The Lion Triumphant (12 page)

Servants hurried out. There were grooms to take our horses and marvel at the carriage.

We were taken into the hall where the Pennlyons—father and son—were waiting to greet us.

The hall, lit by a hundred or so candles flickering in their sconces, looked very fine. At one end a great log fire burned although we were in September and it was not chilly. The long table was laid for the banquet and so was the smaller one on a dais at one end of the hall. In the minstrels’ gallery fiddlers were playing.

I was taken in Sir Penn’s arms and held firmly against his great body; he kissed me loudly and laughed over my head in Jake’s direction as though he were teasing him. Jake then took me from him. I drew myself away, but it was useless. I was firmly held, pressed tightly against him and his lips on mine.

Sir Penn was laughing. “Come, Jake,” he said. “You’ll have time for that later.” He nudged Edward in the side and Edward smiled faintly. The manners of these two must have been extremely distasteful to him.

Jake put his arm about me and swung me around. “You’ll stand with me to greet the guests.”

People arrived from neighboring houses. They congratulated us. It was embarrassing in the extreme and I was glad when we sat at table, which was weighed down with the great pies and joints of meat. There was venison, wild fowl, tarts, marchpane fancies, sugar bread, gingerbread and every kind of food that one could think of.

Jake Pennlyon was watching me, hoping, I knew, that I should be impressed by the quantities of food with which the table was laden. It was as though he were tempting me. See how we live! Look at our fine house! You will have a part in this. You will be mistress of it—but you will always remember who is the master.

I looked beyond the table, for I would not let him know that I was impressed. His hand was on my thigh, burning, probing fingers. I lifted his hand and put it from me, but he then gripped mine and held it against him.

“Your grip is too rough,” I said. “I do not wish to be covered in bruises.”

“Did I not tell you that I would set my mark upon you?”

“You may have said so, but I should not wish it.”

“And I must grant your wishes, I suppose.”

“It is customary during wooing.”

“But we have passed the wooing stage. You are won.”

“Indeed I am not.”

“Why, my Cat, this is our wedding feast.”

“My mother calls me Cat and she alone. I would not wish anyone else to use that name for me.”

“I shall call you what I like and you are to me a cat. You scratch, but you will be ere long purring in my arms.”

“I would not count on that if I were you.”

“But you are not me. You are your maddening self.”

“I am glad I exasperate you, for that is just the effect you have on me.”

“It is a fillip to our passion.”

“I feel no passion.”

“You delude yourself. Come try this malmsey wine. It will put you in a mellow mood and see we have Venetian glasses. We can be as fine as our neighbors.”

“Gracious living cannot be found in a glass. It is good manners that count.”

“And you find me lacking in them?”

“Deplorably so.”

“I promise you shall find me lacking in naught else.”

There had been food and to spare in the Abbey, but it had never been served in this way. To these people food was to be reverenced. The usher who brought in the boar’s head was preceded by one who kissed the table before laying it down and the usher, then having set the dish on the table, bowed low before it. One scullion was cuffed about the ears for standing with his back toward it. And when the sucking pig was brought in the minstrels in the gallery played and one of the servants walked solemnly before it singing of its virtues.

We had started to eat at six and at nine of the clock we were still at table. A great deal of wine and ale had been drunk. Jake and his father had set an example to their guests and I had never seen so much food consumed.

I was amused and elated to see that the wine was having its effect on them and I guessed that they would be easier to handle in such condition than they would be completely sober.

The minstrels played most of the time and there was one with a pleasant voice who came down from the gallery and sang a love song standing before the table and addressing his words to me and to Jake Pennlyon.

While the guests were eating confections of sugared spices and marchpane Jake ordered that a dance should be played, and taking me by the hand, he led me into the center of the hall.

The others fell in behind us. Jake was not a good dancer, but he knew the steps and we circled, came back to each other and touched hands as we danced; and when the dance was over he drew me to a bench where we were a little apart from the company. He continued to grip my hand.

“This … is what I wanted from the moment I saw you.”

“Then your wish has been granted,” I said.

“The first wish. There are many to come. But they are on the way. We are as good as wed. You well know that this ceremony is binding. If you wished to marry anyone else you would have to get a dispensation from the church. You are bound to me.”

“It is not so. There has been no ceremony.”

“We are bound together. All you have to do now is accept your fate.”

“Why do you not take someone else? There are women here tonight who would mayhap be glad to take you. You are of means obviously. You would not be a bad catch for any who fancied you.”

“I have the one I fancy and who fancies me … why should I look beyond though she is perverse and feigns not to want me, that amused me … for a while? But I have had enough of it and I would have you show me your true feelings. I will take you around the house which will be your home. I will show you the rooms which will be at your disposal. Come now with me. We will slip away alone.”

“We should be missed.”

He laughed. “And if we were there would be smiles and understanding. We will have their indulgence. We are all but wed and the final ceremony will take place ere long. I want to take that comb from your hair. It has a Spanish look about it which I like not. Where did you get such a bauble?”

“A peddler brought it in his pack. I like it.”

“A peddler! Are they introducing plaguey Spanish fashions here now. We’ll not have that.”

“Know this. I shall wear what I wish.”

“Don’t tempt me or I shall take it from your hair here and now. That would shock your sister and her fine husband, I doubt not. But I’ll be discreet. Come! I will show you our marriage bed and you shall try it and tell me if it suits you. It will, Cat. I know it. Something told me from the start that you and I were made for each other.”

He attempted to pull me to my feet, but I said: “I wish to talk to you … seriously.”

“We have years for talking. Come with me now.”

I said firmly: “I don’t love you. I can never love you. I am here now because of your threats. Do you think that is the way to inspire love? You know nothing of love. Oh, I doubt not that you are a past master of lust, I’ll swear that many a pirate is. He ravages towns and the women in them; he forces submission, but that is not love. Don’t ever expect love from me.”

“Love,” he said, looking intently at me. “You talk fiercely of love. What do you know of it?”

I had difficulty in controlling my features then because I had a sudden vision of what I had dreamed life would be for me: Carey and I together. Our home would have been Remus Castle; I could see the park at Remus, the walled rose garden, the pond garden with its pleached alley, and beloved Carey, with whom I used to quarrel when I was a child—as I quarreled with this man now, only differently of course—Carey, whom love had made gentle and tender as this man could never be.

He had bent closer and was looking at me earnestly.

I said: “I have loved. I shall never love again.”

“So you are not the virgin I promised myself.”

“You sicken me. You know naught of love; you know only of lust. I have lain with no man, but I have loved and planned to marry, but it was not to be. My father and his mother had sinned together. And he was my brother.”

He studied me with narrowed eyes. Why had I attempted to talk to him of Carey? It had weakened me in some way, made me vulnerable. He had no pity for me; if he loved me, I thought, he would be tender now, he would be gentle with me. But he had no tender feelings for me; his need for me was nothing but desire, a determination to subdue.

He said: “I know much concerning you. It was necessary for me to discover what I could of my wife. Your father was a charlatan.”

“He was not that.”

“He was found in the crib at Bruno’s Abbey. The whole of England knew of it. It was said to be a miracle and then it was found that there was no miracle; he was the son of a wayward monk and a serving wench. Should I marry a charlatan’s daughter, the granddaughter of a serving girl?”

“Indeed you should not,” I retorted. “Such a refined cultured gentleman cannot be allowed to do such a thing.”

“But,” he went on, “this charlatan became a rich man; he was possessed of Abbey lands; your mother was of excellent family, so in the circumstances perhaps I might be lenient.”

“You surely would not wish a woman of such ancestors to become the mother of your sons?”

“Well, to confess, she hath a way with her which pleases me, and since I have gone so far as to become betrothed to her I’ll take her to my bed and if she pleases me I’ll keep her there.”

“She will never please you. Escape while there is time.”

“I have gone too far in this.”

“She would release you, I am certain.”

“The truth is that I am never going to release her and in a short time she will be mine so utterly that she will beg me never to leave her.”

“A pretty fiction,” I said. “I know it to be far from the truth.”

“Come with me now. Let us slip away. Let me show you what love is like.”

“You are the last from whom I could learn that. I shall stay in this company until we leave. And it must almost be time that we did so.”

“Tonight we will be together.”

“Tonight? How could that be?”

“Easily. I will arrange it.”

“Here?”

“I will ride back with you and you will open your window and I will climb through to you.”

“In my sister’s house!”

“Your sister is a woman. She will understand. But she need not know.”

“You still do not understand that I am not as eager for you as you appear to be for me. You know full well that I despise you.”

“Is that why your eyes sparkle at the sight of me?”

I stood up and went back to my seat at the table. He must perforce follow me.

Morris dancers had arrived. They had been engaged to entertain us and so they came into the hall in their Moorish costumes with bells attached to them and their capers were greatly applauded. They did a piece in which Robin Hood and Maid Marian figured and this was greatly appreciated. There was more singing and dancing, but at last the banquet and ball were over.

I rode back with Edward and Honey in their carriage, but Jake Pennlyon insisted on coming with us. He rode beside our carriage as he said he was not trusting his bride to the rough roads and any vagabond who might attempt to rob us.

I whispered to Honey: “He will try to come to my room. He has said as much.”

She whispered back: “When we get back to the house I will feign sickness and ask you to look after me.”

At Trewynd when we alighted from the carriage Honey put her hand to her head and groaned.

“I feel so ill,” she said. “Will you take me to my bed, Catharine?”

I said indeed I would and gave Jake Pennlyon a curt good-night. He kissed me on the lips—one of those kisses which I was beginning to hate and tried hard to avoid. I turned away and went with Honey to her room.

“He’ll go away now,” she said. But she did not know Jake Pennlyon.

I crept cautiously to my room. I did not open the door. I put my ear to the keyhole. I could hear the window squeaking slightly as it swung open. True to his threat, Jake Pennlyon had climbed the wall and come through it. I knew that if I went into that room I would find him there.

I pictured his leaping from behind and locking my door. I should be at his mercy and this time there would be no escape.

I turned and tiptoed back to Honey’s room and told her what I suspected.

“Stay with me tonight,” she said. “Edward will sleep in his own room. Catharine, tomorrow you must return to your mother. This man is dangerous.”

What a night that was. I could not sleep at all. I kept thinking of Jake Pennlyon in my room, ready to spring on me. I could hear his cry of exultation when he caught me as I entered the room; I could hear the key turn in the lock, I could feel his great powerful body crushing mine. It was so vivid in my imagination that I seemed to live it.

It was not until dawn that I slept and then I was late waking.

Honey came into the room. “If he was here he has gone now,” she said. “His horse is not in the stables.”

I went cautiously to my room. The sun was streaming in; it showed my bed—empty but tousled. He must have slept there.

Fury possessed me. He had dared sleep in my bed. I pictured him there, waiting for the bride who did not come.

When I stood gazing at my disturbed bed, I was overcome with a sense of powerlessness. I felt like a hunted animal with the baying of the dogs coming nearer, knowing that the relentless huntsman was bearing down on me.

So far I had escaped. I kept thinking how easily I could have stepped into that room last night to find myself trapped.

He was the sort of man who so far had always won. I knew that. But he should not do so this time. I knew that I must slip away and return to my home. But would that deter him? He must sail in six weeks’ time, but I might well be carrying his seed at that time. I felt that if I allowed him to subdue me I should despise myself forever; and in a way so would he. It must not happen. I must go on fighting.

I couldn’t remain in the house. I guessed he would shortly be riding over. I must make sure not to be alone with him.