As Meat Loves Salt (9 page)

been kindness between Zeb and myself. On saints' days (the Mistress still kept these, and though heathen they were not unwelcome to us servants) I had been fishing, and swimming, with him; I was sure it was Zeb, and not Izzy, who had once made me laugh so hard that beer came out of my nose and I was sent down from table. Was it when Stephen died, and Peter came, that my brothers had changed places in the chamber? It might be that Izzy had wanted the change, for Peter snored in tiny grunts like a dreaming dog; but Zeb and I were never the same again. He withdrew from me; I began to find him wilful and spoilt.

Our room was that night too hot, as it was most nights from April to October, and the grey of dawn showed that, though the casement was open, mist beaded the inner panes. The scent of hard-worked bodies hung in the air like the whiff of some disagreeable mushroom and I wondered how many pints of sweat I had breathed in over the years, along with essences of feet and farts and garlic. My Lady's grand chamber smelt of rose otto and occasionally, when Sir John had paid his wife a visit, of wine, while the room set aside for myself and Caro had as yet no perfume but emptiness and dust. I turned over and sniffed the pillow, finding my own smell mingled with Izzy's, and thought,
Clean linen for us tomorrow,
and for some reason the red glass came to mind.

When our young master, as we called him in the presence of Godfrey, might be fifteen and myself perhaps some two years older, a Venetian visitor brought him a birthday gift - a newfangled glass cup from an island where the people are expert in the crafting of such things. It was presented at the midday meal, first to Sir John that he might look at the workmanship. Standing behind the Master, I craned my neck, marvelling and longing to touch. The thing was like blood frozen and carved, all even, pure and crystalline, a scarlet flower with chains of bubbles intertwined in the stem.

'Most cunningly made,' said My Lady. 'See, Mervyn.' The visitor took it from Sir John and put it into the boy's hand and he, being careless, straightway let it fall and it shattered on the flags.

The visitor's reaction I cannot now remember, for I was so shocked that I cried out in protest as if the cup had been my own. I was told to fetch a broom. Sweeping up the fragments, I cannot swear that I did not let a tear, while Mervyn sat sullen and stupid. I guessed they had given him a tongue-lashing while I was out of the room, but I would fain have seen him hanged for the destruction of the glass before my eyes could learn it.

For weeks I kept the shards of it in a leather pouch, taking them out frequently to admire the stem, which was still in one piece, or to look through the fragments of the bowl and see the world all drenched in blood. The garden viewed thus was a scene of nightmare, its trees and plants hot curls of stone beneath the fiery skies of Hell, the black and crimson maze a trap for souls. Or, it might be, this was how Beau-repair itself would look on the Last Day.

'Your grim fancy,' said Izzy when one day I showed him the Hell Garden. 'The thing amuses, I suppose. But I would rather have the garden as it is.' Zeb would also hold or look through the glass pieces from time to time, until the day when, called to some urgent task, I left them on the floor and out of the pouch. When I returned to my treasures they were gone.

I at once suspected my brother. But Zeb persuaded me that this was none of his teasing while Izzy, looking sick, suggested I enquire of Godfrey. The steward told me that he had trodden on the glass shards and one of them had pierced his shoe and gone into the sole of his foot. 'And so,' said this wise old fool, 'I have thrown them down the jakes.'

Thus perished a lovely thing, all broken and degraded, for that it was given into the wrong hands. I drifted off remembering, and it came back to me in my dream, where I was holding it for someone to see. But it was already broken, and a sadness blew through me like smoke.

When next I opened my eyes the room was light and the other three were standing over my bed.

'It is time,' said Izzy.

We were boys again. Half asleep, I protested as the cover was dragged off. Izzy put into my hand a cup of salep, a rare treat in that

house where the servants drank mostly beer. I let its thick, pearly sweetness drop over my tongue like some great honeyed oyster.

Peter had fetched us up a special perfumed water from the still-room. As bridegroom, I was first with this water, which had been infused with rosemary and lavender. There was also a washball to scrub my skin with, and cloths for drying. In the days when we still had old Doctor Barton for tutor, he showed me a print of a Turkish bath and I, being at once full of a child's desire, begged of him that we might go to Turkey. He said that it was too far off, and the people not Christians, but the picture with its men naked or draped in sheets, the spacious stone halls, the fountains and the musician in strange pantaloons and pointed shoes, plucking at a shrunken harp, stayed with me. It was still before me even when I bent to hoe Sir John's cornfield, miserably fulfilling the Word:
In the sweat of thy face shalt thou eat bread.
Now I took a dampened cloth and ran it over my body. My delight in washing and aversion to every kind of dirt was a byword in our house. Though I was called fantastical, and was much teased, yet it made me a careful servant, and I thought Caro did not like me the less for it.

While I was drying myself and lifting out my best shirt from the press, the other three all washed together, splashing the water here and there, mostly over head and hands for none but me took off his shirt. There was much fooling, much spitting of foam; the chamber floor was soaked, as was Zebedee when Peter scooped up water in his hands and threw it.

'Clodpate,' said Zeb without venom. He pulled the wet shirt over his head and came to the press where the fresh ones were kept. Almost dressed by now, I watched him fling the linen this way and that, Peter wailing that everything would be crushed. It struck me how rarely I saw Zeb naked, for all that we shared a chamber. Stripped, he showed more muscular than I remembered, but well-knit and graceful - what some called a
proper
man, one who drew women to him and had already sired a child to prove it. As for my elder brother - poor Izzy, what woman would be charmed by him? His back would never be as straight or as strong as the one that was turned to me now as Zeb dropped a shirt over his head and pulled on his breeches.

'Hold, Jacob,'said Izzy. Peter and Zeb turned to watch as he handed me a pair of hose I had never seen before, of the finest wool and such a tender white you would say they came from the mildest, purest lambs.

"These are not mine,'I told him.

'Yes they are, they're a gift from us three.'

They smiled kindly on me and the hose were straightway more precious to my heart than anything the Mistress might give or lend. I hugged my brothers and Peter, gaining a little damp on my shirtsleeves, but that mattered nothing: the coat would go over it.

'Soft as down,' I said as I stood up, hose stretched clean and tight and my newest shoes on.

"They look well on you,' said Izzy.

'My thanks, they are the best I ever saw.'Again I suffered a pang for the sweet brother whose garments never looked well on him. Peter helped me do up the mother-of-pearl buttons on my coat, which, like Zeb, were handsome but difficult to lay hold of.

'Like a prince. She'll want to eat you,' Peter said as he slid the last one into place.

Zeb laughed. 'Be kind and let her.'

Izzy was giving a last brush to his coat. 'I hope Mounseer finds the cooks to his liking. I heard shouting from the kitchen last night.'

'Have you seen Caro's robe?'Zeb asked him. 'It is magnificent.'

I stared. 'You have, then?'

'It's only the husband that's not allowed. You'll take her for My Lady Somebody.'

'When did she show you?'

Izzy stopped brushing. 'Are we ready, lads?'

'The favours!' cried Zeb. With shaking fingers we pinned them on, so that the guests could pluck them off later — another curtsey to Dame Fortune, but one I had not dared to oppose.

'Here, here!'Peter shoved a glass of wine into my hand. 'Down in one. Go to it.'

I was glad to obey.

'Done like a man,' said Izzy.

'When did she show you the gown?' I repeated, but Zeb and Peter bounded out of the door, eager as dogs to the hare.

"This is no day for jealousy,'Izzy said, laying his hand on my arm.

'I'm not jealous.'

Peter went directly to the garden, while we brothers had first to knock at Caro's chamber. It should have been her father's house, but there was nothing to be done about that. I tapped on the door and heard whispering and a stifled laugh within. Godfrey's voice bade me enter.

She was standing in the middle of the room, her eyes glittering. A cloak had been thrown over the gown, and her hair hung down loosely as befitted a virgin bride. Mary and Anne, clutching branches of gilded rosemary, looked me over from head to toe. I took Caro by the hand as custom demanded, said the traditional 'Mistress, I hope you are willing', and allowed Godfrey, who was standing in for her father, to lead me out of the room. The bridesmaids, giggling, went on either side of me, their captive man, while Izzy and Zeb stayed behind to escort Caro.

We slowly descended the stairs. I was in a daze and my shoes, which were not well broken in, pinched. I heard Izzy and Zeb laughing along the corridor. The idea was that Caro should follow me out to the maze, where tables of food and drink would be laid out. There we would pause a while, admiring the delicacies and everybody's finery, until the time was come when Caro and I should make our vows before those assembled. Then there would be well-wishing, much eating and drinking, presents and diversions (perhaps that kissing game with which she had enticed me all those months back) to the sound of sweet music, and afterwards back into the house to gorge ourselves further until the time came for us to be put to bed. I must get through everything, showing no impatience for that blessed moment when the chamber door would shut out their urgings and jests. Then I would turn to her, trembling, aching, while outside the pastimes went on and everyone pictured, with amusement or envy, our mutual entertainment.

'God has sent you fair weather,' said Anne. We passed through the door by the stillroom and a cry went up,
"There he is/'The
company was

assembled and waiting for me just outside the house. Dazzled by the sudden strong light, I with difficulty made out the Master and Mistress, and taking off my hat I bowed to them. Then I looked about me, greeting all the guests with a general bow and a smile. I remarked little Joan, who was lovesick for Mounseer, and another, older dairymaid standing further back in the group. There were also the ostler and his boys, and some of the farmworkers, both men and women, who had laboured by my side in the fields. I wondered did they remember those days, and resent my rise in fortunes.

'Your mother awaits you in the maze,' said My Lady, whose face was pink with pleasure. At
your mother
I started guiltily, for I had not missed her. We strolled in a leisurely fashion towards the maze entrance, and my vanity was tickled when I heard one woman tell another that I was a very proper man.

'Wait till you see her wedding clothes. Beautiful as the day,' said Godfrey, craning his head backwards to speak to me. I could not help but grin like a fool, though the fresh collar chafed my neck. I put my finger down it and pulled to loosen the stuff as we stepped between the rosemary hedges.

/
am to be espoused. I am to be espoused.
Bound to a woman who
wondered, in her innocence, if I suspected another man of killing Walshe. The thought was enough to rob me of breath. We rounded the last corner and passed through a high dense arch. There I turned, and waited. Everyone watched me wait.

First came my brothers, pacing with branches of rosemary before them, Izzy's slight lurch a foil to Zeb's long supple stride. The sun glanced off their thick black hair, so exactly like my own, all three of us showing like gypsies among our fair-complexioned friends. Both bridesmaids turned towards Zeb as he approached, as daisies open themselves to the dawn.

Caro entered the maze in profile to us, so that I saw first her long neck and the sapphire drop depending from her right ear. Her hair hung down her back. It had been brushed and polished with silk so that it shone beneath the chaplet of wheat and roses. When she turned to face me I took the full force of her beauty, which seemed almost that of a lady, her gown cut low, her neck and shoulders of cream. This

was Caro transformed indeed, wondrous tight-laced, in silk the colour of June sky — I could never have procured her such. Her brown eyes rested on me with a delight equal to my own. Drawing near, we bowed and curtseyed each to the other and a general
aah
of pleasure ran through the company. The bridal finery showed more of her breasts than I had ever seen before: I tried not to gape like a lumpkin at the delicately gleaming skin thus revealed.

'Son.' My mother's voice cut through this delectable contemplation. I went at once to where she was standing in the little gateway cut in the left-hand hedge. We embraced and she wept, saying her Elias stood before her in the flesh. That did please me. Though others had remarked on it, Mother had never yet given me so much in the way of praise as to say I was the print of my father.

'Do you not think her beautiful, Jacob?' She indicated Caro. 'The earrings show very brave against her neck, do they not?' By which I understood that the two of them had made up their quarrel.