With each passing day, I began to understand the rhythm of life at Berrow Hall a little more. I worked hard and I didn’t ask questions: I didn’t need to when some of the answers were so obvious.
Everyone was a little afraid of Mr Spicer. Our sneaking down to the beach each day, our clothes, our whispers, continued apace, though we all knew we’d be in monstrous trouble if we were ever found out. So I was glad of the news, a few weeks after my arrival, that Mr Spicer would be absent from home for a day or two. The grisly Dr Blood was accompanying him.
‘Is it sugar business that takes him away?’ I asked Mistress Bagwell. We were sitting in the servants’ hall, slurping pottage, as we did to break our fast every morning.
‘Oh no,’ she said, in that dramatic way of hers that warned me I was in for a story. ‘They’ve gone to Ilchester to observe a witch trial. To see how it’s done, like.’
I stopped eating.
‘Someone here in Somerset is being tried as a witch?’
‘Yes, poor woman.’ Mistress Bagwell sighed. ‘All she did was make better cheese than her rivals, and now they’re trying her as an example to others.’
I felt suddenly ill. Mother had always sworn that Old Margaret would come home again – I mean, why wouldn’t she, when she’d done nothing wrong? The good women of Fair Maidens Lane were midwives, pig breeders, milkmaids, fisherwomen. There wasn’t a single witch amongst them. Never had been. Never would be. All I could hope was that somehow Master Sharpe – my gangly brother – was enough to keep everyone else above suspicion.
*
Had it not been for Susannah and Bea, I would have spent the day fretting over Old Margaret, and imagining worse fates for Abigail and Mother. As it was, Bea wouldn’t stop crying. Mistress Bagwell brought lavender water and cold cloths, and when that didn’t work, tried sugar mixed with milk. But Bea only twisted her head away and cried more.
All day Susannah walked the baby up and down the stairs, round the house, through the gardens. I hoped the sounds of the sea on the beach below might soothe her, like they’d done to me as a child. But out in the salty air she screamed even harder.
When Susannah grew tired, Master Ellis took over. He sang to Bea, rocked her, kissed her. By nightfall, everyone was exasperated.
‘I promised Mama I’d look after her,’ Susannah wailed. ‘I gave her my word.’
Master Ellis – fretful, teary – took himself off, claiming he had a balancing act to practise. It was then Susannah broke down too.
‘There must be something else we could try,’ she sobbed.
As I’ve said, I was rather afeared of babies. Growing up with midwives as neighbours, I was all too aware of the dangers of childbed and how frail new life could be. Many of the graves in our churchyard were the little ones that didn’t take the sexton long to dig. At the thought of such a fate happening to Bea, I felt desperate.
‘I know what your father thinks of herbs, but we really should try some chamomile,’ I said to Susannah.
She was still wary of me, still kept that mistress–servant distance, even though her brother and I were as easy together as old friends. And I could see her weighing it up, thinking over my suggestion, when we’d wasted enough time not treating Bea properly.
‘I’m sorry about what happened to your mother, truly,’ I pressed her. ‘But herbs aren’t witchcraft, they’re medicine. We’ve got to at least try – nothing else has worked.’
She wiped her eyes. Nodded as if to gather herself.
‘Mistress Bagwell keeps a bunch of dried flowers in the cellar. Hidden,’ she added, seeing my look, ‘behind the apple basket.’
*
The chamomile was easy to find. What was harder was rubbing a tincture of it into Bea’s gums. I had more luck than Susannah, which surprised us both, and it wasn’t too long before the baby began to look calmer. She even managed a dribbly smile.
‘I think she likes you, Fortune,’ Susannah observed.
‘Ah, I’m no dab hand with babies, miss,’ I replied, getting to my feet in case she’d any plans to give me the child.
‘Well, they say babies can tell if a person’s decent, and I think Bea’s decided on you.’
The funny little creature was staring at me, all right, her eyes as dark as nutmegs.
‘Thank you, Fortune,’ Susannah said quietly. ‘For helping with Bea, and for Ellis. He’s happier than I’ve seen him since, well, since Mother died.’
I flapped my hand, in truth a bit embarrassed. ‘Oh! Enough, now!’
I went off to the kitchens for bread, cold meat and a jug of small beer because Susannah was looking exhausted. By the time I returned, Bea was fast asleep. Susannah, feet up on a stool, was sewing.
I put down the tray of food, glad as anything. ‘Would you look at her now, peaceful at last!’
But Susannah seemed oddly captivated by the square of crewel work that lay in her lap. It struck me as a funny name for something so swirly and pretty.
‘Come,’ I said gently, ‘why not put your sewing aside and have a proper rest? I can turn your bed down and make up the fire—’
‘Fortune?’ Susannah said, as if she’d not heard me. ‘Look at this. What do you see?’
She was holding up the piece of crewel work. I wasn’t sure I was the best person to ask, knowing as little as I did about needlework. All I could see was a pale blue curve that looked like a plant stem, and some shapes in red that might’ve been flowers.
‘It’s … umm … very pretty,’ I said. ‘Is it a cover for a pillow?’ which clearly wasn’t the right thing to say.
‘It’s not nice,’ Susannah insisted. ‘It’s peculiar. Can’t you see the crying baby?’
I looked again. As she traced the blue curves with her finger, I began to see something that might’ve been a person’s head, or a tree or … I rubbed my eyes. No, I couldn’t see a baby.
‘Sorry. It just looks like a pattern to me,’ I admitted. ‘I mean it’s very beautiful and you’re proper good at it, but—’
Susannah slumped back in her seat with a groan.
‘What is it?’ I was worried now. ‘What’ve I said?’
She shook her head. ‘It’s not you. It’s me, overthinking things again. It’s probably a silly coincidence. It’s just that sometimes, when I sew …’ She hesitated, ‘… the needle has a life of its own. It won’t follow the pattern I want to work with.’
‘Sounds like my needle every time I try to sew,’ I remarked.
‘I’m being serious,’ she said sharply.
‘Sorry.’ But I couldn’t quite grasp what she was trying to tell me. ‘So you mean your needle sews by itself?’
‘Yes, it does.’ Susannah nodded. ‘And then afterwards the picture it’s sewn seems to actually come true. It’s happened twice now – once at the hiring fair when Father fell on the ice, and now Bea with her teeth.’
It came back to me that day in the carriage, when she’d left her needlework lying on the seat, and snatched it away to hide it up her sleeve. But really, anyone might’ve slipped over on the frozen river – and I’m sure plenty did. As for babies, well, they cried a lot, didn’t they? Neither incident was that unusual, all told.
She must’ve read my face: putting the crewel work aside, she reached for the bread I’d brought her and started eating.
‘You’re right,’ she said, between mouthfuls. ‘Forget what I’ve told you. It’s childish nonsense.’
‘Very good, miss,’ I agreed.
*
Except I didn’t forget, much as I tried to. And the next day, when Mr Spicer returned to Berrow Hall, he brought a darkness with him, which made me feel the weight of Susannah’s secret all the more. The mood in the house had changed. A taint seemed to cling to Mr Spicer – I was certain it came from the witch trial, and in the days that followed, his poor children bore the brunt of it. Ellis was made to watch cock fights and shoot pistols, Susannah to practise needlework until her fingertips bled, and poor Bea was passed between the house staff like an extremely chatty parcel. It wasn’t right at all, and I was in a turmoil for wanting to say so. But as I’d not yet been paid my first quarter’s wages, it was wiser to keep quiet, though I wasn’t certain how much longer I could manage to.