The Silver Touch (3 page)

Hester enjoyed her new position as waiting-maid. She viewed it as promotion. It could not have come at a better time. She had had earlier stints at sharing the cooking in the kitchen, but for the past three months she had been baking without respite the pork pies for which the hostelry was famous. Martha had discovered she had a light hand with pastry and Hester had begun to fear she was never going to be allowed to do anything else again. In the taproom there was jollity, laughter and singing and during her past four years at the Heathcock she had received enough cheeky chaff from brewers delivering ale and from stable-lads and grooms to know how to stem good-temperedly any customer’s remarks that threatened to go too close to the bone.

Tips were a welcome, if infrequent, part of this new role. Sometimes only a halfpenny during a whole week, but there were the more generous among the better-off who now and again gave her a silver sixpence. It was the first time she had ever had money of her own in her pocket. Jack, who had thought of everything else concerning her well-being, had never considered how much a few pence now and again would have meant to her. Instead she had had to rely on Martha’s doling out for necessities with never a farthing over, which was hard when the shops and stalls were full of pretty things.

Her first shilling tip in the taproom came from a sergeant in the Grenadiers. She looked at it shining in her palm. ‘It’s a freshly minted one,’ she exclaimed in awe, for it was embossed with the head of the new King, George II, which she had not seen before.

The sergeant closed her fingers over the coin, not wanting too much attention brought to his generosity. By rights such shillings in his possession were currency to cement the recruitment, often by wily means, of young men into His Majesty’s army, and for once he had a few in hand. ‘Buy yersel’ some fripperies,’ he advised splendidly, munificent in his drunkenness, ‘an’ bring me another tankard of that black ale as quick as you did before.’

The next time she was out on an errand she bought herself a drawing tablet, some paints and other requirements to replace the worn-out sketching materials she had brought from home so long ago. It was a long time since she had done any sketching, except with a fingertip before dusting furniture or in steam on a windowpane, and she wondered if her skill had deserted her. But it came back as if no more than a day had elapsed and her first subject was a flight of geese winging across the London sky, observed from her bedchamber window.

In spite of having drawing materials to hand once more, often weeks and even months went by before she could use them again. Life at the tavern continued in its hectic routine, enlivened at times by brawls, organized pugilistic bouts in the main yard, and once a duel with rapiers when two drunken gentlemen fell out, fortunately both too unsteady on their feet for either to do the other any harm.

Two more natal days came and went for her. With Martha’s watchful eye on her, there was little chance of forming romantic liaisons, and in any case she had not met anybody who was of interest to her. Her only regret was that time to herself was so limited, but she had learned to snatch whatever was available and to take advantage of any lull, however short, usually with her drawing tablet on her knees. When she was out and about in the city there was much that caught her eye and was tucked away in her memory to be set down at the first opportunity.

Her artistic ability had always been a private matter to her, something not to share with others, although naturally her mother had known of it. Maybe the old disgrace of failing to read had stunted any wish to sketch her fellow human beings, or to let them into her own special sphere. Whatever the reasons she made sure that her drawing materials were kept out of sight in her room and only ever brought downstairs when she could be sure of being unobserved.

There was a corner of the kitchen yard where she could conceal herself and have plenty of warning should anyone approach. It was on some steps that led from a little-used rear door away from the kitchen entrance. If she locked it behind her nobody could come upon her unawares and the balustrade wall of the steps hid her from view. She welcomed the rare moments of solitude in the open air that this retreat afforded her and was blissfully happy as she sketched from memory the swans on the river or a ship in sail, or anything else that had a lovely line.

She was sketching the tavern cat, its face squashed in sleep, on a hot August afternoon when someone entered the yard by the kitchen gate, the only spot from which she could easily be seen. If it had not been left ajar, the screech of the hinges would have warned her of an approach. Instead she continued drawing, her bodice strings loosened against the heat of the day, her skirts up to the knees of her bare legs in a tumble of petticoat frills, and her head, free of the white cotton cap that was everyday wear, bent over the work in hand. The cat’s tabby fur was downy in the sun, light as spun gold and as difficult to capture in pencilled lines. She was totally absorbed.

What made her look up she never knew. Maybe the strange alchemy that can exist between a man and a woman set a spark flying in the quiet, sun-baked yard. A tall young man stood there, slender and wide-shouldered, his shadow foreshortened by the high sun that blazed into his fair hair, which he wore caught at the nape of his neck with a black ribbon tie. He was staring at her as though magnetized and for a few seconds she was held in the same spell, registering the planes and hollows of his keen, energetic face, the thin aristocratic nose, the well-shaped mouth and the handsome chin. His clothes were shabby and ill-cut, those that any poorly paid worker might wear, and his buckled shoes were worn. One part of her mind judged him to be about nineteen to her eighteen years while her gaze continued to be held by alert eyes that were as river-blue as the Thames on a summer’s morning and with equal depths to drown in.

The drawing had been slipping from her lap unnoticed. Its sudden flutter as it skimmed down the steps to rest face downwards on the cobbles brought her back to her senses. She sprang up, remembering her disarray, and clutched her bodice together, her skirts swinging into place about her ankles. The fixed look in his eyes broke and suddenly he appeared to be as startled by the whole encounter as she. Her voice burst from her on a higher note than was normal.

‘Why are you here? What do you want? Most people go to the coach-yard entrance.’

‘I came by way of the alley, taking a short cut.’ He spoke in what she recognized as educated tones. ‘My master sent me to pick up a watch-chain from Master Needham which is in need of repair. I am expected. Should I find the other entrance?’

‘No,’ she insisted hastily, not wanting anyone else to take up his errand for him. ‘Wait here. I’ll let Jack know you’ve called.’ Turning, she hurried up the steps and unlocked the door to let herself in. He came to the foot of the flight and called after her: ‘One moment!’

‘Yes?’ She looked down over her shoulder at him. The serious set of his face, which she guessed was normal to him, had relaxed into a quick, leaping smile, showing teeth that were white and even.

‘I haven’t asked your name or told you mine,’ he said, leaning an arm on the stone balustrade.

‘I’m Hester Needham.’

‘Are you the landlord’s daughter?’

‘No, his half-sister. I came to live and work here six years ago. And you?’

For some reason his smile widened, illuminating an extraordinary kindliness in his features, making her feel that here was a good man in the true sense of the word, one without cruelty or baseness. ‘My name is John Bateman.’

In the cool, flagged passageway within, she drew a deep breath to recover herself, pulling the strings of her bodice tightly together and tying a bow. John Bateman. It had a ring to it like that of a fine wineglass and she was sure he had given his name more for her benefit than for Jack’s. Her heart was pounding away as if her whole world had been turned upside down. Perhaps it had. Nobody had ever had this effect upon her before, although maybe the circumstances of their meeting had something to do with it, for she was not used to being caught at a disadvantage.

As he had come for a watch-chain, it was her guess that he was an apprentice goldsmith. Apprentices of every trade were always in the Heathcock, usually in the rougher taproom frequented by travelling coachmen, servants and similar folk, and if they made a drunken nuisance of themselves they were soon thrown out by Jack. Whipping her white cap from her pocket and popping it on, Hester did not think that John would ever make a public exhibition of himself. He had a quiet air about him.

Smoothing down her apron and satisfied that her appearance was orderly again, she went in search of Jack and failed to find him anywhere. ‘Where is he?’ she asked Martha, who was doing accounts in the office, seated at the high desk.

‘Out,’ Martha replied abruptly, her pen still scratching across the open page of the ledger in front of her. She never wasted words in conversation with Hester.

‘A messenger has come for his broken watch-chain.’

‘I’ve no idea where it is although I heard the arrangement being made.’ Martha dipped her pen into the ink again. ‘In any case I’m too busy to look for it now. Inform the fellow you’ll deliver it to Master Harwood’s workshop tomorrow.’ She failed to see the flash of delight that passed across Hester’s face.

‘I’ll tell him.’

Going downstairs again Hester almost danced down the flight. She had been handed the chance to see John Bateman again, to further the unusual encounter, and she would make sure that she delivered the watch-chain to him personally. As for Master Harwood, whom she had waited on many times, she had always thought he would be a hard master to serve.

Emerging into the sunshine again, she halted abruptly with a sense of deep shock. John Bateman was holding her drawing of the cat and studying it intently. ‘That belongs to me!’ She made an involuntary rush down the steps as if she would have snatched it from him.

He looked up from the drawing, his expression intrigued, his eyes narrowed. ‘You’re extremely talented. This is a fine drawing. I assume you’re self-taught?’

She was trembling in the aftermath of shock, but there washed over her an intense joy that he liked what she had done. It was like a benediction, his approval a balm, sweeping away the rejection and scorn she had always expected others to pour upon her efforts. Her mother had always praised them, but that had been different altogether, part of the security of home, an extension of herself.

‘Yes, I am.’ She felt unusually vulnerable. ‘I have always liked to sketch but I have little time these days.’

‘That’s a pity.’ He handed the drawing back to her. ‘Do you have the watch-chain?’

‘No. Jack is out and his wife doesn’t know where it is. I’m to deliver it to you tomorrow at Master Harwood’s workshop.’ She noted that he smiled again upon hearing her words as if inwardly he was as pleased as she was that they were to have another meeting, and shortly, too.

‘Do you know where the workshop is?’ he enquired. ‘No? It’s easy to find.’ He gave her clear and precise directions. It was in Cripplegate, not far from St Giles’s Church. Many goldsmiths had workshops there, it being common practice for those of one craft to set up in close proximity.

‘Are you going to do the repair?’

‘I expect so.’

‘Then I’ll ask for you.’

He nodded, those river-blue eyes dwelling on her.

‘Please do that, Miss Needham. Now I’ll bid good day to you. I have to get back to work.’

‘Good day, Mr Bateman.’

She watched him stride across the cobbles to reach the gate. There he paused to look back at her with a wave. The hinges screeched as the gate swung closed after him. She stood lost in her own happy thoughts until Martha, shouting from an upper window, caused her to go scuttling back indoors.

Her one fear that evening was that Master Harwood would come into the tavern and then Jack would hand over the watch-chain to him directly, curtailing all chances of her expedition the following day. Fortunately Master Harwood did not appear and during the clearing up in the taproom at the evening’s end, Hester seized an opening to tell Jack about John Bateman’s call.

‘I know the lad,’ Jack said, turning chairs upside down on the tables ready for the sweeping out of the old spittle-soiled sawdust and the spreading of the new. ‘John Bateman is Harwood’s senior apprentice. He comes of good Staffordshire stock but has no money. It’s the familiar story of gentlefolk impoverished by the gambling of previous generations. Both his parents died young and he was reared by his grandfather who paid for his education at Westminster School and settled him in his present apprenticeship, which was the limit of what the old fellow could do, being almost in penury himself.’

She was surprised to have learned so much in a short time, even though Jack was typical of most landlords in being affable and talkative with a fount of information gathered about people and events far beyond the range of their own taproom bars. ‘Did Master Harwood tell you all this?’ It struck her as odd that a master craftsman, even in his cups, should discuss a humble apprentice during a social hour.

‘He did. About six or seven months ago when his daughter became betrothed to young Bateman.’

‘Betrothed!’ She was wiping beer rings from the oaken surface of the bar and swung round to look towards him, her face dismayed. Not only had she waited on Caroline Harwood during supper parties and knew her to be good-looking in a cool, elegant way, but by repute Master Harwood’s daughter was educated and well read, having been tutored from the age of seven until her seventeenth natal day as if she were a boy. Moreover, it was said that she played two or three musical instruments with remarkable talent. Wildly in her racing thoughts, Hester remembered pitying Caroline for not having been given the chance to serve a goldsmith apprenticeship and for being subjected to book-learning instead. Now it was she herself who was in need of pity, having no cultural attributes to compete with this paragon for John Bateman’s attentions.