Beside her Eustace bit his lip in equal indecision. He clung to his hatred of Rannulf, because Rannulf had shamed him and because he wanted to believe Rannulf a traitor. Still, it was a dreadful thing to see a man like Rannulf of Sleaford die at the hands of a cur like Osborn.
Catherine alone thought only of one man on the torn grass of the field. She prayed for her husband and feared for him because she loved him, but she was filled also with a bitter resentment because she was sure he did not love her.
How strange, she thought, her eyes resting on the panting men, that she could not love her first man who had deeply adored her. Now that she had a man whom she considered worthy of her love, he did not care for her. It was a judgment upon her for her dissatisfaction and selfishness, but if he came alive out of this she would show him that she, too, could be indifferent. The bloodstained warriors moved toward each other, and Catherine resolutely closed her eyes and began to pray. "
Ave Maria, Gratia plena, Dominus tecum. . . .
"
Less blindly angry now, Rannulf had considered his position carefully while he caught his breath. There was no point in deceiving himself; he was not strong enough to rush Osborn and bear him down. The man was his equal in strength and was fresher, but it was also plain that Osborn was not his equal in experience.
For the next half hour Rannulf waged a strictly defensive battle, making no effort to hide his weariness, but allowing Osborn to exhaust himself in fruitless attempts to cut through his guard. He was losing blood, but not much and, although weaker, felt with satisfaction when Sir Herbert again withdrew to breathe, that he could have continued to fight longer without danger.
A swift glance at the sun gave him more cause for satisfaction. It was too late now to start the melee; he would have the night to rest before he needed to exert himself again. Now when the lying cur attacked, he would take him.
Osborn, puzzled, furious, and a little frightened, stared at his drooping adversary. It seemed impossible from moment to moment that Sir Rannulf could parry another stroke. His shield hung lower and lower; his sword moved more and more slowly. Yet, each stroke
was
parried, and Osborn felt as if his head and chest would burst with the effort he was making. This must end it, he told himself; the man can barely stand upright. I need only try once more and the more swiftly the better. He drew one more deep, slightly shuddering breath, and charged.
Slowly Rannulf backed away. One mighty downward blow he took on his raised shield. The sword rebounded, was turned swiftly in Osborn's hand and brought round in a slashing sideswipe. Rannulf countered with his sword, retreating again. Another blow and another were caught and fended off, but those blows were weaker.
The gray eyes on either side of the shining nosepiece grew keener and more calculating; they were nowise glazed nor did they waver, Sir Herbert saw with a sudden choking sensation of panic. His strokes became wilder and, when Rannulf's hard lips parted in a merciless smile, he began to sob.
Once more Sir Herbert raised his sword above his head, but this time Rannulf did not content himself with guarding against the blow. This time he leapt forward, using his favorite thrust of the shield, trusting to being too close to his opponent for Osborn's stroke to touch him. At the same time he swung hard and low with his own sword. He felt metal bite metal and then cleave something softer; he heard Osborn's scream as the tendons of his thighs were cut and saw him topple.
Catherine heard the cry. Her eyes sprang open. She nearly screamed herself before she recognized the arms of Soke on the shield and on the surcoat she herself had made for Rannulf. Terror washed over her again when she saw how much the cloth was bloodied, but as Rannulf easily lifted his sword and she realized he was not badly hurt, Catherine suffered another revulsion of feeling.
Doubtless he had been enjoying himself while she had been near fainting with fear for him. Well, she could not help loving him, but he would never know it. If it killed her, she would not again display the love for which Rannulf had only contempt.
The battle was over. To strike the sword from Osborn's hand was the work of a moment, and in that moment Rannulf decided to pardon the slander upon himself and redeem his promise to Catherine by permitting Sir Herbert to live. There was no particular point in killing the man, if he was willing to admit that he had lied both about Catherine and the drugging. In all likelihood he would never fight again—cut tendons did not heal well and, in any case, Osborn's lands would be forfeit. Rannulf set his point at Sir Herbert's throat; preparatory to telling him to yield and confess his falsehood.
"Do not slay me, my lord," Sir Herbert sobbed. "I will confess all. It was the prince, Eustace, who set me to this deed. I did complain that I had offered for Lady Catherine and, though I thought she favored me, her father would give me no answer. It was Eustace who bid me write that letter, and he who took the seal of Soke from the king's strongbox to seal it. I will tell the world, if you desire, that he—"
With a face as yellow as parchment, Rannulf drove home the blade, right through the mail, cutting the jugular. It took a frantic effort, and he laid the whole weight of his body behind the thrust to still the voice before the heralds could reach them and hear. The bright mail turned red; the bright blade turned red; the green grass turned red. Only the future was black as Rannulf of Sleaford denied mercy to a fallen opponent in loyalty to his king.
CHAPTER 6
Mary, Rannulf's bastard daughter, sighed with relief as she took her seat and raised her spindle. She liked to spin. It was very pleasant to twist the soft fleece between one's fingers and feel the twist as the spindle dropped. It put all sorts of strange thoughts in one's head. Strange, pleasant thoughts, far removed from washing and fulling clothes, cleaning and airing beds and bed-furnishings, and endlessly polishing silver and gold plate.
Spinning still, Mary looked out through the open window over the fields of Sleaford, which were fresh and green with the burgeoning life of May. It was two years exactly, no, there was an extra three weeks, since Lady Catherine, countess of Soke, had come to be mistress of the forbidding keep at Sleaford. Now the spindle slowed as Mary looked around her at the women's quarters. She had grown used to them of late and hardly noticed, but they were nothing like what they had been in Lady Adelecia's time—nor in any other time, for that matter.
The entire keep had changed in the past two years, but one noticed it less than the change in the women's quarters because these, the least important, were the last to receive Catherine's attention.
Casting her mind back, Mary remembered Lady Catherine's cry of consternation when she first entered her new home, remembered how she had stood, clinging to Richard as if the child alone kept her from running away. Mary remembered herself too as she was then and laughed. There had been a change in herself as great as the change in Sleaford. Then she had been a half-wild child of thirteen, snatching crusts of bread off the tables between the men-at-arms.
She raised a hand to stroke the smooth braid that lay on her shoulder and jumped a trifle as she realized she had made a fault in her spinning. The spindle was lifted, the fault corrected, and the spinning began again. It was a great pleasure to have smooth clean hair instead of ragged and louse-infested tresses and a pretty, if plain, gown instead of filthy rags.
Only one thing had not changed at Sleaford—its master. Mary frowned and the spindle turned faster. She had developed a fanatical devotion to Lady Catherine who, like an angel of heaven, had made all these changes and given her every blessing she enjoyed.
It was the master who made Lady Catherine so sad. Every time he came home, which, praise God and the blessed saints, was not often, her ladyship drooped anew. She was never very lively, but Mary guessed that it was oppression of spirit that made her so subdued. When the effect of the master's infrequent visits had worn off, Lady Catherine could show flashes of great merriment if she were playing with Richard or herself.
The spindle turned faster and the fleece flew through the nimble fingers. He was coming home again. That was why all the bedding was to be cleaned and aired and all the silver polished. That too, no doubt, was why Mary heard Lady Catherine weeping in the night, and why she sat so silent over her embroidery.
Catherine's mind too was on the past on this bright May morning, but she was not considering what had changed, only what had remained the same. In two long years she had come no closer to her husband's heart. If anything, they were more strangers to each other than they had been when they were first married.
Despairingly, Catherine wondered why every effort she made to attach Rannulf only seemed to drive him further away. To the best of her ability she had patterned her behavior on what she believed he desired. She cared for his children with great tenderness; she made his home comfortable; to him she maintained a manner courteous and respectful without any hint of affection.
Perhaps, she thought, bending the bright silk over and under to form the central knot of the flower she was embroidering into the neckline of Richard's tunic; she had not been careful enough. Perhaps her love had shown through from time to time and that was what disgusted him and drove him away.
The movement of her needle was suspended for a moment while she fought back the tears that were obscuring her vision. She had tried so hard, even denying herself the pleasure of responding to his lovemaking, keeping herself cold and still when she desired nothing more than to render passion for passion. It was so hard not to betray oneself. How often she had stifled a sigh of pleasure or turned her face from his kisses to conceal her joy.
It was indifference he wanted, was it not? The ever-recurring hope that she had misread him caused a faint color to bloom in her pale face, but the pink did not live long in her cheeks. There was always that rejection of her tenderness before the tourney to remember. Also, for a time after that, while she had still been furious with him and shown it by her coldness, Rannulf had seemed satisfied with her, even pleasant in his hard way.
When she had been ready to forgive his rudeness and willing to smile on him, however, he had turned cold again. Then there was that night when her sadness had made her take a cup too much of wine, and she had … Deliberately Catherine put that thought aside, but it was after that night that Rannulf had left Sleaford, and he had been away for months.
Catherine's hand lay still on the embroidery frame as the slow tears trickled down. He had come so seldom to her bed after that—so seldom—and for almost a year now, not at all.
Lady Warwick touched her horse with her heel and left her husband to ride beside Lord Soke. "I hope your wife expects us, my lord."
"Yes," Rannulf replied dully.
He is aging fast like my own husband, Lady Warwick thought. How his face has fallen in! It is well that I should speak with the countess of Soke at this time. She may be a widow again before she thinks to be, and it will be well that her mind be given a proper direction.
"Surely the news is ill," she continued in an effort to bring some life into her companion, "but it is no more than was rumored beforehand. Is there some reason I do not know of for your being so cast down?"
"Am I cast down? Nay, there is nothing the whole world does not know of. Henry is now duke of Normandy, count of Anjou, and having snatched the divorced wife of the king of France, will soon be count of Aquitaine and Poitou also. God, it seems, is never tired of showering good on that young man."
"He is a most capable young man, from all I have heard."
"Capable of making a bitch howl in bed," Rannulf growled with such bitterness that Lady Warwick was startled. "What is he capable of? Geoffrey the Fair—he was a good man, it is true—won Normandy for him. Having done so much, he did more. He took a fever and died, giving his son Anjou and Maine also. Now a woman hot with lust is about to give him Aquitaine and Poitou."
"Nay, Lord Soke, there must be more to him than that. Hereford says—"
"Hereford! Hereford! He has dinned in my ears also till I am almost deaf with his talk. I believed him once an honest man. I believe so no longer. First he is a king's man, then—"
"You shall not missay him. He was never a king's man, never gave oath or did homage."
Rannulf bit his lip, conscious that his personal unhappiness was making him unjust. It was true that Hereford had made a truce with the king, but he had done no more than that ever. He had never said he would forswear his rebel sympathies or his loyalty to Henry. The truth of the matter was that Rannulf envied that bright and beautiful young man the close understanding he had with his wife.
"One good thing, at least, has come of this," Lady Warwick continued. "Even you must admit that it will benefit everyone that Eustace should go to France."
Again Rannulf made no reply. What she said was incontrovertible, for Eustace had grown worse and worse so that all men looked at him askance. Maud was being racked apart between her conflicting loves, and even Stephen, blindly fond, agreed that Eustace needed action. Still Rannulf would speak no word against the prince, not though Sir Herbert's death, useless as it was in retrospect, had precipitated his marital misery.
Catherine would never forgive him, he thought, staring between his horse's ears, deaf to Lady Warwick's voice. He had almost believed her when she swore she cared nothing for Osborn, but after he had killed the cur, she turned to ice. He had given her the tourney prize, hard-won, for he was sore all over with his wounds, and she had thanked him as if for an insult. The only time since then that she had offered him the slightest response of any kind was when she was lightheaded with drink.
Unbearable. It was unbearable the way she endured his caress, cold and stiff. It was unbearable the way she turned her head to avoid his lips, her teeth gritted together. Better far to let her be, even though he ached so with desire for her that his stomach fluttered in her presence and he could not eat, even though no other woman could truly give him ease.