Joe Treasure - The Book of Air

The Reeds brought her out from the Hall and pushed her to her knees. Ada, who is as thin as a stick, was one of them. The other I didn’t recognise until she set about cutting Annie’s hair. Then I saw it was Miriam, who makes ewe’s cheese and is clever with orphan lambs. She touched Annie gently and we could all see she was sorry for what must be done. She had made a start when Annie tipped forward without a word and was sick into the grass. Miriam waited until the retching stopped, then lifted Annie upright and went on with her cropping, while the Mistress told us that it would be worse for Annie because she would not say who the man was.

‘And why must this girl be punished?’

We all knew to be silent until the Mistress answered her own question.

‘Because we are not cattle and we are not scroungers and we are not vermin, but people of the village. And by the fire that got me I will have you live as though Jane our first Governess listened at every door and watched at every keyhole.’

Meanwhile Miriam worked on until there was nothing left to hide Annie’s skull but a ragged stubble.

I wanted to speak. I burned inside to say this was wrong, that a man had hurt Annie and we must repay her by hurting her again. But the words twisted themselves into a knot in my throat until they made no sense. I glanced at my mother, who stood beside me, but there was a dead look on her face as though she had taken her thoughts elsewhere.

We stood among the racks where the hay was drying, vetch and meadowsweet and grasses of all kinds, yellowing in the sun, while Annie was caned. The Mistress struck her on the hands, so as not to harm the baby, and not as hard as she might have done I thought, but hard enough even so. I looked at Sarah. She was pale, whether with anger or fear I couldn’t tell. I was thinking, what would they do to me if they found my book? I shivered and went hot and felt my insides turn to water. Below by the river a cow was calling to its calf, and I thought how simple to be fed hay and be milked and to have no choices, and I wished there was more noise, enough to drown Annie’s cries. Above me something moved quicker than I could follow. A house martin, I thought, swooping from the eaves. When I looked again I caught a movement of a curtain high under the gable. I felt something like shame to know that Brendan was watching, but for what reason I can’t say.

When the caning was done, the Mistress said, ‘Because she has no man to speak for her, Annie will stay with us at the Hall for a time.’

Annie had sunk to her knees and was hunched over, with one hand on the ground and one on her belly. She looked about to see what this meant. I thought at first it was kind of the Mistress to offer Annie a room, but the whisper among villagers spread a different understanding of her words. I saw the fear grow in Annie’s eyes and felt it rising up inside me, crushing the breath and lifting the hairs on my scalp. Annie wasn’t to live like Roland, lounging at his window above the stable yard, or like Sarah, looking out at bedtime to see the gathered hay pale in the moonlight. She was to be locked in the red room.

‘If she’s good and quiet,’ the Mistress said, ‘we shall keep her only until the baby quickens, and then back home she’ll go, if Morton will take her.’

We all looked at Uncle Morton then. I could see nothing in his face but a sort of impatience to be elsewhere – in his field, perhaps, picking raspberries, not having his time wasted. I think he never learned to be a father, losing his own father so young. While we waited to hear what he might say, there was a disturbance behind me and Daniel pushed between mother and me to stand in the circle. His mouth opened but no words came. Then he said, ‘I’ll…’ but nothing more, while he sniffed and made that grunting noise that always means he’s got a word stuck in his throat.

On the other side of the circle, Tal took a step forward as though he meant to rebuke his son, but the neighbour who stood next to him put a hand on his arm, and he said nothing.

Daniel’s words came out at last in a splutter. ‘I’ll… speak for Annie if she’ll let me.’

There was a commotion and then silence, while we waited to hear what the Mistress would say. Annie fixed her eyes on the ground. The Mistress gave Daniel a sharp look. ‘You’re saying you’ll take her?’

Daniel sniffed twice and said, ‘Yes.’

‘Tomorrow then. In the afternoon, before milking.’

And it was decided.

Next day, when the time came, Daniel looked dazed with excitement. Like all the women, I had woven ragweed in my hair. At first it didn’t feel like a wedding day, there had been so little time to look forward to it. When the men tied Daniel’s blindfold and pushed him into the circle to search for Annie, he played his part well, but Annie shrank from so much attention and could hardly move to avoid his arms. We helped her of course, the women, pushing her this way and that, until at last we allowed her to be caught, but it was a troubled kind of joy I felt, seeing Annie without a hair on her head long enough to tie a ribbon to. She led him still blindfolded to where the Mistress waited. And they were brought face to face in view of the Hall with the sun sinking pale and watery above the orchard.

And so they were married. When Annie loosened Daniel’s blindfold there was such joy in his eyes and he held her with such pride that her own face lit up with pleasure. We all crowded round to hug and kiss her and she wept to find herself so loved, and I wept too. Even the Mistress took her in her arms and whispered some words, perhaps of consolation, and all her shame was washed away. Only Morton seemed unmoved.

Then Daniel led her down across the lawn to the gateway, and across the road and over the bridge to his mother’s cottage and their bridal bed. And we were left to dance, and those too old to dance to cheer themselves with gin. We danced long and wild because it was a day no one would stop us, and Tal played his pipe and Peter beat time on a cow skin drum.

Mother sat for a while to watch. If she ever danced in her life I never saw it. Now any labour hurts her back. Standing hurts her too, and stooping, and sitting too long in one place. Bessie talked to her and I saw her smile and was glad. Then Sarah sat by her and took her hand. Roland and Megan went and sat in the shade of a beech tree and seemed very fascinated with each other, so I danced until the trees and the sky ran all together. When I paused to let my head stop turning, I looked for them but they were gone. I went to the spring, splashed water on my face and on my neck and stood while it ran down my back.

Sarah came and knelt beside me to drink. ‘You’re often alone,’ she said.

‘Yes, I suppose I am.’

‘Because you want to be?’

‘Sometimes.’

‘Roland and Megan were here, but I don’t see them now. Why don’t you find them?’

‘I’m not sure they want to be found.’

‘All the more reason.’ She stood wiping the water from her lips with the back of her hand, and then gathering with her fingers the drips on her chin. She saw my confusion. ‘For their sake, I mean,’ she said. ‘Because they’re your friends.’

‘Are they?’

‘Yes. And it would be an act of friendship not to leave them too long alone together. You see what happened to your cousin.’

‘Annie was a different case. Roland and Megan can marry if they want.’

Sarah looked at me closely. ‘And you? Is it what you want?’

I found I was in a state of agitation, to be asked this question, and to have Sarah ask it. For a while we stood saying nothing, watching the villagers on the lawn. Then Sarah spoke again.

‘There are things I should have said to you, Agnes, and I’ve stopped myself.’