Meridon. Philippa Gregory

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      Robert Gower came into the kitchen when we were at our dinner and took Mrs Greaves’s seat at the head of the table, a large glass of port in his hand.

      ‘Would you care for one of these, David?’ he asked, gesturing to his glass.

      ‘I’ll take one tonight gladly,’ David replied. ‘But I never drink while I’m working. It’s a rule you could set these young people, too. It makes you a little bit slow and a little bit heavy. But the worst thing it does is make you think that you are better than you are!’

      Robert laughed. ‘There’s many that find that is its greatest advantage!’ he observed.

      David smiled back. ‘Aye, but I’d not trust a man like that to catch me if I were working without a net beneath me,’ he said.

      Robert sprang on that. ‘You use cushions in your other show,’ he said. ‘Why did you suggest we try a net here?’

      David nodded. ‘For your own convenience mostly,’ he said. ‘Cushions are fine for a show which is housed in one place. But enough cushions to make a soft landing would take a wagon to themselves. I’ve seen a net used in a show in France and I thought it would be the very thing for you. If they were using the rings, and just hanging, not letting go at all, you could perhaps take the risk. But swinging out and catching, you need only be a little way out, half an inch, and you’re falling.’

      The table wavered beneath my eyes. I took my lower lip in a firm grip between my teeth. Dandy’s knee pressed against mine reassuringly.

      ‘I’ve worked without cushions or nets,’ David said. ‘I don’t mind it for myself. But the lad I was working with died when he fell without a net under him. He’d be alive today if his da hadn’t been trying to draw a bigger crowd with the better spectacle.’ He looked shrewdly at Robert Gower. ‘It’s a false economy,’ he said sweetly. ‘You get a massive crowd for the next three or four nights after a trapeze artist has fallen. They all come for the encore, you see. But then you’re one down for the rest of the tour. And good trapeze artists don’t train quick and don’t come cheap. You’re better off with a catch-net under them.’

      ‘I agree,’ Robert Gower said briefly. I took a deep breath and felt the room steady again.

      ‘Ready to get back to work?’ David asked the three of us. We nodded with less enthusiasm than at breakfast. I was already feeling the familiar ache of overworked muscles along my back and my arms. I was wiry and lean but not all my humping of hay bales had prepared me for the work of pulling myself up and down from a bar using my arm muscles alone.

      ‘My belly aches as if I’ve got the flux,’ Dandy said. I saw Robert exchange a quick smile with David. Dandy’s coquetry had lasted only as long as her energy.

      ‘That’s the muscles,’ David said agreeably. ‘You’re all loose and flabby, Dandy! By the time you’re flying I shall be able to cut a loaf of bread on your belly and you’ll be as hard as a board.’

      Dandy flicked her hair back and shot him a look from under her black eyelashes. ‘I don’t think I’ll be inviting you to dine off of me,’ she said, her voice warm with a contradictory promise.

      ‘Any aches, Jack?’ Robert asked.

      ‘Only all over,’ Jack said with a wry smile. ‘It’s tomorrow I’ll stiffen up, I won’t want to work then.’

      ‘Merry won’t have to work tomorrow,’ Dandy said enviously. ‘Why’re you taking her to the horse fair, Robert? Can’t we all go?’

      ‘She’ll be working at the horse fair,’ Robert said firmly. ‘Not flitting around and chasing young men. I want her to watch the horses outside the ring for me and keep her ears open, so I know what I’m bidding for. Merry can judge horseflesh better than either of you – actually better than me,’ he said honestly. ‘And she’s such a little slip of a thing no one will care what they say in front of her. She’ll be my eyes and ears tomorrow.’

      I beamed. I was only fifteen and as susceptible to flattery in some areas as anyone else.

      ‘But mind you wear your dress and apron,’ he said firmly. ‘And get Dandy to pin your cap over those dratted short curls of yours. You looked like a tatterdemalion in church yesterday. I want you looking respectable.’

      ‘Yes, Robert,’ I said demurely, too proud of my status as an expert on horseflesh to resent the slight to my looks.

      ‘And be ready to leave at seven,’ he said firmly. ‘We’ll breakfast as we go.’

       Chapter 8

      We went to Salisbury horse fair in some style. Robert Gower had a trim little whisky cart painted bright red with yellow wheels and for the first few miles he let me drive Bluebell, who arched her neck and trotted well, enjoying the lightness of the carriage after the weight of the wagon. Mrs Greaves had packed a substantial breakfast and Robert ate his share with relish and pointed out landmarks to me as we trotted through the little towns.

      ‘See the colour of the earth?’ he asked. ‘That very pale mud?’

      I nodded. There was something about the white creaminess of it which made me think of Wide. I felt as if Wide could be very near here.

      ‘Chalk,’ he said. ‘Best earth for grazing and wheat in the world.’

      I nodded. All around us was the great rounded back of the plain, patched with fields where the turned earth showed pale, and other great sweeps where the grass was resting.

      ‘Wonderful country,’ he said softly. ‘I shall build myself a great house here one day, Meridon, you wait and see. I shall choose a site near the river for the shelter and the fishing, and I shall buy up all the land I can see in every direction.’

      ‘What about the show?’ I asked.

      He shot me a smiling sideways glance and bit deep into the crusty meat roll.

      ‘Aye,’ he said. ‘I’d always go with it. I’m a showman born and bred. But I’d like to have a big place behind me. I’d like to have a place so big it bore my name. Robert Gower, of Gower’s Hall,’ he said softly. ‘Pity it can’t be of Gowershire; but I suppose that’s not possible.’

      I stifled a giggle. ‘No,’ I said certainly. ‘I shouldn’t think it is.’

      ‘That’ll give my boy a start in life,’ he said with quiet satisfaction. ‘I’ve always thought he’d marry a girl who had her own act, maybe her own animals. But if he chose to settle with a lass with a good dowry of land he’d not find me holding out for the show.’

      ‘All his training would have been done for nothing then,’ I observed.

      ‘Nay,’ Robert contradicted me. ‘You never learn a skill for nothing. He’d be the finest huntsman in the county with the training he’s had on my horses. And he’ll be quicker witted than all of the lords and ladies.’

      ‘What about Dandy and me?’ I asked.

      Robert’s СКАЧАТЬ