The Ruby Talisman (14 page)

Tilly lifted her arm in a welcoming gesture to make sure the woman could see the precious pearls glimmering on her wrist.

‘Perhaps some bread and cheese,’ suggested Tilly. ‘And something hot would be lovely.’

The woman sniffed. ‘I’ve baked bread for the men’s breakfast. I’ve none to spare. Be off with you.’

Tilly slipped the pearl bracelet from her wrist and held it out to the woman. ‘I’ve no money, but I can pay you with this beautiful pearl bracelet,’ she coaxed. ‘It’s worth many, many times the value of the food.’

The woman’s eyes were drawn greedily to the bracelet. It was worth far more than what their farm could make in a year. She hesitated, glancing over her shoulder into the kitchen.

‘How do I know you aren’t a thief? That some
aristo
won’t be knocking on my door tonight saying I stole it?’

‘The bracelet belongs to my friend, who would be happy to trade it for some good, nourishing food – some bread and cheese, perhaps some soup or a pie?’

Tilly’s mouth began to salivate. From the kitchen she could smell something delicious simmering over the fire.

The woman sized up Tilly once more. ‘Wait here,’ she ordered.

The woman returned in a moment with a basket of freshly baked country bread, a round of brie, a bottle of apple cider and a bucket filled with hot potato and leek soup.

Tilly’s mouth watered, and she had to restrain herself from snatching away the food. She imagined that it could take them a few days to reach the coast, and she did not want to risk stopping for food very often. She swallowed.

‘The bracelet is very valuable,’ Tilly reminded her politely. ‘There are three of us and a dog, so I would really appreciate it if you could give us some more food.’

The woman stiffened with annoyance. Tilly held out the pearl bracelet. The woman stepped back.

‘Never mind,’ said Tilly with an air of complete indifference. ‘I am sure I will get much more for the bracelet in the next town.’

She turned away and began to walk across the farmyard.

‘Wait,’ called the woman desperately. ‘I do have a couple more things you could have.’

She returned in a moment with more bread and brie; some cucumbers, warm from the sun; a basket of cherries; a pot of strawberry jam and a large onion tart. Tilly looked over the selection of food. She knew the bracelet was worth far more than the food, but they were desperate.

‘This is all the food I’ve cooked for the men’s breakfast. They’ll be in soon and mighty angry if there’s nothing for them to eat.’

‘Thank you,’ Tilly replied with a nod. ‘This looks delicious.’

Tilly passed over the pearl bracelet and took the two baskets and bucket of soup in return.

‘By the way,’ Tilly added, as though it were an afterthought. ‘My friend has a fever. Do you have any willow bark or other medicine?’

The woman went pale and stepped back, crossing herself. ‘Get out,’ she ordered. ‘Get out at once before I turn the dogs on you.’

Tilly’s heart sank. Well, at least she had enough food to keep them going on their journey.

She struggled back, carrying the cumbersome baskets, careful not to spill a drop of the precious soup. Amelie climbed up to help her load the food onto the barge. The girls each tore a strip of fresh bread crust and jammed it into their mouths.

Tilly was reminded of the two children cramming bread into their mouths outside the burning chateau two nights ago.
Was it only two nights? It feels like a lot longer
...

Tilly steered the barge back out into the current and didn’t relax until the farmhouse was well behind them.

Tilly and Amelie shared a bowl of hot potato and leek soup, which they slurped eagerly.

Henri groaned and tossed. Should she try to feed Henri? Tilly vaguely remembered there was an old saying about ‘feed a cold and starve a fever’ – or was it ‘feed a fever and starve a cold’?

Amelie bathed Henri and dribbled some water in his mouth while Tilly steered the barge around a small island in the river.

‘What shall we do about Henri?’ asked Tilly. ‘I tried to get some willow-bark tea from the farmhouse, but she threatened to turn the dog on me.’

‘People get very nervous of fevers,’ agreed Amelie. ‘Perhaps we could try to make it ourselves.’

‘What do you mean?’

‘The tea is made from the bark of willow trees,’ Amelie explained.

Tilly glanced at the pale-green weeping willow trees lining the river. ‘You mean those willow trees growing along the riverbank?’

‘Oui,’
replied Amelie. ‘Maman would always nurse us herself when we were sick. She’d soak a small pile of bark in water for a few hours, then boil it. But I do not remember exactly. It was a long time ago.’

‘Let’s give it a go,’ suggested Tilly.

Tilly steered the barge into the reeds on the left-hand bank once more and scrambled ashore. Using her knife, she peeled a large slice of bark from a willow tree. Back on the barge, she used the knife to break the bark into smaller pieces, which she then dropped into the bucket of fresh water.

‘Let’s hope this works,’ Tilly said, pushing the barge out into the current again.

The girls sat together in the stern, taking it in turns to look after Henri – giving him sips of water and soup, keeping him cool with wet cloths. They only had one bucket of fresh water, so they all had to sip the slightly bitter willow-bark concoction.

The girls gradually relaxed after the terrifying ordeals of the last few days. Amelie was feeling weak from her illness and dozed awhile. When she woke, they ate some more bread, cheese and cucumber, inexpertly sawn with a knife.

‘Tell me about your life,’ Amelie asked suddenly. ‘I know very little about you, except that your time seems so different to ours?’

Tilly thought about it. Could she begin to explain to Amelie about mobile phones, computers, cars, aeroplanes, televisions, electricity, trains, refrigerators, dishwashers, spaceships? Tilly’s own mind began to boggle. And was it a fair thing to tell Amelie about these things? Tilly searched for something easier and more personal to talk about.

‘I live with my mum and my brother,’ Tilly began. ‘In a small house – nothing grand like yours was.’

‘You have a mother and a brother?’ asked Amelie, looking a little misty-eyed. ‘Oh, how lucky you are.’

‘I have a dad, too, although he doesn’t live with us,’ Tilly explained. ‘He left my mother to live with another woman and her children.’

Tilly felt the old, familiar pain. But somehow it didn’t hurt as much as she remembered to talk about it.

‘He doesn’t love Mum anymore, or maybe us,’ Tilly continued, a lump in her throat.

‘How do you know?’ Amelie asked. ‘I mean, how do you know he doesn’t love
you?’

Tilly was flummoxed. ‘I ... I guess because he left us.’

‘So he does not wish to see you?’ Amelie asked.

‘No,’ Tilly replied. ‘I don’t want to see him, because he left us and he doesn’t love my mother anymore.’

Amelie gurgled her infectious laugh. ‘I am sorry. In France, people do not marry for love,’ Amelie explained. ‘To marry for love is a romantic, new concept. People marry for money or for convenience – to join two estates or bring a great dowry. Or, in my case, to marry a wealthy old man. You marry who your parents arrange for you to marry.’

Tilly nodded. ‘I think it would be really sad to have to marry for convenience,’ she said. ‘I hope I find the love of my life one day.’

Tilly glanced surreptitiously at Henri; his handsome face flushed with fever; his long, dark hair tangled and lank; his clothes torn and filthy. Tilly suddenly thought how she must look an ugly fright. Amelie followed her glance to Henri and bit her lip.

‘So, where do you live? In France or England?’ asked Amelie, changing the subject.

‘I live in Sydney, on the other side of the world in Australia. You know it was settled by England in 1788, last year?’

Tilly felt like pinching herself. She was living in 1789, when Sydney was just a fledgling colony. It was incredible to imagine.

‘Non,
that is unbelievable,’ replied Amelie, shaking her head. ‘The French explorers returned from this great land in the south and said it was barren and inhospitable, with wild, primitive natives and strange creatures and monsters. They said it was worthless, that the English would starve to death in a year.’

Tilly smiled at this summation of her country. ‘Well, they were wrong. The English beat them on that point.’

It was funny to think that if history had changed slightly, Australians would all be speaking French.

The days on the barge were long and languorous. The sun rose at about 6 am and set at about 10 pm, so they floated downstream for about sixteen hours a day. Tilly estimated they covered between sixty and eighty kilometres per day, but the Seine snaked and wound back on itself so often that the two hundred kilometres to the coast was more like four hundred kilometres.

Amelie and Tilly took it in turns to tend to Henri and steer the barge. Most days, Tilly would jump in the river and swim behind in her clothes, then let the sun dry her. At night, they pulled up on the riverbank and made camp, trusting Juju to guard them and warn them of danger. They used the rough decking of the barge to build a fire to heat water for willow-bark tea and boil up the rags that they used for cleaning Henri’s wounds.

For food, they ate sparingly of the bread Tilly had bought, soaking the stale crust in water to soften it. Sometimes they found a cherry or plum tree growing on the banks of the river where they could scavenge some fruit. Mimi would climb to the very top of the tree to get the ripest, sweetest fruit and sometimes brought down presents for the girls to share.

They often saw fish jumping, but they had no way of catching them. Whenever they saw a fresh, clear brook joining the Seine, they would stop and refill their water bucket.

After the third day, Henri began to improve. His fever dropped and his wounds began to heal, losing their red, angry colour. He was very weak and slept a lot, but gradually regained strength.

On the fifth evening, the barge floated past the medieval town of Rouen. Tilly wished they could stop to explore the narrow, cobbled laneways and half-timbered houses clustered around the soaring towers of the cathedral.

‘Do you know that Jeanne d’Arc was burnt as a witch at the stake here at Rouen in 1431 when she was only nineteen years old?’ commented Amelie as they floated past the graceful spires and turrets of the town.

Tilly sat up, her eyes bright with interest. She had heard of Jeanne of Arc, but couldn’t remember the specifics of her life.

‘No,’ replied Tilly. ‘I didn’t know that. Why was she killed? She was so young.’

‘In the fifteenth century, there was a war that lasted a hundred years between the French and the English,’ Amelie explained. ‘The English were victorious and had taken over much of France – particularly the north. The French suffered many years of humiliating defeats.

‘When Jeanne was only twelve years old, she experienced her first visions from God. Jeanne was a young, illiterate peasant girl, but she convinced the Dauphin of France that God had sent her these visions to lead the French troops to victory. He must have thought she was insane, but was so desperate that he eventually allowed her to lead his army. She was seventeen.’

Tilly nodded. That was only a few years older than she was now. It was amazing to think that a girl could command an entire army.

‘Miraculously, Jeanne did exactly that, turning the tide of the war in a matter of days,’ Amelie continued. ‘Jeanne cut her hair, dressed in men’s armour and led the French army to a string of victories, the first for more than a generation. Jeanne managed to lift the long-running siege of Orleans in just nine days.

‘Unfortunately, she was eventually captured by the Burgundians and sold to the English, who tried her for heresy and witchcraft. Jeanne attempted to escape several times, even jumping from the top of a twenty-metre tower into a dry moat, but was recaptured.

‘Finally, Jeanne was burnt at the stake, her body thrown into the River Seine. She was a brave, young peasant girl who changed the entire fate of our nation.’

‘That’s so sad,’ replied Tilly. ‘Why did they think she was a witch?’

‘Of course, the real reason the English wanted her dead was that she was so successful, but the official reason was that she claimed God had spoken to her when she was just a girl,’ said Amelie. ‘Even worse than that, she wore men’s clothing into battle and throughout her incarceration, which was considered extremely unnatural.’

‘They killed her for that?’ asked Tilly, shaking her head with disgust. ‘In my time, most girls wear clothes like boys. They’re certainly more comfortable and practical than stays and petticoats.’

Past Rouen there was far more traffic on the river, with bigger ships coming up from the sea to pick up and drop off cargo. The girls talked about trying one of these ships for passage to England but, since Henri was still so weak, they decided to keep going.

On the sixth day the river widened, and in the late afternoon Tilly steered the barge into Le Vieux-Bassin, the harbour of Honfleur.

The harbour was a bustling place that smelt of salt and tar and fish. Boats jostled for position near the stone quays, with fishermen and sailors having to scramble over the decks of other boats to get to shore. As Tilly jockeyed for a spot to tether their barge, she had to vie for space with the fishing boats coming back from their day’s work, nets bursting with wriggling, silver fish.

On the quay, cranes unloaded the catch onto horsedrawn carts, which clattered away to warehouses along the shore where the fish would be sorted. Until recently, the best of the catch was packed in ice and galloped by special courier to Versailles to grace the table of King Louis XVI.

Tilly and Amelie stared about them in bewilderment. What should they do now? Henri sat up, pale and weak, with Juju curled up beside him.

‘I think we should find an inn,’ Amelie suggested. ‘We can enquire there about ships to England and get some hot food. Innkeepers know everything that is going on in a town.’

Narrow, tall, slate-roofed stone buildings lined three sides of the harbour, nestled tightly together.

Tilly, Amelie and Henri climbed up on the quay, followed by a bounding Juju, delighted that her master was on his feet again.

Tilly’s eyes were wide open as she watched the crowds milling around the quays. There were barefooted fishwives sorting their catch on the edge of the stone wharf, expertly tossing the fish into piles of different sizes and quality. They wore battered straw hats and loose-fitting dresses, silvery scales speckling their arms up to the elbows.

Women walked around with urns on their backs, selling earthenware cups of coffee, black and pungent. Porters wheeled barrows of seafood through the streets, winding their way through the crowds. Ragged street urchins hung around, hoping to earn a coin or two by helping unload nets or cargo.

Mimi clambered up a pie vendor’s leg, snatching a piece of pastry from his basket and gobbling it greedily. Mimi had not enjoyed the measly rations of stale bread. She was used to far finer fare.

Amelie apologised profusely, but the pastry vendor just laughed, delighted by Mimi’s exotic antics. ‘It matters naught,’ he replied. ‘It was just a piece of broken crust, and she is a rare sight. I’ve never had a monkey climb up me before.’

Further along were the larger, ocean-going ships laden with cargo from all around the world – silks, lace, tea, wine and brandy leaving France; spices, coffee and cotton coming in.

Henri limped along slowly, giving Tilly plenty of time to take in the vibrant, fascinating scene. Her every sense buzzed.

They asked a fishwife for directions but could hardly understand the rough patois she spoke, nor could the fishwife understand their French, so Tilly repeated, ‘Inn? Inn?’ Eventually, they simply followed her waving hand, accompanied by a voluble torrent of incomprehensible words.

Further along the quay Tilly spied a sign hanging outside a building. It had a bright-green parrot painted above the words, Le Perroquet Vert – the Green Parrot. They wandered in. On one side was the taproom filled with crowds of fishermen drinking cider and small glasses of a clear, strong spirit.

When the three ragamuffins entered, with a large wolfhound and a monkey at their heels, the crowd stopped and stared.

The innkeeper came over, looking at them suspiciously.

Henri pulled himself up tall, unconsciously adopting his most regal manner.

‘Monsieur, we require a private room, some supper and some assistance of a confidential nature,’ ordered Henri.

The innkepper glanced sceptically at the three weary travellers in their ragged and stained clothes, their dishevelled hair and Henri’s injuries. ‘Do you have the money to pay for such luxuries, monsieur?’ he asked curtly.

Henri flushed. He had never before been questioned about his ability to pay or his station in life.

‘I presume diamonds should cover it?’ snapped Henri, holding out his hand to Amelie. Amelie pulled a diamond shoe buckle from her pocket.

The innkeeper’s eyes widened and his entire demeanour changed. He bowed low, rubbing his hands.

‘Monseigneur. Mesdemoiselles. Poulaine at your service. You have come to the right man. Follow me, I have a private parlour across the hall.’

The parlour was humble but comfortable. It felt good to sit in a proper chair again and to be under cover after days in the open air.

Poulaine returned in a few minutes with bread, warm from the oven; a pat of golden butter; a jug of apple cider and a pot of steaming bouillabaisse – a thick, hearty, garlicky soup filled with tender seafood. He ladled out huge bowls of the bouillabaisse and left.