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Chapter Two - What I found in the cottage

His name was 'Jules.'

We found that out later in the day - I hadn't thought to ask, but he'd told us when Henry had continued to call him, 'Mr. Frenchman.' It must have been a Frenchified name, cause it sounded funny, but then Robbie remembered that there was a Mr. Julian Crowe that had passed through Shillingworth last year, so that was close enough.

The story in the book was just like he'd said - there was a lot about people getting their heads cut off and escaping from prison and things like that. Henry and Peter took to tussling now and again when there was a part they didn't much like, usually when Lucie was talking to Sydney Carton, and they would act out some of the fighting parts of the story even when there weren't really fighting parts.

Jules didn't seem to mind. He stopped reading to explain when Cherry or Robbie didn't understand something and reminded me to check on Em when she got tired of rolling the apple off the step and followed a butterfly off to the bushes. I would have noticed she was gone myself, but for the way the story went - it wrapped around my thoughts and made me all dizzy, like the cordial Mama gave me when I had a bad cough or the sniffles. That and it was very hard to follow the words printed on the page as Jules' finger moved past them. But if I concentrated real hard, I could manage well enough to start to make out the real sounds of the letters.

It was only when Jules stopped reading that I woke up from the story. He looked down at me and asked, "Polly, could you get me a drink? There's a bottle on the table inside--"

I'd jumped off the bench almost before he'd finished talking, feeling my cheeks go red for not thinking - of course he was thirsty, he'd been reading to us for forever! "I'll get it," I answered, then looked around for Em. She was pulling up blades of grass and using them to cover her apple.

"I'll watch Em," promised Henry. He'd just finished another wrestling match with Peter and moved closer to Em. "Jules, what's that thing you said, about people breaking up a cart and putting it in the street? Why would they break up a cart? Wouldn't they get in trouble?"

"Grownups never get in trouble," countered Robbie.

"It's called a 'barricade.' They'd break up carts, furniture, and used paving stones to make a wall of sorts, something to hide behind, to block off the streets from the soldiers."

"Our soldiers would never do something like that--"

I was half-listening to Henry as I walked into the cottage, but I stopped dead inside the door. The shutters had been just pulled, so inside it was mostly dark, but I could still see. And what I saw!

There was no fireplace or hearth like any other crofter's cottage, but a black metal stove, bigger even than the one in the schoolroom in town. The earth floor had been replaced with wood and over that was a carpet that looked softer than a baby chick's down; my bare feet sank into it as I headed toward the table. The candles there were beeswax - not tallow - and smelled like clean laundry. There was a bottle, as Jules had said, and a glass, and a basket of apples and bread and cheeses, some of which smelled awful funny, and real china plates and china cups, not even earthenware.

And there were books. More books! And paper and a pen and inkwell. There were drawings, too, like the pictures from schoolbooks, of buildings and things that didn't make much sense to me.

A popping sound startled me and I looked up, breathing hard, but it was only a coal in the stove. Beyond that was a wooden screen strung with silk that had a picture sewn into it, like a sampler but prettier and made with such stuff that it was shining in the few shreds of light that passed through the gap in the shutters. One time I'd looked in the tailor's window and there'd been something like that cloth on the table - the parson's sister had been buying it. I had wanted so much to walk over to it, to touch it and see if it felt as slick as it looked . . . .

But there was the bottle on the table and a glass and Jules was thirsty. So I pretended that my hands weren't shaking as I pulled the cork from the bottle and poured the liquid into the glass. It was a dark red and smelled like bitter-root, with that sharp smell like papa's malted beer. I touched my finger to it and tasted it, then spit it out and wiped my sleeve across my mouth - if that's what the French people had to drink, no wonder they wanted to go to war with us and steal our beer!

I took the glass in two hands and walked back to the porch, trying not to notice how soft the rug was beneath my feet, or think about how rich Jules would be to have such things. Were all French people rich like that? I wasn't sure I should ask him such a thing and mama had always told me not to say things if I wasn't sure about them.

Outside was so light that I stood in the doorway and blinked into the brightness. I heard a sound beside me - Jules was putting the book down on the bench as he looked at me. I held out the glass to him with both hands, afraid that I might drop it. He took it from me with a very soft, "Thank you," but he looked at me instead of the glass and he didn't drink from it right away.

My mouth was suddenly dry, drier even than his might have been from all that reading, and the burn from that red liquid still sat on my tongue. "We have to go home now," I heard myself say," stepping out into the dirt and grass and grabbing up Em by one arm. "We've got chores. Robbie, you'd best get Cherry home."

It was a feeling of not belonging that had struck me suddenly, a feeling that I shouldn't be in that place with rich things and that the others had better not either. Maybe Jules was French and maybe he wasn't and maybe he was born well above us or maybe he was a thief and had stolen it all . . . it wasn't for me to say. I just knew that wasn't a place we should be. Even with the books.

Oh, the books . . . .

"Don't go," said Jules, setting the glass on the bench and rising to his feet. At least, he tried - I saw him reach out for the cane, cause his leg looked a little stiff and he winced as he tried to put his weight on it. "Not yet - we haven't even finished the first book."

Em had started squalling as soon as I took her arm. I tugged her to her feet and then picked her up - she was pretty heavy for being three, but I managed. "We have to go," I said again, over the protests of Henry and Peter, while Robbie tried to rouse Cherry Louise from a nap.

"But you'll come back?"

I hadn't been able to look at him, but there was something in his voice, the same sort of tone Em used when she was scared of walking in a spot in the cottage where the firelight couldn't reach or that I'd heard from Henry when Peter had told him he'd be caught for poaching and hanged for taking the game hen. It was scared and sad and sorry and made me think of mama wrapping her arms around me and telling me that this new schoolteacher couldn't last forever. Perhaps Jules didn't have a mama. Perhaps he was too old, or his mama had died, like had happened to Peter's mama two winters back.

"We'll try," I said, trying not to promise because I was afraid and yet very much wishing that I could. There were those books sitting on the bench, so many books, and the sad sound in his voice . . . .

"When?" He was on his feet now, leaning on the cane. "Tomorrow - could you come back tomorrow?"

"Can't we, Pol?" asked Henry eagerly. "There's more story - you can tell cause there's more book there. And if we get chores done early--"

He'd glanced at Peter, who added, "Yes, we can get done quick enough if we set our heads to it. And I can help Robbie and you can help Cherry if you get yours done."

I had started to back away, Em wriggling in my arms, not able to look Jules in the eyes - I was still too scared about the room with the soft carpet and the stove and the shining screen. "Maybe."

Jules reached behind him and picked up the book he'd been reading to us. He slid it between Em and me, so that it wouldn't fall. "There - take it and look over the part I read today. Then you can bring it back tomorrow and we can continue."

The book was heavy and smelled of new leather. Em twisted around to get her hands and - I feared - her mouth on it, so I had to put her down and juggle the book so it wouldn't fall in the dirt. I was suddenly aware that my hands weren't clean and yet I was holding the book. "I can't."

"Of course you can." Jules was smiling, retrieving Em's well-used apple to occupy her as he nodded toward me. "You can all come back tomorrow."

The only real thing was the soft leather of the book cover beneath my fingers. I tucked it under my arm, heard myself say, "All right," took Em's hand, and started off at as fast a pace as her little legs could manage. I didn't think to thank him or say anything more. There was only the book in my hand and, when I turned my head to see him sitting again on the bench, a sad look on his face as we left him.

"Wait'll I tell my grandpa," said Henry, as we hurried past the hedges and up to the stone bridge over the rill. "There's a Frenchman at Shillingworth and he didn't even know!"

"Maybe he'll get his sword," said Robbie, with wide eyes. "Do you think he'd try to kill Jules?"

Cherry covered her mouth with her hands, blocking off a little cry, as she stopped still in the dirt path. "Oh no! Pol, you mustn't let them hurt Jules!"

We all stopped. The cottage was hidden around a bend and by the edge of the orchard, but each of us turned in that direction, as if we could still see it.

"She's right, Pol," said Peter solemnly. "Henry's grandpa's still pretty angry about the 'loo. And my da' doesn't like the French much either. If they found out Jules was here . . . ."

We pondered the problem. "Somebody must know that he's here," I said, "because Papa said the land agent had the Morse cottage fixed and the squire's son came out to check on it."

"Maybe the land agent fixed the house for the squire's son or for one of the house staff. That's where old Morse had come from, after being groundskeeper all those years." Henry put his hands on his hips and glared at me. "Maybe he's not supposed to be here. Maybe he's a spy after all. And don't say he can't be a spy, Pol, cause he's French and he could be."

"He could be hiding," said Peter, picking up a blade of grass from along the edge of the road and twisting it in his hands as he stared down at it. "Maybe they were chasing him and he hurt his leg and that's where he's hiding until he gets better. Couldn't that be what happened?"

They were looking at me, all except Em, who was trying to climb the side of the rock bridge to see over into the rill. I lifted her up to stand at the top of the stone and held her around the waist while I thought about the problem. I was the oldest - I had to find an answer.

"It might be better if we didn't tell anyone about Jules being at the cottage," I said, after a long pause. "Em won't say anything. I can hide the book. And we can just say we were out at the orchard, 'cause that's true, we were. It wouldn't really be lying."

Peter was usually the hard head - if he didn't think of an idea, it couldn't be any good. But even he nodded in agreement. "I suppose we could ask Jules tomorrow. But what're we supposed to do if he's a spy, Polly? We'd have to tell somebody, wouldn't we?"

And even as I admitted that as good and loyal subjects of the Queen, we'd have to tell somebody . . . I knew we'd have to find a way to help Jules escape first.

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End of Chapter Two

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