The Gilded Lily (2 page)

Sadie glanced up at the sky. The moon was up and floated like a ghost in and out of the clouds. Under a tree on the other side of the track Ella sat on the pigskin trunk, with
the other baskets and boxes piled up beside her. They had sold the mule and cart on the second day and hitched a lift this far with a boxwagon. The weather had worsened and now they had taken
shelter by the side of the track. The rain dripped insistently off the branches but Ella huddled under the shelter anyway, her cloak dark on the shoulders with the wet. On the other side of the
track the Thames slid by, black as molasses.

‘By, I could sleep stood up, I’m that tired,’ Ella said, ‘but the light’s not far off and we’d best keep our eyes skinned. Soon as we can hie a lift, we
will.’

Sadie’s eyes followed the snaking line of the river into the distance to where the moonlight caught the edge of a carbuncled silhouette – the city of London. Her stomach was hollow
with hunger, and with apprehension. She turned away from the city and leaned against the comforting solidity of the tree, looking back up the track whence they had come. She drew her old shawl
tight, pulling at the frayed fringe with her fingers.

‘Don’t fash yourself,’ Ella said. ‘No footpad or bezzler in their right mind would be out at this time of night in this weather.’

‘I’m not scared,’ she said. Then after a moment, ‘It’s just that I can imagine the folk that must have travelled this road. All on their way to London. I feel like
I can hear footsteps, horses even, passing right through where we’re standing. Kings and ordinary folk. It makes me giddy. And there’ll be others after us too, maybe hundreds.
Don’t it make you feel small?’

Ella sniffed. ‘I tell you, ’tis good London’s so big – more chance to lose ourselves in it. And we’ve got a grand start with what’s in here.’ She
thumped the side of the pigskin trunk. ‘It’s just us now. No wife to tell us what to do or what to buy. No father ready to batter us if we don’t hand over our earnings. No master
wanting us to fill his bed before he fills our bellies. We’ll be able to afford a house with glass at the windows and proper furnishings. Drapes and all.’

‘And will there be a plot for biddy chickens to scratch in, and a place to grow beans?’

‘Bet your life there will. And we’ll get new shoes made of soft leather, and starched white chemises, and we’ll sleep on clean linen too.’

Sadie came to join Ella and edged up next to her. ‘Do you think they’ll send someone after us?’

‘They might. But they’ll not find us in London, needles in a haystack we’ll be. We’ll lie low a while. They’ll soon give up.’

‘What about Da?’

‘Forget him.’ Ella’s arm came round her waist. They sat a moment in silence before Ella said, ‘Sarah in the village says her cousin works on Bread Street. And that
there’s a Milk Street and a Honey Street and even a Pudding Street. We’ll get our puddings on Pudding Street, hey, Sadie?’

Sadie contemplated this a moment, the pictures forming into a biblical promised land of milk and honey.

‘Tell us more about how it will be, Ell,’ Sadie said, elbowing closer.

Ella slapped her arm a stinging blow, suddenly impatient. ‘How should I know? We haven’t got there yet.’ She stood up and went to look up the track. ‘It’s all the
waiting. We seem to have been on the road for ever. I just want to get there now. What time is it?’

‘I heard a church strike the four a while back.’

‘A trap should be along soon then. I’m fit to drop. If I nap, will you keep an eye out and wake me if something comes?’

‘Course. You rest up, it’s foolish the both of us watching out.’

‘Just a little while, then it’ll be your turn.’

Ella swirled her woollen cloak around her, and sat back down. She swaddled it tight across her chest, leaned back against the tree and closed her eyes. Sadie watched her upturned face grow
passive and still. Asleep, Ella looked a different person – her arched eyebrows relaxed, her mouth settled into an expression of innocence. All boldness and bluster gone, she looked like a
child. Sadie snuggled closer, put her hand out to touch the bumpy shape of her elbow under the rough texture of the cloak. Her sister did not move but her breath came heavy and even. The rain had
turned to sleet, which fell onto her forehead through the tree canopy, and Sadie brushed its icy granules away with the tips of her fingers. Even then, Ella did not stir.

Sadie’s chest constricted with tenderness, she thought she had never seen a more beautiful sight. Just the two of us, Ella had said, starting a new life together. She had the urge to hold
on to the moment, to press it in a book the way ladies pressed wild-flowers, to preserve their beauty before they faded.

She stood to stretch her legs and looked towards the city for a long time. To watch quietly had always been her way. She had never drawn attention to herself and consequently had always been on
the fringes of things. In the village the other children had called her ‘patch-eye’ and ‘dog-face’, told her she was ugly, squealed and run away from her, shouting out that
she’d the Devil’s pawprint and would hex them all. When she was little, she had not known what they meant, but when she was about four summers old she looked in the glass window of the
bakehouse, and she saw that there was a blood-red mark staining the side of her face. It went from her cheek, round her eye and up onto her forehead, as if someone had thrown a pail of paint. She
had spat on her palm and rubbed and rubbed, but it did not shift, and she had felt suddenly sad, and old beyond her years, for she knew that like a skewbald’s blaze it was something that
could never be cured, was with her for life.

She looked back to the tree where Ella was snoring gently. A swing of light in the distance alerted her and she hurried over to the bank, where a makeshift jetty stuck out into the water. A few
moments later she heard the slap of oars. A small craft came round the bend in the river, its sail furled to the mast, a single lantern illuminating the two occupants who were rowing steadily,
their shoulders swaying back and forth.

‘Ell, a boat. Wake up.’ Ella shifted slightly but did not open her eyes. Sadie shook her by the shoulder. ‘Someone’s coming, Ell.’

Ella stumbled to her feet. ‘Where?’

‘On the river – look.’

‘Leave it. I’d rather go by wagon.’

‘But it could be hours yet. Let’s try.’ Sadie knew Ella hated the water. She could not swim and could never be persuaded to paddle in the tarn with the other girls of the
village. ‘I know you’re scared of the water, but—’

‘Am not. Who said that? It’s just—’

‘Go on, Ell. You shout – they’ll listen to you.’

Ella stood a little back from the edge. Her bravado had returned as soon as Sadie challenged her. ‘Oy!’ she yelled, ‘you going downriver?’

One of the men started and let go of his oar. ‘What the—?’

‘We need a ride,’ she called. ‘You got any room?’

‘Damned fool woman, made me lose my oar,’ said the man, ignoring her and floundering over the edge of the boat to retrieve it. ‘Charlie, paddle over a bit, I can’t reach
it.’

The oar floated towards them and Ella began dragging the trunk towards the jetty. She signalled silently to Sadie, who scrambled past, her head down, to drag all the other bags and baskets to
the edge.

‘We can pay you,’ Ella said, throwing her winning smile at Charlie, who stared from under his slouch cap first at her, and then more dubiously at Sadie and the jumble of bags on the
jetty.

Ella leaned forwards and unwrapped her shawl to show her white throat, smiling at him as she withdrew a small bag from her stays. Sadie just waited and watched. She saw Charlie smile back
– no man seemed able to resist Ella’s dimples once she had a mind to use them.

‘Where are you going?’ Charlie said. She knew then that their lift was secure.

‘Come on, let’s not waste our time,’ scowled the other man, slotting the oar back into the rowlock. ‘Pull on those oars.’

‘Wait a while, the ladies have said they’ll pay.’ He smiled up at Ella, who beamed back. Sadie hung behind her like her shadow.

Ten minutes later their luggage was on board and Ella had been helped into the prow. Sadie saw her hands clinging to the wooden seat although her face was haughty and serene. She would never
admit she was afraid of anything. Sadie, meanwhile, was squashed up with the trunk digging into her thigh and a pile of baskets and boxes wobbling on her knee. She pressed one hand on top of her
load but peered sideways at the passing trees, looking for the houses and taverns that would signal their arrival.

‘Where you going?’ she heard Charlie say.

‘London,’ Ella said.

‘Very droll,’ Charlie’s friend said. ‘He means where shall we let you off?’

‘Where are you going?’ Ella asked.

‘St Olave’s Wharf.’

‘Well, that’s mighty strange, that’s where we’re bound too,’ Ella said.

Sadie hid her smile behind a wicker basket. The dawn was coming up and the sky had lightened. Now there was a pale yellow smudge on the horizon so that she could make out distant spires and
rooftops, and there were more taverns by the side of the river and jetties with punts tied alongside. The river was sluggish, but soon it became more of a highway with small craft appearing from
nowhere, some under brown sail and some under manpower. Near the edge horses trudged the bank, pulling long barges of goods wrapped in oiled canvas, and punts skimmed by, stacked with barrels of
ale. In the pall of mist on the surface of the river it looked as if the men were gliding upright, standing on the water.

The sides of the river became more crowded until she saw at last the city walls and a jumble of blackened half-timbered houses. She realized she was holding her breath trying to take in all the
new sights and sounds, and had to let it out in a long sigh. But then she would catch her breath again as some new wonder came into view. By now the river was thick with craft of every shape and
size and the air was a Babel of men and women, all shouting to each other in an accent Sadie could barely fathom. She wrinkled her nose; there was a smell, like something rotting.

‘Oh my word,’ said Ella, pointing ahead to a huge mountain of a bridge so log-jammed with boats trying to get through that the river itself was all but invisible underneath them.
Some boatmen had clearly given up and made their way to the jetties, but on the other side of the bridge the banks were thick with boats waiting to carry them on.

‘We’ll never pass through there,’ she said, but Charlie and his mate rowed steadfastly, making for one of the larger barges loaded with crates of squawking chickens, just
ahead. It was pulled by a grey Percheron horse with hooves the size of trenchers. The barge thrust everything else out of its way as the horse trundled up to the bridge. There it was unharnessed
and the barge continued to move by its own momentum under the bridge. Once on the other side the horse was hastily put back in traces. Their boat simply followed close behind in the barge’s
wake. Sadie saw Charlie wink at Ella. Ella was white-faced. A small tic moved in her cheek but she forced a tight-lipped smile. Sadie peered over the side at the water but withdrew as she saw a
scum of jetsam and a bloated dead rat, partly submerged in the water.

A few minutes later they drew up at a wharf, the boat lurched and Charlie threw the rope out to the ground. Several ragged children with grey faces and enormous eyes fought with each other to
take the rope and tie it round the post, screaming insults, kicking and punching each other in their hurry. Their arms were thin as kindling, they looked half starved. One of the lads armed with a
broken spar of wood swung it out until the others cowered back, making himself room until, triumphant, he grabbed the rope and in a deft movement wound it round a mooring. Charlie alighted and
threw him a coin. He snatched it from the air and scurried away. The rest of the filthy gaggle of children left them be and ran further up the bank to where another boat was just landing.

Ella sat stock-still, clinging to the wooden seat. ‘Here, let me help you,’ Charlie said, offering his arm.

Sadie jumped out and began to heave their luggage onto the wharf.

‘Careful, it’s heavy,’ said Ella.

After a few moments, Charlie’s companion reluctantly lent a hand. Sadie vaguely heard Ella ask about finding lodgings but paid no attention to the conversation, she was too busy looking
round, amazed at all the comings and goings, clutching her shawl to her stomach.

As she was staring, a huge woman, long-stemmed pipe still asmoke in her mouth, loaded up a basket with carrots from a barge stacked with crates of vegetables. She swung the basket onto her back
as if it weighed nothing and swayed off along the quay. Sadie stared at her departing rump.

‘Hey,’ Ella shouted. A wiry child with sticking-out ears had picked up one of their baskets and was dodging his way through the crowd.

Ella lunged towards him and grabbed him by the shoulder. ‘Oh no you don’t, you little mongrel,’ she said, seizing the basket back.

Charlie took hold of him by the waist and delivered a punch to the side of his head so the boy reeled and stumbled. ‘Sorry, mister,’ he said, but Charlie kicked out at him another
vicious blow to the shins. ‘That’ll learn you,’ he said, hitting him again with a sideways look at Ella. The boy crouched, shielding his head with his skinny arms.

‘Oh please stop,’ Sadie said. Charlie and Ella turned to look at her and the boy made a grateful escape. Charlie continued to stare at her face, likely he had not noticed it in the
dark.

‘Why wasn’t you watching our bags, you lummock?’ Ella said, back to her usual self now she was safely on dry land. ‘We could have lost that basket then.
’Tain’t no use staring into the air like a halfwit. Wake up, can’t you.’ Sadie flushed and looked down.

‘Maid like you needs a buck to look out for you,’ Charlie said to Ella.

‘Have a care.’ Charlie’s friend was suddenly at his side. ‘What about Joan?’ he whispered.

‘What about her?’ Charlie was sullen.

‘Come on, now. The ladies don’t need our company.’