The Little Shop of Found Things--A Novel

by Paula Brackston

  Xanthe felt horribly woozy, and the smoke had left her throat so sore that she could not swallow without difficulty, but however tempting it was to climb back into the feather bed and rest, she knew she must not waste the opportunity to begin her search. Once she was in the kitchens and put to work it would be more difficult to sneak off on her own. And at this moment Mistress Lovewell was out of her bedchamber. That was where the chatelaine pieces had gone missing. That was where she had to begin seeking answers.

  After pulling on her blouse, dress, belt, and boots, she crept from the room. She found herself on a long, upstairs corridor. Most of the walls were paneled with smooth, dark, polished wood. The floorboards were bare, which made them unhelpfully noisy beneath her heavy boots. She moved toward the front of the house, reasoning that the main bedrooms would be located there. There were deep casement windows at the end of the hallway allowing enough light for her to see what she was doing. She lifted the latch on the first door, but a quick peek told her this was Clara’s room. Even in the seventeenth century, generations before the term had been invented, there were telltale signs of a teenager: brightly colored damask drapes on the four-poster bed and at the windows, piles of ribbons and lace upon the dressing table, more than one mirror, a warm fur throw upon the bed, and a collection of beautifully dressed dolls. Xanthe hurried on to the next room. This one was very grand and had a more grown-up feel to it. At its center was the biggest four-poster bed she had ever seen, intricately carved, with an impressive canopy and drapes. A status symbol, as well as a place of warmth and comfort that must have been rare in the 1600s. The room boasted beautiful rugs on the floor, two heavily padded chairs, as well as a cushioned window seat at the generous window. The glass was of fine quality, allowing in plenty of light, and some of the panes were even of stained glass, which must have cost a fortune. The Lovewells were clearly keen to shout about their wealth and position, however much the mistress of the house might like to pretend otherwise.

  On the far side of the room was a small table with two wooden boxes on it. The little stool in front of it and the hand mirror and hairbrush suggested it was Mistress Lovewell’s dressing table. Xanthe hurried toward it, wanting to check the boxes.

  “What business have you in the mistress’s bedchamber?!” came the shout from behind her.

  She wheeled around to find Mary standing in the doorway. The statuesque maid who had tended her when she was brought out from the barn looked a picture of fury and suspicion at finding her where she absolutely should not have been.

  “Forgive me, I … became lost,” she stammered. “It is such a big house. I wanted some air but could not find my way out.”

  “Indeed? And why would a person seeking a way out of a place not walk toward the flight of stairs that would take them downward? It is curious that a stranger should find their way so conveniently to the very room where the mistress of the house might keep her valuables.”

  “I promise you, I am no thief.”

  “You will have to do better to convince me than effect a winsome countenance. Your prettiness will not move me, so do not seek to use it.”

  “Truly, I meant no harm. I really was looking for a way out of the house. You must believe me.”

  “Must I now? Who is to say so? And who is to say Mistress Lovewell will accept your protestations of innocence? Come. Away with you. We will see what the good lady of the house has to say.”

  13

  As Mary marched her from the room, Xanthe’s mind raced to find a way to prevent herself from being delivered up to the mistress. She was certain the woman would take snooping in her bedchamber as being all the proof needed that she was untrustworthy. At the very least she would be sent packing. Mistress Lovewell might even have Xanthe dragged away and locked up as Alice had been. She needed to think fast, but her head was still fuzzy, and her breathing had not yet entirely recovered from inhaling so much smoke, so that she was having trouble catching her breath as Mary bundled her down the stairs. The sweeping staircase led down to the broad entrance hall. As they reached the bottom the door opened and the family came in. Xanthe felt Mary straighten up. She opened her mouth to speak, but at that moment Pepito grew tired of being in Clara’s arms and jumped to the floor. On seeing his rescuer he came running, wagging his tail and making small squeaks by way of greeting.

  “Oh, see?” Clara laughed. “He knows you, and he wishes to show his appreciation. Pepito, you have a new friend.” She clapped her hands as the little dog ran in tight circles. Xanthe reached down and patted him, taking care not to touch the patches where he had lost his fur.

  “I see you are recovered,” Mistress Lovewell observed. She frowned at the faux minstrel’s clothes. “Mary, find the girl something to wear more suiting her position in the household. And endeavor to do something with all that hair.”

  “My lady…” Mary started, but she got no further, for her mistress was already striding across the hallway, her hand raised.

  “I have not time to spend further on the matter. We are in disarray. This dreadful fire, and all remedies no doubt will cost us dear. Let the girl prove her worth and see that she stays in your sight while she does so.”

  Mary looked at Xanthe, her face set, arms folded. “That I certainly shall do, my lady,” she said. “That I shall do.”

  She took her to the rear of the house, whisking her along the narrow passageways and through low doors at such speed that Xanthe had little chance of taking it all in. She was endeavoring to get her bearings, to make a note of which door led where, but Great Chalfield was all unexpected twists and stairs and corridors, suggesting the core of the house, with its great hall and important rooms, had been built earlier than much of the rest, with further rooms being added over the years. Xanthe attempted to remember what it had looked like in the modern day when she attended the auction, but had only her impression of the exterior on which to make a judgment. It had certainly finished up bigger, with less timber frame and more stone, but that was all she could bring to mind. At last they came to a locked room. Mary had a ring of keys at her belt; nothing so grand as a chatelaine for her, just a loop of metal for her keys. She found the one that opened the door into a small room filled with tall cupboards and nothing else. When she opened the nearest one Xanthe could smell soap and starch and saw that all the shelves were filled with neatly folded linen. The Lovewells might not be nobility, but they were certainly wealthy. All that fine bed linen, table linen, and clothing would have not only cost a great deal to buy, but cost time and money to launder and repair.

  “You will have use of these garments for as long as you are a servant in this household and not a day beyond,” she announced, selecting things from the linen press and handing them over. “Keep them in good order. The mistress will not tolerate waste nor carelessness with what is given you. You bear responsibility for losses, and woe betide you should you present yourself in an unclean state.” With that Mary strode from the room, calling after her. “Do not dawdle, for there is ever work to be done and hours too few in which to do it.”

  Xanthe scurried after her out of the room. Mary locked the door and took her up a tightly twisting wooden staircase that led two floors up to the rooms in the attic. They passed through one with a single bed in it and eventually came to another at the very end of the house. They were in the roof itself, the ceiling sloping, rafters and beams exposed, with tiny windows set in one side. There were two mattresses, straw-stuffed and lumpy, upon wooden pallets. One was made up, next to the other were folded some basic-looking bed linen and blankets. There was a stool, a low table with a candle stub in a little earthenware holder, and above the beds a sampler reminding all who stood before it to give thanks to the Lord. Xanthe was assailed by a strong feeling of sorrow and thought she could hear sobbing. She whipped around, but there was no one else in the room. She knew then that this had been Alice’s bedchamber. Alice’s little bed, where she had been living out her little life before everything had gone so disastrou
sly wrong for her.

  “For now, you shall share Jayne’s bedchamber. She is also a kitchen maid, so your working days will tally. You may keep your own clothes in here. You are given one candle per week—do not squander the mistress’s generous allowance. We attend church on Sunday morning and evening, and Wednesday evensong. Sunday afternoon is your own time if there are no guests staying in the house.”

  Mary stood, waiting, watching her new charge. Xanthe knew she must have already seen her strange undergarments, and probably her locket. What would she make of a lowly minstrel owning such a piece of gold? It struck her that Mary was not the type to give away what she was thinking, unless it was to bark instructions. Xanthe began to unbuckle her belt and Mary turned away, leaving the room with her customary purposeful stride.

  “See to it that your cap covers that hair,” she said as she went. “Come to the kitchens directly and you will be given your duties. Be quick.” She paused and then added, “This night I shall give you balm for your burn. Mind you tend to it. We’ve no room here for an ailing maidservant.”

  It was a relief to be on her own again. She took her clothes off, glad she could keep her own underwear, seeing as she was no longer under Mary’s scrutiny, and put her outer garments in what she hoped passed for a neatly folded pile on the little table. Her bag she stuffed beneath the mattress. She had been given a shift of cream cotton which she slipped over her head. Next came a brown kirtle, which was essentially a long-sleeved dress cut in the most unflattering way imaginable, devoid of shape, with a square neckline and nothing by way of embellishment or even nice stitching. She pulled it over her head. The fabric was coarse enough to be itchy, so she was glad of the shift beneath it. It fell to her ankles, not quite covering her heavy boots, which would no doubt gain her some curious glances. Finally, she tied an apron, stiff with starch, around her waist. On the table were a handful of hairpins. She already had a band, but even so it was a struggle to get all her hair into a sufficiently tight bun to force it beneath the starched white cap she had been given. She was glad there was no mirror, as she was certain she looked awful, what with the shapeless dress, the drab colors, and the dangling flaps of the headgear that would, to modern eyes, look completely ludicrous.

  She took one more look around the room. What was so striking was just how little of Alice there was to be found. There were some things in the corner that she supposed belonged to the other kitchen maid, Jayne. But what of Alice? Had her own clothes already been thrown out? Or taken to her? Had she no other possessions? No mementos of her family even? Willis had mentioned them only as traitors, so perhaps Alice had been compelled to get rid of anything that connected her to them. It seemed a sorry story that had only grew more sorrowful. Xanthe paused in the doorway, reluctant to leave her own few connections with home, but she was still wearing her locket. She could still return to her own time, when she was ready, when Alice was free, and when Flora would be safe.

  She took the back stairs and followed her nose to the kitchen. This was not, in fact, one room but a collection of spaces, all given over to the preparation and storing of food for the household. Xanthe did a quick tally and reckoned that, with Willis and Peter and Mary, the carriage driver, the servants she could see now, probably gardeners as well, and the Lovewells themselves, that meant feeding at least twelve people, presumably two meals a day. Which explained the hectic pace of work that was going on. The main room—the one that most resembled a modern-day kitchen—was huge, with its most noticeable feature being the enormous open fireplace set into the far wall. There was a fire burning in the hearth, with pots set over it, either on stands or hanging from chains. She could see a spit put to one side that would no doubt be used on feast days. To the left of the fire was an oven door, through which a stick-thin man was using a wooden peel to push trays of bread dough for baking. A young girl was emptying pails of water into a barrel, and two young men were carrying in crates of stoneware jugs that Xanthe guessed contained beer of some sort. Mary saw her and put her hands on her hips, clearly not impressed by her attempts to look neat and tidy. Tutting, she tightened the stays of Xanthe’s apron and repositioned some of her hair pins, all the while issuing instructions and warnings, none of which she really understood. Even her gruff voice was difficult to hear above the general noise in the kitchen. She pointed out a darting figure scarcely bigger than a child, and stated that this was Jayne. The girl gave a fleeting smile as she hurried past with a basket of eggs. Through one door Xanthe could see a flagged passageway that looked like it led to the dairy in which she had hidden on her previous visit. At the other end of the room the young men were endlessly bringing things in—crates of beer, a churn of milk, baskets of vegetables, armfuls of logs for the fire—or taking things out: buckets of ashes, slops, vegetable trimmings, and general rubbish. The little baker snapped out orders, and she quickly understood that he was in fact the cook and in charge of the kitchen. A maidservant scurried through another door into what appeared to be a storeroom for all of the tableware. Xanthe glimpsed shelves and tables stacked with pewter or silver plates, wooden platters and serving dishes, and silver and glass goblets and beakers. It was all on such a huge scale, just for a family of four people! But then there would be the “entertainments” Master Lovewell had hired her for. And there was the team of staff to be fed, too.

  “Mind your backs!” shouted a burly man with a red face as he carted a side of pork through the kitchen and hefted it onto the table at the center. Xanthe stepped out of the way, wondering who among the servants knew Alice best and who she could make a friend of, who might answer some of the dozens of questions she had stored up. The cook looked as if he never had a free moment. Mary was already suspicious of her. Judging by their clothes, the manservants seemed to be mostly from outside the house, possibly employed in the gardens or somewhere else on the estate, and probably only fleetingly seen indoors when muscle was required. Jayne was now scrubbing pots with what looked like a handful of straw and some ash. She could not have been more than thirteen. Xanthe was about to sidle up to her and introduce herself when a bark from Mary summoned her.

  “Here,” Mary said, shoving a cloth-covered basket into her arms. “Take this out to Willis and the boy. The Lord knows they will be in need after their terrible morning. Inform Willis the mistress has had beds made up for the pair of them in the hoard house. There they will find clothes to replace those they lost. Do not stand and stare like a dumbkin, girl, away and make haste!”

  Xanthe hurried out of the kitchen, glad to be free of the noise, the heat and the smell of the place. She had only been in it a matter of moments, and on a workaday afternoon; what would it be like toiling in there on feast days from dawn till dusk with few chances to rest or eat, she wondered. Outside the day was mild but cool, the leaves on the creeper climbing the west side of the house already turned to autumn reds and golds. The smell of smoke hung about the smoldering stables and grew stronger the nearer she got. For a moment she hesitated, her stomach lurching, the memory of the fire, of the heat and choking smoke, of falling, transporting her back to that very real danger. What if she had been unable to escape? What would have happened to Alice? To Flora? She pressed on, having no time to dwell on what-ifs.

  Although badly damaged by the fire, the main structure of the stables remained standing. As she reached the arched doorway that led to where the carriages were kept, Willis emerged carrying armfuls of harness, Peter trotting along behind him.

  “I am happy to see you both well,” Xanthe said. “Mary sent this for you. You are to have beds in the hoard room, and new clothes.”

  Peter laughed. “Will be the first time I’ve been allowed in there!”

  She had no idea what a hoard room was, or why Peter would have been kept out of it, but did not wish to show her ignorance. Clearly it was something commonplace, yet not open to young boys. Only later would she learn it was a place for hoarding fruit and vegetables through the winter months.

  Willis made
no move to take the basket, but stood and stared hard at her, clutching the straps and buckles tight as if she might try and snatch them from him.

  “I told you to leave,” he said levelly. “How was it you were in the hayloft?”

  “I had to come back. I have to find a way to prove Alice isn’t a thief.”

  “You’ll find nothing up there.” He jerked his head in the direction of the wrecked roof.

  “I was waiting … for a chance to enter the house unseen.”