McCann, Maria - As Meat Loves Salt

by Balefanio

  The rain from the day before had cleared the sky for a bright hard sun more fitted to early spring. In the field I saw the Tunstalls, bent to the earth, and Jeremiah not far off from them. No other soul was visible. I turned away, silently rehearsing my first words to Caro.

  Outside the tent I found the child squalling on the grass and yearning towards me with its arms and legs. It should have been swad­dled, and in this laxity I recognised one of Ferris's notions.

  'I don't know your name,' said I, taking it up. There was not much of Caro in it, only the mother's roundness of cheek and lip, but that all babies had, even those whose mothers were very deathsheads.

  'Black but comely.' I held the babe away from me to get a good look. It ceased screaming and seemed to regard me with curiosity. It was a Cullen: the skin alone was enough to settle that. Then the hand: I could see it would grow to be square in the palm, with a long strong thumb. That was my hand, but it was also Zeb's, supple and capable on the lute strings. The eyes were blue, but again, my own grey eyes did

  not mean I was not my father's son. Did it know me, I wondered, and I folded it to my breast.

  The tent door flapped open and Catherine came out. 'Ah, there's a sight,' she said. Before I could stop her she was yelling, 'Sister Jane! Come out here!'

  There was no time to do more than try for a calm face and a level voice. Caro was out and curtseying to me, as self-possessed as if we had never met. Bowing awkwardly because of the child, I observed bluish-brown marks around her temples and jaw. A deep unbroken scratch began at her ear, crossed her neck and disappeared into her clothing. I tried not to stare at it.

  'This is Brother Jacob,' said Hathersage, who as always these days followed practically on Catherine's heels. 'Brother Jacob, Sister Jane.'

  'I am very glad to meet you, Brother,' said my wife. Her shyly upturned face put me in mind of her as a little girl, sitting on Izzy's knee and whispering in his ear that Jacob was thwart. I hoped I was smiling.

  'The lad bids fair to be as handsome as you, eh?' asked Catherine.

  A very pretty one,' I replied, thinking that this was like acting a play in a madhouse. ‘A boy? What is his name?'

  'Dan, Daniel,' said Caro. I had been dreading Jacob, or worse, Ze-

  We stood at a loss and I dandled the babe as best I could. Ferris was nowhere to be seen.

  'Have they made you a hut, Sister?' I asked.

  'Not yet,' said Hathersage. 'We were not sure - Brother Christo­pher was away, and Sister Kane was afraid the men who attacked her, you know of this—?'

  I nodded.

  '—afraid they might return, and so she has been in with Susan­nah.' He waited, triumphant, while I worked it out.

  'Then you and Catherine are espoused?' I asked him.

  'We are,' his wife answered for him.

  'I give you good joy — why — you must excuse me, no one—'

  'I told folk to say nothing,' Hathersage explained. 'I wanted to give the news to Brother Christopher myself.'

  'Well.' I jogged the child up and down. I would not ask them why they had waited for Brother Christopher's absence. 'Well! May you be happy. And Sister Jane, shall you live with us? What has Ferris to say?'

  'Ferris is Brother Christopher,' Catherine explained to Caro.

  'He says I may stay.'

  "Then everything falls out pat. I have no special work on hand, come with me and I will build you a hut. You shall help pass the time by telling me your tale as we work.'

  'We were making buttermilk,' Caro said, glancing hesitantly at the new spouses.

  'O, no!' cried treacherous Catherine. 'Go get your hut built. You'll find Jacob a quick workman.' I saw she could hardly wait to get back into the tent with her Wisdom, who was even then slobbering on her neck.

  'Come then, Sister Jane,’ and I walked away in the direction of the wood, keeping a firm grip on the child which might or might not be mine. I heard her tripping over the grass behind me but she took no pains to catch up.

  'Now then,' I said, turning as we reached the first trees. 'None can hear us.'

  She gasped and stared around.

  I went on quickly, 'I mean only that we can talk. I will do you no harm,' and put the child, which had fallen asleep on my breast, into her arms. Caro watched me without speaking. I found I lacked the courage to begin at once, so told her to wait while I went back for an axe, which in my confusion I had forgotten to bring from the tent.

  'Stay here,' I urged.

  'Where would I go?' she replied.

  I slowed my steps as I came near the tent, treading silently until I pushed through the flap. There was a scuffle as I entered. Hathersage turned his body away from me, I saw Catherine's skirt drop, and both blushed exceedingly.

  I took my time finding a suitable axe-head, fitting it to a shaft and sawing off some rope from the smallest pile there. At the door

  I hesitated as if in thought, returned and selected a turving-spade. Hathersage glared at me.

  'I may need more rope,' I told them with the sweetest of fraternal smiles. 'Be careful, don't spill the buttermilk.'

  The infant was beginning to whimper as I again approached the trees. As I laid down the tools I saw Caro arrange a shawl over her bosom, and knew she was about to put the boy to her breast. My child or my brother's child, I told myself. We were once like Catherine and Hathersage, I put my body inside hers.

  Carp fiddled with her bodice. Daniel ceased whining and began to snuffle. A part of me wished my wife would let me see her giving suck, and I felt as if haunted by my own ghost.

  The work proceeded slowly, for I went for the straight, slender branches that Harry would have chosen, but did not hurry in cutting them. Instead, I made much play with the axe and then reined in the force of each blow before it pierced the wood.

  'Our bargain was that you should tell me your tale,' I said. 'I know in advance it will shame me.'

  She regarded me curiously.

  'I am not the man I was,' I said. 'I would do what I can to make things right.'

  'Make things right?' she interposed. 'How will you—?'

  As best I can. But be so kind, my dear, as to tell me the rest. How comes it you are alone?'

  Caro drew her shawl more closely over the child's head. 'Some take me for a widow. I may be one.'

  'What—'

  'I was abandoned by my husband.'

  I paused in mid-swing. 'Did you not abandon him?'

  She made no reply and it came to me that by 'husband' she must mean Zeb. O, how could we get over that ground! I hacked at the branch harder than I had meant, severing it. Having propped it against the bottom of the tree I went on, 'So why are you come here?'

  'To find him. Someone told me he lived on the common.'

  With this woman, of all others, I dared not talk of beatings. Be­sides, my ear had fastened on her 'to find him'. Could it be that Zeb had lied to me, and given her the slip - it might be because of the

  child? Enquiring through the lanes and taverns for one dark-skinned man by the name of Cullen, she had been sent after another. I cringed to think of her wandering in the whore-infested warrens near the dock, being pushed up against the wall, pinched and squeeze d by the drunken scum of the town.

  Then I recalled that wives lie as well as brothers. I would try her a little further. 'How did you get to London? With the gypsies?'

  She glanced up in alarm at this guess. I had perhaps given myself away and she would now know I had seen Zen. "That's how it falls out in the old tales,' I added casually. 'And you have no money?'

  'All gone.' She seemed to have no questions to put to me. Zeb had known I was living in Cheapside, and at whose expense. I wondered how much of it he had relayed to Caro.

  'I was in the New Model, and then in London, before I cam here,' I said. No need to tell her that the common thread was Ferris. Unable to whittle it any longer, I hacked through another branch. She shifted the child from the left breast to the right.

  'I am ver
y sorry,' I said. 'You did right to leave me without a groat.'

  'Leave you?'

  'However you want to put it. Forced away.'

  Her face was puzzled.

  'Never mind,' I went on, 'I will help you as far as I can.'

  "That is most kind,' she said. I took my hand from the branch I was about to mark and stared at her. There was no mockery in her expression.

  'One thing I do long to know.' It was mayhap too soon and she might not tell me for spite, but I could not hold back. 'Mother, Isai­ah - what became of them?'

  'How should I know?' Her face was now grown anxious.

  I set down the axe. 'Caro, I'd sooner have the truth. No matter how cruel. Are they dead?'

  'My name is Jane.'

  I looked about. There was none to overhear. 'Surely between us you could be Caro.'

  'Why, Brother?' Her voice was perplexed. 'Don't you like my name?'

  For an instant I doubted myself. I stepped up closer and examined her. She was tanned and bore the marks of poverty and violence but she was Caro.

  I took her by the shoulders, gently so as not to alarm, and crouched before her, our eyes on a level. 'Lord, wife, we are in a pitiful plight! Though the fault be all mine, we must pull together. Do you know anything of them?'

  She shook her head.

  'Did you know I was here before we returned from London?'

  'They talked mainly of Brother Christopher. But why do you call me wife? My name is Jane Allen. Do you feel well, Brother?'

  'You come from Beaurepair, do you not? Your voice! You talk like me.' Why, I thought, am I arguing thus? We are insane—

  Forcing myself on, I spoke into her face: 'Caro. That little child is— is my child. We must decide what to—'

  'O no, Brother. The child is my husband's.'

  I was dumbfounded. Did she mean that she would never again acknowledge me, even in my private ear? That the child was Zeb's and she would go about saying she was his wife?

  Caro continued, 'You are not my husband. Why, Brother,' and she actually laughed, a pretty, innocent laugh, 'when you were presented to me just now by Brother Wisdom and Sister Catherine, you called me Sister Jane to their faces! You never said I was your wife!'

  She had me there. Either she was more cunning than I had ever dreamt, and determined that I should never claim her, or my poor wife had lost her wits along with everything else.

  'What was your husband's name?' My head felt light as if a band were being twisted round it.

  'Thomas Allen,' she returned, her face clear as the infant's.

  'Very well,' I said at last. 'The child is your husband's, I see it now.'

  Caro nodded.

  'Tell me, Sister Jane,' I went on, for now I thought to discern whether or not her madness was feigned, 'does your son have the same eyes as your husband?' My notion was, that if she were feigning she would not pass by this chance to stab me by hinting that the child was Zeb's.

  Caro smiled at me, head on one side. Something stirred in me at the sight of her wide gaze and rounded, trusting lips. I thought of days sitting on the stone bench, teasing one another, and of the fullness of a woman's breasts heavy with milk.

  'Your son has blue eyes,' I prompted.

  She answered me, 'Have brown eyes, Brother. Do you see?'

  Confounded, I rose and turned to go. There was nothing I could do; but in time she might recover her reason. We might even make it up.

  Look where she laughs. She has excellent sport of you!

  I whirled about without warning and caught a squint of amuse­ment before she could veil it. Though she at once dropped her eyes, that glimpse sufficed. Caro was very far from mad. Like the dog and like myself, she had lain and though, but to greater effect. She had hit on this vengeance: I could never know her more, or make the restitu­tion I craved. In our society, I saw, was protection for her, and I felt with horror my own impotence. She could live by my side,, share my food and fire, and yet not be my wife.

  TWENTY-EIGHT

  The Stuff of Jest

  Poor girl,' said Ferris. He frowned from under his old felt hat at Caro strolling in the field, rocking the little one in her arms and talking with Hepsibah ad Susannah as they fetched the pails of milk up to the tent.

  'The rest carry the milk while she does nought,' I said.

  "That's right, Jacob, you stand up for Susannah,’ put in Jeremiah.

  It was not worth the trouble of gainsaying him.

  'Where's Catherine?' asked Jonathan.

  'Gone to look t marble,' I said, while the other two jeered his ignorance for the talk that morning had been of nothing else. Cath­erine and Hathersage had taken the ox-cart to the village to bespeak some marble from a stonecutter there. I guessed Ferris had dug into his private purse so that the sisters-in-law could at last make cheese. Hathersage, that reed of a man, was to help load samples.

  All of the men were engaged in building a dairy, using the sods as before. I marvelled that Ferris could think we would be allowed to stay long enough to use it. Though the weather was cooler than it had been, it was hot work, and the long narrow shape of the thing did nothing to strengthen my faith. Already it seemed to lean inwards.

  I placed myself at all times by Ferris's side or opposite him where he might see me, and observed him at his work. Twice or thrice I caught him eyeing my body, but could not make him meet my gaze, for he constantly moved away or changed places with another man. I followed him as constantly. It was easily done as if by accident, circling

  about the hut, filling gaps here and there. Sometimes I would pause to watch him cut wood or stack turf. I always knew when he had remarked me at this game, for he at once lost his natural grace. Thus did I hunt him.

  The men fell to talking of the new arrival, downright gossip as to whether she would work with the dairymaids or in the fields with Hepsibah, and of whether Catherine would continue to work with her sister-in-law or would fall in more with Brother Wisdom.

  'You are as bad as midwives,' said I.

  Unabashed, Jonathan went on, 'My Hepsibah says Sister Cather­ine dislikes Sister Jane.'

  'Oh, aye?' Ferris turned sharply towards him. 'And why might that be?'

  Jonathan shrugged. 'She sees it whenever they are in company. As to reasons,' he pressed together two pieces of turf, 'best ask Cather­ine.'

  As soon ask the cow there,' declared Jeremiah. 'There's no why with women.'

  The talk no longer struck me as empty. I at once determined to hear Catherine and Caro speak together. Aloud I said, 'How will we prevent soil dripping from the roof into the milk?'

  Ferris ignored me.

  'Brother Christopher has had some thoughts on that,' Jonathan answered. 'There will be a roof of planks, packed very close together, with sod on top.'

  Jeremiah was of the opinion that the thing would not stand firm enough.

  'One day it will be stone,' said Jonathan. We were silent a moment and I wondered why everyone behaved as if Sir George did not exist.

  'Jane Allen,' said Ferris. He bent to take an armful of turf and straightening, laid it across the frame as if dealing cards. 'We must be gentle with her. It seems her husband was as cruel as the beasts she met with on the road.'

  I held my breath and looked into his face. There was no special meaning there, no freshly disguised glance at me, and I concluded that Caro's husband was still named Thomas.

  'He beat her excessively?' asked Jeremiah.

  Ferris frowned. I knew it was for that word 'excessively' but he went on without taking up Jeremiah. 'Something like. He persuaded himself she was unfaithful.'

  'Could he not keep her indoors?' I asked. Jeremiah laughed.

  'It was his own brother he suspected her with,’ said Ferris. 'They all three lived together.'

  Jonathan shook his head.

  Dissembling vixen, I thought. Well go on, torture me. Soon would come the Unsealing threatened by the Voice, and I would leave. Let them all be spitted by Sir George, and Caro fir
st on the point of the sword.

  'Am I the only man working here?' asked Ferris. We bent again to the walls of the dairy, straining our muscles to the useless task.

  'Her tale is one a guilty woman might tell,' I suggested.

  'She seems to me not wanton,' said Jonathan. 'More innocent-like.'

  Ferris said, 'She puts me in mind of my own wife.'

  'Her hair has something of that colour,' I agreed, 'but Joanna was more beautiful.'

  He looked as if that were a matter for debate, but would not an­swer me. Instead he said to Jonathan, 'When I see her with the child, I think, had Joanna lived—'

  'Your boy would have been fair, like you,' I told him.

  He raised his eyebrows at me and I flamed hot with the sense of my stupidity. Now he would think I had forgotten, whereas I had often thought with admiration of the shame he had borne for his Joanna.

  'And we— we should all of us remember,' he went on. 'When Elizabeth left, she said that husbands and brothers are for protectors to women.'

  'Husbands? None of us can be her husband if her first still lives,' I said.

  'Her brothers, then,' said Ferris.

  'Or something else,' said Jeremiah. 'It has been known, even un­der the husband's nose. Shall I race you to her, Jacob?' He winked at me.

  'You are welcome,' I told him.

  I saw Ferris scowl, and it came to me why Catherine did not like Caro.

  The samples of marble lay on the grass and Caro patted the palms of her hands on one of them for coolness, as Hathersage had once pressed his palms to a table. On that occasion, I recalled, Ferris had covered the hands with his own. Now he stood back, listening to Su­sannah and Catherine's opinions of the stone. The rest of us, having each said which we found the handsomest, bent down from time to time to stroke the blocks and perhaps remember the touch of city life. There were two whites, a rust-hued marble like polished sandstone and an adamantine black.

  'Each is good,’ said Susannah. "This is what we used in London and we always found it answered, eh Catherine?'

  'The other white takes a higher polish and is more easily cleaned,' Catherine replied. 'Sister Jane, would you—?'

  Caro lifted her hands from the 'other white'.