The Innocent (3 page)

“Do not worry, Father, she’s only tired. It’s been a long feast.”

From that moment things had changed.

Later, Deborah told the girl that with the spring it would be time for her to go to London and into service with a pious household. There she could complete the education that had been begun in the forest, for Deborah had no more to teach Anne in their small, safe world. The girl had cried herself to sleep for many nights, but Deborah was implacable, though it broke both their hearts. And so now, miserably, weighted with a sense of the abandonment to come, the girl followed her foster mother deeper and deeper into the city until they stood before the closed door of a great, dark house.

Chapter Two

“You say you can both read and write Latin?”

The man in the thronelike chair looked suspiciously at Anne as he smoothed the surface of the fine silk carpet covering his worktable with a capable, broad hand.

“Yes, master, I can—and a little French and some English—and calculate also. And besides this, I have a knowledge of simples and dying, I have been taught to dress and tan leather, to cook, and embroider, to make tapestry, to prepare and weave flax and—“Enough.” A wave from the large hand and a hard look silenced the girl. Her throat tight with nerves, she dropped her eyes from his to disguise the fear.

Mathew Cuttifer frowned at her. These were remarkable claims for any woman, and this girl was a peasant. He turned to the girl’s foster mother, a handsome woman with the permanently suntanned skin of the poor, who was also respectfully looking down at the floor.

“Mistress…Deborah, is it?”

Without raising her eyes, the woman nodded.

“Are these claims true?”

“They are, sir.”

“And who has taught her?”

“I have, sir—the domestic skills she speaks of. And the good priest of our nearby village. He believed my foster daughter warranted teaching. He gave her letters, and the numbers. And the Latin. He also spoke French and she picked it up. She learns quickly and he is an educated man.”

Mathew raised his eyebrows at that. An educated man giving his time to teach a peasant girl? He looked the girl up and down. Plain, neat dress of homespun cloth—finely woven though it was—and abundant dark, tawny hair pulled back tightly from a high forehead.

The girl’s eyes were unusual too; they had the surprising jeweled flash of kingfisher feathers, or topaz, the whites so clear they shone. True, she did not have the smooth egg-shaped face considered beautiful, for hers had well-defined features and a mouth too wide for current taste, but it was pleasing, the skin burnished like ivory, and when she smiled, striking. But there was something else. Something disturbing. Did she look too…refined, or clever, perhaps to make a servant?

“How did you know of the place I have in my household?” Again, Mathew addressed the woman, Deborah.

“Sir, I am acquainted with Helvega, the sister of your priest, Father Bartolph. She’s married to our squire’s reeve and lives close by in the village next to our home. She visited her brother in your house, I believe, and when she returned she told me of the need. A hardworking and trustworthy girl to be a body servant for your wife?”

Mathew was puzzled. “But that was some time ago. You have come a long way on a chance, it seems to me…”

Deborah smiled calmly. “I trusted to Our Lord for guidance on the matter. He told me that all would be well if I brought my foster daughter to your house.”

Again Mathew frowned. The woman sounded very sure, dangerously presumptuous. How could she know what the Lord’s will in this matter might be?

A gentle cough shifted his glance to another woman standing in the shadows of his dark, richly appointed room.

“Speak.”

Phillipa Jassy, Mathew’s housekeeper, had also been looking at the girl. She too was uncertain about the gentility, even delicacy, of her appearance. Generally, Jassy looked for solid girls, girls with strong arms and broad backs who were capable of hard physical work. But she was also a shrewd judge of character—you had to be if you ran a large household for such an exacting master. A plain beast of burden would not suffice for her mistress, Lady Margaret Cuttifer, that she knew.

“Have you ever been part of a large household before, girl?”

Anne was nervous since Mathew had rebuked her, so she shook her head. That met with Jassy’s approval. She had no liking for pert, bold girls with opinions freely offered.

Unaccountably, though, Mathew was faintly displeased. He had liked the sound of her voice, he realized; it was low and pleasing.

“Have you ever served a lady before?”

Again the girl shook her head, saying nothing.

The girl’s response was to be expected, but the housekeeper was disappointed. In their current sad situation, it seemed unlikely that Mathew would want a girl waiting on his wife who had no real training.

“Master Mathew, in the circumstances, perhaps it would be good if we could speak together for a moment…” Jassy was already holding the door of Mathew Cuttifer’s workroom open, as if to usher Deborah and her foster daughter out of Blessing House, out of their lives…

Then something strange happened. Something uncanny. The girl smiled, a radiant smile, and it so transformed her face that the man and his housekeeper were astonished—for a moment it seemed as if she were bathed in light from another source. Mathew even looked around to see where that light might be coming from.

Then the girl said simply, “Sir, my name is Anne and I am here to work. I will serve your wife well, you will see, and with all my heart.” Her voice had a quality, a certain bell-like clarity, that sang through the air between them like music, and the sincerity in her eyes was guileless.

Deborah looked at Anne quickly. Was she surprised by the confident little speech? It was hard to tell.

Mathew was—but he didn’t find himself offended. There had been no presumption from the girl: she’d spoken truthfully. Rocking for a moment on his heels, Mathew threw a look at the housekeeper. She shrugged slightly before dropping her eyes respectfully—Anne did not see the gesture, having fixed her gaze on Mathew Cuttifer’s face—but it was enough. He grunted and found himself saying, “Very well.

You may stay under this roof for a period to be agreed between your foster mother and myself. Should you prove a useful addition to this house, your position with us will be confirmed by next quarter day.”

Formal, dry words, but they were rewarded with a look of such passionate gratitude from Anne that Mathew felt a wave of heat in his head and neck. Of course, well versed by his religion against the snares of the flesh, he should have been proof against the gratitude of women and girls these twenty years, but life was sometimes surprising, even at his age. Hastily, he recalled the need for pious instruction if this girl was to be useful. There was much she needed to learn, and quickly. “Jassy will instruct you in all that is necessary. You are to obey her and Aveline, my wife’s maid, as if they were me. This is a godly house; see you keep the Lord in your heart and not Satan.” Then he waved toward the door of his workroom. The interview was ended.

Thus began Anne’s time in Blessing House, and when Deborah kissed her one last time before she walked away into the London streets, the two clung to each other.

“Pray for me, as I shall for you, child. I shall miss you.”

That was all there was time for; Jassy did not believe in sentiment: “Make your farewells, girl. There is much to acquaint you with if you are to be useful to your mistress.”

Anne’s last sight of Deborah was the swirl of her dull red cloak as she strode away down the dark London streets. Then she was alone with strangers.

Blessing House, Mathew Cuttifer’s city base and place of business, was a very ancient structure, as Anne now saw, running to keep up with the housekeeper as she led the girl to her private room.

Massive stone walls and dark passages with many turns spoke of the fort or small castle this great house had engulfed as it grew.

Indeed, many of the public spaces in Blessing House were gloomy because the high, narrow windows were barely enlarged arrow slits. Mathew Cuttifer saw no need to adopt the expensive new fashion for large, leaded, many-paned glass lights in the business parts of his house—he confined them to his private quarters. And there was a coldness breathing out of the massive walls that all the fires and braziers they passed did little to lift. Perhaps the built-over stream that wound past and under the footings on one side of the building was the source of the dank cold. The house must once have stood by itself with its back to the river in a good defensive position. Now a warren of narrow streets had locked themselves around the walls with buildings great and small lapping right to the very gate.

As Anne hurried after the housekeeper, she tried to fix as much as she could in her mind, observing first that her new home was a very busy place. Deborah had told her that Mathew Cuttifer was a self-made man and an increasingly important mercer; now she saw that for herself as tides of humanity flowed through Blessing House on numberless errands for the master himself, or for members of the nearby Court of Westminster with whom she knew he had close commercial links.

“Girl!” Jassy briskly cut into Anne’s thoughts, no longer the meek and deferential servant of a few minutes past. “Through here. Lively now!”

Anne found herself in a low, small room at the back of the building that looked down on the river, the room from where Phillipa Jassy ran the household. Another girl of about her own age was spreading new rushes onto the floor as the housekeeper entered.

“Melly, fetch Aveline here to me now.” The girl dropped her bundle of rushes as if they were burning, and scuttled from the room. Then the housekeeper began to describe what was expected of Anne. “You will find that much personal service needs to be done for Lady Margaret, Master Cuttifer’s wife: everything from washing to dressing and even feeding her. Sadly for us all, her illness means your work here may not last long. Pray God spares her to us.”

There was a knock at the door and as the housekeeper called out, “Yes!” a pretty young woman slipped into the room. She was dressed modestly in a plain, dark blue housedress with a sideless surcoat of dark red, but her elegance confused Anne. Was she Master Cuttifer’s daughter?

“Aveline, this is Anne. The master has hired her to assist you with Lady Margaret. She will answer through you to me. She has skills you will find useful.”

The girl who turned and looked at Anne with cool detachment was Lady Margaret’s personal maid—that explained the fineness of her clothing and the smooth whiteness of her hands. After a moment’s inspection, Aveline turned back to the housekeeper and said, “My mistress has no need of another attendant.”

Jassy frowned. She was a very busy woman and this was just one of many problems to deal with this morning. “It is the master’s wish and there’s an end. Now take Anne and make her familiar with what must be done. I shall speak to you about this after prayers this evening.”

Aveline curtsied rigidly and beckoned Anne to follow her out of the room, a set expression on her face.

The pair set off down another dark passage and Anne’s heart sank as she followed the stiff back ahead of her. This was not a good beginning and she felt alone and afraid. Aveline moved on in the gloom as the corridor turned this way and that past closed doors and flights of stairs that disappeared to the upper parts of the building. Her felt house slippers were soundless on the flags and she did not acknowledge Anne’s presence in any way.

Several minutes’ brisk walking brought them to an iron-bound door, big enough for giants, which stood between two mighty pillars carved in the shape of naked men, each supporting the heavy burden of the lintel above. The lintel stone was shaped like a reclining woman, abundant breasts spilling out of her dress as she suckled a large boy child, an expression of pleasure on her broad face.

Aveline saw Anne’s startled look and laughed briefly, a surprising, harsh sound, as she pushed the door open. “This, girl, is the most ancient part of the house. A lewd way to go into a kitchen. Lower your eyes when you pass this way or you will be misjudged by the men.”

As the door opened, the stone silence of the passage outside the kitchen was swamped by a resonant booming babble, and Aveline chivvied the girl ahead of her into a great space.

At first, Anne thought she had entered a vision of Hell, but after a moment she saw she was in a vast kitchen. It was vaulted like a church, with light pouring down from a central stone lantern set high above their heads in the apex of the groined roof.

Serving three gaping fire-filled caves—the cooking fires ranged around the walls—was a mass of hardly human beings, sweating and cursing as they rushed to and fro in apparent chaos.

In days to come Anne would understand she had arrived just before the morning dinner; and Blessing House had many souls to be fed—members of the family and their personal attendants, Mathew’s clerks, his apprentices, the upper servants, including Jassy, and her underlings, the general servants, the men in the stables, the girls in the cow byre, the gardeners—but for now Anne had the urge to cross herself and whisper a prayer to Saint Christopher, patron saint of the beleaguered traveler, as she felt herself to be. The noise and the heat were terrifying to someone unused to the ways of a large house.

Aveline ignored the din and waved testily for the girl to follow as she plunged into the surging mass of men and women. Anne was so intent on not losing her guide, she barely sidestepped a wizened child, staggering under the weight of a huge pot brimming with fish heads and slopping guts. A high piping voice screamed out, “Way, way there, lumphead!”

Close up, Anne saw that the child was in fact a very old man the size of a boy, and the malice in the rheumy eyes was ancient and very real. Anne jumped aside, unreasonably frightened, and nearly caused another accident by backing into someone else. “I am so sorry…I’m new and—”

“I know that. Just get out of the road, can’t you!” Melly, the thin girl she’d seen earlier in Jassy’s room, rushed past her carrying a bright metal cleaver toward a man dismembering a side of beef and bellowing for assistance.