Slammerkin - Emma Donoghue [107]
Anger came up in Mary's chest like heartburn; if she'd had a knife in her pocket, it would have been in her hand by now. But she opened her eyes and saw how old this man was. How much he needed to punish her: not for the clap, nor the money, but for the night on a stinking mattress in Coleford when she'd played the virgin and fooled him into feeling young and dangerous again. 'Please, sir,' she said with difficulty. 'Please. I need to keep my place.'
He folded his arms more tightly. 'I've thought of a way you could repay me,' he offered.
'Yes?' she asked, curious. Maybe she would get to hold on to the money in her pocket after all.
He nodded towards a little group of drinkers in the darkest corner of the inn. 'There was a traveller asking for a girl, tonight, and I told him there was no one since Sally Mole.'
Mary met his level gaze, waiting for it.
'Sally used to take them to a room over the stable.' He jerked his head. 'The stairs are round the back.'
He just wanted to humiliate her. She should have known.
'A shilling a go to you, the same to me,' he added lightly. 'At that rate it wouldn't take you too many nights to pay off the pound you owe me.'
Mary allowed her lip to curl. She took enormous pleasure in scooping the coins out of her hanging pocket and sliding them across the sticky bar. 'You're too kind, but there's no need. Here's your money, Reverend.'
His eyes went wide with surprise. She picked up her lantern and Mrs. Jones's cider and stalked out.
Daffy was leaning against a post with his hands in his pockets. He watched Mary emerge from the tavern; the door banged shut behind her. Her colour was up; it must have been the heat from the fire.
When she caught sight of him she leapt, and almost spilled the cider. 'My god, man, what are you doing skulking about here?'
'Waiting for you,' he said, slightly offended. 'It's a dark night; I thought you could do with company home.' He took the lantern from her and opened the glass to trim the flame.
'Why, thank you, then,' said Mary, almost meekly. She took his elbow before he offered it, and they set off up Grinder Street.
He tried to think of an interesting topic of conversation to propose, but for once his mind was entirely blank.
'That's not a bad alehouse your father runs,' Mary remarked.
Daffy let out an inarticulate puff of contempt.
'You don't think so?'
When the words came they were like a swarm. 'It's the same as it was in my grandfather's day, and his granda's before him,' he told her. 'The man hasn't expanded, or improved, or so much as whitewashed the place in twenty years!'
'Would you?'
She had a way of cutting to the meat of things that took him aback. He thought for a moment, then said, 'Probably not. Pulling pints is a low business, whitewash it or not.'
'Lower than being a manservant?'
He flashed her a look, but she was only teasing. 'That's my father's argument,' he told her. 'He still thinks I'm going to crawl home in the hopes of someday owning that sodden barn. He says no son and heir of his should follow another man's orders. But what he doesn't see,' Daffy added eagerly, 'is that my aims are high.' The girl's smile was wide and shiny. He felt tempted to go on. 'I'm more an apprentice to Mr. Jones than a mere servant, you know; I made most of that last pair of stays for the Widow Vaughan myself.'
'Did you really?'
'And I've done a couple of very plain pairs for a Quaker family. Besides, trade will expand with the town, it's sure to. We get more visitors of quality every winter; Monmouth is becoming the regular stopping-place after Bath. I tell you, Mary, one of these years there'll be a sign hung up that says, Davyd Cadwaladyr, Master Staymaker!'
She was laughing, a low gurgle in her throat. He flung her arm away from him as if it were a snake. She stopped in her tracks, there, at the corner of Inch Lane.
'Mock all you like,' he said, his voice ragged.
'Oh, Daffy, I wasn't laughing at you,' the girl