ASilverMirror (39 page)

Barbara stopped and stared, surprised but also relieved. She
had feared daily to see the keep emptied as the men all marched away to fight.
She knew, of course, that Mortimer and his allies had not responded to the
summons to Oxford on the twenty-fifth of November, and Alphonse had told her
that Walerand had not been successful in blocking the passages of the Severn
River. That meant Leicester could bring his army across the river into the
Marchers’ territory and attack them on their own lands. If Mortimer came to
terms with Leicester, there would be no fighting, and she had never been
certain—partly because she was afraid to ask directly—whether Alphonse intended
to go to war with the Marchers.

“Very well, my lord,” Barbara said after a moment. “When do
you want us to go?”

“Now.”

“But my husband has just ridden—” Barbara drew a sharp
breath. “No.” She shook her head. “I will not go without Alphonse.”

“You have no choice,” Mortimer said, getting to his feet.
“When I say you go from Wigmore, you go, and you do as I bid you do.”

Barbara backed up a step, but her eyes were defiant and her
voice steady. “You can beat me unconscious and tie me to a horse, but you
cannot make me say what you want me to say once I am in Leicester’s presence.”

Mortimer clenched a fist and raised it.

“Go ahead.” Barbara’s voice rose in challenge. “Break my
nose. Knock out my teeth. Send me thus to Leicester who treats his wife as if
she were a jewel. Do you think I will not tell him who beat me? Do you think I
will beg for just terms? I will tell him you are not to be trusted, that you
are a traitor and a liar, and a murderer too! Where is my husband?”

“My lord,” Matilda cried as Mortimer advanced and Barbara
backed away, shaking with fear but still defiant. “You will have to kill her
husband if you hurt her.”

Mortimer knew that himself. He had been much surprised and
amused by Alphonse’s steady refusal to avail himself of female companionship
when they were away from Wigmore for several days. Until this moment he had
felt somewhat contemptuous of the respect he detected in Alphonse when he spoke
of his wife, which was more often than Mortimer felt necessary. He was furious
because it had never occurred to him that Barbara would refuse to obey a direct
order from him, but he was not furious enough to forget how desperate his
situation was and how little he could afford to make it worse by losing an
emissary who could get quickly into Leicester’s presence and might have real
influence. He stopped and dropped his hand.

“Shut your mouth and listen,” he snarled.

Barbara clapped her hands over her ears. “Where
is
my
husband?” she screamed.

“Curse you! He is only ridden out. He will be back by
nightfall. You must be gone by then.”

“No! I do not believe you! I will not go, leaving him
hostage. Since you will doubtless torture or kill him if I cannot make
Leicester meet your terms—”

“No I will not!” Mortimer bellowed indignantly.

“Then why keep him hostage? I will not go without him. I
will cry of murder and rape if you put me out.”

“I will kill you!”

“Then kill me!” Barbara shrieked, knowing either that the
words were a toothless threat or that Alphonse was dead already. “Kill me! I am
sure that will ease your terms with Leicester and give pleasure to Leybourne,
le Strange, Tybetot, and all the others. Think of their pride in being led by a
murderer of women.”

“My lord, bring back her husband,” Matilda cried. “She will
not listen to anything until she sees him.”

Mortimer turned on his wife with a snarl, and she backed
away, but he was too clever a man to be ruled by rage. He swung his head back
to Barbara, snarling again with frustration, like a baited bear. There were
ways to break a spirit so completely that what was left of the person would be
obedient even when far from the master, but that took time and more time for
healing, and sometimes left the subject wanting in wits. He needed an emissary
who could ride hard and soon, and one who would be convincing in his behalf.

“Sit!” he roared, pointing at Barbara. “Watch her!” he
barked at his wife.

Barbara gladly sank down on the nearest bench. She was weak
and sick with relief, since Mortimer’s behavior virtually guaranteed that
Alphonse was alive and probably uninjured too. For some time she just stared
blankly at her hands in her lap, but as the shock Mortimer’s order had given
her receded, she began to feel warm so close to the fire, and she pulled the
pin from her cloak, slid it off her shoulders, and folded it across her lap.
When she moved, Matilda drew closer.

The movement seemed to release her mind, which had been
frozen, but the idea that popped into her head was a surprise. Matilda had
understood her desperate, uncaring defiance when she thought Alphonse was in
danger or dead. If so, Matilda loved Mortimer. How strange, and yet was it so
strange? Mortimer was not nearly so bad as his loud voice and wild appearance might
suggest. He had not hit Matilda, although many men who could not vent their
fury on its real object would have beaten a wife nearly to death for speaking
when Matilda had spoken and, worse, for making unwanted suggestions.

Barbara wondered why such an irrelevant idea should occupy
her mind, and then realized it was not really irrelevant. If Mortimer was not a
monster, then perhaps he had never intended harm to Alphonse. So why did he not
send them both to Leicester? That was easy, he liked Alphonse but did not trust
him completely. Yet Alphonse trusted Mortimer, Barbara realized. Alphonse had
not let her out of his sight in Walerand’s keep, but he had gone out, even
stayed away from Wigmore several days at a time.

Mortimer returned to the hall but did not come near or speak
to her, busying himself with his clerk by one of the windows. Time passed
slowly as Barbara worried at the puzzle of why Mortimer had tried to send her
to Leicester while her husband was away. Finally she began to wonder whether
the plan had been set up between Mortimer and Alphonse to make her think
Alphonse was a hostage and thus frighten her into pleading the rebel’s case
more passionately.

The unwelcome notion stuck firmly in her mind because it
fit. Alphonse believed she was of Leicester’s party and would need pressure
applied to her before she helped the Royalist cause. He also had good reason to
believe he was God’s gift to women, and she, had she not forgotten at least
half the time to seem cold and indifferent? So
he
had reason to believe
she would do almost anything to get him back safe. The logic made her so angry
that she almost stood up and told Mortimer she would go to Leicester and he
could keep Alphonse—for good—but with Mortimer’s name came the question of why
he had not simply said at once that her husband knew and approved of the plan.

By the time Alphonse entered the hall, the question of
whether he had been party to the plan was more important to Barbara than the
politics. She was aware of him the moment he stepped into the doorway, but he
did not see her at first and walked toward Mortimer, who was still involved
with his clerk. Barbara sat still, as if she intended to allow him to speak
first to Mortimer. As he came near the hearth, she jumped to her feet and ran forward
to confront him. Matilda cried out with surprise or alarm, but Barbara’s voice
overrode hers.

“Lord Roger ordered me to go to Leicester without your
permission, but I would not go.”

Alphonse stopped when she stepped into his path, and his
face, which had been wearing an expression of lively interest, clearly he had
expected that some important news or event had occasioned his recall, went
utterly blank. Now Barbara had the answer she had hoped for, and she wished
heartily that she had never asked the question. Alphonse had been shocked
beyond concealment. He had known nothing about Mortimer’s intention and he was
very angry. Barbara swallowed, but his eyes had gone past her. He came forward
again, catching Barbara around the waist and bringing her with him as he
advanced on Mortimer.

“Why do you wish to separate me from my wife?” he asked
softly.

Barbara’s breath caught with terror. She could feel her
husband’s arm slipping around in front of her so he could thrust her behind him
when he drew his sword, but Mortimer only growled, “Do not be a fool. She would
have been back here before you if she had only done as she was bidden instead
of screaming that I had murdered you and planned to torture you and God knows
what other nonsense.”

There was a brief silence in which Alphonse’s arm once again
encircled her waist and briefly pulled her tight against him. Barbara did not
know whom she wished to murder more, Mortimer or Alphonse, the one for
betraying her and the other for understanding too clearly and too quickly what
her terror meant. She settled on Alphonse as the guilty party in the next
moment when he chuckled and said, “Ah, you bade her go, did you? That is not
the way to obtain compliance from my Barbe.”

“I am not accustomed to pleading with women.” Mortimer’s
lips twisted with contempt.

Alphonse chuckled again. “Pleading would have got you no
further than shouting. Barbe, bless her, is not a fool and needs to know why
she does something.”

Barbara promptly forgave Alphonse all his sins.

“You are proposing I tell Norfolk’s daughter why I am asking
for a truce to discuss terms and then send her off to Leicester?” Mortimer’s
voice was strained.

“Hmmm.” Alphonse looked thoughtful. “You have a point.”

“If Alphonse goes with me,” Barbara said, “I will not need to
know any more than I do now. I will even promise to say nothing beyond what you
bid me say.”

“No!” The double shout made Barbara’s ears ring.

Mortimer’s voice was louder, but Barbara was closer to
Alphonse. His objection was as quick and emphatic as Mortimer’s. The green
fiend that lay coiled inside her rose up and hissed,
He wants you gone. He
wants to be loose of you
. She knew it was ridiculous. Everything that had
gone before—Alphonse’s fury at the idea Mortimer wished to separate them in
particular—gave the lie to the jealous thought. Nonetheless she shook her head
furiously.

“I will not go and leave my husband a hostage.”

“I am not a hostage,” Alphonse said before Mortimer could
speak. “Be reasonable, Barbe. I have been living in Wigmore and riding out with
Mortimer and his men for weeks. I have seen too much. But he is protecting me
as much as himself. If Leicester asked questions and I refused to answer, might
not he begin to regard me as an enemy?”

“Thank God you are a man of sense and not an idiot woman,”
Mortimer said.

Alphonse cocked his head inquisitively. “When another man
says I have sense it means I am doing what he desires. And that reminds me that
I must ask, before I urge my wife to go, why you tried to send her away without
telling me.”

“Because you are besotted of her,” Mortimer said, his lips
curving downward as if he had bitten a very sour apple. “Anyone can see it. I
cannot send an army to protect her. Speed is of importance. And I did not want
to argue with you about the cruelty of exposing her to the winter weather and
making her ride so far and so fast and the dangers of sending her across this
wild land with so few—”

A double burst of laughter from Alphonse and Barbara cut him
off.

“That I am besotted is perfectly true,” Alphonse got out,
“but you have mistaken the reason and the result. I am besotted
because
I can trust Barbe to ride as hard and as long as is necessary and not to cry
for more protection than she really needs. So where do you want her to go?”

“Worcester,” Mortimer said. “Leicester is gathering the
feudal host at Worcester. I would prefer that he come no farther west with his
army. That is why I want my message to get to him as soon as possible. All I
want Lady Barbara to do is to carry the message. I thought she could gain
admission to Leicester’s presence more easily than a common petitioner. She
does not need to plead my case.”

“I am not unwilling to plead for peace,” Barbara said, her
demon crushed, at least temporarily, under the weight of evidence that her
husband did not wish to be rid of her.

Mortimer shrugged angrily and turned away to look out of the
window. Alphonse touched Barbara’s hand, but he spoke to Mortimer. “Will you
trust me, my lord, to suggest the limits Barbe must set on her pleading?” The
dark head turned, eyes as black as Alphonse’s locked with his, then slid away.
“If she offers more than you are willing to yield,” Alphonse continued,
“Leicester will believe you have deceived him, perhaps to gain time. He will
feel ill used and angry and be unwilling to grant any compromise. But if she
offers less than you are willing to yield, will not the earl think he is making
a good bargain?”

Mortimer’s gaze came back to fix on Alphonse’s again. “You
are a clever devil,” he said softly, “but if I offer too little, Leicester will
not be willing to talk at all.”

“There will be a fine line between what is worth some delay
to talk about and what is not. What do you say—”

“Would it not be better to talk of this in private?”
Mortimer said quickly. “Or perhaps we have said too much already.”

“No.” Barbara smiled. “Even if I wished to betray you, all I
could tell was that you planned to yield more than the proposals I presently
carry, and after all, will not that be a temptation to listen to you in person
to see how much more can be wrung from you?”

Mortimer stared at her for a long moment, then looked back
at Alphonse. “I would strangle her if I were you. She thinks too much. That is
dangerous.”

“But I enjoy danger.” Alphonse’s eyes glittered.

Barbara’s broad brows lifted so that she seemed to be
looking down her long, elegant nose. “There is no danger for my husband. It is
said that two heads are better than one, and as we are flesh of a flesh and
bone of a bone, being made one by wedlock, it is as if the two heads were on
one body. My thinking is only for my husband’s good. Would I bite off my own
right hand? So neither would I do him harm.”