Lion Triumphant

Homecoming

THE FAMILIAR CREAKING OF timbers, the rolling and pitching of a ship at sea—it came back to me so vividly. Jake Pennlyon’s cabin was not unlike that of the galleon’s Captain. It was less spacious and the deck head was lower. The same kind of instruments were there. I saw the astrolabe and the cross staff, the compasses and hourglasses.

We were taken to his cabin, Honey, Jennet and I with the children. Edwina clung to her mother as Roberto did to me but Jake Pennlyon’s boys were examining the cabin; they were into everything, trying to understand how the astrolabe worked and chattering in a kind of half English and half Spanish language of their own.

Jennet was smiling to herself. “Wel, fancy, ’twere the Captain himself,” she kept murmuring.

Honey sat limply staring in front of her as though she were in a trance. I knew how she felt. She had lost a husband whom she loved—even as I had. Hundreds of memories must be crowding into her mind as they were into mine.

Felipe, I thought, I loved you. I never let you know how much because I didn’t realize it myself until I saw you lying there.

Then it was back in my mind—that hideous memory. I could see the blood staining his jacket, making a pool about his body. I could see the blood on the walls and Jake Pennlyon’s dripping sword.

I must try to shut that terrible picture out of my mind.

“The children should be sleeping,” I said.

“Oh, Mistress, do you think they could after such a night?” asked Jennet.

“They must,” I replied. I was thankful that at least they had not seen the murders. I wondered what was happening now. How many of the servants had survived, what they would say in the morning. Pilar at the Casa Azul would cry out that it was the witch’s work—the English witch who had fascinated the Governor and brought him to his death.

The door of the cabin opened and John Gregory came in.

“Well,” I said, “here is the double traitor.”

“Did you not want to go home?” he demanded. “Was it not what you hoped and prayed for?”

I was silent. I was thinking of Don Felipe. I could not stop thinking of him.

“You are to be taken to a cabin where you will sleep. I will show you.”

We followed him along an alleyway and into a cabin which was considerably smaller than the one we had left. There were blankets on the deck.

“You may all rest here. Captain Pennlyon will see you later. He will be busy for some hours yet.”

I followed John Gregory into the alleyway.

“I want to know what happened in England,” I said.

“I left in good faith,” he said.

“Did you ever know good faith? Which master did you serve?”

“I serve Captain Pennlyon who is my true master and was ere I was taken by the Spaniards.”

“You betrayed him once.”

“I was taken and submitted to torture. I was made to obey but when I saw once more the green fields of home I knew where my loyalty lay. I never want to leave my country again.”

“You found my mother? You gave her my letter?”

“I gave her your letter.”

“And what said she?”

“I never saw such joy in any face as when I placed your letter in her hands and told her you were well.”

“And then?”

“She said you must be brought home and she bid me take a message to Captain Pennlyon, your betrothed husband, to tell him where you were. She said I must take him to you and that he would bring you safely home.”

“And this you did. You were a traitor to him and to your new master. And now you have returned to the old. How long will you be faithful to him, John Gregory?”

“You are sailing for home, Mistress. Are you not content to do so?”

I said: “There was bloody murder in Trewynd Grange on that night when we were taken away. There was bloody murder at the Hacienda. These murders are at your door, John Gregory.”

“I understand you not. I have expiated my sin.”

“Your conscience must trouble you,” I said. I asked myself: How near had I come to loving Don Felipe? I did love him. Surely this emptiness I now feel, this numbed despair was due to love.

I went back to the cabin. Roberto was looking anxiously for me, so I took him in my arms and soothed him. Edwina was fast asleep. Carlos and Jacko were whispering together.

I said: “We should all lie down. Though I do not expect we shall sleep.”

In a short time Jennet was breathing noisily. I looked at her contemptuously and asked myself of what she dreamed. Of further tumbling with the Captain? How wantonly her eyes had shone at the sight of him.

Honey lay still.

I whispered: “Honey, what are you thinking?”

She answered: “I keep seeing him lying there. A man who has slept at your side … in whose arms you have lain… There was so much blood, Catharine. I can’t forget it. I see it wherever I look.”

“You loved Luis?”

“He was gentle and kind. He was good to me. And you Felipe, Catharine?”

“He took me against my will, but he was never brutal. I think he soon began to love me. Sometimes I think I shall never be loved as I was by Don Felipe.”

“Jake Pennlyon…” she began.

“Do not speak of him.”

“We are in his ship. What will happen do you think?” I shivered. “We must wait and see,” I said.

We must have dozed a little, for it was morning. The ship rocked gently, so the weather was calm. There was food for us—beans and salt meat with ale. It was brought by John Gregory. As on that previous occasion he had been given the task of guarding us.

“All’s well,” he said. “There is a fair wind and we are on course for England. The crew have had a double ration of rum for last night’s work. The Captain has promised them a share of his booty when we’re safe in the Hoe. He wishes to speak with Mistress Catharine when she has eaten.”

I was silent and in no mood for food. Roberto said he did not like the food, but I noticed Carlos and Jacko ate heartily. Edwina ate some beans and Jennet did justice to her share, but Honey could not eat. We drank a little of the ale, which tasted bitter, but at least it was cooling.

John Gregory conducted me to the Captain’s cabin.

Jake Pennlyon roared, “Come in,” when he knocked.

I stepped inside.

“Come and sit down,” said Jake Pennlyon.

I sat on the stool which was fixed to the deck. He said: “This is your second sea voyage. A little different from the first, eh?”

“The galleon was a finer ship,” I said.

He pursed his lips contemptuously. “I’d like to meet her. Then I could show you who is master.”

“She had an armament of eighty cannon. I doubt you could match that.”

“So we have become a sailor, since we sailed with the Dons! You’ll never see that one again.”

I shuddered. Once more I saw him clearly there on the floor, his blood mingling with the mosaic tiles.

“John Gregory told me you had been questioning him.”

“Do you expect silence from your captives?”

“Captives! Who speaks of captives. I have rescued you from God knows what. I am taking you home.”

I said: “Don Felipe Gonzáles was my husband.”

The color flooded his face.

“I know he got a Spanish brat on you.”

“We had a son,” I said.

“Married you!” he spat out. “That was no marriage.”

“Solemnized according to the rites of the church,” I went on.

“The Catholic Church. How could you sink so low!”

I laughed at him. “You are a very religious man, I know. You lead a life of piety. All your actions are those which one would expect of a holy man.”

“I am a man of tolerance. I am even ready to take my wife back even though she has played the whore with a filthy Don.”

“He was a man of fine and cultured manners such as you could never understand.”

He took me by the forearm and shook me; I thought at once of the gentle hands of Felipe.

“You were betrothed to me. That betrothal was binding. It was as good as marriage.”

“I did not regard it as such. If I had I would never have entered into it.”

“You lie. You wanted me. You would have been my wife, you would have been at Pennlyon Court had you not been sick of the sweat.”

“I never was sick of the sweat.”

He stared at me. Oh, I had deceived him completely then.

“It was a ruse. It was a way of keeping you off. Now, Jake Pennlyon, was I eager for you? When I kept to my bed for weeks to escape you?”

“You were suffering from the sweat. I saw your face.”

“A concoction … a paste, spread lightly over the face. Even you lost your lust when you saw that!”

“You … devil!” he said.

“In Tenerife they called me a witch and you call me a devil. In truth, all I am is a woman seeking to escape from a man she does not want.”

He was shaken. So he had not really believed in my reluctance, so great was his conceit.

He said at length: “I shall marry you when we reach Devon. In spite of everything I will honor my bond.”

“I will release you,” I promised him. “I will leave Devon and take my son with me to my mother. She will be happy to have us.”

“I have not risked much to bring you home for that. You will honor your promise and when you have a son of whom you can be proud you will forget that you so demeaned yourself as to go through a ceremony of marriage with a Spanish dog.”

“You are to blame for everything that happened,” I cried. “You with your lust and your cruelty and your wickedness. It was no ordinary raid which was made that night. It was for revenge because of what you had done to Don Felipe. You had ravished the innocent child he was to marry; you left your seed there. Carlos! Oh, yes, your eyes light at the sight of him. There is no doubt that he is your son. It is due to this and a proud Spaniard’s desire for revenge that I was taken as you took that girl. Because I was betrothed to you. Betrothed to you through blackmail. There never was a more unwilling partner in such a bond! So because of your wanton lust I was taken and submitted to similar treatment.”

He clenched his hands. I knew he was imagining me fighting with all my strength and finally being overcome.

“He was not like you,” I said. “He did not want violence. It was not lust for a woman but for revenge. You are responsible for everything. You … you … from the moment you came into my life you have destroyed my peace. Because of you this has happened to me.”

“You liked him. You agreed to marry him. Or was that for the child?”

“You would not understand this man. There could not be one less like you. He explained to me what was to happen. He did not come himself to get me and it was not until I reached the Hacienda that I was forced to submit. He offered me a choice. He did not wish to use violence. I was trapped. So I was passive. Then … he loved me and he married me … and life was not unpleasant.”

“So my wildcat was tamed … tamed by a dirty poxy Don.”

I turned away. As always I was, to my fury, excited by the presence of Jake Pennlyon. I felt alive now as I had not since I left England. I was actually enjoying the battle with him and I was disgusted with myself—particularly that this could happen so soon after Felipe’s death.

He sensed this, I know. For suddenly he had me pinioned; he held me against him.

He kissed me then and I felt an excitement which Felipe had never aroused in me.

He said: “I’ll not let the fact that you were a Spaniard’s whore stop our marriage.”

“Dare say that again.”

“Spaniard’s whore,” he said.

I lifted a hand to strike him, but he caught the hand by the wrist.

He bent me backward and again his mouth was on mine. He said: “Ah, Cat, ’tis good to have you back again. I was too kind to your Spaniard. I should have brought him back to the ship and had sport with him before I dispatched him to the torment of hell.”

I said, “I hate you when you speak of him. He was a good man.”

“We’ll forget him, for I have you back and to hold you thus and know that ’ere long you and I will be as one gives me such delight I have not known since you went away.”

When he said those words I felt a lifting of my spirits. I knew that I had missed him, that I had thought of him often, that although I hated him my hatred was in itself a fierce enjoyment. It was like coming out into keen fresh air after a long stay in prison. I was exultant, and I must be true to myself and admit that Jake Pennlyon had done that to me.

I knew that he would not allow me to escape him during the long voyage home. I knew he would force me to become his mistress within the next few days.

It was as inevitable as night following the day. Yet even as I mourned for Felipe I could not suppress a wild exultation.

For three days I held him off. I believe that was how he wanted it to be. He wanted to tease himself; to let me think I had a chance of winning in this battle, for battle it was. But it was inevitable that this would not go on. There he was in that floating world of which he was the indisputable master; he could have taken me at any time he wished. But he held off … just for three days.

He wanted to keep me in suspense. He enjoyed his verbal battles with me. Physically I was no match for him, but I was more than a match with my wits. I was trapped, of course. There was no way in which I could hide from him on his own ship.

For those three days the weather was ideal. There was enough wind to keep us on course. It was a wonderful sight to stand on deck and see those sails billowing out. Despite myself, I began to be proud of the Rampant Lion and admit that she had a quality which the stately galleon had lacked. The Lion was a faster vessel; she had less to carry; she was jaunty, confident; and I knew too that Jake Pennlyon was her master as the Captain had never been of his galleon. I guessed there would never be near mutiny on Jake Pennlyon’s Lion.

It was dusk. We had eaten and I came upon him in the alleyway near his cabin.

He barred my way and said: “Well met.”

“I am going to the children,” I told him.

“Nay,” he replied, “you are coming with me.”

He took my arm then and pulled me into his cabin.

The lantern swinging from the deck head gave a dim light.

“I have waited long enough for you,” he said. “Look, the wind is rising. It could mean stormy weather.”

“What has that to do with me?”

“Everything. You’re on the ship and the weather is of great concern to you. I could be occupied with my ship. I want time for dalliance with my woman.”

“I had thought you had begun to understand that I wished to be left alone.”

“You thought nothing of the sort.”

He pulled the comb from my hair so that it fell about my shoulders.

“That is how I fancy you,” he said.

I said: “If you are looking for someone on whom to satisfy your lust may I recommend you to the maid Jennet.”

“Who wants the substitute when the real thing is there for the taking?”

“If you imagine that I shall submit willingly … and eagerly … and that I am of a like mind to Jennet…”

“You lack the girl’s honesty. You suppress your desires, but you don’t deceive me into thinking they are not there.”

“It must be comforting I dare swear to have such a high conceit of yourself.”

“Enough of this,” he cried and at one stroke stripped my bodice from my shoulders.

I knew of course that the moment which I had resisted for so long had come. I was not the innocent girl I had been when I had first come to Devon. Already I had been taken in humiliation—for revenge not for lust—and later I had become accustomed to my life with Don Felipe. I had borne a child. Indeed I was no innocent.

But I fought as any nun might have fought for her virginity. I could not deny to myself that I experienced a wild exhilaration in the fight. My great concern was to keep my feelings from him. I was determined to resist for as long as I could as I knew the climax was foregone. He laughed. It was a battle which of course he won. I could not understand the wild pleasure that he gave me; it was something I had not experienced or imagined before. I was murmuring words of hatred and he of triumph; and why that should have given me greater satisfaction than I had ever experienced before I cannot say.

I broke free from him. He was lying on his pallet laughing at me.

“God’s Death!” he said. “You don’t disappoint me. I knew it was meant from the moment I clapped eyes on you.”

“I knew no such thing,” I said.

“But you do now.”

“I hate you,” I said.

“Hate away. It seems it makes a better union than love.”

“I wish I had never come to Devon.”

“You must learn to love your home.”

“I shall go back to the Abbey. As soon as I reach England.”

“What?” he said. “Carrying my son? You’ll not do that. I’m going to be gracious. I’m going to marry you, in spite of the fact that you’ve been a Spaniard’s whore and mine too.”

“You are despicable.”

“Is that why you can’t resist me?”

He was on his feet.

“No,” I cried.

“But yes, yes,” he said.

I fought him; but I knew that I could not resist. I wanted to stay; but I would not let him know it.

And so I stayed with him and it was late when I crept back to the cabin I shared with Honey.

She looked at me as I came in. “Oh, Catharine,” she whispered.

“He was determined,” I said. “I knew it would come sooner or later.”

“Are you all right?”

“Scratched, bruised. As one would expect after a fight with Jake Pennlyon.”

“My poor, poor Catharine! It’s the second time.”

“This was different,” I said.

“Catharine…”

“Don’t talk to me. I can’t talk. Go to sleep. It had to happen. He was determined. It is not as though I were a young inexperienced girl like Isabella…”

She was silent and I lay there thinking of Jake Pennlyon.

The journey was long and not uneventful. Was any voyage on the unpredictable seas? The storm Jake had prophesied came and we battled through it. It was not as violent as that which had hit the galleon; or was the Lion more able to withstand the elements? Was it due to her Captain, the undefeatable Jake Pennlyon? The mighty and imposing galleon was unwieldy compared with the jaunty Lion. The Lion defied the seas as she was tossed hither and thither; her timbers creaked as though sorely tried, but she stood up defiantly against the driving rain. The wind shrieked in the rigging and she was shaken by the seething waters as gust after gust caught her top-hamper.

Jake Pennlyon was in charge. He it was whose seamanship made the Lion turn toward the wind So that the upperworks gave shelter to the leeward side, where he was shouting orders above the roar of the wind. Did everyone on board feel as I did? We are safe. Nothing can stand against Jake Pennlyon and win—not even the sea, not even the wind.

So we rolled in the Bay and the storm persisted through two nights and a day and then we were calm again.

When the wind had subdued there was a thanksgiving service on deck. How different it was from that other. There was Jake Pennlyon actually giving thanks to God for the safety of his ship in a manner which suggested that it was the ship’s Captain rather than the Deity who had brought us through the storm. He talked arrogantly to God, I thought, and I laughed inwardly at him. How like him! How conceited he was, how profane! And how grand!

That night of course I was in his cabin.

He had come to the cabin which I had turned into a nursery and there demanded of Carlos what he had thought of the storm.

“It was a great storm,” cried Carlos.

“And you whimpered, eh, and you thought you were going to be drowned?”

Carlos looked astonished. “No, Captain. I knew you wouldn’t let the ship sink.”

“Why not?”

“Because it’s your ship.”

Jake pulled the boy’s hair. It was a habit he had adopted with Carlos and Jacko. Sometimes I thought he hurt them, for I saw them steel themselves to hide a wince. But both the boys were proud when he spoke to them. They clearly revered him. They were his sons and he reveled in the thought. Men like Jake Pennlyon passionately wanted sons. They thought themselves such perfect specimens of manhood that the more often they were reproduced, the better; and they always looked for signs of themselves in their children.

I could see it already in Carlos and Jacko. They had changed since they came aboard. They aped him in many ways.

“And you think I could stop it, eh?”

“Yes, sir,” said Carlos.

“You’re right, boy. You’re right, by Heaven.”

He pulled Carlos’ hair and Carlos was happy to bear the pain because he knew it meant approval.

Jake Pennlyon then gripped my arm.

“Come now,” he said.

I shook my head.

“What, would you have me force you here before the boys?”

“You would not dare.”

“Don’t provoke me.”

Roberto, whom Jake always ignored, was looking at me fearfully, and because I knew that Jake was capable of anything if he were, as he would put it, provoked, I said: “Give me a few moments.”

“See how I indulge you.”

So I kissed the children and said good night to them and I went to Jake Pennlyon.

When we were in his cabin he said, “You come readily now.”

“I come because I do not wish the children to see your brutality.”

“I am indeed a brute, am I not?”

“Indeed you are.”

“And you love me for it.”

“I hate you for it.”

“How I enjoy this hate of yours. You please me, Cat. You please me even more than I dreamed of being pleased.”

“Must I endure this…”

“You must.”

“As soon as we are home…”

“I will make an honest woman of you. I’ll swear I’ve got you with child by now. I want a son … my son and your son. That boy Carlos, he’s a fine boy. So is Jacko. They’re mine, you see … but mine and yours, Cat, by Heaven, he’ll be the one. I doubt not he has begun his life now. Does that not lift your heart to think on it?”

“If I should have a child by you,” I said, “I would hope I do not see its father in it.”

“You lie, Cat. You lie all the time. Speak truthfully. Was your wretched Spanish lover like me?”

“He was a gentleman.”

Then he laughed and fell upon me and gave vent to his savage passion which I told myself I must needs endure.

And I was exhilarated and exulted and I told myself no one ever hated a man as I hated Jake Pennlyon.

Through the treacherous Bay of Biscay into the almost equally treacherous Channel we sailed and what emotion we felt—Honey and I—when we saw the green land of Cornwall!

And then we were entering Plymouth Harbor.

So much had happened to us—I had become a wife, a mother and a widow. I was surely a different woman from the girl who had sailed away on that strange night five years before. Yet nothing seemed to have changed here. There were the familiar waters, the coastline. Soon I should be able to make out the shape of Trewynd Grange.

We dropped anchor. We went ashore with the children; Jake Pennlyon came with us. He had never looked more arrogantly proud. He was a sailor returning home with his booty, and he had taken his revenge on the Spaniard who had dared thwart him.

I was unprepared for what I found on the shore, for there was my mother.

She held out her arms and Honey and I ran to her; she hugged first me and then Honey and she kept saying, “My darling girls!” over and over again, while she laughed and cried and kissed us and touched our faces and held us at arm’s length to look at us before she held us again.

The children stood looking up at her wonderingly. We introduced her to them—Edwina, Roberto, Carlos and Jacko. Her eyes lingered on Roberto. She picked him up and said: “So this is my little grandson.” Then she did not forget to show equal interest in Edwina—her little granddaughter as she called her.

She was staying at Trewynd Grange, which Lord Calperton had put at her disposal. No member of his family had used it since the tragedy of Edward’s death. When Jake Pennlyon had set out to bring us back, my mother had prepared for the journey to Devon, so determined was she to be there to greet us as soon as we stepped onto English soil.

How strange to walk into the Grange again, to look up at that turret window from where I had first seen the galleon. My mother and I walked arm in arm, hands clasped. She could not speak of her emotion just then, though later doubtless she would.

As soon as the Rampant Lion had been sighted she had set the servants preparing a banquet, and the smells of savory meats and pies greeted us. It was so long since we had smelled such food and in spite of our emotion we were eager for it.

I went up to my old room; I stood at the turret window and looked out on the Hoe and the Rampant Lion dancing there on the waves.

My mother was behind me, and we were at last alone.

“Oh, my dearest Cat!” she said. “If you but knew.”

“I do know,” I said. “You were in my thoughts all the time.”

“What terrible experiences for you—and you little more than a child.”

“I am a mother too now.”

She looked at me anxiously. I started to tell her why we had been abducted, but she already knew. John Gregory had told her.

“And this man … you say he was good to you.”

“Yes, Mother.”

“And you married him!”

“In the end it seemed the best thing to do. I had my son. Roberto was made heir to his estates. And I was fond of him, for he was good to me.”

She bowed her head. “I too married, Cat.”

“Rupert?” I asked.

She nodded.

“And my father?”

“He will never come back. He is dead, Cat. I have long known he was dead.”

“He was said to have disappeared mysteriously.”

“There was nothing mysterious about your father, Cat—at least no more than there is about all men and women. He was placed in the Abbey by the monk who was his father and so the legend was built up. He acquired his riches by selling the treasures of the Abbey and he died by an accident in the Abbey tunnels. That is all in the past and I have married Rupert.”

“You should have married him long ago, Mother.”

She said: “I am happy now. He wanted me to come here because he knows of my love for you, but he is eagerly awaiting my return.”

“And Kate?”

“She is as ever.”

“She did not marry again?”

“Kate does not wish to marry, though there are many who try to persuade her. She wishes to keep her freedom. She is rich, independent, she wants no man to govern her.”

“No man would ever govern her. She would govern him.”

“You still speak of her bitterly, Cat.”

“I still remember. And Carey?”

“He has a place at Court.”

“So you see him now and then?”

“Yes.”

“Does he speak of me?”

“We all spoke of you when we lost you.”

“Carey too?”

“Yes, Carey.”

“And is he well, Mother?”

“He is indeed. Now, Cat darling, what will you do? Will you marry Jake Pennlyon? I want you to be happy, dearest Cat. More than anything I want that. Jake Pennlyon brought you back. He plans to marry you. He was betrothed to you before and he has waited for you.”

I laughed aloud. “I think I may be going to bear his child.”

“Then you love him.”

“Sometimes I think I hate him.”

“Yet…”

“He insisted,” I said. “He was the Captain. He offered me marriage, but he was impatient.”

She took me by the shoulders and looked into my face.

“My dearest Cat,” she said, “you are changed.”

“I am no longer your virgin daughter. Twice I have been forced to submit. It’s odd, Mother. They both offered marriage.”

“Now you must build up a new life for yourself, Cat. Come home with me to the Abbey.”

“I thought of it. There I should see Carey perhaps. I do not want to open that old wound. Perhaps he will marry. Has he married?” I asked swiftly.

She shook her head. “You married the Spaniard,” she reminded me.

“I married him because I thought I would stay there forever. I wanted to assure my son’s position.”

“And this child you are carrying?”

I hesitated. Was I beginning to ask myself if I could overcome my grief for Felipe, which stirred sadly in my heart, by my hatred of Jake Pennlyon?

I said: “I will marry Jake Pennlyon. He is the father of the child I am carrying. I shall stay here, Mother, for much as I long to be with you I could not return to the Abbey.”

She understood as she had always understood.

Jake Pennlyon was triumphant. The preparations for the wedding began at once.

“We want our son’s birth to take place at a respectable time after the wedding day.”

During the previous year Jake’s father had had an apoplectic fit and died instantly. He had lived so lustily that he had shortened his span, was the general opinion. So Jake was master of Lyon Court and I was to be its mistress.

I made conditions.

The children were to remain with me. He wanted Roberto to go to the Abbey when my mother went. “For to tell the truth,” he said, “the sight of that brat makes my gorge rise.”

“He is my son,” I said. “He shall never be parted from me as long as I live.”

“You should be ashamed of consorting with our enemies. A brat that was forced on you!”

“That could be said of the child I am to bear.”

“Not so. You were willing. Do you think you deceived me?”

“It is you who deceive yourself. My son stays or there will be no marriage.”

“There will be a marriage,” he said. “Don’t think you’ll cheat me twice. No plaguey sweat this time, my girl.”

I laughed at him. “Roberto stays,” I said.

“And the other two,” he said. “By God, I’ve no objection to a nursery. We’ll fill it. Those two boys are game little fellows. I like them.”

“You would. They resemble you. Manuela and Jennet will take care of the nursery, but let me tell you this: There will be no more merry games with my servants.”

He took my chin in his hand and jerked up my face in one of his ungentle gestures. “You must see to it that there is no one but you. I warn you I am a lusty man.”

“I do not need the warning.”

“You need to heed it. You can keep me solely yours, Cat, and you will.”

“Do you think I can manage to retain such a prize?” I asked with sarcasm.

“If you are wise, Cat, you can.”

“Who is to say? Who knows I might welcome your lust for others? All I say is it shall not be in my house and with my servants.”

“I have never had difficulty in finding willing companions.”

“A pretty subject for a man about to marry.”

“But we are not as others, are we, Cat? We know that, do we not? It is what makes the prospect of our union so enthralling. Tell me how does my son today?”

“I am not at all sure that he exists. If he does not … there may not be the need for this wedding.”

“If he is not there rest assured he soon will be.”

I said: “I would like to see the house. There may be changes I wish to make.”

He laughed at me, exulting. I knew he was longing for our wedding with deep intensity.

The day dawned when I was married to Jake Pennlyon. The ceremony took place in the chapel where once Jake had spied through the leper’s squint. There was feasting in Trewynd Grange and afterward I went back with Jake to Lyon Court.

It is no use pretending that I was not excited by this man, and to enter that house of which I should be mistress, to go with him to our bridal chamber, and stand there with him. In those first moments I believe he was moved almost to tenderness. I knew that he had achieved that which he had long desired and when he put his arms about me he was momentarily gentle. This was different from those adventures which were familiar to him.

The moment did not last. His passion was fierce; and because I knew that there was a need in him to subdue, to fight, I resisted him.

But I shared his passion. He knew it. Yet I did not want him to realize how overwhelming were these encounters, how they drove everything from my mind but this intense physical satisfaction.

My relationship with Jake was entirely physical. I could not uphold my refusal to admit my pleasure in them, but it was always the pleasure of the senses and I did not attempt to hide this. If he had no tenderness for me, I had none for him. I was not going to pretend to love him. I was not even going to pretend I had need of him. I found him coarse, crude, arrogant and I was not going to pretend otherwise. I had married him because I was to bear a child he had forced on me. I was a woman with strong natural impulses and his tremendous virility matched a similar quality in me. It was possible to share a sexual encounter and yet not to love one’s partner.

I made this clear to him, but he laughed at me. He had always known, he told me, that I wanted him as he wanted me. He had always been aware that he only had to beckon and I would be in his bed.

“There was much beckoning,” I reminded him, “but I never was in your bed till forced to be there on your ship when there was no escape for me.”

“I could see you longed for me.”

“As silly Jennet did. I’m not Jennet, remember.”

“I know it well. But you are a woman even as she is and a woman like you needs a man like me.”

“Nonsense!” I retorted.

“Let’s prove it.”

And there was no holding him back.

Yes, I was exhilarated by our encounters. I could not hide it. “We were made one for the other,” he said. “I knew it. From the moment I clapped eyes on you on the Hoe, I said to myself, ‘That’s your woman, Jake Pennlyon. She’ll be the best you ever knew.’”

But afterward we would argue and I usually won and he was pleased to let me.

He had only to seize me and although I would often resist he would always have his way … at any time, anywhere.

I said he was shameless and he answered that I was equally so.

And so passed the first month of my marriage to Jake Pennlyon.

Then my mother said she must go home. She had left Rupert too long.

Honey would go with her. Trewynd had too many unhappy memories for her. She would live with my mother at the Abbey and they both said that this was a consolation for saying good-bye to me.

So with Edwina, she set off for the Abbey; Roberto, Carlos and Jacko stayed behind and in the nursery Jennet and Manuela were their nurses.

I was certain by this time that I was pregnant.

Soon, I promised myself, there would be another in my nursery.

Roberto was pining. His dark eyes grew larger in his little olive-skinned face.

“Madre,” he said, “I want to go home.”

“Roberto, my precious,” I answered him, “we are home.”

He shook his head. “This is not home. Home is not here, Madre.”

“It is now,” I told him. “Home is where I am and that is where you belong.”

He conceded this.

“I want my father. Where is my father?”

“He is gone away, Roberto. He is dead. You have a new father now.”

“I want my own father, Madre. Who is my new father now?”

“You know.”

He shrank in terror. “Not the Man…”

“He will be your father now, Roberto.”

He shut his eyes tightly and shook his head. I had said the wrong thing. I had frightened him.

I took him onto my lap and rocked him. “I am here, Roberto.” That did comfort him. He clung to me. But he was terrified of Jake, and Jake, who had no understanding of children, did nothing to alleviate the situation. Carlos and Jacko had been taken over the Rampant Lion; they played wild games which involved ships and captains. Carlos was always Captain Pennlyon and this pleased Jake. He was proud of those two … his boys. He didn’t seem to care that one of them was the son of a Spanish lady of high degree and the other of a serving girl. They were Pennlyons and that was good enough for him.

How different it was for my little Roberto!

I was so concerned about the child that I spoke to Jake about him. I even went so far as to plead with him to show a little interest and kindness to the boy.

“Interest in that man’s son?”

“He is mine also.”

“That does not endear him to me.”

“It should. I have taken your sons and cared for them.”

“You’re a woman,” he said.

“If you have any decent feelings in you…”

“But you know I have not … only indecent ones.”

“I beg of you. Be kind to my son.”

“I must act as I feel.”

“Oh, so you have become honest, have you?”

“In this matter, yes.” He turned to me suddenly. “I tell you, I hate the boy. When I see him I think of you with that Don. I want to break every bone in his body; I want to destroy anything that reminds me of that.”

“You’re inhuman. To blame a child.”

“You should have let him go with your mother.”

“My own son!”

“Will you stop talking of your son? Soon you’ll have mine and then that dark-skinned brat can be sent away. I might take him with me when I sail and drop him off at his old home. How would that be?”

“You dare touch that boy.”

“And?” he mocked.

“I’d kill you, Jake Pennlyon.”

“So we would become a murderess.”

“Yes, if any harmed my son.”

“Oh, come, what’s a bastard now and then? You’re going to have that nursery so full of real boys you’ll not miss this one.”

I hit him across the face. This sort of encounter always excited him. He had me pinioned and forced me down.

There was the inevitable ending, but it solved nothing.

He hated my son because of his father and I was worried.

When Roberto became ill I was with him all the time. I think it was the cold east wind which blew up suddenly and which was too much for him.

Jennet and Manuela were worried about him and I spent a day with them in the nursery.

He was a little better as the dusk fell.

“He do seem comforted to have you with him, Mistress,” said Jennet.

It was true, when I sat beside his bed he slept a little, holding my hand; and if I attempted to release it momentarily his hot little hands clung.

I decided I would stay with him.

When night fell Jake came to the nursery. Jennet and Manuela hastily disappeared.

“What means this?” said Jake. “I am waiting for you.”

“The child is sick,” I answered.

“Those two women can care for him.”

“He is uneasy when I’m not here.”

“I am more than uneasy when you are not with me.”

“I am staying here for the night.”

“Nay,” he said, “you are coming to bed with me.”

“I shall stay with my son tonight.”

“You will come,” he said.

He caught my arm and I stood up and threw him off. “You will wake the child.”

“Why should I care?”

“I care,” I said.

I stepped out of the room with him, for I greatly feared the effect a scene would have on Roberto.

“Go away,” I said. “I have made up my mind.”

“And if I have made up mine?”

“You must needs unmake it.”

“You are coming with me.”

“I am staying with my son.”

We looked unflinchingly into each other’s eyes.

“I could carry you there,” he said.

“If you touch me, Jake Pennlyon,” I said, “I will leave this house. I will take my son to my mother and never see you again.”

He hesitated and I knew that I had won.

“Go away,” I said. “Don’t shout. If you wake the child, if you frighten him now I shall never forgive you.”

“Are you not afraid that if you deny me I might turn to others?”

“If you are so desperately in need you must do so.”

“You would not wish that.”

“I tell you I care for nothing tonight but that my son sleeps peacefully and I shall stay with him to make sure that he does so.”

“Cat,” he said. “I want you … now … this minute.”

“Go away.”

“So you don’t care what I do?”

“Do what you please.”

He caught my arm and shook me. “You know full well that I have a fancy for no one but you.”

I laughed at him. Exultantly, yes. I had won of course. I went back to Roberto.

In the morning the child was better, but I knew that he was terrified of Jake Pennlyon.

The summer came. Tenerife seemed a long way behind. I had settled in to life at Lyon Court. Soon Jake would go away on a voyage. He had postponed this because of our marriage and I knew he wished to be with me; but of course he could not stay ashore forever. I think sometimes he planned to take me with him, but I was pregnant and the sea was no place for a woman in my condition. He was a sailor who loved the sea and his ship was near to his heart as any living being I was sure, and yet he lingered on shore. I laughed at him. He could not leave me.

He could never shut out of his mind the memory of the raid which had taken place while he was away. He was afraid that it might happen again. He was torn between his desire for adventure on the high seas and his life with me.

Often I would see him down at the Hoe; he would be rowed out to his ship and spend some time on her. He finally decided that he could stay behind no longer.

A Captain Girling came to visit us from St. Austell—a man some twenty years older than Jake. He was a keen man, Jake told me, one of the few whom he cared to trust on one of his ships.

Captain Girling stayed with us for a month and he and Jake went out to the Lion every day; and there was a great deal of bustle on the Hoe while her stores were taken aboard. She was taking out a cargo of linen.

At dinner the conversation was generally of the sea and ships and I became increasingly knowledgeable in these matters, particularly as I had firsthand experience of two voyages. They used to question me at length about the galleon and I could never resist praising her and pointing out her superiority over the Rampant Lion and English ships I had seen, which exasperated and intrigued them.

Captain Girling was as fierce in his denunciation of the Dons and Catholicism as Jake was and they were at one on this as on most matters.

They hated the Inquisition, which had seized a number of English sailors, submitted them to torture and even burned them at the stake. John Gregory was an example of a man who had been captured and only freed on condition that he spy for them. Oddly enough Jake seemed to have forgiven him although he had helped in carrying me off in the first place. He had, however, made it possible for Jake to bring me back.

“There’s good news from the Netherlands,” said Captain Girling. “There’s a rising there and by all accounts it’s a success. The Spaniards had set up the Inquisition there, and because of this the country is in revolt. By God, the sooner we blow them all off the seas, the better.”

Jake regarded me with some amusement. “I’d slit the throat of any Spaniard on sight … no matter who.”

“Throat slitting’s too good for them,” growled Captain Girling.

And I trembled for Roberto, who looked more like his father every day.

“If ever they attempt to come to England …” began Captain Girling.

Jake’s face was purple at the thought, yet his eyes shone with excitement.

“That would be the day!” he cried. “We’d see them finished off forever then. Why, Girling, do you think there’s a possibility the rascals would be so foolhardy as to try it?”

“Who can say? You know they’ve taken possession of lands all over the globe. They’re taking the rack and the thumbscrews among the savages and trying to make Papists of them.”

“Let them come here!” cried Jake. “Oh, God, let them come here. Let them bring their thumbscrews here. We’ll show them how to use them.”

“They fear us … they respect us. They prefer to play with savages,” Girling said.

“I swear they shall continue to fear us. When they meet one of my ships on the high seas they’ll show some respect too.”

“You talk much of what you will do if certain things happen,” I said. “We know exactly how they would act and how you would. But why should they come here? What hope would they have?”

“They would build a fleet of ships. They would come to our coasts. They would attempt to land,” said Jake. “Let them try it. Oh, God, let them try it.”

“There are traitors here,” said Captain Girling. “We must beware of the traitors within.”

“Plaguey Papists,” said Jake. “And now with this Queen above the Border! The Queen of Scots, recently Queen of France, could lead an army into England if she could find the support from traitors here on land and the King of Spain from the sea.”

“War!” I said. “Oh, I pray not war.”

“There are continual forages on the Border,” said Girling. “Our Sovereign Lady Elizabeth is shrewd. She seeks to cause friction among the Scottish nobles and, by God, they are a quarrelsome crowd. ’Tis said that she herself did all possible to further the marriage of the Scottish Queen with Lord Darnley, while pretending to oppose it. That fellow is no good to Mary. He’s a swaggering braggart, a lecher, a coward, and he greatly desires the Crown Matrimonial of Scotland. If the Queen of Scots is wise she’ll keep him in his place, which is not on the throne with her.”

“While I have been away,” I said, “the situation has become grave between England and Scotland.”

“It was so since Mary’s husband, the young King of France, died and she lost her position overnight,” said Captain Girling. “The Medici woman made it clear that she must get out and where could she go but to her own country of Scotland?”

“Let us not forget,” added Jake, “that she dared call herself the Queen of England. Our Lady Elizabeth will not forget that, I am sure.”

“For that alone she deserves to have her head cut off.”

“Mary’s point is that our Queen is the daughter of Anne Boleyn, whom the Catholics call a whore because they say she was never in truth King Henry’s wife, whereas Mary herself is descended legitimately through Henry’s sister.” I reminded him.

Jake threw me a warning glance. “You talk like a Papist.” He narrowed his eyes. “And let me tell you, I’ll have no Papist in this house. If I find any it will be the worse for them.”

I knew he was referring to Roberto, for he had been watchful of the boy. I trembled for my son, but I replied boldly: “I speak without religious bias. I merely state that this is the case.”

“Our Lady Elizabeth is Queen by right of inheritance, a true daughter of King Henry,” retorted Jake, “and we’ll fight for her. There is no Englishman worthy of the name who would not give his life for her—and keep the Papists from the land.”

We drank the Queen’s health—I as fervently as the others.

But I was uneasy. There would always be disquiet in the land I supposed. There would always be this conflict; and when I thought of the quiet determination and religious fervor of Felipe and those whom he commanded, and the might of the Spanish galleons, I feared the breaking out of a mighty conflagration.

In the night I awoke and Jake stirred beside me.

He said: “You know why I’ve sent for Girling?”

“He is going to command one of your ships, I doubt not.”

“Which ship think you?”

“That I cannot know.”

“The Rampant Lion.”

“Your ship?”

“Well, she is lying idle there in the Hoe.”

“I did not know that you allowed others to command her.”

“Nor have I till now.”

“But why so?”

“Need you ask? I have found a more desirable mistress than adventure. She is as unreliable as the sea, but by God, she can be whipped to sudden fury; she can be soft sometimes—though she tries to hide it. There are times when I am at the helm and she is as soft and gentle as any could wish—but I can never be sure of her.”

“Your fancies are beyond your imaginative powers to express. I should not attempt them if I were you.”

He laughed. “Know this. I am letting Girling take the Lion. It’s a short voyage. And when he comes back I shall go away. I would take you with me, Cat. You and the boy. But he’d be too small, wouldn’t he? Who knows what we might meet on the seas? Here’s a problem. If I leave you I shall dream every night, and in the day too, of Spaniards raiding the coast. If I take you with me… How could I take you with me?”

I said: “You will have to go as other men go.”

“What a reunion it’ll be when I come back. You’ll be on the shore waiting for me. No games, my love, while I’m away.”

“Do you imagine everyone is like you? I wonder how many games you will play on your voyage?”

“You must not be jealous, Cat. I am a man who must needs game. But there will only be one for whom I truly care and for her I would cast aside all others.”

“Do not deprive yourself,” I said. “Game all you wish.”

“Nay, you would be jealous, but we have to part in time. I am a sailor. For the first time I almost wish I were not. See how I love you. I love you so much that I give Girling command of my ship that I may stay with you.”

I was silent being moved by such a declaration. For the first time I felt a certain tenderness toward him.

Girling had sailed away. Poor Jake, he stood watching until she was out of sight—his love, his ship, his Rampant Lion.

He said: “It is like seeing another man with your woman.” He was moody for a day or so, wondering why he had allowed Girling to go in his place. He busied himself with the comings and goings of others of his ships, but there was only one Lion.

He would follow the voyage in his mind, studying charts and working out where the ship would be. He would say: “If the winds have been favorable, if she has not been becalmed, if she has not met up with any with whom it has been necessary to do battle she will be here.”

At times he wished he were with her. At others he was clearly delighted to be at home. In the midst of some of our battles he would say: “To think I gave up a lion for a shrew.”

But there were the moments of deep satisfaction. I began to be satisfied with my life. Was this again the serenity of pregnancy? Perhaps it was. My mother sent a messenger to me fairly frequently with letters.

“If only you were not so far away,” she mourned. “How I long to be with you at this time.”

My grandmother sent recipes and even concoctions she had prepared. After having been so far away we seemed moderately close now in spite of the miles which separated us.

The months began to pass. My child was due in February.

Jake was beside himself with glee. He visualized the sturdy son we should have. He continued to despise Roberto, but Carlos and Jacko never ceased to delight him. They were growing wilder and more untamable every day. They rode, went hunting with Jake and studied archery and fencing. They played truant from the tutor whom I had engaged to teach them, which amused Jake.

He had done it all before. Anything they did which reminded him of his own exploits was applauded and they knew this. My Roberto was clever in the classroom, a fact which made me rejoice, for it gave him this advantage at least. I kept him away from Jake as much as possible and often arranged that they did not come into contact for weeks at a time, a fact which pleased them both so it was not very difficult to maneuver.

“The boy should be here when the Lion returns,” said Jake. “We’ll call him Lion.”

“There is no such name,” I said.

“We’ll make one.”

“Would you saddle the boy with such a name? He will be laughed at throughout his life.”

“Much he’ll care.”

“As a compromise we’ll call him Penn after your father.”

Christmas came and with it the messenger from the Abbey bringing gifts but most welcome of all letters. Honey was happy at the Abbey. Edwina was well. “How peaceful it all is, Catharine,” she wrote. “Tenerife seems far away.”

And Luis? I wondered. Did Honey ever think of the two husbands who had been murdered—one before her eyes? I myself could not forget the sight of Felipe lying in his blood, slain by the man who was my second husband. I missed his courtesy; sometimes I found myself comparing Jake with him.

We lived in violent times and life was cheap. Men such as Jake Pennlyon thought little of running a man through the heart. I trembled to think of the slaughter there would be when the Rampant Lion met a Spanish galleon on the sea.

This hatred of men for men, when would it end? I hoped that by the time my little Roberto was a man it would be over.

It was the end of January when the Rampant Lion came home. It had been a bleak month with cold winds blowing in from the east. Then it had turned warm and with the warmth came the inevitable rain. There was a heavy mist and out of this suddenly there loomed the ship. She was dangerously near the shore and the mist clung eerily to her masts; Jake at the window saw her first.

“God’s Death!” he cried and stared at her.

I looked at him and saw that his deep color had faded.

“What’s wrong?” I cried.

“God’s Death!” he cried. “What have they done to the Lion?”

Then he was out of the house. He was running down to the Hoe. I followed him. I stood on the shore watching the small boat row out to the shattered ship.

What a day that was! I shall never forget the dampness of the mist and that still, almost lakelike sea. And there she was, his beloved ship, with one of her masts shot off and a hole in her side.

It was a mercy she had managed to limp back to the Hoe.

I saw the faces of men, blackened by sun, gaunt from near starvation and many of them wounded.

There was little I could do.

I felt tender toward Jake as I saw the bleak horror in his face. He loved this ship and she had been ill-treated.

I knew then how he must have looked when he came back from his voyage to find that the Spaniards had taken me.

It was an old story. The ship had encountered a mightier one. There was no need to say that that ship had been a Spaniard.

She had sought to take her, but by mercy that had not happened. The Rampant Lion had suffered almost mortal wounds, but she had given a good account of herself. She had inflicted such deadly havoc on her enemy that the Spaniard had had to limp away, thus enabling the Lion to do likewise.

Captain Girling had been fatally wounded, but he had lived for four days after the attack. He had nobly directed his crew from the pallet which he had had brought on deck. He had known he was dying, but his great concern had been to bring the poor wounded Lion back to her master. Only when he knew that could be done did he die.

One of the sailors kept saying: “It were as though he keep his strength till then, Captain ’Lyon. It was though he clung to life till he knew she could make port.”

Jake was quieter than I had expected. I had imagined he would fly into recrimination; but he was seaman enough to understand exactly what had happened.

The Lion had not disgraced him or herself; she had stood up nobly against a more powerful adversary. She had given as good as she had taken. Perhaps better, he promised himself. He took satisfaction in picturing the sinking of the Spaniard. He was certain she had gone to the bottom of the sea.

He called curses on her and her crew. But his great concern was with the Lion. He stayed on her throughout the rest of the day and far into the night while he tried to satisfy himself that she could be made seaworthy again.

Then he came back.

“It shows what she can do, Cat,” Jake said to me. “I’d always known it. There’s not another of her class who wouldn’t have gone down, but here she is and in a matter of months she will be herself again. I’ll see to that.”

This was indeed a time of disaster. The day after the Lion had arrived home, my pains started. It was too early and my child was born dead.

What made the tragedy more hard to bear was that the child had been a little boy.

I was desperately ill. The fact that I had lost my longed-for child did nothing to help my recovery, and for two weeks it was believed I could not survive.

Jake came and sat by my bed. Poor Jake! I loved him then. His Rampant Lion all but a wreck, the son he had so desired was lost to him. And I, whom he loved in his fashion, was about to die.

I heard afterward that he was almost demented and threatened the doctors that if I died he would kill them, that he spent his time between my sickroom and his ship; it was not until the end of the second week when it became apparent that I had a good chance of recovery and that the Rampant Lion would sail again that he became his old self.

I was delirious often; I was not entirely sure where I was. Often during that period I believed I was in the Hacienda and that soon Don Felipe would come into the room. Once I thought I saw him standing by the bed, holding the candle high while he looked at me. At another I was holding my son in my arms and he was watching us.

One night I came out of my delirium and saw that it was Jake who stood by my bed. I saw his clenched fists and heard his muttered words.

“You are calling to him! Stop it. You gave him a son. Yet you cannot give me one.”

I was afraid suddenly, afraid for Roberto because I understood in that moment how violent Jake’s feelings could be. I knew the fact that I had borne Felipe a son would be like a canker in his mind, and that his fierce hatred of Felipe, of Spain and all things Spanish would be concentrated on my son.

I wanted to appeal to him. “Jake,” I said, “I am going to die…”

He knelt by the bed and took my hand; he kissed it fiercely, possessively. “You are going to live,” he said, and it was like a command. “You are going to live for me and the sons we shall have.”

I understood something of his feelings for me. He needed me in his life; he could not contemplate being without me. His lips were on my hand. “Be well,” he said. “Be strong. Love me, hate me, but stay with me.”

I felt secure then, but when I began to get better my anxieties about Roberto returned. What would have happened to him if I had died? I asked myself.

It was in this mood that I sent for Manuela.

Manuela had been unobtrusive since her arrival in England; if she was homesick for Spain she had never shown it; and she and Roberto had something in common because they were both of Spanish blood.

So while I lay weakly in my bed, I summoned her and bade her sit beside me and assure me that there was no one in earshot.

“Manuela,” I said, “tell me, are you happy in England?”

She answered: “It has become my home.”

“You have been good to Roberto. He trusts you more than he does the others.”

“We speak Spanish together. It is pleasant to speak as though one is at home.”

“I have thought a great deal about him while I have been lying here. He is young yet, Manuela, and not able to take care of himself.”

“The Captain hates him, Señora. It is because he is the son of Don Felipe and you are his mother.”

“I have come close to death, Manuela. I clung to life because I feared for Roberto.”

“Your passing would be in the hands of Almighty God, Señora,” she said reproachfully.

“I am still here, but weak. I want you to make me a promise. If I should die I wish you to leave here at once with Roberto. I wish you to take him to my mother. You will tell her that I asked that she should care for him. She must love him because he is my son.”

“And the Captain, Señora?”

“The Captain does not love Roberto, as you know.”

“He hates him because he is a Spaniard.”

“He is a little impatient with him,” I prevaricated. “Roberto is not like Carlos and Jacko. I know you once loved Carlos dearly. I remember when you came to the nursery at the Hacienda…”

My voice faltered and she said vehemently: “Carlos has become the Captain’s boy. He shouts. He boasts he will slit the throats of Spaniards. He is no longer of his mother’s faith.”

“He is his father’s boy now, Manuela.”

I saw angry tears in her eyes. I knew that she was fiercely true to her faith and that she practiced it regularly but in secrecy.

“And Roberto,” she said softly, “he is different. Roberto would stay true. He will never forget that his father was a gentleman of Spain.”

“You love the boy, don’t you, Manuela? Carlos can take care of himself now, but if anything should ever happen to me look to my little Roberto.”

“I will do anything to save him,” she said vehemently, and as she spoke I knew that she was sincere.

I awoke to find my mother sitting by my bed.

“Is it really you?” I asked.

“My dearest Cat. Jake sent for me. I came at once and I shall stay until you are well again. Your grandmother has sent you many remedies and you know her cures always work.”

I took her hand and would not release it. I wanted to be absolutely sure that I had not dreamed she was there.

From the moment she arrived my recovery was rapid. I felt that I must get well with her to nurse me. I had always felt this when she nursed me through my childish ailments. She used to say: “All’s well now. Mother is here.” And I believed it now as I had then.

She and my grandmother had made garments for my child. “We shall leave them with you for the next,” she told me.

I felt wonderfully optimistic then. The next! I thought. Of course! What had happened to me was a disaster which befell many women during the course of their childbearing years. I had had one son. I could have another.

She brought into the house a sense of peace. I liked to hear her talking to the servants.

I told her of my interview with Manuela.

“My darling Cat,” she soothed me, “you need have had no fear. If this terrible tragedy had befallen us I should have come here and taken Roberto away with me. But, God willing, his mother will live long into his manhood.”

She asked me earnestly whether I was happy in my marriage and I did not know how to answer her truthfully.

“I doubt there was ever a marriage like ours,” I told her.

“He sent another man out with his ship, I hear, because he could not leave you.”

I laughed. “Dearest Mother, do not attempt to understand what my marriage is. It could never happen to one as gentle as you are. There is a wildness in me which matches that in him. Yet there is a good deal of hate in us.”

“But you love each other?”

“I would not call it love. He was determined that I should bear his sons. He selected me for that purpose. I have failed him now … and at the time when he all but lost his ship! I can find it in my heart to be sorry for him, which surprises me. Mother dear, do not look so put about. You could not understand us. You are too good, too kind.”

“My dear daughter, I have lived and loved and life has seemed strange to me often.”

“But now you have Rupert and everything is as you always longed for it to be.”

“Yet I could have taken Rupert years ago and did not. You see nothing is simple for any of us.”

“I used to think it would have been wonderful for me,” I said, “if I could have married Carey.”

She was a little impatient with me. “You delude yourself,” she answered. “All that is past. You have one child and you will have others. You are still living with an obsession of Carey, when you have Jake. You love him. You know you do. Stop thinking of the past. You loved your Spaniard, too, but now you have Jake. Face reality, Cat.”

Was she right, this wise mother of mine?

Jake came in and sat with me.

“You will soon be well,” he said, “now you have the best possible nurse.”

“Thank you for sending for her.”

“Now she is here I am going away for a short time. I have been thinking a great deal about Girling’s family.”

“What family has he?”

“His wife died recently—the sweat, I think. He has children who may be in need. He served me well. I must not fail him.”

“You must make sure that they are not in want,” I said.

“So thought I. I shall go to St. Austell and see for myself what is happening there. I know I shall leave you in good hands.”

He left the next day.

The house seemed peaceful without him. I was able to get up. I sat at the window and looked out over the Hoe. I could see the Rampant Lion there. Men were working on her. Her canvases and rigging were being overhauled. The shipwrights were going back and forth in the little boats; they would be busy repairing her faulty timbers.

I wondered how long before she would sail again and when she did I knew Jake would go with her.

I drank the broth my mother prepared for me; I swallowed my grandmother’s special remedies and I was soon taking my first steps into the fresh air. It was the end of April and the daffodils were in bloom. My mother, who delighted in flowers and who was herself named after the damask rose, gathered them and arranged them in pots to fill my bedroom. We walked under the pleached alley together with the sun glinting through because there were only buds and tiny leaves on the entwined branches at this time; we sat in the pond garden and talked.

It was while we sat there that she gave me the news which must have lain heavily upon her. I knew that she had been awaiting the time when I should be well enough to receive it.

We had taken our seats near the pond when she said to me: “Cat, there is something I have to tell you. You must be brave. You must understand. You will have to know.”

“What is wrong, Mother?”’

“It’s Honey,” she said.

“Honey? She is ill?”

“Nay. You love her well, do you not, Cat?”

“You know I do. She is as my sister.”

“It is how I always wished you to be.”

I knew that she was even now delaying the moment of telling.

“Please, tell me quickly,” I begged. “What has happened to Honey?”

“She has married again.”

“But why should she not? She is so beautiful. Many men would wish to marry her. It is good news, is it not? Why should she not marry?”

My mother was again silent. I turned to her in astonishment. She seemed to steel herself. Then she said: “Honey has married Carey.”

I stared at the green grass, at the sun glinting on the pond. I pictured them together. Beautiful Honey and Carey, my Carey… Why should I feel this sudden anger? I could not have him and it was inevitable that he should marry one day. Had I not done so … twice? And if he was to have a wife, why should it not be Honey, who had long loved him?

My mother had reached for my hand and pressed it warmly. She said: “I asked Manuela to bring Roberto to us. I think I hear her coming now.”

I knew she was telling me: You have your son. Forget the impossible dream. That is the past. Here is the present. It is for you to make the future.

And Manuela came leading my son and when he saw me he ran to me.

“Madre, Madre,” he cried; and I knew that while I lay ill and cut off from him he had suffered deeply.

I said: “I am well again, Roberto. Here I am. Why, we have missed each other.”

And I was comforted.

My mother would talk of everything except Honey and her marriage, but I could not forget it. I pictured them in Remus Castle, laughing happily together, talking of the old days, making love. Did they ever mention me? I wondered. And how would Carey feel if they did?

Honey was both beautiful and lovable. There was a serenity in her beauty which I think made it doubly appealing to men. There was nothing of the wildcat about Honey; she was adaptable. She had been a good wife to Edward although she had loved Carey; she had appeared to forget Edward and had devoted herself to Luis; and now she would have forgotten them both for Carey. And I had to confess that she had always loved Carey.

My mother talked of what was happening at home. How her half brother twins were eager to go to sea and how my grandmother was trying to dissuade them, of the flowers my grandmother was growing and the many bottles that lined the shelves of her still room. “She is becoming quite an apothecary and people come to her for cures.”

My mother was a little easier in her mind because there was less fear of a Catholic rebellion. The marriage of the Queen of Scots to Lord Darnley had been a good thing for England. The young consort was such an overbearing, arrogant, dissolute and generally unsatisfactory man that he was causing a great deal of dissension above the Border.

“It is better for them to quarrel among themselves than to seek a conflict with us,” said my mother. “That is what everyone is saying.”

The turmoil up there had increased when the shocking murder of the Scottish Queen’s secretary had taken place at her supper table.

My mother shuddered. “People have been speaking of nothing else. Mary is with child and was supping privately at Holyrood when certain of her nobles burst in and dragged the young man from the table. Poor fellow, they say, he clung to the Queen’s skirts and begged her to save him. What an ordeal for a woman six months with child! It was said that Secretary Rizzio was her lover. This seems unlikely. Poor woman! Why, Cat, she is but your age.”

“Perhaps we should be thankful we are not born royal.”

My mother said soberly: “There are dangers enough for all folk, royal or not. But it seems that matters are less tense because of this conflict in Scotland. Our good Queen Elizabeth is highly thought of and surrounds herself with able statesmen, and what we need is a good stable monarch. There is of course the religious conflict. They say the Queen is Protestant because she could be no other and it is for expediency’s sake she is so. But I must whisper that, Cat. One must guard one’s tongue. We are fortunate in our Queen. But as long as the Queen of Scots lives there will be danger. It is wrong to hope for trouble for others, but it does appear that the more disasters which befall the Court of Scotland the more peacefully will English men and women sleep in their beds.”

It was a lovely May day when the fruit trees were in blossom and the hedges full of wild parsley and stitchwort and the birds everywhere were in full song. A glorious time of the year when nature renews herself and there is a song of thanksgiving from the blackbird and chaffinch, the swifts and the swallows.

And at this time Jake brought Romilly Girling into the house.

She was twelve years old—a sad little waif when he brought her, very thin with great green eyes too big for her small white face.

They arrived late at night after the journey from St. Austell and the girl was almost asleep when they came into the hall.

“This is Romilly,” said Jake. “Captain Girling’s daughter. She’ll live with us. This is her home now.”

I understood at once. The girl had lost both parents. She would be without a home and I was glad that Jake had brought her. I ordered that a room should be made ready for her and she was given hot food and sent to bed without delay.

Jake explained. “There was very little left. The two of them … she and her brother … were in the house alone. The servant had gone. They were almost starved to death. A distant cousin of the Captain’s took the boy. All I could do was bring the girl here. Her father served me well.”

“We will care for her,” I said warmly.

It was wonderful to see the girl react to good food and comfortable living. She filled out a little; but she was still rather waiflike—a dainty elflike creature with quiet manners. Her great beauty was her eyes, they were big and such a strange green color that they immediately attracted attention. Her hair was dark and thick and straight. She had short, stubby lashes even darker than her hair.

June came and my mother said she must return home. Rupert was the most patient of husbands, but naturally he missed her. We said farewell and I watched her for as long as I could ride off with her party for the first stage of the long journey home.

By August of that year the Rampant Lion was ready to put to sea. Jake had been ashore too long. News had at length reached us that in June the Queen of Scots had given birth to a son. He was called James and this boy would be said to have a right to the throne of England.

Jake said: “The plaguey Spaniards would put his mother on the throne. You know what that means. We’d have the Papists here in no time. It would be the Smithfield fires before we knew where we were. They’ve got to be driven off the seas and it’s up to English sailors to show them who are the masters.”

I knew what this meant.

He was longing to put to sea again; and this time the Rampant Lion would be trusted to none but himself.

I was once more pregnant.

And in September of that year Jake sailed out of Plymouth.