A Catch of Consequence. Diana Norman

‘patriots. Like me. No, they don’t.’

      ‘And would not rejoice that you did?’

      ‘No,’ she said, ‘they wouldn’t.’

      ‘Presumably they are not aware that I am at this moment, ah, in residence in … what’s the name of your tavern?’

      ‘The Roaring Meg,’ she said. ‘No, they ain’t.’ She added: ‘And mustn’t.’

      ‘Why did you pull me out, Miss Burke?’

      She frowned again, surprised at the question. ‘You was drowning.’

      ‘I see.’

      Awake, his eyes, which were brown, took away from the plainness of his face. She saw they were studying both her room and her person. A rectangular attic of lumpy whitewashed plaster cushioned between oak stanchions, bare floorboards supporting a chest, a three-legged washstand with a canvas bowl, a candlestick, a set of drawers on which were placed a small but select pile of books. A sparse woman of twenty-four years.

      Makepeace saw no reason to be ashamed of either, both were homely, clean, serviceable and free of fleas. Indeed, in that she had the bedroom to herself and didn’t share it with siblings or servants, here was Puritan luxury but, for sure, this man would prefer his rooms painted. Like his women.

      He was silent for a minute, then said plaintively: ‘I’ve got a hellish imaginary headache.’

      Makepeace lit a rushlight from the lamp and went downstairs to the kitchen. The inn was silent except for the rip of Betty’s snores and the occasional creak as beams contracted from a barely perceptible cooling of the air. Aaron’s room was quiet – he’d slept through the ruckus before closing time; he’d sleep through the Last Trump. There was neither sign nor sound of Tantaquidgeon; he chose odd corners for a bed. Come to that, she’d never caught him asleep at all, as if some memory of the forest made it necessary for him to be seen only with his eyes open.

      She poured a dose of physick into a beaker, ladled still-warm chowder into a bowl and pumped up a jug of water. Before she went back upstairs, she made sure no tendril of hair escaped her cap and smoothed down her apron.

      She slipped an arm under the Englishman’s neck to lift his head for his dosing. ‘Betty’s Specific against pain and bruises,’ she told him when he made a face. ‘Also kills worms.’

      He swallowed. ‘I don’t wonder.’

      She gave him some water, then the chowder, spooning it into his mouth for him.

      ‘You’ve got children,’ he said.

      ‘Ain’t married yet,’ she said. ‘You got childer?’

      ‘No.’

      ‘Used to feed my brother like this when he was little,’ she said. ‘Our ma died when he was born.’

      ‘Where is your brother now?’

      ‘Works in marine insurance,’ she told him. ‘He’s educated.’

      ‘Who set my collarbone? You?’

      ‘Betty.’

      ‘A large black lady?’

      She nodded.

      ‘And was there, or did I dream him, an even larger, red gentleman?’

      ‘Tantaquidgeon.’

      ‘His pomade is … unusual.’

      She grinned. ‘Bear’s grease.’

      The lamp guttered and went out and Dapifer was left with the memory of an astonishing smile. Her arm was instantly withdrawn from his neck and he heard the stool scrape back. She was retreating, as if physical contact with him was improper in the dark.

      He saw her go to the window, her head in its dreadful cap outlined against the moonlight, like a carapace. He recalled from the kaleidoscope of the day’s feverish images that she had equally astonishing hair.

      Out of habit, he began a seduction. He sighed. ‘No,’ he said, ‘it was a saint in that boat. She had a halo round her head – like an autumn bonfire. I distinctly remember a saint rescuing me from the harbour.’

      Instead of going into a flutter, she snapped: ‘Don’t I wish it had been.’

      So much for seduction.

      He said gravely: ‘It appears, Makepeace Burke, that I overindulged last night. With great carelessness I stumbled into a ditch thereby breaking my collarbone.’ Well, he owed her – not merely for his life, which was hardly worth the asking price – but because, just then, she’d made him want to laugh, something he’d not been inclined to do for a long time.

      ‘That’s what you’ll tell ’em?’

      ‘Lieutenant-Governor Hutchinson, who is my host in this town, will be so informed. The matter will proceed no further.’

      ‘Swear on the Book?’ She turned swiftly, picked up her bible and placed it on the counterpane.

      He took it, swore, then, since it seemed expected, kissed its battered leather.

      She was holding out her hand. Moonlight showed wet on the palm. God, she’d spat on it. He held out his good hand and they shook on it, making him wince.

      She went to the door, carrying the dirty plate and spoons. ‘Go to sleep now,’ she said.

      He heard the stairs creak as she went down them.

      Resisting the pain in his head, his shoulder, everywhere, he tried to take stock. No need for oaths on the Bible; if Mistress Burke thought he was about to broadcast the ridiculous position he found himself in she was much mistaken. He didn’t know which was the more embarrassing: Sir Philip Dapifer thrown into Boston harbour by colonial bullies or Sir Philip Dapifer fished out again, like a halibut, by a tavern wench. He imagined the laughter if they heard of it at Almack’s. Another humiliation, his least and latest, for the delectation of London society.

      A waterfront? At night? In a town already in turmoil? What had he been thinking of, walking it, exposing himself to such risk?

      What he always thought of, he supposed: two entwined naked bodies, one of them his wife’s, the other – its arse bobbing up and down like a ball bounced by an invisible hand – his friend’s.

      Ludicrous image, all the more ludicrous that it was set against his own drawing-room carpet; he’d almost laughed. But it had hooked itself into his brain like some flesh-burrowing insect and festered so that it pounded there with the energy of an abscess, debilitating him, making him careless of life in general, his own in particular …

      Gritting his teeth against pain actual and mental, Dapifer concentrated. What had he done before venturing along the waterfront? That’s right, that’s right, he’d been saying goodbye to Ffoulkes. Dear, good Ffoulkes. They’d gone aboard the Aurora as she readied herself to sail and Ffoulkes had tried to persuade him to make the voyage as well.

      ‘For God’s sake, Pip, come back home with me. Don’t let her infect all England for you, old fellow. Nor him; they’re neither of them worth it.’

      Looking back on it now, Dapifer saw the restraint their upbringing – where insouciance was the order of the day – imposed on them. In all the weeks the two of them had spent in Massachusetts, that had been the first time either had broached with emotion the matter that had brought them there. Even then, Dapifer remembered, it had been difficult for him to respond to overt concern. He’d said lightly: ‘Odd, isn’t it? One almost regrets his defection above hers, friends being more difficult to acquire than wives.’

      The safety lantern had swung in its cradle, not from the movement of the sea, which was pressed flat by the heat, but from preparations on deck for embarkation. Bare feet had pattered overhead like heavy raindrops; there were commands to the rowers of the sweeps that would pull Aurora out of the quays to the open sea. They could