Such was my answer and I still think it was a good response, presenting complicated ideas in a simple way for her benefit, although I thought it unlikely she would understand. But, far from being grateful for my instruction, she continued to pursue me, leaning forward in her eagerness to dispute like a starving beggar who had been offered a crust.
“Jesus is our Lord. Do you believe that?”
“Yes.”
“Why?”
“Because His coming was in conformity to the predictions of the Bible, His miracles proved His divinity and His resurrection proved it still more.”
“Many people claim such miracles.”
“And in addition I have faith, and hold that to be better than all reason.”
“A more earthly question, then. The king is God’s anointed. Do you believe that?”
“If you mean, can I prove it, then no,” I replied, determined to keep my distance. “That is not a certain belief. But I do believe it, because kings have their position, and when they are thrown off the natural order is disturbed. God’s displeasure with England has surely been manifest in past years, in the suffering it has borne. And when the king was murdered, did not enormous floods demonstrate the disruption of nature that had taken place?”
She conceded this obvious point, but added—“But if I said these prodigies were because the king had acted traitorously to his subjects?”
“Then I would disagree with you.”
“And how would we decide who was correct?”
“It would depend on the weight of opinion of reasonable men of position and character who heard both propositions. I do not wish to belabor it or give undue reproof, but you cannot be called of position and character. Nor,” and here I made another attempt to switch the conversation to a more appropriate topic, “nor could someone so pretty ever be mistaken for a man.”
“Oh,” she said, dismissing my kindly warning to mind her own business with a toss of her head, “so whether the king is appointed by God, or justly a king at all, depends on the decisions of men? Is there a vote?”
“No,” I said, slightly flushed at finding myself apparently unable to halt this increasingly ridiculous encounter, “that’s not what I’m saying, you ignorant girl. God alone decides that; men merely decide whether to accept God’s will.”
“What’s the difference if we do not know what God’s will is?”
It was time to bring this to an end, so I stood up to give her a physical reminder, so to speak, of our respective positions.
“If you can ask questions like that,” I said sternly, “then you are a very foolish and wicked child. You must have had a very perverted upbringing indeed even to think of such things. I am beginning to see that your father is as evil as they say.”
Instead of being sobered by my reproof, she leaned back on her stool and let out a peal of laughter. Very angry now at being answered back in such a way, I left her, feeling a little shaken, and took refuge in my books and notes for the rest of the morning. It was merely the first of many occasions when she reduced me to such a display of foolishness. Do I have to say again that I was young? Does that excuse the way her eyes fuddled my thoughts, and the fall of her hair tripped my tongue?
2
I intend to break my own rule about propriety, and talk much of Sarah Blundy—it is necessary. I do not intend to cause distress by libertine discourse on matters of the heart, a subject which, as all but courtiers know, does not belong on the public page. But there is no other way of explaining my interest in the family, my concern over her fate, and my knowledge of her end. I must be regarded as a competent witness where my personal recollection is important, and therefore must provide proof of my knowledge. Words without fact are suspect—so I must provide the facts. They are simply stated.
At that time the Wood family was still in funds, and I lived in a house on Merton Street with my mother and sister, in which I kept the top floor for myself and my books. We needed a servant, as sluttishness had forced my dear mother to discharge the one we had, and I (having discerned the Blundys were in sore straits) suggested Sarah. My mother was far from happy about the idea, knowing something of the family’s reputation, but I persuaded her that she would be cheap, having resolved that I would make up her wages myself out of my small competence. Besides, I asked, what was so terrible about her? To this she had no specific answer.
Eventually, the thought of saving a ha’ penny a week brought my mother around; she consented to interview the girl and (reluctantly) conceded that she did indeed seem properly modest and obedient. But she let it be known that she intended to watch the girl like a hawk, and at the first sniff of blasphemy or sedition or immorality she would be out the door.
And so she and I were brought into close proximity, hindered, naturally, by the necessary distance that must exist between master and servant. Though she was no ordinary servant—indeed, she soon achieved an ascendancy in the house which was all the more remarkable for being largely uncontested. Only once was battle joined, when my mother decided (there being no man in the house except me, and my mother always regarding herself as the head of the household) to give the girl a beating, expecting that the child would submit placidly to her chastisement, as she ought. I do not know what the offense was, probably very little, and my mother’s irritability was more likely due to the pain she received from a swollen ankle that had afflicted her for several years.
Sarah did not think this was a good enough reason. Hands on hips, blazing with defiance, she refused to bend. When my mother advanced on her, broom in hand, she made it clear that if my mother so much as laid a finger on her, she would thrash her back. Thrown out the house instantly, you might think? Not a bit of it. I wasn’t there at the time, otherwise the incident might never have occurred, but my sister said that within half an hour, Sarah and my mother were both sitting in front of the fire talking, with my mother almost apologizing to the child, a sight never witnessed before or since. Thereafter, my mother said not a word against her and, when Sarah’s time of trouble came, it was she who cooked food for her and took it to the prison.
What had happened? What did Sarah say or do which made my mother so charitable and generous for once? I did not know. When I asked, Sarah just smiled, and said that my mother was a good and kind woman who was not as fierce as she seemed. More than that she would not tell, and my mother said nothing either. She always grew secretive when caught out in a kindness, and it may be that it was simply that, shortly after, her ankle stopped giving her pain—it is often the case that simple things like this can bring remarkable changes in demeanor. I often wonder if Dr. Wallis would have been less cruel had he been less afraid of the blindness that began to creep up on him in this time. I myself have been unreasonably offensive to my fellows when blighted by toothache, and it is well known that the mistaken decisions that ultimately led to the fall of Lord Clarendon were taken when that nobleman was wracked with the agonizing pain of the gout.
I mentioned that I occupied two rooms on the top floor, from which other members of my family were excluded. I had books and papers everywhere, and was constantly afraid that someone, in a misguided act of kindness, would tidy them up and set my work back by months. Sarah was the only person I allowed in and even she tidied up only under my supervision. I came to dream of those visits to my scholarly aerie and, more and more, I passed time in conversation with her. My room got dirtier and dirtier, it is true, but I found myself waiting eagerly for the tread of her footsteps on the rickety stair that led to my attic. Initially, I would talk about her mother; but that soon became a pretense to prolong her presence. Even more so, perhaps, because I knew little of the world and less of women.