Burning Bright

by Tracy Chevalier

  Maisie had not noticed the exchange, for she was now listening to a buxom woman with chapped cheeks and beefy arms leaning over the partition from the adjacent booth.

  “I been meanin’ to drop in on you and your mam both,” the woman was saying. “I’ve a lady wants a different kind of button, for waistcoats she’s making. Do you know how to make a High Top?”

  “Course I do!” Maisie cried. “I be from Dorsetshire, don’t I? Dorset buttons from a Dorset maid!” The punch made her voice loud and a bit shrill.

  Bet Butterfield frowned—she had caught a whiff of rum. “Your mam knows you’re here, does she?”

  “Of course she does,” John Astley interrupted. “But it’s not your business, is it, Madam Nosy?”

  Bet Butterfield bristled. “It is too my business. Maisie’s my neighbor, she is, and we look out for our neighbors round here—some of ’em, anyway.” She cut her eyes sideways at him.

  John Astley considered how to handle her: He could flatter her, or he could treat her with disdain and indifference. It was not always easy to judge which method would work with which type of woman, but he had to decide before he lost Maisie to her neighbors. Now that there was a chance that he could not have her, he wanted her more. Setting down the drinks and turning his back on the laundress, he slid onto the bench next to Maisie and boldly put his arm around her. Maisie smiled, snuggled back against his arm, and took a gulp of rum punch.

  Bet Butterfield watched this cozy display with suspicion. “Maisie, are you—”

  “I be fine, Mrs. Butterfield, really. Ma knows I be here.”

  “Do she, now?” Though Maisie was becoming more adept at lying, it took some doing to convince Bet Butterfield.

  “Leave it, Bet,” Dick Butterfield grumbled, with a tug at her skirt. It was the week’s end and he was tired, wanting nothing more than to sink into a few drinks with family and friends. He often felt his wife interfered too much in others’ dramas.

  Bet Butterfield satisfied herself by saying, “I’ll come and see you later about those High Tops, shall I?” as if to warn John Astley that Maisie should be at home soon to receive her.

  “Yes, or tomorrow. Best make it soon, as we may be leaving shortly.”

  “Leaving? To go where—back to Dorsetshire?”

  “Not Dorsetshire.” Maisie waved her hand about. “To Dublin with the circus!”

  Even John Astley looked surprised—if not horrified—at this news. “You are?”

  “I heard your father ask mine to come. And of course you can convince him to let Pa bring all of us.” She sipped her punch and banged the glass down. “We’ll all be together!”

  “Will you, now.” Bet Butterfield frowned at John Astley. “Perhaps I’d best go with you now to your mam, then.”

  “Bet, sit down and finish your drink.” Dick Butterfield used a commanding tone Bet Butterfield did not often hear, and she obeyed, sinking slowly into her seat, the frown still glued to her face.

  “Somethin’ an’t right there,” she muttered. “I know it.”

  “Yes, and it an’t your business, is it. You leave those Kellaways be. You’re as bad as Maggie, lookin’ out that Kellaway boy every chance she gets. Maybe you should be more worried about her than that girl in the next booth. Miss Dorset is old enough to know what she’s about. She’ll get what she wants from Astley. Now, when you do go round to see Mrs. Kellaway, be sure and ask what her husband’s goin’ to do with all his wood if they’re off to Ireland. Tell him I’ll take it off him for very little—chairs too, if he’s got any. Now I think on it, perhaps I’ll come with you when you pay your visit.”

  “Now who’s buttin’ into Kellaway business?”

  Dick Butterfield stretched, then took up his mug. “This an’t Kellaway business, my chuck—this is Butterfield business! This is how I keep that roof over your head.”

  Bet Butterfield snorted. “These are what keep it.” She held out her chafed, wrinkled hands, which had been handling wet clothes for twenty years and looked much older than Bet was herself. Dick Butterfield seized one and kissed it in a combination of pity and affection. Bet Butterfield laughed. “You old sausage, you. What am I going to do with you?” She sat back and yawned, for she had just finished an overnight wash and not slept in more than a day. She settled into her seat like a rock set into a stone wall and allowed Maisie to slip from her mind. She would not be moving for several hours.

  John Astley, in the meantime, was pondering Dublin. One of Maisie’s attractions was that he would be leaving her here in a few days and not have to wrestle with any virginal claim she made on him. “What’s this about Dublin, then?” he said. “Your father is going to do what?”

  “Carpentry. He be a chairmaker, but Mr. Astley asked him to join the circus to build all sorts of things.” Maisie slurred the last words, the rum taking effect. She wanted to lay her spinning head on the table.

  John Astley relaxed—his father would certainly never allow a carpenter’s family to join them in Dublin. He drained his glass and stood up. “Come, let’s go.”

  Not a moment too soon, either. The surly lad who had made him spill his wine was now with a group across the room and had begun to sing:

  A loving couple met one day

  Bonny Kate and Danny

  A loving couple met one day

  Together both to sport and play

  And for to pass the time away

  He showed her little Danny!

  Maisie’s cheeks were fiery red now, and she looked a little dazed. “Come, Maisie,” John Astley repeated, glaring at the singers. “I’ll see you home.”

  Around the room others had taken up the song:

  He took her to his father’s barn

  Bonny Kate and Danny

  He took her to his father’s barn

  There he pulled out his long firearm

  It was as long as this my arm

  And he called it little Danny!

  Maisie was taking her time arranging her shawl around her shoulders. “Quick, now!” John Astley muttered. Pulling her to her feet, he put an arm around her and led her to the door. Over the singing, Bet Butterfield called out, “Don’t forget, now, duck—I’ll be comin’ to your mam’s shortly!”

  He took her to the river’s side

  Bonny Kate and Danny

  He took her to the river’s side

  And there he laid her legs so wide

  And on her belly he did ride

  And he whipped in little Danny!

  John Astley shut the door behind them to bellows of laughter. Maisie did not seem to notice, however, though the fresh air made her stand straight and shake her head as if to clear it. “Where we going, sir?” she managed to say.

  “Just for a little stroll, then I’ll get you home.” John Astley kept his arm around her and led her, not left along Hercules Buildings, but right into Bastille Row. There was a gap that way between two of the houses that led to Hercules Hall and its stables.

  The cold air made Maisie progress instantly from happy drunk to sick drunk. A little way along Bastille Row she began to moan and hold her stomach. John Astley let go of her. “Idiot girl,” he muttered as Maisie sank to her knees and vomited into the gutter. He was tempted to leave her now to find her own way. It was not far back to the pub, though the fog was so dense that there was no sign of it.

  At that moment a figure came pattering out of the fog toward them. They were only a few steps from the Butterfields’ rooms, where Maggie had stopped briefly after work to change her clothes. She was now working at a vinegar manufactory near the river, by the timber yards north of Westminster Bridge, and though she smelled acidic, at least her nose no longer hurt and her eyes were clear. The owner even let them off early on a Saturday afternoon.

  Maggie started when she saw John Astley. For a year now she had not liked going through the fog on her own, though she did it when she had to. She had walked back from the factory with another girl who lived nearby, and the pub was so close to t
he Butterfields’ that she had not thought to worry. Seeing the horseman so suddenly almost made her scream, until she spied the huddled form at his feet, still retching into the gutter. Then she chuckled, for she recognized John Astley with one of his conquests. “Having fun, are you, sir?” she jeered, and ran on before he could reply. Her relief that this was a familiar scene and John Astley no threat to her, coupled with her haste to get to the pub out of the fog and the cold, made her give Maisie no more than a glance before she hurried on to Hercules Tavern.

  6

  “There you are, Mags,” Dick Butterfield called. “Come and sit.” He stood up. “You’ll be wantin’ a beer, will you?” These days he was more solicitous of his daughter; handing over her wages to him every week had bought her better treatment.

  “And a pie, if there’s any left,” Maggie called after him as she took his vacated place next to her mother. “Hallo, Mam.”

  “Hallo, duck.” Bet Butterfield yawned. “You all done, then?”

  “I am—and you?”

  “For the moment.” Mother and daughter sat side by side in weary companionship.

  “Is Charlie here?” Maggie asked, trying not to sound hopeful. “Oh, never mind, there he is.” Though her brother bothered her less than before—another bonus from her wages was that Dick Butterfield reined in Charlie—she was always more at ease when she was alone with her parents.

  “Anything happenin’ here?” she asked her mother.

  “Nah. Oh—did you know that the Kellaways are going to Dublin?” Bet Butterfield had a habit of changing the possible into the definite.

  Maggie snapped upright. “What?”

  “’Tis true. They’re leaving this week.”

  Maggie narrowed her eyes. “Can’t be. Who told you?”

  Bet Butterfield shifted in her seat, Maggie’s disbelief making her nervous. “Maisie Kellaway.”

  “Why didn’t Jem tell me? I saw him the other night!”

  Bet Butterfield shrugged.

  “But they’re mad to go! They’re not travelers. It was hard enough for them to come here from Dorsetshire—and they’re just startin’ to settle. Why would Jem hide it from me?” Maggie tried to keep the note of hysteria from rising in her words, but Bet Butterfield heard it.

  “Calm yourself, duck. Didn’t know you cared so much. Pity you weren’t here five minutes ago—you could’ve asked Maisie herself.”

  “She was here?”

  “She was.” Bet Butterfield fiddled with an end of her shawl, picked up her glass of beer, then set it down.

  “Maisie don’t go to pubs. What was she doing here, Mam?” Maggie persisted.

  Bet Butterfield frowned into her beer. “She was with that circus man. You know.” She waved her hand in the air. “The one what rides the horses. John Astley.”

  “John Astley?” Even as she shouted his name, Maggie shot to her feet. Neighboring drinkers looked up.

  “Careful, Mags,” Dick Butterfield said, halting in front of her with two full glasses and a pie balanced on their rims. “You don’t want to lose your beer ’fore you’ve even tasted it.”

  “I just saw John Astley outside! But he was with a—” Maggie stopped, horrified that she hadn’t looked closely enough at the figure in the gutter to recognize her as Maisie. “Where were they going?”

  “Said he was takin’ her home,” Bet Butterfield muttered, her eyes lowered.

  “And you believed him?” Maggie’s voice rose.

  “Stay out of it, gal,” Dick Butterfield said sharply. “It an’t your business.”

  Maggie looked from her mother’s bent head to her father’s set face, and knew then that they had already had this argument.

  “You can have my beer,” she said to Dick Butterfield, and pushed through the crowd.

  “Maggie! You get back here, gal!” Dick Butterfield barked, but Maggie had pulled open the door and plunged into the fog.

  It was dark now, with only the street lamps cutting through the dense mist, casting weak, yellowy green pools of light at their bases. Maggie ran past the spot—now deserted—where she had last seen John Astley and Maisie, and headed down Bastille Row. She passed her own house, then stopped a neighbor just going inside two doors down. He had not seen the couple. When he shut the door behind him, Maggie was alone on the street in the fog.

  She hesitated, then ran on. In a minute she reached the gap between the houses, where an alley led to the field around Hercules Hall and its stables. She stood looking down the dark passageway, for there were no lights on at Philip Astley’s house to guide her through it. She could not go around and enter by the Hercules Buildings alley on the opposite side of the field, however—it was a long way around and just as dark. As she stood, undecided, the fog swirled around her, leaving a shiny, sulfurous film of sweat on her face. Maggie gulped. She could hear the sound of her heavy breath thrown back at her.

  Then a figure stepped out of the fog behind her, and Maggie gasped—it was so like the man looming out at her from another fog on another night. The scream got caught in her throat, though, and she was grateful for that—for the figure was her brother, who would have teased her ever after for screaming in his face.

  Maggie grabbed his arm before he could speak. “Charlie, c’mon, we have to go down here!” She tried to pull him along the passage.

  Despite his lean frame, when Charlie planted his feet, it was impossible to move him, and Maggie’s arm-pulling had no effect. “Hang on a minute, Miss Cut-Throat. Where do you think you’re takin’ me?”

  “Maisie,” Maggie hissed. “He’s taken Maisie down here, I’m sure of it. We have to get to them before he…he…”

  “He what?” Charlie seemed to enjoy drawing this out.

  “You know what he’s goin’ to do. D’you really want him to ruin her?”

  “Didn’t you hear Pa say it was none of our business? The rest of the pub did.”

  “Course it’s our business. It’s your business. You like her. You know you do.”

  Charlie’s face hardened. He did not want others—particularly his sister—thinking he had such feelings.

  “Charlie, please.”

  Charlie shook his head.

  Maggie dropped his arm. “Then why’d you follow me here? Don’t tell me you didn’t follow me—no one’d be out here just for a wander.”

  “Thought I’d see what you’re so bothered about.”

  “Well, now you know. And if you’re not goin’ to help me, then go away.” To make clear that she would do this on her own if she had to, Maggie stepped into the darkness, though beads of sweat broke out once again on her upper lip and brow.

  “Hang on a minute,” Charlie said. “I’ll come with you, if you tell me something first.”

  Maggie turned back. “What?” Even as she said it, her stomach clenched, for she knew there was only one thing about her that interested her brother.

  “What was it like?”

  “What was what like?” she said, playing his game of drawing it out, giving him the time and space he craved for the line he was now to deliver.

  “What was it like to kill a man?”

  Maggie had not heard these words spoken aloud, and they had the effect of taking her clenched stomach and twisting it, knocking the wind out of her as effectively as if Charlie had punched her.

  There was a pause while she recovered her voice. It gave her the time to think of something that would satisfy him quickly and move them on. “Powerful,” she answered, saying what she thought he wanted to hear, though it was the opposite of what she had actually felt. “Like I could do anything.”

  What she had really felt that night a year ago was that she had actually killed a part of herself rather than someone else, for she felt sometimes that she was dead now rather than alive. She knew, though, that Charlie would never understand that; she herself didn’t. Mr. Blake might understand it, though, she thought, for it fell into his realm of opposites. One day maybe she would get him to explain it to her so
that she would know where she was. “Nothing was the same after that,” she added truthfully. “I don’t know as it ever will be.”

  Charlie nodded. His smile made Maggie shudder. “All right,” he said. “Where we going?”

  7

  Maisie felt much better after being sick, for it cleared the rum from her. She was sober enough to say to John Astley as the stables appeared out of the fog, “You taking me to see your horse?”

  “Yes.”

  He did, in fact, lead her to the stall where his chestnut mare was stabled, lighting a candle first so that they could see. After the rehearsal at the amphitheatre the mare had been brought here and groomed, watered, and fed, and was standing stolidly, chewing, waiting for a circus boy to come and get her for the evening performance. She snorted when she saw John Astley, who reached over and patted her neck. “Hallo there, my darling,” he murmured, with considerably more feeling than he used with people.

  Maisie also reached out a timid hand to stroke the horse’s nose. “Oh, she be lovely!”

  “Yes, she is.” John Astley was relieved that Maisie was no longer quite so drunk. “Here,” he said, stooping to fill a ladle from a bucket of water. “You’ll want a drink.”

  “Thank’ee, sir.” Maisie took the ladle, drank, and wiped her lips.

  “Come here a moment.” John Astley led the way past other horses—Miss Hannah Smith’s stallion among them—to a stall on the end.

  “Which horse—oh!” Maisie peeked in to see nothing but a pile of straw. John Astley set the candle down on an upturned bucket and pulled a blanket from the corner, which he spread out over the straw. “Come and sit with me for a moment.” The stench of horses all around had aroused him, and the bulge of his groin was prominent.