The Lady's Slipper (35 page)

‘Sir,’ said a breathless voice. ‘You dropped your glove.’

‘Thank you,’ she heard Richard say. ‘Tell the gatekeeper to open the gate, will you.’

‘Yes, sir.’

The man’s feet moved off with a clink of iron against stone and she was hoisted, swung suspended in the air once more. The grinding of the windlass and a chain running through pulleys. They were opening the gate.

The conveyance lurched forward and she heard the grate of the portal against flagstones, but then winced as the ear-splitting clangour of the prison bell drowned out all other sound.

The sedan jolted to the ground.

Richard’s face appeared at the window. ‘Hurry,’ he said, opening the door and grasping her wrist, throwing off his hat at the same time. ‘Get out.’

It was a tussle to climb down in the heavy cloak and her limbs were weak; he had to half drag her out of the door.

‘Run!’ He pulled her towards the massive gates, which were just beginning to squeeze closed again. She looked over her shoulder and saw the yard full of scattered men, charging hither and thither in a blur of disorder. A noise like an explosion filled her ears, then came the stench of powder. She did not dare look back again but fled towards the gate, holding tight to Richard’s hand, seeing nothing but his mulberry back and the narrow shrinking opening to the outside world. Another explosion of shot bounced off the wall in front of them and the fog of smoke partially obscured the closing gate. When it cleared she saw there was a guard running towards the gateway, armed with a musket.

‘Make way, in the name of the king!’ shouted Richard, waving the pistol. The soldier looked momentarily nonplussed, pausing as they raced towards the gate. Alice felt Richard’s hands almost lift her off the ground to propel her through the vertical crack before the soldier raised his musket to fire at point blank range. Richard flung himself through just as the musket ball sliced the edge of the gate, sending a shower of splinters and powder into the air.

Alice crouched low next to the wall, panting and breathless, as the gate finally shut. The bell was still tolling. A mist of smoke rose up to vaporize into the night sky and the spasms of firing within boomed out over the town.

Richard looked into her face, pulling her back to her feet, his eyes asking her how she fared. She reassured him with a brief smile and followed him, fleet-footed, down the steep cobbles, through the rabbit warren of streets towards the landing stage, where they could see the strip of silver water holding the land together like a belt of mercury. Several ships were already headed out towards the sea, their sails cracking as the bluff wind filled them and drew them westwards.

At the top of the steps they looked back to where the crenellations of the castle were occasionally thrown into relief by feeble flashes of continued gunfire. Alice found her legs were shaking, her heart tattooing behind her ribs. She staggered and almost tumbled down the steps. Richard drew her towards him to support her. He held her close to his chest, his arms wrapped about her waist, her head resting in the hollow of his shoulder.

He drew away to look at her. ‘The search parties will be out for thee, when they know thou art gone,’ he said. ‘’Tis not safe to remain here. We had best take that passage, as Stephen said.’ He squeezed her arm in wordless comfort before leading her down the steps. ‘We must hurry, for the tide is turning and the ships will be heading out. Yet neither must we arouse suspicion with our haste.’

They walked briskly along the wharf, looking for the
Noblesse.
There was a large crowd on the quay, getting ready to sail with the tide, and no one paid Richard and Alice any attention. They walked to the end of the stone jetty but still could not see the
Noblesse.

At length, Richard paused to ask one of the men carrying a basket of salt herring.

‘The
Noblesse
? Why, she’s just sailed. You’ve missed her.’ He pointed to a collection of small dots out towards the horizon. ‘That’s her with the red pennant.’

Alice sagged. A grey hopelessness swamped her. Richard turned her to face him.

‘I’ll not leave thee,’ he said. His forehead was creased with worry. ‘We will find another passage.’

‘She’s sailing on the hour,’ said the man with the salt herring, ‘the flute, over there.’ He pointed to the dark hulk of a merchant ship across the other side of the bridge, still lying quietly in its berth.

‘Thanks to thee,’ said Richard. They weaved towards it, in and out of the tradesmen, keeping it in their sights. Alice was acutely aware of her dirty clothes and scuffed boots beneath the blue velvet cloak. Her hands clung tightly to its folds to hide what was beneath.

‘Over there!’ The noise of running feet spun her around.

‘Richard–’ she stopped him short with a hand on his shoulder–‘the guards have seen us.’

He turned instantly–the metal helmets of two guards could be seen running towards them, dodging through the bustling activity on the quay.

Richard and Alice ducked down into the crowd.

‘Now,’ Richard said, and he set off at a run, tugging at her arm. They sprinted into the darkness, across the arch of the stone bridge towards the flute that was just about to heave to. The oars were out, the tow boats and ropes ready. The silhouettes of the heads of the crew could be seen bobbing above the rails as they went about their business. Two coopers in wide canvas breeches had just wound the capstan to hoist the last barrels of ale aboard.

Alice heard the sound of running feet but did not dare look behind her. They raced up the stone platform and onto the gangplank. Two rough-hands stared at them as they hauled themselves aboard by the rope rail, then exchanged glances and shook their heads before hauling on the pulleys to raise the plank. Richard held Alice’s hand in a firm grip as he shepherded her quickly across the deck, weaving between the teams of men loading grain into the dry stores.

‘This way,’ he said hurrying towards the rear of the ship. ‘We will find the Master and, God willing, buy passage.’

She followed his broad back but paused as the world around her began to swivel on its axis. There was a bellow from the quay below and she glimpsed a cluster of black uniforms and the glint of helmets. Quickly, she ducked her head and hastened to catch up with Richard. The sailors at the rails looked up from their work and leaned over to see what the commotion was, but only for a moment, for the land was gliding away from them and once the vessel was moving there was no stopping her–above, a crack of canvas announced a small sail unfurling into the wind. The sound caused her heart to leap in her chest.

She picked her way between the ropes and pulleys to where Richard was speaking to a sailor coiling ropes about a peg. The sailor jabbed his finger wordlessly towards a short stout man with a bristling moustache. Under a hanging lantern, the Master was giving orders to the dishevelled-looking sailors grouped about him. When he saw them approach he looked at Alice with disbelief. Alice saw his look and hurried to Richard’s side. The Master frowned and was already addressing them.

‘You are not one of my men,’ he said, ‘nor even a sailor by the looks of you.’

‘Good evening, sir,’ Richard said with a nod. ‘We missed our passage, but just caught the tide with thee. Tell me, where are you bound?’

The Master’s eyebrows lowered and he shook his head. He opened his mouth, about to speak, but Richard carried on, ‘We can pay for our berths,’ and held out the bag of coinage Stephen had given him.

‘I don’t like women aboard. I won’t have them. They cause nothing but trouble,’ the Master said.

‘I am Richard Wheeler of Kendal, and this is my spouse, Alice. I will vouch for her.’ Alice felt heat rise to her face, and not just because Richard had an air of authority and directness about him that made him difficult to refuse.

The Master tried again. ‘I tell you, I don’t like it, it unsettles the men. By rights I should have you put to shore.’

Alice thought of the guards waiting on the quay. Richard squeezed her hand.

‘Sir?’ A man appeared at the Master’s shoulder.

‘What is it?’

‘Bo’sun’s found another split in the topsail, he needs more men on it.’

The Master gave a heavy sigh. ‘I haven’t got time for you now, I’ve better things to do. Fetch a boy,’ he said to the sailor. ‘I can’t have women berthing with the men, can I? I’ll have to see if there’s space. It’s not usual, sir. Women are unlucky.’ He shook his head.

‘Thanks to thee,’ Richard said, opening the purse, ‘we appreciate it.’

‘No, I’ll not be taking your money, you’ll need to make yourself known to the owner for that. I don’t know what the drill is for paying passengers. The boy will show you to his quarters. Where is your luggage?’

Alice caught Richard’s eye, but fortunately the Master did not wait for an answer. A small boy in a brown knitted cap and filthy jersey skidded to a halt on his bare feet. The Master turned and gave the boy orders. The boy nodded.

‘Over here,’ said the lad, holding up his lantern and beckoning to them with a scrawny hand.

Richard bowed politely, although the Master had ceased to pay them any attention, and followed the boy. Alice swayed behind them, her feet uncertain on the shifting boards. They went past the helm to a small wooden door with a carved surround and green oilskin over its glass panel.

‘Here it is,’ the boy said in a loud whisper, ‘but if I were you I’d hold off till after dinner. He’s got a right temper on him and he’s sleeping now.’ The sound of a rasping breath could be heard through the door. ‘He won’t take kindly to being woke. Come on, I’ll show you where you can berth.’

The boy took them down some slippery wooden steps beneath the quarterdeck to where there were two small plank doors side by side in the gloom. ‘It’ll have to be this one. Owner’s son was to have this one, but he’s not coming. Next door’s the Master’s.’

The boy handed Alice the light and stepped aside to let them enter.

Richard held a coin out to him. ‘Thanks for thy advice.’

The boy snatched the coin. ‘No trouble. Thank ye, sir,’ and ran off, leaving the door creaking back and forth. Alice stepped in and looked around her.

She went over to the port window and peered out through the smeary bubble of glass. The glimmer of fishermen’s cottages passed by their flank, then the rocky promontory of the headland and an expanse of flat pale sand, grey in the cloudy moonlight. Richard came to join her at the window.

‘That’s the last of England,’ he said. ‘They will not catch us now.’

And he lifted her off her feet like a small child and swung her round.

‘Put me down at once,’ she said. But she was smiling.

Geoffrey’s heart lifted as the slate of sea widened before him and the land became a mere smudge of tiny lights on the coastline they had left behind. He was glad to be cuffed by the cold air; he knew that after a few weeks at sea his skin always felt cooler and sleek as an otter under his silk shirt. The almanac had predicted fine weather and a stiff breeze out of harbour, so the prospect of the many weeks at sea was very pleasant. He smiled, suddenly carefree, for he was leaving his woes behind him, leaving the dark clouds of Westmorland for the sunshine of Virginia.

When it had occurred to him he could take ship again, it had seemed like providence. He knew that in some sense he was running away. He needed to be as far away from the gibbet at Lancaster as possible; he could not have stomached being present when Alice Ibbetson was hanged. Could not bear the sound of it. Even as a boy he had a ghoulish fear of the hangman in his black hood. It had given him the night-terrors thinking he lay in wait for him under his bed.

He shivered, and not just from the chill of the spray. With Alice Ibbetson’s death, the old woman’s ghost might be tempted to creep out from her cold resting place. He fancied she knew exactly what he was doing every day, almost as if she was following him–an invisible, but inextinguishable, malevolent presence.

Geoffrey looked up. There was a reassuring number of men on the topsail spars. Maybe she would not be able to reach him on this table of water. Here the men treated him with the respect he deserved and there would be no women with whom he need concern himself. He would have sturdy male company and could forget the troubles of Westmorland. He would meet with Fairfax in Virginia, have a look at his estate.

There were rumours the king was soon to give Fairfax a proprietary colony, and who knows, Geoffrey thought, if he were to ingratiate himself with Fairfax enough, he himself might yet be awarded a swathe of land rather than having to purchase it from Lord Baltimore’s portion. He would invite Fairfax to dine; he would certainly prove to be a more interesting companion than the ship’s Master, who hardly spoke a word, and when he did could talk of nothing but wind and water.

With a light step, he went down to his familiar sea-going chamber, creaking slightly like a baby’s bassinet–with its comfortable leather chair, its fixed escritoire and delightful collection of objects from around the world. There on the shelf above his cot, with its wooden rail to keep them from falling, were a Dutch porcelain pipe with a silver mounted lid, various drinking vessels from Moorish lands and a curved dagger from Spain with a tooled leather handle.

On another shelf near the stern windows sat his books, including the obligatory large Bible and atlas, and his botany volumes, next to his own nocturnals and mariner’s quadrant. He liked to amuse himself by double-checking the progress of their passage. On the starboard wall hung a framed compass-rose and a collection of pressed butterflies from the Caribbees, their iridescent wings glimmering in the light of the hanging lamp, which rocked gently in its counterbalanced housing.

He idly took down a sword from his collection of arms. His swords were arrayed in a sunburst effect on the wooden wall. He made a few thrusts and parries, pleased with his swordsmanship, before sliding the rapier back into its housing and pressing his eyes to the porthole. The blur of the coast was now so faint as to be almost imaginary.

He rang for a boy and sent him to fetch his meal. It felt good to be aboard, to be giving orders again. After a meal in his cabin of salt-pork, bread and beans, he felt the infernal itching returning, so he unpacked his leather case and drew out one of several phials containing the lady’s slipper extract. He brought the O-shaped neck of the bottle to his lips and drained it, grimacing at the taste and smell. He was ready with his flask to take a nip of rum to counteract it. After wrapping a blanket around his knees, he sat down in his chair and closed his eyes, listening to the noise of the miniature world of his ship–the lowing of the milk-cow from the hold, the familiar clunk of something heavy rolling on the poop deck above and the distant shouts of the conning officer giving directions to the helm.

The rocking motion and the warming effects of the food and rum soon had him dozing in his seat; he slept with his head tilted back, his mouth open. He did not hear the bells for the change of watch or the slap of the sail. Instead he fancied that his ship had sunk underwater, down to the sea bed, where the mast turned into a gallows and Alice Ibbetson was hanging there, her naked feet swinging above his head.

Alice stared out of the window at the undulating horizon. It was calm but the swell under her feet was an unfamiliar sensation; already her feet longed for solid earth. The cabin was cramped but clean. It smelt of damp wood and had no furnishings except a locker set into a bench, a fixed washstand and a single bare berth which lay along one wall. On it was folded a single canvas hammock for the hooks in the roof beams. Richard had gone up on deck to buy blankets and linen from the ship’s stores and already she missed his steadfast presence. She felt vulnerable when he was not by her side.

Earlier he had asked the boy for water and more light, and she was able to wash herself at last. She noticed how her shaking fingers looked red and coarse against the fine porcelain of the bowl. The water was salty and stung in the small cuts in her fingers. They were no longer soft and white but looked like the hands of a maid of all work. She thought fleetingly of Ella, but the thought pained her, so she resolutely put it aside and paid attention to the act of washing her face.

The wooden door opened and Richard stepped over the threshold, ducking his height under the lintel, his arms full of blankets, a basket of other items balanced on top. She turned from her washing and reached out her hand to pull a corner of a linen cloth from the basket. She rubbed vigorously at her face.

‘If I am supposed to be your wife, then I suppose I must take pains to be clean, at least,’ she smiled.

‘I surely would not choose such a troublesome wife as thee.’

He was making jest, and they both laughed, but there was a moment’s silence before he spoke again. A moment where both saw clearly what they had not seen before.

‘As my wife,’ he said to her softly, ‘I would have kept thee safe at home and made sure nothing could harm thee.’

Tears sprang to her eyes from a deep well inside her. The cloth fell to her side.

‘Come here,’ he said softly.

He put down the basket and reached out towards her, closing his arms tightly about her waist. The tears came. But then she found herself yielding, pliant like a tender young shoot, her back arched, her face upturned to his. When he kissed her, it was long and slow and sweet, his lips soft and warm against hers. And there was a stir ring in her breast and the heaving world seemed turned to silence by his kiss. It was he who pulled away first, his eyes beseeching. ‘I have not offended thee?’

‘No, Richard. I think I have wished it for a long time but without knowing it, since the very first time you smiled at me. In the miller’s. Do you remember?’

‘I remember your face, and something in your eyes. A light there that catches me somehow.’ He took hold of her face and looked down at her. ‘It still does.’

He reached for her again, and she felt him press towards her and his face come down to cover her throat with kisses, whilst her hands grasped his hair as she sought to bring him home to her. She heard herself moan with pleasure as an exquisite tingle mounted in her thighs and she pushed her hips towards him. His hand was on her breastbone, where her breath rose and fell in gusts, she felt him move against her, hard, through the soft petticoats.

He guided her over to the cot, where he began to untie the laces from the side of her bodice, with the sort of concentration one might use if engaged in a very delicate act of calligraphy. She watched the laces slide away through the holes and hang in his broad fingers, his head bowed to the task, and was strangely moved. Her breath came quicker as the bodice slid slowly from her shoulders, and his hands rubbed over her breasts through the fine lawn of the chemise, her nipples hardening as his kisses drew nearer towards them. Finally his mouth was on her nipple and her hand was wrapped in the silky skein of his hair. She pushed towards him, the place between her legs wet and wanting.

He reached out to touch her face. ‘Your husband? I would not want…’

‘Hush,’ she said then, moved by his earnest expression. ‘Who knows what tomorrow may bring. Yesterday I thought my life ending. But today it seems it was a beginning, for I have found you, I have found
thee,
and if it be one more hour or one more day in thy company, I am content.’

He smiled then and kissed her neck, and the ship creaked gently as they took their pleasure of each other for the first time.

The rap on the door made them both start. Richard stood up quickly, tugging on his breeches, and went to listen at the door.

‘Who is it?’

‘’Tis the steward’s boy, sir,’ came a high-pitched voice from without. Alice pulled her bodice back over her shoulders, flustered, her eyes never leaving Richard’s face.

‘The Master requests you at his table. At the next bell, sir.’

Alice mouthed to him, ‘What shall we do?’

He shook his head. ‘Thank you, boy,’ he said loudly through the door. ‘Thank the Master, but tell him the lady has not yet found her sea legs and we must unfortunately decline his invitation. Perhaps tomorrow.’

‘Yes, sir.’ They listened until the footsteps had died away. Richard then opened the door and looked out, before shutting it and barring it firmly against intruders.

‘I am not ready to share thee with company,’ he said. ‘Happen the owner of the ship can wait until the morrow for his payment. After all, we cannot go far unless we wish to swim.’

She did not even smile. ‘Richard, I am afraid.’

‘We are safe here.’ He reached for her hand. ‘Or leastways as safe as anyone else on this voyage.’

She paused a moment. A deep unease gnawed in her belly but it was a feeling she could not name. ‘I don’t know. I suppose I am just not used to the sea. And I am as much afraid of gaining a new life as I was of losing it.’

‘Thou wilt find thy sea legs soon enough. ’Tis hard to get accustomed to at first, I know.’

‘It is not that. It’s like an emptiness, leaving England behind. I have nothing left, Richard, nothing to offer. Only what I am standing in.’

He grasped hold of her shoulders and looked at her steadily.

‘That is enough for me. Thy life. It could so easily have been otherwise. I will not leave thee, I promise. We will face what life brings together.’ He dropped his eyes a moment before speaking again. ‘I cannot hold it from thee any longer, the ship is not bound for France, but for New England—’ She drew back and made to protest, but he stayed her. ‘There are Quakers there who will help us–old Isaac used to talk of them. It is not so bad. We can make a fresh start there, build a new life for ourselves.’

‘But I know nothing of Quaker life, only the few things Hannah told me.’ She turned away, agitated. ‘I cannot start to imagine it, I’m not ready to even think of it.’ She pressed her palm to her forehead. ‘The other side of the world. I have never been out of my little England before. And besides, I am not so devout as Hannah. I am not sure I am fitted for that life.’ She moved away, twisting the lace of her bodice in her fingers.

‘You know I would never press thee to become one of us. But we have no choice, and in a way it is good, for it would be hard for thee to return to England, to be always looking over thy shoulder. In New England thou wilt be a free woman in a free land. A new start–for us both.’

He reached over, curled his fingers into hers and squeezed them, his eyes searching hers. She looked down at his broad palm and her own hand lying trustingly there. She must have faith in providence. She reached her other hand around his neck and pulled him down towards her. The boards under her feet tilted slightly and she shifted her weight to compensate. He took her in his arms and clasped her close.

‘I love thee, Alice,’ he said.