Girl In A Red Tunic

by Alys Clare

  Ivo and Helewise eat their meal on the grass with their families. They watch the dancers circling the May Pole; they dance on the grass to the squeaky fluting and rhythmic tabor beat of the rustic band. Ivo squeezes her as they dance. He holds her hand every moment that he can.

  In the end, hand-holding is not enough.

  The long day draws to its close. Dusk is falling fast and torches are lit, their flaring, dancing light making swift-moving shadows as people continue with the celebrations. The cooking fire is stoked up and blasts heat and light out into the deep black of the night-time woods and fields. In the happy, disorganised crowds and the kindly darkness it is easy to slip away. Ivo and Helewise hurry to Helewise’s secret place and, in the springy grass beneath the willow tree, she sits down and he kneels before her, gazing in adoration.

  ‘Helewise,’ he murmurs. He touches the garland of flowers on her hair. ‘My Flora. My Queen of the May.’

  Tenderly they remove each other’s clothes. Staring at his mature male body as she helps him strip off tunic, undershirt and hose, she is aware at the same time of his hands on her, pulling at the laces of her gown, dragging at her under-gown with an impatience that all but tears it from her. Then, in the cool and fragrant stillness of a May night, naked and un ashamed, at long, long last they make love.

  Chapter 15

  Ivo and Helewise are married in July, a week before her birthday.

  She has spent a fraught few weeks.

  May is traditionally the fertile month. According to the Old Ways, it is the season when the Goddess and the God, mature and ripe for each other, mate in the greenwood. Their fertility echoes and rebounds with that of their creatures, animal and human; with the flowers, the trees, the crops; with the very land, Mother Earth herself. Some of the old folk who live under the skirts of Swansford still call the May feast by its ancient name of Beltane and the god whom they honour is not the Christ or His Holy Father but Bel, God of the Sun.

  Sexual magic was abroad in the night after the feast. It worked on Helewise and Ivo; it worked within Helewise, and Ivo’s seed sought out her egg and she conceived out there beside the stream under the soft light of the distant stars.

  She does not realise this for several weeks. Ivo formally asks Ralf for her hand in marriage and Ralf, having noticed his elder daughter’s new expression that is incandescent with joy, hardly needs to consult her to enquire whether this is what she wants too. This is, however, a necessary step since officially a marriage would not be considered legal without the free consent of both parties (although, as Emma and Ralf have often remarked when considering in private the marriages of the great and the not necessarily very good, sometimes this is hard to credit). Ralf accepts Ivo’s suit and consent is given; the families think ahead to the practicalities. Benedict and Ralf get their heads together to discuss the financial settlement, a procedure which, as Emma tartly remarks, seems to require the consumption of rather a lot of the Swansford household’s best Rhenish wine. Whether or not the wine is instrumental, a happy compromise is reached regarding Helewise’s dowry and the rights she will be able to expect as a wife in her husband’s home. Soon afterwards the families hold a small betrothal ceremony, and the priest who will marry Helewise and Ivo attends and gives his blessing. He will read out the banns in church three times over the following weeks and issue the formal invitation for anyone who has a legitimate reason to argue with the match to step forward. In order to give the couple – and Helewise in particular – plenty of time to make the necessary preparations for her new life, the marriage is set for late August; Ivo and his bride are to meet at the church door on the last day of the month.

  There is a small and very beautiful house on Benedict Warin’s land into which he will move, leaving the Old Manor, traditional home of the Warins, for his son and the new bride. Benedict will continue to be attended by his quiet manservant, Martin; Helewise has learned that the two men are not in fact related although she hears it said that they are as close as brothers and have been companions for a long time. Ivo undertakes to prepare the marriage bed and the priest promises to go along and bless it, praying that the couple’s union may prove fruitful.

  The trouble is that, as the weeks go by, Helewise knows that this blessing of fruitfulness has already been bestowed. She has missed her courses: she is pregnant.

  When she realises this and there is no longer any room for doubt, she seeks out Elena and, dropping her head on her nurse’s generous lap, tells her.

  Elena gently strokes the wild red-gold hair; Helewise has been pacing her room gathering her courage for this moment and grooming has been the last thing on her mind.

  ‘I know,’ Elena croons.

  ‘You know I’m pregnant?’ Helewise sits up.

  ‘Aye, my girl. You’ve been showing the signs. And who is it washes out your menstrual rags, which have lain unused in the chest since April?’

  Slowly Helewise nods. ‘Of course,’ she murmurs. It has always been impossible to hide very much from Elena’s sharp eyes, especially something that has apparently been so very obvious.

  Elena gives her a little dig in the ribs. ‘Why didn’t you come to me, girl, before you ran off into the wildwood to mate with your man?’

  Helewise is puzzled. ‘Why should I have done that?’ She adds, with a faint haughtiness that covers up her shame, ‘I didn’t need your permission.’

  ‘None of that tone!’ Elena says spiritedly. ‘What I meant is that, if you’d only asked, I could have told you how to enjoy yourself without conceiving this little one.’ She puts a large hand on to Helewise’s lower belly.

  ‘You—’ Helewise does not understand. ‘You could have prevented this conception? But how? Babies come from God and it isn’t for us to choose whether or not we accept them.’ Even to herself she sounds horribly self-righteous and pious.

  ‘Oh, dear, dear, dear!’ Elena chuckles. ‘I admit you took a real chance, making love under the stars on Beltane night, because isn’t it the very time when the Goddess and the God are abroad and giving you every encouragement? Why, the souls of the unborn are flying in the warm air just longing for an invitation!’

  But Helewise is hardly listening. Fascinated by this extraordinary idea that a woman might choose whether or not she wished to conceive, she wants to know more. Elena readily obliges; indeed, she is planning in any case to have a word with Helewise before the marriage to enlighten her about certain things. Now, thinks the wise old nurse, is as good a time as any.

  ‘It’s said,’ she begins, ‘that a poultice of hemlock applied to the man’s testicles prevents the shedding of fertile seed, but I’ve known that fail and in my opinion it’s not to be relied on, besides being a mite uncomfortable. For the man, anyway!’ She chuckles. ‘Anyhow, best, I always say, for the woman to take care of herself in that way. Now, here’s what I suggest ...’

  For the next few minutes Helewise listens to her nurse’s contraception advice. Some suggestions are reasonably acceptable: wearing a crown of myrtle to delay conception, or chewing raspberry leaves to make the womb ‘clench’, whatever that means, and thus render itself unwelcoming. Secreting walnuts in her bodice, one nut for every month that she wishes to delay conception. Then Elena describes several potions which, when drunk, cause temporary sterility. She finishes by telling Helewise how to make a pessary that will reject male seed before it has a chance to sow itself, but the ingredients sound so ghastly that Helewise cannot imagine that its use would be entirely painless.

  She absorbs all of this new information, storing it away for possible future use. Then, returning to her present predicament, says, ‘But it’s too late to prevent this conception, Elena.’

  ‘Aye, my girl.’ Elena sighs. Then: ‘D’you want to keep the child?’

  ‘Of course!’ Helewise is shocked.

  ‘Very well and right glad I am to hear it.’ Elena gives her young mistress an encouraging hug. ‘You’ll not be the first bride to stand pregnant at the church door. I onl
y asked because there are ways, you see, for a woman to slip a child from her womb.’

  ‘I don’t want to hear them,’ Helewise says firmly. ‘Now, what are we to do, Elena?’

  Elena still has her strong arms around Helewise. Now, dropping a kiss on to the unruly hair, she says, ‘It’s simple. We bring your marriage forward by a month. You’ll not be showing that early and there’s no need for anyone else to know. We’ll tell them you’d forgotten it was your birthday at the end of July and you’ve set your heart on being a wife first.’

  ‘Why should I do that?’ logical Helewise asks.

  ‘I don’t know!’ Elena cries, exasperated. ‘Make something up! Be fanciful and silly for once!’

  Helewise grins. ‘I’ll try.’ Then, gratitude flowing through her, she flings her arms round her old nurse and says, ‘Will you come with me to the Old Manor, Elena? I’ll be needing you early next year when he’s born.’ She points to her stomach.

  ‘You have decided it’s a boy?’ Elena raises an eyebrow.

  ‘I know he is.’

  Elena puts her hand on Helewise’s lower belly again, this time leaving it there for a few moments. ‘Aye, aye, happen you’re right.’ Removing her hand, she says, ‘As to coming with you to your husband’s home, I would like that, my girl. But I’ll speak to your mother; see what she has to say.’

  Helewise has leapt up, restless energy evident in her very stance. ‘Where are you off to now?’ Elena demands.

  Helewise smiles sweetly at her. ‘I’m going to find Father and tell him that I must have my marriage date brought forward because I can’t restrain my excitement and I do so want to be Ivo’s wife before I’m fifteen.’

  If anybody suspects the reason for Ivo and Helewise marrying in July rather than August, they never say. As far as Helewise is aware, it is a secret known only to herself, Ivo and Elena. When Leofgar is born the following February, nobody thinks to comment that he is large for a seven-month child; they are all too busy being thankful for a safe birth and welcoming a healthy infant into the world.

  In the short time between betrothal and marriage, Helewise gets to know her new family. Benedict is a widower; his late wife Blanche died three years ago from some mysterious swelling in her breast. Helewise tries to encourage Benedict to speak of her; since Helewise is destined never to meet the woman who would have been her mother-in-law, she wants to find out something about her. Benedict speaks of Blanche as if she had been a veritable saint: patient, kind, long-suffering, always considerate of her husband’s well-being and reluctant ever to mutter so much as a word of criticism. Her health was never robust, according to Benedict, and he manages to imply without actually putting it into words that he was a considerate husband and did not insist on his marital rights with any great frequency. Blanche, he tells Helewise with an expression of deep regret, took to her bed at the onset of her illness and stayed there for the year that it took her to die. Meanwhile— But Benedict shuts his mouth firmly and does not speak of meanwhile. It is as if he suddenly remembers to whom he is speaking and, clearly, he wishes his son’s future bride to think well of him.

  As an aid to this good impression that he wishes her to form, Benedict presents Helewise with a dazzling array of gifts. He has told Ivo that he will leave the best items in the Old Manor for their use; his small house is quite adequately furnished for a solitary man, he informs his son. Besides this bounty he has ordered new things for the betrothed pair: thick and costly wall hangings to keep out the draughts; a beautiful chest in which to store unseasonable garments and the like; heavy silver candle holders; a new mattress for the marriage bed. For Helewise herself there is a length of brilliant scarlet silk and a gold circlet to wear to secure her veil.

  She feels it is disloyal to this most generous of fathers-in-law but still she cannot help herself trying to find out more about him, specifically the things that he is holding back from telling her himself. Ivo can reveal little more than she already knows so she enlists Elena’s help. Elena uses her subtle skills and puts the word out among her many friends and relations that she would be pleased to hear anything they may know of Benedict Warin.

  The results are surprising.

  Most of her contacts, it is true, perceive Benedict as he paints himself: open-hearted, fond of his meat and drink, a good friend and a cheerful companion; loyal and truthful, a fair master and a generous host. People pity him for the loss of his wife and for the ill health of that wife that prevented her from giving Benedict more than the one child, fine man though this son might be. Benedict likes women; yes, of course, what red-blooded male does not? He flirts with them, praises them, pays them extravagant compliments and makes them feel beautiful and beloved. Yes, indeed. Where is the harm in that?

  But some people – quite a few, it seems – know the truth behind this comfortably harmless image. One woman – she is the sister of someone who nursed poor Blanche in her dying weeks – knows very well what Benedict Warin is really like. He uses his easy charm, says she, as a sort of double bluff to conceal his true nature. He is a flatterer and a charmer, but he is more than that: with rather a lot of young women he goes further, seducing them, enjoying them and then abandoning them. While Blanche was alive, or so goes the ugly tale, Benedict always had his excuse ready: my sweetheart, he would say to the girl he was about to discard, how I should love to keep you with me always, care for you as you deserve, make you mine in the eyes of the world as well as in the privacy of our precious moments of intimacy. But what would it do to my poor suffering Blanche if I follow where my aching heart leads me and stay with you? No, no; although it will break me, I must give you up. And, with a tear in his eye and a last tender kiss, off he would go, leaving the poor girl to rearrange herself as best she could, brush the dust from her skirts and pull the hay from her tangled hair.

  Since Blanche’s death – a happy release in perhaps more ways than one – his excuse is that he must honour her memory. The fact that honouring a dead woman who is surely past caring means that he dishonours many living ones seems to have escaped his notice.

  This is what Elena’s cousin’s friend’s sister reports. Elena tells Helewise, who goes away to think about it. After some time she concludes that, first, it may not be true. Second, is it really any of her business? Third, she likes Benedict and she is hardly going to be affected personally by whatever he gets up to in private. Fourth, she is far too happy and excited to worry about it anyway.

  She puts Benedict’s infidelities to the back of her mind and, for a quarter of a century, that is largely where they stay.

  Amid the happy splendour of Helewise and Ivo’s wedding day, one small disturbing incident occurs.

  The sun has shone since early morning, the bride looks quite exquisitely beautiful and the handsome groom clearly can hardly restrain his impatience to get her alone. Family and friends shower the bridal couple with flowers and the tenants and peasants turn out to wish them well.

  The small incident occurs during the splendid feast that Ralf de Swansford throws for his daughter and her new husband in the flower-bedecked hall at Swansford. Helewise, flushed with happiness, is momentarily separated from Ivo as the two make their separate ways around the hall, pausing to talk to their guests, thanking them for the gifts they have brought, encouraging them to eat, drink and enjoy themselves. Helewise is wearing her new scarlet tunic whose silk is so stiff and heavy that it rustles, and Elena has helped her to cut it so that the fullness of the wide skirts begins slightly above the natural waistline; at nearly three months, Helewise’s pregnancy is just beginning to show and this wise precaution has been taken just in case anyone is sufficiently impolite – sufficiently curious – to take a close look at the radiant bride’s belly.

  Helewise dances up to an elderly but still handsome couple who are vague relations of Benedict’s and engages them in cheery conversation. They are friendly, affectionate, and they have just given her a beautiful little ivory statue of the Virgin for the private chapel at
the Old Manor. Martin, Benedict’s man, comes up to join them.

  The four of them, even the taciturn Martin, are laughing, happy. But in the midst of these pleasant exchanges, Helewise suddenly feels as if someone has run icy fingers down her spine. She breaks off in mid-sentence, spinning round, and sees that a malevolent, black-clad and dark-aspected woman of about thirty is glaring at her ferociously, her expression suggesting she would have willingly stuck a knife in Helewise’s back. Helewise catches her breath, shocked to the core by this sudden discordant element in her blissful day.

  It is as if the bad fairy has turned up at the feast.

  The wife of the elderly couple has caught Helewise’s arm and is turning her away from the awful fascination of the dark woman’s stare; she has seen too and she mutters something that sounds like, ‘Take no notice, my dear, she is nothing to you.’ She gives Martin a nudge – quite a sharp one – and he nods his understanding. He strides off, the old woman’s husband following him, elbowing his way through the crowd until he stands beside the black-clad woman. He leans down to say something to her – he leans really close so that he speaks right into her ear – and then he takes hold of her and hustles her away, the old man following, until she has been escorted out of the hall.

  ‘Who is she?’ Helewise asks nervously.

  The elderly woman sniffs. ‘That? That’s Sirida. She should not even be here ...’ And she stares worriedly after her old husband, as if suddenly anxious for him.

  Helewise tries to laugh. ‘She’s quite slight; she won’t hurt them!’ she says jokingly.

  But the woman replies, ‘She might. Oh, she might.’ She shakes her head, still looking anxious. Then she leans closer to Helewise and whispers, ‘They say she is a witch.’

  Then the old husband comes back – Martin has disappeared – brushing his hands together as if he has just ejected an unruly hound from the house and, before Helewise can ask any more questions about the dark woman, Ivo comes to find her.