‘What’s that?’ I said.
‘Some things to make you invisible.’
‘Are you setting up as an enchantress?’
‘Not of that kind. Open it.’
When I undid the blanket a tangle of clothes flopped out: plain brown jacket, tweed cap, coarse cotton shirt, red neckcloth, corduroy breeches, gaiters and a pair of that hybrid form of footwear known as high-lows, too high for a shoe and too low for a boot. They were all clean but had obviously been worn before.
‘Men’s clothes?’
‘Boy’s. It’s the next best thing to being invisible. Boys go everywhere and nobody gives them a second glance.’
‘I can’t wear these. It’s not decent.’
‘Why not? Women in Shakespeare are always dressing up as boys – Viola and what-was-her-name in the forest – and they all of them end up marrying dukes and things.’
‘Then why don’t you do it?’
For a moment, in my confusion, I’d forgotten I had my own risks to run.
‘Of course I can’t. Imagine if I were caught.’
‘And what if I were caught?’
‘You won’t be. In any case, you’ll make a much better boy than I should. I’d never fit into the unmentionables.’
I picked up the breeches carefully.
‘They’re clean,’ she said. ‘I saw to that.’
‘Where did you get them?’
‘My grandmother collects old clothes from the household for the vicar to give to the poor. She was pleased when I offered to help her. Do the high-lows fit?’
I slipped my feet into them. They did, more or less. Somehow the touch of the leather against my stockings made the idea more thinkable, as if the clothes brought a different identity.
‘Very well,’ I said. ‘I’ll try it.’
She put her arms round me and kissed me on the forehead.
‘Oh, you brave darling. You’re saving my life, you know that?’
I turned away and picked up the neckcloth, not wanting to encourage her dramatics.
‘You’ll go tomorrow morning, early?’
‘Yes.’
‘There’ll be a reply for me, I know. Leave a flower on the bench again when you get back, and I’ll find an occasion for you to give the letter to me. I must go now. Fanny will notice if I have bags under my eyes in the morning.’
Luckily there was nobody to notice my eyes when I got up at four in the morning because I hadn’t slept at all. The boy’s clothes were piled on the chair beside my bed and I puzzled my way into them by the first grey light of the day, not daring to light a candle in case the light or smell of it penetrated to the maids’ rooms downstairs. It took time because my fingers were shaking, but I managed at last to work out the buttons and to pin my hair up under the cap so tightly that it dragged at my scalp. I slid my arms into the sleeves of the brown jacket and put my latest report to Blackstone into a pocket. The lack of a mirror to show me what I looked like was one mercy at least.
I went barefoot down the stairs carrying the high-lows and sat down on the edge of the pump trough in the back courtyard to put them on. Though the household would soon be stirring, I hoped the servants would be too bleary-eyed and weighed down with their own tiredness to worry about anything else. And yet, when I took my first steps across the courtyard, the feeling was so exposed and indecent that I felt as if the eyes of a whole outraged world were staring at me. I missed the gentle movement of skirt hems against my ankles, the soft folds of petticoats. The roughness of breeches against my thighs seemed an assault on my softest and most secret parts. The high-lows were a little too large and, since Celia had not thought to steal socks as well, my feet slid around in them like butter in a churn. I tried to work out a way of walking that suited them, kicking one foot ahead and planting it firmly before moving the other. By this method I got myself through the archway and to the point where the drive divided, one part heading towards the bridge over the ha-ha and the front of the house, the other down the back road.
I sat down on the bank, plucked handfuls of grass and used it to pad out the high-lows so that my feet didn’t slip round so much. After that, walking became easier. I learned to bend my knees and swing my legs less stiffly, although it felt odd to look down and see brown breeches where there should have been lavender or green skirt. After a while, I was almost enjoying it and even pushed my fists into my pockets and tried whistling. When I passed the reapers and their boy on much the same part of the road as I’d met them before, the men hardly gave me a second glance, though the boy threw me a hard stare that might have been meant as a challenge. I dropped my eyes until they were well past.
It was full light when I arrived at the Silver Horseshoe. I waited by the gate until I saw Amos Legge coming out of one of the looseboxes and walked up behind him.
‘Good morning, sir. Any horses to hold?’
I’d been practising my boy’s voice as I walked along. A hoarse mumble seemed to work better than a boyish treble. He turned round.
‘You’d best ask … Well, I’ll be dankered. It issun May Day, is it?’
‘May Day?’
‘When the maids dress up for a lark. None of them made as good a lad as you, though.’
Rosalind in the Forest of Arden had poems written for her and stuck on trees. His compliment might not be Shakespearean, but it pleased me.
‘I thought it was in your mind,’ he said. ‘Only I didn’t know you’d do it. I’ll go and get the tack on her.’
‘Tack?’
All I’d intended was to give him my letter for Blackstone, collect Celia’s reply and go. Before I could explain that a big red-faced man came up to us.
‘Who’s that, Legge?’
‘Lad come to ride the new mare, Mr Coleman. Recommended especial by the owner.’
The man gave me a quick glance, then nodded and walked away.
‘Ride Rancie?’ I said.
‘That’s what you came here to do, isn’t it?’
In a daze, I followed him to her loosebox and helped him tack up. When he led Rancie out to the yard with me following, some of the lads were already mounting. I watched as they faced inwards to the horse and crooked a knee so that a groom could take them by the lower leg and throw them up into the saddle. When it was my turn, my legs were trembling so much that Amos must have felt it, but he gave no sign. He helped my toes into the stirrups and my hands to gather up the reins, and stood watching as the string of six of us walked out of the yard, Rancie and I at the rear. It felt oddly unsafe at first to be riding astride instead of side-saddle, but the mare’s pace was so smooth that after a half-mile or so I wondered why anybody should ever ride any other way. The fear began to fall away and something like a prayer formed in my mind.
Your horse, Father. Your present to me. I know it was not meant to be this way. I’d have given my whole heart for it to be different, for you to be riding her on this fine morning and I watching you. But since it can’t be different, I have this at least, perhaps for the first and last time. I haven’t forgotten my promise to nail that great lie they told about you. But this is here and now, and for you too and …
Oh