The Armourer's House Page 14

  A gardener-groom sort of person with a broad, cheerful grin appeared suddenly behind her, and went to the horses’s heads. Piers doffed his bonnet and swung down from his saddle and lifted Tamsyn down too, and Uncle Martin dismounted likewise. Peter and the horses disappeared up the court, and Mistress Bourdekin hustled everybody indoors, chattering all the time so hard that nobody, not even Uncle Martin, could get a word in edgeways. She took off Tamsyn’s cloak, and shooed them, as though they were chickens, into a long, lovely room, where the table was already spread with white damask and bright pewter, and a fire of sea-coal blazed on the hearth, and the panelled walls were decked with holly and ivy in honour of Christmas. Then she stopped and looked at them with her head on one side like a robin.

  ‘My good man is down at the Yard,’ she said, ‘but he’ll be home any moment now, and then he’ll be free for all the afternoon. You will be Master Martin Caunter. We have never met before, but of course I know you must be because one of you has to be, and it couldn’t very well be either of the other two, could it?’

  Uncle Martin bowed very gravely, though his eyes twinkled. ‘You are quite correct, Mistress Bourdekin; I am Martin Caunter,’ he said; and he presented and explained Piers and Tamsyn.

  Piers bowed, and Tamsyn spread her russet skirts and dropped her best curtsy; and Mistress Bourdekin returned the bow and curtsy with a crinkly smile, and said, ‘Come to the fire now, do, for ’tis cold enough to freeze your toes and fingers off, and you’ll have a cold afternoon, my poor chicks.’

  So they all crowded round the fire, and Tamsyn squatted down on her cold heels and held out her cold hands to the blaze, and Piers squatted down beside her, and held out his hands, too.

  ‘Glory! Doesn’t the fire feel good,’ said Piers.

  ‘Mmm!’ said Tamsyn. ‘Oh, isn’t this loverly.’

  And Piers looked down at her in his funny quiet way, but he didn’t say any more.

  At that moment Master Bourdekin came home for his dinner. He was as big and burly as Mistress Bourdekin was small and shrivelled, with a great hooked nose and a golden beard streaked with silver, looking a little like a Viking, but pinker and not so fierce. And after Uncle Martin and he had wrung each other by the hand and clapped each other on the shoulder a great many times, Piers and Tamsyn were explained and presented again, and made another bow and another curtsy. Then a pair of larded capons and a beautiful raised-pie steaming through a hole in its golden-brown pastry lid were brought in and set on the side-chest, and everybody gathered to their dinner. But before they sat down, Master Bourdekin said Grace. At least, it was not Grace exactly. ‘For all who go down to the sea in ships and occupy their business in great waters, that we on the land may sleep secure and eat when we are hungry, the Lord make us truly thankful,’ said Master Bourdekin.

  The raised pie was as good as it looked, for it was full of ham and eggs and pigeons and spice, all swimming in thick brown gravy that you had to sop up with crusty bread; and it was so hot and spicy and delicious that it seemed to go right down through Tamsyn until it reached her cold toes and made them all tingly warm again. Uncle Martin and Master Bourdekin talked about old times and new trade and ship-building, with their elbows on the table; and Piers sat listening to every word they said and almost forgetting to eat his dinner, although he was quite as hungry as Tamsyn; and Mistress Bourdekin chatted away to Tamsyn about Christmas when she was a little girl. And Tamsyn ate solidly, and listened to Mistress Bourdekin with one ear, and to Master Bourdekin and Uncle Martin with the other; so she was kept really very busy all through dinner.

  ‘Topgallant sails,’ Uncle Martin was saying, ‘and a laced bonnet to the mainsail. She’ll outsail any ship of the West Country.’

  ‘Topgallant sails, hey?’ Master Bourdekin replied, with a kindling eye. ‘In a hundred years from now there’ll not be a ship built that doesn’t carry topgallant sails; but today . . .’

  ‘When I was a little girl, good St. Nicholas used to leave a gilded walnut and a sugar-top in the toes of the pair of shoes I put out for him,’ said Mistress Bourdekin. ‘Always the walnut in the right toe, and the sugar-top in the left, and then the other things on top. One Christmas he brought me a doll with gold spangles on her kirtle and the most beautiful pink cheeks, and I loved her dearly, but my brothers dropped her down the well, playing at ducking witches, and though we fished and fished with a bent pin, we never got her out again.’

  After the raised pie and larded capons there was a great cake of gingerbread and queer, sweet, dried fruit in syrup; and after that Tamsyn was quite full. But Master Bourdekin and Uncle Martin were still drawing trade routes and designs of ships on the table-cloth with their fingers, and Piers was still listening with his chin in his hands and his eyes all bright and far-off looking.

  So Mistress Bourdekin rose and shook out her skirts and smiled at Tamsyn. ‘Let you and me go back to the fire until the menfolk have finished playing,’ she said.

  So they went back to the fire; and Tamsyn sat down on her heels, and they looked at each other. Mistress Bourdekin was not the least bit pretty, like Aunt Deborah, but her eyes were very merry, and her face changed all the time as quickly as the thoughts changed inside her head, so that it seemed to shimmer, and Tamsyn liked her tremendously. They talked about all sorts of things: about Christmas and ships and gingerbread and gardens; and Mistress Bourdekin told Tamsyn about her two sons who were grown up now and away at sea, but had done the most dreadful things when they were little, like setting fire to the apple-loft with themselves inside it, and pretending to be sickening for the smallpox when Cardinal Wolsey came to see the Dockyard, and frightening the poor man into fits lest he should catch it, because he had been rude about their dog. And Tamsyn told Mistress Bourdekin about Bideford and about her red tulip that was almost open, and about the time that Littlest grew a peacock’s tail.

  At last the menfolk pushed back their chairs and got up.

  ‘Now we had best be getting down to the Yard,’ said Master Bourdekin. ‘These winter afternoons close in so early, and there is a goodish lot to be seen.’

  So they all trooped back into the hall, and Mistress Bourdekin bundled Tamsyn up in the blue cloak with the orange-tawny lining, and then they all set off; and Mistress Bourdekin went in again and shut the door, for she was not coming with them. She could see the Dockyard any day she liked, and she was used to it.

  Master Bourdekin and Uncle Martin went first, still talking hard, and Piers dropped behind and took Tamsyn’s hand. They didn’t talk at all, because Piers seldom talked much anyway, and Tamsyn was feeling too excited inside; she was so excited inside that she gave a little hop every three steps. Excitement, and happiness, and magic, and things like that always went to Tamsyn’s toes, and made her hop. They turned left at the opening of the court, and there, right in front of them, was a gate in a high wall; a broad gate, big enough to let through the great wains that brought timber down from the forests to build the King’s ships; and they went through, and then they were really and truly in Deptford Royal Dockyard!

  ‘Oh!’ said Tamsyn. ‘O-oh!’ and then she didn’t say any more. The Royal Dockyard seemed very big, even bigger than the shipyards at Bideford, and from end to end and from wall to river, it was full of a great coming and going of seamen who sailed the ships and shipwrights and caulkers and smiths who built them; the clatter and ring of hammers on anvils and the rasp of saws sawing great oak trunks into ships’ timbers, and the mingled smell of rope and pitch and salt and woodsmoke was stronger than ever. There were huge sheds with narrow, white drifts of snow still lying against their walls, and a red line of bonfires burning rubbish, and high above the roofs of the sheds rose the tall masts of the King’s ships, towering into the sky.

  That was a very wonderful afternoon! Holding tight to Piers’ hand and occasionally treading on Master Bourdekin’s heels in her eagerness, Tamsyn explored sail-lofts and rigging-lofts and rope-walks. She saw the huge kilns where the timbers were boiled until th
e shipwrights could bend them to the curve of the ships’ sides; and the sheds where the tree-trunks were stacked to season for a year (for Master Bourdekin said that oak was not good for shipbuilding until a year after it had been cut). She saw great masts and spars being built of fir wood clamped together by iron rings, and the Dockyard sheer-legs, which was a thing for stepping the masts into ships after they had been launched. She saw a long shed called a mould-loft, that seemed as big as a cathedral, where Master Bourdekin designed every ship that was built in the Dockyard, drawing her deck-plan full size on the floor, very much as Piers had drawn the Dolphin and Joyous Venture on the floor of Kit’s Castle, and her side view and her stern view, from keel to poop-rail on the towering white-washed walls, so that the shipwrights under him could see the exact size and shape of every plank and timber. There was a great ship drawn out there now, and after they had looked at the drawings on the floor and walls, Master Bourdekin took them to see the ship herself. She was in a dry dock that had a thing rather like a mill-wheel at one end to bale out the water, for she was going to be a very big ship, five hundred tons burthen, Master Bourdekin said, and most of the big ships of King Henry’s Navy were built in dry docks. She was only a keel of elm timbers, and bare ribs of seasoned oak, yet awhile, but one day she would be a tall and stately man-of-war, with gold-work on her prow and stern, and guns between her decks to protect the new trade of England.

  But not all the ships in Deptford Dockyard were unfinished ones; there were others which had sailed the seas for years, and come home to be refitted or simply because they were not needed just now, and were made fast to the quays and jetties with what Master Bourdekin called a care and maintenance crew on board. And among these was the Mary Rose herself; the incomparable Mary Rose, which could outsail every ship of the King’s Fleet – even the Great Harry. And oh, she was lovely, resting like a swan on the grey water that caught the wintry light in its ripples and made shimmering criss-cross light-patterns along her sides. All her gilding was as joyous as marigolds on her proud stern and forecastle, for she had been newly gilded in readiness for the spring review, and her bare masts and spars loomed dark against the grey sheep’s-wool sky.

  Master Bourdekin had not told them that the Mary Rose was in the Dockyard; he had kept it as a surprise, so that he could enjoy their astonished faces when they saw how superbly beautiful she was; and when he spoke of her he did it in the sort of voice that someone might use in speaking of their Queen. For Master Bourdekin had built the Mary Rose, and he loved her the best of all his ships.

  But the ship that seemed loveliest of all to Tamsyn, and to Piers too, was quite a little one; and she was not even finished yet, but lay in the slips that sloped down to the water, with workmen swarming all round her. And she was so beautiful that Tamsyn’s heart went out to her the moment she saw her, and she could not say a single word, but just stood and gazed and gazed, while Uncle Martin and Master Bourdekin talked to the workmen.

  Presently Uncle Martin asked when the ship would be ready for launching.

  ‘In about a month’s time,’ said Master Bourdekin. ‘But by the time she has her masts stepped and her rigging complete, she’ll not be ready to sail before the spring.’

  Then he and Uncle Martin moved away to speak to a foreman; but Piers and Tamsyn stood quite still where they were, gazing up at the lovely ship, with all the bustle and noise of the Dockyard quite forgotten, so that it was just the three of them, Piers and Tamsyn and the ship, alone to themselves in all the world. There she lay, disdainful of the comings and goings all around her, her castles lifting above the slipway, and her bowsprit reaching out towards the open water, as though she was growing eager for the sea-ways in her sleep. For Tamsyn was sure that she was asleep, like the bare woods across the river; and in the first days of the spring she and the woods would awake, and the sap would rise in the trees and the buds begin to thicken, and the sails would break out from the bare masts of the ship, and she would sail away. She was lovely now, in her winter sleep, so lovely that it hurt deep down inside you to look at her, but she would be a hundred times lovelier when the spring came. Tamsyn knew the ways of ships, she had seen them so often at home before she came to live in London, and she knew how this ship would rise and curtsy to the seas, and how her sails would fill and she would heel over gently into the wind, as she sped down river and away across the world.

  ‘Oh, Piers!’ she whispered at last. ‘She’s like the Dolphin and Joyous Venture.’

  And Piers said in a queer, hushed sort of voice, ‘I’d give all the world to be aboard when she sails, and feel her lift as the sea takes her.’

  Then Uncle Martin and Master Bourdekin came back; and Uncle Martin put a hand on Piers’ shoulder, and said, ‘Isn’t she a beauty?’

  ‘Yes, Uncle Martin,’ said Piers.

  And Master Bourdekin stopped looking at the ship, and looked hard at Piers instead. ‘You are not going to sea, hey?’ he asked in an abrupt sort of way.

  Piers’ nose went white under his freckles, and he said, ‘No, sir; I’m apprenticed to my father – he’s a swordsmith.’

  ‘A pity,’ said Master Bourdekin. ‘You are a likely looking lad, and you have the love of ships and the sea in you. And there’s never been a time like this for English seamen.’

  Piers said, ‘I know, sir,’ rather quickly.

  And Master Bourdekin looked at him harder than ever, pulling gently at his golden beard, and demanded, ‘Then why aren’t you going to sea?’

  ‘My eldest brother was drowned two years ago, and of course I have to take his place and follow my father’s trade,’ Piers told him.

  Master Bourdekin went on pulling his beard. ‘Ah,’ he said, ‘I suppose there is no help for it, then; but ’tis a pity, a great pity.’

  But Uncle Martin was a hopeful person, and he protested. ‘Don’t croak, John. Nothing is ever certain in this world, and the bad things least of all.’ Then he gave Piers’ shoulder a little shake. ‘Never you forget that, my lad, and never you forget that there’s a place for you aboard one of my ships, if ever the days comes when you can take it.’

  ‘It’s – it’s very good of you, sir,’ said Piers. ‘I’ll not forget.’

  But Tamsyn knew that he didn’t believe for an instant that that day would ever come.

  It was time for them to be getting back, for already the light was beginning to fade and the milky sparkle was gone from the river. So after one last look at the ship that was so like the Dolphin and Joyous Venture, they turned back the way they had come. Tamsyn and Piers still walked hand in hand behind the other two, and Tamsyn looked back regretfully many times before the lovely ship was hidden by sheds and lofts; but Piers never looked back at all.

  When they got to the Master Shipwright’s house again they found the candles were already lit, and Mistress Bourdekin hustled them all into the warm room where the holly sparkled on the walls and the fire blazed half up the chimney, to toast themselves and eat sugar-bread and dried apricots while the horses were brought round. She wanted them to stay to supper, but of course they couldn’t do that because of the long ride home.

  Then they heard Peter bring the horses round, and they all trooped outside again, and Mistress Bourdekin bundled Tamsyn up in her cloak once more, and kissed her on the top of her head. (She didn’t usually like being kissed, but she didn’t mind Mistress Bourdekin.) There were goodbyes and hand-clasps and bows and curtsies and Thank-you-very-much-for-having-me’s; and Uncle Martin mounted his horse and Piers lifted Tamsyn up behind him and then swung into his own saddle; and then Uncle Martin was leaning down to shake hands with Master Bourdekin once more, and Mistress Bourdekin, who had been standing in her lighted doorway, kilted up her skirts and came darting out again to whisper to Tamsyn, ‘Come and see me again one day, sweetheart.’

  ‘I will,’ said Tamsyn, leaning down as far as she dared, from the high pillion saddle. ‘Oh, I will!’

  Then they really were off, leaving the Master Shipwright and
Mistress Bourdekin waving after them in the yellow light that streamed out from the open doorway across the snow.

  ‘Goodbye,’ called Piers and Tamsyn and Uncle Martin. ‘A Merry Christmas to you!’

  And, ‘A Merry Christmas! Goodbye! Goodbye!’ called back Master Bourdekin and his wife, until they were round the corner and clattering up the street towards open country.

  It had grown quite dark while they were in Mistress Bourdekin’s candle-lit parlour; and when they were clear of the town, and Tamsyn turned to look back, the lights of Deptford shone golden among the snowy fields, and beyond them the riding-lights of the ships sparkled against the furry darkness of the woods across the river.

  It seemed a very long way home, but it was not nearly so cold as it had been when they rode out in the morning; and suddenly, just short of Southwark, Tamsyn felt something like a tiny ice-cold feather settle on the tip of her nose.

  ‘Here’s the snow!’ she cried.

  So they rode through Southwark with the first flakes of the Christmas snow drifting all about them; and through it shone the golden windows of coopers selling great yule logs and chandlers selling Christmas candles, and shops of every kind all lit up and decked with evergreens and full of gay and festive things for the hurrying crowds to buy. The windows of St. Mary of the Ferry glowed rose and saffron, green and crimson and azure as they rode by, and the sound of singing drifted out to them so faintly that it was as though the carved saints and gargoyles high above them in the spire were singing, instead of real people beyond the glowing windows. The city was still full of a great hurry-scurry that would go on for hours yet, but it was all very silent, and getting more so every moment, because the sounds of hooves and feet and the rumble of cart-wheels were all stilled by the soft white carpet of snow that was being spread in the streets.