by Karen Brooks
‘Ignore that bastardo, Hattycliffe,’ said Angela softly. ‘He is nothing more than a, what is it you say? A roaring boy — and all who live here know it.’
I hesitated a second before responding, determined the wobble of my limbs would not infect my voice. ‘A coward and a bully he may be, but there’s many would argue my actions created him — Mamma among them.’
Mistress Blight. Dear God, is that how they see me?
We walked the rest of the way home without exchanging another word, aware of the gossip that would no doubt swell in our wake. Relief swept my body as the house came into view. I was a soldier returning from war, longing for the safety of those walls, even though the harbour they represented was only temporary.
On the corner of Harp Lane and Tower Street, our house was a fine three-storey building with mullioned glass in all the windows and two parlours inside, all surrounded by a stone wall. The entrance was on Harp Lane, while access to father’s shop was on Tower Street. His workshop was at the rear, separated from the main house by a small yard complete with chickens and a greedy cow. Just before the intersection with Tower Street there was a big old creaking gate, partially hidden by a huge elm tree. Mainly used by tradespeople and servants, it had always been my preferred entrance and exit.
Once inside, I would pay my respects to Papa, to my lady mother, and then lock myself in my room and never venture out again … This outing had been a mistake, a terrible, wretched mistake. I should never have allowed myself to be persuaded. The play, for all its glory, was not worth it. Damn Caleb … and damn Papa for his acquiescence.
Just as I opened the gate, it was wrenched backwards. In the gap, a grime-streaked face with large eyes appeared. It was my father’s youngest apprentice, Dickon. Upon seeing me, he started, his neck and cheeks reddening.
‘M … M … Mistress Mallory. I … I … I was just coming to find you.’
‘What is it, Dickon?’ I asked and, casting etiquette aside, squeezed past him.
Leaving Angela to shut the gate, Dickon followed me then stopped, studying his feet, scraping them back and forth in the dirt, hands clasped behind his back, his blue shirt covered by his leather apron. Taken on by my father after I left, Dickon had heard the prate about his master’s daughter and didn’t know what to think when the subject of that tattle manifested as a living, breathing being. He had avoided me since I’d been home. Now he had no choice.
He swallowed a few times. ‘It’s your pa. He needs you, mistress.’
My heart gambolled in my chest. At last.
He locked eyes with me. He had lovely brown eyes, like our spaniels.
‘Thank you, Dickon.’
A long, low rumble of thunder sounded. As one, we glanced towards the heavens. The chickens squawked and the cat, Latch, scurried along the branch of the elm, leaping onto the rear wall. The dense, dark smell of moisture clung to every surface.
‘M … Mistress, I feel I should tell you —’ Dickon paused and gulped, his head swivelling to follow the cat. ‘The master’s not alone. There is a stranger with him.’
I turned towards the workshop. Light flickered through the closed shutters, smoke billowed from the chimney. ‘A stranger? Who?’
Dickon shrugged. ‘A gentleman … nay, a nobleman. I’ve not seen him before. Master seems to know him. Not certain if I should be telling you this, mistress, but he’s not been himself since the gentleman arrived. Not at all.’
The earth opened beneath me, a great maw into which I would sink. No. No. Please God. Had damnation come to visit me? I resisted the urge to clutch the locket hidden beneath my dress. Instead, I rested my hand briefly over where it lay against my heart, cleared my throat, and pretended nothing was amiss.
‘This man, he’s been here a while?’
‘Since the bells tolled three at least. Master told us to leave the workshop, even though tasks remain unfinished, what with the holiday yesterday and all.’
‘I see.’ This time when I met Dickon’s eyes, I saw something that reflected what lay in my own. Fear. I pulled my cloak tighter.
‘Lead the way.’ I mustered the warmest smile I could, considering the cold wrapping itself about me. The first drops of rain struck.
‘Nay, mistress,’ said Dickon, brushing water from his cheeks. ‘The master says I’m to stay in the house. You’re to go alone.’
The light was gloomy, the shadows growing. A gust of wind lifted my cloak, my kirtle, nipped my cheeks. The rain became heavier and still I didn’t move. A flash of lightning ripped the sky.
‘Vai,’ said Angela, giving me a little shove. ‘You go, Mallory. You must obey your Papa.’
Indeed, from now on, I must. I promised. It was what we’d agreed, after all. A condition of my return. I would be a dutiful daughter.
Gripping Dickon by the shoulder, Angela manoeuvred him before her, a shield against the weather. With one last reassuring look, she jerked her head in the direction of the workshop.
Left with little choice, I lowered my face and ran, wondering who this mysterious nobleman might be. The man who finally forced my father, a proud master locksmith, to acknowledge that he needed me still.
TWO
HARP LANE, LONDON
The 18th of November, Anno Domini 1580
In the 23rd year of the reign of Elizabeth I
I paused outside the workshop, took a deep breath and entered. Arthur and Galahad, our two spaniels, scrabbled at my legs to attract attention. Trained not to bark lest they destroy father’s or the apprentices’ concentration, they were nonetheless active in their affections. I kneaded their ears and stroked their soft heads as I glanced around.
Papa was bent over the main table in the middle of the room. He raised a finger to indicate he knew I was there, and continued to concentrate on an object in front of him. As for the mysterious guest, of him there was no sign. Aside from Papa, the workshop and shop beyond were deserted.
Slipping the wet cloak from my shoulders, I studied the place where I’d spent a great deal of my youth. I had not graced its rooms since my return some weeks earlier. Everything appeared just as I remembered. So much so, I could almost persuade myself time stood still. The forge against the west wall glowed, its embers banked, its heat comforting. A pair of bellows rested next to it; the anvil squatted a few feet away. The larger tools sat in their holders nearby. Beneath the shuttered window was a bench strewn with instruments and bits of solid metal. An assortment of keys and barrels lay awaiting ward and tumbler cuts, their shanks gleaming in the soft light. Beside them were locks in various stages of completion, not yet dressed for the occasion. Papa’s work stool was abandoned underneath the bench. The half-eaten remnants of a loaf, some cheese and unwashed tankards sat on a smaller table. Above a large cupboard on the far wall hung a series of keys and an unfinished master lock — the work of Kit Jolebody, Papa’s eldest apprentice, if I wasn’t mistaken.
Though it had been a long time since I’d sat at these benches and tested my competence, I knew locks and their workings better than most.
I’d never sought to acquire such knowledge nor the skills that attended it. Up until the age of seven, I was like any other girl of my station, learning to sew, dance, paint pretty pictures and correctly address folk of all ranks. What set our family apart, aside from Mamma’s origins and stubborn adherence to the old faith, was that our house was blessed with books — wonderful books, full of stories, ideas and so much more. The second son of a gentleman, Papa, like his brothers, had been given a good education. Able to translate from the Greek and Latin, he would read me stories of gods, goddesses and the mortals who both loved and defied them. I also learned of King Arthur and his knights, the Holy Grail, courtly manners and tales of damsels in need of rescue by sword-wielding lords with noble intentions, holiness and grace. I would imagine what it would be like to be the object of such intense passion that a man would forgo his dearest friends and his sworn oath in order to serve the woman who’d captured his heart and soul.
I would sigh into my pillow, clutching the cat or one of the hounds until they wriggled free. My days were crowded with such stories and my nights with the dreams and longings they inspired.
Then Papa read Thomas Becon’s book The Catechism, whose pages argued forcefully for the education of girls. Becon believed girls must be as learned as boys so they might grow into virtuous women who in turn would teach their children the benefits of godliness and morality. According to Papa, one had only look at Her Majesty Queen Elizabeth to see such principles in action. She was clever as well as virtuous and godly and her children, the good folk of England, reaped the benefits.
So would I.
It wasn’t long after Papa had finished Becon’s book that Master Fodrake, a teacher, sought lodgings with us. Papa struck a deal — Master Fodrake could have rooms and food provided he taught me my letters and, much to my delight, to read for myself the tales Papa had related. It was Master Fodrake, then a man of middle years with a straggly beard, kind twinkling eyes and a voice so mellow and soft that listening to it was akin to being stroked with feathers, who brought William Lily’s Latin grammar book into the house and used it to add the language of scholars to the Greek he struggled to teach me, as well as the Italian, French and English with which I was already conversant. Within months, I was able to read the marvellous orations of Cicero and, against Mamma’s wishes, the magnetic verses of Ovid and Virgil. Master Fodrake, my tutor and oft times instructor to Papa’s apprentices as well, also brought the musings of Plato, Aristotle and the works of the Saracen philosophers into my little sphere. Insisting my mathematics must be beyond reproach, he introduced me to William Buckley’s Arithmetica Memorativa, a series of Latin verses that taught the rules of mathematics — so my Latin and numbers were improved in one fell swoop.
But all this learning, this vast pool of knowledge in which I swam with such pleasure, didn’t compare to having the attention of my Papa. Mamma may have laboured to bring me into this world but it was as if once this maternal duty had been accomplished, she was not obliged to fulfil any others. It was no secret Mamma longed for a son, but no matter how many times her womb quickened, aside from me no child, male or female, survived more than a few weeks. Believing that somehow it was my fault and that my presence precluded her being blessed with any other babes, my relationship with Mamma became increasingly strained. To say it lacked the fondness I enjoyed with both Papa and with Mamma’s companion, her cousin Angela, was to understate the coolness that accompanied our every encounter. Over the years Mamma became an ever more distant figure of judgment and disdain. At first I sought to please her, but, as I grew older, I came to challenge and ultimately defy her.
Did Mamma’s remoteness drive me into Papa’s workshop, to hover by his side as he made beautiful intricate keys and locks? Did I understand, even as a young girl, that my bond with Papa was at the expense of the one with my mother? I’m uncertain. In many ways I simply accepted that Mamma didn’t hold the same fondness for me as Papa. It was the natural order of things and required no explanation.
I was my father’s daughter. When I was with Papa, the hours became a solace, the workshop a refuge from the vexation my mere presence aroused in my mother. Indulgent, he would answer my endless questions, explain his techniques and allow me to file his carefully crafted keys to polished smoothness. At first he did it to humour a lonely child, but as he saw my enthusiasm and responded to it as a natural teacher does a willing pupil, these early lessons transformed into something more. My mornings were spent with Master Fodrake and my afternoons became Papa’s. Mamma did not object nor change the manner of her dealings with me.
When I reached the age when I should have been learning how to run a house, make ale and perform any charitable works the parish required, I was not only burying my head in the work of the Romans and Greeks, I was also becoming adept at understanding the temperatures at which a forge must be kept in order to turn metal molten and make it pliable. When I should have been concerned with studying songs and perfecting my abilities with a musical instrument, I was learning how the instruments of a locksmith were used: the tongs, hammers, rods, stilettos, slim metal bars and bellows. Father would explain how someone who works with bronze, iron and steel or alloys must approach each task not only with respect for the material but with an awareness of the shape it would take. It was the master’s role to understand what resided within the metal and to help it emerge. Only then could a locksmith bend the iron, for example, to the pattern in his mind or in the sketch before him. While the head held the Platonic and God-blessed form, the product of the hands was the imperfect earthly version. Though it never lived up to its heaven-sent ideal, it was incumbent upon the craftsman to seek perfection. I would watch as Papa sought to arrive at this destination daily. Though he believed he fell short, his many wealthy clients and the reputation he earned did much to counter that notion.
While fashioning keys and locks didn’t require the strength of a blacksmith or an ironmonger, it was beyond my capabilities and sex — apart from filing the metal, Papa would never allow me to practise as his apprentices did. But testing the locks, seeing how resistant they were to the cunning of a lock-pick, this was within my ken and something Papa indulged. Lock-picking required an agility and firmness of purpose, a mind not shackled to the object itself and what it was designed to do, but to defeating the intentions of its maker. My nimble fingers and understanding of the workings behind the metal plates and elaborate escutcheons — the ornate frontispiece that often covered the keyhole — as well as the pins, springs and bolts, served me well. Undoing the locks, bypassing the wards and tumblers without the keys designed to open them, was something that came naturally to me. Being a girl proved no handicap — not while my skills were kept secret.
Before long, after the apprentices had retired for the night or were occupied with errands and other tasks, I was helping Papa test the locks his workshop produced.
It became a game between us — and as I grew older and more skilled, more often than not I emerged the victor.
Whenever Mamma saw my stained and calloused hands she railed at Papa before turning on me. Accused of taking no care over my appearance, of defeating her efforts to make me presentable and thus marriageable, I didn’t argue. Instead of exclaiming over the silk and woollen garments she ordered so I would not shame her, the wife of a wealthy locksmith, in public, I would gladly cover the sumptuous fabrics and shuck on the leather apron and gloves of the trade, hiding my pretty skirts and bodice, tying back my long hair and tucking it beneath an ugly thick scarf instead of the fashionable coifs, caps and decorated bonnets designed to enhance my ebony locks. Shamefully, I sometimes paraded in this working apparel before Mamma simply to nettle her, but also to get her attention. With a slap across my face, or a hairbrush against my thigh, Mamma would demand I remove the filthy garments and, with loud prayers to blessed Mother Mary and all the saints, banish me from her sight.
In the privacy of my room I would smile through the tears, holding my hand mirror aloft, turning it this way and that in order to admire my strange ensemble before undressing. Mamma was mistaken in thinking I wasn’t vain. I was. I relished every scald and scar, every broken fingernail, every scratch and torn piece of clothing. Her punishments became part of my achievements, a sign I wasn’t the curse of a female instead of a male child, or God’s punishment for her sins, but a skilled and useful person. Dressing in my best for church each Sunday, I wore the badges of my secret ability the way other young women wore their ruffs, embroidered stomachers, decorated partlets, satin kirtles and farthingales. My indifference to her perturbation, my stubborn refusal to capitulate to her desires, infuriated Mamma and saddened Papa, who loved us both.
‘She’s a young woman,’ Mamma would screech. ‘Not an apprentice to be enslaved to a craft.’
Papa would agree, reaching for his ale, and grin. ‘No less because she wears leather over her silks.’
‘You only say so because when she dresse
s like this, she resembles you. She’s like an actor in costume. But God in His wisdom knows, there’ll come a time when she must cast this playacting aside and be the woman she was born. It’s not a profession she needs but a husband. If we’re ever to see her settled in this world, out from under our roof, it’s by marriage. Lord knows she’ll have enough trouble finding a husband looking the way she does, let alone possessing a man’s mind and skills. It’s not natural,’ she would cry and then, lowering her voice and turning her head aside, would murmur, ‘Nothing about her is.’
Defiantly she would stare at Papa, cross herself in the papist way and mutter words that, if they ever reached certain ears, would see her loyalty to the throne questioned. Despite how she sounded, Mamma’s objections were never about our sovereign lady; they were about the woman I was becoming.
The pain Mamma’s words aroused became another piece of my armour — chinks were not allowed.
‘Let her be, Valentina,’ Papa would sigh. ‘You’re too hard on the child. What harm is there if, for the time being, she continues to find pleasure unpicking locks? After all, she’s very talented.’
‘At unmaking what you fashion, sir. This is not a gift but a curse you have bestowed. You’re playing at God. Making her in your image,’ scolded Mamma. ‘No good will come of it. The smithy is no place for a woman. Look at what happened to the last one known to work the forge — she crafted the very nails driven into the palms of Our Lord Jesus Christ. Mio Dio! As if we women don’t suffer enough penance for our sins. The catalogue need not grow, and not with your daughter’s name upon it.’
