. I got out a kerchief to scrub at my face. So I hadn’t even achieved a dignified leave-taking. The children’s tutor! How ever was I going to tolerate being under the same roof – and perhaps take instruction – from such a man?

Scowling, I tucked my kerchief into my pocket and set off once more, very anxious to see Isabelle and tell everything that had happened.

Chapter Seven

‘
B
ring jugs of hot water!’ Mr Kelly demanded when I answered the ringing of the bell in the library next morning. ‘And two bowls, scissors, washing cloths and towels.’

I stared at him in surprise, wondering if he had gone a little vacant in the head. He clapped his hands. ‘Now. At once.’

‘As he says,’ Dr Dee said, and I saw to my great surprise that Dr Dee had partly disrobed, and was standing by the fireplace wearing nothing but a loose cotton night smock.

Turning away from this alarming sight, I went to boil water and also inform Mistress Midge that the master and Mr Kelly had lost their senses. ‘Either that, or they plan to set up as barber-surgeons, for they want me to bring them hot water, scissors and towels.’

‘Oh, ‘tis nothing but a cleansing ritual,’ said Mistress Midge. ‘They do them on occasion.’

‘But why?’

‘It means that one of their schemes has gone awry.’

‘One of their schemes . . .’ I repeated. The Miss Charity one, no doubt.

‘The cleansing ritual is to rid the house of any evil spirits which might have caused such a thing.’

‘But why do they need washing water?’

Merryl, who was grooming Tom-fool, patiently explained, as if I were the child and she the adult: ‘Father and Mr Kelly have to wash themselves thoroughly and clip their nails so that no amount of dirt is attached to their bodies. And then they must make an invocation five times to the east and five times to the west.’

‘And then what?’

‘Then they light brimstone, and the smoke from this drives any remaining evil spirits away from the house.’

‘I see,’ I said, and trusted they would never find that it was I, in fact, who had caused the collapse of their plan, and not an evil spirit at all.

The children’s tutor, by name Mister Leopold Sylvester, began his tutorage of the children two days later. A small room off the hallway was designated the school room and I had been instructed to clean this and make it ready with a table, chair and stools and so on, then light a fire ready for the first lesson. You can imagine that I was extremely thorough in the dusting of this room, the washing of the window, the polishing of the table and the sweeping up and relaying of rushes on the floor. I was determined that Mr Sylvester should not discover me in any way negligent.

The fire was troublesome, however, for the chimney was unused and damp, and sent smoke into the room, and I was trying to deal with this when Dr Dee brought in Mr Sylvester to commence his lessons. Both men immediately started coughing and Dr Dee ran to throw open a window. This only made things worse, as it let icy cold air into the room and caused smoke to billow out of the fireplace in great gusts. At least this incident helped to cover the embarrassment I felt on seeing the tutor again, for by the time order was restored my cheeks had cooled. I was even able to appear unperturbed when, in response to Dr Dee’s introduction, the tutor told him that we had already met. I lowered my eyes at this point, curtseyed to him very formally and said I hoped he’d find my young ladies studious and diligent in their work.

‘And so do I,’ he said before moving the table slightly, seating himself on the chair and taking out some books. He was dressed more in the manner of a scholar on this day, I noticed, for he wore a dark furred gown and cap and had exchanged his coloured leather boots for plain velvet slippers.

Once the fire was burning well, I took Beth and Merryl along to the school room, tapped on the door and ushered them in.

‘This is Beth,’ I began, propelling her forward, ‘and this Merryl.’

‘Good morning, young ladies,’ Mr Sylvester said, inclining his head, and the girls returned his greeting and seated themselves on the stools. They were looking at him rather nervously, but this, I discovered later, was because they were fearful about what he might set them to do, not because they’d recognised him as the man on the riverbank.

I was about to leave the room, thankful that he’d not reproached me about the manner of our first meeting, when he suddenly addressed me, saying, ‘Perhaps, Lucy, we should forget that we have met before and begin our acquaintance from this day.’

I looked at him, very surprised. ‘Yes. Thank you, Sir.’

He nodded. ‘That will be all, then,’ he said, and I left the room and went back to the kitchen to report that Mr Sylvester might not, perhaps, be as niggardly a scullion as I’d first supposed.

That afternoon Mistress Midge and I were at the kitchen sink, dealing with the pots and pans from dinner, when we noticed the large numbers of people walking along the riverbank. Some of these were gathering holly and ivy for Christmastide and consequently were laden with greenery, but there were many others about, well wrapped against the weather, walking purposefully and all going the same way: upriver towards Richmond.

‘It seems like a party to which everyone has been invited except us!’ Beth remarked, and on the bellman going past and calling something which we didn’t quite catch, she was straightaway despatched to run and ask him what he’d said. She came back to report that he was calling with news of a frost fair. ‘It’s on the river just before Kingston, and will be held each afternoon until the ice melts!’ she added with some excitement.

‘Lord above. Whatever next?’ Mistress Midge muttered.

‘We must go!’ I responded. ‘Won’t you come with us?’

‘To slide about on ice, to fall over and crack my head?’ said that lady. ‘Certainly not.’

But Merryl and Beth were fair dancing with excitement already, so I gained permission from Mistress Dee, sent them to get their warmest cloaks, boots and gloves, and we set off.

If I’d known how long the walk would take I may not have attempted the journey, but luckily I managed to get the girls a lift in a baker’s handcart and walked briskly alongside them, trying to keep pace. I’ve said that the girls were excited, but I was equally so, for frost fairs were as rare as pig’s eggs. Ma had once told me of one that she’d been to in her youth, but I’d never visited one before.

At every town and village we passed – Twickenham, Teddington, Richmond – more people joined the river walk, and all were happy, sometimes singing as they walked along, sharing slabs of gingerbread, squares of biscuit-bread or whatever victuals they had with them.

Our first glimpse of the fair came just as dusk was falling and the air was soft and misty all around. Viewed under these conditions any place can take on a kind of enchantment, but to come around the bend in the river by Hampton, to hear music playing and see the frost fair from a distance, lit at each side of the river by huge baskets of burning coals, was truly a glimpse of a kind of faeryland, and those who were on the cart jumped down and began to run along the tow path in order to reach the fair the sooner.

I’d remembered to bring some money with me, and this was soon required, for we found that the ferrymen, deprived of their usual income, had taken over the frozen river and were charging a penny for every person (and six pence for horse and carriage) to come down the bank on to the ice. Once safely down, I took Merryl and Beth by the hand and made them promise not to stray too far from me, for – perhaps attracted by the aristocracy parading the ice in their fine furs – I could see several knavish looking fellows who were no doubt out for a day’s mischief and pickpocketing.

The frozen river had been smoothed over and brushed with sand to make walking easier, and between the two banks stakes had been dug into the ice, with a candle placed atop of each, so that the greater part of the fair was contained in a long, straight roadway between the two opposing riverbanks. Inside this boundary were rows of booths, some selling foodstuffs and others containing various side-shows and all the usual fun of the fair: a counting dog, a pig said to be able to speak its name, peddlers selling singing birds and pretty trifles for the ladies. Outside these confines were other activities: a sledge you could sit in and be pushed along the ice, some ponies trotting on straw, a swing-chair and a boat upon wheels, this latter with its sail outspread ready to take you along to a nearby island said to be famous for its eel pies. At another booth you could, if you were so minded, hire wooden skates which had come all the way from Holland, and a man was demonstrating these by spinning around and around in a marvellous way and attracting a large crowd.

We walked around looking at everything, at first setting down our feet gently and with some trepidation, but soon discovering that in a short while all seemed quite safe and natural and you could forget that you were walking on something so slippery.

Passing another booth, Beth gave a sudden shrill scream.

‘Look down!’ she instructed us. ‘Look down beneath your feet!’

Merryl and I did so and shrieked as well, for where we were standing the ice had been polished clear so that one could see through it right down to the bottom of the river, where – by what miracle I couldn’t say – a woman could be seen, quite dead, lying in a boat, her shroud loose and her hair floating about her.

‘’Tis the lady of the lake.’ A knave who had been standing to one side now sprung forward. ‘And you have spied her in her pretty boat coffin. That will be three pence each, if you please.’

‘But we didn’t
want
to see her!’ I said straight, and would have liked to add that it was a river and not a lake, so how could she have been the lady of one? ‘’Tis only that we walked over her and there was no help for it.’

He winked at me. ‘Those that see the lady of the lake find that special good fortune follows them. Nine pence, if you please.’