Jude

by Betty Burton

  “You can’t go out in this.”

  But already the two men were putting on their warm, steamy boots. They saddled up quickly and took the shortest route over the fields towards Tradden.

  “Shouldn’t we ask in the village first?” said Will.

  “No. She’ll be on the hill.” He said this with such certainty that Will Vickery wondered what kind of a girl wouldn’t shelter in the village but would go out on to a hillside when a storm was threatening.

  There was no point in hurrying now that she was soaked to the skin. She unpinned her hair, heavy and darkened with rain. It whipped her face as she walked with the storm behind her.

  Many of the plants that hold on precariously to the thin loam of the chalk-hills live close to the ground, like the chicory, plantains, and toadflaxes. Others, the harebells, the cornflowers and scabious, flower on pliable stems, nodding and bending before every gust. Jude walked down amidst them, masses of blue little whirling Dervishes, and she felt pleasure in them. She was tired: not the fevered tiredness she had worked for recently. The disorder that had been affecting her seemed to have gone.

  Suddenly a gust of wind whipped her straw hat from her hand. It bowled across the hillside and caught against a stunted juniper bush. By now, the water running off the hills made every score and scar in the soil a miniature cascade. The track, where there was never a vestige of soil covering the chalk, was washed and glistening white. Its surface was so slick it might have been oiled.

  As Jude ran for her hat she slipped on the chalk and slithered on, unable to save herself, until she crashed against the stunted tree.

  When there is no grey curtain of rain on the downs, it is not difficult to see a person from a distance. But today visibility was down to yards, so Fred and Will separated in their search of the wide expanse of downland. It was Will who found Jude. Unconscious and with her leg twisted into an unnatural position.

  Practical, resourceful, no one in such a predicament could wish to be found by a better person than Will. It was not the first broken bone he had treated. Most of the others had been in his father’s stables and he knew that the sooner it was straightened the better. If he could manage it before she regained consciousness, it would save her a lot of agony.

  He carried nothing that would serve as a splint, and the hillside was bare of anything useful. Even the juniper had no branch longer than a foot. Will took off his neck-cloth and tore it into strips, but there was not enough. It was no time for delicacy and in any case, having several sisters, knew all about petticoats; so he removed Jude’s and tore that also. Then he gently turned her on to her back, straightened the broken leg, and strapped it to the good one.

  Either the storm had blown itself out struggling to escape the valley, or had moved on to Kent and Sussex, leaving an increasingly brightening sky from the west, so that Fred Warren could see Will from some way off. His horse found the slithery chalk treacherous, so Fred walked it down. By the time he reached Will and Jude, Will was just finishing the binding of Jude’s legs.

  Will looked up.

  “She’s not badly hurt, I think. Only the leg – it looks like it broke. It’ll not be easy getting her down.”

  They each had weather-cloaks, which in double thickness proved strong enough to carry Jude in a kind of hammock in which her legs could be held stiff. With the horses following, they went down the steep slope of Tradden.

  They made a dramatic tableau. Dicken saw them from the yard, always on the look-out for something to brighten his dull life. “Master, Master,” he called. “They’m coming in with the body.”

  White-faced, with Hanna her little replica a step behind, Bella ran to meet them. Fred waved and smiled. In her relief, Bella searched for words to hurl at Dicken, but could find none at the moment.

  Before they had reached the flat ground at Raike Bottom, Jude had begun to regain consciousness. Swimming in and out of the pain and the motion of the sling, she gradually became aware of the sky, the sound of horses walking slowly and the smell of cloth impregnated with the smell of grain. Bella’s face came into focus, then the porch, the beams of the house-place, then, as they lowered her to the floor, blackness.

  It was impossible to get her up the few, twisting stairs, so they brought Jude’s little cot down. Jude’s clothes and the strips that bound her legs, were soaked through. Before she could be put to bed, Bella had to undress and dry her. Fred and Will, in the scullery, rubbed their hair, but the journey down without their weather-capes had soaked their clothes.

  All the time that Bella was drying Jude, dressing her in a woollen gown and wrapping her warmly, Jude gave little groans as she became conscious of the pain. Hanna hovered and helped, her face all concern and seriousness.

  When Bella had finished, the men helped her to lift Jude on to the cot.

  It was now well into evening. The sky was clear again and the whole countryside glistened and glittered as the sun sank down towards Beacon Hill. Will and Fred set off as soon as they could do no more to see to things at Croud Cantle.

  Jude became fully conscious, and hearing Fred’s voice in the yard said to Hanna, “Quick, before he goes, run and tell Mr Warren that Jude says thank you, and tell him I’m sorry I put him about.”

  Even though her leg was painful, Jude had some restful sleep that night, dosed by Bella with one of her opium simples. Bella put no faith in the Cantle wise-woman, so next day, Johnny-twoey was sent off to get the Cunning Man of Motte to call. He came later that day and pronounced a small fracture. He advised that the leg be kept rigid and bear no weight upon it. Bella paid him for a box of pills which remained on the mantelpiece along with her few other souvenirs.

  “Well,” said Bella, after he had gone, “that’s what comes of roastin’ off in a thunder storm.”

  This was the first time that yesterday had been mentioned and they were both aware that it was dangerous ground. One false step by either of them would land them in another quicksand of emotion such as they had recently experienced. Neither of them was ready to tackle it again so soon.

  “I know, Mother. I’m sorry. It was so hot in the field, I wanted a breath of air. I thought it’d be cool on Tradden.”

  And so they settled for this explanation.

  The few ailments that beset the tough Nugent household were put right by large doses of licorice powder for the innards. Bella’s “Green Special” – her own receipt – pungent ointment for cuts and grazes, and a warm stocking, straight from the wearer, tied round the neck for throats and chests. Indispositions at Croud Cantle were rare and the remedies mundane, giving Hanna little scope for her desire to nurse and fuss over people.

  Hanna was just eight years old. Firm and square like Bella, she had strong stocky legs and arms and good, capable hands. She had all the prominent Estover features: small nose and ears, pale skin that freckled in summer, and a soft, full mouth. The Estover eyes were small and close-lidded, and few people could have said what was their colour, but those who did get close enough to look saw that they were green-flecked blue – or was it blue-flecked green? And of course the hair – the fox-red, golden-red, flaming Estover hair.

  Under Bella’s tuition, Hanna had become a reliable little worker. Provided that jobs were scaled down to her stature, there was not much work on the holding that she couldn’t do well. She was now much too valuable a worker to spend her time bird-scaring.

  She and Johnny-twoey were, in many ways, much alike. Both were hardy; both found satisfaction in such common sights as seeing beans and seeds germinating; both got on with whatever had to be done without question or complaint; neither had done much childish prattling. Seeing them digging, dividing or taking cuttings in the herb plot that was the thirteen-year-old Johnny-twoey’s thriving domain, it was impossible to tell whether they enjoyed one another’s company. They were a serious and hard-working little pair.

  Perhaps Hanna’s memory of Jaen went deep, for she was never very easy in her mother’s company. At Croud Cantle she was
usually a staid, placid child who seemed to be quite pleased with life in a rather solemn way. But whenever they went to Newton Clare, she appeared to revert to an older version of the fratchety, red-gum baby of seven years ago.

  Perhaps she was more intelligent than given credit for. Perhaps she had inherited Estover shrewdness.

  There was a houseful of Hazelhursts already, so nobody was likely to want to take back one who was disagreeable and bad-tempered. At Croud Cantle Hanna was wanted. The memory of the two red-haired foster-mothers who had soothed her and rocked her into security certainly went deep.

  One thing she was good at was tending any animal that was injured or ailing. Bella was inclined to say that she had a tender little heart. But in fact, the satisfaction that Hanna got from taking some half-dead creature and putting it on its feet again was akin to the satisfaction that Jude got from taking words and forming them into a satisfying paragraph, or that Bella got from taking raw berries and creating neat rows of preserves.

  Having got over the fright Dicken gave them when he saw the body being carried down, Hanna felt excited at the thought of caring for the injured Jude. As soon as she saw the state Jude was in, she had put bricks to heat up to warm Jude’s bed; had run for a shift and a thick wool cloak; had held them before the fire, so that when Bella had taken off the soaking clothes, Jude could be dressed and wrapped up warmly.

  At the time, Jude was only half-aware of what was happening. She knew that Bella had wrapped her up, but it was only the next day that she recalled Hanna towelling her hair dry and the soothing feel of the warm wool on her chilled skin, and she guessed that the heated bricks and the warmth were Hanna’s.

  The morning after the accident there was a lot to arrange. Two of the weekly-hired women were kept on to do Jude’s work and help on market day. Over the breakfast meal, Hanna went busily back and forth giving Jude her food and drink, fetching and carrying and helping her to hop about.

  “I reckon it’d be best if Hanna stopped in the house for a day or two,” Bella said.

  “No. I shall be all right. I’m not dying.”

  “She can still see to the hens and that.”

  Unusually for her, Hanna spoke up, seeing the chance of nursing Jude slipping away.

  “If she was to fall down again, Jude might be a cripple. You remember that little goat that fell twice?”

  Remembering the little goat, Jude wanted to smile. But she didn’t, and gave in to being attended by Hanna.

  The great storm had caught some crops further west which were still uncut, and had been left as tangled masses to be reaped and dried as best they could. In the Cantle Valley there was no farm caught out and the Harvest Suppers were smug and festive. The air was humid again. Almost immediately, the brown sides of the downs began to show green, but although there was a return to blue sky there was more cloud about. Summer was running down and the days were shortening.

  Jude was weaker than she had supposed she might be. For a couple of days she lay in her cot beside the window, lightly sleeping or watching the pigeons go in and out of the cote under the roof of the cow-shed. Her leg was bound between two cut-down rake handles. It ached constantly and stabbed hot pain when she moved.

  Hanna’s little face was for ever beside her.

  “Do you want anything Jude?” “Is your leg hurting?” “Shall I prop you up, Jude?” “Shall I brush your hair?”

  “I’ll tell you what you can do. Fetch my big book down.”

  Although Hanna thought writing a dull occupation for anyone who might have lain there like a lady, she set everything up comfortably within Jude’s reach.

  “I’m going to write a story.”

  This did interest Hanna. Her only experience of what books held between their covers was from listening to Reverend Tripp. In his delivery of lifting up his eyes unto the hills from whence cometh his help, he caused the eyes of his congregation to glaze over. He could blunt even the Song of Solomon. Hanna could see no connection between “a” is for “apple”, “b” is for “butter”, and tales of witches and magic.

  “Good Heavens!” said Lady Geraldine as she entered.

  The chamber was high and hung all about with drapes and tapestries. She held a candle that flickered in the still air. The reason for her exclamation was the high bed all draped in some dark-coloured damask and a dark counterpane covering it. “Good Heavens! Does his Lordship expect that I shall sleep in such funereal surroundings?”

  The writing of that first paragraph took Jude the best part of the morning, a lot longer than anything else she had done previously. That had come tumbling out of her daily observations and experience. This was very different.

  As she lay resting in the afternoon, she thought about Lady Geraldine. Where had she come from? The more she thought about it the more it excited her. She realised that she had been influenced by her recent reading, but Lady Geraldine was Jude’s own creation. If she went on and on thinking about her ..? It seemed possible that Jude could create a person with as much life as herself. If Jaen were dead ..? If Jaen were dead, then she would exist in Jude’s mind as remembered images and impressions. Which was just what Lady Geraldine was, or could be. And her own father? To me, Jude thought, he is a character created from Bella’s words and a few words in the Parish Register. And so he is for Bella . . . and Lotte . . . and Jaen . . . For anyone who ever knew Tomas Nugent, he was images conveyed by words.

  Jude felt that this was the most important thought that had ever come to her.

  Later, Hanna came and sat beside Jude to hear what she had written, observing each word as Jude ran her finger beneath the line.

  “And did he? Did his Lordship want her to sleep in that dark bed?”

  “I don’t know yet.”

  “Oh, Jude! You said it was a story.”

  To please Hanna, Jude wrote about Lady Geraldine for two days. She turned out to be Little Lady Geraldine, eight years old. Once lost to His Lordship as a baby and brought up by a poor woodsman and his wife, she was found again, became Lady Geraldine and the poor people were rewarded.

  A is for apple had been boredom. But whenever Little Lady Geraldine appeared in writing, Hanna began to recognise words and letters. When the story was finished, Jude tied the pages together and gave the story to Hanna. From then on, Hanna’s progress in reading speeded up, though she still found writing laborious and uninteresting.

  The cloudless whitish-blue sky had gone with the storm. From her place by the window, Jude noticed the gradual change to a pinker sky with small cumulus clouds. The one branch of an apple tree that was visible showed some yellow leaves and reddening fruit.

  On the third day, when Johnny-twoey came to fetch his midday food, he asked in his broad, halting way, “Miss Jude? Done you want to get out of the house?” When Jude said she would like to, but what with the cot and everything, he said, “Miss Jude? I could drag over the old trough what’s waiting for mending.”

  Hanna frowned at his intrusion into her domain.

  Placating her, he went on: “Hanny could fill it with hay, couldn’t you Hanny? And make it soft.”

  The two children arranged the trough just outside the door. It was surprisingly comfortable. Hanna brought out Jude’s writing things and it was there that Jude began her second tale of Lady Geraldine, which she did not read to Hanna or anyone.

  There was a bit of Bella in Jude that caused her to feel that idleness was a dreadful sin. This she assuaged by doing such small chores as could be done without standing. There was also in her a bit of Tomas Nugent’s Sybarite nature that hitherto had no means of surfacing. The two conflicting – Bella and Tomas – sides to Jude’s nature were satisfied: by working extremely hard, but at the pleasure of writing her story.

  The routine of the farm settled down around her. She soon learned to move short distances without help and she spent some rime teaching Hanna. Coming a small way out of his shell, Johnny-twoey changed the hay daily, saying, “Miss Jude?” by way of greeting; reddenin
g at the neck when Jude praised his good idea about the trough.

  By early September, Jude had written and discovered a great deal about Lady Geraldine, who had become interested in a young man. He was unsubstantial and mysterious – to Jude as well as to Lady Geraldine. Then one day, Lady Geraldine fell from her horse. As she lay stunned, the young man found her and carried her back to his house.

  Lady Geraldine’s recollection of how she got to Trelford Court was hazy. The pain in her arm and the severe blow to her head caused her to become faint. The young man was gentle, realising what permanent damage might be done to the arm should it be found to be broken, or should the motion of the horse make the condition worse. Her head lolled on his shoulder and she smelled a strange odour of ..? Lady Geraldine, in her fainting state, could not bring to mind what this might be until she heard the sound of sails as they passed the mill. Of course, it was the wholesome smell of freshly ground corn.

  It was a year when there was an abundance of crab-apples, blackberries and sloes. Although Jude was able to get about the house and yard with the aid of a stick, she could not go out this year into the fields and lanes to pick the wild fruits for making their preserves and wine. So it was left to Bella, Hanna and Johnny-twoey to go out every afternoon, leaving Jude to prepare windfall apples and break up the sugar-loaf.

  As sometimes happens just before autumn, there was a short spell of summery weather. Bella had taken the young ones to pick in Church Farm Lane and Dicken and the hired labour were digging up root-crops and putting them in clamps for winter use. Jude had finished preparing fruit and was sitting on a kitchen chair outside.

  Although she had started the Lady Geraldine story to keep herself occupied, it had recently become marvellously absorbing to her. Lady Geraldine’s adventures were trivial, but Jude had discovered that there were many and various ways of producing an effect with words and punctuation. The discovery excited her. Lady Geraldine’s obsession with finding the identity of the man who had rescued her had been written in several different ways. Jude was fascinated at how she might change the story by the way she wrote it; like changing her tone of voice when speaking. She re-read some of her many broadsides and her few books with a new awareness, comparing the way that they were written with that she had done.