Jane and the Damned (9 page)

The maid gazed up at her with fear on her freckled face. She could not be more than twelve years of age. “I shan‧t have to have it pulled, shall I, ma‧am?”

Jane touched the girl‧s swollen jaw and felt fear and pain, dreadful pain; how could this child not weep with it? And some thoughts of a sister about to give birth, a brother pressganged into the navy, a father she feared for his drunkenness and violence, terror at the thought of an apothecary ripping the tooth from her mouth. The girl started. “Beg pardon, ma‧am, your hands are so cold.”

Betty opened her mouth.

Jane stared at the blackened, infected tooth and the grossly swollen gum and then looked into the girl‧s startled eyes. “Don‧t be afraid,” she said, as quietly as she‧d said to Harris Bigg-Withers. “I‧ll make it better. It won‧t hurt anymore.”

Betty‧s eyes drooped half closed and her face relaxed. Jane helped her into a chair. She took a quick look at the others, who clustered together over the stove, Cassandra and her mother mostly getting in the way of the housekeeper, she suspected.

She raised her hand to her mouth and bit, quickly, a small puncture on one finger deep enough to produce a drop of blood that she smeared onto Betty‧s gum.

Betty jerked upright in her chair, eyes wide, and screamed, shaking violently.

Jane stepped back, horrified; she had obeyed her instincts entirely
without thought, not knowing what the outcome could be. Mrs. Burgess, the housekeeper, rushed forward, a wooden spoon in her hand. “What‧s wrong, Betty?”

Betty leaned forward, clutching at her apron, and spat out blood and pus. Something small and blackened fell from her mouth and rolled onto the flagstone floor. Jane bent to pick it up. “The source of all your ills, I believe, Betty.” She held out the decayed tooth that had come out entirely from the roots, or what was left of them.

“Beg pardon, ma‧am.” Betty spat out another mouthful into her apron and looked up, wide-eyed. “It doesn‧t hurt anymore.”

“Come on over to the sink, girl, you‧ve no business making a mess in front of the ladies.” Mrs. Burgess led her away from the table, and Mrs. Austen and Cassandra joined them at the sink, making suggestions about further treatment and the use of tooth powder and brushes.

“I‧ve never seen such a thing!” Mrs. Austen declared as Betty spat into the sink. “Rinse your mouth out, now. Some vinegar, maybe, Mrs. Burgess, to clean the wound? What happened, Jane?”

Jane shook her head. She was
en sanglant
still and could barely speak. Raising her apron to her mouth as though she felt unwell, she managed, “I—I must go outside.”

“But the French! Cassandra, tell her she must not—”

“No!” Jane gazed at her sister, who stopped halfway across the kitchen. “Roll out the pastry for me, if you please.”

“Oh. Very well.” Cassandra picked up the rolling pin with the obedience of an automaton.

“Put flour on the rolling pin, else it will stick,” Jane continued, debating whether she should tell her sister to get on the table and dance. “I shall be back soon.”

She took the knife Betty had used for the potatoes and plucked
a woman‧s jacket from a peg by the kitchen door before leaving the house. The air was cold and damp in the dimness of the late afternoon. Bursts of gunfire, shouting, the clatter of hooves filled the air, but from some distance. Here it was quiet. A wheelbarrow, its wheel smashed, lay in the gutter with a scatter of broken china and glass around it. The wind blew acrid smoke into Jane‧s face, and, ridiculously, she was reminded of an earlier visit to Bath, with fireworks in Sydney Gardens—except here the explosions and flashes of light were of battle.

She should be afraid. Instead she felt invincible, powerful, and yes, hungry, doubtless her appetite stimulated by the scent of Betty‧s blood. She moved into the shadows, aware of the precision and grace of her movements. She remembered Luke‧s strut as she had seen him last, the set of his shoulders and his long, handsome legs.

She heard the man before she whirled around to face him, the thud of footsteps and jingle and clank of weapons, and then the stink of sweat and cheap wine. His uniform was unfamiliar, but his swagger and leer told her all she needed to know. For a moment she considered drawing herself up and declaring she was a gentlewoman and would scream for help—not that anyone would believe her, with her floury hands and apron and jacket. He strolled toward her, one hand at the fall of his breeches, the other holding a musket.

“Eh,
ma petite,
you walk alone?” His voice rasped. “You like to welcome a Frenchman to your town, yes?”

She hid the knife in the folds of her gown and waited. She could smell his blood now that he was closer, hear the excited thrum of his heart. As though afraid she backed against the railings that led down to the front area of her aunt and uncle‧s house.

He laughed and lunged toward her. He was against her now, almost overwhelming her with his stink and lust and the heat
of his blood, grabbing at her skirts. She raised one hand and ripped at his stock and jacket, tearing the fabric—how strong she was, how powerful—and lunged for his neck beneath the greasy pomade-scented black hair.

Now she was the one who attacked. He yelled in fear and the musket clattered to the ground.

“Silence, s‧il vous plait!”
she hissed at him, looking into his eyes as blood pulsed from his neck—what a waste!—and to her relief his expression became dreamy and distant. He slackened in her grip as she drank, blood spilling over them both, darkening her gown and apron, his boots scrabbling on the flagstones for purchase until he collapsed beneath her.

Astride him, she raised her head to gasp for breath and he came to life beneath her, his eyes wide with fear and rage, while he cursed and heaved. She remembered the knife as he gripped her throat—he was strong, but not as strong as she—and jabbed it into him. The blade struck something hard and jarred her arm. His terror became overwhelming, and she saw a farm and apple trees blooming in the spring and …

“Maman. Maman.”
His eyes glazed over, he shuddered and the last of his blood pumped out.

“Forgive me,” she said, too late. She rose and stepped away. The knife was buried in his side and after a moment‧s hesitation she bent and removed it. She swiped her hand over her mouth and straightened her skirts and the apron, heavy and sodden with blood. As ravenous as she had been she seemed to have wasted as much blood as she had drunk, and the taste of it was strong with garlic—well, what else would she expect from a Frenchman? But weren‧t they—her kind—afraid of garlic? She stared down at the dead soldier, the man who had called for his mother as he died—and hardly a man; the monstrous, threatening Frenchman had been little more than a boy.

She should close his eyes at least—but no, to do so might arouse suspicion if anyone should care about one dead soldier who was not an officer.

“Did he hurt you, miss?” She whirled to see a group of men approaching. Some of them were armed; all of them looked fierce and disheveled. If she had not drunk she would have been frightened by their appearance, but she was full of courage and strength. They stared at her with horror and curiosity.

“No, I—I‧m well. I stabbed him.”

“Go home, miss. This is no place for you,” one of the men said. “The French are coming in on the London Road.”

She opened her fist and showed them her knife. “I killed this one. I‧ll kill another.”

The men exchanged glances and a muttered conversation arose. “We‧ve women on the barricade now. Let her come … But she‧s a lady, you can tell by her speech … She‧s
something
… We can‧t leave her here … For sure, she‧s deranged … No, I tell you, she‧s one of
them
…”

The man who‧d spoken first to Jane held up a hand to quiet his companions and Jane recognized him now—he was the apothecary who‧d sold her father a vial of what she suspected was a panacea that very morning. “Come if you wish, ma‧am, so long as I have your word you‧ll not turn on us. You remember me, I trust? William Thomas, apothecary.”

“What the devil could she do? She‧s only a girl,” another of the men said.

To her relief Mr. Thomas did not attempt an explanation, but pushed his spectacles more firmly onto his nose. Jane saw he had a musket in one hand and a large pestle, a formidable club of marble, tucked beneath his arm. “Come along with us, ma‧am. Time is wasting. They‧ve held the Frenchies off so far, but we‧ve come to help.”

“What is happening elsewhere in the town, sir?”

“The French marched from Bristol, and the militia fight to hold the bridge and the roads against them. We had word they were coming along the London Road too, so that‧s where we are bound.”

They passed Walcot Church and turned right onto the London Road. Ahead of them a bonfire burned in the streets, and a crowd of people moved, dark against the red glow. Two men emerged from a house, dragging a heavy, old-fashioned table between them toward a barrier some six feet high across the street, constructed of furniture, pieces of wood, and flagstones. Jane ran forward to help them as they upended the table onto two legs and attempted to hoist it onto the barricade. She could have laughed at their expressions of astonishment as she grabbed the blackened oak and hauled it up. She clambered aloft and peered cautiously over the edge.

“Any sign of them, miss?”

“Not yet.” She climbed over and dropped down to the other side. Walking farther up the road, she listened carefully, then dropped to a crouch and laid her bare hand on the ground to get a better sense of the faint tremor she had detected. Yes, men and horses, and something iron and heavy that lurched along the road—it had to be a cannon.

She ran back, and climbed over the barricade. “I can‧t tell how far off they are, but they bring artillery.”

“I suppose they‧re not ours?” someone asked.

Jane shook her head. “I don‧t know, but they‧re probably not far off. We‧ll know soon enough.”

Mr. Thomas shook his head, staring at the barricade. “They‧ll reduce this to splinters.”

“Then take cover and attack them after they come through,” Jane said, astonished by her own decisiveness—telling grown
men what to do, or, for that matter, telling anyone what to do, although her mother frequently complained of her willful nature. “Fire your weapons and then run before they can fire the cannon again, for the best we can do is delay them and maybe kill a few.”

“True enough,” Mr. Thomas said. “We have some muskets, but not enough for everyone.”

“Cobblestones!” someone shouted, and the crowd tore at the surface of the street.

“And now we wait,” the apothecary said. The crowd positioned themselves in the steps leading to the servants’ quarters, silent, muskets loaded, handfuls of cobblestones at the ready.

Jane listened. From far off down the road came the orderly clop of horses’ hooves moving at a quick trot, the squeak and rumble of the gun carriage, the jingle of harness and weapons. She watched the faces of those around her and observed that they too heard the sounds. A command to halt rang out. She imagined what they saw—the makeshift barrier with the glow of the bonfire behind it.

“In the name of the Republic, citizens, lay down your arms!”

“Damned Frenchies, excuse me, ma‧am,” the apothecary muttered. His spectacles glinted red, reflecting the flames of the bonfire. He bit his lip. “Do they know we‧re here, do you think?”

“I don‧t know. They‧ll expect an ambush.”

She listened, hearing whispered orders and the scratch of a tinderbox, precise metallic sounds and the creak of the gun carriage; the quiet sounds of a well-trained cavalry unit waiting to attack. She rose and gestured to the waiting townspeople to keep down, then sank down to her former position.

A deafening bang burst the barricade into pieces, scattering debris over the road. Paving stones and pieces of wood flew through the air and smashed to the ground, with coals from the bonfire scattered throughout. From a cloud of smoke the French
cavalry emerged, negotiating rubble and flames, to encounter a hail of musket fire and cobblestones as the townspeople emerged from hiding.

“Got you!” the apothecary crowed as a soldier fell from his mount, and pulled another musket ball from the pouch at his belt.

Beside him Jane hurled cobblestones—Edward would be proud that his little sister had developed such a strong bowling arm, she thought as she caught a Frenchman square on the forehead. Around her, the townspeople scrambled from their hiding places, dodging between the horses and running around debris. What had begun as a disciplined cavalry charge had turned into hand-to-hand fighting. But not for long; already the cavalrymen formed a tight formation, and sabers swinging, charged ahead.

“Call them off!” Jane shouted to Mr. Thomas. “The French have the advantage over us!”

But the apothecary was gone—Jane saw his spectacles glinting on the ground among the blood and mud. She picked them up, hoping he lived still. Around her, townspeople fought to escape the cavalry sabers, and foot soldiers followed.

“Run!” Jane shouted above the screams and shouts. “We‧re outnumbered. Save yourselves!” She watched in horror as French soldiers poured into the front areas of houses, bayonets at the ready, where a few townspeople still remained. She saw a man and a woman hammer at the servants’ door in a basement, screaming to be let in, and then saw them cut down.

“Run!” Jane shouted again. She picked up her skirts and ran ahead of the cavalry, guessing that they would take the most direct route into the center of the town down Cornwall Street. A crowd of people, some supporting the wounded, followed her.

“Where shall we go, mistress?”

“To your homes. The city will fall,” Jane said.

“The wounded may come with me,” said a voice behind her. Mr. Thomas the apothecary blinked shortsightedly at her. His face was blackened with smoke and smeared with blood. “Bravely done, ma‧am. And where will you go?”

“I‧m so glad you‧re alive, Mr. Thomas. Good night to you, sir.” She handed him his spectacles and shook his hand.

She could not return home covered in blood and stinking of smoke and have to explain where she had been or what had happened. But there was one place she could go; once again she felt the bond that drew her to the Damned and distanced her from her family.