There was not a single inch of me he didn’t explore with his lips or his fingers during that long hot night, from the soft pulse at the base of my neck to the secret warmth at the top of my thighs and the little gaps between my toes.
He took me hurriedly in the confines of the bed I shared with William, on the fine linen sheets given as a wedding gift from the sisters at the nearby convent, gasping in pleasure as he cried out my name. And he took me twice, lazily and deliberately on the Bisham furs in front of the dying embers of the fire, watching my face as he pleasured me. And when at last he was too tired for more, he cradled me in his arms and told me how he loved me.
He was magnificent and I worshipped him. His eyes held the colours of every day that had ever dawned and by morning I was totally and completely enmeshed in his being. I loved him. I believed I had always loved him. The memories of our last meetings were cold, as surely as last night’s ashes were cold, and once again I was his adored little Jeanette.
‘I wish I hadn’t given you to young Montagu,’ he whispered in my ear. ‘I wish I’d kept you for myself.’
‘What would you do with me?’ I murmured provocatively, kissing his bare shoulder. Shining beads of sweat clung to the skin and as I tasted them on my lips, I wondered how I dared to do this to an anointed king.
‘I’d keep you beside me always,’ he whispered. ‘I’d never let you go.’
‘Can you not do that now?’
I wanted him so much I had forgotten all the duties and the ties and the other loyalties. I’d given no thought to my family, to my husband, to my cousin’s children or his wife. In a single night my world had shrunk to the size of this little room where I lay with my cousin, the man who had been my first love.
I felt him smile in the darkness, his lips curving against my cheek. ‘How would we explain it to young William, dear heart? And what would the queen say?’
I thought of what the two knights from Juliers had said about the plump little woman, the grand lady of Hainault, who had lost her baby this last spring. Her face was freckled and lined and tired. Perhaps, despite the rumours, he still loved her but he couldn’t possibly love her the way he loved me? I was the heart of his heart, the soul of his soul, the unwavering flame in the darkness. I sweetened the arid pastures of his life and filled the rivers of his eyes with joy. I knew because he had told me so, and I believed him.
‘She is the mother of my children, sweetheart. She is my helpmeet, my friend and my advisor in all things. I couldn’t do without her. Everything I have and everything I am, I owe to her and without her I am nothing.’
‘But…’
He stopped my protests with a kiss. ‘Ah Jeanette. This is a paradise for fools and one night was what we said. Just one night.’
I must have looked desolate because he picked me up and carried me back to bed and it was a long time before he pulled himself away, groaning how the sun would soon be up and he must be on his way.
He left me at dawn, kissing my mouth, my neck, my shoulder and the swell of my breasts, telling me he didn’t want to go but duty called.
For the sake of appearances, we broke our fast together in my chamber, sitting across the table from each other eating bread and cheese and drinking small ale. He asked me to leave my hair unbound and because I knew it would please him, I wore my green silk gown with the low-cut neck.
The cheese was a fine one brought up from Essex by William last summer. My cousin watched as I placed a sliver in my mouth and licked the last morsel from my lips.
‘You have a good appetite.’ He smiled lazily and, without taking his eyes from mine, reached for his cup.
My eyes danced and I wanted to laugh. I knew that, like me, he was savouring his memories of last night.
I tore another piece of bread and was about to put it in my mouth when I heard noises on the stairs. Voices! A woman’s raised in irritation, a man’s. The steward? Footsteps. The door swung open.
‘Joan!’
It was Lady Catherine.
She looked at me, at the table, at the several platters and the man who had turned in his chair to see who it was. Her eyes widened and her mouth dropped open. For a moment there was no sound at all.
‘Your Grace.’ Her voice was strangled in her throat.
I sat frozen in my seat quite unable to move. We had been discovered and by the very worst person imaginable. My hair! My gown! I knew guilt was written right across my face. Could she tell?
My cousin rose, scattering crumbs. ‘Catherine, by all that’s wonderful.’
He went swiftly to her side and took her hand. He lifted it to his lips, gazing into her eyes the way he had gazed into mine.
‘When they said you weren’t at Bisham I thought I’d find you here. When I discovered your absence…’
He leaned forward and whispered into her ear.
She coloured like a girl.
‘My little cousin gave us lodgings for the night but it wasn’t the same. How could it be?’ He smiled at Lady Catherine as if she was the only person he had ever wanted to see. ‘Perhaps we can step outside and be alone? There seems to be a pleasant little garden where I trust we will be undisturbed.’
She looked up from under her eyelashes and placed her hand on his sleeve in a small possessive gesture which told me everything.
‘Of course, Your Grace. Whatever you wish.’
They turned and left the chamber together. I sat perfectly still, feeling jealousy creep into my very bones. I was unable to move, unable to think, listening to the sound of their footsteps on the stair while the servants stood round the edge of the room waiting for my orders as to what they should do.
Later, after my cousin had gone, Lady Catherine swept up the steps with her skirts billowing angrily about her legs. I followed dutifully in her wake. This might have been my house but Lady Catherine was my mother-in-law and could command my obedience without a word spoken.
I could see her mouth was bruised and her eyes over-bright and I knew he must have kissed her out in the garden. How could he have placed his lips on hers when they must have been full of me? How could he have gone so easily to her when I was the one who had spent the night in his arms?
In the upstairs chamber the men were clearing away the last remnants of the meal, balancing cups and folding napery as they worked, but one look at Lady Catherine’s scowl sent them scurrying on their way.
She turned on her heel. I stopped. She slapped me hard across the face.
‘You little slut!’ she hissed. ‘Who do you think you are? Behaving like a Flemish whore with your hair unpinned and exposing half your bosom to the king. Luckily, he was amused. He considers you no more than a child and thinks you don’t know what you’re doing. But I was not amused and I know exactly what you were doing. You can’t fool me. If you were not my son’s wife I’d have you whipped.’
She gave me a look of pure hatred.
‘If my son should find out about this, I pity you, but mark well, I will not lift a single finger to help you.’
For the next five months I lived in Lady Catherine’s shadow with disapproving eyes following my every step. I was never out of her sight. I slept in her bed and spent every waking hour at her side. She treated me as one of the lowliest members of her chamber fit only for the meanest of tasks. When we sat at our embroidery I was given the dullest bits to sew: the endless blue of the sky or the tedious swirling scrolls which stretched from one end of the cloth to the other. I was quite surprised she didn’t have me stitching hems with William’s little sisters since I was considered so unworthy.
To the others I was an object of fascination. The older women whispered behind their hands and wondered what I could possibly have done to deserve such treatment. I must have sinned, but how and in what manner? The younger girls, who had very little sense and far too much imaginat
ion, merely giggled. They speculated wildly but didn’t dare ask me to my face.
Letters arrived from my husband and were promptly deemed the property of my mother-in-law. They were read aloud to the household and in case I should complain to William, my replies were dictated by Lady Catherine to her clerk. I may have looked like a grand lady in my brocades and velvets and fur-trimmed gowns but in truth I was no better than a well-dressed prisoner.
Lady Catherine kept her eyes on my person but she couldn’t pry into my thoughts. At night I dreamed of my cousin, wonderful sensuous dreams where he kissed my lips and held me in his arms and whispered how much he loved me. In the morning, when the noise of the other women stirring, forced me awake, I lay, imagining him in his bed somewhere across the Narrow Sea and wondered if he was thinking of me.
Our parting had been brief: a curtsey, a nod, a kiss on the hand and a meeting of eyes, so swift it might not even have happened. His men were in the courtyard so obviously he couldn’t acknowledge our closeness or his disinclination to leave but even so I was disappointed. I had hoped for more.
Lady Catherine had received a tender farewell: regret, a rueful smile, quiet words and a whispered promise, but he couldn’t possibly have meant any of it. He couldn’t have left my bed and gone straight to her, not with my scent lingering in the pores of his skin and the memory of our passion filling his eyes. I was certain he no longer cared for her. It was all a ruse. He only cared for me.
At Christmas we received a letter from my father-in-law detailing his progress. He told us how an early assault by the lord of Artois to recapture the town of Vannes had failed and the king and his Breton allies were now settled down outside the walls. I had no idea where Vannes was and Lady Catherine didn’t enlighten me as I was still in disgrace and didn’t deserve to know anything.
Other letters followed and in February we learned that my cousin had made an honourable truce, one which was all to our advantage. We would keep most of the towns and castles in Brittany and there would be no more fighting in Gascony or in Scotland or elsewhere.
When Lady Catherine told us the king would bring the duchess and her children with him when he sailed for England and they would be lodged in comfort in the Tower, I realised the duchess must be uncommonly pretty, possibly even prettier than me. Why else would my cousin bring her home to England? Nothing was said about the duchess’s husband and when he would be released or where he would be lodged and this confirmed my worst fears. My cousin didn’t want me any more; he had found someone else.
When William returned at the end of a week of storms and tempests, I was unsure how to greet him as my mind and my heart were full of my cousin. Should I be meek and docile or should I smile and be merry? Would William expect me to throw my arms around his neck or would he want me to stand three paces behind his mother and sink low in a dutiful curtsey?
I needn’t have worried for as soon as he arrived, William slid from the saddle and knelt at his mother’s feet.
‘Lady mother.’
‘My dearest son. God’s greetings and welcome home.’
Lady Catherine, with tears of happiness filling her eyes, raised my husband up, kissed him on his mouth and bore him away to her chamber leaving the rest of us behind in the courtyard. She barely gave me time to make a wife’s formal greeting so anxious was she to have William to herself.
It was the season of denial but even so we held a feast for William’s return. Every fish pond in the locality was emptied and our men were sent to the market at Great Marlow and the wharf at Maidenhythe to see what extra forbidden luxuries could be purchased for the Montagu household. We wore our best gowns and there was a feeling of wickedness about feasting when we should have been fasting.
William sat in the place of honour where his father usually sat. I knew if she could, Lady Catherine would have banished me to the lower benches at the far end of the hall where the grooms and the maids were sitting, but that would have been unthinkable. Instead she monopolised William’s attention asking him penetrating questions about the campaign and the doings of his noble companions.
Listening to her I realised how ignorant I was. I had never thought to question my cousin’s decision to take his armies to Brittany. I had assumed he was trying to rescue a beautiful damsel in distress and right a terrible wrong. It was nothing like that. He wanted Brittany for himself and he wanted it for the same reason he had wanted the treaty with the Flemings: it would give him a stepping stone, a landing place for his armies and a gateway into France to launch an attack on the Valois king. And of equal importance, it would give protection to our ships sailing to Gascony. If my cousin controlled Brittany, he could stop the constant attacks on our fleets. He had cannily brought down two birds with one stone and I was full of admiration for his cleverness.
Eventually William remembered to turn his attention to me.
‘I missed you, Joan.’
‘I missed you too, William,’ I lied smoothly, wondering if he could tell.
‘My mother says His Grace paid you a visit while I was away.’
‘Yes,’ I said feeling myself blush and trying not to think of what had happened between my cousin and me. ‘He was sorry to have missed you.’
‘I trust you gave him hospitality?’
‘Naturally. I did everything as you would have wanted, William. I remembered how your mother welcomed honoured guests and tried to do what she did.’
But I had done more, so very much more and he would never know. I would never tell him of the pleasure and satisfaction I had given our guest and how much he had enjoyed his visit.
‘He was concerned about our lack of fortifications,’ I said, speaking too fast and tripping over the words.
‘What’s wrong with our fortifications? They’re perfectly adequate. It’s not as if we’re near the coast.’ William was not pleased for his house to be criticised.
‘Oh, I don’t think His Grace believed there was anything wrong, simply that things could be better.’
Holy Mother of God. I hoped I could remember what my cousin had said. Something about the outer walls and the weakness of the gatehouse. I should have had the clerk write it down at the time. Now I had forgotten everything except for the delicious hours I had spent behind that locked door neglecting all my duties except for my duty to my king.
‘Tell me about your campaign,’ I said hoping to divert him from my cousin’s visit.
He smiled. I had asked the right question.
‘Do you remember when we sat in my mother’s garden last summer and I told you how easy it was to kill a man,’ said William, slipping his hand over mine. ‘In Brittany, when I killed the first one, it was like plunging a knife into a sack of corn, there was barely any resistance. I remembered how you looked that day, the little smile on your face and the sun catching your hair, making it shine like a crown of light.’
He was staring at me with a hungry look in his eyes.
‘Did you kill many men?’ I asked politely.
‘Not as many as I’d have liked. The villagers were poor sport. They mostly ran away. The townspeople were better. One or two of the younger men armed themselves with staves and put up a good fight.’ He smiled happily at the memory. ‘The first one was in the garden of a house on the outskirts of Dinan. He leapt out and tried to knock me off my horse. I ran him through with my sword and the thrill of seeing the blood and his body falling gave me an appetite for more. That was when I knew my uncle was right; there is no finer sport than killing a man.’
If we had not been at dinner and if he had been anyone other than William; if he had been Thomas or my cousin or one of the two knights from Juliers, I might have raised my eyebrows suggestively and murmured that I could think of something which gave even greater pleasure. But I didn’t dare say such a thing in Lady Catherine’s presence and I certainly didn’t want William thinking I
was trying to seduce him.
That evening we sat on fur rugs warming ourselves by the fire in our chamber. I glanced sideways at the stranger sitting beside me. William was considerably taller and stronger than he had been six months ago and I realised that somewhere in Brittany, the boy he had once been had vanished. This young man whose face was familiar, was very different to the one who had ridden away from me six months earlier. The eyes were the same, pale grey with light flecks, but the skin was browner, rougher, the hair darker, and he treated me with an interest he hadn’t shown before.
‘Joan,’ he said in a low voice. ‘You’re much prettier than the girls in Brittany, you know. Much prettier. They kept throwing flowers in front of our horses’ hooves and wanting to kiss our feet, and they were very willing but I didn’t much care for their smell and none of them had hair like yours.’
I was panic-stricken when he placed his mouth on mine. I thought he would taste my cousin’s lips, but he paid no attention to my reluctance. He was firm and determined to press home his advantage. I noticed at once the difference in his kisses. He no longer attacked my mouth as if trying to devour me and as I relaxed in the circle of his arms I almost began to enjoy what he was doing.
In between his explorations of my body, he recounted more stories of the men he had killed and how much enjoyment it had given him.
‘If only you could have seen them, Joan. Crawling under carts and into ditches vainly calling on God and their mothers to save them. It was a waste of breath. We slaughtered them like rats. I cornered one man before a church door and hacked off his arms. He screamed like a stuck pig before he died and the alleyway was running red with his blood. It was wonderful.’
He pulled down my stockings and with his right hand traced the lines of his father’s marches on the bare skin of my thighs until he could no longer contain his excitement and ordered me to bed.
Three days later, while we still lingered at Bisham, my father-in-law returned with news. After Easter the king was to invest his eldest son as Prince of Wales. The earl had been summoned to attend the parliament at Westminster and to participate in the great feast of celebration afterwards. All the earls and the barons and the knights of the shires would be there and it was to be a splendid event. But William received no such invitation.
The Fair Maid of Kent Page 16