All Fall Down by Sally Nicholls Page B

to treat someone who’s watched his mother die of the pestilence. But in the end I just watch what Alice does; brisk, loving, practical Alice, scolding the little ones when they pester him, softening Father when he asks too much, sending him away – “Go and fetch me some wood, Robin, won’t you?” when it’s obvious that our crowded little house is too much for him.
    He’s quiet and withdrawn those first few days, brushing aside my attempts to comfort him – “Not now , Isabel” – and going off alone to the archery butts, or the well, or the wood. Mag follows him around like a friendly puppy, curious about this strange, subdued version of her old friend. She brings him things to interest him – “Look, Robin, here’s the cheese that I helped Alice make. Look – these are our hens. Father made this hoe – look.” Robin tolerates her, which is more than Alice or I do.
    â€œSend her to me if she bothers you,” says Alice, but Robin shakes his head.
    â€œI don’t mind. She’s nice, Mag.”
    Father manages to sell Margaret’s cow to Edward Miller, whose cow and all his sheep died of the pestilence. We keep their chickens, but we put Margaret’s cockerel in the pot. No one wants a cockfight every day in their yard.
    Mostly, Robin’s out all day in the fields with Father and Ned. When he comes back, we don’t talk much. We just sit by the fire; me with my spinning, or my weaving, or my mending, him watching my fingers, watching the fireside, resting his head on my knee or my shoulder, quiet.
    â€œWas it awful?” I ask him, one day when he’s been living with us for nearly a week, and he gives a sort of shudder.
    â€œTell me,” I say, but he won’t.
    All he says is, “They go mad, Isabel. After a while. They don’t know who they are, or who you are. They don’t care that they’re lying there in their own blood and shit. It’s better, probably, that they don’t . . .”
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    Five hundred and fifty people live in our village, including Sir Edmund’s soldiers, and more – like the pedlars and the carters and the man who brands the sheep – who come through, stay a few days, and then leave.
    Today, as we stand at the back of the church, Father’s eyes look down, but Alice’s head is turning, counting the missing and the dead. Twenty-three dead this week. More missing. Edward Miller stands against a pillar with his arms crossed and his eyes closed. He lost his mother and his two children in the last week. The eldest was sitting by the fire, with her spindle. They didn’t even know she was sick. Her mother went out to bring in the chickens, and when she came back, she was dead. Amabel’s grandmother died just the same way.
This sort of death is the worst of all. Every morning when I wake up, I lie in our solar and wonder, Who died tonight? I touch Robin and Mag with the back of my hands, to see if their bodies are still warm. If Father and Robin are late home from the fields, I think, Perhaps they’ve fallen down dead . I feel all the time – every day, every moment – like I’m sitting under an axe, waiting for it to fall. I start at unexpected noises, at the sound of crying. I’m frightened, every minute of every day.
    I look around the church like Alice, seeking out bad news. Emma Baker is missing too. She’s not sick, but her husband is. The oven’s been out since he fell ill. One of his apprentices ran away when the pestilence began and the other’s mother is sick in Great Riding and he’s needed at home. I can’t think what will happen when John Baker dies. How can you have a village without an oven? What will we do without bread?
    The two smallest Smith children from the forge are here, but their parents aren’t. Their father is dead and their mother is home with the oldest boy, who’s sick. Alice turns her