The Apothecary's Daughter (33 page)

‘I don’t suppose she has but nevertheless, she will. And then what?’

‘Well,’ Susannah hesitated, ‘I assume William will inherit her property.’

‘
He
will have no need of a waiting woman, will he? And it would not be seemly for you to stay on in the house with him. Alone.’

Susannah bit her lip as the precariousness of her situation came home to her. She felt an icy quiver of unease run down her
back. Had she become too complacent? ‘He would not turn me out,’ she said.

‘Don’t you think you had better make sure of it?’

‘That isn’t something I could discuss with him!’

‘Don’t be obtuse, Susannah. I’m not suggesting you
talk
about what will happen after Agnes has gone to meet her Maker but that you
take steps
to ensure that you still have a future living in her house. With William.’

Susannah felt the heat creep up her cheeks as she understood Arabella’s meaning.

‘He won’t be interested in you now, of course, not while you are bloated and ugly with his cousin’s child in your belly, but
you will need to move quickly once the baby is born. It’s a shame you will be encumbered by Henry’s child but you
must
find another husband as
soon as possible. You could do worse you know. I grant you William always wears a sour expression but if you like your men
with dark looks and can ignore his moods, he is really rather fine-looking.’

Susannah stared down at her hands folded in her lap, horrified by Arabella’s suggestion. Her heart began to thud against her
chest and sweat prickled under her arms. The very idea of making up to William in order to entrap him into marriage sickened
her. And his expression wasn’t sour, only unhappy. She pictured his face, closed in distress when he returned home after losing
a patient. All at once she wanted to cry.

‘I cannot …’ She could hardly speak for the wild thoughts suddenly crowding into her head. And then, like a candle in the
darkness, she understood the cause of her confusion.

Arabella sighed. ‘Well, if you really
cannot
think of William as a suitable husband you will have to look elsewhere. But I urge you not to waste any time. You must look
around you now and make your choice so that you can move swiftly after the baby is born. Time is not on your side and before
you know it the first white hairs will arrive and another tooth will loosen and it will be too late. You will be doomed to
spend the rest of your life as a servant to others and subject to their whims and fancies. You will have no security in your
old age.’

‘I think perhaps I will go and take a look at the twins.’

‘Susannah, have you been listening at all to what I’ve been saying?’

‘Yes, Arabella.’

‘There’s no need to look so shocked. Mistress Fygge has been useful to you but you
must
be prepared to make your own opportunities in life. There’s no pleasure in being alone in the world with a child to support.
Believe me, I know.’

‘I suppose you do.’

‘You must be prepared to make compromises. As I did. And, as far as I can see, William is your best opportunity at the moment,
even if he isn’t your ideal choice of husband.’ She leaned forward. ‘Look, I know we haven’t always found each other congenial
but now that
you have left this house, I can, and do, offer you this advice in the true spirit of friendship. Life can be very frightening
for a penniless widow with children.’

‘Yes, I’m sure it is. And now I’ll go up to the nursery, if I may.’

Arabella clicked her tongue in disgust. ‘Be off with you, then! But don’t come running back to me for help in five years’
time when Agnes is dead, William is married to someone else and you have crow’s feet and no man will look at you.’

Susannah found the nursemaids only too pleased to allow her to entertain her baby brothers for a while. Somehow the babies
seemed to sense her reflective mood and sat quietly on her knee, batting at her curls with their tiny fists, an expression
of intense concentration on their faces.

The trouble was, Susannah thought as she rocked Joshua and Samuel in her arms, the blinding revelation which had come to her
while Arabella prattled on was so disturbing that it had rendered her speechless. Since she had never encountered a similar
situation before she’d had no way of recognising the restlessness that had overtaken her of late and only now that did she
understand its meaning. All at once it had become quite clear to her that, with close acquaintance and the passing of time,
she had fallen hopelessly in love with William.

Agnes had retired to her chamber for a nap. Dismissed, Susannah rested on her own bed for a while but she couldn’t sleep for
all the thoughts whirling round in her head. Lying with her hands clasped over her stomach so that she could feel every little
movement within, she wondered how she could not have realised before how significantly her feelings for William had changed.

Of course he was still the same stern-faced, austere man he had always been but over the months she’d seen something, just
a glimmer, of humour and vulnerability that had made her warm to him. No, a great deal more than that, she admitted to herself.
But somehow it felt wrong to be falling in love with William while she was pregnant with his cousin’s child. And then there
was the distasteful fact of his past association with Phoebe. Even forgetting that, it had taken Arabella to point out that,
after Agnes had been released from her earthly cares, it would be impossible for Susannah to continue to live in the same
house as William. The thought of him disappearing from her life had made her freeze in terror.

At last, finding it impossible to doze off, she decided to go down to the kitchen and make some ginger biscuits to tempt Agnes’s
appetite.

The kitchen was as busy as a beehive. Phoebe was scrubbing pots with Joseph at her side. Peg was sitting at one end of the
kitchen table peeling a heap of vegetables and swatting Aphra’s paw away as she tried to steal a carrot, while Emmanuel chuckled
at the little ape’s antics.

Mistress Oliver had her sleeves rolled up and was pummelling the bread dough as if she held a personal grudge against it,
which, indeed, she did.

‘Will I be in your way if I make some biscuits?’ asked Susannah.

‘You’d better hurry up. The fire will soon be too hot. That’s the third baker we’ve lost to the pestilence this year. As if
I didn’t have enough to do without having to make all the bread too!’

‘Can you not find another baker?’ asked Susannah.

‘I haven’t time to be traipsing all over the city fetching the bread. Peg!’

Peg tapped Aphra on the muzzle and extracted a carrot from the monkey’s paw. ‘Yes, Mistress Oliver?’

‘More coal! And look sharp about it! Make the fire good and hot or the bread will be as hard as a stone.’

Without a word Peg picked up the coal scuttle from beside the fire and hurried off to the coal store.

‘I’ll help her,’ said Emmanuel.

‘Be quick or I’ll come looking for you both. And don’t you be dirtying that velvet coat of yours or you’ll make the mistress
angry.’

Aphra seized her chance and snatched a carrot before retreating to the top of the dresser, chattering with excitement at her
prize. Joseph jumped about, throwing turnips at the monkey and shouting at her to come down while Phoebe clattered the pots
as she put them away.

‘Sometimes I think this kitchen is worse than Bedlam,’ sighed the cook, pushing a stringy lock of hair off her face with a
floury hand. ‘I need to keep my eye on that pair. I caught ’em canoodling in the pantry the other day.’

Susannah pounded the lumps out of the sugar, wondering if she ought to be worried about Peg but then remembered the girl’s
account of how she had cracked Mistress McGregor’s ‘brother’ over the head with a candlestick and jumped out of the window
at the house in Cock Lane. She decided that Peg could look after herself. Nevertheless, she was relieved when Emmanuel appeared
a few minutes later carrying the coal scuttle.

As she sieved the husks out of the flour, Susannah covertly watched Phoebe. She had found a length of blue cotton fabric and
tied it round her head in a turban. It gave her a curiously dignified air as she moved slowly about her duties. There was
no apparent sign of her distress of the previous night and she met Susannah’s glance with such an impertinent look that it
made Susannah gasp.

The sun was warm on Susannah’s back and she hummed to herself while she watered the herb garden. The parsley had grown large
enough now that she would be able to pick a few sprigs for the table. Perhaps she would make an omelette sprinkled with chopped
herbs for William when he returned home. He’d seen such terrible suffering over the past few months and he looked so careworn
that she longed to cosset him.

Kneeling down on the moist earth to pick the parsley, she imagined how they would sit alone by candlelight, talking together
while he ate the omelette. She pictured him smiling at her and then he would take her hand and lift it to his lips. She would
lean towards him, just a little, and then he’d … The toe of a man’s boot appeared in her line of vision. She glanced up and
saw the object of her daydream looking down at her with a half-smile that convinced her he must be able to read her thoughts.
She felt the colour flood her cheeks and attempted to scramble to her feet but became so entangled in her damp skirt that
she was obliged to accept his proffered hand, dropping the little bunch of parsley in the process.

‘Your garden is proving successful,’ William said, picking it up. Brushing earth and bits of weed off her skirt, Susannah
prayed he
could not see how her heart thudded in her breast. ‘I have always wanted a garden,’ she said, slightly out of breath. ‘Have
you seen how tightly the parsley curls? And it is such a beautiful shade of green.’ He raised an eyebrow and she felt herself
blush again. ‘I’m babbling, aren’t I? You shouldn’t have crept up on me and caught me by surprise.’

‘I had no intention of startling you but I admit that I was watching you while you worked. You seemed so content, humming
away to yourself, that I didn’t want to disturb you.’

‘When I’m tending the garden I can’t seem to worry about what else is going on in the world. All cares and concerns seem to
be very far away. Close contact with the earth is very healing, don’t you think?’

He looked at her for a long moment, his face expressionless, almost as if his thoughts were somewhere else. ‘My mother used
to say that,’ he said at last. He blinked, as if breaking a spell. ‘And you’re right about the parsley.’ He held the little
bunch out to her. ‘Its shade is very nearly as beautiful as the green of your eyes.’

Slowly she reached out her hand to take it from him and as their fingers met she heard his sharp intake of breath, just as
if he’d been burned by her touch.

They remained frozen for a fragment of time that seemed to stretch into for ever while she stared at his hand against hers.
Transfixed, she studied his long fingers and the tracery of veins shadowing through the lightly tanned skin on the back of
his hands. She had a sudden and overwhelming desire to kiss the vulnerable-looking skin on the underside of his wrist where
it disappeared under the lace at his cuffs.

Then his hand curled round hers in a grip so tight it made her gasp. ‘Susannah?’ His face was serious, no trace of humour
now. ‘I must talk to you.’

‘Yes, William?’ Surely he must see the pulse beating in her throat? Was he going to admit to her his relationship to Joseph?
Or dared she to hope …

He swallowed and looked at their hands, fingers still intertwined. ‘Perhaps you’ve become conscious that—’

A sudden shout made them both start and they let go of each other as if they were glowing embers. They turned to see Joseph
chasing Emmanuel across the courtyard with a broom. The little boy shrieked with glee as Emmanuel twisted and turned, never
quite letting Joseph catch him. They raced through the cloisters, their laughter echoing under the arcading, disappearing
as quickly as they had arrived, leaving the garden quiet once more.