‘He needs work,’ Bartholomew says again. He hoists the post to his shoulder and comes up to her. ‘And perhaps a distance between him and his father.’
Agnes looks away, down the path, at the dog, lying in the shade, pink rag of a tongue unrolled.
‘I have been thinking,’ she begins, ‘that it might interest John to set up elsewhere. In London.’
Bartholomew raises his head, narrows his eyes. ‘London,’ he repeats, rolling the word over his tongue.
‘To extend his business there.’
Her brother pauses, rubs at his chin. ‘I see,’ he says. ‘You mean that John might send someone to the city, for a while. Someone he trusts. A son perhaps.’
Agnes nods. ‘Just for a while,’ she says.
‘You would go with him?’
‘Of course.’
‘You would leave Stratford?’
‘Not at first. I would wait until he was settled, with a house, and then I would follow him, with Susanna.’
Brother and sister regard each other. Susanna, on Agnes’s back, stirs, gives a small sob, then settles back to sleep.
‘London is not so far away,’ Bartholomew says.
‘True.’
‘Many go there, to find work.’
‘Again, true.’
‘There might be opportunities to be found there.’
‘Yes.’
‘For him. For the business.’
‘I think so.’
‘He might find a position for himself. Away from his father.’
Agnes reaches out and touches the cut end of the post Bartholomew is holding, tracing a finger around and around the circles there.
‘I don’t think John would listen to a woman in this matter. If an associate were to put the idea in his head – someone with an interest in his business, with a stake – so as to make it look like John’s idea in the first place, then . . .’
‘The notion would take hold.’ Bartholomew finishes for her. He rests his hand on her arm. ‘What about you?’ he says in a low voice. ‘You would not mind if he . . . went ahead of you? It could take some time for him to establish himself.’
‘I would mind,’ she says. ‘Very much. But what else can I do? He cannot continue like this. If London could save him from this misery, it is what I want.’
‘You would come back here,’ he jerks his thumb towards Hewlands, ‘in the meantime, you and Susanna, so that—’
Agnes shakes her head. ‘Joan would never take to the idea. And there will be more of us soon.’
Bartholomew frowns. ‘What are you saying? There will be another child?’
‘Yes. By winter’s end.’
‘Have you told him?’
‘Not yet. I will hold off, until all is arranged.’
Bartholomew nods at her, then gives her one of his rare, wide smiles, putting his powerful arm around her shoulders. ‘I shall seek out John. I know where he drinks. I’ll go there tonight.’
gnes is sitting on the floor by the pallet, next to Judith, a cloth in her hand. She has been there all night: she will not rise, she will not eat, she will not sleep or rest. It is everything Mary can do to get her to drink a little. The heat from the fire is so great that Agnes’s cheeks have scarlet spots upon them; strands of hair have escaped from her coif to write themselves in damp scribbles on her neck.
As Mary watches, Agnes dips the cloth into the bowl of water and wipes Judith’s brow, her arms, her neck. She murmurs some words to her daughter, something soft and soothing.
Mary wonders if the child hears her. Judith’s fever has not broken. The bubo in her neck is so large, so taut, it may burst. And then all will be lost. The girl will die. Mary knows this. It may be tonight, in the deepest dark, because that is the most dangerous time for the sick. It may be tomorrow or even the day after. But come it will.
There is nothing they can do now. Just as three of her own daughters were taken, two when they were just babies, Judith will go from them. They will not have her any more.
Agnes is gripping the child’s limp fingers, Mary sees, as if she is trying to tether her to life. She would keep her here, haul her back, by will alone, if she could. Mary knows this urge – she feels it; she has lived it; she is it, now and for ever. She has been the mother on the pallet, too many times, the woman trying to hold on, to keep a grip on her child. All in vain. What is given may be taken away, at any time. Cruelty and devastation wait for you around corners, inside coffers, behind doors: they can leap out at you at any moment, like a thief or brigand. The trick is never to let down your guard. Never think you are safe. Never take for granted that your children’s hearts beat, that they sup milk, that they draw breath, that they walk and speak and smile and argue and play. Never for a moment forget they may be gone, snatched from you, in the blink of an eye, borne away from you like thistledown.