Tidelands

James was trapped with the Millers, watching Master Walter and Rob as they joined in the circle. The dancers laughed and twisted and turned as the fiddle ripped out an irresistible tune. Alinor knew that it was impossible for James to break free from his hosts and dance like his pupils. All the godly men and their wives had gone home as soon as dinner was over—a minister of the reformed Church should do nothing more than watch the first dance and then leave—but she could not stop herself thinking that perhaps he would come to her. For a moment, she fell into a dizzy imagining of him taking her hand and leading her into the circle. She thought of the swell of envy that would follow them, of the familiar flush of jealous rage on Mrs. Miller’s cheek, of how the young women of the parish would whisper behind their hands that of all the girls he could have chosen, of all the young wives he could have honored, of all the plump matrons who would have swooned as they took his hand for a country dance—of everyone—he led out Alinor Reekie, the tall, willowy, excessively beautiful Alinor Reekie, who cast down her eyes like a modest woman and then looked up and smiled at him like a woman in love.

Alinor was so absorbed by this reverie of social triumph that she had a little jolt of surprise when she saw James standing before her. The coincidence of daydream and reality overwhelmed her. She was certain that he had come to ask her to dance, that despite everything he would take her hands and, deaf to her whispered refusal, his hand would come around her waist and their steps would match. She gave a little gasp of delight and stepped towards him, her hand out, her eyes bright, her lips smiling a welcome.

But he was cold. “I will take Master Walter and Robert home now,” was all he said.

“You . . . don’t dance?” she stammered.

“Of course not.” He sounded stern. “And neither may you.”

“But I never do!” she protested. “I was never going to! I just thought . . .” She stepped a little closer. “You won’t stay?” she whispered. “Stay a little longer?”

He frowned at her and stepped back. “No. I certainly won’t.”

She was astounded. “What have you been hearing?” she demanded. “I know you were talking about me with Mrs. Miller. What has she been saying to you?”

He was wrong-footed, caught gossiping like one of the spiteful neighbors. “Nothing! She said nothing but what I knew already: that your husband has left you, that you find it hard to manage.”

“If she told you that I am unchaste it is a lie!” she said fiercely. “If she told you that her husband, Mr. Miller, favors me, then it is another. I never speak to him but in the yard before everyone! He never says a word but what everyone could hear. Is that what she said that makes you so . . . so . . .”

He was mortified that she had seen him listening, and had guessed what was being said. “She could have no influence on me. I wasn’t listening. I have no interest in village gossip.”

“She fears I will fall on the parish, but she is afraid of everyone falling on the parish,” Alinor said rapidly. “Her husband is church warden: he has to raise the funds for poor relief. It is her terror that they will have to provide for the poor wretches, the poor women—”

“Calm yourself. It doesn’t matter what she says—”

“It does matter! It does! It matters to me! She doesn’t care for anyone’s reputation but her own but if she told you she fears a pauper bastard from me then she is slandering me!” The tears started in her eyes, and she gave a little choked sob. “I have known her since I was a girl and she’s never had a kind word for me—”

“Hush!” he begged her. “Everyone is looking!”

He wanted to catch her in his arms and say there was no shame that could touch her. But far more he wanted to get away from her before she openly cried out. He wanted to be far away from this woman, engaged in some pointless fishwives’ squabble with her neighbor, weeping in public at a harvest home. A poor woman, with dirty fingernails, in a mud-stained gown, his friend’s meanest tenant, perhaps the chosen bawd of the manor’s steward, surrounded by her equally poor neighbors, who were all staring at him. Only the young people ignored them, whirling in a circle dance, Walter Peachey hopping about with somebody’s unsuitable daughter, as if there were no degree and order in the world anymore, as if the defeat at Preston had killed the proper distance between masters and men, between gentlemen and wretches, as well as the last hope of the royalists.

It was unbearable: “For Christ’s sake, be quiet!”

She froze at his oath, and shot him a horrified glance from under her drenched eyelashes.

“I cannot be watched,” he whispered urgently. “You know I must not be observed. I have to serve my cause. I cannot have people noticing me. I am going now. I cannot be seen with you while you are in this state. Everyone is looking at us. I cannot have you draw attention to me.”