So Great A Love (23 page)

“I will try,” Catherine said. Taking a deep
breath she pulled away from Margaret's sheltering arms. Then, in a
voice that was almost normal, she asked, “Where are the serving
women? We have orders to give.”

“Tell me what you want me do,” Aldis said to
Catherine. “Margaret is right; we have duties to perform.”

By the time Arden and the seneschal conducted
Sir Tristan and his lady into the great hall the high table was
cleared of dirty dishes, a fresh cloth had been laid, and the table
was reset for the guests. At the lower tables places were made for
the company that was arriving with Tristan and, in the kitchen,
food was being reheated, meat sliced, and fresh ale or wine was
being poured into clean pitchers. As soon as the guests were seated
the food would be served, with little to suggest that their food
was left over from an earlier meal.

Leaving Aldis to finish the final
instructions to the servants Margaret put her arm around
Catherine's waist and urged her forward to greet Tristan, who
entered the hall with Arden. To Margaret's eyes, Tristan was not
much changed in the years since she had last seen him. He was
perhaps a little taller and a bit broader in the shoulders, but
still blond, blue-eyed, and handsome in a pink-cheeked, boyish
way.

“You will remember my sister, Catherine,”
Arden said to Tristan, “and her friend, Lady Margaret, both of whom
were also at Cliffmore while we were fostered there.”

“No,” said Tristan. A faint frown marred his
placid brow. “I am sorry to say I do not recall ever knowing either
of these charming ladies. However, I am delighted to meet them
now.” He bent over Catherine's extended hand with perfect
politeness and no particular warmth.

Margaret saw Catherine's face go white, saw
her eyes grow huge and fill with tears. It was bad enough for
Catherine to love and not have her love returned, but to learn that
Tristan did not even remember her was a blow that no degree of
affection could survive without anguish. For the unhappiness he was
causing to her friend, however unwittingly, Margaret yearned to
slap Tristan's handsome face.

“I have no doubt,” Margaret said with cold
dignity as Tristan dropped Catherine's hand and took hers, to bow
over it in turn, “that to you, important squire to your father that
you were, Lady Catherine and I were no more than silly little
girls. I do assure you, Sir Tristan, both of us remember you.”

“I am honored to know that you do after so
many years,” said Tristan. Something in his eyes in the instant
before he turned back to Arden made Margaret wonder just how much
Tristan did recall about the group of half a dozen girls whom his
mother had undertaken to train into acceptable chatelaines, as his
father trained the boys under his care to become knights. Margaret
considered the possibility that she had misjudged Tristan, that he
did remember Catherine and her girlish affection and was trying to
smooth over a potentially awkward situation by pretending he had
forgotten.

During these introductions Sir Wace remained
near the door, removing Lady Isabel's cloak and helping her with
her gloves. Now he led her forward and Margaret and Catherine saw
Tristan's wife for the first time. She was short, the top of her
head barely reaching to Tristan's shoulder. She had a sweet, pretty
face, intelligent brown eyes, and honey-gold hair gathered into a
golden mesh coif. By her fine green woolen gown and the jewels she
wore, Lady Isabel was well dowered.

She was also, rather obviously, pregnant.

Margaret heard Catherine's gasp of dismay,
she saw Arden's wary glance at Catherine, and she was torn between
the demands of good manners and her love for her friend. However,
to Margaret's great relief, Catherine found within herself the
strength she needed. She put out her hands and welcomed Lady Isabel
to Bowen.

“I hope we will be good friends,” Isabel said
to Catherine, “since your brother and my dear Tristan have been
close companions for so many years.”

They all sat at the high table while Tristan
and Isabel ate and it seemed natural enough for Arden, Tristan, and
Sir Wace to choose seats together so they could talk more easily of
manly subjects, while the ladies gathered in their own group.

Isabel spoke freely and without reserve, as
if Catherine and Margaret were already the dear friends she claimed
that she wanted them to be. She was from Aquitaine, which explained
the charming accent with which she spoke Norman French. Tristan's
wife was blessed with an open, sunny manner, and Margaret could
understand how her husband had grown to love her.

“Of course,” said Isabel, her brown eyes
sparkling mischievously, “my large dowry helped Tristan to decide
he wanted to marry me. For his part, my father was pleased to know
a powerful nobleman would hold his lands after he is gone, for I am
his only child, you see, and Tristan's father is well known to my
father. Altogether, it was a perfect match. Is it not fortunate
that Tristan and I should learn to care for each other so soon
after we were married?”

“Fortunate, indeed,” said Margaret when
Catherine did not respond at once. She could not dislike Isabel,
who was innocent of any desire to inflict pain on Catherine. Isabel
was guilty only of loving the handsome husband her father had
chosen for her.

The weary travelers went early to bed and
Catherine, no longer constrained to act as hostess, fled to her own
chamber soon afterward. Aldis followed close on her cousin's
heels.

“I should go to Catherine,” Margaret said,
taking a step toward the stairway.

“Let her have a little time alone, to sort
out her thoughts,” Arden said. He caught at Margaret's arm to stop
her, keeping her with him in the great hall. “After today Catherine
can no longer deny, even in her dreams, that Tristan is lost to
her. She knows now that he never was hers. There is nothing you or
I can say to erase the pain caused by acceptance of a hard
truth.”

“I could remind her that I love her,”
Margaret said, thinking that everything Arden said about Catherine
applied to her, too. Just as Catherine needed her affection in a
difficult time, so Margaret needed Catherine's love, for Margaret
also had lost the man on whom her heart was set.

“Catherine knows already how well you care
for her.” Arden dropped her arm. He clasped his hands behind his
back and stood gazing into the fireplace, where flames crackled and
snapped. “According to Tristan, the roads are slow but fit for
travel. If they were not, he never would have set out with Isabel.
Tristan says that only along the track between the ancient road and
Bowen was the going difficult. Even that pathway is open now, after
so many carts and men on horseback have passed along it.”

“I see.” Margaret's heart lay like heavy lead
within her bosom. Arden would not meet her eyes. He kept staring
into the fire. In his unwillingness to look directly at her she
found the answer to her unasked question. “If you will lend to me a
single man-at-arms to act as my escort, I will be gone from Bowen
early tomorrow morning and cause you no more trouble. If my father
stops here you will be able to declare honestly that I am not at
Bowen,” she said.

Arden's jaw tightened. He took a deep breath.
Still he did not look at her.

“Not tomorrow,” he said after a tense little
silence. “It would be unseemly for you to depart as soon as Tristan
and his wife arrive, as if you resent their presence.”

“What would you have me do, then?” Margaret
demanded in exasperation. “Shall I go, or stay?” She knew what she
wanted to do. She wanted Arden to put his arms around her, to take
her into the lord's chamber and latch the door tight and make love
to her. She wanted him to make her his completely, and say he cared
about her, as she cared for him. She knew it would never happen.
Arden did not believe in love. Even if he did, the hidden part of
his nature would prevent him from loving with all of his heart. And
all of his heart was exactly what Margaret wanted from him.

She had been right to think of love as an
impractical emotion. She was learning first-hand exactly how
impractical it was – and how dangerous. She knew now that she had
disastrously misjudged her ability to help Arden without falling
into a morass of passionate desire. She was deeply, irredeemably in
love with him, and that love had altered her opinions about
everything she wanted or hoped for from life.

“Tristan thinks Isabel ought to rest here for
a day before traveling on to Wortham Castle,” Arden said. “On the
day after tomorrow we will all leave Bowen. At that time I will
provide a suitable escort for you, a man who will see you safely to
whatever convent you wish.”

“What about Catherine?” Margaret asked.

“Catherine will travel to Wortham with the
rest of us,” Arden said. “It is time she went home again, to face
our father's wrath. And I, myself, am long overdue for a meeting
with my father,” he ended on a note that made Margaret look sharply
at him.

“Arden, I do not want Catherine punished for
daring to help me escape a marriage I did not desire,” she said. “I
do not know your father; please tell me he won't be severe with
Catherine. If there is a chance that Lord Royce will treat her
harshly, I am willing to stop at Wortham to plead her cause with
him, to explain to him that any mistakes she has made were
committed at my instigation.”

“There is no need for so desperate a step,”
Arden said in a way that convinced Margaret the last thing he
wanted was her presence at Wortham Castle. “Our father is not
likely to beat Catherine, or to lock her in her room with no food,
if that is what you fear.”

“It was,” Margaret said. “It's exactly what
my father would do.”

“Once our father has heard what I have to
tell him,” Arden said, “Catherine's misdeeds in your behalf will
fade from his thoughts entirely.”

“I cannot believe you have done anything
terribly reprehensible,” Margaret said, stepping nearer to him.
Boldly she placed one hand on his shoulder, hoping to make him look
directly at her.

With an indrawn breath, as if her touch had
scorched him, Arden moved away and turned his back on her.

“You ought to leave me now,” he said. By his
tone, the words were clearly meant to be an order.

“You forbid me to comfort Catherine,”
Margaret said with a catch in her voice that was almost a
full-fledged sob, “and now you refuse to let me comfort you. Of
what use am I to my friends?”

“My lady, the
use
to which I would put
you is indeed a reprehensible one,” Arden said, throwing her own
word back at her. “It is a use you would soon regret. We've had
this out before. I will not dishonor you more than I have already
done. Since you wish to comfort me, then leave me this one, small
comfort. Leave me alone.”

She stared at him, too sick at heart to argue
with him further. Still he refused to look into her eyes.

“Goodnight, then,” she whispered.

As she passed Arden on her way to the solar
stairs and her own chamber, she was unable to stop herself from
touching his back. It was a light, quick caress, intended to convey
the comfort he claimed he would not allow, which she was,
nevertheless, yearning to provide. She did not miss the shudder
that went through Arden's strong frame when her fingers moved upon
the wool of his tunic.

His single, involuntary movement told
Margaret all she needed to know. Arden wanted her. Her unhappiness
vanished as if by magic, and she left the great hall with a smile
curving her lips. However much Arden tried to deny the truth,
whatever the dark secrets that kept him from claiming her, Margaret
knew his desire was real. And as long as Arden wanted her, there
was hope.

* * * * *

It seemed there was hope in other directions,
too. Defying Arden's instructions to leave Catherine to herself,
Margaret stopped at her friend's door before going to her own
bedchamber. Aldis answered Margaret's soft knock, waved her inside,
and then left Margaret and Catherine alone.

Catherine stood by the narrow window with one
hand on the shutter, pausing in the act of closing it. She was
looking out into the darkness, to the cold and starry night.

“Catherine.” Margaret went to her. Catherine
turned from the window and Margaret saw how her eyes brimmed with
tears.

“Oh, Margaret.” Catherine's voice was choked.
Margaret held out her arms and Catherine went into them, to lay her
head on her dearest friend's shoulder and there weep for a
time.

“I wish I knew of something to say or do,”
Margaret began after a while.

“What a fool I have been,” Catherine
interrupted her. With a tearful little laugh she lifted her damp
face from Margaret's shoulder. “What a silly, heedless girl, to
devote all my hopes and plans for the future to a man who long ago
forgot my very existence.”

“I am sorry.” Margaret smoothed back the few
red-gold curls that had come loose from Catherine's braid.

“Don't be,” Catherine said with a watery
smile. “Or, if you must, be sorry for the years I wasted, when I
could have married one of the decent men who asked for my hand, and
had children and a pleasant life. Shall I tell you a secret,
Margaret?”

“What secret, my dear?”

“I cherished my childish love for Tristan for
so long that it was beginning to grow tedious, even to me. I
suppose it was because my feelings were all one-sided. I can admit
now that never did Tristan indicate any special affection for me.
He only treated me in the same polite way in which he treated all
the girls at Cliffmore. It was I who made more of his good manners
than he ever intended. I am the one who invented my romance and
kept it burning for long years, though Tristan provided me with no
fuel. And now I am left with ashes.”