Girl In A Red Tunic (28 page)

     The results are surprising.

     Most of her contacts, it is true, perceive Benedict as he paints himself: open-hearted, fond of his meat and drink, a good friend and a cheerful companion; loyal and truthful, a fair master and a generous host. People pity him for the loss of his wife and for the ill health of that wife that prevented her from giving Benedict more than the one child, fine man though this son might be. Benedict likes women; yes, of course, what red-blooded male does not? He flirts with them, praises them, pays them extravagant compliments and makes them feel beautiful and beloved. Yes, indeed. Where is the harm in that?

     But some people – quite a few, it seems – know the truth behind this comfortably harmless image. One woman – she is the sister of someone who nursed poor Blanche in her dying weeks – knows very well what Benedict Warin is really like. He uses his easy charm, says she, as a sort of double bluff to conceal his true nature. He is a flatterer and a charmer, but he is more than that: with rather a lot of young women he goes further, seducing them, enjoying them and then abandoning them. While Blanche was alive, or so goes the ugly tale, Benedict always had his excuse ready: my sweetheart, he would say to the girl he was about to discard, how I should love to keep you with me always, care for you as you deserve, make you mine in the eyes of the world as well as in the privacy of our precious moments of intimacy. But what would it do to my poor suffering Blanche if I follow where my aching heart leads me and stay with you? No, no; although it will break me, I must give you up. And, with a tear in his eye and a last tender kiss, off he would go, leaving the poor girl to rearrange herself as best she could, brush the dust from her skirts and pull the hay from her tangled hair.

     Since Blanche’s death – a happy release in perhaps more ways than one – his excuse is that he must honour her memory. The fact that honouring a dead woman who is surely past caring means that he dishonours many living ones seems to have escaped his notice.

     This is what Elena’s cousin’s friend’s sister reports. Elena tells Helewise, who goes away to think about it. After some time she concludes that, first, it may not be true. Second, is it really any of her business? Third, she likes Benedict and she is hardly going to be affected personally by whatever he gets up to in private. Fourth, she is far too happy and excited to worry about it anyway.

     She puts Benedict’s infidelities to the back of her mind and, for a quarter of a century, that is largely where they stay.

Amid the happy splendour of Helewise and Ivo’s wedding day, one small disturbing incident occurs.

     The sun has shone since early morning, the bride looks quite exquisitely beautiful and the handsome groom clearly can hardly restrain his impatience to get her alone. Family and friends shower the bridal couple with flowers and the tenants and peasants turn out to wish them well.

     The small incident occurs during the splendid feast that Ralf de Swansford throws for his daughter and her new husband in the flower-bedecked hall at Swansford. Helewise, flushed with happiness, is momentarily separated from Ivo as the two make their separate ways around the hall, pausing to talk to their guests, thanking them for the gifts they have brought, encouraging them to eat, drink and enjoy themselves. Helewise is wearing her new scarlet tunic whose silk is so stiff and heavy that it rustles, and Elena has helped her to cut it so that the fullness of the wide skirts begins slightly above the natural waistline; at nearly three months, Helewise’s pregnancy is just beginning to show and this wise precaution has been taken just in case anyone is sufficiently impolite – sufficiently curious – to take a close look at the radiant bride’s belly.

     Helewise dances up to an elderly but still handsome couple who are vague relations of Benedict’s and engages them in cheery conversation. They are friendly, affectionate, and they have just given her a beautiful little ivory statue of the Virgin for the private chapel at the Old Manor. Martin, Benedict’s man, comes up to join them.

     The four of them, even the taciturn Martin, are laughing, happy. But in the midst of these pleasant exchanges, Helewise suddenly feels as if someone has run icy fingers down her spine. She breaks off in mid-sentence, spinning round, and sees that a malevolent, black-clad and dark-aspected woman of about thirty is glaring at her ferociously, her expression suggesting she would have willingly stuck a knife in Helewise’s back. Helewise catches her breath, shocked to the core by this sudden discordant element in her blissful day.

     It is as if the bad fairy has turned up at the feast.

     The wife of the elderly couple has caught Helewise’s arm and is turning her away from the awful fascination of the dark woman’s stare; she has seen too and she mutters something that sounds like, ‘Take no notice, my dear, she is nothing to you.’ She gives Martin a nudge – quite a sharp one – and he nods his understanding. He strides off, the old woman’s husband following him, elbowing his way through the crowd until he stands beside the black-clad woman. He leans down to say something to her – he leans really close so that he speaks right into her ear – and then he takes hold of her and hustles her away, the old man following, until she has been escorted out of the hall.

     ‘Who is she?’ Helewise asks nervously.

     The elderly woman sniffs. ‘That? That’s Sirida. She should not even be here ...’ And she stares worriedly after her old husband, as if suddenly anxious for him.

     Helewise tries to laugh. ‘She’s quite slight; she won’t hurt them!’ she says jokingly.

     But the woman replies, ‘She might. Oh, she might.’ She shakes her head, still looking anxious. Then she leans closer to Helewise and whispers, ‘They say she is a witch.’

     Then the old husband comes back – Martin has disappeared – brushing his hands together as if he has just ejected an unruly hound from the house and, before Helewise can ask any more questions about the dark woman, Ivo comes to find her.

     Very relieved to see him, she snuggles up to him, feeling his strong body close to hers as he draws her against him. For the first time she realises that he is, in all ways, a man she will always be able to lean on. She raises her face and starts to tell him about the black-clad woman but he misinterprets her intention and, thinking she is demanding a kiss, obliges with such robust enthusiasm that the people standing around clap their hands, laugh and call out encouraging remarks that verge from the cheerfully ribald to the almost obscene; this is, after all, a wedding. Ivo’s passion instantly infects his bride and Helewise’s brief fear is drowned out by the flood of sensation flowing through her. Then Ivo grabs hold of her hand and, amid the cheers of their friends and relations, spins her away into a dance.

     They dance, feast, drink, laugh, dance again, late into the night. Everyone there is having a good time. Everyone there, now, is happy.

     Helewise’s wedding day ends in joy. In the flurry and the hundred different impressions and memorable images of newly married life, the one unpleasant moment from her wonderful day is forgotten.

     Almost.

Helewise lay in her austere nun’s bed in the dormitory of Hawkenlye Abbey. Her memories had come back with the force of a rain-flooded river bursting its banks and she had recalled things she thought she had long forgotten. In the chilly darkness she found her face hot with shame as she remembered Leofgar’s conception and her total lack of contrition, not only at having lain with Ivo before they were wed but also at the way she had lied to her dear father over the reason why she must bring forward her wedding day. She pictured his face, frowning at first but persuaded by her enthusiasm and her determination and not wanting to question her further in case he put a damper on her joy.

     And Elena, Helewise thought, what would I have done without her? The old nurse had been given permission by Emma de Swansford to accompany Helewise into her new life and from the moment she and her young mistress had set foot in the Old Manor, she had been quite invaluable. It had been Elena who had provided the potions and remedies that helped Helewise through two pregnancies that came a little too close together; Elena who had twice turned midwife, capable and loving, easing Helewise’s pains by her quiet confidence and by her very presence. And, after each baby boy was born, it had been Elena who had given Helewise the sensible advice that allowed her confidence as a mother to grow until she no longer needed her old nurse’s support.

     But it was not Elena whom Helewise now needed to think about. It was Benedict Warin.

     Could it be possible? she wondered. Could one of Benedict’s many infidelities – if indeed
that
accusation were also true – have led to some young girl conceiving his child? Helewise frowned as she considered the possibility. Ivo had been a virile man who, she reminded herself, had set a child growing in her as easily as look at her; why should his father not have been the same? Yes, it was true that Blanche Warin had given Benedict but the one child but then they all said she had been in delicate health and that she had become barren after Ivo was born.

     It
was
possible, then, that Benedict could have fathered an illegitimate child. The more she considered it, the more she had to conclude that it was not only possible but probable.

     As at last she closed her eyes and tried to compose herself for sleep, Helewise wondered how on earth she was to go about trying to find out whether this
probable
event had ever really happened.

Chapter 16

Down in the Vale, Josse had an early morning visit from Gervase de Gifford’s man, Matt. He brought the sheriff’s greetings and the request that Josse come with him down to Tonbridge as soon as he could manage it because de Gifford urgently wished to speak to him.

     Josse knew better than to ask what it was about; Matt was a taciturn sort of a man and in any case it did not seem wise to discuss the sheriff’s business in an open-sided shelter with all manner of strangers wandering around outside. In fact there were only four pilgrims in the Vale at present and one of those was a baby, but the monks themselves were not above accidentally overhearing muttered discussions and then speculating wildly afterwards on what they thought they had heard and what it was likely to mean.

     He told Matt to wait for him while he sought out the Abbess to inform her where he was going and Matt gave a wordless nod of acknowledgement. Then he raced up the path to the Abbey and, pausing to ask Sister Martha if she would kindly get his horse ready, set about trying to find the Abbess. She was not in her room but one of the novices pointed him in the direction of the retirement home which the Abbey ran for aged nuns and monks and that was where he found her.

     Sister Emanuel, who was in charge of the retirement home, greeted him calmly and pointed into one of the two long and narrow rooms where the elderly folk lived out the last of their days, nuns to the right, monks to the left. The Abbess was kneeling in prayer by the narrow cot of a very old nun who, Sister Emanuel whispered, had died in the night. Josse waited. After a short time the Abbess rose to her feet and, bending to bestow a last kiss on the wizened forehead of the tiny nun lying so still on the cot, turned and came towards him.

     ‘Good morning, Sir Josse,’ she said. He thought there was a suggestion of tears in her eyes. ‘Mother Mabilia was our oldest resident; she said she was almost eighty years old.’

     ‘I am sorry for her passing,’ he said formally.

     The Abbess managed a smile. ‘Do not be,’ she murmured, ‘for dear Mabilia was more than ready to leave us and go to meet her Lord. I have just been giving thanks that her death was easy and painless. She slipped away in her sleep.’

     ‘May the good God above grant us all such an end,’ Josse said in the same low voice.

     ‘Amen.’ There was a brief silence and then, taking his arm and steering him out of the retirement home, the Abbess said, ‘What can I do for you?’

     Swiftly he told her about de Gifford’s messenger. She watched him, the anxiety flooding her face, then said, ‘What does this mean, Sir Josse?’

     ‘I do not know,’ he admitted, adding, for he well knew what she was thinking, ‘but, my lady, we must not instantly fear the worst!’

     ‘But what if—’ she began, then, with an obvious effort, stopped herself.

     Josse put out his hand and briefly touched her sleeve. ‘My lady, this may have nothing to do with – er, with the matter that preoccupies us.’

     She smiled thinly. ‘Now that, Sir Josse, I find hard to believe.’ Then, leaning closer to him and lowering her voice, she said, ‘What will you do if he has – if there is evidence that appears to incriminate my son? Oh, Josse, will you tell him what Leofgar told you?’