The Alice Tree part 3
Freed from secrecy, Alice spent several hours in tree form that day, and returned in full health. At nightfall it was decided that she should have Crispin’s caravan, and that Crispin would sleep in a tent. Alice retired early, having not spoken a word the entire day, but Crispin sat up by the fire with his grandmother.
‘Are you angry at me for bringing her here?’ he asked after a long silence.
The old woman stared deep into the heart of the flames. ‘No,’ she told him. ‘Alice is dear to all of us. I am merely worried for her - and for you.’
‘You have no reason to be.’
‘I am worried,’ she said, ‘because you love her. I have seen it for many years, but I always hoped it would pass. I fear you will be hurt beyond repair, Crispin. You know you cannot have her.’
Crispin stiffened. ‘I can’t deny it,’ he told her. ‘I have loved her for a very long time. But I do not see why I can’t have her. She must be able to see how much I care for her now, even if she couldn’t before. She loves me as a friend already, perhaps she will grow to love me as a man now.’
‘Oh, Crispin.’ The Elder shook her head, ‘Do you not see how she grieves over her husband? She will not look at another man, it is not in her nature! And even if she did, she is not one of us.’
‘You made her! Without you she would not exist!’
The Elder squeezed his arm, calming him down. ‘I know that. But she is not one of us. She will not stay with us, you can be sure of that. And you know the rules for what happens to anyone who marries outside of gypsy stock.’
Crispin stood, his face black as thunder. ‘Damn the rules,’ he spat, and stalked away.
*
Lying in his tent, Crispin could not sleep for thinking of the conversation with his grandmother. At long last he came to a decision and, leaving the tent, approached her caravan. He felt almost sick with apprehension.
He knocked softly, and a small voice called ‘Come in.’ He took the first words she had spoken in over four-and-twenty hours as a good omen, and entered to the sight of her lying in his bed, her hair loose.
‘Crispin,’ she seemed surprised. ‘Are you ill?’ She climbed out of bed to face him, her features etched with concern.
‘I am well,’ he told her. ‘It’s you I worry for, Alice. I know you are a married woman, and that your heart must ache for William, but please… I want to ease that ache.’
Alice’s eyes filled with tears at the mention of her husband’s name, but her brow furrowed, ‘I don’t understand.’
‘I know you don’t,’ Crispin sighed, reaching out to take her hand. His heart beat fast, but he could not stop now that he had started. ‘You’ve never understood how I loved you. Not only as a friend, but so much more. Alice, if you will take me I am yours. I know I can’t fill the hole in your heart, but perhaps I might stopper it a little.’
He cupped the back of her head with his hand, and bent slowly towards her. For a second their lips brushed, before Alice pushed him away. ‘I cannot,’ she whispered. ‘Oh Crispin, I have loved you for so long. But we could have never been together as man and wife, and I pledged myself to William. I cannot have him, but I must still do my duty. I cannot be unfaithful.’
Crispin nodded. His stomach squirmed with the pain of rejection, but his face was impassive. ‘I see. You have my apologies, Alice. I thought perhaps… but no, it was stupid of me. Forgive me for disturbing you.’
Alice haltingly touched his hand, ‘Don’t apologise. I wish to God that I could have you, but you know it cannot be. And now I need my friend, Crispin. I need him more than ever.’
Sighing, Crispin pulled Alice into a brotherly hug. ‘I know, sweet. We will forget this?’
‘Yes. Thank you.’
They embraced again, and Crispin left to spend the rest of the night nursing his heartache in private.
*
William returned home three days later in high spirits. His business had gone well, and he had spent several very reasonably-priced hours in the company of a few extremely obliging young women. And so it was with some surprise that he saw what sombre faces greeted him. Mrs Miller in particular looked as though she had not slept in days.
‘What’s all this?’
Mrs Miller burst into tears. ‘We sent you so many messages,’ she sobbed, ‘but none of them found you! You were not in your usual hotel, nor in any of your offices!’
‘No, I wasn’t,’ William told her, fighting his growing exasperation. ‘There were many last minute changes of plan. Tell me - what has happened?’’
‘Your wife is away with the gypsies!’ she wailed. After much commotion, William finally heard the whole story of how a trio of scoundrels led by a young man had come to the house the very day he left, and how his wife - seemingly much changed - had left with them shortly afterwards.
It took William only a moment to come to a decision. ‘Matthew, bring me my fastest horse and my sword,’ he ordered. ‘I follow at once.’
***
The gypsy clan had been travelling for several days, and were still a day’s journey from any village. As evening drew in they stopped to make camp. Alice, though still morose and grieving, was making an effort to earn her keep and helped the Elder peel vegetables whilst Crispin tended his horses. Nothing more had been said of his night-time visit to her, but now and again she caught the way he looked at her and her heart went out to him. ‘A sorry pair we make,’ she thought to herself, ‘both yearning for people we cannot have.’
She happened to glance up, and saw a small cloud of dust some way away. ‘Ma’am,’ she addressed the Elder, ‘is that a rider approaching?’
The Elder peered into the distance, ‘Yes,’ she answered, ‘and at speed.’
The figure was now close enough to distinguish his features. Alice gasped. ‘It is William!’
‘Into my caravan,’ the Elder ordered. ‘And fast!’
Alice ran and hid, crouching behind the door so she could listen. It was only a few minutes before she heard hoof beats outside the caravan.
‘Can I help you, sir?’ asked the Elder.
‘Yes,’ came the reply. ‘You are the gypsies who used to camp near my wife’s former home. She is with you now, is she not?’ His words were slurred and heavy with drink.
‘No sir. It is true I used to know your wife before she married, but I have not seen her in many moons now.’
‘Do not lie to me!’
Alice clamped a hand to her mouth. The pain and anger in his voice made her spine creep. Peeking through a crack in the wood she saw William holding the Elder by her hair. It looked excruciatingly painful, but the old woman did not buckle.
‘Let go of my grandmother.’
He was out of sight, but Crispin’s tone was as cold as ice. It was all Alice could do not to cry out. ‘Crispin, no,’ she whispered.
‘I will do whatever I please until you return my wife to me!’ William shouted, but he let go. ‘Get out of my way, rogue. You and your filthy kind bewitched her away from me, I should run you through.’
Crispin’s voice was calm, but it crackled with tension. ‘I will do no such thing. She came away with me of her own accord. Now I stand to protect her.’
Alice screwed her eyes shut, but she heard the sickening crunch of flesh hitting flesh, and Crispin’s groan. With a cry she burst out the caravan, ‘Stop!’
Crispin was lying on the ground, a purple bruise blossoming on his cheekbone. William stood over him, sword drawn. Alice ran and shoved him away, ‘Leave him! Please, William!’
Reluctantly, he sheathed the sword. ‘So it is true,’ he said, his voice burning with anger.
Tears streamed down Alice’s face as she looked into the hatred in her husband’s eyes, ‘It is true that it was my decision to leave, but not because of that! There are things you don’t know about me which prevented me from staying. If you promise to carry on loving me and to keep my secrets, I will tell you everything and then I can come home. Please, William. Please.’
William regarded her coldly. ‘I do not love you,’ he said at length. ‘Your money has come in very useful, but I have no use for a lying whore. You have made a mockery of my name, you deserve to rot with these dogs!’ He slapped her hard around the face, the noise ringing through the cold evening air. ‘I owe you nothing.’
Dizzy with pain and shock, Alice watched as he spat before mounting his horse and riding away. Her whole head span. Hazily she watched as her legs began slowly to shimmer and change.
Crispin, recovering himself from the blow William had given him, was the first to realise what was happening. He gripped Alice’s hand, forcing her to look at him. ‘Alice, sweetheart, no. Please.’
Her eyes filled with tears, ‘I don’t think I can stop, Crispin,’ she whispered. ‘I can’t live in this world anymore. There isn’t a place for me.’
‘No, no.’ He leaned his forehead against hers and brushed her cheek with his fingertips. ‘There’s room for you with me, Alice.’
‘I wish…’ her voice was almost too quiet to hear, ‘I wish I could have stayed with you, Crispin.’
‘I know, sweet,’ as he continued to stroke her cheek he felt her skin begin to roughen, ‘I wish it too.’
She looked into his eyes one last time, ‘I love you Crispin. Watch over me.’ Then her eyelids closed and she spoke no more.
As he watched her skin began to stretch and her body twisted. Her fingers, clawing the earth, became root-like. In a matter of moments she was gone, a serene silver birch taking her place. All that was left of the girl were her torn and tattered clothes, lying forgotten on the grass.
*
Crispin stayed. He sat under the branches all night and when, come morning, she did not transform back he resolved to stay as long as it took. In his heart he knew she was gone, but he could not accept it, and so for three days and nights he sat under the Alice-tree, having his grandmother bring his meals to him there and sleeping under a blanket at night. On the evening of the third day the Elder brought him his meal, and stayed as he ate it.
‘She is not coming back, Crispin,’ she said gently. ‘Her only comfort now is in the earth. The Alice you knew is gone.’
Crispin reached out a hand to touch the nearest root. ‘I know, Grandmother. But I will not leave her alone.’
‘And so you will live here? A tree lives longer than a man, Crispin. Much longer.’
Crispin looked deep into the Elder’s eyes, ‘I know.’
She saw his choice, and a tear slipped down her cheek. ‘I cannot change your decision, can I?’
He shook his head sadly, ‘I love you Grandmother. But no, you can’t. I am ready now.’
An hour later she returned to him with her wooden potion bowl, the very same from which Elizabeth had drunk all those years ago. ‘To speed you along,’ she said simply. Greedily he drank its contents, then embraced his grandmother and bid her leave him. She went to bed, taking with her the image of her grandson sitting calmly against the trunk of the Alice-tree.
Early the next morning the gypsy camp silently moved on. They left behind them two trees: a silver birch, standing beautiful and delicate, and a strong oak protecting it from the harsh wind.