John Saturnall's Feast

by Lawrence Norfolk

  Tramping into the woods, John led the Kitchen into the orchard-men's abandoned gardens from where they carried down baskets of skirrets and carrots, fat leeks and leathery green kale, pink-topped mangels and purple-bottomed turnips. From the clamps came baskets of tiny apples.

  ‘Ha!’ exclaimed Mister Bunce. ‘Remember these, Master John?’

  They scoured the woods for fallen timber and drove down the pigs and ewes from Home Farm. The pigs were housed in the stables while the sheep were penned in the sagging barracks whose roof groaned under the weight of the snow. There, amid squeals and bleats, Mrs Gardiner tutored Ginny, Meg and the maids in the art of milking. The farm's chickens joined Diggory Wing's doves.

  John cleared Scovell's room and Mrs Gardiner sent down bedding for the cot. Every night, once the kitchen's work was done, John made his way back through the passages, rushlight in hand, towards the Master Cook's chamber.

  But at the junction he turned away from Scovell's room. Taking the door at the far end and hurrying through the deserted kitchen, he climbed the narrow staircase to the Solar Gallery where the moon offered a ghostly light, scudding over the snow-bound lawns to shine through the high casements. When the moon sank the gallery was dark. But from under the door at the far end, a crack of light showed, glowing from the bedchamber. There Lucretia waited.

  The first night she had trembled beneath him, her dark eyes staring up. He found himself frozen by her gaze, fearing to injure her or brush against her grazed knees. But at last Lucretia had pulled him to her and it seemed that a tight string within her was cut. Her arms and legs splayed. He heard her breathing grow hoarse and felt her arch to receive him. At last they fell back. John felt for her hand. ‘I had not thought such pleasure might be mine,’ Lucretia said.

  ‘Nor I,’ he said beside her. ‘Yet it is.’

  Their pleasures were repeated the next night, and the one after that. John recalled the woman in the barn. How his nerves had paralysed him at first. Now his tongue felt dry in his mouth and his heart thudded in his chest. But his desire for Lucretia increased.

  She was not bold, she told him. She made him turn his back while she tugged at laces and stays or pulled off her shift then slipped unseen beneath the covers. But once they touched, she abandoned her reserve. She pulled him to her and ran her hands down the smooth slopes of his back. He buried his face in her hair or pressed his lips to hers. Soon she kicked off the covers, spreading her arms that he might have the pleasure of looking upon her.

  He laid fires in the hearth and watched her stand before the flames, raising an eyebrow at his gaze or touching a finger to her lips as if to preserve the silence. She brought her book and held its torn and taped pages to the flickering light, the coverlet draped around her shoulders.

  Come live with me, and be my love,

  And we will all the pleasures prove,

  That valleys, groves, hills and fields,

  Woods, or steepy mountain yields . . .

  A belt of straw and ivy buds,

  With coral clasps and amber studs:

  And if these pleasures may thee move,

  Come live with me and be my love.

  John let the words dress her, imagining the cap of flowers, the mantle embroidered with leaves, the gown of lambswool and the belt with its amber studs. Lucretia closed the book and smiled.

  ‘Gemma and I used to pretend a shepherd would come and carry us off.’

  ‘Instead you got a cook.’

  ‘I am content with my cook.’

  ‘And what of the valleys and groves?’

  ‘Here is where I want to be,’ she said. ‘Here in this room.’

  They pushed off the heavy blankets, revealing themselves to each other in the fire's flickering light. His gaze played over the curve of her back, down her thighs and slender legs. Her fingers combed his thick black hair, finding the scar left on his scalp by the musket ball.

  She brought a candle and held it over his body.

  ‘You are very dark, Master Saturnall.’

  ‘I'm told my father was a blackamoor.’

  ‘And was he?’ She passed the candle back and forth, her face so close he could feel her breath on his skin.

  ‘Or a Barbary pirate.’

  ‘And your mother?’

  He regarded her across the pillow. ‘You set eyes on her once. But I do not think you will recall.’

  He told her how his mother had come to the Manor and how she had left. The mysterious argument between Almery and Scovell. ‘Mrs Gardiner called him a magpie. He tried to steal from her.’

  ‘Steal what?’ she asked.

  ‘A book. Or so I believe. Did you not wonder how a kitchen boy came to read?’ He described the lessons his mother had taught on the slopes then his life in the village with Cassie and the others. He told her how the sickness gripped the village. Then their flight and the ruined palace in the woods. The anger that had burned inside him and how the sight of Clough had ignited it again. At last he spoke of Saturnus and the woman who had brought the Feast.

  ‘She was called Bellicca,’ John said. ‘She came here when the Romans went home. She brought the Feast to the Vale. Every green thing grew in her garden, my ma said. Every creature that walked or crawled or flew or swam. The Feast was for all, she said. Back then, all men and women sat together as equals and exchanged their affections . . .’

  ‘As we do,’ Lucretia said. She smiled but John had not finished.

  ‘Then Coldcloak came,’ he told her, his expression darkening. ‘Some say he loved her. Others that she was a witch who enchanted him. He sat at her table and took his place at the Feast. But he had sworn an oath to Jehovah's priests. Bellicca had witched the whole Vale with her Feast, they claimed. So Coldcloak vowed to take it back for Christ. He pulled up her gardens. He doused the fires in her hearths and chopped up her tables. He drove her people out and took every green thing. The Feast was lost, except for the book . . .’

  He stopped. Lucretia's smile had faded and a strange look had taken its place. Suddenly she seemed remote from him.

  ‘What is it?’ he asked.

  ‘Only that he betrayed her,’ she said quickly. ‘That he sat at her table then turned on her.’ She shook her head as if to rid herself of the thought then gripped his arm. ‘Promise you will never betray me.’

  Before the gazes of the servants they were cool, addressing each other with a stiff formality. But Philip had to remind John of dishes he had set simmering or those left to cool. Ephraim Clough had made off with his head, he told John in exasperation.

  Motte's men shovelled out the stones from the chapel and moved in a table. They gathered there on Sundays to sing a psalm and join in prayer. As Christmas approached, John and Philip scoured the larders and storehouses.

  ‘We've as many apples as we could wish,’ Philip reported. ‘Bacon, hams, half a sack of dried fruits, some jars of conserves, that sugarloaf in the larder. Two sacks of meal. The ewes are still giving milk. Mrs Gardiner has said she will make slip-cheese and whey. The carrots and turnips in the clamps are good. We can make frumenty, and a minced-meat cake. We can slaughter a pig. But we need more wood. The pile in the yard is almost gone . . . Are you listening, John?’

  He celebrated the long nights with Lucretia, kept safe by the heavy dark curtains. She read the verses from her book to him, sitting by the fire then stepping carefully around the chair, the little table and cradle for fear of disturbing the dust. She dressed her hair in plaits so that he might have the pleasure of releasing the coils, winding the thick locks around his fingers then letting them fall over her face. Her dark eyes watched from behind the disorderly fringe.

  ‘The first moment I saw you,’ she murmured, ‘I hated you.’

  He nodded drowsily. ‘I hated you too.’

  They gazed at each other across the long bolster.

  ‘What if they knew?’ John said quietly. ‘Piers. Sir William . . .’

  ‘They are far away.’

  ‘But when t
hey return?’

  ‘Then you will leave me,’ Lucretia said. ‘You will ride away down the Vale. You will forget me . . .’

  ‘I will not,’ John said. ‘You will marry Piers.’

  ‘Perhaps he will find another. One more to his taste. The women of Paris are most alluring, I hear. What is your opinion, Master Saturnall, on the women of Paris?’

  But a darker mood had descended on John. ‘You will marry him,’ he persisted.

  ‘Douse your anger, Master Saturnall.’

  It seemed they might argue but before John could answer, from under the coverlet, a loud growl sounded. John laughed and Lucretia blushed.

  ‘You are my cook, Master Saturnall,’ Lucretia said, smiling. ‘Feed me.’

  ‘The first men and women drank spiced wine. They warmed it with honey and flavoured it with saffron, cinnamon and mace. They roasted dates and dissolved them . . .’

  He knelt above her, his lips brushing the shallow valley formed beween her shoulder blades. The words of his mother's book rose easily in his memory as if Lucretia's hunger called them forth. Once again the heady fumes twisted up and the wine seemed to warm his belly. As he murmured the words, the imagined liquor soothed him as it had in the freezing wood. Now its balm worked upon them both. When he reached the nape of her neck, she twisted about.

  ‘I should like to taste your spiced wine,’ she demanded.

  John rose and took the tall pitcher from the tray. He poured then watched Lucretia sip. Her throat bobbed as she swallowed. She gathered a droplet that ran down her chin on her finger and sucked. At last she turned to him with a doubtful expression.

  ‘I am bound to say, Master Saturnall, that I cannot taste the dates.’

  ‘Perhaps they were not sufficiently softened. Or perhaps some lazy cook neglected to roast the stones, or add the saffron, or the cloves and mace . . .’

  ‘I fear, Master Saturnall, that your spiced wine tastes more akin to cold water.’

  John raised his eyebrows in mock-surprise.

  ‘Only the laziest cook blames his kitchen, your ladyship. But in this instance I must plead the paucity of our larders. Not to mention our cellars. And our storerooms. In point of fact, we have no wine.’

  He saw her eyebrows rise in alarm. ‘Then how will you feed me?’

  Night by night, he led her through Saturnus's gardens, describing the dishes that might come from each one.

  ‘Poached collops of venison,’ he whispered in her ear. ‘A quaking pudding with raisins, honey and saffron. Custards flavoured with conserve of roses and a paste of quinces. Beef wrapped about a mash of artichoke and pistachio, then hollowed manchet rolls filled with minced eggs, sweet herbs and cinnamon . . .’

  He described the foaming forcemeat of fowls then set before her a dish. He watched her scoop up a little of the pale orange mash.

  ‘I confess that to this poor palate your forcemeats taste strongly of turnips.’

  ‘Ah, but I have not yet described the seasonings of cumin and saffron, the beaten egg whites and the folding of the forcemeats into the pipkin.’ He scooped more of the turnip mash and held out the spoon. ‘Taste again, your ladyship. Imagine the spices . . .’

  He carried up the plain dishes and presented them to her with a joking flourish. She played along, looking up as if she still sat in her chamber with Pole and Fanshawe outside on the stair. Spoon poised over the dish, she looked up from the little table.

  ‘Perhaps, Master Saturnall,’ she asked, ‘you might sit with me?’

  ‘Sit, your ladyship?’

  ‘Like those first men and women.’

  They ate together. Afterwards they lay together. Sated and drowsy, John put his lips to her ear.

  ‘Flaking florentine rounds,’ he whispered. ‘Peaches in snow-cream.’

  ‘No,’ she murmured. ‘No more.’

  ‘Meat pies. Mutton balls topped with spinach and walnuts and cumin ground fine . . .’

  ‘You have no cumin. Mister Fanshawe told me this morning.’

  ‘We have no mutton either,’ he said. ‘Nor walnuts until next autumn.’

  The larders were less than half full, he knew. As Christmas drew near the stores sank lower. They would serve spiced cider in place of wine, John told the kitchen. Cold sallets of sorrel, tarragon and thyme would follow hot ones of skirrets, beets and onions. They would dress lettuce leaves with cider vinegar, salt and oil and dip the endives in oil, mustard and beaten yolks.

  In the bakehouse, Tam Yallop and Simeon tried their hands at Vanian's darioles. Adam Lockyer pledged his dish of songbirds, boned, roasted and salted. Jed Scantlebury proposed himself for the sallets. Hesekey declared that he and Simeon should make honey cakes while Wendell Turpin and Alf assigned themselves baked apples. Philip and Mister Bunce took charge of the boar and supervised its transport across the yard, the massive carcass leaving a dark streak of blood in the snow.

  ‘Should see us through,’ remarked Philip two days later, surveying the carcass which hung from the beam in the jointing room. A basket heaped with apples stood beside it. John peered up at the roof.

  ‘We'll give them a Twelfth Night feast to remember.’

  Adam and his under-cooks scalded off the beast's hair and cleaned the carcass. In Firsts, Mister Bunce cored and peeled apples. Diggory brought in a basket of feathered corpses which Simeon began to draw and pluck. Sacks of skirrets and rampions were carried down from clamps in the woods. Barrels of cider were consigned to the darkest corner of the cellar to cool. Outside, beyond the west wall of Motte's garden, two of Motte's gardeners dug a roasting pit.

  Bent over the cauldron with Scovell's ladle in his hand and the spiced cider sending up its heady fumes, John heard the hum of activity rise, the clatter of pots and pans, the thud of cleavers on boards and the voices of the cooks. Slowly the kitchen stirred into life. At midday he was met by Philip who wore a baffled expression.

  ‘She wants us all up there.’

  ‘Who does?’

  ‘Lady Lucretia. Up there. In the Hall. She wants us to eat together.’ Philip shook his head as if the ways of the Mistress of Buckland were quite beyond the pale of normal comprehension. ‘The first men and women ate together, she told Gemma. Now we should too.’

  As John turned away to hide a smile, a snow-dusted Adam Lockyer entered with Peter Pears.

  ‘The Heron Boy won't move,’ said Adam. ‘Six inches of ice on his ponds and he still won't come in.’ He handed back a bunch of keys to Philip. ‘And some of that sugar-loafs gone.’

  The spiced cider was poured into a plain tureen. Philip marshalled the dishes and ordered the trays. Luke and Colin sweated over the chafing dishes. A grinning Simeon carried in the first tray of darioles and Alf began to pipe in a compote of apples and cherries. From the servants’ yard, John heard Mister Bunce directing his porters— ‘Left a little, Hesekey! Mind that cobble, Adam!'— then the leather curtain was thrown back. Borne shoulder-high on a litter of poles with Hesekey holding a drip-pan beneath, the boar entered the kitchen. The beast's back almost scraped the ceiling. His belly bulged with stuffing. From the wooden tusks attached to his snout hung two delicate cages woven from twigs. In each cage perched one of Diggory Wing's doves.

  ‘Scovell would have been proud of him,’ Philip told John, surveying the beast's glistening, golden-brown crackling. ‘Now, how are we going to get him up there?’

  It took Quiller, all his serving men, Colin, Luke, John and Philip to manoeuvre the boar up the stairs. In the buttery corridor, the buzz of voices from the Hall seemed to John almost as loud as when the King had come. Mister Bunce carried a carving knife the length of a cutlass. John steadied the beast on its tray then Mister Fanshawe's tones rang out, as nasal and penetrating as Mister Pouncey's had ever been, announcing each member of the kitchen.

  ‘Mister Adam Lockyer of Buckland, Cook! Mister Hesekey Binyon of Buckland, Under-cook . . .’

  At last John's name was called. He stepped out from behind the boar and stared.
r />   Candlelight glinted off the polished platters, the little flames flickering throughout the Great Hall. A makeshift High Table ran the length of the room. Behind it stood Lucretia. John stared.

  She wore the dress of silvery-blue silk, the cloth shimmering as the candlelight caught its folds. Beside her stood Mrs Gardiner. Next to her stood an empty chair. Lucretia beckoned.

  ‘So the Buckland Kitchen has consented to join us, Master Saturnall,’ the young woman declared. ‘We of the Household count ourselves fortunate.’

  Her face was flushed. John made little bows to Pole and Gardiner then took his place between them. From the High Table, he saw Philip and the rest of the Kitchen looking over at him, nudging each other and grinning. Down the table, Gemma leaned out from beside a quiet Mister Pouncey.

  ‘A draught for Master Saturnall,’ Lucretia commanded from the other side of Mrs Gardiner. One of Quiller's men poured poached cider into a goblet. In front of him rested the salt caddy in the shape of a ship.

  Waving his cutlass, Mister Bunce attacked the flank of the boar. Wielding a knife as long as his forearm, Mister Quiller carved slices from the rear. Plates of pork larded with mutton and apple were handed up. A platter of golden-skinned birds joined it. Soon John's knife and spoon added their noise to the clatter of cutlery in the Hall. Beside him, Mrs Gardiner slurped heartily from her goblet. At length she stifled a belch and leaned back. John raised his cup.

  ‘To your health, your ladyship.’

  Lucretia acknowledged his salute.

  Across the Hall, the serving men joined the Kitchen, Motte's gardeners, the Estate men and the maids, all of them busy lifting food off the platters. Down the table below, Philip was conducting an energetic conversation with Meg, watched by a frowning Gemma. Beside the maid, Ginny glanced up at John and smiled. Pandar leaned across the table, confiding something to a shocked-looking Hesekey and a laughing Simeon. Jed Scantlebury seemed to be choking but was still pushing hunks of pork into his mouth while Peter Pears slapped him on the back. As John watched the familiar faces, Lucretia spoke across a drowsy Mrs Gardiner.

  ‘Do you remember when last you sat here, Master Saturnall?’