The Vanishing Witch (24 page)

‘You have my word,’ Robert said, glaring at his son, ‘that none in my employ will go near that church again.’

Father Remigius nodded. ‘Then let us speak no more of it.’

The conversation died into an awkward silence. Robert was proud of how well
Jan was learning the business but that had never stopped them arguing over it. It was only natural, Robert supposed, for lads to want to try new ideas, and for older and wiser men to hold the reins firmly so that they didn’t bolt into foolishness. Since his mother’s death, though, Jan had grown ever more prickly and hot-headed. There were days when Robert could hardly make a simple remark to the lad
without him snarling. Both his sons had taken the death of their mother far harder than ever Robert could have imagined.

He glanced down the table at the younger boy. Adam had barely said a word to anyone since the funeral. He poked listlessly at the pork, raising it to his mouth, then setting it down again, as if the effort were too much. Catlin beckoned to Diot and murmured something. She immediately
went out and returned with a pie in the shape of a cockerel with a little pastry hare riding on its back, complete with reins and a saddle.

‘I heard Lombard pie was your favourite, Adam,’ Catlin said, ‘so I had one fetched from the baker this very day for you, stuffed full of chicken and bacon just as you like it.’

The boy’s face had already broken into a reluctant smile at the sight of it.
He examined it from every angle, but did not take a bite. His smile faded and he glanced up at Jan, anxiously gnawing his lip.

Catlin laughed. ‘I know it’s a pretty thing, but you can’t keep it or it will spoil. Diot can always fetch you another. Why don’t you enjoy that one?’

Leonia’s expression darkened. She stared at her mother, her brown eyes narrowed. But Catlin was smiling at Adam.

Robert
squeezed her shoulder. His fingertips briefly touched the warm skin of her neck. He let his hand drop, half embarrassed at the thrill her bare flesh had sent through his body. ‘You really shouldn’t spoil the boy, my dear.’

‘He needs a tender hand after all he’s been through these past weeks, poor motherless lamb,’ Catlin murmured.

Father Remigius caught the remark and waved his knife at her,
beaming. ‘But not motherless for much longer, I think. We have a double cause for celebration this day.’

Jan glanced up, frowning. ‘We’re marking the Easter feast, but with my mother not yet cold in her grave we’re not celebrating.’

The old priest looked confused. ‘I meant the forthcoming nuptials. You’re still in mourning, of course, and it is right and fitting that you should grieve for your
poor dear mother. But Easter reminds us that after death comes life and how better to celebrate our Lord’s resurrection than with the new life a wedding brings? In fact, I believe I will use that very point in my sermon next Sunday when the first of the banns is called. I trust you will be present, Mistress Catlin, to hear your banns read.’

‘My congratulations, mistress,’ Jan said. ‘I wish you
every happiness. Your future husband is to be congratulated, too.’ His brow furrowed again. ‘But . . . why aren’t you celebrating the Easter feast in his company rather than ours? Will he not think it odd?’

The old priest turned to Robert, who had gone rigid and was staring grimly at the fragment of hare impaled on the point of his knife, as if it were the flesh of his worst enemy. Edward was
grinning broadly.

‘Have you not told . . . Forgive me, Master Robert, I was sure you must have . . .’

There was a moment of frozen silence in the room, which was shattered by a peal of bright laughter. ‘But I am spending the Easter feast with my future husband, Jan.’ Catlin fondled the bloodstone necklace that encircled her throat. ‘Your father has asked me to marry him.’

Jan sprang up so violently
that his goblet was knocked to the floor. ‘Is this true?’ he demanded. ‘My mother’s not even a month in her grave and you’ve already found yourself another wife?’ He rounded on Edward, who was watching him with undisguised amusement. ‘Do you think this right?’

Edward leaned across, took his mother’s hand, brought it to his lips and kissed it. ‘Your father’s to be congratulated on winning the
hand of the loveliest woman in England.’ He looked up at Jan, still grinning. ‘So, will you propose a toast to the happy couple,
brother
, or shall I?’

‘I would sooner drink to my own damnation.’

Robert lumbered to his feet. ‘Sit down at once, boy. Where are your manners? Have you forgotten we have guests?’

‘You expect me to continue eating as though nothing has happened?’ Jan said savagely.
‘How could you betray my mother’s memory like this? No man should even look at another woman so soon after he buried his wife. It’s not decent. Did you care so little for my mother that you couldn’t even grieve a year for her?’

‘Mistress Catlin nursed your mother like a sister. She and I have shared the grief of her death, and that grief has drawn us together. After all, Mistress Catlin is herself
a widow long before her time. Leonia needs a father to guide her as she comes to womanhood, and you’ve seen yourself how wretched the boy has become without a woman’s care. I’m so often away on business and Adam needs a loving mother to tend him.’

Jan’s face was flushed with anger. ‘Do you really expect my brother to call another woman
mother
when he has only just seen his true mother laid in
the grave? Or perhaps you were waiting for her to die so that you could move this woman into her bed!’

There was a howl from Adam. He scrambled over the bench and raced out through the door leading to the yard. Beata ran after him.

‘How dare you?’ Robert roared.

Father Remigius clambered to his feet, holding up his hands. ‘Peace, peace. Have you forgotten what day this is? Your father is thinking
of Adam, Jan. He’ll recover from his grief much sooner, with the help of a good woman to—’

But Jan ignored him and strode towards the door through which his brother had fled. He turned on the threshold. ‘You’re always reminding me that you’re a respected man in this city, a man of position. How much respect will you command from your fellow merchants, if you throw yourself into the arms of another
woman before the mourning candles have even burned away? I’ll not allow you to disgrace my mother’s memory in this way. I demand you call off the wedding. I won’t stand by and let you make a laughing-stock of yourself and this family.’

‘How dare you presume to tell me what to do? I am your father and your master. Come back and apologise—’

But it was too late. Jan had already slammed the door
behind him. Robert made to follow, but Catlin caught his hand. ‘Let him walk it off. He’ll spend the night in a tavern, and after a jug of wine it will all seem different to him. In a day or two he’ll be begging your forgiveness.’

‘It is your forgiveness he should be begging,’ Robert said. ‘I never thought to hear a son of mine speak to me as if I was an errant child to be corrected. I should
take a horse whip to him.’

‘I have already forgiven him and so should you,’ Catlin said.

‘Well spoken.’ Father Remigius nodded approvingly. ‘On today of all days we must follow the example of Our Blessed Lord.’

Catlin stroked Robert’s arm and looked up at him anxiously. ‘But I would never wish to come between you and Jan. Perhaps we should do as he asks and delay the wedding for a year or so,
if he thinks it best.’

‘What
he
thinks best!’ Robert spluttered indignantly. ‘I will not be told by a boy who is scarcely out of clouts when I may or may not marry. We’ll marry as soon as the banns are read, and I will not delay by as much as a single day.’

Catlin bowed her head. ‘Whatever you wish, my sweeting. My only concern is for your happiness. I will do whatever you ask of me.’

Robert,
though the blood still pounded in his temples, felt his chest ease a little. That was what he adored about Catlin. Her concern was only ever for him, unlike that insolent brat he had raised.

Deep down, he knew as well as Jan did that the wedding would appear to others in the city to be conducted in indecent haste, which only made his son’s words smart the more, but the truth was he couldn’t wait
a year to take Catlin to his bed. God’s blood, it was all he could do not to carry her up there this minute, but Catlin was not the kind of woman who would ever consent to sleep with a man who was not her husband. Besides, if he waited, perhaps another man would offer her his hand. A year was a long time for a widow alone and in need of someone to protect her. She might be tempted to accept. He
couldn’t risk losing her.

Edward, having taken another gulp of wine, rose and stood behind his mother, hugging her and kissing the top of her head. ‘Master Robert is right, Maman. Ignore Jan. You two deserve happiness after all you’ve both suffered. The pup will come round – and if he doesn’t, who cares?’

But Robert found he did care. He hadn’t realised until that moment how much he wanted the
respect of his son. To see the boy he’d always taken such pride in look at him with such contempt felt like a sword slash across his face. But the pain enraged him the more and made him determined to stand his ground. He would marry Catlin now even if the whole world railed against it.

If anyone had bothered to take notice of the little girl in the room they would have seen excitement flickering
across her face as if she had just watched a hugely entertaining play. But it disappeared when Robert turned back to the table. He suddenly realised the child had witnessed the whole scene. He put an arm around her and drew her close, looking down affectionately at her. ‘Leonia, I’m sorry that you have had to listen to such foolishness. Once your mother and I are wed, I will treat you as if you
were my own sweet child and give you all that I would have given my own daughter, had I been blessed with one.’

A happy thought struck him. He crossed to a small chest, opened it and withdrew a tiny package wrapped in green velvet and tied with a yellow ribbon. He turned back to Leonia, beaming. ‘I’d intended to give this to you on our wedding day, but I think you should have it as an Easter
gift, to show you how much I’m looking forward to calling you my beloved daughter.’

Robert took her hand and placed the parcel in her palm. Leonia glanced at her mother with sparkling eyes.

‘Open it, child,’ Catlin urged.

The ribbon was pulled off in a trice and Leonia carefully unrolled the package. A gold necklace lay inside the velvet cloth, a golden rosebud hanging from it, a single pearl
set on it, like a dewdrop.

Robert chuckled in genuine pleasure at the delight that lit the child’s face. She held it up to the candlelight, watching the rosebud glitter as it twisted and turned at the end of the chain.

‘So you like it, then,’ Robert said. ‘A rosebud for beauty and the pearl for chastity. Your mother chose it. I’ve no understanding of things that please young girls, but I dare
say I will learn. Shall I put it on for you?’

She turned while he lifted the long chain carefully over her head, then raised her black curls. He caught a glimpse of the little arched neck and smelt the sweet perfume of her skin, before letting the soft curls fall back into place. When she turned and pulled him down to kiss his cheek, Robert felt a pleasurable shiver run through him. Leonia was
fair set to be as pretty as her mother, prettier even, with her golden skin and huge, long-lashed eyes. He realised he would have to guard his new daughter’s virtue carefully in the years to come. He’d been a young man once and knew that a glimpse of her would be like placing a jewelled goblet before an open casement: even the most virtuous man would be tempted.

If the heart, eye or brain of a lapwing is hung around a man’s neck, it shall keep him from forgetfulness and sharpen his wits.

I heard the door to the house slam and came out of the kitchen, thinking it might be Master Robert come to comfort his son, but it was Jan. He was striding across the yard towards the gate, his fist clenched around the hilt of his sword as if he was
itching to thrust it deep into someone’s innards. ‘Where’s Adam?’ he demanded.

I nodded towards the gate. ‘He ran out as if the hell-hounds were chasing him. I couldn’t catch him, but Tenney’s gone after him. He’ll find him and bring him back.’

Jan glanced back at the house, shaking his head, like a dog with sore ears. ‘I swear my father’s entirely lost his wits. He’s always insisted that nothing
should ever be allowed to destroy the reputation of our
respectable
family or damage our good name. The times he’s blistered my ears for drunkenness or being seen with a girl from the stew-house, and now he throws all aside and announces he’s going to marry within weeks of my mother’s death. And to spring it on young Adam like that. When was my father intending to tell . . .’

He grasped my arm
so fiercely that I squeaked, though I’m sure he didn’t realise how hard he was gripping me. ‘God’s teeth, you don’t think he’s got her with child? Could she still . . . I mean can women of her age?’

‘I reckon that old hag, Diot, wouldn’t be able to keep her fat mouth closed if her mistress had a brat in her belly. Though you may yet have a half-brother or -sister if they wed,’ I said bitterly.

I’d not thought of that, and somehow it was worse than seeing them wed. Was it because I knew my time for bearing children was gone? I felt cheated. It was strange: I’d watched my hope drip from me month after month, year after year, and felt nothing at the time, not even when I watched poor Mistress Edith’s belly swell with her babies.

Once, long ago, when I still thought Tenney had a fondness
for me, I dreamed one day we two might set up home together and I might dandle a babe on my knee. After all, a child cares nothing for how its mam looks, only for how much it’s loved, and I had love enough in me to flood the Braytheforde. But Tenney never asked me and made no attempt to touch me, save as friend or brother. After a while I forced myself to forget my foolish fancy. Yet, no matter
how often you sternly tell yourself it will not happen, there must still be a tiny corner your words can’t reach, a hidden place in which you stubbornly imagine that one day you will hold your own child in your arms. And when Nature finally takes away the hope you didn’t even know you carried, it hurts something fierce.