Serpents in the Garden (The Graham Saga)

by Anna Belfrage

  “Unbelievable,” she muttered to the pillow. “Absolutely unbelievable what people do to each other in the name of their God.” The pillow seemed to agree, voicing no opinions to the contrary. Alex yawned and closed her eyes.

  Chapter 12

  Jacob woke to a clawing headache and the sensation that his tongue had outgrown his mouth, hanging like a strip of dried leather between his cracked lips. He was shivering, he had no idea where he was, but after ascertaining that he could still move both arms and legs, he sat up and took stock of his surroundings. He didn’t know how long he’d been lying where he was, but seemed to recall waking a couple of times before, and it had been dark and cold. But now it was well past noon, a weak October sun shining down through thin veils of cloud. He got to his feet, and a careful inspection of his head assured him it wasn’t broken, however much it hurt.

  The jetty was a platform on stilts. He blinked down at where the water should have been. The tide was out…the tide was out! In panic, he tried to get his bearings before dropping off the jetty to squelch up the stinking sluggish stream – more of a ditch – that disgorged into the river proper. He sniffed at his clothes and grimaced. Mama would have stripped him had he come home like this, and then she would’ve burnt his clothes and probably scrubbed him with lye all over. He was overwhelmed with sudden longing for her, for the way she would have hugged him, laughing and crying at the same time.

  Jacob turned right onto Thames Street and hurried as best as he could in the general direction of the Tower. The Regina Anne lay at anchor just beyond the fortress, and as Jacob ran, he prayed that she still be there, because what was he otherwise to do? Captain Miles wouldn’t leave him, he comforted himself; not here, not without knowing what had happened to him. He sidestepped stinking piles of ordure, ignored the mouth-watering smell from a bakery, and ran.

  The tide was out, the tide was out, drummed his brain, and when he finally reached the wharves, the tide was beginning to flow back in, but the Regina Anne was gone. He had no idea what to do. His legs folded under him, and he sat down with a heavy thud, staring at the spot where the ship should have been. For an instant, he thought he might cry, but instead he sank his nails hard into his palms and counted slowly to a hundred.

  “Left behind?” A soft cackle accompanied this statement, and a very old man creaked into view.

  Jacob nodded morosely. “I was knocked on my head last night, and by the time I got my wits back, it would seem the ship had left without me.” His head hurt something frightful, not at all helped by his recent run.

  “You’re no sailor,” the old man scoffed.

  “I might still be,” Jacob bit back, insulted by the derision in the old man’s voice.

  “No, not you.” The old man sniffed at Jacob, and his whole face squished itself together. “You stink.”

  “You don’t exactly smell like a posy yourself.” The old man smelled of fish and tar, and a lot of other things.

  “But not of shit.” The old man grinned. “Have you been swimming in the river?”

  “Not out of choice, aye?”

  “No one does,” the old man nodded, “not in the Thames at any rate. Full of offal and bodies and whatnot.” He pointed his cane at what looked like a bloated cow – was a bloated cow. “Have you been to the Customs House?”

  Jacob gave him an irritated look. Did he look like a merchant with wares to declare and tolls to pay?

  “To see if there’s a message for you,” the old man said. “Any real sailor would know to go there first. Over there.”

  With a curt nod, Jacob moved off. Sweetest Lord, but he did stink! The stench wafted off him in little puffs, making people detour round him.

  There was a message. A terse note explaining that Captain Miles couldn’t wait – he was entrusted with a most urgent delivery, a matter of life and death – but that he hoped Jacob was alive and capable of coping on his own. With the note was a sizeable purse, enough to tide him over for some months at least.

  “They spent all night looking for you,” the harbour master said. “The captain was beside himself, near on weeping.” He tut-tutted at Jacob for being such an inconsiderate lout, but when Jacob asked for some paper, he produced the three required sheets and even allowed Jacob the use of his little carrel. One letter to Captain Miles, sent by overland mail to Edinburgh, one rather long letter to Mama, and a third fervent letter to Betty, in which he included the little ring.

  “These might just make it,” the harbour master told him. “The Clarissa is set to sail for Virginia tomorrow. Last ship out this year.”

  “Tomorrow?” Jacob went over to study the ship in question. Home… But no, he wasn’t done with seeing the world yet, and he had money in his purse and a whole city to explore. He paid for the postage, wrung a promise from the master to get them aboard the Clarissa, and left before his nerve failed him. Jacob rushed into the warren of streets, leaving the heaving river behind.

  He found a water conduit and sluiced himself from top to toe, teeth chattering when the cold water seeped through his clothes, but at least the pervading stink of shit was gone. An older woman looked at him and clucked in sympathy, and, to his surprise, extended a piece of linen to him, suggesting he dry off as well as he could.

  Feeling much better, if very hungry, Jacob spent some time moving from patch to patch of sunshine, slowly regaining some warmth. He burnt his fingers on the hot pasties he bought off a street vendor, and now both clean and fed, he set out to properly explore, making for the huge bridge he had so far only seen from the water.

  It was a longer walk than he’d expected, through alleys and narrow streets that teemed with people, with offal, with hand-drawn carts, with dogs, cats, the odd pig and rats. Well-dressed men hurried by, often accompanied by a burly servant or two; chairmen hollered for people to get out of the way as they lugged sedan chairs through the streets.

  Jacob’s senses were assaulted by noise, by smells – most of them unsavoury. His head swivelled to follow a pretty lass on her way, his eyes sliding elsewhere when confronted by yet another set of urchins, so dirty he could see the vermin crawling through their hair and rags. He’d never seen people this thin before, aghast at having to step over beggars that sat slumped on the streets, emaciated hands held out to him. Bairns as young as Adam ran wild through the crowds, fought for scraps of bread, for the odd bit of kindling. Men cursed, bairns wailed, women laughed, and everything stank – of shit, of rotting foodstuffs, of accumulated grime. It was with some relief he arrived at his destination, halting for a moment to gape at the structure that spanned the river.

  This was more than a bridge: it was a floating town, with houses banding the narrow thoroughfare that connected London proper with the southern shore of the Thames. Pedestrians jostled with ox-drawn carts and riders on horses; people went in and out of the myriad of shops that lined both sides of the bridge; and women hung out of windows to yell and converse with each other. At one point, all traffic ground to a halt as the drawbridge roughly at the bridge’s centre was raised to let through a ship. Jacob studied this display of advanced engineering, but was more interested in the nearby food stalls.

  He spent more than an hour walking London Bridge back and forth, sticking his head into small shops, gawking at peddlers and jugglers. Never had he imagined that so many people could live on such a constricted space, and on both sides of the wee open place where he was presently standing rose huge buildings, with the bridge proper tunnelling itself through them. Seven, no, eight storeys… He shook his head in amazement. Who could ever have imagined something like this, and why had Mama never mentioned it? The Tower she’d talked about; he even recalled her mentioning the huge kirk they had seen grow out of the ground of Ludgate Hill yesterday – that would have been the old one, the one that according to Captain Miles burnt so ferociously the stones in its walls flew like projectiles – but never had she mentioned this marvel, this city within the city itself.

  Jacob’s stomach rumbled,
and after yet another hot savoury, he meandered his way up through the city, stopping to buy himself stockings and a new shirt. He studied his battered shoes: the swim in the river had not done them any good, but for now they would have to do, as would his coat. Instead, he began looking about for an inn, and when he finally found one, close to Blackfriars, he didn’t even haggle about the rate. He just paid up the sixpence and stumbled up the stairs to sleep.

  *

  By next morning, a vague plan had formed in Jacob’s head. If he was marooned in London over the winter, he might as well do something useful with his time. So, first on his list was to find a physician and attempt to find employment. Second on his list was something he was far more ambivalent about, not at all sure Da would approve. Jacob smothered a laugh. Da would flay him to the bone anyway when he got back, so how could one more transgression matter one way or the other? He sipped thoughtfully at his mulled beer, turning his idea over in his head.

  Around noon, Jacob sank down into a dispirited heap and kicked at the ground. Three times he’d been laughed out of the room; twice he had been told that being a physician required years of schooling, something he didn’t have, did he? They laughed at his accent, snickered when he attempted to tell them he had studied on his own, and all five of them had gone decidedly greenish when he mentioned Culpeper.

  “Nicholas Culpeper was no physician,” the latest of his potential employers had sneered. “He was a dabbler in plants, a mere apothecary.”

  What most rankled was the way they regarded him as being somehow backwards on account of coming from the colonies – that and the impertinent questions about his faith given his accent. Scotsmen – in particular Presbyterian Scotsmen – were not held in high regard.

  “You can’t sit here!” A broom came down inches from his leg, and he scrambled to his feet. The woman in front of him glared at him. “I won’t have loiterers outside my shop,” she went on, thrusting the broom at him. “And, in particular, not large louts such as you. You scare away my custom.”

  Jacob looked up and down the deserted little alley. “Aye, I can see that.”

  The woman sighed, the aggression running off her as quickly as it had surfaced. “It’s not easy,” she said, thrusting her chin forward.

  “What isn’t easy?” Jacob kept a cautious distance.

  “Being alone.” The woman gripped her broom and shook it at him. “Now, be gone, you!”

  “I’m alone too,” Jacob tried. “I know no one here.”

  “Then why are you here?”

  “I was attacked and left behind by my ship.” To his embarrassment, his voice wobbled, making the woman’s face soften.

  “How old are you?”

  “Sixteen,” he replied, straightening to his full height. “In December.”

  An hour later, Jacob had made his first friend in London, listening with interest as Mistress Wythe told him her story. The youngest daughter of five to a well-off London merchant, she had been wed at sixteen to a haberdasher, and when he had died three years ago, she had found herself the inheritor of a small but profitable business.

  “I should have listened to my father. He had chosen a new husband for me, but I was reluctant to wed yet another man more than twenty years my senior.” Instead, she’d embarked on a hectic social life, setting in motion a hunt for her wealthy person that ended the day one of the suitors bribed his way into her bedroom and took her to bed, despite her protests. “So I was wed again, and my husband sold it all and set me up with this as my jointure, and now he lives a life of gambling and whoring on the south bank, and I, well, I sit alone.”

  “And sew.” Jacob looked at the embroidered chemises and shirts that hung in the little shop.

  “And sew. It feeds me at least – and him, when he chooses to come home.”

  Hesitantly, Jacob shared his plans with her.

  “A physician?” Mistress Wythe laughed. “What would a lad like you know about such?”

  “Nothing – but I’d like to learn.”

  “Would you now?” She shook her head. “They’re right, the masters you’ve spoken to. A physician is an educated man. No, you should talk to an apothecary instead.” She drummed her fingers against the tabletop. “My cousin Alice is married to one of the officers in the Society of Apothecaries. I’ll talk to her tomorrow.”

  “You will? For me?” He beamed at her.

  Mistress Wythe flushed. “I can’t offer you to stay. It would not be seemly.”

  Jacob just nodded, gratified that she should so clearly consider him a man.

  *

  The next afternoon, Jacob found himself inspected by a man who reached him to the shoulder. His hands were turned back and forth, accompanied by small grunts of satisfaction at his obvious strength and size. He was barraged with questions. Feverfew? Foxglove? Garlic? St John’s wort? Milk thistle? He was given dried samples to identify, was told to describe the principal healing qualities of a number of plants. Quite often, Jacob had to admit he didn’t know, but on several of the plants his replies were evidently satisfying, because the little man – Mr Castain – nodded in approval.

  “Will you mind living out in the country?” Mr Castain asked.

  “How out in the country?” Jacob hadn’t travelled across the world to end up living in something like Graham’s Garden.

  “Chelsea,” Mr Castain said. “A village an hour or so by foot from here.”

  “If you walk very fast,” Mistress Wythe muttered. “And how would you know? You always go by barge, don’t you?”

  “I can’t very well be walking.” Mr Castain sniffed. “It’s far quicker to go by boat.”

  “Boat?” Jacob asked.

  “You’ll have to walk,” Mistress Wythe said, “unless you’re rich enough to pay for the fare, that is.”

  “It’s not devoid of entertainments,” Mr Castain put in. “There are a couple of inns, and a lot of coming and going from all the stately homes and mansions.”

  “And what would I do?” Jacob asked.

  “Do? You’ll work with me and my assistants in the best herbal garden in the world, the Apothecaries’ Garden.”

  “John,” Mistress Wythe sighed, “at best it’s a garden in the making.”

  “No, it isn’t. We’ve been at it for six years by now.”

  “But still…” Mistress Wythe said. “It’s mostly a lot of turned earth.”

  Mr Castain gave her a chilly look, puffed out his chest, and told her he’d prefer it if she kept her disparaging comments to herself. Mistress Wythe muttered an excuse, and Mr Castain turned to Jacob. “I’ll teach you two hours a day, give you food and board and a shilling a week.”

  Jacob did some quick calculations. “Two shillings, and I have need of a new pair of shoes and breeches.”

  “Done,” Mr Castain said with such alacrity that Jacob understood he had sold himself too cheap. But he liked this little man, and from the way he handled the plants, this was a man who knew what he was talking about. Even more, he liked the way this John Castain smelled, of mint and lemon balm and all those other herbs that reminded him far too much of Mama. Besides, Jacob Graham needed a profession, and this could be a starting point. So, half an hour later, he bade his newfound friend farewell and hastened after his new employer, making for the river and the barge that would convey them to the as yet unknown village of Chelsea.

  Chapter 13

  “Some more?” Alex set a full plate in front of Peter Leslie.

  Matthew looked up from his own food, and winked at Alex. If ever a man was to be seduced by good food it was Peter Leslie, who at present lived in a household dominated by tasteless stews. Constance had few – if any – cooking skills, and Ailish was at best a disinterested cook, who ensured all were fed and that was that.

  Peter closed his eyes, drew in the smell of pork boiled in ale and topped with a golden piecrust, and exhaled happily. Matthew eyed his wife with amusement. Alex had no intention of ever apologising for what she’d said, but ha
d no compunction whatsoever about winning their neighbour’s heart – nay, stomach – back by serving Peter one succulent dinner after the other now that he was here on a daily basis to help with the stable.

  “Not much left to do,” Peter stated once they were back outside, sounding rather regretful. “Your man is quite handy,” he added, indicating Patrick who was balancing barefoot on the roof.

  “Aye.” Matthew frowned. They would be short-handed over the spring planting without Angus. And Patrick’s contract expired after the harvest next year, and while he had no wish to replace him with a new bond servant, he knew that he would, because other labour was hard to find unless one went for slaves. Slaves: the thought brought him up short. He hadn’t told Alex about the black man down in Providence.

  *

  “Where?” Alex’s voice came out as a croak.

  “I don’t know, but William said how it was down on the eastern side.”

  “Yet another part of the world I won’t be seeing.”

  “Nay, that you won’t.” Matthew lifted a leg, let it fall back with a splash into the hot water, and sank even lower in the tub. “He said ‘okay’, and then there was something about how he moved. You could see this was no slave.”

  “And now he is.” Alex sighed, reclining against her end.

  “Aye, that he is.” Branded on the spot, and his loud, despairing yells had made the men around him laugh.

  “There’s nothing we can do, is there?” Alex asked in a small voice.

  Matthew shook his head: nothing at all. He took hold of her hand and pulled her towards him through the bathwater. Firmly, he banished any thoughts of the unknown man from his head and concentrated on his wife, how warm and slippery she lay against his chest, how her hair tickled his nose.