Saraband for Two Sisters (13 page)

What was it—this sudden fear? It had seemed so easy. All I had to do was put the toad in her bed, leave it there for Mab to find when she came to do the beds, then when she ran out, as I was sure she would, I was to go in and remove the toad so that when she brought the others to see it, it would have disappeared, which I felt was just the sort of thing a familiar would do.

As I stood there in that room and I could feel the toad moving in the kerchief, I had an impulse to drop it and run. I thought to myself: Suppose she is truly a witch. She bewitched Bastian. Suppose the toad
is
her familiar! Suppose it is a devil in toad form! But I had found him—a perfectly harmless toad—by the pond in the garden and it was I who had placed him in her bed.

It was just a feeling that eyes were watching me. Why? I went swiftly to the door between the two rooms. I looked inside. No one was there. Then I ran from the room, out into the corridor. I could hear Mab’s voice as she explained what she had seen.

In the corridor I could hear Ginny’s voice: ‘’Tis nothing. You dreamed it. ’Twas because we was talking of toads.’

And Mab: ‘I can’t go in there. I’d die rather.’

I waited in one of the rooms while they went up to Carlotta’s room, then I came swiftly along the gallery and down the stairs, praying I should meet no one. I went out through a side door and across a courtyard to the gardens.

I sped across to the pool and laid down the kerchief. The toad remained still for several seconds. I watched him fearfully, half expecting him to turn into some horrible shape, but seeming to realize that he was free and on his home ground he made his cautious way to the edge of the pool and hid himself under a large stone.

I picked up the kerchief and went into the house.

On the way I met several of the maids, who were chattering wildly together.

‘What’s happened?’ I said.

‘Oh, ’twas Mab, Miss Bersaba. Her be well nigh in hysterics.’

‘Why?’

‘’Tis what her have seen in the lady Carlotta’s bed.’

‘In her bed?’

Ginny said: ‘Mab could have fancied it. There were no toad there when I went up.’

The maids were silent, their eyes on my face.

‘Whatever made Mab imagine such a thing?’ I asked.

‘’Tis talk, Miss Bersaba,’ said Ginny.

‘I did see it,’ Mab insisted. ‘It were there … on her pillow. The way it looked at me … ’twere terrible. It was like no other toad I seen.’

‘Well, where is it now?’ I asked with a hint of impatience.

‘It have clean disappeared,’ said Ginny.

‘Well, that’s a blessing,’ I answered, infusing scepticism into my voice.

And I passed on.

I knew that that night the great topic of conversation among the servants would be the toad Mab had seen in Carlotta’s bed. I knew too that the story of the toad would not be confined to the Priory. It would spread to the village. I wondered what Thomas Gast would say when he heard it. The habits of witches would be great sin in his eyes.

I dreamed of him that night standing by his furnace with his wild eyes gloating on the flames.

I
T WAS LATE AFTERNOON
and I was in our orchard, lying beneath my favourite apple tree and thinking of Bastian and wondering what he was doing at that time. He had looked so unhappy when he had left, and although I had pretended to be unaware of him I was far from that. I hoped he was unhappy. He should be. He had deceived me and now he was parted from Carlotta, for she was undecided whether or not she would marry him, and when one considered her growing friendship with Sir Gervaise, the wealthy courtier, it seemed unlikely that she would take Bastian, the country squire.

So I hated her on two counts—one for taking my lover and the other for finding him not good enough for her. When I considered that I could gloat over the toad incident. I knew the servants talked of little else because I eavesdropped continuously. Often I would come upon them in a room, on the stairs or in the gardens whispering together. They would stop when I approached, but not before I had discovered the subject of their conversation.

Sometimes I would grow impatient. What if Carlotta decided to go back to Castle Paling? She would then go away … back to Bastian … and when she was out of sight people here would forget their suspicions.

While I was brooding in this way Ginny came out to the orchard.

She said: ‘I saw ’ee come out here, Miss Bersaba, so I knew where you were to. There’s someone as wants a word with you … and in secret.’

Ginny spoke in a quiet voice with a tremor of excitement in it which made her seem conspiratorial. My feelings of guilt were growing very strong. I would start when anyone spoke to me because I suppose I felt that someone had watched me put the toad in the bed and remove it and understood what I was doing—so that … when the time came they would know what part I had played in the drama.

Ginny’s next words quashed my fears in that direction but startled me nevertheless. ‘It’s Phoebe Gast,’ she said.

‘What does she want?’

‘She wants to see you, Miss Bersaba. She be in the barn. She have asked me to come for you and ask you if you’d talk to her like.’

The barn was a stone-walled building in which corn was stored. It was apart from the other outbuildings and one had to cross a small field after leaving the gardens to reach it.

‘Does anyone know she’s there?’

‘Oh no, mistress. She be scared out of her wits, I do tell ’ee. She waited in the lane for me, for she knows I come along that way, and she darted out and said to me, “Tell Mistress Bersaba. Tell her I must see her.” Then she told me she was going to the barn.’

‘I’ll go and see what’s wrong,’ I said; but I knew, and I felt exultant in a way because she had come to me.

When we reached the barn, I pushed open the door and looked in. The creak of the door brought Phoebe to her feet and as soon as she saw who it was relief flooded over her poor sad face.

I felt adult, in charge of the situation, as Angelet, who lacked my experience, could never have been.

I said: ‘Ginny, go back to the house. Don’t tell anyone that Phoebe is here. I will see you when I get back.’

Ginny ran off and I shut the barn door.

‘Oh mistress,’ cried Phoebe, ‘I had nowhere to go. And I thought of you. You was terrible kind to me the other day.’

‘I did nothing, Phoebe.’

‘’Twas the way you looked at me. As though you understood like.’

‘Now, Phoebe,’ I said. ‘You have been with a man and you are going to have a child. That’s it, isn’t it?’

‘You be terrible sharp, mistress. How did ’ee know?’

‘I did know,’ I said. ‘I am … perceptive.’ I think she thought I meant I had special powers, and she was so desperate, poor girl, that she seemed to look upon me as some goddess who could drag her out of her trouble. A great pleasure swept over me to be so regarded. It was strange to have been thinking of bringing disaster, possibly death, to one woman so recently and then to feel gratified because I was going to save another. It was a sort of expiation, placating the angels. Moreover, I felt a sense of power which was very gratifying—and like a balm laid on the wounds which Bastian had inflicted.

I sat down beside her. ‘How did it happen?’ I asked.

‘He said I were pretty and he did like the look of me. He said he couldn’t keep his eyes off me. I hadn’t thought I could be pretty to anyone before that. It just made me soft like, I reckon.’

‘Poor Phoebe,’ I said, ‘it must have been hard living in that cottage with a father like yours.’

At the mention of her father Phoebe began to tremble.

‘I fear him, Mistress Bersaba.’ She unbuttoned the shapeless black gown and showed me the marks of a lash on her shoulder. ‘He gave me that for singing a song about spring on the sabbath day,’ she said. ‘What he’d give me for this I don’t dare think. He’d kill me, I reckon. I deserve it, I don’t doubt. I’ve been so wicked.’

‘Why did you do it, Phoebe?’

‘The need to came over me, mistress.’

I nodded. Who could understand better than I?

‘Let us be practical,’ I said. ‘Does he know?’

‘Oh God help us, no. My mother does and he might beat it out of her. He’ll blame her for my sins. He’ll say she knew of my wanton ways and let them go unpunished. What can I do, Mistress Bersaba?’

‘I’ll think,’ I said.

‘You be terrible good to me. No one ain’t ever been so good before.’

I felt somehow ashamed. I would never have believed I would. I was learning something about myself. I could put myself so easily into Phoebe’s place. I could feel the need coming over me and I could see myself, if I had been Thomas Gast’s daughter, finding myself in the same position as she was.

It was for this reason that I could give out this comfort, this understanding, and even in that moment I thought: Angelet could never be the same. Innocent Angelet could not understand.

I said: ‘Could the man marry you?’

She shook her head. ‘He be married. I did know at the time. I can’t think what came over me.’

‘How old is the baby?’

‘Well, ’twould be six months nearly. There comes the time when it can’t be hid no more … and that time’s come now.’

‘So you ran away.’

‘Yes, my mother knew. Her’s known for a day or two. Her’s beside herself. She keeps saying: “Gast’ll kill you.” He’s a hard man … but a good man. He can’t abide sin and I reckon this is about one of the biggest sins there is. She was frightened for me. So I ran away. I thought it best.’

She was looking at me with pleading eyes, and I said, ‘Don’t worry, Phoebe, I’ll see to it. You mustn’t get too upset. It’s bad for the baby.’

‘Oh, the baby, I wish it dead, mistress. I wish I was dead. I did think of doing away with myself but … I couldn’t somehow.’

‘You mustn’t talk like that. Now, that
is
wicked. Listen. You will stay here for tonight. Nobody knows you’re here except Ginny and she won’t dare tell anyone because she knows I’ll be angry if she does. I’ll bring you a wool cloak to wrap yourself in and I’ll bring you food. There’s a bolt on the barn door. When I go, pull it across the door and don’t open it for anyone but me. In the morning I’ll have a plan.’

She started to cry. ‘Oh Mistress Bersaba. You be terrible good to me. You’re like an angel, that’s what you are … an angel of mercy. I won’t ever forget this …’

‘Don’t say any more. Just wait there. I’ll be back.’

I came out of the barn and heard her pull the bolt as I had bidden. I felt exultant, powerful, godlike, as I went into the house.

The next morning I realized that I could not keep Phoebe indefinitely in the barn and there was only one thing I could do and that was tell my mother. I could have done that the previous night, for I knew very well what her reaction would be. She would never turn away a girl in Phoebe’s condition. I was beginning to take a sharp look at myself, and I did not disguise the fact that I had behaved as I had because of a love of power. I had wanted to take all the glory of saving Phoebe for myself and no one else was to have a share in it. So it was I who had taken food and covering down to her. It was I who kept her secret for a night.

But now I must tell my mother before Phoebe was discovered. I found her in the stillroom with one of the servants, and she looked up with pleasure when she saw me. She always liked us to come to the stillroom because she thought it was so good for us to learn the secrets of preserving and such culinary arts.

‘Mother,’ I said, ‘I want to speak to you.’

I must have looked very serious, for she immediately said to the servant: ‘You carry on, Annie.’ And to me: ‘Come to my bedroom, Bersaba.’

So we went there and I told her that Phoebe was going to have a child and had run away from home and that I had hidden her in the barn for the night.

‘Oh, poor, poor girl. What will become of her? Thomas Gast is such a cruel man. Why didn’t you come to me last night?’

‘She was so distressed, Mother, and I didn’t quite know what you would say. I had to save her for at least a night. I said I would do what I could. We must help her.’

‘Of course we must. She can’t go back to that father of hers.’

‘Could she stay here?’

‘She will have to. Where else is there? But what of the child?’

‘Ginny’s child stays here.’

‘I know. But Ginny was one of our servants. We mustn’t let people think that they can have children as they like and that the Priory is a sort of home for them.’

I knew that while she was talking she was wondering what she could do for Phoebe. She would never turn her away and she would let the child stay here because she would say that a child cannot be parted from its mother. I could see the horror in her eyes, which meant that she was contemplating Thomas Gast’s avenging anger if the girl ever fell into his hands.

‘Mother,’ I said, ‘she is terrified. If you could see her you would have to help.’

‘My dearest child, of course we shall help her. She will have to come here at least until the child is born and then we will see what can be done.’

‘Oh, thank you, Mother.’

She looked at me, her eyes full of love and approval. ‘I am so happy, Bersaba, to see how compassionate you can be.’

‘I have not done wrong to promise her, to give her hope?’

‘I wouldn’t have had you do anything else. Go down to the barn and bring her to the house.’

Exultantly I went.

Phoebe drew back the bolt when I said who it was. Her eyes were shadowed and still filled with terror.

‘It’s all right,’ I told her. ‘You are going to stay here. I have spoken to my mother. She says you are not to worry. The baby will be born here and then we’ll see.’

Phoebe fell to her knees and, taking my hand, kissed it.

I felt wonderfully happy. I had not felt like that since I had heard of Bastian’s deception and I had thought I never would again.

It was impossible to keep Phoebe’s presence at the Priory a secret. Not that we had attempted to. My parents said that Thomas Gast would have to know sooner or later and the sooner perhaps the better. His daughter’s disappearance would have to be explained, and it could only be a matter of hours before one of the servants talked to someone in the village, and such news would spread like wildfire.