The Miracle at St. Bruno's (43 page)

My mother’s naïveté often gave me an insight into what might be happening at Caseman Court and it alarmed me.

When there was talk of the Queen’s marriage my mother could not hide a certain exhilaration, and I could tell at once that she hoped that the Queen would be overthrown. I knew that she was voicing her husband’s feelings for she would consider it her duty to share his opinions.

“Marriage with Spain,” she said, as she and I sat in my garden together. “Why, we shall be a subject of that country! Do Englishmen want that?”

“I doubt not,” I said, “that if the Queen married Philip of Spain there would be all sorts of conditions to prevent Spain’s getting a hold on the country.”

“When a woman marries she is influenced by her husband.”

I smiled at my mother. “Mother,” I said, “all women don’t make as dutiful wives as you do.”

She was a little uncertain what I meant by that but she went on: “We should have the Inquisition here. Can you guess what that means? No one would be safe. Any one of us could be carried off to face a tribunal. Have you any idea what it is like to live under the Inquisition in Spain?”

“It is terrible. I hate persecution in any form.”

My mother dropped the shirt she was embroidering for Peter or Paul. She gripped my arm. “Then, my dear Damask, we must prevent its ever coming to these shores.”

“I am sure the people will never tolerate it here.”

“If this Spanish marriage takes place who can say what will happen? If we are a dominion of Spain, they will be here with their thumbscrews and their instruments of torture.”

“They are already here, Mother, and were before the Queen thought of marrying a foreigner. I shudder sometimes when I pass the Tower and think of Father—and of the dungeons and the torture chambers in which so many people’s beloved sons and husbands have suffered. Women too…. Have you forgotten Anne Askew?”

“She was a martyr.”

“A martyr indeed.”

“A saint,” said my mother fervently.

“And would have been equally so had she been of any other faith.”

My mother was silent for a while and then she leaned toward me.

“This reign cannot last,” she said. “I have reasons for knowing this. I worry about you, Damask…you and the children.”

“Mother, I worry about you and the twins.”

“Yes,” she said. “It’s strange that religion should be the cause. I can’t see why everyone cannot see the true way.”

“Your way, Mother? Or that of your husband perhaps?”

“I have seen the truth,” she said, “and I believe that you live dangerously. I should like to see you with us, Damask. So would your stepfather. He always speaks kindly of you.”

I smiled cynically. “That is indeed good of him, Mother.”

“Oh, he is a good man. A man of principles.”

Oh, God, I thought, do you not know that he murdered my father?

“He thinks that you resent his taking your father’s place.”

“No one could take his place,” I cried fiercely.

“I mean, my dear, because we married. Some daughters are like that…sons too. But you should remember that he has made me very happy.”

I wanted to shout the truth at her. He murdered my father; he asked me to marry him; he has tried to make an infamous bargain with me; he has asked for my virtue as a price for my safety. And this is the man of whom you, my mother, think so highly.

But of course I said nothing. She was so innocent. She must go on in her blissful ignorance.

“You should try to be a little more reasonable, Damask.”

I smiled rather sardonically and she smiled.

“Think about it,” she went on, “think what the Spanish marriage would mean. Queen Jane is still a prisoner in the Tower. There are still many who would be ready to proclaim her Queen and even those who feel that she has no rightful claim can look to the Princess Elizabeth.”

“But, Mother, how could the Princess come before Queen Mary?”

“The King proved his marriage to the Queen’s mother was no true marriage.”

“He proved it to himself,” I said. “Mother, do you not think that simples and herbs and flowers and embroidery are of greater interest than these weighty matters?”

“Well,” she conceded, “these weighty matters are for men.”

“Then would it not be better…and safer…for women to keep to those things in which without doubt they excel?”

She nodded smiling. “All the same, I worry about you,” she said. “I wish Bruno had bought a pleasant country mansion. An Abbey is suspect…particularly when….”

“Oh, Mother, when religion and politics sway this way and that, the treason of yesterday becomes the loyalty of today. Let us all take care. And let us remember that the enemies of Rome are those who are in danger today, although tomorrow it may be different.”

“Tomorrow,” said my mother, brightening. “That will come.”

It was small wonder that she disturbed me.

In the bakehouse Clement was kneading dough; the sleeves of his shirt were rolled up to his elbows and he seemed to caress the mixture as he worked.

Catherine was sitting on the high stool watching him, her lovely face bright with interest. She had always had some enthusiasms for as long as I could remember. They faded quickly but they were nevertheless intense while they lasted; Honey was more constant.

“Go on, Clement,” she commanded; and I heard him say as I entered: “The Abbot had called us and we stood round the crib and there in it was the living child.”

She turned as I entered.

“Here comes our mistress,” said Clement, “to give me orders for the day. Mistress, I am trying a little burdock and purple orchis in the potage today. It gives a mightily pleasant flavor. I shall await your verdict.”

“Mother,” said Catherine, “Clement has been telling me the story. Was it not wonderful! It is like something from the Bible. Moses in the bulrushes. I always loved that story and now to know this….”

I looked at her animated face and I was not sure what I wanted to say to her. She was so thrilled by the thought that her father was some sort of saint or messiah and even though I was convinced that this was false and I wanted my daughter to accept the virtues of truth, the alternative to the mystery story was not something which I could tell to my daughter. Catherine had always had to know everything once her interest was aroused. She knew more of the histories of the people who lived around us than any other member of the household. Now I saw that I was in a quandary which had been certain to arise sooner or later. She either had to accept her father as this superior being or learn the sordid story of his birth. For the moment I thought it better for her to accept the legend, but I wished it had not been so.

I discussed the food that was to be prepared that day and said: “Come, Catherine, it will soon be time you were at your lessons and I wish you to gather some flowers for me and arrange them.”

“Oh, Mother, I
hate
arranging flowers. You know I can’t do it.”

“All the more reason that you should learn. It is one of the necessary accomplishments of a housewife.”

“I don’t think I shall be a housewife. I’ll stay here all my life and become a nun and I’ll have a convent of my own. An abbess I suppose I’d be.”

“My dear child, it is not long ago that monasteries and convents were dissolved by order of the King.”

“Ah, but that was in the old days, Mother. We have a new Queen now—a good, virtuous Queen. Doubtless she would wish to see the return of these institutions.”

“You are a child, Cat,” I said not without a twinge of alarm. “For God’s sake do not get embroiled in these matters yet.”

“Dear Mother, how vehement you are! I have always suspected you of being somewhat irreligious.” She kissed me in that endearing way of hers. “Not that I didn’t love you for it. I used to be frightened by all this…and all the people who looked like monks. I was afraid to go near some of the old buildings. Do you remember how I used to cling to your hand or your skirts? I used to think nothing can harm me while Mother is here, but she will always look after me.”

“My darling, I always would.”

“I knew, dearest Mother. You are so…as a mother should be. He is different, of course. He is wonderful. Clement has been telling me what it was like in the Abbey when he came. They did not know how to look after a baby and although they knew he was no ordinary baby as Clement says, he came in the shape of one and therefore was half mortal.”

“Clement talks too much.”

“It is all so
interesting
. There is so much I want to know.”

“Confine your interests to your lessons for a while,” I said.

She laughed with that high-pitched, infectious laughter which I so loved to hear. “Dear Mother.
Dearest
Mother. You are so practical…always….So different from….No wonder Aunt Kate laughs at you.”

“So I am the butt for your amusement?”

She kissed the tip of my nose. “Which is a good thing to be and we all love you for it. Why, Mother, what would we do without you?”

“Now,” I said, well pleased, “you will just have time to gather your flowers and arrange them before you go to the scriptorium. And do not be late. I have already had complaints of your un-punctuality.”

She ran off and I looked after her with that love which was so intense that it was like suffering a pain.

After that I often found her in the bakehouse where Clement would tell her stories of her father’s childhood. She discovered facts which I had never known. Each day she became more and more interested. Bruno had noticed it and he warmed toward her. At last he was taking an interest in his daughter.

One day I went into the schoolroom and heard Catherine and Honey quarreling.

“You are easily duped, Cat. You always believe what you want to. That is no way to learn what is true.
I
don’t believe it. I don’t like him. I never did. I believe he is cruel to…our mother.”

Catherine spat out: “It is because he is not your father. You are jealous.”

“Jealous! I tell you I am glad. I would have any man for my father rather than him.”

I paused at the door and did not go in. Instead I crept silently away.

I thought a great deal about that conversation. It was inevitable of course now that they were growing up that they should form their own opinions. When they had been little I had kept them away from him, knowing that there was no time in his life for young children. I did wonder whether it would have been different if Catherine had been a boy.

I considered them now—Catherine was nearly twelve years old, Honey fourteen—almost a woman, Honey, for she had developed earlier than most. There was a certain touch of Keziah’s voluptuousness about her and her beauty had by no means diminished. Those startling violet black-lashed eyes alone would have made her a beauty.

But she was not as easy to know as Catherine, who was all effervescence, her feelings close to the surface, tears and anger coming quickly and as quickly dispersing. Catherine showed her affection with a quick hug or a kiss; she could laugh derisively at one’s failings and then show a quick penitence if she thought she had inflicted a wound. How different was Honey! I was aware that I must be careful with Honey and I always had been, taking the utmost pains to show that I loved her equally with Catherine. For me she had, I was fully aware, a deep and passionate devotion. It gratified me and at the same time alarmed me a little, for one could never be quite sure of Honey. How her name belied her! She was wild and passionate.

It was disturbing now that they were growing up and developing such distinct personalities; and the more adoration Catherine showed for Bruno the more loathing Honey seemed to feel; and because they were young neither of them could cloak their feelings; and as Bruno realized his daughter’s growing appreciation and interest in him, so he was aware of Honey’s intensifying repulsion.

I decided that I would speak to Honey about it and I asked her to walk with me one morning around the garden and pick flowers with me. I was growing like my mother, I thought, in that I had become so domesticated; but I never had a great interest in these things and when I did my flowers my thoughts would be far away with what was happening at Court, for instance, and what effect any change there might have on our lives.

“Honey,” I said, “Catherine talks to you often of her father.”

“She talks of nothing else nowadays. Sometimes I think that Catherine is not very intelligent.”

“My dear Honey,” I replied, in what Catherine called my unnaturally virtuous voice, “is it unintelligent for a daughter to admire her father?”

“Yes,” retorted Honey, “if he is not admirable.”

“My dear child, you must not talk so. It is…ungrateful and unbecoming.”

“Should I be grateful to him?”

“You have lived your life under his roof.”

“I prefer to think it has been under yours.”

“He provided it.”

“He never wanted me here. It was only because you insisted that I was allowed to stay. I know so much. I go to my grandmother in the woods.”

“Does she speak of these things?”

“She is a wise woman, Mother, and she speaks sometimes in riddles as wise people do. I wonder why. Is it because they are afraid that if they speak clearly we might learn as much as they know?”

“That could be a reason.”

“My grandmother has told me some truths. She says it is well for me to know of certain matters. I often think how different life might have been for me but for you.”

“My darling Honey, you have been a joy and a comfort to me.”

“I shall always endeavor to be that,” she answered fervently.

“My blessed child, you are my own daughter, remember.”

“But by adoption. Tell me about my mother.”

“Does not your grandmother tell you?”

“I would like you to tell me for people see others in different ways.”

“She was gay and in a way beautiful…though you are more so.

“Am I like her then?”

“No, not in your ways.”

“She was not married to my father. He came to disband the Abbey. What was he like?”

“I saw little of him,” I said evasively.

“And my mother fell in love with him and I was born.”