Aline knew masculine interest when she saw
it. She had grown practiced at deflecting it. She did not want that
kind of complication in her life. Not ever again. Yet, in the
ordinary features and clear grey eyes of this stranger, she saw
something that tugged at her heart. She longed to ask him if he
could explain why she found herself so far removed from her own
time and place. But she did not. She didn’t have the chance, for
while she and Adam of Shotley stood by the fireplace gazing at each
other, a young woman came into the hall.
“My lord.” The woman hurried forward to kiss
Adam on the cheek he presented to her. “Welcome home.” She did not
sound as though she meant the greeting.
“You should have been here when we arrived,”
Adam told her, rather too sternly in Aline’s opinion.
“I did not know you were bringing a guest.
You sent no word. I have not prepared a room. Oh, dear.” The young
woman fell silent, tears filling eyes already rimmed with red. She
was a pale, thin girl, and she looked frightened. She bowed a head
covered with a white linen coif, while her hands fumbled in the
folds of her grey woolen skirt. “Forgive me, my lord.”
“This,” Adam said to Aline, “is my
daughter-in-law, Lady Constance. Now, my dear girl, do stop your
eternal worrying and have one of the guest rooms made ready. I feel
certain you have been keeping the castle clean and the rooms aired
as you ought to do, so there will be no great trouble needed to
make Lady Aline comfortable. I assume you have ordered an adequate
meal prepared for me and my men on our return, so you need only set
an extra place at the high table. Now, I will want a bath in my
chamber.”
“Oh, dear.” Constance looked so terrified by
this stream of instructions that Aline took pity on her.
“There was no way you could have been
prepared for my sudden appearance here,” she said. “Lady Constance,
let me help you. I can make up a bed. Just give me the sheets and
I’ll do it myself.”
“I could not. It would not be fitting. Oh, my
lord, I am sorry. Blaise will be angry with me, too. Oh, dear.”
Constance stood helplessly, twisting her hands into her skirt and
looking as if she did not know where to start her chores.
“And what do you imagine Blaise will be angry
about now?” said a bold masculine voice. “I vow, Constance, you
have compiled a total of at least a thousand reasons to fear me,
and not one of them matters a whit.”
The young man who now joined them was tall,
dark-haired, blue-eyed, and remarkably handsome. He shook his head
in Constance’s direction, the gesture causing that lady to press
her lips together as if to forestall a serious bout of tears. Then
he looked at Aline – looked from head to toe and moved on with an
expression that told her she was much too old to interest him.
Aline received this assessment with good humor and no offense at
all, for she had instantly seen in him the same male attitude that
had once made her unhappy in the days when she had been
married.
“Welcome home, my lord.” With a slight
swagger the younger man went to Adam and embraced him warmly. At
least he had an honest affection for his father, for this could
only be the husband of timid Constance.
“My son, Blaise,” Adam said, confirming
Aline’s supposition.
“Well, wife,” Blaise said to Constance, “why
are you standing there like a half-wit when there is work to be
done?”
“Lady Constance, I do hope we can be
friends.” Aline linked her arm through the girl’s, drawing her away
from the fireplace. “Let us leave the men to their conversation
while we speak of more interesting matters. Will you show me to the
guest room you think will be best for me? Then perhaps I can help
you with your duties, for I am certain the sudden appearance of an
unexpected guest must upset your routine.” As the two women moved
toward the archway and the entry hall, Aline overheard Adam
speaking to his son.
“I wish you would treat her more courteously,
especially in front of strangers,” Adam said. “How can you expect
to be happy if your wife is miserable?”
“I do not expect ever to be happy with her,”
Blaise responded. “The girl is a bore, always weeping and afraid of
everything.”
Aline and Constance were by now out of the
great hall and could hear no more. Aline was certain that Constance
had also overheard her husband’s contemptuous words and had been
embarrassed by them for, as they mounted the stone staircase that
wound toward the upper floors of the tower keep, she could hear
Constance sniffling. By the time they reached a tiny guest room
build into the thickness of the stone tower wall, Constance was
weeping in earnest.
“Let me have that.” Concerned that Constance
would drop the oil lamp she was carrying and thus start a fire,
Aline took the pottery dish from her and set it upon a wooden
stool. The only other furniture in the room consisted of a narrow
bed and a wooden chest that Aline guessed would hold linens or
clothing. “Well, it’s sure not the Ritz in Paris, but it will have
to do.”
“Have you been to Paris?” The question was so
unexpected that Aline answered without considering the effect her
words might have.
“I went there twice, with Gramps. We tramped
through every museum in town and spent a whole day at the Louvre.”
Seeing the way Constance was staring at her, she muttered, “Whoops,
another mistake. I don’t think the Louvre I remember has been built
yet. It may still be just a small fort on the Seine.”
“Have you traveled even farther than Paris?”
asked Constance, forgetting to weep for a moment. “How I should
like to travel.”
This second unexpected remark left Aline
gaping at her. When she found her voice again, Aline said, “Does
Adam hold lands in Normandy as well as here at Shotley? I seem to
recall that Norman barons frequently had estates on both sides of
the Channel. Perhaps Blaise will take you to Normandy.”
“I should like to see the Holy Land, but
Blaise will not take me anywhere.” The brief glow of animation
faded from Constance’s face, leaving it pinched with sadness. “My
husband does not like me.” She looked so dispirited that Aline
forgot her own difficult situation and put an arm around her.
“I assume yours was an arranged marriage?”
She could not imagine the vibrantly masculine Blaise voluntarily
wedding this fearful girl.
“I brought a fine dowry to him,” Constance
said with a tiny flare of pride. “When I first met him on our
wedding day I thought I had been greatly blessed because Blaise is
so handsome and at first he was polite to me. But when the
celebrations were over and we were alone in our chamber, he changed
most unexpectedly. Then he was cruel to me.”
“Had no one told you what to expect on your
wedding night?” It was a guess, but Aline thought it was probably
an accurate one.
“My mother is dead, so I could not ask her.
My maidservant said I would find pleasure in my husband’s arms,”
Constance replied. “I had some idea of what he would do to me. It
is impossible to grow up in a castle unaware of such things. But
Blaise is so overpowering, so energetic, so impetuous, and he is
very big. He wounded me most painfully until I bled all over the
sheets.”
“I get the picture, Constance. You don’t have
to say anything more.”
Great
, Aline thought,
just great.
Not only do I suddenly find myself in the wrong century, but now
I’m expected to be a sex counselor to a terrified teenaged
bride
.
“I am so sorry to trouble you with my
problem,” Constance went on, wiping her streaming eyes, “but there
is no one at Shotley to whom I can talk If I tell my servants about
my unhappiness, they will only gossip and I feel certain Blaise
would not want that.”
“I think you are right there,” Aline
murmured.
“Nor can I confess to our castle priest.
Father John is an old man and would not understand. He would very
likely tell me that a good woman submits to her husband. But how
can I submit to Blaise when I fear his touch?”
“In spite of your fear, I think you love him.
If you were indifferent to him, he wouldn’t affect you this way.”
It was another guess, with the truth of it borne out by Constance’s
nod and a new flood of helpless tears.
Aline could understand the situation. A
weepy, timid soul like Constance must be exasperating to a man of
Blaise’s temperament. Any regard he might have had for her, any
sense of polite respect because of the dowry she brought him, would
have quickly evaporated when Blaise realized he had a bride who
cringed every time he walked into their bedroom. A man like Blaise
needed a woman who was willing to risk direct confrontation when he
became too overbearing. She could easily imagine Constance
dissolving into tears instead of defending herself. All of this
Aline understood because she had once been almost as shy as
Constance and had married a handsome man much like Blaise.
At the moment Constance had wiped away her
tears and was looking at Aline as if she expected some wise advice
that would instantly solve all her marital problems. Realizing that
she could not avoid saying something, Aline began by asking what
she thought was an obvious question.
“Have you talked to Blaise about this?”
“No, no, I could not. He would not listen. He
would think I was criticizing him. A good wife does not criticize
her husband.”
“Oh, rubbish! If you don’t tell him how you
feel, how can he ever hope to please you?” Seeing that Constance
was about to start crying again, Aline grabbed her by the shoulders
and shook her. “Don’t be like one of those people who occasionally
sit beside me on airplanes and spend the entire flight spilling out
all their problems, but they don’t want to
do
anything to
help themselves, they just want someone new to complain to.”
Fortunately for Aline, Constance ignored the part of her speech
about airplanes and fastened upon the words that most applied to
herself.
“You are the first person I have ever
complained to!”
She sounded so forlorn that Aline immediately
regretted her outburst. “Connie, I’m sorry. May I call you Connie?
Look, I’ve had a terrible day. If I told you just how terrible,
you’d never believe me. The only advice I can give you is to stand
up for yourself with Blaise. Do it politely but firmly. And, for
heaven’s sake, don’t cry. A woman’s tears always make a man feel
guilty, and guilt makes a man angry. Trust me, it never fails.
Don’t – I repeat,
do not
– cry in front of Blaise.”
Just listen to you, Aline, giving advice
to this poor girl when you have made such a mess of your own
romantic life
.
“I will try to do as you suggest,” Constance
whispered. She paused, swallowing hard. Aline was pleased to see
her straighten her thin shoulders. “I fear I am not a very good
hostess, Lady Aline. I shall send a servant with fresh linens and a
quilt for your bed. You will want a bath after your cold journey.
I’ll have hot water brought to you at once.”
“It’s a bit chilly in here for a bath,” Aline
said.
“You shall have a brazier for heat.”
Constance paused by the door. “Thank you for listening to me. My
heart is lighter now.”
“Remember what I said. Talk to Blaise. Tell
him how you feel. And stand up for yourself.”
“I will try.”
When the door closed behind Constance, Aline
sank onto the bed, her face in her hands. How she wished she could
unburden herself as Constance had done. But there was no one. All
she could do was sit on the edge of the straw mattress and try to
figure out what had happened to her. She remembered looking at the
Book of Hours…the painting of the Yule log…the snow outside the
library windows. She could think of no rational explanation for her
sudden presence in the twelfth century. She pinched her arm hard,
just to be sure she was awake, and then she tried to imagine what
Gramps would do in her place.
Rejoice. Celebrate. Enjoy
. She could
almost hear him saying the words. Gramps had always seized every
opportunity to enrich his own life and the lives of his
granddaughters. He had tried to teach them to do the same.
“All right, Gramps,” she said aloud. “I don’t
know if I will ever get home again, but while I’m here I am going
to participate in this life. If I get frightened, I’ll just pretend
I’m living out one of those stories you used to tell Luce and me.
After all, this is like one of your medieval tales come true.”
She went to the window to pull back the
wooden shutter and look out at Shotley. It had stopped snowing.
Through a jagged rent in the clouds she could see the night sky and
a few stars. To her left rose the outer wall of Shotley Castle,
with a heavily cloaked guard standing watch on the battlements.
Directly below her and to her right lay open fields, silent beneath
a smooth mantle of snow. Beyond the fields a forest extended as far
as she could see. The road upon which she had come to Shotley was
around the corner of the castle wall, out of sight to her left.
It was so quiet, so peaceful…a silent, holy
night. With one hand still on the shutter latch, Aline rested her
head against the stone window frame. There was no glass in the
window, but she wasn’t cold any more and she hadn’t felt so relaxed
in months. She heard the muffled voice of the guard on the wall
talking to someone, and then it was quiet again. Aline gradually
became aware of a sense of deep contentment.
“My lady?” A maidservant came into the room
carrying a bundle of linens. She was followed by two boys lugging a
wooden tub and a girl with a bucket of steaming water. Yet another
boy carried a black metal brazier, which he set up on a tripod
stand before dumping a basket of charcoal into the pan.
Then Constance was there, igniting the
charcoal with a piece of braided straw that had been dipped into
tallow and tossing juniper branches into the brazier to sweeten the
air. More buckets of water were brought in until the tub was full.
Constance scattered dried rose petals and herbs onto the surface of
the water.