Sally Gardner

I, Coriander

Something changed in my mother after the silver shoes arrived. She seemed worried and would not let me out of her sight. Then another strange thing happened. I was playing in the garden. The roundheads were trying to catch me so I had hidden out of sight under the garden bench: I had to, because I was a royal prince disguised as a girl. It was a good place to hide. No one knew I was there, not even the Roundheads, and this way I got to listen to all sorts of grown-up conversations, my mother having many friends and visitors who cam to ask her for advice and remedies.
  Honestly, I had no idea that the heart could cause such trouble and strife. It could be broken and still mend. It could be wounded and still heal. It could be given away and still returned, lost and still found. It could do all that and still you lived, though according to some, only just.
  Mistress Patience Tofton was one of the visitors. I had not been listening that much until I heard the name Robert Bedwell. Then my ears pricked up, because I often played with his sons. They lied just down the river from us in Thames Street. He must, I supposed, have had a wife once and the boys a mother, but I had no memory of her.
  Patience Tofton was all words and tears.
  'He will be wanting a wife of letters,' she wept bitterly, 'a younger wife than me. I am too long a spinster.'
  That was the silliest thing to say. Why, Master Bedwell was no spring chicken himself. He would be pleased to know that Patience Tofton, who was pretty, with fair hair and all her own teeth, should like him at all.
  I peeped out from under the bench. My mother was talking to her kindly and softly, her words lost to me, and she kissed Patience on both cheeks.
  'It will be all right, then?' asked Patience, getting up to leave.
  I leapt out from my hiding place and said, 'Of course he will marry you! Do not take too long about it. Your two children are keen to be born.'
  After I said it I though perhaps I should not have. It took Patience Tofton by surprise, I can tell you. She went greenish white, then fainted, falling like a bush that had been chopped down.
  I went into the house, thinking it best to disappear until I heard the click of the garden gate. Then I looked out of my bedchamber window to see Master Bedwell helping Mistress Tofton home.
  Later that day my mother came and sat on my bed.
  'What made you say that to Patience?' she asked.
  'I know not,' I said, for in truth I did not. 'I just know that she will marry Master Bedwell on Midsummer's Day and they will have a son and a daughter.'
  'That is all?'
  'Yes,' I said, giving it some thought. 'Well, that much I feel certain about.'
  'Coriander,' said my mother, looking into my eyes, 'you are like me. But remember, you must keep your thoughts away from your tongue.'
  'I will never say another word about any of the thoughts I have tumbling in my head,' I said apologetically.
  'That would be a pity,' laughed my mother. 'Let us agree that you can tell them to me and your father and Danes, but no one else.'
  'So can I have the silver shoes?'
  'No, Coriander. Believe me, they are not the right shoes for you.' She sounded so sad. 'I had shoes like those once. I walked in them for seventeen years. I want you to have different shoes, shoes of your own choosing, not shoes that will take you where you should not be going.'
  'But they are of my choosing,' I cried. 'I want them.'
  'Oh Coriander, you are not old enough to understand,' said my mother. 'You must trust me. I know what is best for you.'
  But what could be better than the silver shoes?

In our family much was made of the anniversary of my birth, and I was given presents to mark the day. This year my mother had arranged for us to take our barge upriver.  I woke early on the day and lay in bed as the sunlight reflected water shadows round my chamber, listening to the street criers as they made their way to the bridge. As soon as the watchman called the hour I ran down the corridor towards my mother and father's bedchamber. I felt like a stop spinning with excitement.
  'Today is my day! Wake up!' I cried. I pulled back the drapes on the huge oak four-poster bed and jumped into the middle of it.
  'I know it,' laughed my father. 'And the street knows it too.' He leant down and brought out a box from under the bed.
  I opened the box with trembling fingers. I was sure I knew what was in it. And there they were: plain, dead, heavy silver leather shoes. A sad imitation, a hopeless copy. Nothing like the silver shoes that had been left by the garden gate.
  I felt tears welling up in my eyes and a lump in my throat.
  'I am sorry, poppet,' said my father. 'You cannot have those shoes. We hoped you would be happy with these instead.'
  I climbed out of bed, all the excitement of the day gone, fighting back tears of disappointment.
  'Try them on,' said my mother.
  I did. They hurt and pinched my toes. I turned to leave, feeling miserable.
  'Coriander,' called my mother. I looked back into the bedchamber. The floor had become a sea and the bed a ship, seen from a great distance. I could hear their voices calling me from far away. It lasted a minute or less. Maybe I dreamt it. Maybe I did not. It was an image that came to haunt me, and I have often wondered what would have happened if I had done as I was told and left the silver shoes alone. Would everything have been all right?

I made my way slowly and sadly back to my bedchamber, where Danes was waiting to dress me.
  'Ah, what is the long face for, my little sparrow?' she said. 'Do you not like your new shoes?'
  I said nothing.
  'Oh well, you will not be wanting your present from me then,' said Danes, taking out from her apron pocket a parcel tied up with silk ribbon. Inside was a sewing box in the shape of a frog, beautifully embroidered, with needles, a thimble and a tiny pair of scissors as well as a fabric book of all the different stitches. So thrilled was I that for a moment I forgot my grief over the shoes.
  I was left alone with my little parcel while Danes went to attend to my mother. I could hear my father calling for hot water, and the silver shoes calling for me. For a moment I thought I must have imagined it, yet I could see where the call was coming from as if it were a wisp of smoke from my father's pipe. I got up and followed it down the stairs to the study.

  'Coriander, Coriander, slip us on your dainty feet.
  We are waiting, soft and sliver, we will dance you down the street.'

  I stood there listening, and finally I took my trembling courage in both hands and opened the door.
  The study was dark. The alligator stood unmoving and all-seeing, king of the ebony cabinet, the key on it's ribbon hanging out invitingly over his teeth.
  I closed the door and stood with my back against it, my hand still on the handle, my heart beating like a drum. Quietness filled the room. There I stood. A decision had to be made. Did I have the courage to do this? I told myself that I did. I just wanted to see the shoes one more time, that was all.
  I tried to move a chair over the cabinet so that I could climb up and reach the key. The chair was far too heavy so I dragged it instead, as quietly as a chair can be dragged, then waited to make sure that no one had heard me. I climbed up. Standing on tiptoe I was faced with the alligator. He looked more frightening close up, as if at any minute he would spring into action.
  Did I really want to see the shoes that much? Oh yes, I did, and more. I half shut my eyes. Shaking with fear, I reached into the alligator's mouth and grabbed the key. If the alligator snapped his jaws shut I did not feel it, I did not see it.
  I climbed down and opened the cabinet. Inside were many tiny drawers beautifully inlaid with cedarwood. I was not sure which one to choose.
  I stood very still holding my breath and then I heard it again, this time no more than a whisper.
  'Coriander, Coriander.'
  I pulled open a drawer at the bottom and there they were, the most magical pair of shoes in the world. They were like glass. They were like diamonds. They were like stars.
  Oh, I thought, what harm if I just tried them on?

I, Coriander © Sally Gardner, 2006. Published by Orion Books.