The Sumerton Women (30 page)
Cecily’s heart pounded as she beheld Father Alec, still in the large copper washtub.
“I’m sorry—I—” She bowed her head, cheeks burning. For some reason, her feet remained rooted in place. “I only meant to bring you some clothes.”
Father Alec lowered his eyes. “I thank you.”
Cecily approached, meaning to set the clothing on his dressing table, but as she tried to pass him he seized her wrist. His hand was warm and wet on her skin. She trembled; the clothes slipped from fingers gone limp onto the floor. Without hesitation she leaned in, pressing her mouth to his. He cupped her cheek in his other hand, devouring her mouth in his own urgent kiss. He pulled Cecily atop him into the water, both working frantically to free her of her gown. They discarded the sopping wet garment to the floor beside the abandoned change of clothes.
Cecily did not think. She suspended reality and consequence, yielding to the moment. She roved his body with her hands, stroking every inch of him as he explored her. Unlike the tender couplings with Hal, this union was infused with passion and a yearning so long denied. She staved off her guilt. She had the rest of her life for penance; had not every day become an atonement of sorts? She could not wonder if she would be damned. She could only gaze into Alec’s loving hazel eyes, immerse herself in his kisses, savor the feel of him, the taste of him, the scent of him. Alec ... how long had she loved him like this? How long had she needed him? There was no need for examination. There was but to lose herself in him, if only for this one sacred night.
When at last they were sated, gasping for breath, their sweat and tears mingling with the water, the two settled back into the bath. Father Alec’s arms wound tight about her as she laid her head on his chest.
“God forgive me,” he said. “I should leave.”
“And take my sanity with you?” Cecily asked, leaning her chin on his chest to look up at him. “No. We acted of our own free will. We chose this. Now we must carry our sin with us, as I carry all of my sins with me... . Still,” she added in soft tones, “I do not regret it.”
“God help me, nor do I,” Father Alec said. “Years ago I learned that Cranmer had a secret wife,” he went on after a while.
“The archbishop?”
He nodded as with one idle hand he stroked her hair. “Do not tell a soul or you will condemn him to death at the stake,” he warned.
Cecily offered a wry smile. He knew she would guard his secret.
“And I challenged him about it,” he said. “But Cranmer made me understand that to be in true service to God, one must be a true man.” He sighed. “Not that it gives license to sin ... but ever since that insight I could not help but hope for the day when our reforms would both allow me to serve my God and grant me a helpmate of my own.” His voice broke. “Cecily, you must know that you are the first woman for whom I have broken my vows.”
“Oh, Father ...” Cecily trailed off. She could no longer call him that. “Alec ...” she whispered. “I am honored.” She reached up to stroke his cheek. He covered her hand with his.
Father Alec swallowed. “We must not sin again,” he told her. “I pray your forgiveness and God’s that I took you in such an emotional state. But by God, Cecily, I have loved you since the day I helped you out of your mother’s wardrobe as a little girl.” Tears coursed slick trails down his cheeks. “Not as it is now, but in innocence. I do not think I knew the depth of it till you married my lord. That is why I left that first time. And then I returned to find you so ...” He shook his head. “So much a lady ... so beautiful. The love that was but a seedling when I left grew. I fought it; believe me I fought it. But I can fight no longer. What is worst is I no longer want to.”
Cecily leaned up to kiss his cheek. “We have both lost this battle,” she said. “And betrayed a man we love well. We can neither of us abandon Hal. He has been nothing but good and forgiving of me and a true friend to you.” She sighed. “We will not sin again.” She drew in a quavering breath. “But we have tonight.”
She tilted her face to his to receive his kiss once more.
Tomorrow it would end.
Though they carried themselves with honor, each look, each touch, each word was fraught with a new meaning. Cecily relived the night again and again, using it as a distraction from her grief and guilt. She would not think of Alice and her daughters, charred in their graves. She would not think of her own little Emmy, who had taken to crawling quite adeptly despite her deformity.
She met Hal’s eyes, trying to put forth the effort they had abandoned after Emmy’s birth. He was kind and helped ease the pain of the loss of her dear friend Alice, whom he grieved for as well. Together they achieved a semblance of what they had known in the beginning, but the façade lacked a key element they could not seem to recapture: their friendship. Cecily told herself it would change. In time. For now there was but to pretend and hope they would someday believe their own charade.
Moments alone with Father Alec were rare. Yet every now and again he and Cecily would allow their gaze to linger, a testimony to what was and what could never be.
One day in late autumn Cecily came upon Father Alec in the stables. He was about to go riding and had shed his cassock for breeches and boots. When he saw Cecily he smiled.
“How are you, my lady?” he asked, his tone soft.
“I am well,” she answered. “Better.” Her voice broke on the last word. She bowed her head.
Father Alec approached her, taking her hands. “I am thinking of returning to London. After the king spared Queen Catherine this summer from heresy charges, my hope is renewed.”
“I thought you told me that it was too dangerous, that you must wait for Cranmer to send for you,” she said. “He—he hasn’t, then?”
Father Alec shook his head. “Not yet. But I can live conspicuously. I can wait there.” He drew her to his chest. “It is better for us, Cecily. I cannot bear to remain here, to see you and not ... I cannot live in such agony and temptation. Despite my sin, I respect Lord Hal. And I respect you too much to compromise you further.”
Cecily’s shoulders slumped as she nuzzled in his chest. “I know,” she answered, her tone rich with anguish. “I trust you to do what is best.” She pulled back in his embrace, raising her head to meet his face. His hazel eyes were luminous with unshed tears. She reached up to trace the line of his jaw. “Stay safe, my dear friend. Promise me.”
“I promise,” he whispered, reaching up to cup her face between his hands. He pulled her close, pressing a soft kiss against her lips, which yielded to his, hoping to trap one last moment before it was gone forever.
The clomp of hooves against the earth startled them. They turned to find Mirabella in the doorway, returned from a ride. Her face was contorted as though she had borne witness to a great horror, her eyes fiery with accusation. She shook her head as she jerked the reins, whirling the horse about and riding from the stable as though it had burst into flames.
Cecily chased after her, crying her name in vain.
Everything, all good purposes, had all been in vain.
Mirabella rode through the forest at breakneck speed, listening to the pounding of the hooves against the fallen leaves. Her blood raced. It was confirmed, that which she had tried so hard to deny, all brought to light at last. Father Alec was a man as any other, a lustful, sinful man, and Cecily, the woman she loved so dear, no better than a common whore. It was just like Sister Julia and her father, sin upon sin. Betrayal upon betrayal. The cycle never ended. Oh, God... .
Mirabella rode until she reached the dwelling, yet another place of shame, another place of betrayal.
An eye for an eye... .
She dismounted and stormed in, finding Grace in the midst of reading cards. She looked up as though she had been expecting Mirabella.
“And so it has all come to pass,” she said in wry tones. “And you will make them pay, won’t you? ‘Vengeance is mine, sayeth the Lord.’ ” She shook her head. “I imagine you provide quite a relief being His right arm.”
“They must answer for their sin!” Mirabella cried as she seized Grace by the wrist, pulling her from the table and out of doors. The frail woman put up little fight as Mirabella nearly threw her over the saddle of her palfrey and mounted. “You will answer for yours as well!” she seethed.
“And you, Mirabella?” Grace returned, her tone calm and cool. “When will you?”
Mirabella said nothing as they cut through the forest, back to Sumerton, back to where it all began.
Mirabella did not bother to stable her horse. She rode into the courtyard, dismounted, and let the beast wander as she dragged Grace behind her into the castle, into the great hall, past wide-eyed servants who paused from their work to cross themselves.
“Where is my father?” she demanded of a fearful Kristina.
“H—he is in his apartments with my lady and Father Alec,” she told her.
“Stay here,” Mirabella commanded of the child, who looked as though demons themselves could not convince her to move.
“Mirabella, I beg you—” Grace began.
“Speak not!” Mirabella cried. “I am through protecting you!”
She pulled Grace down the hall to Hal’s doors, abandoning courtesy and bursting forth.
She held Grace’s hand aloft, thrusting her toward Hal, who had been seated before his fire, a tearful Cecily and Father Alec before him.
“Mirabella, what is the meaning of this?” he asked, rising. His face was streaked with tears.
“Don’t you recognize her, Father?” Mirabella’s tone was low. “Has it been so long that you have forgotten the features of your own true wife?”
Grace stood, mouth parted, tears streaming down her own cheeks as she beheld the broken family before her. “Oh, God ... Oh, Hal... .” But there were no words for this. There would never be any words.
And then something went terribly wrong. In all of Mirabella’s plans for revenge, she could not have foreseen it. Cecily and Father Alec rose, their faces wrought with sorrow. But her father, her dear father... .
Hal shook his head a moment as he advanced toward them. At once his face was overcome with an expression of pain too powerful to be attributed to emotion. He seized his temples in his large hands, crying out, before collapsing to the floor.
Cecily was at his side, taking his head onto her lap. “Quick! Fetch Dr. Hurst!”
Father Alec rushed past an immobile Mirabella.
“My God, Mirabella,” Cecily said, her tone soft as she fixed her eyes upon Mirabella. “Do you hate me so much?”
Mirabella could not speak; she was rendered mute as her father.
“Apoplexy,” Dr. Hurst said. Cecily heard the word as if it were an echo from another time. Indeed, Cecily wondered if she had been sucked through some kind of portal, back to the first time, when her love had willed Hal back.
Would her love be enough now, or would Hal succumb to the betrayal she and Father Alec had only just confessed to him, hoping to confront his wrath before Mirabella revealed it? How his eyes shone with the light of disillusionment when he gazed upon them, his dearest friend and his wife, his most unlikely betrayers. The silence that impregnated the room was suffocating as Hal, still casting his eyes in disbelief from one to the other, tried to find words suitable for such an unprecedented occasion. But the words never came.
Mirabella came, her wrath, her hate; she came at them merciless and exacting, her attack as unlikely and unprecedented as their own betrayal. Never had Cecily imagined this would be the form of revenge Mirabella’s bitterness would incite. It was all too much to take in.
“I’m sorry, Lady Sumerton,” the physician went on, addressing Cecily. “It was severe and he is older now. He will not survive.”
Hal lay abed. The muscles had gone slack on the left side of his face; everything was crooked, as though she were looking at him through a mirror as shattered as her dreams. She sat beside him and allowed no one near.
She would keep vigil over him alone, as any good wife would do.
A moan cut through Cecily’s haze and she opened her eyes, unaware that they had closed, to find the noise had come from Hal. Drool coursed down his chin. She retrieved a cloth, swabbing it clean.
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