Филиппа Карр - Saraband for Two Sisters

This had made a different relationship between us. We were more intimate, and Mrs.

Cherry had become more of a friend than a servant. It might have been because the Royalist cause was being undermined and a great many people were predicting a Parliamentary victory, which would have an equalizing effect on society. She came into my room one day and said I was looking peaky and she had a good pick-me-up tonic. “You can’t beat herb-twopence,” she told me. “I’ve always said that was a cure for every ailment under the sun.”

“I’m afraid of taking tonics, Mrs. Cherry,” I said. “I want everything to be natural.”

“My patience me!” she cried, her cherry face wrinkling up with mirth. “If herb-twopence ain’t the most natural thing on God’s earth, my name’s not Emmy Cherry. A little dash of it would do you the world of good.”

“As a matter of fact I feel very well indeed. If I look a little wan, it’s nothing.” ‘Well, we’ve got to take care of you. You’ve got your sister back again. I reckon she’ll keep her eye on you.”

“I’m sure she will. And she’s experienced too.”

‘Then we’ve got Grace. We’re lucky, I reckon that’s what. Does the General know?”

Her eyes were sharp suddenly.

“Not yet. It’s not possible to reach him. We don’t know where he is. This terrible war... .”

“So he don’t know yet.” She shook her head. “If you was to be able to get in touch,” she said, “tell him it’ll be all right, will you? Tell him that Cherry and me will see everything’s all right.”

“I will, Mrs. Cherry. You’re fond of the General, I know.”

“Well, you might say that was putting it mild like. Cherry thinks the world of him. Served with him. Would be with him now if he was fit and well ... like the rest of them. And all the time I’ve been here ... well, I’ve got to look on him ... more than a mere master.”

“He is a man who inspires great respect.”

She lowered her eyes to hide her emotion, I guessed. Then she said brightly, “Well, if you was feeling a bit under the weather you come to me, my lady. I reckon you won’t be scorning my herb-twopence once you’ve felt its effects.” When she left me I went to Bersaba and told her that Mrs. Cherry thought I ought to try some of her cures.

“Do you remember Mrs. Cherry’s soothing mixture?” I asked.

“It sent you to sleep, didn’t it?”

“I don’t sleep very well now,” I told her. “Sometimes I have strange dreams. I told you how once I went to the Castle Room and saw a face there-or thought I did. I’m sure I did. It was at night and I took a candle. Mrs. Cherry came and found me there. She thought I was walking in my sleep.”

“Were you?” asked Bersaba.

“No. I’m sure I wasn’t. I saw a light in the castle from my room and then I went up and saw the face. I thought it was Strawberry John-a man I once saw in the woods. But they didn’t believe me any of them and after that I lost the baby.”

Bersaba said, “And you think the two incidents were connected?”

“They all said so. I had a fright, you see, and that can bring on a miscarriage, can’t it?”

“Tell me exactly what happened,” said Bersaba. And I told her.

“Did Richard know?”

“Oh, yes. He thought with the rest that I’d had a nightmare.”

“It was all connected with the castle. Did he ever talk to you about the castle?»

“No. There are some things one can’t talk about with Richard. He withdraws himself, as it were, so that you know you mustn’t talk about it anymore.»

“You should not allow yourself to be dominated, Angelet»

“You don’t know Richard.”

She smiled at me, rather tenderly I thought.

Then she said, “Stop thinking about the castle. Stop thinking about anything but the baby. Just imagine how overjoyed Richard will be when he knows, and how happy you will be when you have your little baby to care for.”

“I do try, Bersaba, but then all sorts of thoughts come into my mind. I wonder about Richard, where he is, whether he will ever come back ... whether like Luke … and so many others-“ She gripped my hand so tightly that I winced.

“Don’t,” she commanded. “He’ll come back. I tell you he’ll come back.” That was typical of Bersaba. Sometimes she appeared to believe that she could work miracles.

Then she started to talk about babies and she said we would make the clothes ourselves as we should never have a seamstress in these days.

It is wonderful having Bersaba with me.

It was hot that August. The wasps were thick around the plum trees; the children were tanned by the sun; we could always hear Arabella’s imperious voice above the rest. When I watched them at play I would forget the war, forget my fears for Richard, forget everything but that early next year my child would be born. For days I lived in contentment and then I awoke one night in a state of uneasiness. I couldn’t explain what it was, but it was just a strong sense of warning. It was almost as though something were warning me of danger, and the first person I thought of on waking was Magdalen-Richard’s first wife.

It may have been because she had been in the house as I had, expecting a child as I was; and then she had died. Deep within me I suppose there was a fear here that because it had happened to her it could happen to me. But why? It was something in the manner of Mrs. Cherry and Cherry (although he was a man of very few words), of Jesson, Grace, and Meg... . Yes, the attitude of every one of them had changed toward me since it had become known that I was to have a child. It was almost as though they were watching me, looking for a sign of something. I got out of bed and went to the window. I couldn’t see the castle because I was in the Blue Room. I had not wanted to go to the bedchamber I had shared with Richard; this was more cozy. Bersaba was in the Lavender Room, very close, and all the children slept in a room with Phoebe which was immediately next to hers-so we were all together. I looked out on die peaceful lawns and thought of what had happened to Longridge Farm and how at any moment soldiers could advance and lay waste my home. But it was not such thoughts which made me uneasy. It was something that overshadowed me alone-it was a personal fear-which, of course, is so much more frightening than those that are shared by others.

I went to the Lavender Room, opened the door, and looked in. Bersaba was asleep. She lay on her back with her hair falling onto the pillow, showing clearly the scars on her forehead. She had always tried to disguise them, but they had not prevented Luke’s falling in love with her and loving her in his Puritan way much more fervently than Richard had ever loved me. Plow odd that Luke, a Puritan, should love like that. But was it something in Bersaba?

I turned away and quietly opened the door of the nursery. Moonlight showed me Arabella and Lucas on their child’s pallets and Phoebe sleeping quietly with little Thomas in his crib.

All was well. Why should I have awakened with these fears on me? But as I stood there I knew that I was being watched and I felt my nerves tingling just as they had that night in the Castle Room when I had thought a ghost was behind me and had turned to find it was Mrs. Cherry.

I felt limp with terror and afraid to turn around. Then I heard Bersaba laugh softly.

“Angel, what are you doing?”

“Oh!” I turned and there she was, my sister, her eyes wide with something like amusement.

“I...I couldn’t sleep,” I stammered.

“You’ll catch cold wandering about like that”

“It’s a warm night. And what of you?”

“You came and looked at me.”

“So you were awake?”

“Not completely. But I looked up and there was my sister looking at me in a very odd sort of manner.”