The Ashes of London. Andrew Taylor

      Ann left the room to fetch hot water.

      ‘Well?’ Aunt Alderley said. ‘Is it not exciting? You have so much to look forward to. They say Croughton Hall is very fine.’

      Cat sat forward in her chair so she could see the reflection of her aunt’s face wavering in the mirror. ‘Madam,’ she said, ‘I don’t want to be married to Sir Denzil. I mean it. Is there no way—?’

      ‘But, child, you must let those older and wiser guide you.’

      ‘He doesn’t please me.’

      ‘So you’ve said. But it’s nonsense, my dear. Liking will come later, if God wills it, as it does in most marriages. You must not concern yourself about it now. Remember, he has everything to recommend him, including the fact that your uncle is in favour of the match.’

      ‘But he’s so—’

      Aunt Alderley shook her head. ‘Not a word more, my dear. You’re overtired, and this makes you say foolish things. Besides, this horrible Fire has upset us all.’

      There was a tap on the door, and Ann entered with a jug of steaming water.

      ‘We’ll discuss the question of jewellery later,’ her aunt said in a brisk voice. ‘But now, my love, you must go to bed. You have great circles under your eyes. Shall Ann come with you and undress you?’

      ‘No, madam. But thank you.’

      When she was released, Cat climbed the stairs to the floor above the main bedchambers, candle in hand. She had walked this way so often that she could have done it in the dark.

      Every now and then she passed a window that gave glimpses of London glowing like a bed of coals in the night. It seemed to her that the fire was less bright than it had been, as if its fury were gradually dying. Occasionally there were muffled explosions. The work of demolition continued.

      For an instant, a vision of a new London rose in her mind, growing from this bed of coals: a town of great piazzas and avenues, of lofty churches, and of fine buildings of brick and stone. She would get out her drawing box and her papers when she was safely in her room. She would map an outline of this new and glorious city. The box had been a gift from her other aunt, Great Aunt Eyre; it reminded her of a time when she had been happy.

      Cat raised the latch on her door and entered the chamber. Once inside, still with the candle in her hand, she inserted a wooden wedge above the latch so it could not be raised from the outside. She had fashioned the wedge herself, from a splinter of kindling, using a knife she had sent Jem to buy.

      She put down the candle on the table under the window and tugged the laces that tied the bodice of her dress.

      There was a chuckle behind her. She sucked in her breath and spun round.

      ‘Pray let me assist you, my sweet.’

      Edward was standing almost at her shoulder. For a moment it was as if he had materialized from nothing, like the evil spirit he was. Chasing after that came the realization that he must have been waiting for her in the gap between the side of the big press and the corner of the wall.

      He smiled at her. He wore his bedgown of padded silk trimmed with fur. Around his head he had wound a silk kerchief. He looked younger without his periwig, more like a bloated version of the boy he had once been.

      The boy who had pulled her hair and put a dead crow in her bed.

      ‘Go away,’ she said, retreating. ‘I shall scream.’

      ‘Scream all you like, my love. No one will hear.’

      He seized her as he spoke. His left arm circled her head and the hand clamped over her mouth and nostrils as he pulled her towards him. His right arm wrapped itself around her waist.

      She struggled for breath. She kicked his shins but her soft indoor shoes made no impression on him.

      Her left hand swept over the table and touched the candlestick. She picked it and jabbed the flame of the candle into his cheek. The light died. He swore. His grip tightened.

      ‘Hellcat,’ he whispered.

      Darkness came. And pain.

       CHAPTER SEVEN

      NOTHING LASTS FOR ever, Cat thought, for was there not always death to make an end of it?

      She lay in the darkness. She was on her back still, her legs apart, her dress rucked up, for what was there to be modest about any more? The pain in her body was acute but strangely remote, as if it belonged to someone else, someone she had once known well and now was a stranger.

      Sometimes a church clock struck the hour. That was strange too, the very idea that this devastated city still contained churches with clocks and bells that told the time.

      Churches among the ashes of the dead.

      Gradually other thoughts drifted into her mind. She could go to Aunt Olivia, praying to God she would not find Uncle Alderley tossing on top of her in the canopied bed.

      But Olivia would say that those things were only to be expected, that this was what gentlemen always tried to do to pretty maids, and even to less pretty ones. She would say that Cat should have taken better care of herself, and above all she would say that it was Cat’s fault.

      It was the way of the world. Men always tried to make love to women. That was what Olivia had said in the spring, when she had turned away a servant who had got herself with child. Cat had argued that the man should bear at least some of the blame.

      ‘But it was her fault, Catherine,’ Olivia had said, ‘just as it was Eve’s. A woman leads a man into sin, that’s what your uncle says, and of course he is right. The girl should have managed it better, and now she must live with the consequences. And there’s an end to it.’

      Would they throw Cat into the streets, a defiled woman to live in the gutter as best she could? Probably not – they would simply pretend it had not happened. Master Alderley had his heart set on her marrying Sir Denzil, and Master Alderley was not a man who changed his mind once it was made up.

      Another thought struck her. If she told her uncle and aunt, would they even believe her?

      As a child Cat had been thrown from a horse and landed awkwardly on a heap of stones. This had been almost a year before she first had her courses and her body began to change. But after the fall, she had bled from the place where women bleed at that time of the month.

      Cat felt herself but could not feel anything except pain. If there were no token of blood to show that she had lost her virginity, then why indeed should they believe her? In that case, it would be her word against Edward’s. Her word was worth nothing. But in his father’s eyes, Edward could do no wrong. She was merely the unwanted niece, a relation by law but not by blood, the child of a man whose name was not mentioned. To the Alderleys, her only value was as something to be traded, bought and sold.

      Something to be robbed. Something to be defiled.

      Even Jem had abandoned her. He would not help her – besides what could a crippled servant do? He would argue caution in all things, just as the foolish old man always did.

      Time passed.

      Never forget, never forgive.

      Quite suddenly she knew what she would do. The decision arrived ready-made, needing no thought. It was there because nothing else was left to her.

      The click of the latch made Cat catch her breath. She opened the door and listened.

      The sounds of Barnabas Place settled around her – the creaks, the pattering of rodents, the whispering of draughts. The air was stuffy and still very warm.

      She held up the candle, which accentuated the gloom. Her eyes adjusted slowly. This