As Meat Loves Salt (5 page)

"That was an evil day, for him. The sermons!' Margett gloated. 'Table lectures, fireside lectures, pillow lectures! — until he said she might bring you to the house. A fellow was sent for you directly, before the Master could change his mind.'

I remembered that. When the man came into the field and bade us follow him, for we were now to work indoors at Beaurepair, he must have thought we would never move off. Izzy stood motionless and speechless, while I dropped to my knees thanking God, for I knew what we had escaped. Servitude inside the house was still bondage in Egypt, but we were now shaded against the noonday heat.

Caro's fortune was even humbler than my own. Margett told me that Caro's mother, Lucy Bale, had been a maid at Beaurepair in time past, a woman about the Mistress's own age and her entire favourite.

'It ended sadly, though,' the woman said. 'In the same year that the Mistress married Sir John, Lucy found herself with child. That's a fault easily wiped out, to be sure! — but her Mathias was killed. An unlucky fall.'

Later, Godfrey told me more. Lucy, it seemed, bore up under her shame with no little dignity. Sir John would have sent her away, but his wife argued that provided she showed herself repentant, she should stay, else she would surely sink to a most degraded condition. In the

event she had no chance to sink, for she died in giving birth to her daughter.

The child, which was of a rare white-and-gold beauty (both Lucy and Mathias were, said Godfrey, bright as sovereigns), was christened Caroline and put under the care of the then steward's wife, to be raised up a servant. I remembered her being shouted for, and once, when she might be six or seven, dragged by her hand through the great hall, trembling, for the steward's wife was sharp of tongue and temper. Had Mathias lived, Caro should have been called Caroline Hawks, but none of his kin wished to claim her, so she kept the name of Bale. Izzy, finding her one day weeping in the garden, took her in his arms and dried her eyes and nose on his shirt. He called her Caro for short, and Caro she became.

'Come along, Jacob.' Godfrey stood before me, smoothing down his collar. 'Leave that for later and wash your hands. The meat is ready to go out.'

I rinsed the sand off my fingers in a bowl of water before following him into the kitchen. The roast was set upon a wheeled table, and as fragrant as the stalled ox must have smelt to the Prodigal — a fine piece of mutton stuck with rosemary. Around it stood dishes of carrots and peas, a pigeon pie and sweet young lettuces dressed with eggs, mushrooms and oil.

'Let us hope they leave plenty over,' I said to Godfrey.

'Amen to that.' The steward poured wine from a decanter, held it up to the light and sipped it. 'Very pleasing. I will help you with the dishes and then come back for the drink.'

We trundled in with the mutton, my mouth watering. Someone, most likely Caro, had set up the table with such precision that every cup and dish was in absolute line, not a hair's breadth out. No pewter today; instead, the plate glittered. At one end of this perfection sat My Lady, her hair like string and face flaky with white lead; at the other, Sir John, bloated and purplish. To his mother's right Mervyn sprawled like a schoolboy in a sulk, tipping the chair back and forth on two of its four legs. He was far gone in drink. I silently thanked

Godfrey, grate on me as he might, for keeping Caro away. Only men and whores should serve Mervyn Roche.

When he saw us he shifted in the seat with annoyance and almost fell backwards.

'Mother!'

'Yes, my darling?'

'Mother, why don't you get a proper butler? Here's the steward serving the wine - what does he know of it? - and none but that booby to help him. If there
be
any wine.'

'It is decanted, Sir, and I am going back for it directly,' Godfrey soothed.

'I saw a man at Bridgwater carve in a new way entirely,' Mervyn announced. 'It was a wonder to see how he did it - here—'

To my amazement he leapt from his seat and held out his hands for the carving knife and fork.

Godfrey kept his hands on the trolley but dared do no more; he looked helplessly at My Lady. Sir John, seemingly oblivious, stared at the ceiling.

'Do you think you should, my sweet?' Lady Roche implored. On receiving no reply she tried for help elsewhere. 'Husband, if I may speak a word? Husband?'

'Might a man eat in peace?' the husband grunted.

Mervyn glared at his mother, then snapped his fingers to me. 'You, Jacob. Give it over here. Christ's arse, if I can't carve a joint of meat—!'

The Mistress winced at her son's foul tongue. I took the roast to him and laid the knife and fork ready. Godfrey disappeared through the door leading to the kitchen. I stood back, arms by my sides as I had been taught. He made a fearful butchery of it, hacking in chunks the sweet, crisp flesh which the cook had so lovingly tended. I saw his mother sigh. When the best part of the meat was ruined I brought forward the plates and shared out the tough lumps between the diners.
Why, O God,
I was thinking,
do You not
let slip his knife?

'A butler, I say,' he persisted, cutting into the pigeon pie with rather more finesse than he had displayed in carving the mutton.

'Where is the need?' asked his mother. 'We live in a very small way here.'

'Aye, I'll say you do!' He pushed off with his legs from the table, almost dropped backwards onto the floor, but retrieved the balance of the chair just in time. 'Where is Patty?' This was his name for Patience.

'Patty is no longer with us,' came the reply.

'What! Dead!'

'No.' My Lady began crying.

'What, then?'

'Run away. Or—' She shook her head.

Mervyn glanced at her, took a gobbet of flesh and chewed on it. 'If she's run away she's a fool. You,' he again snapped his fingers at me, so that I itched to twist them off, 'tell that Frenchified capon I've had better mutton in taverns.'

I bowed and took my chance to escape him a while. Going out of the door I met Godfrey returning with the wine and I hoped it might find better favour than the meat. Best of all would be if it were poisoned. One thing was cheering: Sir Bastard might scorn me but I had beaten him to the woman he desired. Setting aside his sulks and his drink-stained eyes, Mervyn was handsome, especially round the mouth, with its fierce scarlet lips hemming in very, white teeth. In him a man might see what his father had been when young, just as in Sir John his son's fate was laid out plain - if the son were fortunate, for his whoring was proverbial and a lucky pox or clap might yet shorten his days. He had always had a thirst for Caro. If I could think at all on my wedding night, I should take a minute to exult over him.

In the kitchen the cook, used to madness in his masters, shrugged when I told him the insults heaped on the roast.

'I have a syllabub for that lad,' he told me. 'A special one. Don't you go tasting, Jacob. Barring Godfrey, everyone's helped with it.'

'Not me,' I said. I took my turn and spat in the thing too, stirring in the spittle. A voice like Father's somewhere in my head said,
Sweetly done, my boy.
I carried in the syllabubs, placed the defiled one before Mervyn and stood the picture of submission, watching him eat it.

The man who had joined with us servants in taking this small but choice revenge was called Mister, or Mounseer, Daskin. Between him and Mervyn was deadly hatred. We were out of the ordinary in having a foreign cook. Margett, who had told me of my father's debt to Sir John, dropped dead one day while arranging a goose on the spit, and the Mistress, who clung still to some pretence of elegance, tormented Sir John for a French cook, such as were just then starting to be known in London.

'I will have my, meat done in the good old English way,' said the husband, who had no hankerings after
hautgousts, hachees
or dishes dressed
a-la-doode.
'There will be no French cooks at Beaurepair while I am master.'

His next dinner taught him better: the meat was bloody, and the sauces full of grit. Sir John glared about him. 'Is the wine spoilt?' he asked.

'Not at all,' his wife replied.

'Then why have we none on the table?'

'The cellar key is lost.'

Sir John knew when he was beaten, and bade the Mistress do what she would.

His wife let him down gently. Letters of enquiry to her friends in Town brought forth a number of likely men, but she settled on Mister Daskin who was but half French, could speak our language and cook in the English way beside. He arrived in the coach one wet October afternoon, a small dapper man in London clothes, looking about him with pleasure. It was said that fashionable life had hurt his health.

'Up all night, and then working again all day,' he told me. 'Never, Jacob, never go to London!'

'You will find it very dull here,' I answered.

'Now that is exactly what I like.'

It seemed he found promise of saner living in our old stone house with its surrounding fields and trees. The first meal he cooked for the household was served to Mervyn, and I guess he was never so pleased with his bargain since.

Daskin was not bad for someone half French. He was a Protestant, and he gave good food to the servants as well as the masters. Peter sometimes assisted him in the kitchen, but more often it was

either Caro or Patience, and Caro told me she had picked up a great deal of knowledge concerning preserves and puddings from Mounseer, who was not jealous of others seeing what he did. Most of what was cooked was done in the English style, for after a week or so during which her pride would not let her speak, the Mistress was forced to admit that she did not care for French feeding, and Sir John's roasts were restored to him.

When Mervyn had given his final belch and strewn bread about the table, the Mistress joined her hands and offered up thanks. Her son rattled off the words through force of habit, so that by happy accident I was able to hear him thank God for what he had just received.

After they had got down from the board Peter came to help me clear away.

'Look at that.' I pointed out the roast, now stiffening as it cooled. 'That's how he carves.'

'Still alive, was it? Kept running about?'

The room felt cleaner with Mervyn gone. Daskin came in and wheeled off the meat, muttering words in French that any man could translate only by studying his face. We returned the plate to the sideboard and carried the slipware to the scullery to be washed along with ours.

In the room where we had our own food there was a smell of onions and cider. Caro was laying out the dishes; Daskin bent over the mutton, trying to save what he could. I was suddenly very hungry. The syllabub could not be spoken of before Godfrey, who was there examining a fork which Mervyn had bent out of shape, but it hung in the air between us all, a secret pleasure to set against the gloom of that morning's discovery.

'There's nothing wrong with this meat,' said the cook. 'If I myself carve what's left you'll find it as tender a roast as you've had.'

'We never thought otherwise,' Izzy assured him.

'I have made onions in white sauce,' added Caro, looking sweetly on me because she knew how I relished this dish. I sat on the end of the bench next to the place she would take when she left off serving.

The meal was set before us and Godfrey led us in asking God's blessing. As soon as folk began spooning up onions and handing about the bread, the talk turned to Chris Walshe, and to Patience.

'Is Zeb back from Champains yet?' I asked.

'No,' said Peter. 'I guess they'll keep him there awhile.'

'What for? All he did was drag the pond.'

'This is fine mutton, Mounseer,' said one of the dairymaids, who seemed to have got the sheep's eyes into her own head to judge by her glances at him.

'Did Chris — was Chris hurt, Jacob?' asked Caro.

'He was,' I answered. 'Has nobody been to look?'

'I locked the laundry after you laid him out,' said Godfrey. 'It is neither seemly nor respectful for everyone to go goggling at the lad.'

'There's something in that,' said Izzy. 'But tell us, Godfrey, how was he wounded?'

The steward hesitated.

'Jacob knows already,' urged Peter.

Godfrey said, 'Well. It was no accident.' He looked at me.

'Stabbed,' I supplied.

A general gasp and then a buzz, not unlike pleasure, rose from the company.

'There are bad men about,' said Godfrey. 'Be watchful. The Mistress has instructed me to look over all the locks and bolts, and I should be obliged if you would bring me to any weak ones.'

And still no sign of Patience,' said Caro.

'Did she quarrel with one of you? Had she any trouble?' the steward asked.

'None,' Caro said. 'No trouble.'

I turned to her and saw her face quite innocent. I pictured Zeb, how he would have answered, perhaps mopping up sauce on a bit of bread, and his eyelashes lying modest on his cheek like a girl's.

TWO

Beating

After the mutton
and cider I felt the need of fresh air. It was Peter's turn for scouring the dishes, so I went out into the rosemary maze. I loved this maze, its pungent scent, the blue blossoms which besprinkled the dark hedges in the summer and the fragrant knot garden at its heart, where one could sit on the bench and doze. Caro went along with me, stealing a few minutes before going back to the house and Mervyn's wine-stained shirt, for he no sooner fouled a shirt than he changed it, no sooner changed than he fouled. His laundry had often robbed me of courting time.