Alis (7 page)

He would have said more but the door opened and Ellen came in. She raised her eyebrows at the sight of the two of them, but she said only, “Your grandmother sent for me to come. She thinks he is worse.”

She went over to the man on the bed and stooped down beside him, examining his features, rolling back his eyelids to look at his eyes.

“He will sleep awhile yet,” she said. “And you must do so also, if you are to be useful. I will watch now. Begone, the pair of you.”

Outside Luke said in a whisper, “Good night, Alis. Do not fear, I will not fail you.”

Back in the attic, awake to the rhythm of Judith’s snores, Alis lay with her eyes wide open. Luke’s face came before her with its smooth olive skin and eyes bright in the lamplight of the sickroom. He would help her, he had said. And she believed him.

T
he man Samuel’s injuries were healing slowly, but he would not speak or help himself at all. Alis tended him carefully, helping to dress his back and bringing him food. He had not yet moved out of the room. It was clear, however, that he would not die, and she was gradually freed from watching.

She waited in dread for Elizabeth to say that she must return to Thomas’s. She knew that the Minister’s wife had sent word to him on the evening of the whipping. He had been ill pleased, but she had not been sent back, and the next morning Lilith had appeared at the door with an armful of Alis’s clothing. That same afternoon, Mistress Elizabeth had accompanied Alis on a brief visit to Sarah and Thomas, so that Alis might thank them for their hospitality. It had been an ordeal to go, and a relief to come away again. But Alis felt guilty, too. Poor Sarah had so wanted her company, and now she was alone with her husband once more.

A few days later, on an errand, Alis had met Thomas in the square. She nearly turned round when she saw him, but it was too late. The familiar sneer greeted her.

“So you work as a servant now, Alis? You would not have to do so in my house. What is it, I wonder, that is so enticing about the Minister’s household?”

Her stomach churned, remembering the last time she had been this close to him. But she would not be cowed. “The man must be tended to, surely, Master Thomas. That is the rule everywhere, is it not?”

His expression darkened and he came closer to her.

“Have a care, girl. You would do better to return. It is not wise to be numbered among those who make light of sin.”

She wanted to tell him it was a sin to whip a man near to death but she did not dare. She only said, “I am sorry you do not approve, Master Thomas.”

He turned away without another word.

She returned to the Minister’s house, deeply grateful that she was permitted to remain there. The thought of living close to Thomas again terrified her. Besides, she had grown to love Elizabeth who had given her refuge when none had seemed possible. And then there was Luke.

When she got back, he was chopping wood for Judith. She told him what Thomas had said. He swung the ax so that the blade bit hard into the log, and then he straightened up, looking angry. “You are not a servant. You are my grandmother’s helper, and a very good one. What does Master Thomas know? Lilith is his idea of a servant and I am sure he treats her ill. She would not be so sullen if he were gentler in his ways. She dropped her basket once in the square and I helped her pick up what had fallen. It was nothing, but she thanked me as if no one had ever done her a kindness before.”

This was not the Lilith that Alis knew, but she did not say so, and their talk moved to other matters.

They had a plan of sorts now for getting Alis to the city, but they must wait for the reappearance in the area of an old acquaintance of Luke’s.

Alis shook her head. “My mother gave Mistress Sarah the money for my journey. And what is left, Master Thomas has for safekeeping. But this man that you know, must he be paid? He will not do it for friendship’s sake?”

Luke looked troubled. “He might, perhaps. I met him first with Tobias, out tracking in the woods when we should have been safely abed. We thought we had been caught for sure when he seized me from behind, and Tobias would not run, though I shouted to him to be gone. But this man—Ethan is his name—seemed mighty amused when he knew that he had two truants to deal with instead of the thieves he had feared. He has no love for the rule of the Book. He said once to me”—Luke lowered his voice—“that he thought there was no Maker; it was just a story to frighten us all into doing as the Elders wished.”

Alis was silent. She could not believe that there was no Maker. What other explanation could there be for the world and all that was in it? But she was no longer the child she had once been, believing in the kindly creator who punished only when he must and who loved his people. What she had seen in the square had changed all that. This Ethan, perhaps, had reasons like hers for his unbelief. Luke had paused but now he continued.

“He could never bear to live in a Community, so he found himself a traveling trade that he might be free to come and go. In the city, he buys ointments and medicines made from plants that do not grow in these parts. Then he goes from place to place and sells them. He comes here two or three times a year, but always in early spring when the Healers need new supplies after the winter. I see him then. He likes to hear the news, and he knows that I am no lover of the rules either, especially since Tobias . . .” He stopped. The subject of Tobias was always painful. “But there is no more than talk between us, and a little rabbit trapping. Whether he would help us in this matter, I do not know. When he comes, I will ask him, and we must offer him what money we have. Until then, we must wait.”

So Alis waited, fearing the summons back to Thomas’s—or worse still, home to Freeborne—but also wishing more and more that she might not be parted yet from Elizabeth. Or from Luke.

Although they were seldom alone together and never without the danger of interruption, the bond between them grew. Sometimes she caught him looking at her admiringly, which pleased her very much. Once, their hands brushed accidentally as he handed her a dish at the table, and she felt the blood burn in her veins. He spoke slightingly of the girls of Two Rivers: they had no spirit, he said, and she knew that he was comparing them unfavorably with her. For the first time in her life, she used the mirror not merely to check that she was tidy but to see whether her looks might please. Each day she brushed her long, fair hair until it was smooth and glossy. No, she did not want to be parted from Luke.

 

 

One morning, as Alis went down the stairs, Elizabeth called to her from the large front room that looked over the square. It was here that the Minister met sometimes with the Elders or gave counsel to the troubled in his congregation. Elizabeth was standing with her back to the window, and opposite her, so that the light fell upon his face, was Thomas. Alis felt her stomach clench at the sight of him. Had the moment come? The Minister’s wife held out a hand to her and drew her near.

“Alis, my dear, Master Thomas has come with some news for you that I fear is not good.” Alis had no time to speak before Elizabeth went on. “You must be longing, I know, to see your parents, but he tells me”—here she smiled at Thomas as if he were the pleasantest of visitors—“that word has come of fever in Freeborne. Your parents wish you to stay here until it is safe for you to go back.”

“And I”—Thomas spoke loudly, as if he thought he had stood long enough while Elizabeth delivered this message—“wish to know whether you propose to return to my house, where you are a guest, or whether you will take up residence here to the inconvenience of the Minister.”

Alis would have spoken, but once more Elizabeth was before her. “It is no inconvenience to the Minister or to me to have Alis here, I assure you. She has been of great service. Perhaps we might keep her a little longer if you would be so good? My poor Judith grows old and needs her rest, and there is much to do in a Minister’s household. You have Lilith, do you not? I am sure she is a goodly support to your wife.”

For a moment Thomas did not answer. He looked baffled and furious as if he would refuse but did not know how. At length he said stiffly, “So be it. Let Alis come for the rest of her possessions.”

As if she knew how little Alis would care for this, Elizabeth said, “Will you not send Lilith with them? It is only across the square and there cannot be much. Alis has her clothes already.”

Thomas flushed, and Alis could see a pulse beating in his temple. His voice was tight with anger. “I will not have Lilith lose her time running after an idle child. If Alis desires her things, let her come for them. If not, I will dispose of them.”

And he was gone from the room.

In the silence Alis listened to the blood beating in her ears. For a moment she could not take in what had happened. Was it really true that she was not to go back to Freeborne, that she could stay in the Minister’s household and not be parted yet from Luke? Elizabeth’s voice broke into her daze.

“I am sorry, my dear, that you cannot go home. But you must not worry too much about your parents. They are not sick themselves, Thomas said. We must pray to the Maker to keep them well. He has left the letter for you to read, and there is one enclosed for you, also.”

Alis was aware of a moment’s guilt. In the rush of feelings aroused by Thomas’s visit, she had given no thought to the danger her parents might be in. Besides, she must not think of them; she must put them out of her mind. But unbidden came a memory of childhood sickness, and of the little wooden horse her father had made for her. He had tied a piece of rope around its neck, and when she had been well enough to leave her bed, she had played for hours, pulling it along behind her. She would not be separated from it even at night. She slept with the end of the rope tied around her wrist, so that the sound of the wheels rolling over the floorboards entered her dreams.

Her eyes filled with tears. She would never see her father again. And who would love her as he had? He would not have wanted her to be forced into marriage. It was her mother’s doing, she was sure. Elizabeth, seeing her grief, put an arm round her saying in her kind way, “Do not weep, my dear. We will take care of you.”

Alis swallowed hard and smiled through her tears at the older woman. “You are very good to me, Mistress Elizabeth. I wish I may be worthy of it.”

For she had an uneasy sense that she meant to deceive the Minister’s wife, and that it was an ill thing to do.

 

 

Later that day she crossed the square to Thomas’s house. Fearful though she was of facing him, she would not be terrorized out of repossessing what was hers. Nevertheless, as she approached the front door, she hoped that he might be out. It would not take her long to collect her things, and then she need never speak to him again.

Lilith answered her knock, glowering as usual, and conducted her up the stairs without speaking.

In the little attic room, Alis collected the few small items and was ready to leave again. But when she turned to go, Lilith, who had watched her in sullen silence from the low doorway, did not move. Alis felt her heart beat faster—she was anxious to be away. She took a step forward but the other girl remained where she was.

“What is it that you want?” Alis asked sharply.

Lilith stared at her, and then said hoarsely, “Tell me what you do there.”

Alis stared back. The girl’s face was thin and sallow in the dim light of the attic but there were patches of color on her cheeks and she was panting a little.

“What do you mean?”

“In the Minister’s house. What do you do there?”

Alis felt her temper rise. Was this girl, who had never given her a friendly word in all the weeks she had lived in the house, to delay her with silly questions until Thomas returned?

“Let me pass, Lilith. I have business elsewhere and you are hindering me.”

Lilith’s lips twisted in a sneer.

“You weren’t so haughty before you took up with the Minister’s wife.” Her face took on a slyly satisfied look. “And you wouldn’t be so haughty now if Master Thomas had the ruling of you, I can tell you. He is much angered. You’d best be gone before he comes home.” But she made no move to let Alis pass.

Alis did not know what to do. She did not want to push Lilith away from the door, nor did she know how to persuade her to move. She said again, “What is it that you want from me?”

Lilith’s look darkened. “I want to know what you do there, in the Minister’s house.”

“I help in the household,” Alis said, thinking it best to humor the girl’s desire for knowledge, though not in the least understanding why Lilith should care what she did.

“And you talk with him?” Again the color was up in her cheeks, and her breath came and went quickly.

“With the Minister, do you mean? I scarcely see him. His health is not good and—”

Lilith interrupted her savagely. “Not the Minister. Why would I want to hear about that old man? Master Luke, I mean. Do you talk with Master Luke?”

At last Alis understood. She chose her words carefully. “Sometimes I do, but Mistress Elizabeth will not have us left alone together. She is strict in such matters.”

Lilith continued to stare at her suspiciously. “You have never been alone with him?”

Alis hesitated, and the other girl shot out a hand and gripped her arm so tightly that she cried out.

“You have!” Lilith hissed at her. “What did he say to you? Did he tell you about me? What did he say?”

“He never mentioned you. Why should he?” Alis struggled to free herself from the fingers digging themselves painfully into her arm.

“Because he is my friend, even though he is the Minister’s grandson and I am nothing but a servant here. And you’ve no right to be there with him when you should be taking care of Mistress Sarah, as you were brought here to do.”