Oswald grimaced. “Good gods, no. My Father was not remotely sentimental. At least, not until old age,” he amended.
Fen felt disappointed. “Perhaps we could have a portrait commissioned of you from Signor Arnotti?” Seeing from his expression that he was not keen on the idea, she added quickly: “A matching portrait?”
“A matched pair of paintings might have merit,” he conceded.
“To hang side-by-side?” suggested Fen.
He smiled at this. “You’re getting rather good at maneuvering me, Wife,” he said, narrowing his eyes.
“Do you think so?” asked Fen wistfully.
He laughed. “Oh I think so.”
Fen smiled. “I don’t know if it’s possible to entirely domesticate a panther,” she joked. He reached across the table and laced their fingers together. “You seem to be managing just fine.”
Really, she chose the stupidest moments to come over shy, Fen thought a full hour later as she reflected on her husband for the hundredth time that day. She unpacked the Livelihood cards, a book of poetry and the preliminary sketches she and Mathilde had put together for their tapestry panel. Mathilde had met her in the West Vestibule and they had taken up the spot by the window where signor Arnotti was hopefully now adding the finishing touches to his latest work. The artist didn’t look any calmer to Fen’s eye, but still wore that habitual half-scowl she was now so accustomed to, as he skulked behind the canvas. Really, she had no notion how Bess could discern anything pleasing about the man’s company! Clearly, poor Bess had never spent time in the company of a truly charming man, such as her own husband. Fen explained to signor Arnotti that she had not been able to bring Bors this morning as he was out with her brother-in-law, but the artist just grunted at this and shrugged so she returned to her friend.
“I thought it might be diverting after we’ve finished our tapestry plan layout, to have a game of cards,” she told Mathilde, after they had enquired politely after the other.
Mathilde, whose mind was clearly elsewhere, gave a small start. “Cards?” she repeated blankly.
Suddenly it occurred to Fen that, with her friends extremely sheltered upbringing she might not be permitted to play. “Oh! Of course, if you would rather not-”
“No, no, I would love to,” Mathilde hastened to assure her. “And Nurse is not collecting me until one o’clock, so no-one need know.”
Fen bit her lip. “I would not wish to put you in any moral quandary-” she started.
Mathilde reached across and touched her hand. “It won’t.”
She smiled at her, but to Fen’s mind she did look like she had something on her mind.
“Fenella,” she started hesitantly. Here it comes, thought Fenella. But to her surprise her friend was drawing something out of her alms purse. “I hope you will accept this small token as a Solstice gift. It is only a trifle and I promise you, it is mine to bestow.”
“Oh!” said Fen, looking down at the small carved trinket box. “Why, it’s beautiful Mathilde! And I have bought something for you also, but I thought to give it to you on Solstice Eve.”
Mathilde flushed slightly. “I think I might – that is, Mother often takes us into the country for the midwinter festival.”
“Then I must give you mine this morning when we return to the living quarters,” Fen told her. “Do you think your nurse will permit you to call at my chambers for it?”
“Oh, I’m sure of it,” said Mathilde. “And perhaps, I might have another hold of Lady Linnet’s baby.”
Fen laughed. “He would be very pleased to see you again, I’m sure. You are quite the favorite.” She opened and closed her trinket box, then clasped it to her chest. “How thoughtful you are. I love it.”
Mathilde flushed. “I think we must endeavor to complete this design today,” she said looking down at their design for the flower panel. “Or it will not be completed at all.”
Fen looked at her in surprise.
“I mean,” Mathilde corrected herself hastily. “In time for the new year.”
“Oh, I see,” said Fen. “Yes, we do need to get a move on, or ours will not be done in time to join the others.”
They bent their heads over the paper until Signor Arnotti signaled his displeasure and Fen had to sit up straighter, and peer down her nose to see it.
“What say you to some marigolds, entwined with the cowslips?” suggested Fen, as Mathilde added finer detail to their preliminary sketches.
“I think that would look very pretty,” her friend agreed. “I did show you my technique, did I not for building up the petals?” she looked slightly anxious as she peered up at Fen. “You see, I have made a note in the border, when to use that particular stitch?”
“Yes,” Fen assured her. “You did.” To her surprise, she noticed Mathilde was making meticulous notes with directions for every stitch to use. Maybe her friend always did her designs this way? It was certainly very thorough. “I thought we could entwine our initials at the bottom corner,” suggested Fen. “Or maybe use a floral device to suggest our names, using the language of flowers.”
A funny look passed over Mathilde’s face. “I think that’s a lovely idea,” she said in a muffled voice. “But perhaps we could decide that later.”
“Yes, whatever you think is best,” said Fen, but it did seem a bit odd not to note that down when she was being so precise about everything else.
“Stop screwing up the face!” barked signor Arnotti, emerging purple-faced from behind his canvas. “This is not to be borne!”
Fen gave him an irritated look. “I would have thought you’d have finished my face by now, signor!”
“It is the light diffusion on your face that occupies me,” he spat out. “Not your features.”
Fen sighed and tried to relax her facial muscles.
“Are you going to watch the dancing in the Yellow Chamber this afternoon?” Fen asked. “I believe Eden is dancing and the Queen will be in attendance.”
“Oh!” said Mathilde. “No, for I have a small, troubling cough today,” she coughed delicately on cue. “And will not be able to stand around and watch the performance this afternoon. My mother will be there,” she added as an afterthought.
Fen did not receive this news with any enthusiasm. “That’s a shame,” she said. “About your cough,” she added, quickly hoping her friend did not perceive an insult to her mother. “I doubt very much Hester will be going, as she avoids such gatherings like the plague.” She sighed. “It is hard when you are faced with a roomful of strangers.”
“I have heard that Lady Bess Hartleby is going,” Mathilde told her, which perked Fen up. At least she would have someone friendly to stand with, even if Bess had been acting quite oddly lately. “Her uncle Sir Reginald Hartleby is lately engaged to one of the Queen’s ladies, Lady Constance Pryor.”
Signor Arnotti’s head emerged once again, and Fen braced herself for a criticism, but he said nothing, merely regarded them thoughtfully and then retreated.
It was on the tip of Fen’s tongue to mention Bess’s odd behavior the previous day to Mathilde, but she could not really do that with signor Arnotti himself within earshot, so she suppressed the impulse. “Well, that is fortunate for me, at any event,” she said and left it at that. She watched Mathilde’s design filling out the border with approval. “The other idea I had was that we could have a central text after all,” she said. “But not an improving one,” she said hastily. “Something around the bonds of female friendship, I thought might be nice.”
Mathilde’s head bowed over the design a moment and when she looked up her eyes were moist with tears. “I think that would be lovely,” she said softly. “Though that subject is not much celebrated in classical literature.”
“Because it is all written by men,” said Fenella briskly. “We can compose our own tenet, if needs must.”
“Yes,” agreed Mathilde and left a blank rectangular shape in the middle of the paper. “That can be added in.” She hesitated. �
�In that case, I think our design is as good as completed,” she said, straightening up.
Fen clapped her hands. “Excellent. Most excellent. And now, poetry, do you think?” she asked lifting a red-leather bound book out of her bag. “Or cards?”
“Cards, I think,” said Mathilde tapping her chin. “We can read the poetry after, and then we won’t have to worry about Nurse arriving.”
“Good idea.” Fen spent the next ten minutes explaining the game of Livelihoods to her friend in great detail. Mathilde’s eyes glazed over and Fen had a feeling she would not be adept at the game, but to her surprise, as soon as they started laying down cards she found that Mathilde was quite the protégée. Fen watched in amazement as her friend’s pile of cards grew and her own diminished. “You really are extremely good at this,” she marveled.
Mathilde glanced down at her pile of cards and flushed “Oh – beginner’s luck, I’m sure,” she said uncomfortably.
“It’s remarkable,” said Fen. “I had thought that I was quite good, but-” She sat in surprise as her friend trumped her cleric’s card with that of the topless female.
“Whore,” said Mathilde absently.
Fen gasped.
Mathilde looked from Fenella to the card and back again. “Is that not what it’s called?” she asked in confusion.
“Roland told me it was a nursing mother!”
Mathilde blushed to the roots of her hair. “I do apologize,” she stammered. “I must not have been attending to what you said!”
Fen remembered how Roland’s friends had told her not to play it with any other ladies. She looked shrewdly at ‘Mouse’ Martindale. “Have I been very naïve?” she asked slowly.
Mathilde fidgeted unhappily on her low seat. “I – have a confession to make,” she said, hanging her head. “I have played this game before.”
“Who on earth with?” asked Fen in astonishment.
Mathilde went an even darker shade of red. “The palace pages,” she admitted. “They’re very dear little boys. And I’ve been so terribly lonely over the years…” To Fen’s horror her friend burst into tears. “Please don’t tell my mother,” she begged, groping for her kerchief.
“Of course I won’t!” responded Fen hotly, patting her on the shoulder. “You’ve done nothing wrong to find allies where you can.” She wasn’t sure how sweet the pages were though, teaching the sheltered Mathilde most unsuitable words!
Mathilde mopped her eyes and sat back. “I give them sweets and mend their hose, and they teach me their games, or tell me their woes. They are most horribly neglected you know, and left to their own devices after being sent by their families to court.” Mathilde looked so sincere that Fen’s heart went out to her. Was this another outlet for her thwarted maternal instinct? She wouldn’t be surprised. “Before you came to court,” Mathilde hiccupped. “They were my only friends.”
“I see,” said Fen. “Of course. Please don’t distress yourself.” She glanced over at the easel, but it did not seem that signor Arnotti was remotely interested in their conversation, so she relaxed.
By degrees, Mathilde was comforted and they abandoned the cards for the poetry book and sat side-by-side in companionable silence. Mathilde’s old nurse arrived promptly as the clock struck one and made much exclamation about Mathilde’s red-rimmed eyes and nose.
“It’s my cough, Nurse,” Mathilde explained, “Indeed my throat is rather sore too.”
“Oh dear, oh dear,” her Nurse fretted. “We must get you back to bed immediately.” She steadfastly refused to allow her charge to come by the Vawdrey rooms to collect her solstice gift. “We must get you to bed at once, my lady,” the older woman fussed. Mathilde looked regretful, but subsided under her nurse’s insistence.
“It is of no matter,” Fen assured her, though she had not seen Mathilde cough once, except the decorous small cough she had given to illustrate her point. “I can send your gift along presently with Cuthbert.”
“I had hoped to see Baby Archie one more time,” said Mathilde wistfully.
“Oh no milady,” exclaimed her Nurse in shocked tones. “Not when you’re so poorly! That wouldn’t do at all!”
Fen embraced her friend, despite Nurse’s disapproval. “Will I see you on the morrow?”
“In three days hence,” said Mathilde. “I should be recovered enough for us to start our tapestry together. Shall we meet in the usual place – the Long Gallery? At the usual time?”
“That would be lovely.”
Mathilde squeezed Fen’s hands tightly. “Don’t forget,” she said cryptically.
“Forget?”
“To think of a text about female friendship,” said Mathilde with a tight smile. But strangely, Fenella did not think that was what she had meant.
She paused, but Mathilde had already let go of her hands.
“Until Friday,” Fen called after her, as she was whisked away by her tutting nurse. Mouse looked at her over her shoulder and gave her a wobbly smile.
Fen had no idea why she felt so unsettled by the whole encounter, but there was no mistaking the fact, she was rattled. She returned to change for the dance performance and don a little jewelry as befitted a royal function. Trudy helped fasten her diamond girdle around her hips, and she changed her head veil for one of the very finest gauzy ones she owned.
“Thank you Trudy,” she said delving into a drawer to find the veil she had bought for Mathilde in the marketplace, decorated with finely-stitched red breasted robins around the edges. When she found it, she carefully folded it and tied a ribbon about it, before hurrying out to find Cuthbert. “Would you be so kind as to deliver this to Lady Martindale?” Cuthbert accepted it curiously. “It’s her Solstice gift,” she explained. “You probably won’t be admitted as she has come down with a cold, but if you could give it to her nurse, I would be very grateful. She resides in Lady Doverdale’s suite of rooms.” He nodded, and Fen noticed he did not seem half as chatty today. “Is all well with you, Cuthbert?” she asked hesitantly.
He shrugged, “Roland doesn’t want a squire,” he said moodily. “Apparently he’s never had one. He refuses to.”
“Oh that’s really too bad!” exclaimed Fen. “I wonder why not?”
“He wouldn’t let me read his palm, so I don’t know,” said Cuthbert with a scowl.
“He really ought to step up and take some responsibility at his age,” said Fen. “How about if I speak to my husband?”
“Will he make him?” asked Cuthbert, with sudden enthusiasm.
“Well, he is the head of the family,” Fen reminded him. “Though I fancy he will be more subtle in his methods. He usually gets what he wants. And if I ask him for something, he generally lets me have it.”
“But…” Cuthbert hesitated. “Aren’t you in disgrace?” he asked simply.
Fen started. “What? Oh...” she remembered being dragged from the dinner table the night before and blushed. “N-no,” she said with embarrassment. “That is all quite forgotten now!”
Cuthbert nodded sagely. “That’s what my lord Cadwallader said.”
“What’s that?” asked Fen wondering what on earth Mason could have to say about the state of her marriage.
“When we was sat round eating salted herrings this morning, your maid brought out your dress and it was all ripped,” said Cuthbert. “And my lord said ‘There’s hope for their marriage yet’.”
Fen stared at Cuthbert in mingled horror and annoyance. “Yes, well,” she said weakly, as words failed her.
“But you’ll ask Lord Vawdrey?” Cuthbert fastened his blue eyes on her hopefully.
“Yes, I will,” she assured him. “By the way Cuthbert,” she asked on impulse just before he disappeared out of the door. “In a game of Livelihoods, what trumps a cleric?”
“A priest do ye mean?” he replied scratching his head.
She nodded, guessing he must play a regional version.
“A strumpet,” he supplied promptly, and shut the door behind him.
<
br /> Ahah! She had thought as much!
**
Fen hurried down to the Yellow Chamber, and had a stroke of good luck when she saw her friend Bess making her way unhurriedly down the corridor. “Bess!” she called. “Wait for me!” She hurried up to her and they exchanged greetings. “I understand you are going to this dance performance with the Queen now?”
“Yes,” admitted Bess glumly. “Though not by choice I assure you!” She glowered. “Uncles are the very devil, don’t you know. I’ve got a new hawk to train and nigh on a dozen more useful things to do than gawk at a load of nubile females.”
“Yes, I had heard that your uncle is lately betrothed to one of the Queen’s ladies.”
“Old fool!” said Bess. “You’d think he’d have something better to do at his time of life than take a wife half his age!”
Fen blinked. “You are close to your uncle?”
“He’s my legal guardian, if that’s what you mean,” she said bitterly. “And if he marries that model of decorum Lady Constance, then I will likely be taken into their household and forced to spin and weave and do all manner of women’s occupations.” She spat the last two words as if they were obscenities.
“Oh, well perhaps this afternoon’s entertainment will take your mind off it?” Fen suggested, and earned a scathing glance in reply.
“Not bloody likely,” Bess grumbled.
The hall was rather full when they arrived, and to Fen’s surprise, both the King and Queen were seated upon the dais. She had only thought the Queen would be in attendance. Bess towed her through the crowds until they found a less populated area next to a large pillar.
“Looks like a quiet spot,” said Bess, as the two of them stood unobtrusively to one side. “Don’t want to get hemmed in so we can’t escape if it becomes too damned tedious,” she said looking about.
Fenella winced, hoping no-one could hear her outspoken friend. One look at the tall, rather fancy-looking ambassador from the Western Isles, made her worried he was smirking at them. She couldn’t quite remember his name, but she knew they had been introduced. “Do you know any other of the dancers?” asked Fen hurriedly, as the ladies filed into the room in a single line and took up their positions in a square formation. To her eye there looked to be about sixteen of them in number. Eden was stood front and center and at twenty-two was probably the oldest in the bunch.
His Forsaken Bride (Vawdrey Brothers Book 2) Page 39