The Scandalous Duchess (40 page)

How I loved him. I could never not love him.

I sighed softly, silently.

‘Then come in and I can close this door,' I remarked.

He hesitated.

‘On second thoughts, it might be better if you came out,' he said.

‘Why?'

‘I imagine your stable will at least offer us privacy.'

‘You said it was cold,' I objected in contrary mood.

He swung the cloak from his shoulders, a magnificent sweep, and offered it.

‘Unless you will reject this—as I thought you had rejected my sables. But did I not see you wearing them today? Perhaps it was simply because of the cold in the Chapter House that made you change your mind.' His speech was uncomplicated, his tone amused. He was making this easy for me. ‘Is there somewhere private for us to talk?'

‘You could join us in the parlour where there is ale and a fire.'

How hard it was to breathe. The cloak rested in my hands. He had seen me, noted what I wore. My mind hopped and flitted.

‘Your parlour is full of Agnes and Mistress Philippa and the young ones, and will be so for the next hour. Do they never stop talking?'

‘No. The Beauforts are very vocal.'

My mind had steadied again. I let him wrap the cloak around me, as impersonal as a servant, and because I could
do no other, and because I wished to, I led him out, across the Close to the stable block. It should have been awkward between us at first, after so long with such a physical distance between us, but we were both possessed of enough grace to overcome it, and that little exchange on my doorstep had broken the threat of ice.

I was aware of his soft footsteps on the grass as he followed me, as we made tracks in the early layer of frost. And then we faced each other in the stable with the shuffling of hooves for company, enclosed by the familiar scents of horse and grain and hay. Before God, it was cold, but the thick folds were warm from his body, and the fur was close at my throat.

‘You have honoured my family today,' I said hurriedly, because it was uppermost in my mind. ‘An honour beyond anything I could envisage.'

‘I had a debt to pay,' he replied. ‘Your letter meant more to me than you will ever know.'

His voice was on a level and I was relieved. I could rely on him to keep all emotions at bay. Was that not what I needed, to part from him in calm acceptance of our new situation?

‘I was trying to be discreet,' I said. ‘You understood what I was trying to say?'

‘Yes. Amongst the rabbits and land drainage.'

I shook my head, silence stretching between us, until broken by a stable cat slinking along the wall, probably with rodents in mind.

‘Forgive me,' he said softly in the darkness. ‘Forgive me.'

And all the past emotions surged within me. ‘Yes. Yes, I forgive you.'

‘Katherine…' It was a sigh from the heart.

‘Once I did not think it possible to forgive,' I explained. ‘But that was long ago. Now I know full well that it is.'

The muscles in his jaw relaxed. You would have to know him well to note it, but of course I did. The tension had been there all along, superbly hidden by a master of dissimulation.

‘Katherine. Will you look at me?'

I realised I had been watching the gleam of light on his jewels as his breathing leaped with the old anguish in his words, but I looked up readily. And then my eyes dropped before the expression in his, as if I were a young girl again, afraid to acknowledge the fervour in a man's appraisal, rather than a mature woman who had known this man as her lover.

‘No—let me look at you,' he murmured. ‘Let me read your thoughts. Before God, Katherine, you are as beautiful as the day I first loved you. You still fill my vision.'

No, no. This was a mistake. I must talk about normal things
.
I could not withstand the emotion. Nor, I thought, could he. So for both our sakes…

I lifted my hands in despair. ‘I cannot speak of this.'

‘Then speak of what matters to you. Whatever words you say, I know what is in your heart.'

The compassion in his face almost destroyed me.

‘Are things well with you?' I managed to ask.

And, as a ghostly barn owl flew in through a high window with a sweep of silent wings, he followed my lead into less contentious paths, responding to what I did not say, as he had always been able to do. How great was his love for me, how strong it still was in spite of all the strains we had placed on it. I thought there was relief in his face as he picked up the new simple strand, as I might in a particularly difficult piece of embroidery.

‘We are prepared, a fleet gathered at Plymouth,' he told me. ‘The King is pleased to see me go. He's praying for my success so that I'll stay in Castile. He resents guidance unless it's from the lips of Robert de Vere.'

‘I heard about the attempts on your life.'

‘They came to nothing,' he replied lightly.

‘God keep you safe in Castile, John. Will I see you again before you go?'

‘No. I'll not return to the north. I'm for London first, to persuade Richard to give me more ships. And then I go in June.'

We might have been two distant acquaintances, choosing subjects that were of political importance yet did not engage our senses. And that was good. There was no emotion here. I continued to step carefully, my voice politely interested.

‘How long will you be abroad?'

‘Impossible to say. It will not be a short campaign.'

‘I hear that Constanza goes with you. Philippa told me.'

‘Yes, she does. My daughters will also travel with us.' And then I saw a moment of indecision on his face. ‘I have to tell you about my wife.'

I took a step forward, hands raised to stop the words before they could destroy the tentative, fragile bridge we had created between us. ‘There is no need. I know. Or at least I can guess.'

‘Then you see my way forward.'

I let my arm fall to my side. ‘Yes. Are we not adult? Have we not always seen this possibility?'

‘It is what she wants. I could not deny her.'

All my calm good sense fled.

‘Oh, my love…' I whispered against all my better judgement.

‘My most dear Katherine…'

I would swear my tears gleamed as brightly as his jewels. There was one thing I needed to do, before I wept on his breast, which would destroy his control as well as mine. It would give both of us a breathing space.

‘Wait here.'

I left him to run to the house. To the parlour to collect the note I had written that very evening, then up the staircase to my own chamber. And then I was back in the garden, in the stables, my breathing harsh with more than the effort.

There he was, exactly where I had left him.

‘I thought you had left me,' he said gently.

‘No. I would not do that.' I held the folded sheet out to him. ‘It is all I can do to show my love for you. It is too dangerous to speak of it, for both our sakes, but this will show you.'

He opened it. A promise of five hundred marks. A loan to help to fund the expedition to Castile.

‘It is given with Thomas Swynford's agreement.'

He studied the gift for so long that I thought he would refuse. When he refolded the page his voice was raw: ‘I will repay you. It is more than generous.'

‘I know you will.'

And I knew that he understood the depth of my gift.

The silence stretched out between us.

‘I must collect Robert and Thomas and go,' he said at last.

For the first time a frisson of fear crept into the spaces in my breast and, longing submerging good sense, I said
what I had promised myself that I would never ask because it would compromise us both.

‘Will you kiss me in farewell?'

The jewels gleamed flatly. ‘No.'

I took a breath at the starkness of his reply for I had not expected such a denial. And perhaps I flinched for he spoke again, quickly.

‘No,' he repeated. ‘I will not kiss you. For if I did I fear I would never let you go.' His lips curved. ‘I recall saying something similar once long ago. I was right then, I am right now. It would be wrong of me to turn a flame into a conflagration beyond control. Neither of us would enjoy that, I think.'

His eyes rested on mine. I returned his gaze, in despair and in gratitude. I might never see him again, but I had been thoughtlessly weak, and he had rescued me.

‘I knew you would understand,' he said.

‘Yes.'

‘Farewell, my love. I think God will forgive me seeking you out this final time.'

‘I think He will. I will think of you.'

‘And I of you.' Someone had lit a lantern outside in the Close. In its wayward light he looked stricken. ‘Remember this: where I am, there you will be also.' I saw his sigh rather than heard it, as I felt the weight of his gaze. ‘You will never know how very hard it was for me to send you away. I don't think I ever did anything so difficult in the whole of my life.'

With a sudden rush of tears in my throat I could not reply to so tormented an admission, understanding that he would not wish it. Some memories of the past were far too painful.
Stepping quickly, before he could make a retreat, I reached out to pin the pinchbeck Virgin to his tunic. The little pilgrim's badge given to me so long ago by Mistress Saxby with all her worldly wisdom on the road to Kettlethorpe. Worth so little but now it carried all my hopes.

‘The Virgin will keep you safe.' Although my hands trembled, I was careful not to touch him, only the cloth. ‘I seem to have spent all my life in saying farewell to you.' I buffed it with my sleeve but the pewter would never shine.

‘I have always returned.'

But would he this time?

He bowed low, as if we were at court rather than in a stable with straw and oats underfoot, and then left me as I sank into a deep curtsy.

Yet he didn't leave. Before I had regained my balance I was caught up in his arms, and at the familiarity of his touch, every emotion I remembered swept back to engulf me. An expression of despair at our parting it might be, but his mouth against mine was enough to set a light to all the old passions, and I gloried in it. It was as if the past years had never been.

‘Katherine,' he murmured against my lips, against my hair as he held me, so briefly. ‘I'll risk the conflagration…'

‘My beloved John,' I responded, fingers tight in his sleeves as if I would hold him here in that stable in Lincoln for ever.

‘How can I leave you?'

Then I was released, the Duke's retreating footsteps clipped and rapid as if he wished to put a distance between us, as perhaps he did in the reawakened desire that threatened to break his control. Whereas I waited, listening, my heart thundering in my ears, my blood hot beneath my skin
until the final sound had died away, leaving me to hold onto the essence of his body hard against mine, his lips a brand on mine.

War was a chancy thing, and so was peace. It might be that if the Duke was victorious he would be King of Castile in more than name and a golden diadem. It might be that we would never see each other again. As King of Castile, accepted and crowned, he would never return to England, and with my gift I was helping him to achieve this. Or his own death on some foreign battlefield. Love demanded a huge sacrifice.

Yet I felt renewed, at one with him. I was alone, but not alone. I could not be with him, but our estrangement was healed, and I would hold him in my heart against all the horrors of foreign campaigns.

And as I returned to the darkened buildings of the Chancery, my heart leaped for joy that he had not had the power to leave without embracing me after all. I pressed my palm against my lips as if I could still feel the imprint of his. I too would willingly withstand the conflagration.

What had he not told me? What had I guessed?

That Constanza was carrying his child. For a moment I pressed my hand against my flat belly, remembering. I must be thankful for her, and I was. The days of my jealousy were long gone, for which I thanked God.

I did not want to do this.

I mixed the ink and mended my pen with a sharp knife, but because my hand shook it was not the best I could manage. Nevertheless, lacking another quill to hand, I forced
myself to open the cover of my missal to the first page that had once been blank. Now it recorded moments in my life over the past year since the Duke had sailed from England.

I did not want to record this moment.

I dipped the pen and prepared to write, but the ink fell in an unseemly blot on the page, like a single dark tear. This was impossible. I could not write it.

I mopped up the ink, abandoned the pen, and let my eye travel down the milestones I had chosen to make note of. Moments of joy. Personal moments of delight. A record of the celebrations of those I knew and loved.

But I had written nothing like this present knowledge, which wrenched my heart from my breast and caused my blood to run like a sluggish stream under winter ice.

I forced myself to read, trying to recapture the joy.

I had written of the Duke's departure to Corunna, but briefly, for it was not a time of rejoicing, even though I kept his words in my mind.

Remember this: where I am, there you will be also
.

They comforted me when nothing else could.

Then began the list of marriages and of births, of the achievements of my own children as they grew and made their mark on the world. Of my dear Philippa of Lancaster's marriage to King Joao of Portugal in the magnificence of Oporto Cathedral, to cement an alliance. I had rejoiced over the birth of a healthy son at last, Henry of Monmouth, to Henry of Derby and his beloved Mary. And then of my own recognition by King Richard as one of the prestigious Ladies of the Garter.

All to be savoured and enjoyed.

But I could not smile as I picked up the pen again.

Some things I had not written because they were too painful. Of Constanza's loss of her longed-for child; another daughter born dead in Corunna. Nor had I recorded those days of intense dread when an attempt had been made to poison both the Duke and Constanza. Philippa's tragic miscarriage of an heir for Portugal too was absent. I did not need to write them. I would never forget.