Mary Grey's Arc

Chapter 5 of 2

Roth's words settled over Mary like cold water. Go tonight, or lose him. She looked down at her grey silk travelling dress, still stiff from days of dust, and understood it was the last thing standing between her and the door she needed to reach. In these streets, the dress spoke before she did. It said countess. It said money worth stealing, or worth avoiding. "I cannot walk in this," she said. "You saw what happened. They close every door." Roth studied her, weighing something. Then he set down his cup. "Wait here." He was gone before she could answer. He returned within the hour with a bundle under his arm. He laid it on the table and unfolded it. A dark workday dress, patched at the elbow, its apron stained and torn at one pocket. Cheap wool, worn soft by another woman's labour. "A scullery girl at the inn," Roth said. "I paid her well. She asked no questions, which is the only kind of person worth paying here." Mary lifted the apron. The fabric smelled of grease and lye. Every fibre in her recoiled. For twenty years she had judged people by the cut of their cloth. Now the cut of her own cloth would betray her husband. "There is a room behind the kitchen," Roth said, turning his eyes to the window. "You may change there." She changed alone by candlelight. The buttons were plain bone, loose in their holes. She scrubbed the pins from her auburn hair until it hung dull and flat. She rubbed a smear of ash from the hearth across her cheek. When she looked at her hands, she saw they were still too clean, too soft. She pressed them into the cold ashes and did not stop until they matched the dress. Roth waited by the door. When she stepped out he did not bow. That, more than anything, told her the disguise held. "Keep your eyes down," he said quietly. "Speak only if spoken to. A tired woman going home draws no one." They walked out together into the dark quarters. No one laughed this time. No door shut. A man passed close and paid her no more mind than a lamppost. Mary kept her chin low and her steps heavy, and the streets that had barred a countess let a working woman through. Roth stopped at last before a narrow house near the river. A single window glowed. Inside, two men's voices rose and fell, sharp with anger over money. "That is his," Roth murmured. "The lower voice. He is here." Mary's heart struck hard against the borrowed wool. She had crossed half of England for this door. Now she stood at it, dressed as a servant, listening to her husband quarrel with a stranger in the dark. She lifted her ash-grey hand and knocked.