Keturah and Lord Death

“Do they work on the road, Grandmother? I hear nothing.”

“They began work on the road yesterday, Keturah,”

Grandmother said, patting my shaking hand. “They will surely begin again after chores.” She made no reference to what had happened at Goody’s in the night, but she was gentle with me.

“But the mill, Grandmother? Do they rid the mill of rats?

Grandmother gazed out the window. “I see nothing from here.”

I set down my spoon. “Tell me, Grandmother, do you see Soor Lily’s baby son in the town?”

I closed my eyes and waited for her answer that seemed to come so slowly.

“Yes—yes, there he is, all brawny and fine. Why do you ask?”

“I—I heard he was unwell,” I said, and I smiled. “Thank you for breakfast, Grandmother, and for letting me sleep.”

She clucked and fussed with the dishes. “We must get you strong again in time for the fair.”

Grandmother left to visit Goody Thompson and be sure that she and the baby were well, and I sat by the window gathering strength from the sunshine. A nightmare clung to me like cobwebs. I brushed at the place where Lord Death had touched me, where it tingled still. I wondered that he had given me another day. It made me not glad. Somehow I felt myself even more bound to him by it.

I willed myself to think of Ben Marshall and prize-wi

As I walked, I saw that people were busy in their preparations for the fair. Men eyed one another’s cattle and fed their own oats and apples. In their yards women made cheese and molded butters and sausages with highly guarded recipes. But no one yet worked on the road. The stones stood in piles like ancient grave markers.

Young women laughed together in companionable competition over their fair offerings and fell silent when I walked by. Martha Hornsby, who had always had a kind word for me, did not look up from her jam-making as I walked past her summer kitchen.

The young men, rather than working on the road or ratting the mill, were building booths for the fair. Some glanced up when I went by, but their eyes did not linger as they once used to do. Wherever I went, a wake of silence followed.

Lord Death had told me that if Goody Thompson lived, it would not go well for me with the villagers. He had been right. Their fear of death was greater than their suspicion of fairies, it seemed. I did not dispute the fairness of their judgment. I knew what it was to think my heart safely nestled in its cage of bone, cradled in flesh, hidden and safe, and also what it was to suddenly and certainly know that Lord Death could reach his cold finger in and touch that heart, cause it pain, and still it. If I were friend to such a one, they thought, then I was no friend of theirs.

When I arrived at the mill, Miller said he was too busy to help me and made his apprentice do it, who trembled and got only half the flour into the sack.

“Barnabus Wren,” I said impatiently, “why do you shake so? Have you seen a ghost?”

“No,” he confessed, “but all the talk is that you have, Keturah. They say now that fairies didn’t steal you, but that you were saved by Death himself—that is what Goody Thompson says, and her man does not deny it.”

I looked at him a long moment. I did not even consider touching the charmed eye in my pocket. I could feel it moving even through my apron, my skirt, and my petticoat.

“That is Lord Death to you,” I said at last, and left him standing open-mouthed.

When I arrived home with my flour, Gretta was there working her needle. She turned and looked at me sadly.

“They know,” I said.

She said nothing.

“He warned me,” I added as I set to work on the pastry.

“Then you have indeed seen him again?” Gretta asked.

I nodded.

“Were you afraid?” Gretta asked.

I nodded again. I was silent while I worked the fat into the flour.

Beatrice came in, gasping for air, having just run the entire way up the hill. “Chores are done—I must go sing, but oh, Keturah, God has not made me into a boy and—”

“God has answered your prayer, Beatrice,” I said, and I fetched John Temsland’s clothes and handed them to her.

“Oh! Oh, thank you, Keturah! How did you . . . ? Never mind, I don’t want to know.” She hugged me, and then held me away with her arms. “You are trembling, and so pale—”

“It is nothing,” I said. “Dress. Go.”

“It is true, then, what they are saying? That you spoke to ... him last night?”

I nodded and eased myself into a chair and began working the pastry from a sitting position, the way I had seen Grandmother do of late. “I told him another story and again withheld the ending. He has given me another day. And with this day, God willing, I shall find my true love.” I did not speak of my other object—I could not bear to frighten my friends with talk of the plague.

“Who will marry her, now that everyone knows?” Beatrice asked Gretta.

Gretta glared at her a moment, then looked at me sympathetically.

“Do they all hate me?” I asked.

“My family speaks for you,” Gretta said.

“And mine,” Beatrice said.

Gretta took a deep breath. “But they are afraid of you,” she said, and Beatrice nodded.

“And Ben Marshall?”

“His mother has invited Padmoh to her home to teach her a kitchen trick or two.”

“She wants Ben to marry Padmoh,” I said.

“It might not mean that,” Beatrice said soothingly.

“Young John Temsland laughs at the talk,” Gretta said. “He says it is all tales and tattles, and besides, what could it hurt to have Death’s dear in our own midst.”

Again we all fell silent. I had added too much water and ruined the pastry. I put it in the pig’s basket and began again.

After a time Gretta said, “You must go to Soor Lily.”

“I have already gone to Soor Lily,” I said.

“No!” Beatrice exclaimed.

Gretta said, “I have heard unsettling things about her.”

“And yet she has warmed the heart of many a man to his lady,” Beatrice said. Gretta gave Beatrice’s arm a pinch.

“Look at Thermidor and Janie Lowneld,” I said. “Thermidor hadn’t a thought for Janie until Soor Lily gave her a charm. Now they are married and there was never a happier man.”

“Nor a more miserable woman,” Gretta said. Since I could not argue with her, I held my tongue.

“Beatrice, go,” I said. “Choirmaster will be waiting for you.”

She changed into the boys’ clothing and stood before us shamefaced.

“Beatrice,” I said, trying to summon a smile, “you will sing before the king, and surely you will win the king’s shoe full of gold and a wish granted. Then you must use it as a dowry for your own true love, who might be Choirmaster himself.”

Beatrice flushed and almost smiled, and then frowned. “I do not wish for a dowry,” she said cheerfully. “What good is a dowry for one who would rather have angel wings than a husband? No, you shall have Choirmaster. If my singing pleases him, I shall use my influence to help him see how he must love you.”

She turned to face the doorway, took a deep breath, and did not move. “Isn’t this a sin, friends, to dress as a man?”

“Not if you are doing it for your friend. And for the king,” Gretta said encouragingly.

“I admit I could desire to be of service to Lord Temsland,” she said nobly.

“That is so like you,” Gretta agreed.