Chapter 4
FOUR
The following morning, as the sun was beginning to climb above the trees, Thomasin called for the horses to be brought round to the front of the house.
She had dressed in her grey riding habit, trimmed with cherry silk, ready for the half-hour ride to Dedham.
The roads were pleasant enough, set amid rolling countryside dotted with sheep and fields of barley, passing through a couple of hamlets along the way.
She was to take Rogers, their steward, along with them, and Nell, one of the laundry girls.
Their part of the world was peaceful enough but for women particularly, it was still safer to travel in numbers.
Lettice arrived on the front steps, flushed with her hurry to get dressed.
That morning, she had proudly selected a new bonnet that Thomasin had given her, plain and suitable for her age, but edged with a vibrant forest green.
Thomasin smiled to see the pleasure it gave her; she was reaching that age now when she was starting to take notice of her appearance, moving from girlhood towards womanhood. Lettice looked up at the sky.
“It’s going to rain, you know.”
Thomasin followed her gaze. The skies looked clear enough to her. “Is it? How do you know?”
“There’s that smell in the air. Can’t you smell it?”
Thomasin breathed in deeply. Now that Lettice mentioned it, there was a note of freshness under the usual garden scents.
“Probably a passing shower.”
“Maybe. I hope so. I don’t want to miss out on the saffron tarts.”
“You know we have marigolds in the garden, and they have quite the same…”
“No!” Lettice groaned. “Marigolds might also be bright yellow, but they don’t taste at all like saffron! They’re nowhere near as sweet.”
“All right,” said Thomasin with a laugh, seeing her own younger self in the girl. “I do not profess to be an expert in tarts. I will eat both saffron and marigold quite indiscriminately.”
“Then they are wasted on you!” Lettice complained.
Rogers appeared with the horses, ready and saddled. “Looks like rain, my lady.”
“There!” said Lettice. “What did I say?”
Thomasin looked at the skies again, wondering whether or not to postpone their plans.
Giles came striding around the side of the house, wearing his best cloak and leather boots.
Thomasin looked at him approvingly, noticing that he was wearing his gold chains underneath. “You look very smart.”
“Thank you. I thought I would ride over to Manningtree, as Sir Erasmus Paston is staying in the town.”
Paston came originally from a Norfolk family, but was the MP for nearby Orford, a useful man to know.
“Oh,” he added, looking at the skies, “it looks like rain, though.”
Lettice giggled.
“What will you do?” he asked Thomasin. “Postpone your trip?”
“It seems that is what everyone else thinks I should do, but a little rain never hurt anyone. It means Lettice will go without her saffron tarts, though.”
“With the price of a saffron tart she could buy five other gooseberry ones.”
Lettice wrinkled her nose. “I do not like gooseberry. The flavour is too … tart!”
Just as they were laughing at her sister’s pun, Thomasin noticed a figure appearing at the far end of the drive. A man on a horse had turned off the main road and was heading up towards the house. She nodded to Giles, who followed her gaze.
“Now, what is this?” he asked. “A visitor? I do not recognise him. A messenger? His matter cannot be urgent, as he has not broken into a trot. Perhaps it is someone who has lost their way. I will go to meet him.”
They watched as Giles walked along the driveway and intercepted the horseman about halfway down. From the house steps, they could see a brief conversation taking place, then a letter being handed over.
“More news,” said Lettice. “What can it be now? Perhaps Dedham is flooded, or there is plague at Eastwell, or all the saffron crops have burned in the fields.”
Giles’s face gave nothing away as he returned, but he handed over the folded paper to Thomasin. “It is for you. From London.”
“From London?” She took it hesitantly. “I do not want more bad news.”
“Well, you won’t know what it is until you open it.”
The seal was in black wax, bearing initials she did not recognise. It snapped easily in two, unfolding to reveal a letter in tight, formal handwriting. Thomasin scanned it once, then read it again, unable to take in the words.
“No, I don’t understand this.” She handed it over to Giles. He scanned it briefly, then read it a second time.
“Now there’s a surprise. Uncle Matthew has left Monk’s Place entirely to you.”
“To me? Not to Mother or Ellen?”
“No, according to this letter, the terms of his will are very clear. It is yours, Thomasin. You are the new owner of Monk’s Place.”
The house with its woody smell, the dark staircase, the long garden, came flooding back to her.
“I wonder why.”
“You always were a favourite of his, I recall. Perhaps he decided that you would get more use from it than your mother. And Ellen is remarried, and not blood-related. I don’t know. Who is the letter from?”
She checked the bottom again. “An Ambrose Brown, lawyer, Lincoln’s Inn.”
“Perhaps he will have more answers for you. The will might have given a reason.”
Suddenly, Thomasin was unsure. It was a blessing, an honour; there was no doubt about that. But London? She had never thought to own a house in London, and did she really wish to return there?
“What are you thinking?” asked Giles.
“I don’t know. What do I do with the place? I never imagined this.”
Giles laughed. “You can do anything you want with it, but you don’t need to decide now.”
“I suppose we must go to London?”
“Perhaps. We might want to sort the old place out, go through your uncle’s belongings. Or I could instruct this Ambrose Brown to have an inventory drawn up.”
Thomasin sighed. The first spots of rain began to fall around them.
“Here it comes,” Lettice said gloomily. “We can go to Dedham another time.”
Much later that day, after the house had been shrouded in darkness, Giles blew out the candle in their chamber and climbed into bed beside Thomasin.
“You have been thoughtful all day; I think that letter is preying on your mind.”
“How could it be otherwise?” said Thomasin into the darkness.
“You did not expect this at all? He never mentioned anything of the sort?”
“Nothing. The last time we saw him, at Christmas just passed, when he came up to Eastwell, he spoke of giving me a gelding he no longer had use for, but I heard no more on the matter. He certainly did not mention a house!”
“I wonder when the will was drawn up.”
“Since our marriage, certainly. Or since Ellen’s marriage, as he no longer felt any need to provide for her.”
“Well, Ellen has Barnaby’s portion, so he probably thought to balance that out. He may have left her a token or two, out of affection. He always did love her well.”
“I wonder if Cecilia received anything.”
They were quiet for a moment, thinking over the possibilities.
Thomasin stared at the familiar ceiling as her eyes grew more accustomed to the dark.
Four years she had slept in this bed, with not a thought of London, nor any desire to return.
A house was an obligation. She did not feel able to sell it, because of the memories, but it felt like a waste to leave it empty.
Uncle Matthew’s house should be a family home, with meals prepared in the kitchen and laughter ringing in the chambers.
“I suppose we shall have to go to London,” she admitted, “even for just a short time.”
“It may be a good idea,” said Giles softly at her side. “You may want to look at the old place. Take away some of your favourite possessions.”
“But what can I do with the house? I love it here at Green Hollow; I never want to leave. I suppose this is what you wanted, after what you said the other day.”
“I only want what you want, Thomasin, my wife.” He rolled over and took her in his arms. “It is your house and your decision entirely.”
“You said the other day that it would be good to travel, to visit friends. If only I had thought to visit Uncle Matthew sooner. I had no idea at Christmas that we were saying goodbye for the final time.”
Giles kissed the top of her head. “We can never know these things.”
“It makes me realise how short our time is, how anyone might be taken at any moment.”
“Now, don’t start thinking morbid thoughts about this. Your uncle was an old man; it was his time.”
“But it makes me think I should go and visit friends, as you said. We should see Harry and Ellen again soon, and perhaps go to London to see More and Margaret.”
“It would be convenient to have a London house, should we wish to visit the city. We can spend most of the year here, enjoying the garden in the summer, but the cold winter months here are isolated and bitter. That might be a time we choose to spend in London, closer to life and people.”
Thomasin sighed. “We should plan a visit to sort out Monk’s Place, if nothing else.”
Giles squeezed her tight against him. “You might find you enjoy going back. We could take Lettice with us, give her an introduction to London.”
“She would like that,” Thomasin agreed, “so long as we go nowhere near court.”
Her memories of Henry VIII’s court had been tainted by the royal separation, the grief of her former mistress and the ascendancy of Anne Boleyn.
“I think court will be too busy to bother with us, now that a prince is on the way.”
Anne Boleyn was finally with child, having entered into a secret marriage with the king earlier in the year. Letters from Giles’s friends had confirmed that she had assumed the position and title of queen, and that an elaborate coronation was being planned ahead of her lying-in.
“I cannot wish her well,” said Thomasin, recalling the many unpleasant altercations she had had with the second Boleyn sister. “I wish no one ill, but I cannot wish her well.”
“We will visit Monk’s Place, see this lawyer at Lincoln’s Inn and then head out to Chelsea to stay with More. No one will even know we are there.”
“You think so?”
“Why not? Write to More, give us a week or so, and we’ll be back here for high summer.”
Thomasin closed her eyes, but could not shake off the feeling of foreboding that was creeping into her mind.