Page 91 of Dark Tides
“I’m to see they fulfill it,” she said easily. “And then come home with them.”
“Why?” he asked simply. “Why not let me fetch them like last time?”
Sarah shrugged. “You know what she’s like,” she said, confident that he did not. “She wants me to pick them out. I can’t refuse. She just ordered me to come, and so here I am.”
“She said nothing to me about sending a maid to do my work. I thought she trusted me, I’ve worked for her often enough!”
Sarah smiled at him. “Oh no no! Not Mrs. Stoney! She’s fair enough—it’s the other one. The Italian one. It’s her that sent me.”
“Ah,” he said dourly. “Her.” He showed Sarah into a small cabin and stowed her hatbox under the bunk. “We only stop at Lisbon,” he warned her.
“That’s fine,” Sarah replied. “I didn’t even want to come. I’m here to fetch her goods, and to meet my husband.”
“What’s he doing in Venice?” he asked, immediately suspicious.
“He’s sick,” Sarah improvised.
“How sick? For if they have sent him to the lazaretto we’ll not even see him, you’ll not be allowed to meet till the end of his quarantine, if he survives at all.”
“No, nothing like that! It’s a broken leg,” she said glibly. “Nothing infectious. He’s a trader… a trader in silks. I’m to choose her goods and bring him home.”
He looked at her, his blue eyes acute under his sandy eyebrows. “I hope you’re telling me the truth, young lady?”
“Oh yes,” she lied cheerfully. “I am.”
NOVEMBER 1670, LONDON
The next morning Alinor told Alys that Sarah had sent a message from the millinery shop to say that she had gone to the country for a visit and would be back within the week. The three women were sewing herb bags in Alinor’s high room. Below the turret, the tide flowed in, a surge of rubbish on the incoming waves, creamy with foam from the tanneries and dye shops that had drained out to sea and were now washing in again. Seagulls cried and dived into the mess. Alinor watched for cormorants breasting the water and soaring gulls in the sky and spoke absentmindedly: “It was Ruth from the milliner’s shop. Getting married from her village and she wanted Sarah to cook her wedding breakfast.”
“And that takes a week?”
“Oh, my dear, she’s worked without a holiday for seven years! She’s served her time, let her take a holiday.”
“Alys, don’t be a hard mamma!” Livia interpolated, resting her work in her lap. “Let our pretty girl stretch her wings. She’ll be clipped and cribbed soon enough.”
In silence, Alinor observed Livia advising Alys on how to treat her own daughter.
“I’ve never even heard of this Ruth before,” Alys complained.
“You think she has run off with a lover?” Livia challenged, laughing at her. “No, you don’t! So, let her go. She’ll be back in a few days, won’t she?”
Alinor smiled. “I’m sure you know best,” she said with a little edge in her voice. “And are you going to the Strand today, my dear?”
Livia preened. “For my exhibition tea,” she said smugly. “To meet the buyers. And one sale agreed: I have sold my Caesar heads!”
“How much?” Alys asked eagerly. “Are they as valuable as you thought?”
“A hundred pounds,” Livia said, halving the sum without hesitation.
“One hundred?” Alys repeated disbelievingly. “One hundred pounds?”
“I told you!” the younger woman triumphed. “And Sir James is taking nothing from me for using his house!”
Alys glanced at her mother at the mention of his name. Alinor was impassive, her eyes on the bright face of her daughter-in-law.
“You’ll bring the money home tonight?” Alys pressed her. “You know how badly we need it in the warehouse.”
“It’s not for running the warehouse,” Livia ruled. “It’s for buying us a beautiful new home.”
