Authors: Jane Feather
Pippa wondered about Luisa's sleeping arrangement and then decided that Lionel would have taken care of it, as he took care of everything. She climbed the ladder and entered a small chamber under the eaves. There was a straw mattress on the floor and Lionel piled the quilts upon it.
He helped her with her clothes and Pippa waited for the surge of hungry passion that had accompanied their every move in the last three days, but it didn't come, and she could feel in his hands that he too was without desire tonight. It would have been a comfort to make love on this their last night, and until this moment she couldn't have imagined being this close to him without craving his touch.
They lay down beneath the quilts, listening to the soft murmur of voices in the room below. And then there was silence and the gleam of light that had shone upwards through the uneven floorboards of the attic chamber was extinguished.
“So you are going tomorrow?” Pippa, tense now and no longer heavy with sleep, spoke into the darkness.
“I must. But I will come back.”
“When?”
“I don't know. I will try to be back before the child is born.”
Could she bear it? Bear to spend the rest of her life waiting? Waiting for Lionel to come back with the smell of the outside world on him, with his mind charged and brimming with the large matters that had always informed her own world, while she lived a shrunken existence with her fatherless child?
“Perhaps it would be best if you did not come back,” she said, her voice dull in the darkness. The words came from the dark emptiness of her soul that had come upon her as soon as they had sighted the coast of France. She had not formed the thought then, but now she knew it was the only right thing to say. She could not put that burden upon him.
There was a long silence, then he sat up. “I don't understand. Why would you say such a thing, Pippa?”
“Because eventually you will not want to. You will grow tired of coming back to a woman who has not moved, not changed, not really lived in your absence.”
She stared dry-eyed into the darkness. “I would not hold you to blame, but there will come a time when I will wait for you in vain.”
And he thought that perhaps she was right. But if he did not come back to her it would not be of his own volition. He said briskly, “There will come a time when you will be able to leave this place, return to your own world.” He looked down at her, trying to make out her expression in the darkness.
She laughed, a dry humorless rasp. “Can you promise me that, Lionel?”
And he said what he had said once to Luisa. “No, I cannot promise you. I do not deal in promises, only possibilities.”
“Yes,” she agreed. “As I thought.” She turned on her side away from him and lay staring at the wall as he slid back under the quilts beside her. He put his hand on her hip and she let it rest there.
Lionel told himself that she was tired and naturally dispirited, that her comment revealed not lack of faith in him but a dismal view of the future that the bright morning would dispel. And yet, as he thought of how much had been taken from her, her life as she knew forever lost to her, her faith in herself, in her own worth, battered by betrayals, he could understand that she might now think she should face what lay ahead alone. Yet he felt that her faith in him had slipped and it hurt and angered him to lie beside her, knowing she was wakeful and unhappy, and refusing to turn to him for the simple comfort of his arms.
Pippa slept finally and awoke at dawn to find herself alone under the quilts. Voices rose from below with the clatter of crockery and the smells of cooking. Her nose twitched at the rich and wonderful aroma of baking bread.
She scrambled out from under the mountain of quilts and found a jug of hot water and a crisp linen towel on the floor beside the straw bed.
“Pippa?” Luisa's voice came from the ladder and her head appeared in the hole in the floor. “Oh, you are awake. Don Ashton sent me to see.” She brought the rest of herself into the attic. “Everyone's very busy. I think they're preparing for some feast or something, but I can't understand a word anyone says. Even Robin's only speaking French.”
Pippa remembered that there was to be a wedding today. Her own griefs must be put aside in her happiness for Robin and Luisa. It seemed that Robin had not yet shared the happy news with his bride-to-be. In Luisa's shoes, she would be somewhat annoyed, Pippa decided, but it was not for her to propose for her brother, so she only smiled and said cheerfully, “Let me get dressed and then I'll find out what's going on.”
She washed and dressed in the same simple gown that Lionel had provided on
Sea Dream.
She would have to get some new clothes from somewhere. But she had no money. She had brought nothing with her, no jewels, no coin. She had quite literally gone into penniless exile. She wasn't sure that Robin had much in the way of money with him. But he would be able to supply her at some point. And Pen, too, of course. But she couldn't contact Pen until it was safe. And when would it be safe?
No, today she was not going to think of herself. Luisa too had only the gown she stood up in and it was much the worse for wear. Something had to be contrived.
Invigorated by this need, Pippa climbed down to the main room. A shaft of morning sun fell through the open door onto the newly swept floor. The long table was piled with wonderfully painted earthenware crockery and at one end Berthe was rolling pastry.
She greeted Pippa and Luisa with a friendly nod. “If you wish to break your fast, there is bread and quince jelly outside.”
Pippa thanked her and they went outside where the promised meal was set out on a small table in the sun. There was no sign of either Robin or Lionel, but Gilles was sitting on an upturned log mending a fishing net. He too offered a silent but nevertheless friendly nod.
They would need flowers, Pippa thought as she spread jelly on the warm bread. You couldn't have a bride without a bouquet. There were wild flowers aplenty, so that was easy, but Luisa's gown was a different matter.
She left Luisa with her breakfast and returned to the cottage to consult Berthe.
Luisa was licking jam off her fingers when Robin and Lionel strolled into view from around the corner of the church. They saw her and Lionel said something to Robin, then came on ahead. He kissed the top of Luisa's head as he passed on his way into the house, leaving her openmouthed in surprise at his unprecedented carelessly affectionate gesture.
“Robin, is something happening?”
“Why, yes,” he said, with a beam so broad it nearly split his face in two. His eyes danced with joy. “Why, yes. We are to be married this morning.”
Luisa just stared at him. “Married?” she said at last.
“Why, yes.” He looked at her in mock innocence. “You knew surely that we would be married as soon as we reached France.”
“Yes . . . yes . . . but not so suddenly. Not just like this.” She glanced down at her well-worn gown. “Without warning. You can't just surprise someone with a wedding, Robin.”
Robin looked crestfallen. “You can't? I thought you would like it.”
“Oh, men,” Luisa exclaimed. “Of course I wish to be married, but there have to be preparations.”
“Ah, has he told you at last?” Pippa's amused voice came from the cottage doorway. “I was beginning to think I would have to tell you myself.”
She came over to them. “I have been talking with Berthe and she has the most beautiful muslin gown which she would like you to wear. I think 'tis possible it was her own wedding gown but she is not a great one for conversation. Come and look at it.”
Luisa looked at the bewildered and still crestfallen Robin. Then suddenly she laughed. “Oh, you are the most absurd creature, but I do so love you, and, yes, I will marry you even though you haven't asked me properly.”
She flung her arms around him and he hugged her tightly with a sigh of relief, wondering whether he would ever understand her sex.
They were married in the little church that followed Breton custom with its curious roof of rafters shaped to form the ribs of a fishing boat. The wooden pews were filled with villagers, who seemed to regard the four foreigners at the altar with an almost proprietorial air.
Luisa carried a bunch of wild poppies and golden celandine, and Pippa was filled with sisterly pride in her beauty, so darkly exotic with her black hair and deep blue eyes, and yet so delightfully innocent in Berthe's simple white muslin gown embroidered with tiny knots of flowers.
Lionel pronounced the words that gave Luisa to her bridegroom then stepped back to stand beside Pippa. They had barely exchanged a word in the morning's bustle; she had been far too occupied with preparing the bride to engage in any kind of sustained conversation. Now he stood close enough for their bodies to touch at shoulder and hip, but after a minute she took a step away, unable to bear the proximity as Robin and Luisa exchanged their vows.
Her marriage to Stuart had been a lavish affair in Southwark Cathedral, attended by the new queen and the Lady Elizabeth. The wedding breakfast had lasted for two days. Pippa had floated above it all enjoying the party as she always did in those carefree days. But she could remember very little of her real feelings about her marriage. She had not been in love with Stuart. And now she wondered why she had then thought that didn't matter. She had spoken these very same words that Luisa and Robin were murmuring with such passionate sincerity, to a man she merely liked, taking on the responsibility of a commitment that was terrifying in its immensity. And she had thought nothing of it.
She loved the man beside her with every fiber of her being but they could never belong to each other in the way that Robin and Luisa now belonged to each other. They could love each other, they could make love to each other, but they could never make these vows to each other. The vows she had once spoken without thought for their meaning.
Lionel looked down at her, at her bent head and the slight droop of her shoulders. He was filled with a fierce tenderness, and an overwhelming sense of possession. He did not want to leave her but he had no choice for now. He knew that Pippa was contrasting her own future with the happiness that lay in store for her brother and his wife.
He was aware of a frustration he had once felt before with her. She had deliberately fractured the glory of their reconciliation, and he didn't know why in the name of God's good grace she had pushed him from her, accusing him of a breach of faith that she had quite simply and quite wrongly decided would happen.
He had not wanted to spoil the joy of their time of rediscovery on
Sea Dream
with the reminder of their inevitable parting, but he had not thought then, not even for a minute, that she would decide that parting had to be permanent.
He would not accept it, and he could not bear to see her so unhappy.
He took her arm above the elbow and walked her out of the church amid the disapproving looks of the congregation as the priest intoned the words of the mass.
Pippa was both surprised and annoyed by her sudden removal from the ceremony. “What's the matter?” she demanded when they stood once more in the sunshine in the deserted village.
“I think you're going to have to tell me,” Lionel stated. “You throw a baseless accusation in my face. What have I ever done that you would imagine I would break faith with you, now or at some as yet unknown time? I don't think you understand that you belong to me.”
“How can I?” Pippa cried softly. “We can never make the commitment those two have made to each other.”
“I have already made that commitment to you,” he said, his voice quiet and level. “Can you not make it to me?”
The autumn sun was surprisingly warm on the top of her bare head. She crossed her arms over her breast and stared out towards the green line of the sea. “I would not hold you to it.”
“Forgive me, but you have no say in the matter,” he responded, resisting the urge to shake some life into her. “And you did not answer my question.”
He caught her chin and turned her face towards him. “Answer me, Pippa. Can you not make that commitment to me?”
“What kind of life could we lead?” she said, meeting his eye.
“Will you answer the question?” His fingers tightened on her jaw and his eyes contained both anger and the fear that he might not win this.
“I love you,” she said. “I would commit myself and my life to you. But—”
“There are no buts.” He caught her face with both hands and kissed her. It was a kiss of possession, but also of passion that expressed his anger and his hurt. He felt her relax, her lips part beneath his, and he moved his hands from her face to her back, holding her against him with all the strength he possessed as if only thus could he ensure she would not run from him.
When finally he released her, she looked up at him, her lips swollen, her cheeks flushed. “I did not mean to hurt you,” she said. “But I thought I was being realistic. I must be strong for this child, I cannot be if I am weakened by my longing and my fear for you.”
“I will never leave you. Understand this, Pippa. Even when I am not with you, I will live in your mind, in your heart. You will hear my voice as you go to sleep each night and when you awake in the morning, just as I shall hear yours. This I promise you.”
“For a man who does not easily make promises, that is a most powerful one,” she said, her eyes blurred with tears.
“I only make the ones I can keep.” He took her face once more and gazed intently down at her. “Will you make me the same promise?”
“Yes,” she said. “'Tis one I too can keep.”
“And you will stay here and grow fat and contented and when your time comes Berthe will deliver your child. She is an experienced midwife. And I will promise you that I will move heaven and earth to be with you then.”
She smiled. “And now you must go.”
“Aye, now I must go. But I leave my self behind.”
Later as the evening shadows fell long over the feasting guests, she walked to the clifftop with him. He would not let her come down the cliff path to the beach, so she stood like so many women of this land, watching from the cliff as her man took his tiny boat out through the reef and onto the wild green sea.