A Kiss in the Night (27 page)

He released her as he stepped back and turned to disappear through the window. She stared after him before she sank slowly to the floor. A cool morning breeze blew in through the window. The struggle to generate the unnatural strength to resist the pounding sweetness of forbidden love had just begun.

A battle she was doomed to lose…

* * * *

Tom Boswell found much to admire as he walked through the streets of Gaillard No pillories, for instance. He thought he might stay here, at least for a spell, if only he could remain honest for a change. Or if he could just be dishonest on a more modest scale. The trouble, of course, was that God created more fools than the lice that plagued them.

The sun was bright and shadows were sharp. Signs of industry abounded everywhere; the streets were full of people bustling about their chores. Tom smiled widely, tipped his head to all, even a group of unkempt cottars heading toward the fields. He drew deeply of the scents wafting from the bakery, before stopping to read the banner proclaiming an upcoming fair, one that promised fortune readings from the lady of Gaillard. The tailor glanced up as he passed and smiled. A most friendly town, Tom saw as he passed the smithy, where a man was shoeing a new coach. A group of men bent over cobblestones being laid into the street. There seemed as many people milling about the goldsmith shop as the butcher's. Coins were passing from hand to hand everywhere he looked. Vineyards stretched as far as he could see. And he had a taste for what vineyards produced. No beggars here either, another good sign. 'Twas perfect.

Gaillard had more industry than any English town he knew, and he knew many of them. He had been chased out of every English village east of London, until at last a sheriff put him on a boat crossing the channel. "So ye can try ye hand at emptying the pockets of the frog-faced French.”

Tom still chuckled every time he thought of it. "'Tis a fine thing by me," he had shouted back. "No doubt the French have as many fools as merry ole England!"

Besides, he knew the language well enough.

So here he was, a man without a country, looking for a few rich pockets and already holding the introduction to one in his sack. He shielded his eyes with his hand as he looked down the thoroughfare to the gates at the Chateau Gaillard. Perhaps he would soon be wrapped in the comforts of this wealthy provincial court.

He stepped into the shady dark comfort of a tavern. A woman was sweeping the rushes thrown over the floor. "How do ye do, sir?" she asked pleasantly.

"As fine as Adam afore the fall. How about a mug of some nice cool ale."

She cried with surprise, "Oh, ye be an Englishman!"

"By no fault of me own,” he said. “‘Twas my mother's doing. God rest her soul."

The woman laughed as she set down the broom and stepped behind the counter. She grabbed a mug, opened the barrel and tumbled cool ale into a cup. This was set before the man as she looked him over. "Ye be wearing a monk's cloth?"

"That I am, good woman, that I am. I've come with sorrowful news for Lord Chamberlain.”

"Oh?" she inquired. "Which one would that be?”

"Be there two Lord Chamberlains now?"

"Ye must have just arrived if ye have to ask. There are indeed two. Brothers. Twins at birth."

"Ye don't say? Well, I'm seeking a Lord Paxton Chamberlain, who until recently had in service a knight named Simon."

She drew back. "Did some mishap befall the goodly man Simon?"

She held her breath, bracing herself for bad news. She had liked Simon. Everyone did. He had shown them how to better roof their tavern, spending a whole two days here to do it. He had learned carpentry from his father, a high-minded architect with connections to the crown. He said he had always meant to follow in his father's footsteps, but somehow, after he was knighted and with the king's wars and all, he never had the chance. Still, he couldn't keep his hands from any building going on and he had been anxious to quit Gaillard for Alsace with Lord Chamberlain.

"Aye." The monk shook his head sadly.

The woman waited for more to be said, but the monk remained silent. She supposed she'd learn about it soon enough. Nothing but bad news and evil deeds seemed to be coming to the Lords Chamberlains these days. Two weeks since the mad girl murdered Lord Morgan's doomed bastard, and people still talked of nothing else.

Poor Lord Paxton. Never had it easy despite his riches and title. Always in the shadow of his brother. Now more than ever, she suspected, the way Lord Paxton and the Lady Linness were always seen together, the love between them so tangible. Some said they saw its sparks flying from the chateau's windows at night.

"God save us," she whispered, and she told the man how to press a request for an audience with the lord general, murmuring again, "God save 'em all...”

* * * *

With a sweep of skirts, Linness stepped into the hall. It was so very quiet. Soft summer sunlight filtered through the stained-glass windows and the enormous skylight overhead. The air was cool. Four priests sat at the table on the dais with two open Bibles. Papers, the bishop's seal, ink wells, and feathered quills crowded the tabletop.

The bishop stood, his hands clasped behind his back, staring up at the stained-glass depiction of Mary and Child, a gift Linness had ordered for Morgan at Christmas gift-giving time God appeared as a golden light above her. It was an unorthodox vision the Lady Chamberlain herself had ordered the artisan to make.

Linness knelt before the priests in supplication. "You called to speak with me, Bishop Luce?"

He turned from the stained-glass window to see the lady kneeling there. She was beautiful, but then, so was Satan. So was Satan. Women were the source of original sin and weak vessels particularly liable to vice. This lady more so; unholy demons had seized her soul; he knew this now. She tempted more than one man to vice.

As for her unusual beauty, it was a ruse, a clever trap for the obtuse man. Like Lord Paxton. And this one wielded her beauty with particular skill. He had noted this from the start. She never let her vanity reveal itself in the normal pretensions of her sex; no coy sighs and batted lashes, indecent bodices, provocative hair arrangements, or fashionable shoes. The theatrical air of melancholy about her was most irritating, and deceptive. Half the people of Gaillard, including her own husband, saw it as a signature of the depth of her feeling for the sordid scene played out here that night.

The town's gossip had led him to a series of startling conclusions. What the simple folks didn't know was that, no doubt, the lady had caused her husband's impotence through witchcraft, which explained Lord Morgan's infidelities. Now she was free to copulate with his brother, entangling that man in her godless ambitions. He had guessed it all. This, in turn, brought about the sordid triangles of adultery and fornication, which ended in the devil's own horrific spectacle played for the entire court of Gaillard. He had never witnessed anything quite so diabolical.

He meant to uncover her deceit and bring her to her knees before God's judgment. He meant to see the fear of the everlasting fires of damnation consume her whole. Beginning now. "So," he began. "You have emerged from your meditations today."

"Aye," she said quietly.

"The day that marks the pagan solstice."

She looked confused for a moment. "Is it now?"

"Would you pretend not to be aware of the date or its unholy significance?"

"I would not pretend," she replied, speaking in a cool, detached voice.

It infuriated him, her calm.

For a moment he said nothing. He turned back to the stained-glass depiction of Mary and Christ. "You had these made, I am told."

"Aye. For my husband. It was a gift."

"This obsession you have with the holy Mother. From whence does it spring?"

That was an easy answer to give. "From the everlasting bounty of my love."

"So you say, so you say. The reverence for Mary is specious at best, false and illicit at worst. It steals your prayers and soul from God—"

"Mary brings me closer to God!"

His eyes blazed with sudden wrath, though his voice remained calm as he replied, "The worship of Mary over Christ and God is an evil ideation that directly contradicts the teaching of the holy church!"

Father Aslam stood and read three scriptures from the Bible, including the first commandment and ending with a more ominous one. She hardly listened. The scriptures, she knew, were a mirror held against the soul; what one found there revealed the nature and inclinations of one's heart. Father Gayly used to say it best; there were as many ways of reading the Bible as the sun had of shining, and that as man thinkest in his heart, he finds in the scripture.

"Yet you know this, do you not?"

"I have heard those passages many times."

The bishop added, "You have thus been warned, milady. I shall not suffer the impertinence of your false ideation again. You shall remove all false images of Mary and replace them with the cross. You shall begin directing your prayers to Christ and God. You shall delete any reference to Mary from your mind. Is that understood?"

She made no reply, save for her eyes. How dare he? He wouldn't know God if He knocked him down with a lightning bolt! This was too maddening.

"Now I shall direct my questions to another matter. Did you know the serving woman, Amber?"

"Aye."

"How did you know her?"

"Just from passing."

"Is that all?"

"Aye."

"Did you know she was your husband's mistress?"

Linness paused and in a whisper she said, "Aye."

"So you knew her a bit more than just in passing?"

"The common gossip had been brought to me.”

"Who brought you this news?"

"I heard it from a number of different people."

"Name them."

"I will not. They are of no consequence to your questioning."

The bishop slammed his fist on the bench. "I will determine what is and is not of consequence here. In the name of God, state the names of the people who told you this."

Bright rebellion flashed in her eyes. She would not involve any other in the man's malice. No matter what. "Then, I do not remember who."

His gaze bored into her. "You would lie to protect these people. Another abomination before God. Very well. Did you or did you not consider your husband's mistress a rival for his affection?"

"I did not," she replied.

"Yet you knew he was conducting an affair. How do you reconcile this disparity?"

"I do not see it as a disparity. I have always had my husband's regard and affection. What he did or did not do with another woman concerned me not. I have no moral authority over my husband."

"Perhaps you have another reason for ignoring your husband's affairs."

She made no reply to that.

"You have no answer, milady?" he pressed.

"I did not hear a question."

"Do you have another reason for ignoring your husband's affairs?"

"Nay," she lied for the first time. She had to. To save Jean Luc. To save Paxton. To save Morgan. Firmly, she said again, "I do not."

"And would you swear to this on the Bible before God Almighty?"

There came the briefest hesitation. “Aye."

"So now how do you answer the woman's charge?"

"What charge is that?"

"The charge of witchery!"

"I say not guilty to that mad accusation."

"Do you? And if you were guilty, would you not also deny it?"

A trick, she knew, of course. “Aye."

"So do you admit you are lying to save yourself?"

"Nay!"

"But you at least admit that we cannot trust the veracity of your word?"

"Nay!"

He paused a moment, having proved her denial meant nothing. "And what of your well-known reputation as a seer of men's fortunes?"

Linness frantically searched the stone and marble squares around her before lifting her gaze. The brightness of the afternoon filled the hall with little lights and quivers, dancing across the walls and floors and lighting the bishop's thin face with frightening planes and shadows. Perhaps she was only imagining this, for the question truly scared her. How to answer it? To deny it was impossible. It was indeed common knowledge, but then to admit to the gift before a man such as Bishop Luce was to set fire to the kindling sticks beneath her fate. He would declare her guilty of witchery no matter what.

`"Do you or do you not see into the future?"

"Aye, occasionally."

"And to whom do you attribute this 'miracle of sight'—as you have been known to call it?"

"To no one."

"No one?"

"No one."

"Are human beings capable of orchestrating miracles?" When she made no reply, he demanded, "Are they?"

"Nay," she confessed.

"Then I ask you again. To whom do you attribute these miracles—"