by Leah Fleming
*
But Mistress Kit did not alight from the cart after these friendly words. Instead she turned it around and bade them farewell. Margery darted out with her, glad to be in the weak midday sunshine. The streets of board stalls were so quiet and the streetmongers strangely silent as they swayed from alley to court with their baskets. Few had paid over their pence to set up a stall.
For once Margery kept her eyes from their ribbons and trims, making straight for the cloth merchant and the haberdasher’s stall. She needed to cheer herself up. Goodwife Harwise’s stall was always just round the corner in Women’s Ceaping, tempting the local girls with second-hand garments. Goody would always keep back special items in her sack for one of her most regular customers.
What Hamon didn’t know would do him no harm; how she stole the odd coin from his leather purse belt, delivered more loaves than were ordered and kept the difference for her clothing allowance, overpriced and cheated customers when the opportunity arose, so that she was never without a few bits of silver to treat herself. Everyone admired Margery Bagshott for her genteel outfits, the way she harmonised colours and fabrics, wore different gowns to all the civic occasions and Guild parades. She wore dagged edgings to her sleeves and tunics, bought fresh ribbons and embroidered on them flowers and motifs like the finest Lady of the Manor. She won disapproving glances from the higher ranked wives for showing off and could see them wondering how she obtained such quality cloth and other finery. Well, it was the early bird that caught the worm and usually she shot out on market day to catch Goody’s stall before the streets were thronged. But today there would be no hurry. No one would be buying anything but herbs and spices, such was the general fear. There would be bargains to be had.
Margery waited until a few browsers had moved on before she tapped the stallholder on the shoulder. ‘Anything for me today?’
The dealer spun round, her face pink and sweaty, eyes tired.
‘You startled me… no, I’ve nothing much.’ She saw the look of disappointment on Margery’s face and grinned mischievously. ‘But just for you, there could be this beauty here…’ Goody pulled out a sleeveless surcoat of the richest heavy wool, edged with fur and slashed to show any gown worn underneath. ‘It belonged to a lady, that I do know, but she has no need of it now, poor soul.’
‘Don’t you go telling me she died of the fever?’ Margery dropped the coat quickly.
‘Now would I sell my best customer such a death robe? No, I have it on the finest authority that the widow woman had no daughters to pass it on to in her will. I gave a good price for it.’ Goody rummaged around her stall, not looking the girl in the eye.
‘It’s beautiful and so thick. Just what I need with winter coming on. How much?’
‘For you, my dear, two silver pieces.’
‘So much? I don’t think…’
‘Mistress Baker, look at the quality, feel it. You’ll not see the like again for many a year.’
‘The fur looks flea-bitten to me.’ Margery was desperately trying to find a reason not to buy the garment.
‘Only dust… it’s travelled many a mile in its time and will grace your slender outline for many more. Think how you’ll look in it on the arm of your handsome husband. He’ll be admired for having such a worthy wife.’ The dealer knew when to soothe and flatter away any indecision. For Margery this was the stuff of dreams.
‘Go on, you’ve twisted my arm. I shall have to pay in bits, as I can. Here’s all I have for now. Next week there’ll be more. Save it for me.’
‘Nay, lass, take it. I know where you live. If you don’t pay up I can always knock on the bakehouse door. I’m sure you’d not want that, would you? My legs are weary today and my head aches so much the stalls spin around me… I’m in no mind to carry something away only to bring it back again. Keep it and enjoy the fortune it brings.’
Margery bundled the garment into her basket under the few loaves she had brought to disguise her purpose. No one must see her surcoat until she was ready to dazzle them with her bargain. It must be hidden in the sack with her other purchases, high on a shelf away from rats and mice. She would brush it and check it closely for any fleas but it was worth every penny. Wait until Aggie clapped eyes on her in it! It would be worth traipsing up to Frideswelle to visit her sister, just to see the green stalks of envy shooting from her eyes at the sight of Mags in her glory. What a lark that would be!
*
‘Where shall we wander now, Mary? This has been a poor show for you today. Not at all what we expected. Would you like a honey cake or an apple? We can take the high road back by Overstowe towards the shrine, if that pleases you? We’ll pass the swampy grounds where the King himself walked barefoot in pilgrimage to the shrine of the Blessed Chad by the well a few years back. What a day that was for our Prioress and her nuns, to process behind the King and his courtiers! Don’t you remember how Father John feasted on every detail?’
Mary smiled wanly. Kit was doing her best to cheer them both up, to repair the day, but nothing was how she had dreamed it would be.
The maid did not like the foul-smelling streets, the noise and the dark passageways. Frideswelle was fairer by far and she longed to be back in the orchard, looking over the wall into the peaceful Priory.
‘Come, child, that’s a sad face… Let’s go to the shrine ourselves and buy a blessing token for you.’
There was just one stall selling token badges and pilgrim biscuits, and a pardoner selling his indulgence scripts. Mary watched the pilgrims kneel by the well, which was little more than a puddle of water with a thatched roof over it. An old woman knelt for a sprinkling of holy water, praying for some cure. Perhaps the saint could cure Mary’s leg of its twist, straighten it out so that she could be a lay sister across the lane? Why did God make her come out all twisted, pulled out backwards and bottom first? How many times had she been told it was His miracle she had lived? If only she could have been born healthy to a mother like Mistress Kit.
There was such a wistful look in her sad dark eyes that even the mistress felt tears welling up and shoved her hand into her purse to pay for a blessing on the girl. ‘Here, you go and dip yourself in the holy well and buy a honey cake. But don’t tell your mother. Then we’ll go home the back way, through the pretty woods at Elmhurst, on to the Longhall cart road and down into Frideswelle.’
Mary knelt with difficulty, waiting for her miracle for a long moment, but nothing stirred. There was only the sound of a blackbird pinking. The best of the weak sunshine was fading and soon it would be dusk. The Michaelmas Fair had been a poor show indeed and news of the sickness had dampened their spirits but high up at Frideswelle they would be safe enough.
It was almost dark when they returned down the windy top road past the Priory gatehouse. In the twilight a little girl lurked in the shadows: the Prioress’s little minx, Amicia, standing sucking her thumb as she always did when she sneaked out through the hedgehole for a kiss and a cuddle from her wet nurse.
Kit unbridled the mule wearily. ‘Go inside, child. I’ll see to this madam forthwith.’ Mary paused, hearing the child whining, ‘Want some titty…’
Every day she would cry for comfort and Mistress Kit always opened her shirt for the child to take from her teat. Mary knew it wasn’t right and the Prioress, if she learned of it, would have them all punished. Amy had been at Kit’s breast these past two years. The pretty poppet who had everything wanted only her wet nurse but this was their little secret. They huddled together under cover of darkness while Mary stood guard, not understanding any of it. She sniffed the air, which smelled sweet in her nostrils, and was glad to be home, safe from the vapours of the city in the valley below.
*
Two days later there was panic within the Priory and Dame Juliane was in a crotchety mood again, barking orders for jars of hog’s fat and leek seeds. Her shed had been ransacked again and all her newly set lozenges stolen. The herbs in the physick garden had been scythed down and trampled so that t
he infirmary garden lay desolate and bare, tinged with silver in the first autumn frost.
‘Who’s doing this, child? Who’s stupid enough to steal the herbs with no knowledge of their use? Some of the yard girls, fearing for their lives, have run away. See, they have taken poison berries and deadly roots… Without the right star signs to guide us our medicines are useless. Come on, Agnes, shape yourself. I want more clove gillyflowers. See if there are any creeping up the wall. They like that position best now that Dame Serena has torn them out of the old garden to make her fancy pleasance. She’s sorry enough since her damozel fell sick yesterday.
‘The poor little mite lies stricken but she cannot be moved now and the Prioress has fled to another chamber in the nuns’ dorter so as not to catch the fever herself. The child is left alone with only the dogs, but she must be isolated for the safety of us all. Only Father John dares risk the sick room to say prayers for her recovery.’
Agnes was for once all ears, greedy for news of the outbreak of sickness in the village beyond the wall. It had started at the mill with Cousin Kit falling into a swoon and vomiting up blood, her skin all covered in blotches it was rumoured. Poor Kit, Agnes’s only friend, had barred her children and husband from the room but Simeon broke down the door in his distress and now was sick himself. Their crippled maid was also ailing with tell-tale swellings under her armpits, the size of tiny apples, but she saw to them all until she was laid low in the apple loft. Her own kin across the green, afeared for their lives, barred her from their hovel to keep out the sickness. Simeon Miller had sent his boys to Longhall village, thinking someone would take them in, but they were met by his old childhood friends bearing staves, forcing the lads back down the track. Frideswelle village was now cut off even from the Priory, such was Dame Serena’s determination to keep out the fever.
Agnes climbed on top of the wall to shout to Simeon but the mill wheel was silent for once and she feared the worst. Someone had repaired all the gaps in the wall with stones and thorny branches. The beggars and wanderers came sneaking out of the forest under cover of darkness to plead with the priest to bury their dead. Father John hid from them in the church. Hamon had not visited for weeks now and Agnes was going mad for want of his touch.
She reckoned that if there was sickness here then it must have come from the city. For the moment she was safer inside the wall than out. The Prioress now appeared every day at the chapter meeting and insisted every room be brushed and freshly strewn. She’d ordered all the nuns to be bled to improve their blood and now Dame Juliane issued leeches to gorge on each nun as close to the heart as possible.
Agnes hated blood letting for it drained her spirit and left her tired and foul-mouthed, but she had to admire the way Dame Juliane had braved the sickness to soothe the child, Amy, with elecampane grease one morning. One look at the size of her swellings and a whiff of their foul stench had sent even her scurrying for safety, however. ‘She’s doomed, such horrors cannot be borne by a child for long,’ she’d said sadly.
Later, feeling guilty for abandoning the girl, Dame Juliane took her novice to the door of Amy’s bedchamber. Mercifully the child was dead, already covered by a shroud. Father John lifted her with gloves on his hands and buried her out of sight at the bottom of the orchard field with only the Prioress as witness. For three nights the Priory held its breath, waiting for the Angel of Death to pass over. Three nights of vigil and prayer. No other case of fever broke out.
*
Mary woke in the darkness. Her throat was on fire and her limbs ached too much for her even to turn on her side. Where was she? It did not smell of hearthsmoke here. The sickly sweet smell which had been in her nostrils was no longer there. Instead she could smell the ripeness of fruit and fresh hay. There was not a sound. Then she felt the swellings, once the size of apples and now the size of plums, which ran down her belly to the top of her itching legs. They were hard, sore, but unruptured. Her neck felt swollen and stiff, her ears throbbed with strange noises and her tongue was hanging out with thirst. By her side stood a pitcher of water but she could scarce move to lift it. Instead she bent forward painfully to lick the cool earthenware. Where was she? Not in the mill, not by the hearth but alone, covered with a thin shroud, somewhere in the darkness.
She heard the sound of mice scampering through the straw, a cock crow at a distance and with the approach of dawn came remembrance.
I must get up and see to the fire. I must set the pot a-boiling as I’ve always done… But a sickly weakness seeped into her limbs. She had been ill of the fever like her mistress and all her kin. Mistress Kit and her boys were gone now. In her heart Mary knew she was the only one left alive. The rest was a blur, she did not want to recall how they’d suffered, but how did she come to be here, safe from harm in a cool loft?
Then she heard the bell tolling. The sound was almost on top of her. Surely she was not within the Priory? Who had left the jug of fresh water close at hand? Someone must know she was here. She must wait to see who had come to her aid.
*
All Agnes could think of from Matins to Vespers was escaping from this place. The Priory had been frightened from its lax habits into strict observance of the rule again. Every nun was to wear her black habit, cover her head and wash her hands before offices were said. There was also a steady procession to the Frideswelle spring to drink the water, risky though this might seem, but the Prioress swore by the efficacy of holy water and they knew the Blessed Ambrosine had once seen the Virgin in the well.
It was Dame Juliane’s theory that Amy had died for being too clean and protected from the foul air. How else could the child have sickened, being totally confined within the Priory walls? Agnes volunteered to wash down the Prioress’s rooms so they might be used as a temporary infirmary should it be needed. She liked to sit there amongst the fine tapestry wall hangings and oak four poster bed with its rich drapes, admiring the view over the pleasance garden, cut off from all the turmoil. The bed was stripped and dismantled at the Prioress’s order, to be stored out of sight. Dame Serena could not countenance any reminder of the little maid. The floor was freshly strewn with rose petals.
Sometimes Agnes was woken by the sound of a child crying out. The thought of such sufferings filled her with horror. If ever she was to catch the fever she would not endure such lingering agony. Oh, no! She’d want out of the suffering and knew enough now to ensure a hasty exit. That was the one good thing about being yoked to the infirmary, with access to lotions and potions, some much deadlier than others. Poppy syrup would make her drowsy enough to swallow anything to ease her discomfort and safely locked away there were tiny balls of dog’s mercury, henbane, cowbane, hemlock and monkshood, any of which would hurry her on her way. She wasn’t yet sure of the quantity but stole enough of each to make up three round lozenges which she wrapped in dock leaves and put in a leather pouch carried around her neck. She made up the remedy slowly and skilfully, remembering each prayer which the old nun usually mumbled, each charm uttered in the making. Agnes was learning fast out of necessity. Just carrying such deadly protection made her feel strong and calm and she noticed now that there was no bullying from the high-born nuns, from Iseult de Saulte or her favourites. In fact, just the opposite. Agnes was now an object of interest and respect. If they fell sick then they would be in her hands, for her to do with as she pleased. For the first time she knew what it was to wield power and the feeling was good.
*
Margery Bagshott pleaded with Hamon to send her to Longhall to live with his kin away from the terror in the streets around them. The air was heavy with the stench of death. Every night corpses were thrown like garbage into the drain. The night soil men lifted them for a fee but more often than not, if the corpses were far gone and uncovered, left them to stink for days so that flies and rats scavenged among the debris. The tide of fever had washed over the city in several waves since the Michaelmas Fair. It would recede for a few days only to return again to catch another street, anot
her alley of houses. It was the lucky and the blessed who woke to see another dawn.
The bakery had remained shuttered and locked, no one going in or out. Will Bagshott fed his family on his reserves of flour and water from the deep underground well hidden from view. The dogs were set on strangers trying to break in for supplies. He sold the surplus at a high premium to members of the Guild, knowing that when all this was over many favours would be owed him. Margery sat by the upper casement, looking out over the city, like a prisoner in a condemned cell. The tolling of the church bells would drive her to madness if she did not escape. There was a common pit on the outskirts where the dead were thrown from carts in the night, and when the wind came from the west the stench of rotting flesh was overpowering.
She must escape. It could not be so bad in the villages and Aggie was the safest of all, she’d heard, walled up in her Priory. If only she had known the future Margery could have been there and it would be Agnes suffering here. Mags felt sick with fear.
She knew it was not the fever for it had gone on for many months. A child was kicking in her womb and she would bear no babe in this festering hell hole. Hamon knew her condition and was weakening in his resolve to keep them all together.
‘Please, Hamon, let’s go together, far away from this place,’ she pleaded again.
‘And be beaten to death by strangers? No, you must go to my parents’ cot or to your cousin’s mill. Don’t put our child at risk, my sweet.’
Hamon was thrilled that his seed was ripening in her belly at last and had so many plans for his son and heir. Margery hoped it wasn’t another cursed double seed. If so she would smother one herself for she wanted no bairn of hers to be burdened with its own reflection in the looking glass, like she and Aggie.
