Philippa Gregory - Meridon

He kept his eyes straight ahead so that he was not looking at my clothes, hand-me-downs, of a cheaper quality than his own. There was a hole in one of the boots. ‘You know what it is like for poor people,’ he said discreetly. ‘You would not make their lives hard for them if you could choose.’

I thought about that as I rode. And I knew it was not so. Nothing in my life had taught me tenderness or charity. Nothing had taught me to share, to think of others. I had only ever shared with one person. I had only ever had a thought for one person. Will’s belief that my knowing the underside of a cruel and greedy world would make me gentle could not have been more wrong.

We rode without speaking, listening to the river which flowed clattering on stones and whirlpooling around twigs beside us. In the distance I could hear the regular slap slap and creak of a mill wheel. Then we rounded a little bend and I saw it on the opposite side of the river, a handsome plain square building in the familiar yellow stone.

‘That’s the new mill,’ Will said with satisfaction. ‘The Green family run it as their own business. They grind Wideacre corn for free but they also take in corn from the other farmers and charge them a fee for grinding.’

‘Who owns it?’ I asked.

Will looked surprised. ‘I suppose you do,’ he said. ‘Your mother got it running again, but it was built by the Laceys. The Green family came as tenants, long ago. But they’ve paid no rent since the corporation was established.’

I nodded. I looked at the trim little building and at the bright white and purple violets in the windowboxes. I looked at the pretty curtains in the windows, and the mill wheel turning around. On the roof there were white doves cooing. I thought of the times I had gone hungry, and she had been hungry too. I thought of the times we had been cold, and how very often Da had beaten me. I thought of her sitting on gentlemen’s laps for a penny, and me being thrown from horse after horse for ha’pence. And I thought that all the time, for all of that time, these people had been living here in comfort and plenty, beside this quiet river.

Will set his horse to a trot and then we went alongside the strawberry field I had seen in the morning. The lad had nearly finished the harrowing and he waved to us as we rode by. There was a little track between two fields and it brought us out on the driveway towards the Hall.

‘You’ve never been poor have you?’ I said shrewdly. ‘You’ve always worked, wherever you said it was – Goodwood – and here. But you’ve never gone short.’

The horses walked shoulder to shoulder up the drive. The birds still sang in the treetops but I could not hear them. The sweet singing noise had gone from my head, too. ‘You’d never have such hopes of me if you had been poor, hard poor. You would know then that the only lesson anyone learns from poverty is to take as much as you can now, for fear that there will be nothing for you later. And don’t share with anyone, for certainly they’ll never share with you.’

Will kept his eyes on the lane before his cob. He never turned his head.

‘In all my life I only ever shared with one person,’ I said, my voice very low. ‘I only ever gave anything to one person. And now she is gone. I shall never share nor give to anyone else.’

I thought for a moment. ‘And except for her,’ I said consideringly, ‘no one ever gave me a damned thing. Every penny I saw I worked for. Every crust I ate I earned. I don’t think I’m the squire you hoped for, Will Tyacke. I don’t think I’m capable of gentry charity. I’ve been poor myself, and I hate being poor, and I don’t care for poor dirty people. If I’m rich now, I’ll stay that way. I don’t ever want to be poor again.’

20

Mr Fortescue was waiting for us in the stable yard. He asked Will to stay for dinner but Will said he had to go. He waited while I slid down from the saddle and then nodded to Mr Fortescue and to me.

‘I’ll come back this evening,’ he said. ‘When I finish work at dark.’

Then he gave me a friendly smile which also seemed somehow forgiving. Then he rode away.

‘I had better wash,’ I said. I put a hand to my cheek and felt the grime from the dust of the road.

‘Becky Miles has put some clothes in your room,’ Mr Fortescue offered, his voice carefully neutral. ‘They belonged to your mother, but she thinks they would fit you if you cared to try them.’

I could tell he was trying hard to pass no comment on my eccentricity of boys’ clothes. I looked down at the shabby breeches and jacket and I laughed.

‘It’s all right, Mr Fortescue,’ I said. ‘I know I cannot dress like a stable lad for the rest of my life. I was wanting to ask you about clothes. I also need to ask you about all sorts of other things which I will have to learn.’

Mr Fortescue brightened. ‘I only hope I can help you,’ he said. ‘We’ll talk over dinner.’

I nodded and went indoors and up to my room.

For the thousandth time that day I had a pang of pain and anger that she could not be with me, when I saw what was laid out on the bed.

It was the finest riding habit of plum velvet, edged with silky violet ribbon in a great double border. There was a matching tricorne hat to go with it, and dark leather boots with silky tassels and even cream-coloured stockings with plum clocks on the side.

I thought of how she would have flown at them and how ravishing she would have looked in them and I had to lean back against the panels of the door and take a deep breath to ease the sudden pain which thudded, as hard as a blow into my belly, at the thought that she would never see them. That in all her beauty-seeking life she had never known anything better than rags and trumpery.

So there was little delight for me in the thick smooth feel of the cloth, nor the fineness of the linen shirt and stock that went underneath. But when I had slipped on the skirt and gone to the mirror in the smart little boots I could smile with some pleasure at my reflection.

It was a half-mirror so I could not see the hem of the gown nor the boots without dragging over a chair and standing high on it to admire them. Then I slowly got down and saw how my linen shirt looked white against the neat purple waistband of the skirt, and how I looked somehow taller and older and quite strange and unlike myself. I stared at my face. The hazy green eyes looked back, the lines of my cheek, of my throat above the tumble of lace as clear as a drawn line.

My hair was still hopeless. I made a few half-hearted passes at it with the silver-backed brush but the soft bristles slid over the curls and the tangles and hardly straightened them at all. It remained an obstinate tumble of copper curls half-way down my back, and only the memory of the ragged mess of a bob stopped me from ringing for Becky Miles to bring me some scissors and hacking it all off again.

I turned from the glass and went down to dinner, feeling already stronger and more confident in boots which clicked on the floorboards of the hall and did not clump.

Mr Fortescue was waiting for me in the dining room and when he saw me his jaw dropped and he gaped like a country child at mummers.

‘Good God!’ he said.

Becky Miles who was setting a soup tureen on the table swung around and nearly dropped it in her surprise.

‘Miss Sarah!’ she said. ‘You look beautiful!’

I felt myself flush as vain and as silly as a market-day slut.

‘Thank you,’ I said steadily and took my seat at the head of the table.

Mr Fortescue sat at my right-hand side and Becky Miles loaded the rest of the expanse of mahogany with as many dishes as she could, to conceal the fact that there were just the two of us, camped out at one end of the table.