As Meat Loves Salt

It was Caro who opened to my knock, and on seeing me she at once laughed. I guessed by this that I was the subject of their talk, but said only, ‘Will you tell Her Ladyship that my mother is here to give her thanks in person?’

‘I will come down,’ called a voice inside the room. We stood aside as the Mistress swept past.

‘Going down!’ Caro whispered.

‘Going to be fawned on for a present she made,’ I returned. ‘I had as lief not see it.’

‘Should I not go to your mother, after?’

I hesitated. ‘Let Mother see her darling boys first.’

‘Very well. Come here, Signior Jacob—’ Caro put her face up, and from her kisses I did not pull away until we heard a door open downstairs.

‘You are lucky to get me. So my mother says,’ I murmured as we listened for the sound of the Mistress coming back up.

She pinched my cheek. ‘I’d say the luck’s all the other way. My Lady has promised more—’

‘But it is agreed,’ I said, surprised. Lady Roche had already settled a dowry of thirty pounds on Caro, who said over and over that the Roches were none so bad after all, while I thought the money would be best spent in getting away from them.

Caro explained, ‘Other things. There’s a gown for the day, not so old, neither. Earrings also. And I am to have a chaplet from the gardener, with roses, or gilded wheat and rosemary.’

‘Earrings? You have not had your ears pierced?’ I did not want my wife’s lobes punctured to suit the Mistress. Lifting the edges of her cap, I was reassured to find them still whole.

She laughed. ‘The loan is only for the day. We will tie them on with silk.’

‘I would gladly have got you a gown,’ I said. ‘But we are to have an espousal, not a church wedding.’ And I dislike the Mistress making you her poppet, I thought.

‘Yes, but since we are to be espoused de praesenti, where’s the difference?’

‘I mean only that—’

‘O Jacob, you will not be thwart, I hope? There will be a bridebed and all, why not a gown? Besides, her lending it is a sign of high favour!’

‘She may well favour you. No maid else could endure her white lead and belladonna.’

Nonetheless, I found myself smiling back at her. Her gown had been hard earned.

Caro went on, ‘It is all of blue. For constancy. And heeled shoes, with silver thread—’

We kissed again.

‘Shall I not have the ring inscribed?’ Caro wheedled. ‘Eh, Husband?’

‘No,’ I said at once. We had already been over this. I did not want a ring at all, preferring a simple and godly joining of hands before our friends, but I had bent so far to her wishes as to purchase one. I would not, however, have some doggerel such as Our Contract, Was Heaven’s Act cut into it. I had done much that foolish custom requires: gloves had been purchased to give to all our friends, and a fine embroidered pair for Caro herself. In this last instance, Zeb had threatened that if I did not give way, he would shame me by furnishing the bridal gloves in my stead. I had also presented her with wedding knives, those scissors as necessary as the groom himself. All of it was very much against my will, not through meanness on my part, for I grudged the cost of nothing that I thought seemly, but I disliked this courting of good luck through gew-gaws and trifles. What have Christians to do with luck? Nor would I have garters pulled off by her bridesmen, or stockings thrown about in the bridal chamber. The others complained that without such brothelry (which they called merriment) it was hardly a wedding, but no matter for their whims.

My love linked arms with me. ‘What will you wear, Jacob?’

‘My best coat, the one you know with the mother-of-pearl buttons, and a lace collar to my shirt. I have had them ready a month and more.’

‘And favours?’ she coaxed.

‘Aye, favours,’ for I had gained my point over the ring and other trash, and I knew that without these trumpery bits of ribbon her woman’s soul would not be satisfied.

Caro squeezed my hand. ‘We will look like gentry.’

‘I am gentry.’ My own words surprised me. Having been a servant so long, I had near forgotten.

‘But not idle like some we know.’

‘Let us hope,’ I said, ‘that he will be away, or dead drunk in bed.’

My Lady was coming back up the stairs, grunting from a stiffness she had in the legs and hips.

‘Madam, may we go down now?’ I requested. ‘Caro has not yet been seen by my mother.’

‘What! Most certainly you must go. She is in the garden with your brothers, near the lavender bed.’

‘You are all kindness.’

We bowed and curtseyed, then scampered downstairs like children.

Mother was just where the Mistress had said, standing between Zeb and Izzy.

‘I always forget how pale your mother is,’ said Caro as we crossed towards them. ‘Where is her part in you, Black Jacob?’

‘The eyes.’

‘So much?’

‘More than she has in the others. Zeb and Izzy have Father’s complexion entirely. Yet folk say I am the most like him.’

Mother turned the grey eyes which were under discussion sharply upon her future daughter as soon as she perceived our approach. Caro curtseyed with a graceful sweep that not even Mervyn could have faulted, but to no purpose: there would never be liking between these two. My mother bristled like a dog’s back. For Caro’s part, as soon as she came out of her curtsey she drew herself up, Youth against Age.

‘You have met Caro before, dear Mother,’ I tried. ‘Now you meet her as a dutiful daughter.’

Caro smiled.

Mother’s glance raked her up and down as if seeking cracks in her skin, as she said, ‘I will scarce know what to do with a daughter. My babes have all been boys.’

Izzy shot me a sympathetic glance.

‘I had hoped we might put you to bed at home,’ Mother said, turning on me. ‘But you will not want that.’

‘That was our first wish,’ I assured her, Caro’s head bobbing up and down in agreement. ‘But the kindness shown, and such gifts – a servant is not a free man—’

My mother inclined her head so slightly that one might not say she nodded.

‘The Mistress has given me a gown against the day,’ put in Caro. ‘And a pair of—’