The Painter's Apprentice by Charlotte Betts Read Free Book Online Page B

swaying enough without you making us seasick with your hopping up and down.’
     She pressed a lavender-scented handkerchief to her lips and sucked on a piece of candied ginger, hoping desperately that they
     would soon reach their destination.
    Cecily managed to sit still while they progressed past Charing Cross and then along the Strand.
    ‘We’re coming up to Fleet Street very soon,’ said Noah, ‘where Grandfather Cornelius had his apothecary shop.’
    Lady Arabella sniffed and her lips tightened into a thin line.
    The carriage began to slow its pace since there was a great deal more traffic now: drays and horsemen, carts and costermongers.
    Beth leaned forward to look outside, wondering where the apothecary shop had been. Except for one half-timbered building,
     all the houses and shops were newly built of brick and stone. ‘What a shame almost all the buildings burned in the Great Fire,’
     she said. ‘I should have loved to see the old apothecary shop.’
    ‘It was a mean little place with a narrow front,’ said Lady Arabella. ‘And I’ll thank you not to mention it to any of my acquaintances
     this afternoon.’
    ‘Don’t your fine friends know you came originally from Shoreditch?’ enquired Beth pointedly.
    Lady Arabella gave her a hard stare. ‘Unfortunately, as you grow older you become more and more like your mother, Beth.’
    The carriage became caught up in the press of traffic and finally jerked to a standstill behind a bottleneck of hackney coaches
     and a fishmonger’s cart.
    Samuel pulled down the window glass.
    Instantly their ears were assailed by the sound of angry shouting and the high-pitched squealing of pigs. Somewhere a dog
     barked itself into a frenzy and the hoarse, repetitive call of a knife-grinder carried over the whole appalling cacophony.
    Beth put her hands over her ears; she had never heard such a racket.
    ‘Welcome to the city!’ said Noah.
    Samuel slammed the window shut but not before the carriage was filled with the eye-watering odour of pig dung, stale fish
     and a swirl of sulphurous sea-coal smoke. ‘The pigs being driven to market are causing the delay,’ he said. ‘They’ve upset
     a fruit stall and the swineherd is quarrelling with the greengrocer.’
    ‘I told you we should have come by the river, Mother,’ said Joshua. ‘The streets are always hideously congested.’
    ‘And ruin my new shoes with mud from the public stairs at Paul’s Wharf?’ his mother replied.
    ‘Sir Christopher Wren told me that several architects drew up plans for a new city of London after the Great Fire,’ said Noah,
     ‘with fine, wide streets, which would have solved these continual obstructions. What a pity nobody listened to their suggestions.’
    Outside, the squealing of the pigs reached a climax and the swineherd bellowed at the top of his voice while he used his stick
     to prod his charges in the right direction.
    All at once the coach was rocked violently from side to side as the horses reared up, whinnying in terror as the pigs hurtled
     past.Lady Arabella let out a scream and snatched for the hanging strap.
    At last some semblance of order was restored and the carriage jolted forward over the cobbles again, resuming its swaying
     progress towards Ludgate Hill.
    There was a long queue of carriages outside Stationer’s Hall and the coachman had difficulty in finding a convenient place
     to stop. Finally he pulled up a little distance away, much to his mistress’s disgust.
    ‘I didn’t arrive in Sir George’s new carriage for no one to see it,’ said Lady Arabella as the coachman handed her down. ‘Noah,
     you may take my arm.’
    The street was crammed with a chattering crowd, all richly dressed. Beth thought she has never seen so much lace and silk
     and was startled to see the number of ladies who painted their faces unnaturally white and whose lips were as improbably red
     as a cherry. She felt very plain in her best Sunday dress; like a dove amongst richly