Meridon (Wideacre Trilogy 3) by Philippa Gregory

of that princely sum I had repaid him for my shirt and my breeches, and I wanted to buy a jacket for the winter too. I had no savings from my wages. He had paid out the pennies and when I had saved them into shillings, I had paid them back. I looked at Dandy; he paid her the odd penny for minding the gate and she still picked the occasional pocket. ‘Do you have any money saved, Dandy?’ I asked.
    ‘No,’ she said. ‘I had to repay Robert for the material for my riding habit. I still owe him a couple of shillings.’
    ‘We’re all treated the same then,’ William said with doltish satisfaction. ‘But you have a real pretty room of your own up the ladder.’
    He pointed to a rough wooden staircase without a handrail which went up the side of the stable wall. I checked that all the horses were safely bolted in, and then Dandy and I clattered up the twelve steps to the trapdoor at the top. It lifted up and we were in the first room we had ever owned in our lives.
    It was a bare clean space with two mattresses of straw with blankets in each corner, a great chest under the window, a fire of sticks laid in the little black grate, and two little windows looking out over the stable yard. The walls were finished in the rough creamy-coloured mud of the region, and the sloping ceilingwhich came down to the top of the windows was the underside of the thatched roof – a mesh of sticks and straw.
    ‘How lovely!’ Dandy said with delight. ‘A proper room of our own.’
    She went at once to the broken bit of mirror which was nailed to one of the beams running crosswise across the room and smoothed her hair back from her face. ‘A looking glass of my own,’ she breathed, promising herself hours of delight. Then she dropped to her knees and examined the ewer and bowl standing in lonely state on the chest. ‘Real pretty,’ she said with approval.
    I ducked my head to look out of the window. I could see over the stable yard and across the lane to the yard and cottage on the far side. Beyond them was a glimpse of green fields and the glitter of light on a broad river.
    William’s brown head appeared comically though the trapdoor. ‘Come for your tea,’ he invited. ‘It’s ready in the kitchen. You can bring your things up later.’
    Dandy rounded on him with all the pride of a property dweller. ‘Don’t you know to knock when you come to a lady’s bedroom!’ she exclaimed, irritated.
    William’s round face lost its smile and his face coloured brick red with embarrassment. ‘Beg pardon,’ he mumbled uncomfortably, and then ducked down out of sight. ‘But tea is ready,’ he called stubbornly.
    ‘We’ll come,’ I said and taking Dandy firmly by the arm I got her away from the mirror and the ewer and would not even let her stop to examine the great chest for the clothes we had not got.
    Our first two days in Warminster were easy. All I had to do was to care for the horses, to groom them and water them, and discover the boredom of cleaning out the same stable over and over again. Travelling with horses I had never had to wash down cobblestones in my life, and I did not enjoy learning from William.
    Dandy was equally surly when Mrs Greaves called her into the kitchen and offered her a plain grey skirt and a white pinny.She clutched to her red skirt and green shawl and refused to be parted from them.
    ‘Master’s orders,’ Mrs Greaves said briefly. She stole Dandy’s finery while she was sulkily changing, and took them away to be washed but then did not return them. Dandy collared Robert as he was inspecting the stable the same afternoon.
    ‘I warned you,’ he said genially. ‘I told you there’d be no whoring around this village. They’re God-fearing people, and my neighbours. You’ll cause all the stir you want at church tomorrow morning without being as bright as a Romany whore.’
    ‘I’ll not go to church!’ Dandy said, genuinely shocked. ‘I ain’t never been!’
    Robert glanced at me. ‘You