The AltoBy Meltha
Abelard
1600: London, EnglandFor several years, Abbie made her living as a pickpocket and petty thief in London, evading capture by the law and beatings from more established criminals through a remarkably quick wit. She slowly grew to have a reputation for being as hard to catch as a July snowflake. She never grew tall, though in that age few people did, and if a situation became too dangerous for her she simply drifted away in the crowds of the London slums.
But this arrangement wasn't to last forever. While a street child might possibly eek out an existence as a minor nuisance for a while, at long last there were only two places he or she could end up. One was in a pauper's grave at the local churchyard, without a stone since no one ever bothered to learn the names of the orphaned dead. Death for the young was a common outcome. If any one of a thousand diseases in the filthy city didn't catch hold of a homeless child, then the freezing cold in winter or hunger that was never truly assuaged would do the job. When nature didn't visit a quick end on those of Abbie's ilk, a violent death usually lurked around the corner. Drunken knifings, senseless beatings, and the so-called administrators of justice claimed a high tide of victims, as did the strange unknown that dwelled in the shadows and fed upon those no one would miss.
Abbie, however, simply refused to die. After she survived the measles, no other serious disease seemed willing to touch her. She'd lived long enough among plague and pox that if she was going to have them, she would have, and she didn't. For such a small child, she had an extraordinary constitution. When the gales of winter came, in spite of her thin clothes and often bare feet, she stubbornly wouldn't freeze. If at night she had to break into a house and sit by the embers until dawn like an unmoving shadow, departing in haste at the first sign of the inhabitants' rising, she did. During the days, she would find some shelter in the cathedrals or taverns, doing her best to look as though she had some business in the place for as long as she could before moving on to her next stopping point, never loitering so long as to draw attention to herself.
As for violence, she'd seen and been the victim of her fill, but she had learned quickly which places to avoid for fear of the worst cut throats or the law, and her appearance was meant to make her blend in, making her a much less obvious mark. Abbie had the gift of being one of those who drew no trouble on herself because she drew no attention. However, much of that hinged on something she was beginning to have trouble hiding.
It was actually the measles that had first done it just after she left the Worthshires. Within days, her fever had been so high that she had slipped into unconsciousness. An old couple had happened upon her form in an alleyway, and, since she still had the appearance of a servant, albeit not a particularly well cared for one, they took her home with them and nursed her in hopes of a reward. Both had already had measles and had no fears of getting it again, so there was little to lose and possibly much to gain. While it was actually a wonder that their ignorant brand of care, which including bleedings with dirty knives and homemade concoctions with ingredients that could have made most well people ill, Abbie slowly came out of her delirium.
The girl had awoken from her fever to find herself in a strange bed, and the hushed voices in the corner were discussing greedily how much gold they might get in exchange for healing her and returning the errant servant to her household. Out of the frying pan, into the fire, Abbie thought in irritation. She had sense enough not to move, and when the elderly couple went to sleep, intent upon asking the sheriff the next morning whether any wealthy family had reported a runaway scullery maid, she crept silently from her bed. She noticed two things immediately. The first, which hit her forcefully quite literally as she and the floor collided, was that she was still extremely weak. Thankfully, the two adults, who were perhaps half-deaf with age, slept on in the next room. The second, which was revealed when she grabbed her head from the sudden dizziness of the fall, was that her hair had been cut off short due to the fever.
It was then that her eyes fell on a stack of clothes sitting in a mending basket near the fire. Lying on the top were a threadbare shirt and pair of pants that must have belonged to the old man, and an idea hit her as quick as lightning. In a flash, her old frock and apron were off and burned in the fireplace, and she dressed quickly in the man's clothing. She ran unsteadily out the door, going as fast as her unhappy legs would carry her, until she was far from the "charitable" couple.
Pausing to rest, she saw a horse trough outside a nearby inn, its surface illumined by a lantern hanging over the door. She peered carefully at her dim reflection, and her fevered gaze was returned by that of a young boy-a pale, rather small and skinny boy, but definitely a boy, she thought.
For almost six years she had kept up the charade very well, dressing in stolen boys' clothes and going by the name Abelard, which she had heard a storyteller mention in a tale at one of the Worthshires' feasts. She found the inside joke most amusing. Her disguise saved her from a multitude of scrapes, keeping her from the countless dangers that tended to kill off or maim a girl on the streets, and she had no fears of rape. Her days and nights were spent with as much safety as any street waif could have.
However, six years had changed her from a gangly, frail, shapeless child into a young woman, and what was worse, she didn't seem to be destined for homeliness. Strips of cloth were becoming of little avail for tying in her figure, and she had to concentrate very hard to keep her voice, which was taking an alarmingly sultry turn of late, from sounding too feminine. Her time was nearly up.
It was mid-September when it happened. Abbie was sitting at the Three Oxen tavern, a mug of ale bought with ill-gotten money in front of her, when she had the prickling sensation that she was being watched. In short order, the owner, a squat man with a face like an angry mule's, wove in and out of the patrons towards her.
"Man over there wants to talk with ye, Abelard," he said with a nod towards a figure half-hidden in shadows.
Abbie weighed the possibilities carefully. Strangers were always risky propositions. On one hand, he could be offering her a job, looking for a hired hand to help with a bit of theft. It wouldn't be the first time she'd been offered such an opportunity, and the pickings had been terribly slim of late. Her next meal was completely in doubt. On the other hand, this could be some sort of trick. Still, it was a public eating house. If trouble was likely, she could easily raise an alarm, and the poker next to the fire would be a handy weapon should her trusty knife strapped in her boot fail to get her out of things.
Cautiously, she made her way to the man, taking the seat opposite him.
"What've ye to say to me? I've not got the whole night to be wasting," she said in a voice that she hoped was convincingly low enough.
The man, a rather oily-looking specimen with a grizzled beard and black hair that was starting to show gray, unexpectedly grinned and slapped his thigh as he laughed heartily. "Aye! It's so! I don't see how I was blinded to it afore this."
Abbie blinked in alarm and drew back instinctively.
"Nay, don't rear back like a frighted horse... a mare, as the case may be," he said in a voice that didn't carry to the other tables.
"I've no idea what you mean by that," she started hoarsely, but he silenced her with a look.
"No lies, Abelard, if that's the name ye choose. I do believe yer mother must have give ye a most different appellation, but that's neither here nor there," he said smoothly but with a hint of warning, and her heart nearly stopped with the fear that her secret was known at last. "Ye know who I be?"
"Nay, I know you not."
"Most call me Martin," he said in an unconcerned voice. "I've had the greater part of my dealings a bit farther south than here, but I'm still well known in London."
Abbie gave him a hard look. "Known for what?"
"Running Cupid's less pure affairs, as we call it to them what call on us," he said without a show of embarrassment. "I be the proprietor of one of the finest leaping houses on the Thames. Ye know what a leaping house is, Abelard?"
"I'm not so much a fool as that," she said in annoyance, "and if this conversation is taking the turn I see that it is, I've no use for ye," she added as she got to her feet before a hand tightly gripping her arm forestalled her.
"Stay a bit. Let me lie before ye my thoughts, and then shall ye make up yer mind, Abelard," he said firmly as he directed her back into the chair, "that is, unless ye wish me to rip that jerkin off ye before this whole assembly and give them an eyeful of most unmanly flesh as they'll not likely forget again."
She wasn't frightened; she was too furious for that.
"Come now. This is no way to behave. Listen to what I say, for I believe ye'll see the truth of the matter as I set it forth. I'm not over fond of lies, though useful they can be."
She glared at him across the table, willing his head to spontaneously catch fire.
"Ye're quite right. I'm offering to ye a place in my business, provided you clean up somewhat. My girls have naught to fear of hunger or cold, and I treat them right well," he paused a moment, "for whores. We'll not play with words, for that is what they be. T'is indeed what I'm suggesting for ye, Abelard. But the ladies what work for me, they're clothed well and sleep safe. Can ye say that for yerself?"
"Aye," she spat. "I do well enough on my own."
"Mayhaps so," he agreed, "for now. But what in a year's time? Two? What will become of ye then, eh? I've seen through ye. Twill not be long before others notice as well, and do more than notice once they pierce through yer most transparent disguise. Ye know I speak plainly. Think on it. Ye haven't to decide now. If ye choose well, ye'll see me in Crescent Street under the sign of the blindfolded Cupid."
He rose from the table, putting down a few coins.
"Yer ale is paid for with my gold. Health to ye," he said as he gave a stilted mock-bow then left her sitting by the fire with a sinking heart.
This was, of course, the second option open to children of the streets. Boys could escape that fate through a trade or by becoming one of the long-term thieves or worse. But for girls, either death or prostitution would end their days. There were no other roads to travel, and she had realized this long ago.
Two months passed, and in that time she had stolen only enough for a handful of decent meals. Her stomach complained loudly throughout the nights, and the hunger pains were worse than any she had felt before. Winter was coming on, and her boots were growing thin at the sole. When December came, she'd be barefoot once more. It wasn't as easy for her to find her way into a warm kitchen anymore, and she had more than one very close scrape with being caught. Still, none of this was enough to make her run to Crescent Street. But there was something that was.
It was mid-afternoon on a chill day in late November when she was striding down the street, her path preparing to take her past two tinkers' carts. The men were fat and goitered about the face, their eyes reddened even at this time of the day with drink. Normally, she would have taken another route upon seeing men who gave her such violent shivers down the spine, but the only other road that could take her to her destination was infested with the law this day. She had no other choice.
"Hey, there, Jakes," said one of the tinkers as he saw her approaching. "That one there. There's somewhat strange in him. What make you of him?"
Jakes leaned against his motley collection of pots and pans and stared a good long while at her nearing form, but eventually smiled in an altogether unwholesome way back at his fellow tinker. "George, I'd bet my last teeth that's no boy. If the jaunt in the hips would not convince ye, then those merry bobblings a bit closer to the sun would. He's a she is what she is."
Jakes laughed, a sound rather like an animal's snarl. "Aye, I agree with ye. I see it now. However, might it not be worth our while to satisfy curiosity, check to see if we be right or no, eh friend?"
It was just then that Abbie was level with the carts. She was employing her oldest trick, pretending she didn't exist and was of no consequence. This time, though, it was a grave mistake. Her downcast eyes left her vulnerable, or else she would have noticed the hand that was poised to grab her before it could strike, but she didn't.
In a flash, she found herself grasped around the waist by the nearest man, held tightly against his filthy waistcoat by his much stronger arms, her own hands pinned behind her back in the act of reaching for her concealed knife.
"Let go of me!" she called roughly, but surprise had betrayed her by making the timber of her voice entirely too womanish for comfort.
"Aye, we will, young missy," said George in a prurient tone. "In good time. We're just after knowing if our eyes deceive us or not."
It was "missy" that terrified her into a stupor. They knew. In spite of the clothes and the bindings, they knew. The charade was over. For a long moment, she felt as though she were outside herself, watching the faces of the men who were leering at her, knowing that this was how it would always be.
It was Jakes's hand clumsily pawing at the topmost lacings of her tattered jerkin that brought her back to herself. She hadn't survived alone on the streets for six years on pure luck. With her blood boiling in fury, she brought her knee up solidly, connecting hard with the vitals of her would-be attacker. As Jakes doubled over in pain, George's mouth went slack in shock, and he absent-mindedly loosened his grip on her arms. She lifted her foot and slammed it down on George's left boot, causing a spasm of pain to shoot up his leg and crumpling him to the ground, leaving her quite free.
With one fast kick to the face of Jakes, who was beginning to recover himself, she ran down the street for all she was worth, leaving the two tinkers behind her in the grime of the gutters along with any sense of safety she possessed.
For a miserable night and a day, she wandered the city, remaining in the shadows, her brow knitted in consternation. Everything had gone topsy-turvy. While the tinkers might keep their mouths shut to spare themselves the embarrassment of publicly admitting they'd had their backsides kicked by a lone woman, it wouldn't be long before there were others. A girl with no family or friends to go to for aid had few choices. She had tried to appeal to the charity of the churches, the kindness of the people, the conscience of the law, but what help was given was small, and that was given with a great show of reluctance.
That night, she found herself outside the doors of a building in Crescent Street that bore a painted Cupid in a blindfold above the door. For a moment, she thought whether she would rather take her place among the beggars on the Thames and die with them in the winter, but then she decided against it, at least for now. Death was always available.
She put out a hand that shook in spite of herself and knocked on the door with a sound that was surprisingly loud in the nearly vacant street. It was Sunday, the one day of the week when this part of the city wasn't full to bursting with people either offering or buying forbidden pleasures, and she was silently grateful for the coincidence of arriving today.
After a short wait, the door opened. A woman stood behind it, older than Abbie, short and rather plump.
"We're not open for business upon this day, young sir," she said, revealing a missing tooth in her upper mouth. Her voice was roughened by drink in the same way that Abbie had heard many times in the taverns she frequented. "Get ye gone. Ye may return tomorrow, if ye have the money for what's within."
"Nay," Abbie replied. "I'm not... there's... I'm here to see Martin." Her voice was tense, and her face strained with embarrassment. "My name is Abelard."
The woman looked at her appraisingly for a while, and then held the door open a bit wider.
"Get ye inside, then, and blame me not if he tans the hide off ye for being an arrogant pup," she said, none too sure if this thin fellow really had business with the master of the house or not.
Abbie paused for a moment as the woman turned her back and went off down the hall. She was more aware of the feel of the cold stone of the doorstep under her worn soles, and the wind cut through her thin clothes sharply. She knew this was the moment when an absolute decision must be made. If she passed into this door, she would become another one of the prostitutes held inside those walls. If she remained outside, her life would be measured, most likely in weeks. One last time she wracked her brains, trying to see another solution, but there was none.
She took a deep shuddering breath, looked at the stars overhead as though she expected this to be the last time she would see them, then followed the woman inside.
Martin was sitting in a small room off the main hallway, counting over the proceeds of the week. A small sack of gold lay upon the table, and he was entering the amount in a ledger book that stood upon a wooden stand.
"An Abelard to see ye, Martin," the woman said. "He would speak with ye."
Martin's eyes immediately left off the book and went up to the small figure in the doorway.
"Aye. I knew as you would be coming here one day. They found ye out at last, and ye've come to me as I suggested should be done?"
She nodded, doing her level best to keep her chin from shaking and making her eyes meet his. "Aye."
He made a sound halfway between a grunt and laugh, then turned to the other woman, saying "Moll, what say you to young Abelard here joining up with the rest of the girls?"
Moll blinked at this. "We've never done fellows in the crew before."
"T'is not a fellow, are ye, Abelard?"
"No, sir," she replied slowly.
Moll tutted loudly. "Had me fooled. What shall be done with the likes of her, if that's what she is?"
Martin seemed to ruminate on this a bit before coming to a decision. "Hast e'er had a bath?"
"Aye," she said uncertainly. "Nigh eight years hence. I'd fallen in the pig sty and reeked most sourly."
"Well, ye'll be having one again this night. Moll, send Jane to the pump and set much hot water on the kitchen fire. The two of ye are to scrub our Mistress Abelard here til the color of her skin is seen."
"Aye, Martin," she replied with a grunt, none too pleased at the work this would entail, and herded the person in question into the kitchen.
Abbie was rather flustered and unsure of herself, unsure of the prospect of bathing, and most unsure that Moll wasn't planning to drown her in the water when it would arrive. At length, Jane, who turned out to be just a few years older than Abbie, had a fairly pretty face, and wore a dress of oddly-shaded scarlet cotton, brought in bucket after bucket of water from the pump, splashing half of it into a large cauldron that hung over the fireplace and the other half into a wide tub that stood before it. It wasn't long before a thin steam was rising off the surface of the heated water, and Jane and Moll together poured it into the tub.
"There," said Jane, testing it with her elbow. "Tis not so hot as to burn, nor yet so cold as to chill."
Abbie glanced around the room nervously, not quite certain what was expected of her.
"Your clothes, you goose-egg! Off with them!" cried Moll in annoyance.
Abbie gave a single, hard nod, then quickly began unlacing her jerkin. It didn't take her long to undress, and in short order her clothes lay on the kitchen floor. Both Moll and Jane exchanged surprised looks.
"Well, ye be a female, and no doubt of it at all," Moll said in a slightly impressed tone. "T'is a wonder how ye managed to hide that amount of flesh."
Jane tilted her head, gazing at Abbie in the same way some of the old women in the marketplace looked at vegetables to decide which to buy. "Ye're a mite thin, though. Get you in the tub, then."
It turned out Jane needed to go out for yet more water as what she'd brought rapidly turned black with the industrious application of washcloths and soap. In fact, the bathwater was dumped and replaced no fewer than three times in the next hour and a half. At the end of that time, a remarkable transformation had occurred.
When Abbie stepped from the bathwater, she was cleaner than she'd ever been in her life. Her skin was revealed to be a creamy white and remarkably soft given the life she'd led, glowing in a surprisingly ethereal way beneath the candlelight. Her hair turned out to be a warm, sunlight-colored blonde, which had surprised all three of them. It curled slightly above her shoulders from the damp, showing the promised of waving into a charmingly tousled cap of tresses. Granted, it was much shorter than fashion warranted, but what it lacked in quantity was more than made up for in quality, and time would supply the lack.
"Crikey," said a male voice from the doorway, and Abbie quickly ducked behind the tub, the others laughing at her show of modesty. "T'is a most marvelous change. I should as well be gazing on Venus rising from her bath."
He walked the length of the room to her, grabbing her arm and hoisting her to her feet. She shook slightly in humiliation as he walked a wide circle around her, taking the view of her from all sides.
"Never seen the like, and that says much. Lie not to me, as I told you before, for I'll know. Are ye a maid?"
She bit her lip slightly before finding her tongue. "Aye. I'm untouched."
"T'is well. Ye'll fetch a most handsome price from the man to first have ye. Well, girls, fix her up with a dress for the night and burn those foul clothes of hers. On the morrow, we shall decide how to best display her charms to advantage in raiment. Abelard... bah, that name pleases not. What is the name ye were given at birth?"
"My full name is Abigail, though I was called Abbie," she answered as levelly as she could considering she was standing naked in front of three other people, one male.
Martin shook his head in disgust. "Nay. Sounds like some prunish old harridan. Ye're a rare beauty, and ye'll need a name what gives that air to ye. Something rich and elegant. Something that'll make them want to buy. Something..."
He slapped his hands together loudly in a sudden burst of thought, making all the other occupants of the room jump.
"T'is simple. I'll call ye as I first though of when I saw ye without grime. Yer name shall be Venus. Moll, see to it that tomorrow ye go to market and buy several yards of white cloth and make a dress out of it like unto those seen in pictures of the old Romans. We've a goddess amongst us!" He sauntered over to Abbie, his eyes moving over her nude form as he did so, and he put one hand out to touch her cheek. "Ye belong to me, now, girl. I am yer master. Behave well and ye've naught to fear."
His hand drifted down her throat and came to rest possessively on her collarbone, a thing Abbie was none too fond of. She might have sold herself, but she didn't have to like the greasy haired, rather smelly man before her, she told herself.
"I shall look forward to taking ye to my own bed once yer sold and broken. Ye'll bring a pretty penny from yer first night's work, but I'm near tempted to forego it this night for my own pleasure. Fare you well til the morrow," he said in her ear, then roughly kissed her lips, pushing his tongue forcefully into her mouth as he did so. He then abruptly left the room for his own apartments.
She shuddered in disgust but controlled the bile rising in her throat until she had put a nightdress over her head and been shown to her own bed. It wasn't until the door closed behind her with a loud click and she was quite alone that Venus vomited forcefully into her chamber pot, her body wracked with silent sobs.
A.N.: In Medieval France, Peter Abelard was the lover of Heloise. Her uncle found out about the two of them and had Abelard castrated.