The original grant had also included a two hundred acre deer park from which the estate had taken its name,
Pearroc Royal
being the old English for
Park Royal
. Deer, however, brought in no revenues with which to fatten the parsimonious king’s purse, and so it had been relatively easy for Henry VII to give away the small estate to Aidan’s great-grandfather in exchange for his generosity to Prince Arthur.
The coach rumbled up the driveway, and came to a stop before the front entry. At once the arched oaken door swung open, and several servants hurried out to aid the vehicle’s occupants. The door to the carriage was opened, its steps pulled down, and a hand was thrust in to help Aidan descend.
“Welcome home, Mistress Aidan!” said the white-haired butler.
“Thank ye, Beal, but ’tis Lady Bliss now, and this gentleman is the new Lord Bliss.” She waved her hand at Conn who had descended the coach behind her. “Let us go inside. Are all the servants assembled? I shall explain everything.” They hurried into the building entering through a covered porch that opened into a long hallway. Aidan led the way into the Great Hall which was on the left, and separated from the corridor by two beautifully carved screens that sat on either side of the entry to the Great Hall.
In the Great Hall there were over twenty people milling about, but at their first sight of Aidan all chatter ceased, and their faces were, to a man, wreathed in smiles. “Welcome home, Mistress Aidan,” they chorused.
Aidan smiled happily back at the household staff. “Thank ye,” she said. “I have missed ye all, but I have come home because I have a happy surprise for ye. When my father gave my custody to her majesty he requested two things of our queen. That she find me a good husband, and that he take our family name so that there would be another generation of St. Michaels. This gentleman is my husband, Conn St. Michael, Lord Bliss. He is yer new master, and I hope ye will all serve him as loyally as ye have served my beloved father, and as ye have served me.”
Beal, who was the butler and head of the staff, stepped forward. He was an older man, of average height, but with a stately bearing that was increased by his snow-white hair. “Welcome home, my lord,” he said. “If ye will allow I will present the staff.”
Conn nodded.
“Mistress Beal, my spouse, is the housekeeper,” he began, and then went on to introduce Erwina the cook, Leoma the laundress, Rankin the gardener, Haig the head groom, Martin the coachman, and Tom his assistant. Then came the four footmen, the four housemaids, the two kitchen maids, the potboy, the knife sharpener, the two assistant laundresses, the four men who helped in the garden, and two of the four stablemen, the other two currently stabling the young Earl of Lynmouth’s coach and horses.
To each servant Conn nodded his acknowledgment, smiling winningly at all the ladies who were immediately enchanted by him. “I thank ye for yer kind welcome,” he said. “I hope ye will welcome as kindly my personal servant, Cluny, to yer midst.”
“We traveled from Greenwich,” said Aidan, “in the Earl of Lynmouth’s coach. His lordship left us at Worcester to travel by horseback on to his mother’s estate at
Queen’s Malvern,
but with the storm his coach and coachman will remain until after the storm. Please see that he is made comfortable.”
“Of course, m’lady,” said Beal, and then he dismissed the staff.
“If there is nothing else, m’lady,” said the butler, and with a nod Aidan dismissed him.
“This is a fine hall,” said Conn looking about curiously now that the servants had gone, and they were alone.
“Isn’t it?” Aidan agreed. She was very proud of her home, and it pleased her that he was apparently appreciative of the aesthetics of the manor house. “My father put the wooden floors in. Beneath them are the original stone floors which were fine when we used rushes, but my father preferred fine carpets from the East.”
“So do I,” said Conn. “For one thing it is cleaner and warmer. There is no temptation to throw the bones upon the floor when ye’ve carpets.”
The hall was a good-sized almost square room, and on one wall there was a large fireplace with a fine carved stone mantel, its great crowned lions seated, holding up the mantelshelf upon their heads. The frontal panel of the mantelshelf had a frieze of vines and fruits carved into it. Upon the mantelshelf were a pair of heavy silver candelabra that burned fine beeswax candles. On the far side of the fireplace was an oriel window facing west that allowed the hall to be flooded with bright sunlight even on a winter’s day, and on the other side of the room was a matching window facing east. The east window was not actually a part of the Great Hall, but rather it belonged to a corridor outside the Great Hall that housed the staircase to the upper floor. There was no door, however, between the staircase corridor and the Great Hall, and so light could flow from the east window unimpeded unto the room.
Behind the Great Hall there were two rooms, one small, and one of medium size. The smaller of the two was used as the estate office, and was entered via the staircase corridor. The larger of the rooms was the family parlor, and entered from the office. This room had a fine fireplace, and windows facing west, whereas the office had but one little window. The rest of the ground floor of the house was given over to the buttery, the kitchens, the pantry, and the family chapel, which was a small room located in the front of the house just off the porch. It was a pretty room with two tall arched windows of fine stained glass, a testament to the wealth of the St. Michaels. In the cellars below the ground floor was a laundry room with stone tubs, and a hearth for heating the water, a brew room, a wine cellar, and the servants’ quarters.
Conn liked the look of the house which was furnished in sturdy oak pieces, pleasantly mellowed with time. The ceiling in the Great Hall was paneled in heavily carved sections of dark oak that contrasted with the white plaster walls which were hung with three well-worked tapestries. The rooms were well lighted with wall brackets made of iron that held candles, and tall candlesticks of the pricket type stood upon their three legs in various parts of the chambers.
Aidan led her husband upstairs, and upon the second floor of the manor house there were five bedchambers, the master chamber running the width of the building at the south end; the other four rooms were set lengthwise along the west wall, their entry gained from a windowed corridor. The master chamber was spacious, the other bedchambers comfortably large, and each room had the supreme luxury of its own fireplace. In the attics above were additional servants’ rooms.
Conn stood in the center of their bedchamber which had a thick Turkey carpet upon its wide board floors. The fireplace was lit with a good fire, and the air was sweet with the fragrance of potpourri. “This is a fine house, Aidan,” he said quietly. “More than a house it is a home. We can be very happy here, my wife.”
“It has always been a happy house, Conn,” she answered him. “It is not a grand place, but it is a good house for a family.”
“A
family
?” he gently teased her. “And how, madame, do ye intend to manage that?”
Aidan blushed. “We have been wed only five days, sir,” she protested. “Ye promised me that ye would be patient.”
“And so I shall, Aidan, but until we come together as man and wife there will be no children. We are wed, and there can be no changing that. The longer ye demur, the harder it will be to give yerself to me.” He put his arm about her. “Come, lass, we like each other, and that is a good start, better than many have.”
She shook him off. “Must ye have every woman ye meet fall into yer bed immediately, sir? I may lack experience in matters between men and women, but I will not behave like all those highborn drabs who have warmed your backside these two years past!”
Conn burst out laughing. “Is that what is bothering ye, Aidan, my fiery wife? Ye would not have me lump ye in with all those delicious ladies who were so kind to a young Irishman, far from his home? Sweetheart, yer my wife! There is a difference between a wife, and a mistress.”
“What difference?” Her voice was filled with suspicion. He was making her feel silly, and she didn’t like it.
“A wife is not like other women.”
“Oh?”
She folded her arms across her chest, one foot tapping, and pierced him with a fierce gaze.
Suddenly Conn was most uncomfortable. Aidan’s look bore into him, and he began to stutter and stumble over his words. “A wife . . . a w-w-wife is t-to be . . . respected! Cherished!” he finished triumphantly.
“And a mistress is not? The poor woman gives ye her good reputation, and is scorned for it? That is unfair!”
“Aidan, God’s foot! That’s not what I meant!”
“Then what did ye mean? I am eager to understand, Conn! When ye have sorted it all out I hope that ye will tell me!” Then with a swish of her skirts she departed the room leaving him standing openmouthed.
How the hell had she done it? One minute he was trying to ease her into normal marital relations, and the next she was confusing him totally by demanding to know what made her different from other women. Suddenly Conn laughed, for he realized that the joke was on him. She was a damnably clever wench! It was going to take a great deal to outsmart her. Following her back downstairs to the Great Hall he saw her giving Beal orders for their supper.
Then suddenly upon the door came a great knocking, and Beal hurried to answer the pounding. Aidan was close behind him, for she was curious as to who was out in such a snowstorm with night upon them. Beal opened the heavy oaken door, and in with a gust of wind and snowflakes two caped figures came. One was a tall man, taller than Conn, with an elegantly barbered black beard, and deep blue eyes. His companion threw back the furred-edge hood of her cloak, and Aidan found herself face to face with the most beautiful woman she had ever seen. The face was a perfect heart, the eyes a wonderful blue-green, the hair a mass of dark curls. She knew at once that this was Conn’s sister, and her heart sank. How could she expect to compete with such a woman?
“Skye!” Conn dashed forward, and embraced his elder sister. “How the hell . . . I mean, what brings ye out on such a night?”
“What brings me out?”
The voice was musical. “Robin comes home unexpectedly, and tells me that ye’ve been banned from court, and are at
Pearroc Royal,
less than a mile away across the fields, and then laughs uproariously saying ye’ve a surprise for me. What have ye done, ye young scrapegrace? I thought ye had that Tudor bitch wrapped about yer little finger! Why are ye banned? For how long? Why are ye here?”
While she pummeled him with her barrage of questions, her companion turned to Aidan.
“I am Adam de Marisco,” he said quietly.
“I am Aidan St. Michael,” she answered him.
“The young heiress? Of course! We came to call after yer father had passed on, but yer servants told ye were gone to court.”
“It was my father’s wish that the queen find me a husband, my lord.”
“A husband?” Then suddenly Adam’s eyes began to twinkle, and looking to Conn he then looked questioningly at Aidan.
“Yes, my lord,” she confirmed, and when her mouth turned up into an impish smile he saw how pretty she actually was, and he began to laugh.
Diverted, Skye turned from her brother. “What is so amusing, Adam?” she demanded.
“Will ye tell her, Conn, or shall I?” chuckled Adam.
“I am married, Skye.” Conn took Aidan’s hand, and drew her into his sister’s line of vision. “This is my wife, Aidan St. Michael. Aidan, my sister, Lady de Marisco.”
“Bess banned ye for marrying! Of course! ’Tis just like her, dried-up old maid she is!”
“No, no!” Conn began to laugh. His sister and the queen had always been at loggerheads. “I was brought kicking and protesting all the way to the altar, my dear sister.”
“What?”
Skye looked somewhat surprised, and then her eyes narrowed, and she hit her brother a hard blow upon the arm. “Did ye seduce this poor lass?” she demanded, outraged.
“Nay, madame,” said Aidan beginning to see the humor of the whole affair, and the only one able to explain, as both Conn and Adam were doubled over with mirth.
“Nay?” said Skye. “Then why are ye married if he did not seduce ye, or ye did not elope?”
“Conn is, I am afraid, rather high-spirited,” Aidan said with great understatement. “If he could learn to confine himself to one lady at a time, but alas for him, he could not. He was caught in a rather delicate situation with an ambassador’s wife, and then while the entire court was laughing about that, it came to light that yer brother, my husband, had been involved not only with Lady Glytha Holden,
but
her two comely daughters, Grace and Faith, as well! The queen had no choice with not only the ambassador crying for Conn’s head, but Lord Holden as well, than to send Conn from court in disgrace.”
“With an heiress for a wife?” said Skye. “Ye have yet to tell me how that all came about.”
“Come into the hall,” said Aidan graciously. “I am a bad hostess to keep ye both here in the corridor. Beal, fetch some mulled wine. Lord and Lady de Marisco must be chilled to the bone.”
“Conn, ye young devil,” said Adam de Marisco, “yer a lucky man! She’s a bonnie lass!”
His compliment warmed Aidan, and gave her the courage she needed to continue on with this beautiful and commanding woman who was her sister-in-law. Settling her guests before the blazing fire she continued. “Marrying Conn was actually Lord Burghley’s idea. He felt a good wife would settle Conn so that when he came back to court he would not cause any more scandals. I was a royal ward and as my estates are near to yers both the queen and Lord Burghley thought a marriage between yer brother and myself the ideal arrangement.”
“I do not like arranged marriages,” said Lady de Marisco. “I have had six husbands, and of the six, two were arranged marriages. They were appalling mismatches. I detested both men, and neither were kind to me.”