I didn’t know what to say. She had spoken softly and gently, her voice caressing me as she spoke the words of her father; so quiet, so kind and, I realized with a start, so profoundly evil. I began, very faintly, to understand how it was done and what the appeal of this Blundy was. If a mere girl could be so seductive, what must the man have been like? The right to eat—no good Christian could object. Until you realize that what this man desired was the overturning of the right of masters to command their employees, the theft of property from its owners, the hacking at the very roots of the harmony which binds each to all. Quietly and kindly, Blundy took these poor ignorants by the hand, and led them into the power of the devil himself. I shuddered. Sarah looked at me with a faint smile.

“The raving of a lunatic, you think, Mr. Wood?”

“How can anyone who is neither a fool nor a monster think otherwise? It is obviously so.”

“Coming from a family of lunatics, I see things a little differently,” she said. “I suppose you think my father used ordinary people for his own evil ends. Is that it?”

“Something like that,” I said stiffly. “That it was devilish was attested by the eating of babies and burning of prisoners.”

She laughed. “Eating babies? Burning prisoners? What liar said that?”

“I read it. And many people have said so.”

“And so you believed it. I am beginning to doubt you, Mr. Historian. If you read there are beasts in the sea that breathe fire and have a hundred heads, do you believe that too?”

“Not unless I have good reason to.”

“And what does a learned man like yourself account a good reason?”

“The proof of my own eyes, or the report of someone whose word can be trusted. But it depends on what you mean. I know that the sun exists, because I can see it; I believe that the earth goes around it because logical calculation concludes that, and it is not contradicted by what I can see. I know that unicorns exist because such a creature is possible in nature and reliable people have seen one, even though I have not myself; it is unlikely that fire-breathing dragons with a hundred heads exist because I cannot see how a natural creature can breathe fire without being consumed. So it all depends, you see.”

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.