Winter Song (32 page)

Alys smiled at her. “I know because I know my husband. He
has many heavy burdens to consider, and I am certain he is very eager to hear
his father’s advice.”

“Why should Raymond need to bother himself with such
matters?” Lady Jeannette asked peevishly. “He is at last come home. He should
be free to take his pleasure at his will.”

“But the world does not stop because a man is in a different
place,” Alys pointed out. “And it takes so long for a letter to go and an
answer to come. Now, when he is with his father, is the time for exchange of
news and a thorough sifting of plans and counterplans.”

“You seem to know a great deal about my son’s business,”
Lady Jeannette snapped.

Alys’s eyes opened wide. “Of course. I know
all
his
business. Who should know it if not I? And, more particularly, as a good part
of the business is mine as much as his.”

“What do you mean?” Jeanine asked.

“The estates in Gascony—Blancheforte, Benquel, Amou, and
Ibos—they are mine,” Alys replied calmly and deliberately, blessing her father
and dear, beloved Uncle Richard, who had been so wise in the manner in which
the lands were bestowed.

“Do not be so stupid,” Jeanine commanded. “Dower lands pass
into a husband’s hands.”

“Not mine,” Alys said, hoping Raymond never heard of this
conversation. “They are settled on
me
, not entailed. I take homage of
the vassals and castellans, and I sit in justice. If I die without issue—in
fact, if I die without writing a will and stating how my lands are to be
bestowed—the lands go back to King Henry, or rather, to the crown of England.
When I have issue, I may will the lands as I choose. Raymond explained it all
to me most carefully.”

“Raymond? Raymond told you this? He agreed to it?” Lady
Jeannette sounded stunned.

“Of course. Why should he not? I assure you I do not plan to
die without issue just to spite my husband, nor am I fool enough to contest his
will in the management of my lands.”

“Why do you keep speaking of Raymond as your husband?” Lady
Jeannette asked pettishly.

“He is my husband. Did not Queen Eleanor or Sancia write of
our wedding? Both of them attended me. It was a very grand affair.”

“But Raymond promised he would marry you here,” Lady
Jeannette shrieked.

“Yes, Mother, yes,” Alys soothed. “And indeed he will. Of
course we must be married where your husband’s vassals can see that all is done
rightly and according to custom. But you cannot have thought that my father
would let me out from under his eyes without first seeing me wed.”

“It is good enough for royal brides to travel to their new
homes unwed,” Lady Jeannette cried. “Are you so much more precious?”

“Perhaps to Papa and Uncle Richard I am,” Alys replied,
smiling. “But I was traveling with my husband, which is not the case with royal
brides.” Alys laughed aloud. “I do not think, knowing us both, that Papa or
Uncle Richard would take the chance of my arriving intact if we had not
married.”

“Shameless,” Jeanine cried.

“It is not shameless to love my husband and to joy in giving
him joy,” Alys protested, quite shocked.

That her pleasure in coupling with Raymond was shameful had
never entered Alys’s mind. She knew lust was a sin, but did not associate lust
with the joyful pleasure of procreation. Even the most severe and austere of
priests agreed that procreation was a marital duty. Taking pleasure in it might
be a sin—some priests said that
all
pleasure was a sin, even pleasure in
eating and drinking and being warm and comfortable—but that was no problem.
Alys regularly confessed to such pleasures, was regularly enjoined to turn her
eyes to God and take pleasure only in Him, regularly given a penance of a few
Aves and Paters, and regularly absolved. There was nothing more shameful in
coupling than there was about eating or pissing, to Alys’s way of thinking.

“When you are married—” Alys began, to be abruptly cut off.

“Silence!” Lady Jeannette ordered. “Do not corrupt my
daughters with such foul talk.”

Alys’s mouth opened and closed. She bowed her head hastily
to hide the glitter in her eyes. Corrupt, was she? Until this moment Alys had
taken no offense. Lady Elizabeth had pointed out that a mother who desired to
keep her son so tied to her would almost certainly resent his giving his heart
and be jealous of a daughter-by-marriage. Lady Jeannette, Alys realized, was
the one who was corrupt. She smeared with the filth of her mind what was
innocent and beautiful. She deserved a good lesson, and Alys considered herself
just the girl to give it—and to lift the claws of this harpy out of the bodies
of her husband and daughters, too.

“Forgive me,” Alys said meekly. “I am young. There are many
things of which I am ignorant, my mother having died when I was only a child.
And more than all I am ignorant of the ways of this land.”

“You certainly are,” Jeanine snapped.

Not as ignorant as you
, Alys thought, but all she
said was “I can see that my dress is not right. I hope you will instruct me,
Sister, in the correct fashion.”

“
I
?” Jeanine gasped, outraged. “I am no maid to sew
for you!”

While this exchange was going on, Lady Jeannette had been
thinking of Alys’s innocent confession of her lust. Since Alys and Raymond were
already married—and
why
had she not been informed of that?—her original
plan would not work, however, it was not too late to incite in him a healthy
disgust for his wife by showing that Alys was crude and lascivious. Also, it
would be possible to point out to Raymond that a wife who took such pleasure in
coupling would be very prone to seek that pleasure with others as well as with
her husband.

It had been a mistake to expose Alys to the idea that, for a
decent woman, love was of the heart and mind, a source of beautiful words and
fine emotion. A true lady endured the act that made children, but that was not
to be confused with love. Such a mingling was an abomination to Lady Jeannette.
Procreation was for husband and wife; love was for a lady and her troubadour.

Lady Jeannette comforted herself with the assurance that
Raymond knew that. He also knew that some ladies and troubadours did not
confine their love to songs and glances but descended to the crudities of
nature. Obviously Alys was that kind. Raymond was essentially fine, Lady
Jeannette thought. He would soon sicken of this coarse animal. So much the better,
then, that Alys
was
coarse. It would be easy to encourage her lustful
way, perhaps even urge Alys to take a lover. Then Raymond could lock her up.
But to have her advice accepted, Lady Jeannette knew she would need to gain
Alys’s trust, and first she must seem more friendly.

”Do not be silly, Jeanine,” Lady Jeannette said, responding
to Jeanine’s earlier indignation. “Alys did not expect you to sew clothes for
her, only to advise her on how to have the maids do them.”

“Our maids?” Jeanine whined. “They are busy enough. If she
brought furniture, she should have brought servants, too.”

“And so I did,” Alys said. “I have my maid, and I am a good
needlewoman myself.”

“You sew your own clothes?” Lady Jeannette asked.

But before Alys could answer, Raymond spoke her name from
the doorway. “I thought you were going to tell Gervase what to do about the
furniture,” he said, grinning at her, “and here I find you at your favorite occupation—talking
about clothes.”

“Oh, how you startled me, my lord,” Alys cried, then winked
at him. ‘‘Clothes are not only a favorite topic but a very soothing one, just
the subject for calming your mother after you were so sharp with her. And then,
Lady Jeannette was very shocked to hear we were already married after you
promised that the wedding should be here.”

Their eyes met, and Alys could see the relief and approval
in Raymond’s. She had, just as he predicted, taken care of everything, saving
him the unpleasant duty of making that revelation. “There will be a wedding
here, also,” he hastened to agree.

“I assured our mother it would be so,” Alys told him, then
chuckled. “And that brought clothes to mind, my lord, for I can see that
fashions here are different from those of England or Bordeaux.”

Lady Jeannette had again been rendered speechless, her
emotions alternating between surprise and fury. She had intended to seek
Raymond out or summon him privately and weep over how cruel Alys had been to
her. Instead, he had found her calmly conversing, so it was impossible to
claim, as she had expected to do, that Alys had shocked her and his sisters
with foul talk and had tormented her. Lady Jeannette was unused to frustration
and reacted to it without thinking, which led to another mistake.

“Who gave you permission to come into these chambers?” she
cried, her voice high and thin with fury.

Raymond lost his smile, and his lips set hard. “My father
gave me permission,” he snapped. “He rules this house, not you, madame. And I
came to fetch away my wife.”

“Raymond, love,” Alys said softly, running to him and laying
a hand on his arm. “Be kind. Your mother is hurt at your sharpness. Tell her
you were not angry at her belowstairs, only annoyed at the interruption of your
talk. It is long since she has seen you.”

“Will it make your path easier, my love?” Raymond asked,
very low.

Alys immediately dropped her eyes. “Do not think of me but
of your father,” she whispered.

“You are my haven and my heaven,” he responded, feeling more
in love than when he first decided to have Alys as his wife, no matter what
barred the way. Then, more loudly, he said, “Get you to your unpacking, Alys.
You know I do not like to see the chambers all disordered.” His eyes passed
over Jeanine’s face, white and thin-lipped, to Margot’s countenance, which was
bright-eyed with interest. “Go you with your sister, Margot,” he added, “and
lend what aid you can to her. Some of the words Alys uses are different, and
the servants may not understand her.”

Lady Jeanette uttered a cry of protest, but Raymond shook
his head at her sharply and gave Margot a gentle shove to hurry her out on Alys’s
heels. Then he came up close to his mother and told her softly he had something
to discuss with her and with Jeanine that was not fit for Margot’s ears.
Raymond was not above duplicity with women where he did not consider his honor
involved, and he had unconsciously absorbed a great deal of information from
his conversations with Alys. His wife’s last remark had been a warning, and he
recognized its validity at once.

Raymond knew he would soon leave Tour Dur to return to the
Gascon properties, so his mother’s reactions would affect him very little.
However, his father could not leave—at least not until Raymond-Berenger
recovered completely or died. In any case, Alphonse would not leave his wife
for long. He was truly fond of her, truly enjoyed the singing and poetry, the
games of words, chess, and chance with which Lady Jeannette whiled away the
hours when she was in good spirits. He loved to go on picnics and flower
gatherings when they plucked the petals into baskets for potpourri while a
minstrel or their daughters sang to them. Alphonse was truly grieved when his
wife wept and moaned and kept to her chamber.

Since it was for his father’s sake, Raymond was willing to
swallow his new-found pride in dominance and return to the old path of
cajolement. This he could navigate with the skill of long experience. Moreover,
he had a subject he knew would interest his mother and older sister. The notion
had come to him when he decided to send Margot with Alys because his younger
sister seemed open to friendliness. It would be pleasant for Alys to have a
woman friend. There was one topic Raymond was sure his mother would consider
unfit for Margot’s ears—sex. Without the slightest intention of taking any of
the advice offered, Raymond asked his mother and Jeanine whether they thought
it worthwhile for the vassals’ sakes to pretend Alys was still a virgin and, if
so, how to go about faking the evidence.

This fascinating question so riveted their attention that
Raymond’s “crimes” were soon forgotten. Moreover, a marvelous revelation came
to Lady Jeannette. If Raymond wished to pretend he and Alys were not married,
he could not share her bed. She leapt on this with such enthusiasm that Raymond
had much ado not to laugh, but he agreed to it with a pretense at reluctance.
This deception was not so much to pander to his mother’s obvious desire to
separate him from his wife as because he did not trust Lady Jeannette to be
able to hold her tongue if he admitted to her he had no intention of depriving
himself of the sweets of Alys’s body.

Chapter Fifteen

Alys worried a little that Lady Jeannette might
cross-question Margot about the time she spent with her sister-by-marriage, but
she need not have done so. Raymond’s mother had far more absorbing topics for
consideration than her daughter’s conversation. Jeanine and Margot had always
meant little to her, except as they served her comfort, compared with her
eldest son. Raymond’s seeming confidence in her ideas and his return to his old
manner with her as soon as Alys was gone gave her two false impressions. The
first was that Raymond was still amenable to her influence, the second was that
his severe manner toward her had been assumed to impress or frighten Alys. The
alacrity with which Alys obeyed her husband, the lack of protest or pouting,
the soft, placating voice in which she spoke to him also conveyed a false impression
of fear.

Thus, Lady Jeannette came down to dinner in a far different
mood than she had come down earlier in the day to greet her
daughter-by-marriage. She was no longer off balance and had her campaign
planned out. First, Lady Jeannette set out to show Raymond how coarse and crude
his wife was, despite her small size and delicate looks. At the table she
professed herself amazed at the quantity of food Alys consumed. Innocently,
Alys did not realize this was an attack and agreed most cordially that she was
hungry and the food was very good.