Lion Triumphant

Murder in Mind

HE STOOD BEFORE ME … changed, yes changed. So lean had he become that he looked taller than ever; his hair was bleached almost white by long exposure; his face was deeply bronzed and more lined, but his eyes were as startlingly blue as ever.

I flew into his arms, a wild joy taking possession of me.

He held me for a long time; then he drew away from me and looked long and searchingly into my face.

“Still the same Cat,” he said.

“Oh, Jake,” I answered, “it has been such a long time.”

We went into the house. He looked at it wonderingly, touching the stone, marveling at it, loving it. Over the years how he must have dreamed of it, of our life here, of me!

“We have made no preparations to welcome you,” I began. “If we had known there would have been such a feast…”

“Have done,” he answered. “It is enough to be home.”

There was so much to talk of, so much to tell and it was only by degrees that I discovered the full story of what had happened to Jake during those long years.

I learned how they had encountered the Spaniards and that in pursuing one of the galleons Jake had left the rest of his group. The Spaniard had got away and the Rampant Lion had not escaped unscathed, and knowing that she could not undertake a long journey, Jake had been forced to look for some place where he might get her refitted. No easy task on a coast where the Spaniards might appear at any moment. Jake knew the Barbary Coast and it occurred to him that he might persuade or threaten the natives to help him refurbish his ship.

What a story it was of frustration, misery and hardship!

I could sense the force of the fury he had known when after leaving his ship and traveling some fifty miles inland he and his men were captured by a company of Spaniards.

Proud Jake, a captive in such hands! How that must have maddened him.

He did not tell the whole of the story at once. I pieced it together as I learned of incidents here and there. Over the years, I promised myself, I should discover more and more and in detail, the whole terrible story of what had kept him away all these years.

I heard snatches of how they had been chained and marched through the jungle, of the mosquitoes which tormented them and were responsible for the death of some, of the leeches which clung to their limbs when they tried to cool them in the streams. And worst of all was the knowledge that they were the slaves of their Spanish masters.

He must have spent two years in the jungle before they sailed for Spain. Jake was a prisoner with some thirty members of his crew who had so far survived. They knew what they were heading for … Spain and the Inquisition. There would be no leniency for a man whose main reason for sailing the seas was to rob and plunder Spaniards and to destroy them.

Fortunately for Jake perhaps—although it seems strange to say “fortunately” in such circumstances—in the Mediterranean, the galleon in which he was sailing encountered several Turkish pirate ships and in the skirmish the galleon was defeated; Jake and his men, who were chained in the hold of the Spanish ship, became the prisoners of the Turks.

My poor Jake, sold into slavery! There was one small piece of good fortune, though, because he and those of his crew who were taken with him were sent to the galleys and there they worked together, year in year out, pulling at the oars.

He had lost count of time, but always the determination stayed with him that one day he would escape. He impressed this on his men: One day they were going to return to England.

He told me how he had dreamed of the homecoming, never allowing himself to believe for one moment that it could fail. Such vivid accounts he gave of the stinking galleys, of the endless toil, of the beating of the drum to keep them in time, of the galley-master brandishing his whip for those who flagged.

“Oh, Jake,” I cried, “what has this done to you?”

But he was the same as ever. He had come back, had he not? All sailors knew when they left home that they faced fearful odds. He had been fortunate all his sea life until that ill-fated day when he had chased a Spaniard and ill luck had sent him ashore to look for native help in a place which was already occupied by the accursed enemy.

“All the time I was biding my time,” he said. “I planned every waking moment. There were times when we were released from our chains. They had to keep us alive. I have a good and faithful band and we made the most of those moments.”

He would tell me more later. There were many hideous details to come. But first I wanted to know how he had come home.

He, with some fifty slaves, had overpowered the captain of the Turkish craft. They had seized her and after many adventures at sea had brought her back to Plymouth.

I said he must not go away for a long time. I wanted to nurse him back to health.

He laughed at that. He was strong as ever. “Hardship never hurt a man,” he told me.

But he seemed content to stay. The Rampant Lion was lost and he would build a new ship. He would want to watch her grow. He was delighted to hear that the boys had sailed with Drake. They should have their own ships to command, he told them.

And I think I was happier than I had ever been before. I had come to terms with myself. Perhaps, though, during his absence I had glorified Jake. I had to relearn so much about him. I had forgotten how coarse he could be, how demanding, and he had not lost his love of a fight. Although in my heart I rejoiced at his return, at the same time we argued endlessly.

He still taunted me for not giving him a boy and I was angry with him because he was inclined to ignore Linnet, and a more attractive girl and one more like him there could not be. She had taken a dislike to him too. I think when I had talked of him I had built up a picture which she now thought to have been false. They were constantly at cross purposes.

To my great joy soon after Jake’s return I conceived. This time I must have a boy.

How I longed for this son who would be born of a new Catharine, a woman who had come to terms with life and knew how good fate had been to her. Jake had been brought back to me, and whatever we said to each other in our heated arguments, I was certain that I could find no true happiness without him.

It had been a wonderful realization. And now that he was back I desperately wanted him to have his son.

Jake was busily concerned with the building of the new ship. He enjoyed the company of Carlos and Jacko and Romilly’s Penn, now thirteen years old, adored him.

The months passed. Jake often talked of his adventures and more and more clearly the picture of those years was built up.

Once I said to him: “Now that you are home and safe perhaps you will never want to go to sea again.”

He looked at me in astonishment and burst into laughter. “Are you mad? When I am building my fine ship. How could a sailor give up the sea? I’m going out to kill many more Spaniards yet. I’ve a score to settle…”

He had changed little.

He talked often of the boy we would have. “Our boy,” he said. “He’ll be the best of the bunch. We’ll call him Jake after his father.”

I said I would not call him anything else.

He had a name for his new ship. A Lion of course. The Triumphant Lion because this young Lion was going to avenge the old one. This one would be mightier, his claws would be sharper, his teeth stronger. She was going to sweep the Spaniards off the sea.

Everything was ready for my confinement. The midwife had been in residence for a week before the child was born. We were taking no chances.

And so my child was born.

I lay in my bed experiencing that strange mingling of exhaustion and triumph which will be familiar to every mother. Then I knew the truth. My child was alive and perfect in every way—except that it was a girl.

Jake came in. I saw his face puckered and distorted.

“A girl!” he said. “Another girl!”

I felt the tears on my eyes; they were running down my cheeks. I felt so weak from my ordeal and the sight of him there angrily bitter was more than I could endure.

Linnet was at my bedside. “Mother, it is wonderful,” she cried. “I have a sister … a dear little sister. Get well soon, dearest Mother.”

She stooped and kissed me, and when Jake strode out of the room she went after him.

I heard her voice. “You wicked man! You cruel man! She has suffered and you do not care. All you care for is to have a boy. I hate you!”

I heard the sound of a resounding slap and I thought: He has struck her.

I tried to get up but I could not. The midwife was holding me.

She said: “I will bring the baby to you. A dear little girl.”

She was laid in my arms and I loved her.

I decided to call her Damask after my mother.

Jake was penitent afterward. He, a man who had never disguised his feelings, had been unable to control his bitter disappointment at my bedside.

He came to see the baby and could not hide his distaste as he looked at the crumpled pink face of my second daughter.

He said: “It seems you and I were not intended to have boys.”

“It would seem so,” I answered. “You made the mistake. You said that you had chosen me to be the mother of your sons. It is your fault. You should not have chosen me.”

He laughed suddenly.

“’Tis no use crying over what’s done.”

“Nay,” I agreed, “we make our mistakes and must needs suffer for them.”

“Ah, Cat, we are in agreement at last. So I have got another girl who doubtless will grow up like her sister.” He touched his cheek. “The young devil,” he went on. “She struck me. Upbraided me for my treatment of you and then quick as lightning she upped with her hand and hit me across the cheek. That young woman will have to be taught a lesson or two.”

“Take care that she does not teach you one.”

“Not only have I got me a wife who cannot give me sons, but I’ve begotten a virago of a daughter. By God, my household is turning against me.” He clenched his right fist suddenly and beat his left palm with it. “I wanted a boy,” he said. “More than anything on earth I wanted a boy.”

There was a boy in the house, Romilly’s Penn, and from the time of Damask’s birth Jake’s interest in him increased. Penn was a bright lad, fearless and showing a great interest in ships and the sea. Jake had a model of the Rampant Lion and the boy had been discovered taking it apart, a fact which might have earned him a severe punishment. But Jake took a lenient view of the offense and showed the boy how the ship was operated. I was amused to see them trying out this precious model on the pond in the garden.

Romilly was pink with pleasure. I came upon her standing by the pool, her hands clasped in a kind of ecstasy as she watched Jake and the adventurous Penn together. I was sure she hoped Jake would do for her son what he had done for Carlos and Jacko. I was certain that he would. Penn had the sea in his blood, for his grandfather had been, as Jake had said often, one of the best captains who had sailed with him.

As each month passed there was more and more talk of the growing strength of Spain. The captive Queen of Scots was a perpetual menace. There were constant rumors of plots to set her on the throne and bring the Catholic Faith back to England.

The Queen honored her sailors. The news of the great fleet of ships which Philip of Spain was building was constantly discussed. People cheered the English ships when they came into the Hoe as though they looked to them to save us from the terrors which the Spaniards would thrust upon us.

Old sailors on the Hoe chatted together about the Spaniards. One or two of them had been captured by them. There was one man who had been taken before the Inquisition, tortured and somehow escaped before they had been able to burn him at the stake. He had many a tale to tell. The people had to understand that the ships of the Spanish Armada would bring not only guns and fighting men but instruments of torture which would make the rack and thumbscrews and even the Scavenger’s Daughter look like children’s toys.

John Gregory, who was still with us, was clearly afraid. I wondered what would happen to him if he were taken by the Spaniards a second time.

It was almost open war between England and Spain at this time. Philip declared that he would seize all ships found in Spanish waters. Elizabeth replied that reprisals would be taken. She equipped twenty-five ships to avenge the wrongs done to her and her brave seamen. Who should be in charge of this venture but the great Sir Francis and he set forth in the Elizabeth Bonaventure with vengeance in his heart?

We heard stories of his exploits; how he had raided Spanish harbors and carried off treasure. Drake sailed on to Virginia, where he had a conference with the colonists who had been sent there by Sir Walter Raleigh.

Very soon after that two very interesting products were brought to England. The potato, which we found very good to eat and which we began to serve with meats to great advantage. The other was tobacco, a weed, the leaves of which were rolled and smoked, and from these, oddly enough, many people began to find a certain solace.

These were uneasy times. We could never be sure when we would look from our windows and see the Spanish Armada bearing down on us. Jake said this was nonsense. We should have warning of their coming. Sir Francis Drake and men like himself were ever watchful. We need have no fear. The Spaniards were not ready yet and when they did come, by God’s Death, we would be ready for them. He had decided that he would not go far away until the matter was resolved. He was putting his ships at the disposal of the Queen. He would make forays into Spanish harbors, but he was going to be at hand when the great confrontation took place.

Jake had changed a little. He seemed to enjoy being at home. He was becoming more domesticated. He took no notice of Damask, but he was very watchful of Linnet and the fact that she scorned him seemed to amuse him. He was Penn’s hero and the boy would follow him about at a discreet distance until Jake either roared at him to be off or had a few words with him.

Jake was mellowed, I believed; there seemed a certain contentment about him. He had accepted the fact that we were not going to have a son.

On my birthday he gave me a cross studded with rubies. It was a beautiful piece. I wondered whether he had taken it from some Spanish home, but I did not ask him because I did not wish to question a birthday gift.

He liked to see me wearing it so I did often.

A few weeks after he had given me the cross I began to suffer from an occasional headache and when this was so I used to take my food in my room. Jennet would bring it to me because in spite of our differences I had always wanted her to be my personal maid.

Jake had little sympathy for physical ailments. He never suffered from any himself and his lack of imagination made it impossible for him to understand other people’s feelings.

When I was not feeling entirely well I liked to be by myself and these were the occasions when I remained in my room. Linnet would come and talk to me. She was always tender toward me and had taken up a protective attitude, which amused me, because I had always been well able to look after myself.

On this occasion Jennet brought me a kind of soup dish which contained that novelty, the potato, and some kind of mushrooms and meat.

It was tasty and I enjoyed it, but in the night I began to feel ill. I was very sick and feverish and I wondered whether there had been something in the dish which had not agreed with me.

I went to see the cook who told me that others had had the dish and suffered no ill. They were fearful, I could see, lest I had contracted the sweat after all.

I said it contained mushrooms and there were toadstools which looked very like mushrooms. Could it be that one of these had been used?

The cook was indignant. Had she not been cooking for twenty years and if she didn’t know a toadstool from a mushroom she ought to be hung, drawn and quartered, that she did.

It took me some days to recover my health, but in a week or so I had forgotten the incident until it happened again.

I had eaten in my room half a chicken with a loaf which I had washed down with a tankard of ale, and as I was drinking the ale I was aware of a strange odor about it. I had drunk little of it but was determined to drink no more, for it was at precisely this time that a horrifying notion came to me.

I had eaten of the soup dish. So had others. I had been ill. Mine had been brought to me in my room. What had happened to it on the way up?

I smelled the ale. I was becoming more and more convinced that something was wrong with it.

Somebody had tampered with it on its way to my room. Who?

I found a bottle and poured some of the ale into it. I threw the rest out of the window.

I felt mildly ill and I was certain that the ale had been poisoned.

Could it possibly be that someone in this house was trying to poison me?

I took the bottle out of the drawer in which I had hidden it. I smelled it. There was a sediment.

Oh, God, I thought. Someone is trying to kill me. Someone in this house. Who would want to do this?

Jake!

Why should he immediately come to mind? Was it because when someone wished a woman out of the way it was usually her husband? Jake had chosen me. Yes, to be the mother of his sons. Could it be that he wanted sons so much that… I would not believe it.

Life was cheap to men like Jake. I saw a vivid picture in my mind of that scene when he had run his sword through Felipe’s body. How many men had he killed? And did his conscience ever worry him? But they were enemies. Spaniards! I was his wife.

Yet if he wanted me out of the way…

I sat at my window looking out. I could not face him. For the first time I felt unable to stand up to him. Always before I had been conscious of his great need for me. Now I doubted it.

I went to the mirror and looked at myself. I was no longer young. I was in my mid-forties and getting too old to bear sons. One does not notice one is growing old. One feels as one did at twenty … twenty-five, say, and imagines one is still that age. But the years leave their marks. The anxieties of life etched lines around the eyes and mouth.

I was not a young woman anymore. Nor was he a young man. But men such as Jake never feel their age. They still desire young women and think they should be theirs by right.

I went back to the window and sat down.

The door opened softly and Linnet was there.

“Mother,” she said, “what are you doing here?”

“I was looking out of the window.”

“You are not well.”

She came and looked at me searchingly.

“Are you ill?”

“No, no. A little headache.”

I took the bottle of ale to the apothecary in one of the little streets close to the Hoe.

I knew him well. He mixed scents for me and I often bought his herb concoctions.

I asked if I might speak to him in private and he conducted me into a little room behind the shop. Drying herbs hung on the beams and there were pleasant smells which were intensified during simple time.

“I wonder if you could tell me what this ale contains?” I said to him.

He looked astonished.

“I fancied that it was not as it should be and I thought you might be able to tell me why.”

He took the bottle from me and smelled it.

“Who is your brewer?” he asked.

“I do not think this has anything to do with the brewer. The rest in the cask was well enough.”

“Something has been added,” he said. “Could you give me a little time and I might be able to discover what?”

“Please do,” I said. “I will call in two days’ time.”

“I think I shall have an answer for you then,” he replied.

I went back to Lyon Court and there seemed to be a sudden menace about it. The lions which guarded the porch looked sly as well as fierce, sinister as well as handsome. I felt that I was being watched from one of the windows, though through which I could not say.

The thought kept recurring: Someone in that house wants me out of the way.

I was sure now that my soup had been poisoned. And now the ale.

So much depended on what the apothecary would have to tell me in two days’ time.

I was sleeping badly; I was pale and there were dark shadows under my eyes. I would lie in bed with Jake beside me and say: Does he want to be rid of me?

I thought of life without him and I felt wretched and lonely. I wanted him there; I wanted him to go on desiring me more than I desired him. I wanted to quarrel with him. In short, I wanted to return to the old relationship.

But he had changed. I had thought it was because he had become preoccupied with the coming war with Spain. But was this so?

Strange things began to happen.

Carrying a candle, I was mounting after dusk the stairs to the turret whither I had been earlier that day. I had discovered that I had lost a bow of ribbon from my gown and wondered if it was there. It was lonely in that wing of the house. Normally I should not have thought of this, but of late I had become nervous and was startled at the least sound. And as I mounted the spiral staircase I thought I heard a noise above me. I paused. The candle in my hand cast an elongated shadow on the wall. I noticed what looked like a grotesque face there—but it was only the shadow caused by the shape of the candlestick.

I stood very still. I was sure I could hear someone’s breathing above me. The turn of the staircase made it impossible to see more than a few steps ahead and I felt a cold shiver run down my spine. All my instincts were warning me that I was in danger.

“Who is there?” I cried.

There was no answer, but I fancied I heard a quick intake of breath.

“Come down, whoever is there,” I called.

There was still no answer.

I felt as though I were rooted to the staircase. For some seconds I could not move. Someone was waiting for me up there … someone who had sent me to Mary Lee’s cottage, someone who had poisoned my soup and my ale.

Good sense was saying: Don’t go up there. Don’t attempt to find out now. This is not the time. It could be fatal if you took another step.

I thought I heard a board creak. And turning, I ran down the stairs as fast as I could.

I went to my room. I lay on my bed. My heart was beating madly. I was frightened. This was unlike me, but recent events had shaken me more than I had realized and I was not in my usual good health.

I must be strong, I thought. I must find out what was happening. I must know if someone was in fact threatening me.

You know, said a voice within me.

I don’t believe it, I answered myself. He couldn’t. I know he has killed many times. He has taken what he wanted … always. Oh, no, it can’t be.

But why not, if he no longer wanted me? Why not, if I stood between him and something he wanted? Perhaps a young woman who could give him sons.

The door of my room opened suddenly. I knew it was Jake who had come in.

Had he come straight here from the turret? What would he do now?

Could it really be that he wished to be rid of me? Fiercely he had wanted me once; now did he as fiercely want someone else. Jake allowed nothing and no one to stand in the way of his desires. The lives of others, what were they? I kept thinking of Felipe lying dead on the floor of the Hacienda.

Jake had never shown any remorse about killing him.

He was standing by my bed looking down at me. He whispered my name quietly, not roaring it as he did so often.

I did not answer. I could not face him now with these dreadful suspicions in my mind. I could not say to him, “Jake, are you going to kill me?”

I was afraid.

So I pretended to sleep and after a few minutes he went away.

I went to the apothecary’s shop.

He bowed when he saw me and invited me into the room where the herbs were drying on the oak beams.

“I have found traces of Ergot in your ale,” he said.

“Ergot?”

“It’s a parasite which grows on grass, very often on rye. It contains poisons known as ergotoxine, ergometrine and ergotamine. It is very poisonous.”

“How could it get into the ale?”

“It could be put in.”

“How could it be?”

“The leaves could be boiled and the liquid added. I believe people have died through eating bread which had been made from rye which had this parasite growing on it.”

“I see. Then the ale I brought you was poisoned?”

“It contained Ergot.”

I thanked him and paid him well for his trouble. I intimated that I did not wish him to discuss this matter with anyone at the moment and he tactfully gave me to understand that he realized my wishes and would respect them.

As I walked back to Lyon Court I tried to remember the little I had learned from my grandmother about the things that grew in the fields and which could be used to advantage in cooking.

I remember her saying: “You must know the difference between good and evil. That’s the secret, Catharine. Mushrooms now. There’s many been caught on mushrooms. The most tasty food you could find; but there’s wicked growth that masquerades as good in the fields as there is with people. And you must not be deceived by looks. There’s Fly Agaric, which looked wicked enough; there’s stinking Hellebore, which would drive you off with its smell; but the Death Cap toadstool and the Destroying Angel are white and innocent-looking as any good mushroom.”

I had been amused by the names of Death Cap and Destroying Angel and also my grandmother’s earnestness. Perhaps that was why I had remembered.

Someone had put a Death Cap or Destroying Angel into my soup. Someone had put Ergot into my ale. A long time ago someone had sent me to Mary Lee’s cottage. Someone wanted me dead.

If I was going to save my life I must find out who was my would-be murderer.

I laughed at myself and said: You know.

But I wouldn’t believe it. I couldn’t believe … not then. It was not until later.

How strange it is that one does not see something which concerns one deeply and would be obvious to many. And then suddenly one discovers something which can be linked with other things and the truth is revealed.

I was looking from my window and I saw the three of them by the pond. Romilly, Jake and Penn.

Penn had a model of a ship and he was sailing it on the pond. Jake knelt down beside him and guided the ship. I could see he was pointing out something to Penn.

Romilly stood there, arms folded, the sunlight gleaming on her luxuriant hair; there was something about her which told me. She was complacent, satisfied. And I knew.

Romilly and Jake! He had brought her to this house as a young girl—was she twelve or thirteen? She had not cared when the tutor had been found in Jennet’s bed, for he was nothing to her. She had been ready to marry him, though. Yes, because she knew that she was to bear a child.

Jake had said: “We must care for her. Her father was one of the best men I ever sailed with.”

He did not add: “And she is my mistress.”

But of course it was so.

When Jake came into our bedroom I said to him, “Penn is your son.”

He did not attempt to deny it.

“So under my own roof…”

“It is my roof,” he replied shortly.

“She is your mistress.”

“She bore me a son.”

“You have lied to me.”

“I did not. You did not ask. You presumed it was the tutor’s. There seemed no reason to upset you with the truth.”

“You brought that girl into the house to be your mistress.”

“That’s a lie. I brought her here because she needed a home.”

“The good Samaritan.”

“God’s Death! Cat, I couldn’t leave an old seaman’s daughter of that age to fend for herself.”

“So you brought her here to bear your bastard. I wonder what her father would say to that?”

“He’d be delighted. He was a sensible man.”

“As I should be, I suppose?”

“No, I wouldn’t expect that of you.”

“You are a considerate husband.”

“Oh, come, Cat, what’s done is done.”

“And the girl is still here. Is there another on the way?”

“Stop this. The girl had a child. It was mine. There, you know. What’s to it? I was home from sea. You were having a daughter. There’s little time I have ashore.”

“You have to make up for your celibacy at sea of course, because raping dignified girls and sending them mad does not count. You have much to answer for, Jake Pennlyon.”

“As much as most men, I’ll swear. Oh, stop it, Cat. I took the girl. There’s no harm done. She has a fine boy who is a joy to her.”

“And a joy to you.”

“Why not? I get no sons from you. You can get a son with a Spaniard and for me … daughters … nothing but daughters.”

“Oh, I do hate you, I do!”

“You have said that often enough, God knows.”

“I had thought that we might come to some good life. I had pictured us … our grandchildren in our garden … and you contented…”

“I’m not ill content. I’ve got three fine boys that I know of. And I wouldn’t want to part with one of them. Understand that, Cat. Not one of them. I’m proud to own them. Proud, I say.”

“Proud of the manner in which they were begotten, I doubt not. One from rape of an innocent child, the other one a lustful serving girl and another on this sly creeping … insect who crawls into my house … who is a poor little orphan who lies about the tutor and all the time is laughing because she has your child.”

“Oh, come, Cat, it’s long ago.”

“Long ago, is it? Is she not still your mistress? I see it all now. The ribbons she puts in her hair; the manner in which she pushes the boy under your feet. What plans has she, this sly little crawling thing? What does she hope for, to take my place?”

He was alert I fancied. “How could that be! Don’t talk nonsense, Cat.”

“Is it nonsense?” I asked slowly. “How do I know what is happening in the house? I am deceived all the time. My daughters are nothing to you. But you have ever made much of your bastards.”

“They are my sons.”

“Mayhap this woman … this Romilly could give you more sons. She has given you one. I am beginning to understand. I see so much.”

“You see what you want to see. You are an arrogant woman. You led me a dance as no other woman has. You belonged to a Spaniard before you did to me. You gave him a son and what have I had?”

“Was it my fault? Everything that has happened has been due to you. You raped Isabella, Felipe’s bride. It was on you that he sought to revenge himself. What have I ever been but a counter in your games … your wicked cruel games? Jake Pennlyon, I wish to God I had never seen you. It was an ill day for me when I met you on the Hoe.”

“You mean that?”

“With all my heart,” I cried. “You blackmailed me because of what you saw in the leper’s squint.”

“You were playing a game with me. Did you think I didn’t know that. You wanted me as I wanted you.”

“So that I pretended to have the sweat to escape you?”

“By God, I’ll never forgive you for that.”

“What does it matter, eh, now that you have Romilly? She gave you a son. She can give you sons … sons … sons … for as many breeding years as are left to her.”

“She could,” he said.

“They would only be your bastards unless…”

“Who cares for that?” he said. “I have three fine boys and I’m proud of them.”

I wanted him then to seize me, to shake me roughly as he had done so many times before. I wanted him to tell me that it was nonsense. Penn was his son. He had gone to her when I was ill and he was sick with disappointment because I had not given him a son. I wanted him to tell me that it was all over and done with. That he had been unfaithful as I knew he must have been a hundred times … a thousand times during his long voyages from home.

But this was different. He went away and left me and I did not see him again that night.

It’s true then, I told myself. He wants to be rid of me. He wants to marry Romilly, who can give him sons … legitimate sons.

I knew instinctively that my life was threatened and there seemed no doubt by whom. My husband wanted to marry another woman and the reason he wished to marry her was that she could give him sons. This sly creature who had wormed her way into my household with her pliable ways was threatening me.

It was not that she meant more to him than hundreds of other women had. But she had proved that she could give him sons … and men like Jake wanted sons. It was an obsession with them. We had the example of a recent King who had rid himself of several wives—and the great theme of his life had been “Give me sons.”

It was the cry of arrogant men. They must continue the family line. Daughters were no use to them.

Boys adored Jake and he was interested in them; girls meant nothing to him until they reached an age when they could arouse his sexual desires. Jake was a fierce man, undisciplined, a man who had always known what he wanted and gone out to take it.

That was what was happening now.

I was no longer desirable to him because I could not hold out any hope that I would give him sons. He wanted me out of the way.

I thought then of Isabella. I remember the calm intensity of Felipe. He had wanted me; he had wanted to legitimize our son. Isabella had stood in the way of Felipe’s marriage to me as I now stood in the way of Jake’s to Romilly.

Isabella had been found at the bottom of a staircase. She was not the first to die in this way. Long ago the Queen, some said, would have married Robert Dudley. But he had had a wife and she was found dead at the bottom of a staircase.

Beware, unwanted wives.

What could I do? I could go to my mother. I could say: “Mother, let me live with you because my husband is trying to kill me.”

I could tell my daughter perhaps. But how could I? She hated her father already. There was too much hatred in the house. And somewhere at the back of my mind was the thought—the hope—that I was wrong. A part of me said: He would not kill you. He loved you once—oh, yes, this emotion he had for you was love. You are the same except that you are ageing and can no longer bear a son. He would never kill you. You still have the power to infuriate him, to anger him. How could he forget the passionate years, the delight you have had in each other, for it is true that you have. Battles there have been, but have not those battles been the joy of both your lives?

This was why it was so wounding and so impossible that Jake should want to kill me.

I would wake in the night trembling from some vague nightmare.

Jake was away a great deal and I was often alone. He was visiting the towns along the coast where preparations were going on for the possible coming of the Spanish Armada.

I was glad in a way. It gave me time to think. I went over many of the little incidents of our life together. I remembered vividly scenes from the past. And always afterward I would say: It is not so. I don’t believe this of him … not of Jake.

I refused to see Romilly. She was aware, of course, that I knew who Penn’s father was. Jake must have told her.

Penn was kept well out of my way and I never saw the boy. I could not bear to look at him—sturdy, healthy, his home my house, the son another woman had given Jake when I had failed to do so.

Linnet was worried about me. “Are you well, Mother?” she asked constantly. She would make me lie down and sit beside me.

Strange things started to happen. Once I awoke in the night when Jake was away and saw a figure in my room. A shadowy figure dressed in gray. It stood at the door. I could not see the face, for it was as though it were wrapped in a shroud.

I screamed and some of the servants came running into my room.

“Who is there?” I cried. “Someone came into the room. Find who it was.”

They searched, but they could find no one. Jennet appeared at some time later, half-asleep. I knew she had had farther to come than the others—from the bed she was sharing with a lover.

“It was a nightmare,” said Linnet. “I shall write and ask my grandmother to send something to make you well. You are not yourself.”

Who had come into my room, and for what purpose? What was the matter with me? I was not the sort to be intimidated. Why was I overcome by this strange lassitude so alien to my nature?

Linnet said I was to stay in bed for a day. I had had an unpleasant shock. She brought my food to me. I felt very sleepy.

“That is good,” she said. “It shows you need a rest.”

I slept and when I awoke it was dusk. I saw a shadowy figure by my bed and I cried out. Linnet was bending over me.

“Everything is all right, Mother. I have been sitting with you while you slept.”

Yes, I was different. Something was happening to me. I could not throw off this tiredness. I found that I was falling asleep during the day.

What is changing me? I asked myself, and once again I thought of my grandmother who knew so much about herbs and plants and how she used to talk to me when I was a child. My attention had often wandered, but my mother had said: “You must listen to your grandmother when she talks, Cat dear. She is very clever about these things and they are important to her. When terrible tragedy came to her she went into her garden and found solace there and she prides herself on her knowledge as you do on your riding.”

To please my mother I tried to listen and as a result certain things she said remained with me.

“There’s everything here in the ground, Catharine. There’s life and there’s death. There’s things to cure and things to kill. There’s things to make you lively and things to make you sleep.”

To make you sleep. There was poppy juice, I knew. That could make you sleep.

I thought: Someone is trying to unnerve me. Who was it who came into my room? Where in this house is there a gray shroud. Who wore it to stand at my door?

Why should I, who had fought Jake Pennlyon and sometimes been the victor, why should I be gradually growing into a lethargic, frightened woman?

I was going to find out.

I was sure that someone was tampering with my food. Romilly and Jake would work together. Did they talk together of how they would rid themselves of me? Did Romilly picture herself the mistress of this house? Were they impatiently asking each other: “How long must it be?”

Felipe had never talked to me of his desire to see an end of Isabella. Yet Isabella had died and the day she died the household had gone to the auto-da-fé and neither I nor Felipe was at the Hacienda.

Jake was away. Was he deliberately away? Did he, when he returned, hope to find me dead … say, at the bottom of a staircase?

Who would throw me down? Who had thrown Isabella? The man Edmundo had done it. He had confessed. But he had done it for Felipe and that was Felipe’s guilt. Who would do it for Jake? Jake was surely a man who would do such things for himself. Would he creep into the house by stealth when he was supposed to be far away? Would he come to my room and drag me to the top of the staircase and hurl me down? Would he strangle me first? It could be done, I had heard, with a damp cloth pressed over the mouth. That was what was said to have been done to Isabella.

I must regain my former strength and courage. I must first find out what was changing me into a feeble, defenseless creature.

I was no longer Jake’s wildcat; I was his tame mouse—frightened and caught in a trap. I was a woman who allowed others to plan her death while she waited inactive.

No more, I said.

I would never drink anything in my room. That would mean that my food could not be tampered with, for if I ate at table I would take from the dish which everyone partook of.

That was the first step. I did this and it was amazing how much better I felt.

There at the head of the table I sat—since Jake was away. Romilly was present, sly, eyes downcast. It was small wonder that she dared not look at me.

Linnet was delighted.

“You are getting better, Mother,” she said.

For three days my strength returned. I laughed at myself. I even laughed at the idea of Jake’s wishing to marry Romilly. How could she hold his affections? He would tire in a week of her meekness. I was for Jake as Jake was for me.

It had taken more than twenty years and threats of murder for me to realize this.

Then strange things began to happen again. I looked for a cloak in my wardrobe and could not find it. I sent for Jennet; she could not be found.

“That woman is useless,” I stormed.

I went into the garden and there I found her among the herbs and lettuces we grew for salads.

I said: “I sent for you.”

“Why, Mistress,” she said, “I was here, you see.”

“I cannot find my green cloak. Where is it?”

“Why, ’twas there but this morning, Mistress. I saw it when I was putting your clothes away.”

“Well, ’tis not there now.”

“Then where can it be to, Mistress?”

I went back to my room and she came with me.

She opened the wardrobe door and there was my cloak.

“’Twere here all the time, Mistress.”

“It was not,” I said.

“But, Mistress, ’tis there just as I hung it.”

“It was not there ten minutes ago.”

She shook her head with a disbelief she dared not utter.

This was constantly happening. I would miss something, question its disappearance and then find it miraculously in its place.

The household was beginning to notice and Linnet was distressed.

I often went down to the hut where we had hidden Roberto. Ever since he had ridden away that morning I had been anxious about him. I had heard nothing. What was happening to him? I hoped that he was not involved in anything that would bring him to trouble.

He was young and impetuous. What match would he be against men such as Walsingham?

I would creep into the hut and look around and assure myself that he was not hiding somewhere.

There was so much talk now of plots and the Spanish menace that my anxieties had grown concerning him. I would not have been surprised at any time to find him there.

But I was feeling better. If it had not been for the apothecary’s evidence I would have told myself my fears were the result of my foolish imaginings. I was certain now that Jake had had no hand in any plot against me. Romilly must have poisoned the ale and the soup. She must have sent me to Mary Lee’s cottage all those years ago? Had Jake ever told her how I had evaded him long ago? Had she thought to murder me in such a way as could never be traced to her?

And then Jake had gone away and was lost to all for all those years. I was out of danger then. Had Romilly made the wax image of me? Then how did it come to be in Jake’s pocket? Had she put it there—why?

Now Jake was back; Romilly’s and his son was growing up. Jake wanted a legitimate son; she had borne him one; she had proved she could do so. She could give him his legitimate son … if I were out of the way.

It fitted.

I tried to work out what had happened. I had taken the whole of the soup and I had had a comparatively mild attack afterward. So whoever did it either did not wish to kill me or did not understand what quantity was needed to bring about the desired effect. The same may have applied to the ale. But who could want to make me ill and yet not kill me?

Romilly! She knew of the effects of these plants but did not know the extent of their deadliness. What could I do about Romilly? Send her to my mother. Send a potential murderess to my mother! I could not do that. And what of Penn? She would not go without him and Jake would not let him go.

I must lay my own traps. Thinking thus, I wandered down to the hut. There was no sign of anyone there. The relief was great, for I could not imagine what would happen if Jake discovered Roberto in hiding.

I stood for a few moments in the hut recalling those anxious times and when I went to the door I found that I could not open it. I pushed with all my might and could not budge it.

I’m locked in, I thought, and I felt the hair rise from my head.

For what purpose? Here I was some distance from the house. If I called no one would hear me. Strange things had been happening to me and now someone had locked me in this hut. What was to happen to me now?

I looked up at the window high in the wall through which Roberto was to have escaped into the bushes had he been surprised. I did not see how I could reach it. Then I should have to break it and jump through.

I turned back to the door and hammered on it. There was no response.

I leaned against the wall.

“What is happening to me?” I asked myself.

There was a key to this hut. Manuela had found it hanging inside. She had said that we would lock Roberto in and no one would be able to disturb him. Then if the Queen’s men came for him he was to jump through the window.

I went to the hook on the wall. The key was not there. Someone had seen me enter this hut often. Someone had taken the key and locked me in.

But why? For what purpose?

Was there someone lurking outside now waiting to come in and kill me?

Jake?

Jake was away.

Who had locked me in? Romilly? Would she leave me here until Jake came back … say, at dusk … and open the door? Would Jake then creep in and kill me and then go away again? A man should not be at home when his wife was murdered. Felipe had not been home and I had been sent away.

If only someone would come. Anyone. It was the quiet that was so nerve-racking. No one was about. I was all alone. I banged on the door until my fists were bruised. I called. But who could hear me? It was because the hut was so far from the house that it had provided such a good hiding place for Roberto.

It was afternoon. I felt sick and frightened. But if my murderer had come I should tackle him, I would fight for my life. Anything was better than this waiting.

I called out. But who could hear my voice beyond the thick walls of the hut? I tried to climb up and look through that window. I could not do so. My hands were grazed and bleeding and I fell twice in the attempt.

The afternoon was passing. Soon it would be night.

Night! I said to myself. Of course they are waiting for the night.

Oh, God, I prayed, what is happening to me? What has gone wrong with my life? Why was I not content with it? I had Jake, who wanted me and loved me in his fashion—as I loved him in mine. I had my beloved children. What more could I ask?

And now I was going to lose everything I treasured. Someone was trying to kill me.

Dusk fell. No sound from outside. Nothing. Let someone come this way, I prayed. Linnet will be worried. I was to have been with her and Damask. They will come to look for me. Oh, God, let the door open and Linnet come for me.

I went to the door and beat on it with my fists. To my amazement it moved. I pushed. It was open and I was out in the fresh air.

I ran to the house.

Linnet cried out when she saw me. “Mother, what has happened? We have been so worried! Where have you been?”

We were in each other’s arms.

“I was locked in the hut,” I said.

“In the hut? Mother. You mean that old place… What were you doing there?”

I said: “I went in … and then the door was locked.”

“Who locked it?”

“I don’t know.”

“They have gone out searching for you. I sent two parties of men out. We had been so anxious. But you are exhausted, dearest Mother. I’m going to get you to bed. I’m going to bring you something warming to drink.”

What a ministering angel she was! How I loved her! How could I die when I had my beloved daughter Linnet?

I could not sleep. Nor did I wish to drink the hot herb drink she had brought for me. It stood on a table by my bed.

“Try to rest,” she said.

“I want to talk. Who could have locked me in the hut?”

Linnet stroked my hair; she was looking at me in a strange way as though she did not recognize me.

“Mother dear,” she said, “you were not locked in. The door was unlocked all the time.”

“What nonsense! It was locked. I couldn’t open it. And then suddenly it was open.”

“Perhaps it was jammed.”

“It couldn’t have been. I pushed and pushed and then it opened so easily. Someone unlocked it.”

“It doesn’t matter now. You must have thought it was locked. The key was there all the time.”

“Where was the key?”

“It was hanging on a hook inside the hut.”

“But it wasn’t. Someone locked me in and put the key back afterwards.”

“It doesn’t matter,” said Linnet soothingly.

I was so tired that I thought it didn’t matter either. I was so exhausted and so glad to be back with Linnet sitting beside me.

It was only when I awoke later that I realized how much it did matter.

They were watching me. I saw their looks. My daughter, Edwina, Manuela, Romilly, the servants … everyone.

Something was happening to me. I had changed. I imagined that a shrouded figure was in my room. I had spent hours in the hut thinking I was locked in when the door was open and the key was on the hook all the time.

Devils were beginning to possess me, which meant that I was being robbed of my reason. This was what they believed, but I knew that some evil threatened me, that someone was trying to rob me of my reason—or to make it appear that I had lost it—before killing me. It did not seem impossible that my husband wished to be rid of me so that he might marry a young woman who could give him sons. Death was stalking me and with Death was a companion, Madness.

No one could ever have called me a weak woman. I had always been able to defend myself and I was going to defend myself now. I was not mad. I was certain that I had been locked in that hut and that the door had been suddenly opened and that the key had been put back after I had left. Someone had been lurking in the bushes outside the hut. The door had stealthily been unlocked and when I had run out and gone to the house the key had been replaced.

That was how it must have happened. That was how I knew it had happened.

And I was going to prove it.

Strangely enough that incident in the hut had given me strength. I was going to throw off this lethargy which I knew now was the result of the evil herbs with which my food and drink had been laced.

I was going to fight this with all my strength and I was confident that I could win.

Oh, Romilly Girling, I assured myself, you will find you have a strong adversary in me. I shall not step aside so that you can marry my husband. And, Jake, you have not won the last battle yet.

Linnet had left now. “I will sleep,” I said. But I never felt less like sleep.

I picked up the drink by my bed and smelled it.

How could a drink brought to me by my loving daughter have become contaminated?

Still, I did not drink it. I left it there at my bedside.

I must think of a plan. I would watch what I ate. I must be alert. I must be ready at any hour of the night. The next time the shrouded visitor came to my room it should not escape. I was going to catch it, drag off the shroud and find out who it was who was playing these tricks on me.

I would stay in my room for a few days. I would feign illness. I would have food sent to me which I would not eat. I would preserve part of it and take it to the apothecary and when I had proof from him that my food was being laced with poison I would lay my evidence before … before … before whom? Before Jake! What if my suspicions were correct and he was my would-be-murderer? How he would laugh. Before Linnet? Could I say to her: “Someone is trying to kill me. Help me find who it is.” How could I? No matter. I would wait and see what I would do. In the meantime I would collect my evidence.

I took a piece of beef from the kitchen and with it a good cob loaf. These I concealed in my bedroom. I took also a flagon of muscadel wine with nuts, apples and marchpane.

Once I had pretended to have the sweat. I must have been rather good at pretense. I now feigned to a lethargy which I was far from feeling. I took my secret meals and ate nothing which came to my room, although I took several samples of what was brought to take to the apothecary.

My spirits were rising. I was at last taking an action which I felt suited my nature. I was going into the offensive.

I did not take even Linnet into my confidence, although I was on the point of doing so many times.

I wanted to be ready when my shrouded visitor appeared. And I was.

I had pretended to be very sleepy all day. I had become aware that most of the food which came up to me was laced with poppy juice, so the object was to dull me into a mood when my wits would desert me. Then instinct warned me some plan was about to be put into operation.

I was right. It was three o’clock in the morning of the third day when I was awakened by a presence in my room.

The bedclothes were being gently drawn from the bed.

I opened my eyes. Standing at the foot of the bed was the figure I had seen before—shrouded in gray. Over the head was a hood which covered the face; there were slits for the eyes to see through.

I lay still waiting. The figure moved not toward me but to the door. It stood there and I was ready to leap out of bed—tense waiting. As soon as it moved I would be after it. I would tear off that concealing cover. I would find out who was hiding beneath it.

And suddenly there came to my mind: What if it were indeed a ghost? What if the ghost of Isabella had come to haunt me? What part did I play in her sudden death? Was it murder? And if it was, was not I the motive for that murder?

And why should I think of Isabella at such a moment? How could I say except that there was something about that shrouded figure which had brought her to my mind?

Ghost or not I was going to find out. The figure moved backward. Then I saw a hand emerge. The finger was beckoning me.

I was about to leap out of my bed when my instincts warned me. If there was a murderer concealed behind that shroud it was the same person who had been dosing my food. I had feigned a lassitude I did not feel. I must behave like a person who was under the influence of poppy juice.

I rose slowly from my bed.

The hand disappeared; the figure had moved out into the corridor.

I went out. The figure was a few yards away. The finger beckoned me again.

Trying to act like a sleepwalker, I followed.

The figure had disappeared around a bend. I hurried after it. I came to rest at the top of the great staircase which led into the hall.

There was no sign of the shrouded figure.

I stood at the top of the staircase; and then I knew. Someone was behind me, hands stretched out, waiting to hurl me down those stairs.

I turned and grappled.

I heard someone shout: “I’m coming,” and there was my daughter Linnet. She seized the shroud. The three of us were huddled together for a moment. I felt myself lifted off my feet. Then suddenly there was a wild scream. I found myself clinging to a piece of gray cloth as a figure went crashing to the foot of the staircase.

Linnet and I did not speak. We ran down the staircase to that crumpled figure, which lay face downward. I lifted the hood and the mask that fitted over the face.

“’Tis Manuela,” I said.

She did not die until three days afterward. Poor tragic Manuela!

She was conscious and lucid for a while before death overtook her. I was at her bedside and she was aware that I was there. She had little time left, she said, and much to say.

To think that this Spanish woman should have lived in my household for so many years and I know so little of her! How strange that she should be so devoted to Roberto and yet plan to kill his mother.

It was vengeance. Just retribution, she called it.

“As soon as I saw the ruby cross I knew that I would kill you,” she said. “Before that I just wanted to make you suffer.”

“But you did not attempt to kill me until last night,” I reminded her. “You gave me small doses of poison and tried to rob me of my reason.”

“That was what happened to Isabella. She was ill; she was robbed of her reason; and then one day she was thrown down the staircase.”

Her story was told jerkily, far from lucidly and not at one sitting. I had to piece it together to make a coherent whole. She was very weak, but she wished to tell it. It was a kind of confession. She wanted extreme unction, and I was determined that she should have it if I could manage it. It would mean running some risk, but I had known of Catholic families in the neighborhood and I would ask if a priest might come to ease Manuela’s last hours.

He would have to come in secret, but I would defy Jake, if necessary, to bring her this last consolation.

I learned that Manuela was a half sister of Isabella—her mother having been a serving girl in the mansion which was Isabella’s home. Manuela had been given a place in that mansion as soon as she was old enough to take it and had been sent to Tenerife when Isabella went there to marry Don Felipe.

She had been present when Jake had stormed the mansion; she had successfully hidden herself from the marauders. She had assisted at the birth of Carlos and had loved the boy. It was only when he came to England and threw off all his Spanish ways that she turned to Roberto.

But the gist of her story was Edmundo. She had loved him and they were to have been married. She had greatly admired the ruby cross which Isabella wore frequently. She had even taken it once and worn it when she went to meet Edmundo in the garden—a sin for which she had done penance.

Edmundo had said: “I would I could give you a cross like that.”

Perhaps someone had heard him. In any case the cross was missing and Edmundo confessed that he had strangled Isabella, then thrown her down the stairs. He had done it, he admitted, because he had stolen the cross and been discovered in the act by Isabella, who had threatened to have him arrested for robbery.

Manuela had accepted this because she knew he loved her and the cross was missing—until she had seen me wearing it. She believed then that it had been in my possession ever since, that Don Felipe had given it to me and that therefore I must have known that Edmundo had not stolen it and only admitted to doing so under torture which few men could stand out against.

It seemed clear to her that Edmundo had killed Isabella on orders from his master. A servant belonged to his master and if certain deeds were demanded of him he performed them, but any sin incurred was not on his conscience.

When Edmundo was arrested Don Felipe should have saved him, but he had not done so. He did not want anyone to know that Edmundo had killed Isabella on orders from him. The situation was fraught with danger because Don Felipe wished to marry me and there were rumors in circulation that I was a witch and a heretic. Therefore, Don Felipe dared not make any move to save Edmundo because by doing so he could turn suspicion on himself and I was involved. The ruby cross provided a good reason why Edmundo should have committed the murder and so Don Felipe was content for this to be the accepted version of the affair, although the cross all the time was in his possession, while poor Edmundo, tortured until he admitted that he had stolen it, was condemned to death.

When Manuela saw me wearing the cross she believed that I had had it all those years. It had not occurred to her that it was one of the valuable objects which Jake had stolen when he raided the Hacienda, that it had been in his possession ever since and he had only recently given it to me.

She had always hated me. She had blamed me for what happened. But for me, she was sure that it never would. In her view, I was, therefore, responsible for Isabella’s death. It was she who had aroused Pilar’s venom against me; it was she who had made the image of Isabella and put it in my drawer. She had taken it to Pilar and it was to have been used as evidence that I was a witch.

And then because she knew that there had been suspicion in my mind, she had sought to make it grow. She wanted me to suspect my husband was planning to murder me. She had put the image among Jake’s clothes and waited for me to find it. Her revenge was slow and painstaking. She was in no hurry. She had infinite patience. All she wanted was my uneasiness—until she saw me wear the cross.

Then there was no doubt in her mind of Felipe’s guilt and mine. She brooded on the happy life she might have had; on the children of her union with Edmundo who had never been born. She was fierce and passionate; she could find no satisfaction in anything but revenge.

So she had decided I should suffer as Isabella had suffered. She did not wish to murder me outright. She wanted justice. Isabella had gone mad, so should I. She had suffered over a long period, so should I. And in due course I should be found at the bottom of a staircase, as Isabella had been.

She lived for this revenge. It was the only thing which could compensate her for the loss of Edmundo.

She had put poisonous plants into my food—not enough to kill me but only to impair my health; she had locked me in the hut and then unlocked the door and hung the key inside. She had made herself a shroud and tried to unnerve me. She had meant to drive me into madness and then, when those about me began to doubt my sanity, lure me to the top of the staircase—an easy victim, half drugged as she believed me to be—and throw me to the foot of it. People would say: “She was possessed by devils. Remember, how strange she became?”

“My poor Manuela!” I cried, and I assured her that I had never seen the cross until a short while before. I now remembered such an ornament’s being mentioned at the time of Edmundo’s execution, but I had not connected it with the gift which my second husband had given to me.

Oh, Jake, I thought, you took the cross when you came to the Hacienda. You took everything of value you could lay your hands on. And Felipe … you were guilty of the murder of Isabella, just as guilty as though you yourself had strangled her and thrown her down the stairs.

I was relieved that Manuela now knew that I was guiltless of participation in Isabella’s death.

“Take care of Roberto,” she said. “I loved him … dearly.”

I told her she had no need to ask his mother to do that.

I rode over to a family nearby who when the priests had come to Trewynd in Edward’s time had entertained them there and hidden them.

They had one there at that time. He was brought out of the priest’s hole in which they hid him whenever visitors called at the house and, disguised as one of the grooms, he rode back to Lyon Court with me.

I knew that I was doing a daring thing. If Jake had returned home at that time I cannot imagine what would have happened.

I told the priest of my fears and he answered that he was accustomed to taking risks and would not deny a dying woman her last solace on Earth.

I took him to her sickroom and he was there holding the cross before her eyes as she passed away.

She died peacefully, I think, for I had assured her of my forgiveness. She was glad that she had not succeeded in killing me and did not have to go before her Maker with murder on her conscience.

She died clasping the cross.

I felt alive again. What a fool I had been. As if Jake would murder me and if he did it would not be by such devious methods. He would have taken out his sword and run me through. I laughed. It was good to be alive. I was not menaced. Jake was an unfaithful husband. Had he not always been and had I ever expected anything else? I had sheltered two of his bastards under my roof already. Penn was but the third. They gave him satisfaction in the sons he could not get with me.

My vitality had returned. I could fight again.

Linnet had to know what had happened. I should have had to tell her the whole story some time or other—just as my mother had told me her strange story when I was about my daughter’s age. The whole household knew too that the mistress who was supposed to be going mad was not, but Manuela had been completely so because she had poisoned my food and tried to throw me down the stairs. There was no need for them to know the reasons why she had done these things. It was enough that they accepted the fact that devils had begun to possess her.

Manuela was buried in the Lyon section of the graveyard and we laid rosemary on her grave.

I at least would never forget her.