Lady of Hay (35 page)

***

Giles, her second son, was born in April the following year, as the heavy scented air of Sussex drifted like balm through the open windows of Bramber Castle, bringing with it the slight tang of salt from the hazy channel, floating in from the saltings below, and, from the fields and Downs, the heady perfume of apple blossom and bluebells. As the child was laid, sleeping peacefully, in its crib, Jeanne slipped silently to the glowing hearthstone and there laid wine and water and fresh towels for the fairies. With their blessing the child would grow strong and lucky. Matilda felt a sudden shiver of fear. There had been no such magic for baby Will. Dimly she remembered as a bad dream from the past the vision she had had at her eldest son’s birth and she crossed herself, afraid for him. Then, even as she tried to recall the meaning of the vision, it blurred and slipped from her and she saw that Jeanne was watching her with strangely narrowed eyes. Matilda fought to look away but somehow she could not move. The memory grew dim and she saw only the reflection of the sunlight glinting on the ewer of water by the fire, and then again she slept.

***

In her bed at Abergavenny Jo stirred in her sleep as the dream faded. The moonlight touched her face with cold fingers and she flung her arm across her closed eyes and shivered before lying still again.

***

“I want you to listen to me carefully.” Sam sat down on the edge of the coffee table in front of Nick, his eyes on his brother’s face. “You trust me, don’t you?”

Imperceptibly Nick nodded.

“Good. And you know I would do nothing to harm you—and I think it would harm you, Nick, to take you back into the past too soon. First I must prepare you. I must warn you who you were in that life, long ago…” Sam paused, a flicker of grim humor straying across his face. “You were not Richard de Clare, Nick, and you have good reason to be jealous of him. He was your friend and your adviser. And he was your rival. You and he both loved Matilda de Braose. But Richard won her. It was to him that she turned. She despised you. She feared you and hated you. She was your enemy, Nick. Do you remember?” He paused, watching Nick’s face closely as his brother shifted uncomfortably in his seat, his face somber. His gaze had strayed from Sam toward the lamp once more, his eyes fixed on it, the pupils pin-size in the brilliant blue of the floodlit irises. Hanging down toward the carpet at his side, one of his hands twitched involuntarily as he clenched and unclenched his fist.

Sam smiled, wondering for a brief second if what he was saying had a grain of possibility behind it. Where had the violence in his brother come from? One day he would find out for sure, but not today. Today he was setting the scene.

“I think perhaps you do remember, Nick,” he went on quietly. “You were a prince when you first saw her. She was beautiful and tall and charming. A lady. And you were a snotty boy. Do you remember? You were born too late. She was the first woman you ever desired and she was already another man’s wife and the mother of his child, and you were too young still even to screw the serving wenches you caught in the dark corners of the palace. You made do then with pinching their breasts and thrusting your hand up their skirts, but later it was different. Later you could have any woman you wanted. And you took them. Peasant or lady. Willing or not. Your reputation has echoed down through the centuries. You took them all. All save Lady de Braose. Her scorn unmanned you. When she looked at you, you knew she still saw you as a sniveling child. And your love began to sour. You determined to bring her to her knees, do you remember, Nick? You told her husband to control her better, but he was weak.” His jaw tightened momentarily. “She needed William’s help and he failed her. When he should have whipped her and bridled her shrewish tongue, he let her speak. He let her walk into your trap, when he could have saved her.” He stopped, unable to go on for a moment, sweat standing out on his forehead as he watched Nick’s face. “You hated her by then, and you determined she would pay for her scorn with her life.”

He sat forward on the edge of the table, hooking his forefinger into the knot of his tie and pulling it loose while behind him the sky was losing its color, the sunset fading as the glare of streetlights took over outside the open window.

“And now, Nick,” he went on after a pause, “you and she have been born in another century and in another world, and this time you are not a child. This time she sees you as a man, a man she finds attractive, a man to whom she has submitted. But you cannot trust her. Your hate remains. You have not forgotten, Nick. And you have not forgiven. You swore vengeance against Matilda de Braose eight hundred years ago and you are pursuing it still.”

He stood up abruptly and turned away from his brother. “And this time, my friend,” he murmured, “when she calls on her husband for help, it will be there. I shall not let her down again. I have waited for the chance to make amends, and now at last I have it. Now at last we are all once more on the stage together.” He turned. “You will love the role I’ve given you, Nick. You always were a conceited little bastard—so self-assured. So clever. So sure every woman will fall for you. And they all do, don’t they? But Jo is beginning to see through you. She has tasted your violence now. She no longer trusts you, and if you hit her again, Nick, she will come to me. She will always come to me, I shall see to that. And I shall comfort her. She’ll return to you for more because there is something of the masochist in Jo. Violence excites her. She may even tempt you to kill her, Nick. But I shall be there.” He smiled evenly. “And this time I shall be the one in charge. This time I shall have men to help me. And you will crawl away,
my liege
. You will lick your wounds and beg for forgiveness as William did to his king, and I shall have you sent away, not to hide in France to die a whimpering shameful death like William had to, no, I shall have you committed, brother mine, to an asylum. The sort of place they put people who live in a world of make-believe and pretend that they are kings. And Jo will come to me. Jo will be mine. She will repent that she slighted me and beg for forgiveness and I will console her as a husband should.”

He walked toward the tray and poured himself half a tumbler of whisky. He drank it down at a gulp and then poured another.

“Have you been listening to me, Nick?” He turned slowly.

For a moment Nick gave no sign of having heard, then slowly he nodded.

“And have you understood what I have told you?”

Nick licked his lips. “I understand,” he said at last.

Sam smiled. “Good,” he said softly. “So, tell me what your name was, Nicholas, in this past life of yours.”

“John.” Nick looked at Sam with alarming directness.

“And you know what you must do?”

Nick shifted in his chair. He was still staring at Sam but there was a clouded, puzzled look on his face.

Sam frowned. He put down his glass. “Enough now,” he said slowly. “You are tired. I am going to wake you soon. You must ask me to hypnotize you again, little brother. You find that hypnosis is soothing. It makes you feel good. You are going to forget all that I have told you today with your conscious mind, but underneath, slowly, you will remember, so that when you are next with Jo you will know how to act. Do you understand me?” His tone was peremptory.

Nick nodded.

“And one other thing.” Sam picked up his shirt and began carefully to straighten the sleeves. “A favor for a friend. Before Jo comes back you must go and see Miss Curzon. Make your peace with her, Nick. You like Judy, remember? She’s good in bed. She makes you feel calm and happy. Not like Jo, who makes you angry. Go and see Judy, Nick. Soon.” He smiled. “Now I want you to relax. You are feeling happy now and at ease. You are feeling rested. That’s good. Now, slowly I want you to count from one to ten. When you reach ten you will awake.” Slowly Nick began to count.

***

“Abergavenny, Crickhowell, Tretower,” Jo murmured as she swung the MG onto the A40 next morning. She glanced up at the line of hills and then at the gleam of the broad Usk on her left, and she shivered, remembering the icy feel of the water, the snow beneath her bare feet, and the silence of the hills. Thankfully she concentrated as a tractor swung out onto the narrow road ahead of her. She leaned forward and turned on the car radio. She could not look at the hills now, not as well as hold the car on the road. She turned the station up loud and, hooting at the tractor, tore past him north toward Hay, refusing to let herself think about the vast empty area of moor and mountain far away on her right.

The approach from Talgarth was along the foot of the small foothills that hid the huge shoulders of Pen y Beacon and Twmpa—the Black Mountains that David had showed her on his map—but she could smell them through the open roof of the car, the sweet indefinable smell of the mountains of Wales, which she remembered from her dream.

The town of Hay, nestling in a curve of the Wye, was a maze of little narrow streets, crowded and busy, which clustered around the gaunt imposing half ruin that was the castle. As she drew into a parking space in the market square immediately below the castle, Jo sat staring up at it in awe. In front of her, to the left, was a cluster of ancient ruins, while at the right-hand end of the edifice was a portion that looked far more recent and appeared to be in the midst of rebuilding and restoration. That part looked as if it might have been recently inhabited. She climbed out of the car feeling strangely disoriented; this time yesterday she had been standing in the London apartment, phoning Janet Pugh. Now she was standing within a stone’s throw of the building Matilda had built. She took a deep breath and made herself turn away toward the crowded streets behind her. First she must find a guidebook.

Bookshops throng the narrow streets of Hay-on-Wye. Shelves overflow onto the pavements. Fivepenny paperbacks rub shoulders with priceless esoterica and antiquarian treasures. Fascinated, Jo wandered around, resisting the urge to stop and browse, drawn constantly back to the brooding gray ruin. She bought her guide, a history of the town, and a little street map, then, with a pasty, an apple, and a can of lager she walked slowly down the hill toward the Wye, away from the castle. It was too soon to look at the castle. First she wanted to get her bearings.

Beyond the high modern bridge that spanned the river she found a footpath leading down through the trees to a shingle bank at the edge of the broad expanse of peat-stained water, carpeted so thickly in places with the tiny white flowers of water crowfoot that the water was almost hidden. She stood for a moment staring down at the river as it rippled swiftly eastward toward Herefordshire, pouring over the smoothed, sculpted boulders and rocks through flat water meadows and away from the mountains; then she found a deserted piece of sun-baked shingle and sat down. Opening the lager, she propped her back against a bent birch tree as she watched the water. Out of the corner of her eye she saw a flash of jeweled colors and recognized her first sight of a kingfisher. Enchanted, she stared after it, but it had vanished as quickly as it had come.

She rummaged in her bag for her books and sat eating as she looked through them, every now and then glancing up at the town beyond the river to glimpse the castle at its center or the church nestling beyond the bridge in the trees. Each time she found her gaze drawn back to the water, watching it as ripples formed patterns and swirls in the reflections of the clouds. A feather danced past, curled white in the sun, and far out in the middle of the current a fish jumped, silver-bellied, and plunged back in a circle of ripples.

The afternoon was very hot and still. Jo nodded, and her book fell into her lap. Forcing her eyes open, she made herself stare at the water again, trying to concentrate on staying awake, but the reflections danced in her eyes, dazzling, forcing her to close them again, and slowly, imperceptibly, the sound of the water dulled and grew muffled. It was only after a long while that she realized she could hear the sound of horses’ hooves.

***

England lay beneath a pall of dust. The summer sun burning down beneath a coppery sky smelled acrid and the hot breeze that occasionally fanned the travelers’ faces was dust-laden and gritty.

Wearily Matilda pulled up her horse at last. The groom who had been walking at its head raised his hand and the whole tired procession halted. Behind them the forests and rolling hills of Herefordshire shimmered in a haze. The Border March, a vast, wild area of forest and mountain and desolate moorland, lay before them to the west. At their feet they could see at last the River Wye, which had shrunk in places to a narrow ribbon of water flowing between broad strips of whitened stones. There were deep pools, shadowed from the beating overhead sunlight by the crowding alders and hazels, which in places overhung the water, and by great black rocks brought down by the spring floods. They alone were cool and green, the last refuge of salmon and grayling.

William was once again in attendance on the king, this time in Normandy. Matilda had received a message from him shortly before she left Bramber. The household had stayed there too long, overtaxing the facilities, running its supplies down to nothing, but still she had been reluctant to obey William’s instructions to set off once more for Wales. He planned to join her there, the message said, by Martinmas, so that he could enjoy some of the late season’s hunting in the Hay forest.

One by one the horses and men picked their way almost dryshod across the silvery shallows. Before them lay the small township of Hay. It clustered around the church of St. Mary and the neighboring wooden castle on its mound securely surrounded by a thick high hawthorn hedge, trailing with honeysuckle and brambles. Outside the hedge the small fields, red-gold with brittle wheat, showed up in the heavy green of the encroaching forest. Somewhere nearby were the black brooding mountains, but they had withdrawn beneath a haze that hid all but the lowest wooded slopes of the foothills.