Philippa (20 page)

“You acted from anger then,” he said quietly. “You must learn never to allow your emotions to dictate your actions, Philippa. Such behavior could lead to a fatal mistake, I fear. Who was the gentleman in question?”

“Sir, I do not kiss and tell! It was only Sir Roger,” she exclaimed. “And ’twas just kissing. He took no other liberties. He is a friend. But Cecily said he was her first kiss, and he is considered the best kisser at court.”

The earl of Witton didn’t know whether to laugh, or scold her. The queen was obviously not in complete control of her maids, although given her difficulties, poor lady, it was a wonder there were not more scandals. “Before we wed, if we wed, you will cease your experimentation in kissing. If you wish to be kissed, I shall kiss you.”

“I don’t know why,” Philippa pouted. “What harm is there in innocent kissing?”

“Your reticence but arouses my curiosity, and I cannot help but wonder why you would deny me,” he told her.

“Because you will make a fool of me. You can’t call out this man for the simple act of a few kisses last year before you and I even met,” Philippa said.

“Call him out?” The earl was astounded. “Why would I call him out?”

“Do you not think my behavior has dishonored you, and you wish to restore your family’s honor?” she asked him naively.

“Nay, Philippa, I do not wish to call out a young man for offering to console a disappointed girl with a few kisses before I even met this girl. I am sorry if you misunderstood me.”

“Oh,” Philippa responded, feeling both foolish and disappointed. “Then why would you insist on being by my side if I go to France?”

“If you are to be my wife, Philippa, I cannot leave you to yourself if we accompany the court to France. It simply is not done. I must be by your side to escort you as your future husband.”

“What if we are not formally betrothed until we return from France?” she asked him slyly.

“If we are not betrothed before you go to France, Philippa, then I expect we will not be betrothed at all. You say you are to be sixteen in April. Well, I shall be thirty-one in early August. Neither of us can wait. I will want an heir as soon as possible. I am willing to allow you the latitude of going to France with the court, but if you are to be my wife I must be by your side. And we will wed as soon as we return. If you cannot agree to that here and now, then I see no reason for our acquaintance to continue further.”

Y
ou would not believe what he said to me!” Philippa told Lord Cambridge, and then she repeated the conversation she had just had with the earl of Witton. His declaration had surprised her so, she had run from the hall.

“I agree with him, darling girl,” Thomas Bolton said.

“He behaves as if he didn’t trust me, uncle! I cannot wed with a man who does not trust me,” Philippa said angrily.

“Even if Crispin knew you well enough to trust you, Philippa, he would still not allow you to go to France unescorted. It is unseemly. Now let us go back into the hall, and straighten this matter out.”

“Uncle!” she protested, pouting.

“Philippa, this is an amazing match for you. If indeed you have not put the earl off with your childish behavior. We shall return to the hall immediately!” His voice was stem, and she looked surprised. In all her life she had never heard Thomas Bolton speak in such a sharp, commanding tone.

“Did you ever speak to my mother like that?” she demanded of him.

“I never had to speak to your mother like that,” he told her. “Now, girl, to the hall!” And he gently pushed her from his library, through the corridor, and into the hall again where the earl of Witton stood staring out at the river morosely.

The earl turned as they entered.

“Philippa has come to apologize for her behavior,” Lord Cambridge said, “and she will gladly agree to your escorting her to France this summer. Philippa?”

“Oh, very well,” Philippa grudgingly muttered. “I apologize, my lord.”

“There,” Lord Cambridge said, almost purring. “Now you two will be friends again. Being of an independent turn of mind you must both learn to compromise, eh?”

“I agree,” responded the earl, looking towards Philippa.

“I am sorry I left you so precipitously,” Philippa allowed stiffly. “I was upset that you did not trust me, my lord. No one has ever questioned my veracity.”

“And I did not mean to, if indeed that is what I did,” he replied. “I am simply concerned for your good name, Philippa. I am happy we are to be friends again now, and that you will accept my company in France without complaint.”

She nodded. “We are, and I will,” she told him.

“Excellent, excellent!” Lord Cambridge said, smiling broadly. “Now, my dears, I am absolutely ravenous, and you have both been so busy arguing that you never noticed that the board is set and ready for us. Philippa, you will remain the night. There is an icy rain falling outside now, and I do not wish to compromise your health by sending you back to the palace this evening. The morning is time enough.”

They sat down to an excellent meal. Lord Cambridge’s cook was a true artist. They began with salmon, sliced wafer thin, and lightly broiled with dill. There were fresh oysters, and large prawns steamed in wine and served with lemon. Next came a fat duck dripping its juices, and swimming in a gravy of rich red wine; a rabbit pie; a platter of chops, and another with half of a country-cured ham. Philippa’s eyes widened as a silver platter filled with lovely plump artichokes was offered.

“Uncle! Where did you get these?” she asked him. “I thought the king kept them all for himself. You know how he adores artichokes.”

Lord Cambridge smiled craftily. “Why, darling girl, I have my little ways as you well know. I, too, adore artichokes.”

“It is not the season for them,” the earl said, helping himself from the platter.

“Nonetheless I manage to obtain them,” Thomas Bolton said, tearing off a piece from the warm cottage loaf, and buttering it lavishly before taking a large bite.

“Miracles are born in Uncle Thomas’s kitchens wherever he may be living at the time,” Philippa said.

“You have more than one house then?” the earl asked.

“Here, and at Greenwich, and of course Otterly in Cumbria,” Philippa responded before her cousin might. “And each house is identical both inside and out, for Uncle Thomas does not like a great deal of change.” She laughed. “Is that not correct, uncle?”

“It is,” he agreed. “My life is far less complicated that way. It matters not where I may be living, everything is in exactly the same place.”

“But the upholstery is different,” Philippa put in, smiling.

“One must have some small variety,” Lord Cambridge said drolly.

Their meal ended with a tartlet of winter pears and a bowl of clotted Devon cream. The goblets had been kept filled, and all at the board were feeling mellow as outside the rain poured down, a certain indication of the spring to come.

“Philippa plays a fairly good game of chess, Crispin, dear boy,” Lord Cambridge said. “I taught her myself. As for me, I am exhausted, and must seek my bed.” Arising from the high board he bowed to them, and departed the hall.

“He is not very subtle,” Philippa said when he had gone.

“But most hopeful, I think, that you and I will not quarrel again,” the earl replied.

She smiled. “As a child my mother ruled me. These past few years at court I have felt as if I were the mistress of my own destiny, although I know it to be not fully true. Now I face the prospect of a husband who will be master over me. And while I know that is how it should be, it is something with which I must come to terms. Does that make any sense to you, my lord?”

He nodded, thinking that taking a wife was much like taming a wild creature, at least where Philippa was concerned. “I shall try not to prick you too hard, Philippa,” he promised her with a small smile. Then he arose from the board. “Come, and play chess with me, madame. ’Tis a game I very much enjoy.”

She fetched the board and the pieces from their place within the sideboard. Then she set them up neatly on a small game table she had instructed him to bring to the fireside. “White or black, my lord?” Philippa asked him as they seated themselves.

“Black,” he said. “I have always enjoyed being the black knight.”

“And I the white queen,” she quickly parried, and moved her first pawn.

He laughed, then studying the board carefully for a moment, he too moved a pawn.

They were, he quickly found, quite equally matched. She did not play like other women, filled with emotion, and weepy when she lost a piece. Philippa played coolly and with a sharp intellect. She was careful with each move she made, and he was quite astounded when she checked his queen. They spoke virtually not a word, and not easily did he finally defeat her, checkmating her king.

And she laughed when he did. “Ah, at last I have found a worthy opponent,” she told him. “I shall not allow you such leeway the next time we play.”

“Ahh,” he replied with a small smile, “then you think you can beat me, eh?”

“Perhaps,” Philippa hedged. Men, as she recalled, did not like being bested by a woman. She had foolishly allowed her tongue to run away with her.

“Only perhaps?” he taunted gently, wondering why she had suddenly drawn back.

“Nothing is ever certain, my lord,” Philippa said quickly in reply.

He laughed again. “You think you can beat me, but you have decided to spare my masculine feelings, Philippa. Is that it? Well, do not bother. If you think you can beat me, then let me see you do it.” He did not believe she actually could, but he was very much enjoying teasing her, seeing the range of emotions play across her lovely face.

Without a word Philippa set the chess pieces in their proper place again, and then playing with intense concentration she proceeded to beat him in a far quicker period of time than he would have imagined. When she checked his king, and set it next to his queen, his knights, and his bishops, she looked across the table at him. There was not even the hint of a smile upon her face when she spoke.

“You were correct, my lord. I sought to spare you. You cannot live at court as I do, and serve the monarchs as I do, and be a total ninny. Neither the king, the queen, or those who surround them in their more private moments during the day would tolerate a bad chess player. And while I have carefully held back with his majesty so that he always wins our matches, I play hard enough with him that he believes he has actually bested me. It delights him, for I have bested his brother-in-law, the duke of Suffolk, and others of his favorites on many occasions. I have even played and beaten the cardinal twice.”

The earl of Witton nodded slowly. “Lord Cambridge said it. You are a consummate courtier, Philippa. I am most impressed by your acumen.”

“But am I the sort of girl you would want for a wife, my lord? Unlike others of my sex I am a poor dissembler,” she responded. “What you have seen this day is what I am. I have a temper. I have a passion for beautiful things. But I am not a giggling or silly turnip head.”

“Will you always obey me if I am your husband?” he asked her candidly.

“Probably not,” she told him so quickly that he smiled.

“You are honest, Philippa. I count honesty among the greatest of virtues along with loyalty and honor,” Crispin St. Claire said. “Well, I can always beat you if you are truly disobedient. And there are other more pleasurable means of bringing a fractious wife to her husband’s will.”

“Are you flirting with me, my lord?” she asked. Her cheeks felt warm.

“Aye, I am,” he replied. “I like to make you blush, Philippa. To find that I can discommode you reassures me that I will have some small advantage.”

“You speak as if the matter between us is settled, my lord,” she responded, feeling a small prick of irritation. There was an arrogance about him that troubled her.

“Can you find a better match than an earl of Witton?” he asked seriously. “I could probably find a girl with better bloodlines, but as Lord Cambridge has reminded me, an over-bred girl would be a poor breeder. If you are like your mother you will prove more than worthy, Philippa. Aye, it is settled between us, and you will be my wife.”

“I have not said it!” she cried, jumping up from her chair so suddenly that the game table between them shook, and several chess pieces fell to the floor.

“But you will, Philippa,” he taunted her. “You will agree to be my wife.”

“It is the land you want,” she flung back at him.

“In the beginning, aye. But not now,” he told her. “I beheld you for the first time at court the other night, and decided the matter then and there.”

“Do not dare to say you love me!” she cried.

“Nay, I do not, for I barely know you,” he responded. “Perhaps we shall learn to love each other one day, Philippa. But few go into a loving marriage. You are not a fool, as you have so carefully pointed out to me. You know that marriages among people like us are arranged for a variety of reasons. Land. Wealth. Status. Heirs. We will respect one another, Philippa. We will make children together. And if we are very fortunate the love may come. But you will make me a good wife, and I will make you the countess of Witton, and a good husband. Do you find me unattractive, or unpleasant to be with, Philippa?”

“Nay,” she admitted. “You are not a beautiful man, but neither are you an ugly one. And you have wit, and intellect, both of which I value far more in a man than a handsome face. But I think you arrogant also, my lord.”

“Aye, I can indeed be arrogant, but nonetheless I believe we have made a good beginning, Philippa.” Then reaching out he drew her from behind the table, and wrapped his arms about her. “I want the betrothal papers drawn up soon,” he said, looking down at her, his fingers tipping her face up to his. “I find I do not choose to wait long for you.”