The Sumerton Women

by D. L. Bogdan

  Under his canopy, the boy was accompanied by the premier gentlemen in the land. The Earl of Shrewsbury and Bishop of Durham walked beside him, followed by the ever-present John Dudley and Edward’s beloved uncle, famed rake Thomas Seymour, who carried his train.

  Alec watched them file into the abbey, where after his anointing the boy would later climb seven stairs to the dais and sit on the throne, fitted with extra cushions to compensate for his unimposing size.

  Cranmer, Alec noted with an inner chuckle, appeared a font of calm after three weeks of being hassled and harried and hoping this day would eclipse every coronation before and after. As he began his address, Alec was tempted to mouth along the words. He had read and reread the nervous archbishop’s epistle, reassuring the man that the people and young king would indeed receive his message with the desired effect.

  Alec’s heart lifted at what he considered by far to be the most compelling part of the speech. Cranmer’s voice thundered forth with confidence and authority.

  “Your Majesty is God’s vicegerent and Christ’s vicar within your own dominions, and to see, with your predecessor Josiah, God truly worshipped, and idolatry destroyed, the tyranny of the bishops of Rome banished from your subjects, and images removed. These acts be signs of a second Josiah, who reformed the church of God in his days. You are to reward virtue, to revenge sin, to justify the innocent, to relieve the poor, to procure peace, to repress violence, and to execute justice throughout your realms... .”

  No stronger message to the papists could have been sent. Edward, the “Second Josiah,” had come to reform the Church, to bring about a new closeness with God sans the shiny distractions of Rome. Under the reign of Edward, a new era would begin, that of a purer faith, one that called its practitioners directly to a personal relationship with God without the intervention of others. A faith infused with straightforward simplicity.

  At his side Alec felt Mirabella grow rigid. He regarded her a moment. Her eyes were hard, her jaw set. It was evident that Cranmer’s message, a warning to Mirabella no doubt, had been absorbed. Alec shook his head, dismissing unpleasant analysis in favor of watching the coronation proceed.

  Crowned with the imperial crown and that of Saint Edward, the young king was at last fitted with his own, one light enough for his head. He was given Saint Edward’s staff, the orb and spurs, and the scepter, which could only be held with help from the Earl of Shrewsbury. The child, though maintaining a regal dignity expected of him, betrayed his youth with his wide eyes as he bit his lip under the weight of the various accoutrements. To his good fortune, he was relieved of them soon enough.

  The lord protector, Duke of Somerset, knelt before him first, then a reverent Cranmer. Each man kissed on the cheek the boy who carried their every hope and ambition, after which the nobility knelt before him together, where Somerset declared their allegiance.

  It was done. It was formal, written in the heavens and the earth.

  Edward, the at once neglected and pampered son of mad Henry VIII, was King of all England.

  The celebrating commenced in earnest at Westminster Hall, decorated and freshened for the occasion. The walls were draped with cloths of arras, the hall and stairs covered in rich carpets of crimson, filling the place with festive grandeur. The guests competed with both the hall and one another, their attire sparkling with jewels of every imagining, soft furs, rich brocades, and velvets. Color and life emanated from every corner; the revelry was contagious.

  As Alec and Mirabella took to their table among the lowest gentry present, they watched the nobility serve the king course after course only so the entire assembly could move to Whitehall for more feasting and drinking.

  By the beginning of the masque, which featured a blatant mockery against the Bishop of Rome, Mirabella’s Pope, Alec was tipsy from toasts and drowsy from overeating. Beside him Mirabella sat, unable to disguise the pain that contorted her expression as she witnessed her faith ridiculed for the pleasure of the court. For the second time that day, Alec was stirred to pity. He leaned toward her, resting a hand on hers.

  “Would you like to return to Sumerton Place?” he asked in soft tones. Though he relished the triumph of the Church of England, he still could not will himself to throw it completely in Mirabella’s face, no matter her sins against him.

  Mirabella turned toward him, her eyes lit with tears, and nodded. She appeared a child of thirteen again, vulnerable and afraid, compelling Alec to take her hand in his and lead her from the hall.

  “You mean you are accompanying me?” she asked him, mystified.

  “I am exhausted,” Alec confessed. “Besides, there are to be revels all week.”

  “Yes, then,” Mirabella said, squeezing his hand. “Let us remove to Sumerton Place, to home.”

  Alec in truth was more than ready. He must have taken in too much wine. His limbs were weak and quavering; he stumbled a bit as he walked, and, for some unfathomable reason, he could not stop laughing.

  It had been an effort, but one that had paid off in Alec’s response to what Mirabella had sprinkled at great discretion in his wine at Whitehall. The concoction she procured from the servant girl Nan, which could prove deadly if administered incorrectly, contained caraway, lovage, and mint, along with its most potent ingredient, something called nightshade. The Italians called it belladonna and used it for increasing the beauty of the eyes, among other things.

  Tonight it would be among other things.

  She willed herself not to think of anything beyond what lay in the moment. She would not allow guilt, that tool of the devil, to creep in.

  She led a dizzy Alec to his chambers.

  “Really I am rather embarrassed,” he confessed as Mirabella turned down the bedclothes. He flopped unceremoniously against his pillows. “I did not think I took in so much.”

  “It was a long day,” Mirabella said, sitting beside him. “There was more wine than we imagined and taken over a long period.”

  Alec smirked. “I suppose ... and you, did you enjoy yourself watching this King of the Reformation be crowned?”

  Mirabella winced. “It was a good day,” she said at length. “I am glad we went together.”

  Alec laughed. “Me too.” He rolled to his side, fetching the chamber pot beneath the bed. “I fear I may vomit.”

  Mirabella rubbed his back, her heart sinking. “You will be fine,” she said in soothing tones. “I will stay with you until you are asleep.”

  “It isn’t necessary,” Alec told her. “This is not my best hour.”

  At this Mirabella was compelled to laugh. “Then consider us even, for you have never seen me at my best hour.”

  “That I will agree with,” Alec muttered as he leaned over the chamber pot.

  Mirabella bowed her head. She supposed she had invited that remark.

  After a few moments of feeble dry heaving, Alec lay back on the bed, his lids fluttering before closing. Mirabella swallowed. She could go to her rooms now; she could leave him to rest and recover. She did not have to do this.

  Where was her resolve? Determination surged through her. She would see this through. She would seize what had been so hard won. Undressing to her shift, she lay beside him, resting a hand on his chest, stroking idly.

  “I do love you, Alec,” she whispered.

  “I love you, Cecily,” Alec murmured, covering her hand with his.

  Mirabella bit her lip. Her heart pounded. Cecily. The name caused bile to rise in her own throat, bitter, repulsive. Cecily ... Fine. Let him think it was Cecily... .

  Poising above him, Mirabella began to cover his face and neck in soft kisses, feeling his hands reach up to cup her face.

  “You’ve come to me at last,” he slurred.

  But his eyes were closed, and as he took the virtue Mirabella had saved for this night at great cost one name remained on his lips: Cecily.

  Mirabella lay beside Alec, sore and trembling. She found no pleasure in the coupling. It was an act, nothing more, and if t
his was what she had saved herself for, she might have remained intact her life long without missing the obsession of poets and bards alike. Perhaps if it had not been under false pretenses, perhaps if he said her name and not Cecily’s ... It mattered not. It was done. Their marriage was consummated and she was a wife truly made.

  She drew the covers to her neck and wrapped her arm about Alec’s middle, snuggling closer beside him. The light filtered through the window, casting eerie shadows about the room.

  For what you stole, you will be made to repay... .

  Mirabella sat bolt upright. The whisper was familiar. Her mother again? No ... She began to tremble as her eyes found the source. At the end of the bed he stood, transparent and surrounded by a soft white glow no light source could provide. Was he floating or did he stand atop solid ground?

  “Brey ...” she breathed, reaching out.

  Brey, his head crowned in golden curls, his blue eyes containing the wisdom years of life would have afforded him, stood before her. His eyes, the only testament of his age, were those of a man in the body of a child-ghost. He shook his head as though the weight of every disappointment in the world rested atop his slim shoulders. He began to fade.

  “Brey!” Mirabella cried. “Don’t leave me! I need you... . I need help!”

  The apparition retreated, fading into just another shadow in the room.

  Beside her Alec stirred, his eyes flickering open. They rested on her a moment as confusion washed over his features.

  “What are you doing here?” His voice was low. The warning in his tone was not lost on Mirabella.

  She drew the covers around her. She could not stop shaking. She scrambled for an explanation. Anger replaced the fear of the apparition’s cryptic statement. “You do not remember? I came at your drunken invitation last night,” she snapped.

  Alec leaned on an elbow, then cupped his forehead in his hand with a grimace. “And ... ?”

  Mirabella leaned forward, her face inches from his. “Our marriage is made true before God,” she hissed. “One sacrament your reformation will never change. I am your wife now, in deed as well as name.”

  Alec did not meet her eyes. “How did you accomplish this? I have taken in many a cup of wine in my day with no such effects.” He sat up, his head still in his hand. “What did you give me, Mirabella?”

  Mirabella shook her head, wrapping herself in the coverlet and rising. “You cannot believe you wanted me of your own free will? That is too much for your mind to take in, that you would lust after your own wife, the woman who saved you.”

  Alec met her eyes for the first time, shaking his head. “No, I cannot believe it,” he told her. “But getting the truth from you is a useless enterprise, so there is naught to be done but congratulate you once again on your cleverness. Though I must add that it is a pity you had to resort to such means. It should be noted that our marriage could only be made ... how did you say it? True? Yes, made ‘true’ with my mind and humors altered. You call it consummation. There is another word for it, my dear. Rape. What your mother saved you from with her life, you throw back at her with this act, therefore invalidating an honorable woman’s heroism.” He allowed the words to hit her, daggers thrown to the soul, every one of them, and her eyes burned with tears. Rape. It had not been rape. Men could not be raped, could they? He had never screamed or protested or behaved unwillingly. He had never said no ... yet could her deception be considered such? Had she fallen so far? No. Women were not capable of such things... . She was not capable of such things ... was she?

  “But!” Alec’s voice, light with false cheer, cut through her reflections. “If I had a cap I would surely doff it to you, dear lady.” His laugh was wry, his eyes filled with a mingling of sadness and mockery. “You win, Mirabella. You have successfully ‘saved’ me from every dream and value I held dear. I hope it was everything you wanted.”

  Mirabella averted her eyes. She could not bear his expression another moment. He did not even look at her in anger anymore. He regarded her as if she were some helpless inmate at an asylum in need of a mercy killing. That look shamed her like she had never been shamed before.

  “It wasn’t anything I wanted,” Mirabella confessed at once, her voice strangled by tears. “Oh, if I could take it all back ... if I could take everything back ...” She shook her head, covering her mouth with her hand.

  She could not remain. She would not meet his eyes and find in them pity once again.

  Sobbing, she climbed out of bed and fled, Brey’s words echoing in her mind, relentless and ruthless as she had ever been.

  Mirabella would leave. She would give Alec everything he wanted, an annulment, whatever he wished. Anything to be free of the guilt and shame that stalked her, a falcon preying on her conscience, every waking moment. She would return to Sumerton, if Cecily could abide the sight of her, and from there decide her fate. Perhaps she would remove to France, still a favored daughter of the Pope. There she could take her vows once more. Yes, that was what she would do! Hope began to replace shame as she supervised the packing of her things.

  There was no need for good-bye. Alec had gone to the jousts in honor of His Majesty as it were. No words were spoken. There was nothing to say now. By the time he returned, she would be gone, his fondest wish granted.

  Mirabella ordered her coach.

  You cannot run from this.

  Her mother. Oh, God, why? Why must she be pursued by these voices from beyond? She was leaving now. She was setting things right. She did not need moral intervention from the living or the dead.

  On Alec’s writing table she left a quick note:

  You are free.

  With this, she bid farewell to London.

  She was going home, that place that had never denied her no matter her sins.

  Sumerton.

  Cecily had little time to invest in pondering what was or was not occurring in London. Between running her household, keeping correspondence with her children, who seemed to be flourishing under the care and tutelage of the Hapgoods, and caring for baby Emmy, there was more than enough to occupy her mind. When not consumed with the tasks of the day to day, she kept company with the former Lady Grace. In her she found the friendship she had longed for since the tragic passing of Lady Alice and the sisterhood she had never quite grasped onto with Mirabella.

  When Grace was not attending her own flock that included sick tenants and women in search of her various remedies, the two found solace in conversation. No subject remained untouched.

  “I think it is harder mourning the living than it is the dead,” Cecily noted one afternoon as the two sat before a crackling fire in her apartments watching baby Emmy attempt to crawl. Despite her misshapen leg, the child’s ability to compensate displayed a strength of character and determination that swelled Cecily’s heart with pride.

  “How do you mean?” Grace queried.

  “The dead do not choose to leave you, at least most of the time,” she explained. “But the living, when they hurt or abandon—they choose it.” She sighed. “I have found more resolve and peace when I think on our dead then I can ever find with the living.”

  Grace reached out, resting a calloused hand over Cecily’s. “Treat the choices of the living as you would a death, done and out of our control. I have never been a woman of faith, my lady. You know that. However, in my later years I have learned that we have no control over our children, our mates, or our family and friends. All we have control over is ourselves. And God? He is the master of all. Give Him that power and trust and you will be more at peace than ever you could have imagined. When you give yourself over, you find that your heart becomes a font of grace, forgiveness, and sincere goodwill.” Grace’s smile was serene. “I call it divine surrender. Surrender yourself to it, my dear girl, and you will find you have more power than any king.”

  Cecily offered a smile of gratitude, squeezing Grace’s hand in hers. “I am so glad you have been returned to us, Lady Grace. Despite Mirabella’s many
transgressions, I still thank her for that.”

  Grace bit her lip, blinking back tears. “Come now, enough of that,” she muttered, waving off the thought with a modest laugh.

  A light knock on the door of Cecily’s apartments brought the women to compose themselves with sheepish grins and the subtle daubing away of sentimental tears with their handkerchiefs.

  “Enter,” Cecily ordered in husky tones.

  The door opened, revealing Mirabella, pale and drawn, her eyes glassy. She had left young and returned an old woman. Cecily’s heart thudded against her ribs in a painful rhythm. What now, was her first thought. She cursed herself. She must maintain a generous heart. Mirabella would always be Hal’s daughter. Any kindness Cecily was bound to show her would be for him, if she could not in sincerity do it for her.

  Cecily rose from her settle. She did not know what to say, how to feel. “Master Cahill remained in London. He is much occupied with the king’s coronation and doing the bidding of the archbishop,” Mirabella began, her voice soft.

  Cecily could not yet detect a threat in her manner.

  “If I may, my lady, I have come to stay awhile and ... reflect... .”

  The knot in Cecily’s stomach eased a bit. She willed herself to be calm. She would not reveal her dread or disappointment. She was the lady of this house and so she would remain, with dignity and charity.

  Cecily reached out, taking Mirabella’s hand in hers. It was cold, clammy. “This will always be your home, Mirabella,” she told her.

  Mirabella bit her lip, her green eyes luminous with unshed tears. Cecily was mystified. Never had she seen Mirabella more vulnerable or, as it appeared, more broken. Not when Brey passed, or when she revealed the loss of her mother, nor when her baby nephew died. Not even, and perhaps especially, when her father died. She had always been closed off, as if something in her was missing. Was it too much to hope that the key to unlocking her humanity had been restored?